And the Truth Will Set You…
Chapter 12
At 5:00 a.m. Lois finally decided that it was close enough to morning to get out of bed. It had been a very long night. The previous nights had already taught her that sleeping with her arm still hurting was challenging. Tonight there was an extra surprise. Sympathy pains.
At least that is what she figured they must be. After talking to Martha, she went straight home to bed. She was nervous, and no matter how hard she tried, she couldn’t get her mind off Clark. Part of her kept hoping for a call from the hospital telling her that Clark was awake and that he was asking for her. That call never came.
Instead, she used some meditation techniques she’d learned long ago to force herself to relax. Once she’d finally drifted off, it didn’t seem like she’d been asleep more than a few minutes when she woke up with sharp, localized pain. There were three spots. Her left hand, left shoulder and her ribs.
The first time she woke up, the pain was so intense that she was sure that she’d been stabbed. It was only after she came fully awake that she realized that she was feeling the pains in the same locations that Clark was hurt. Just to make sure that something odd hadn’t happened, Lois went to the bathroom and turned on the light so she could look at herself in the mirror. Sure enough, she was unharmed.
Lois woke up twice more that night with similar pains, the last one being just before 5:00 a.m. Each time the pain seemed the same, but at least it wasn’t so scary. She just wished she knew why this was happening. It seemed that becoming involved with Clark carried its own set of special surprises.
After the 5:00 a.m. incident, Lois got out of bed and started her day. She had wanted to get an early start but even for Lois, 5:00 a.m. was an early start for a Saturday.
After breakfast, she headed straight to the hospital. Given the nature of her evening, she wanted to check on Clark. This morning she wasn’t worried as much as she was curious. She kept telling herself that sharing Clark’s pain had been an indication that he was getting better. This morning, Lois found that she was no longer worried about whether or not Clark was going to get better. Now her concern was how long it would take.
She arrived at the hospital too early for regular visiting hours, but this time she was happy to play on her status as next of kin to gain admittance to his room.
As she sat and watched him, she couldn’t help but think he felt different somehow. When she’d been with him yesterday morning, the experience had left her afraid. He’d been dying.
Today was completely different. He was still weak – incredibly weak – she could sense that. But he was holding his own. That awful poison was out of his system now, and he would get better. It might take a long time, but he would recover.
Lois was startled by the sound of someone clearing his throat behind her. She looked over to see a balding, middle-aged man standing in the doorway. As soon as she made eye contact, he stepped in. “Hi,” he said, while reaching out to shake her hand. “I’m Doctor Bernard Klein. I work out of Star Labs. Are you Lois Lane?”
“Yes,” she answered. “Star Labs… Are you the person that designed the Kryptonite detector?”
At the mention of his invention, Dr. Klein’s smile grew larger. “Yes. Although all I did was modify a high-sensitivity Geiger counter that I was working on for another project. That green crystal is slightly radioactive and shows up on regular high-end radiation detection equipment. It would have been very unlikely that anyone would be able to develop a completely new type of detector so quickly.”
Lois decided she liked this Dr. Klein. He seemed nice and, more importantly, he’d helped Clark. “Whatever you might think of your efforts, Dr. Anderson told me that your detector made the surgery go much better, so I want to thank you.”
Dr. Klein blushed at this. “I’m happy to help Superman any way I can.” Then he looked at a chart he’d had in his hand when he arrived. After studying it for a moment, he looked up at Lois. “I understand that you are acting as Superman’s next of kin.”
“Yes,” Lois answered cautiously.
“The surgery seems to have improved his situation,” Dr. Klein offered. “Before Dr. Anderson removed the… Kryptonite, his vitals were trending steadily downward. That seems to have stopped but he hasn’t started to show any improvement yet either.”
But Lois knew he was getting better. She just didn’t know how she knew. “I’m sure he’s getting better,” she offered.
Dr. Klein looked at the chart again. “I wish the chart showed it. Ms. Lane, one of the reasons I was called in, is that I’ve been leading the Superman research at Star Labs.”
Lois wasn’t sure she liked the sound of that. “Superman research?” she asked.
Klein held his hand up defensively. “Nothing bad, I assure you. Star Labs set up my group shortly after Superman first appeared. Most of his abilities seem to defy the laws of science as we know them. We try to understand how he does the things he does. Anyway, one of the questions we’ve looked at is where he gets the energy necessary to be… well, super.”
“Dr. Klein, please, are you going somewhere with this?”
“Yes, sorry. Several of us think he gets his energy from the sun. I’m sure you remember similar speculation during that heat wave incident. If that’s true, we may be able to speed his recovery by exposing him to sunlight. I believe that if his system was provided with an appropriate energy source, he should heal more quickly.”
“That sounds fine,” Lois said. “But did you notice that it’s raining outside? From what I saw of the forecast it will continue all day.”
Dr. Klein was nodding quickly. “I know. Unfortunately, the weather isn’t cooperating. But I have something that should work just as well. I’d like your permission to bring in a special exact-spectrum sun lamp. We have a device that duplicates the spectrum of the sun perfectly. It’s similar to a full-spectrum lamp but much more advanced. This lamp is very bright and reproduces the specific absorption bands of the sun. If Superman does get his power from the sun, this is the closest we can get on a rainy day. I’d like to try it and see if it seems to make any difference in his recovery.”
“Would there be any risk to Superman?”
“Not unless there’s some reason to believe that sunlight will hurt him. Besides, if we decide to try this device, we’ll monitor him even more carefully than we are doing now.”
“Well, then, it’s fine with me.” Anything to help Clark get better.
“Great. Could you come with me to see Doctor Anderson? I’d like him to know that you agreed to this procedure. We were already leaning towards trying this treatment, but he’ll be glad to know we have your support.”
~~~***~~~
Stepping off the elevator at the Star was almost beginning to feel normal. Lois’s time here had seemed a roller coaster ride but now things were settling down. Despite the obvious differences between this place and the Planet, she was starting to have a similar feeling of “coming home” that she had felt when she entered the Planet bullpen. That was a feeling that two weeks ago she’d feared she would never know again.
As she headed for her desk, she saw Jimmy leaning over the Emily’s small desk. He was pointing out something to the young woman. That was part of the change. Emily was a joy to work with. Now with Jimmy here too, this had the real feel of home.
Lois reached her desk to find several notes all saying the same thing. Lex had called. Based on the notes, even though it was only just 10:00 a.m., he’d already called twice. There wasn’t anything to talk to Lex about, so she pushed the notes aside.
Lex probably wanted to talk some more about the rebirth of the Planet. Lois didn’t know if she was up to another day of feigned interest in the project. The possible reopening of the Planet had crept into her thoughts during the sleepless hours last night. In many ways, the idea of the Planet reborn under Lex’s control was worse than simply letting the grand lady die. If Lex took this project forward, there would be a newspaper in Metropolis that carried the name and the face of the Planet, but wouldn’t have the old girl’s soul. Lois knew it would break her heart every time she saw that paper. Just thinking about it made her heart ache. That kind of pain that could drive her from Metropolis. With Clark, of course.
The challenge for today was not to let herself get distracted. She had an investigation to run. Lois was about to head to Emily’s desk to talk with her associates when she spotted them heading her way. When they arrived, she greeted them with a cheery, “Good morning.”
Emily replied first. “Good morning Ms. Lane.”
Before Jimmy could say anything Lois realized that if she was going to make this her home, she needed to start getting more comfortable. “Emily, and this goes for you too Jimmy, please call me Lois. Having both of you call me, Ms. Lane all the time makes me feel like I’m old enough to be your mother. So, Lois?”
Emily was blushing just a tiny bit. “Okay,” she answered. Jimmy just nodded.
“All right,” Lois said. “So what do you have for me?”
They pulled nearby chairs up to Lois’s desk and sat down. After looking at each other for a second, Emily said, “You go first,” to Jimmy.
“Last night I started seeing what I could find out Officer Smith. You know, the policeman that shot you.” He paused but Lois motioned him to continue. “I was able to… um, get access… to his financial records. They tell quite a story. It’s amazing what you find in loan application documents. Especially when someone is applying for loans with multiple banks. I spent the entire evening putting all the pieces together.”
Jimmy paused for a second but Lois made a motion for him to continue. “It all starts when he got married early last year. He and his wife bought a house in a nice neighborhood that was barely within what they could afford with both their incomes. Then, within a month of moving into the house, his wife lost her job and discovered that she was pregnant. Now the joker, about a month later they discovered a major water leak under the slab of their house that wasn’t covered by their insurance. It cost thousands of dollars to fix that they didn’t have. They were about to lose everything when he suddenly came up with enough money to pay off all his debts.”
“I agree, that could be suspicious,” Lois said. “Were you able to get any information on where the money came from?”
“There were several deposits over a period of a few weeks.” Jimmy replied immediately. “The two largest were checks from what looked like a grandmother in Texas. I’m working on getting into her records now, but as far as I can tell, the grandmother’s bank isn’t tied into any computer network. Sorry.”
“No, don’t’ be sorry. That’s a great start for a half-day’s work. Stay with it for at least another day. Do you have anything else?”
“Not from my side of the investigation,” Jimmy answered.
Lois turned to Emily. “Emily?”
“One of my classmates from Met U has been at LNN for about six months. Do you remember Sandy Jenkins from when you were at LNN?”
Lois thought for a moment. “No, sorry. I never got settled in there.”
“That’s not surprising. She said that she saw you around the office but never spoke to you. She’s really jealous that I’m working with you. Anyway, I called her yesterday and she was able to walk me around LNN this morning.”
Lois was suddenly worried that her young friend might have given too much away. “What reason did you give her for wanting to see LNN?”
“I told her that I’d heard you talking about LNN and it made me curious to see how the other half lived. And there is some truth in that claim. Did I do anything wrong?” she asked defensively.
“No.” Lois replied quickly. “This whole situation has me jumpy. Please continue.”
“I met her at the apartment and we went into LNN together. She starts at 5:30 a.m. and I shadowed her for about two hours. I’d asked her not to mention where I worked, so she introduced me as a friend from school. No one looked at me twice.”
“I don’t believe that,” Jimmy interjected.
Emily blushed at the complement and turned to Jimmy. “Well, some of the guys were a little flirty. But I made sure to play the part of Sandy’s school friend and nothing more.” Then she turned back to Lois. “I was able to work their recent Superman policy into conversations twice. Sandy didn’t know anything except that the decision to attack Superman came from high up. But there was this one guy, Jerry, who claimed to have overheard a meeting of the senior staff where they were talking about the Superman policy. He insisted that the senior managers seemed angry and a little scared. He told me that from what he heard, none of them wanted to attack Superman like this. They were told to do so or get out. There are rumblings all over the station that Zimmerman almost quit over the whole mess.”
“Zimmerman?” Jimmy asked.
“The senior editor at LNN,” Lois answered before Emily could reply. Then Lois continued. “If Zimmerman was against it, then the policy came from the board of directors… or someone at that level. When I was there, Zimmerman had the final say on all policies. If he got something shoved down his throat, he can’t be happy.”
“I can’t really say,” Emily said. “Based on your warnings I was making sure to keep as low a profile as I could. I was careful about pressing questions and, of course, I never saw Mr. Zimmerman.”
“That’s okay,” Lois said. “This is as much as I could have expected to get out of LNN. If this thing breaks open, then Zimmerman might be willing to speak up later. I bet he knows exactly where that directive came from.” Lois paused for a minute to assess their situation. “Emily, unless you have an especially promising lead, I’d like you to back off the LNN angle.”
“Sure Ms… Lois. I was going to ask you about just that. I wasn’t sure where to go short of some of the more aggressive techniques that you’re famous for.”
“No. We don’t want to risk that,” Lois answered quickly. “So, if we set LNN aside, that leaves Donaldson and Smith. I have an angle that I want to work myself for Donaldson. Would you be okay working with Jimmy on Smith? While he’s working the computer side of the money trail, why don’t you see what you can find out through other means? From what Jimmy has learned, his problems seem to have started with some everyday bad luck. Given that he’s known to have shot a Star employee, it shouldn’t raise any eyebrows to have a Star reporter asking questions about his background.”
“Do you think they’ll talk to me?”
“Maybe not, but there’s no harm in asking.” Lois thought for a minute. “Why don’t you approach this as if you were doing a human interest background piece? Explain that you are new at the Star and you don’t get to do real work. That way when you start asking about his family, the questions shouldn’t raise any undue suspicions.”
Lois could see the wheels turning in Emily’s head. “I see it. You’re right, that should work. Even if I don’t learn anything, it shouldn’t make anyone overly nervous.”
“If either of you find anything that needs my immediate attention, let me know. Otherwise we’ll meet again tomorrow morning.”
As her two assistants went to tackle their respective assignments, Lois turned to hers. She doubted that Donaldson had just arrived in Metropolis the day he started shooting. Bill had told her that when the police examined the body, there was no evidence on him at all. Nothing in his pockets. Nothing at all on his person. If he’d been staying in a regular hotel, the police should have found his room already. Lois was hoping that one of her contacts might be able to turn up a lead.
Unfortunately, she’d learned a week ago that almost none of her contacts would talk to her. Today her list had exactly two names. Bobby Bigmouth and Sammy the Mouse. She hadn’t been able to reach Bobby last week so Lois didn’t know if he was going to be willing to help her. Sammy had already proven that he’d support her.
~~~***~~~
A very tired Lois Lane entered Memorial Hospital at 7:00 p.m. that evening. Some parts of her afternoon had been very successful. She’d reached Bobby and he’d agreed to see what he could find out. It made her feel good that both of her two most reliable snitches hadn’t abandoned her.
Bobby had been out of town last week visiting his sister. Lois felt obligated to warn him of the injunction that no one was supposed to talk to her. She liked Bobby and didn’t want him inadvertently walking into trouble. He’d been offended that she’d thought he wouldn’t already know about something like that. Bobby had pointed out that the warning was not to get caught helping Lois Lane. He didn’t plan to get caught. Just the same, he didn’t have anything… yet.
For Sammy, Lois had left a message. The young man could rarely be reached by phone. Lois had dropped copies of a note in a few locations around the city. It was nothing more than a scrap of paper with a rough drawing of a mouse on one side and a stylized ‘L’ on the other. In the past when she’d used this method to request a meeting, Sammy had always contacted her within 24 hours. She would have to wait for him to respond so she could explain what she needed.
When Lois reached the ICU she was surprised to find Clark’s room empty. There was a nurse she didn’t recognize walking by, and Lois took advantage of the opportunity. “Excuse me?”
“Can I help you with something?” the nurse asked.
“Superman,” Lois said, pointing at the empty room. “Where is he?”
The nurse looked her over again. “Oh, you’re Lois Lane. I’m sorry, but I didn’t recognize you. After all, you were only with us for two nights.”
“That’s okay,” Lois said hurriedly. She wanted to know what happened to Clark. “Can you tell me where Superman is?”
“Sure. They transferred him to the fourth floor this afternoon. It was before I came on shift so I don’t have any of the details. If you head up there, you can probably see him.”
When Lois reached the fourth floor, she had to show her driver’s license before the head nurse would tell her where Clark’s room was located. As she approached the room, she saw a policeman standing outside the door. As the officer watched her approach, his expression never changed. Lois had a fleeting thought that MPD must be hiring from the Buckingham Palace guards.
“Good evening, officer,” Lois said when she reached him. “I’m Lois Lane. I believe you will find me on your admittance sheet. I’d like to see Superman.”
“I’m sorry, ma’am. You can’t go in.” His tone was professional.
She almost got angry but knew that it wouldn’t help the situation. “I believe if you check your list, you’ll find I’m on it,” she said with exaggerated patience. “Here’s my ID,” as she offered him her driver’s license.
“I know who you are, Ms. Lane. It’s not a question of security. I can’t let anyone in his room unless it’s either an emergency or with the clearance of the head nurse.”
Lois glared at him for what must have been a full 30 seconds. He just looked calmly back. Definitely Buckingham Palace. “Fine!” she said curtly, and headed back to the nursing station.
For each of the 54 steps that it took to reach the station, Lois was fuming. The nurse could have told her that the guard wouldn’t let her in. Instead, she’d decided to play a joke. Fine! Lois would share some of her amusement and see if you really could peel paint off the walls by yelling. A tiny voice was trying to tell her that was not acceptable behavior for a hospital, but the other, very angry voice in her head completely drowned it out.
As the reached the station and was about to let go with volley number one, another voice changed the entire picture. “Ms. Lane. Nurse Martin called me and told me you were here.” It was Dr. Klein.
Well… that was better, but she still wasn’t in Clark’s room. Since Klein was here, he was a viable target. “Why can’t I see Superman?” she barked.
The scientist was clearly unprepared for Mad Dog Lane. He took a step back defensively before answering. “You can,” he replied quickly. “We just need to turn off the lights before you go in.”
“Lights? What lights?” Lois asked, still angry.
“Remember, we talked about them this morning. We’ve been using a solar lamp treatment. There are monitors on Superman. To make sure we track his progress properly, we have to be sure to log each time anyone enters the room and we turn out the lights.”
“I just wanted to see him for a minute. Why couldn’t I just duck in quickly?”
“Because we have to turn out the lights, and that affects his recovery,” Dr. Klein answered. He nodded at the head nurse, picked up a clipboard and motioned towards Clark’s room. “Ms. Lane, I’ll be happy to let you in. Please follow me.” And he started down the hall.
Lois was right behind him. “Why did you move him? Is he doing better?”
“He’s doing much better,” Klein replied. “He still hasn’t regained consciousness yet but his vital signs turned up as soon as the light hit him. That’s why we moved him. You’ll remember that in the ICU room, the wall that faced the nursing station was glass. That didn’t work so well when we started the light treatment. The lights are very bright.” They had reached the door and now the guard simply stepped aside. Dr. Klein turned back to her and said, “You might want to shield your eyes.”
The scientist checked his watch, jotted a note on the clipboard, and opened the door just a crack. The brightness inside the room was overwhelming. Dr. Klein reached in and the light disappeared. Then he opened the door the rest of the way and stepped in.
Lois followed him in, and there was Clark. He was lying on top of the sheets wearing only what looked like a Speedo bathing suit, some kind of protective goggles for his eyes, and his bandages. Lois couldn’t help but think that even injured he was magnificent. After a few seconds, Lois snapped herself out of simply admiring Clark and looked at his injuries. The bandages hid the extent of his injuries but he didn’t look to be in that bad a shape.
She turned to Klein. “Has he been awake at all yet?”
“No. We were surprised at first but I think it’s part of how he heals. Since we started the light therapy…” He pointed at the three lamp fixtures surrounding the bed. “…his vital signs have been climbing steadily. About two hours ago, his tissues started regenerating at a highly accelerated rate.”
“When do you think he’ll wake up?” Lois asked.
Dr. Klein paused only a moment before answering. “It’s just a guess, but my theory is that once his body is healed and recharged he’ll wake up. Based on his progress today, that should be by morning.”
TBC
Bob
