Lois & Clark Forums Forums Fan Fiction Lois & Clark Fanfic Lethal Qualities 4/15

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Chapter 4: Dread
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A hard ball of dread sat low in Clark's stomach. His destination was less than half a block away, visible to him even without employing his powers. He could have been there in the fraction of a second as Superman; as Clark, he could reach it in a minute.

Yet he couldn't bring himself to take one more step nearer it.

Nervously, he fiddled with his tie. It would have been easier to come as Superman, he knew, but he hadn't yet managed to convince himself to change into the superhero. The feel of hands pulling on his cape, the sound of shouts aimed his way, the look of fear and hatred--they were all too fresh, too raw, a wound that hadn't yet scabbed over. Superman was hated now, hated and feared; Clark wasn't. And so he was Clark.

But Clark couldn't meet with Orville Dorian.

Truthfully, though, Clark wasn't sure *Superman* was up to it either.

Throughout his three and a half years as Superman, he had accidentally hurt a few people while apprehending them. He had even, much to his horror, been responsible for a few deaths that still haunted him during dark nights when their accusing eyes would send him crashing back down to the bed. As many times as his parents and Lois had told him it wasn't his fault, Clark could still vividly remember the image of Lucy kneeling beside Johnny Corbin's body, the sound of Spenser Spenser and his cohorts shattering into a million pieces, the feel of Tez's body beneath him turning limp and cold as his eyes burned into oblivion, the smell of Patrick Sullivan's body smoldering into ashes, and the terrible feelings of helplessness as Jaxon Xavier had slipped away and Annette Westman had shrank to nothing.

As much as he dreaded remembering these things in his dreams, how much worse would it be to look into the real eyes of a man who had been harmed by his desperate need to deny his weakness? How much worse would it be to face the accusation while he was awake?

It had been easier lifting the Messenger shuttle, but Clark finally managed to take another step toward the station, and another, and another, until finally he found himself just across from it. And now it was time to change into Superman and take responsibility for his actions.

*I'm used to saving people, not getting them injured,* he had once told Lois.

Clark double-checked several times that he was alone in the alley before spinning into the Suit. Now more than ever he could not afford his secret identity being discovered. He needed the haven of Clark Kent, a refuge to which he could flee when being Superman hurt too much. So, carefully, Clark modeled the stance that had become iconic. He spread his legs to keep from running, straightened so that he seemed taller than he really was, folded his arms across his chest to hide everything he was really feeling, and firmed his jaw to appear sterner and more invulnerable. It was a pose he had never consciously adopted, each facet built by circumstance and public perception--a pose he was now depending on to remind him that he was a superhero, not a man.

Not daring to lose the pose lest he not be able to find it again, he floated straight up into the air and then landed almost immediately on the precinct's top step. Taking a deep breath, he strode inside the building, swallowing his dread and exuding a false layer of confidence.

"Superman," Henderson greeted him openly. "How are you doing?"

His arms briefly loosened as Clark almost lost hold of the entire façade, its solidity crumbling beneath the unexpected weight of the inspector's concern. "I'm fine," he replied stiffly. "Though I assume you want my statement concerning--"

"Nah. I got plenty of eye-witness accounts, as well as a clear set of laws that prohibit any charges being pressed against someone only trying to help. I've already informed Dorian of that, but he got himself a lawyer, so be careful. I'd hate to see you facing another lawsuit."

"Thanks," Clark managed, astonished by the torrent of words from the taciturn officer. "I just want to apologize and let him know that I never meant to harm him."

"I sincerely doubt that you did," Henderson stated decisively. "I talked to Dr. Klein. He said that if you had really swiped Dorian at superspeed like he claims, he'd have been torn in half. Obviously, his story is bogus."

"And the gashes on his arms?" Clark asked.

It was hard to tell due to the tinted lenses Henderson preferred, but Clark thought he saw compassion in the officer's eyes. "Definitely caused by shattered glass."

Clark closed his eyes but couldn't escape the knowledge. "Then I did hurt him. I need to apologize, try to make amends."

Henderson studied him for a long moment, so long that Clark almost lost his composure. Finally, he shook his head and let out a long sigh. "I suppose you do at that. Come on. He's in my office."

Consciously burying himself under the Superman persona, Clark stiffened his spine and followed Henderson into his small office. Upon his arrival, the two men already present stood from their seats. The one holding a briefcase and sporting an indifferent expression was obviously the lawyer; Superman recognized him from past run-ins. The other man was short, overweight, and trying to hide nervousness behind belligerence.

Henderson waved a hand as he made the perfunctory introductions. "Superman--Orville Dorian--Wesley Lenke."

"Mr. Dorian." Superman inclined his head graciously and held out a hand. "As much as I regret the situation, I am pleased to meet you."

Dorian didn't take the offered hand. "Of course you regret the situation," he snapped, his tenor voice harsh and grating. "You can't stand that your unimpeachable image should be tarnished, can you?"

"Mr. Dorian, I'm here to apologize for any of my actions that put you in dang--"

"Well, I've got news for you, *Superman*!" Dorian's mouth twisted with distaste, and Clark fought the urge to step back before his contempt. "Simply existing with the destructive powers you hold at your beck and call puts people in danger! I've been saying it from the beginning, and now I have absolute proof of it!"

"I never meant to hurt you, and I assure you that I usually have complete control of my--"

"You are a menace, Superman, one that shouldn't be allowed in the city!"

Clark flinched back from the accusing finger Dorian poked at him, the movement causing his gaze to fall on the bandages adorning the man's arms. Superman, he reminded himself desperately; he was Superman, an invulnerable superhero.

He wished he was as strong as people thought he was, but if he were, why did the simple sight of bandages cause him to feel sick?

"Mr. Dorian," he tried again through the disconcerting sensation of falling--not a feeling he was accustomed to.

"No! If you think a simple apology is going to make me fall for the charms with which you've seduced and deceived the rest of the world, you're very much mistaken!" Dorian turned to his lawyer. "You were right, Mr. Lenke--this was a waste of time. Be warned, Superman, I plan to take this to whatever court I have to in order to make people realize that you are a danger. Metropolis has been your playground too long--I plan to change that. And thanks to your recklessness, I have the means to do exactly that."

"Please, I'm sorry that I hurt you! Wait!" Superman stepped forward to follow the men exiting the room, but Henderson's hand on his arm stopped him.

"Don't, Superman." The inspector shook his head. "It's no use. He won't listen."

The last façade of the untouchable hero fell away, leaving Clark defenseless and alone, staring after a man he had harmed. "I never meant to hurt anyone," he whispered. "The last thing I want is for people to be afraid of me."

"Trust me, they're not." Henderson sighed and slumped back into his chair. "Come on, K--uh, Superman. If people were afraid of you, they wouldn't accuse you to your face or pull on your cape or antagonize you. They'd be falling all over themselves trying to assure you that they were on your side. You'd be surrounded by flatterers and sycophants, not rude, paranoid creeps like the one who just left this office."

Clark shook his head, wishing he could go numb to stop the devastating pain and yet cherishing that pain because it meant he still cared about whether he hurt people or not. "All my life, I've worked so hard to keep people from hating me. I've been so careful. And now...I should have never--"

"What?" Henderson demanded. "Answered a cry for help? Responded to an alarm? That's what you do, Superman!"

"Not if it hurts people," Clark stated definitively. "I realized even before I went to stop that robbery that my powers were too strong for me to safely control, yet I went anyway. That's unacceptable."

The inspector shook his head. "Look, I know you feel responsible, and really, maybe that's a good thing--it proves that you don't take things lightly. All right, I accept that. I understand that. But the red Kryptonite is safely stowed away, and you're back to normal. You've got to move on. If you let this fester in your mind, you'll never be effective again. Trust me. I've seen it happen to good police officers."

For a long moment, Clark stared at Henderson, not sure what to say. Only belatedly did he realize that he had forgotten to be Superman. Without that mask to cover him, he couldn't figure out how to handle the situation.

Suddenly, his head snapped around as he heard a cry for help and an alarm sound simultaneously, both originating from the same place. "There's a robbery," he hastily told Henderson at the inspector's interested look. "Fiftieth and Bessolo, a convenience store."

"Go!" Henderson snapped. "We'll follow."

That unreasoning, unshakable fear filled Clark, the same that had caused him to hesitate such a long moment that morning. The fear he had managed to shake off only because Lois was looking at him so trustingly and commanding him to go. How could he trust himself to handle this safely if he didn't have her there to reassure him?

"Go, Superman!"

Clark jerked and met Henderson's eyes--Henderson's trusting eyes. The officer trusted him, just as Lois did. With a sharp nod, Clark disappeared, replaced by Superman, who blurred into the distance. Police sirens chased him to the scene of the crime, falling further behind as he streaked across blocks in an instant.

In an odd way, Clark felt as if he were watching himself make the rescue. He had done the same thing hundreds of times before, so many that it had become little more than routine to round up the robbers, see that they were safely bound, ensure no one was hurt, and deliver the criminals to the arriving police. Yet never before had he been so aware of his least movement.

Superspeed had been his largest bane while under the influence of the red Kryptonite, so Clark was careful to modulate his speed as he sped through the doors of the small store. His strength had caused the most damage by leaving fingerprints on Lois's arm, so he kept himself under rigid control as he bound two of the robbers before they even knew he had arrived. His heat-vision had terrified him the most when he hadn't been able to shut it off while Lois was in the room with him, so he refrained from using it at all.

But there was one more robber, standing behind the counter near the terrified cashier.

"Don't come any closer, Supes!" the thug yelled menacingly, brandishing a knife and yanking the hostage closer.

Clark froze.

This situation had played itself out a hundred--a thousand--times before. Every time, if he didn't use his heat-vision to make the criminal drop their weapon, he would use super-breath to toss the criminal away from the innocent victim.

And yet...he hadn't used his super-breath since before the red Kryptonite. The one time he had been tempted to, the image of Lois's still, pale body lying like a corpse in front of Mazik and Nigel had stopped him. He hadn't dared risk using the deadly power, not when he hadn't been certain he could control it, not after seeing the power of his simple exhalation in S.T.A.R. Labs.

Now...now he wasn't sure he would be able to keep the cold air at a safe level. And he couldn't--could *not*--bear to hurt someone else.

"That's it," the robber directed. He brought the knife closer to the hostage, causing the cashier to whimper with fear.

The sound was Clark's undoing. As much as he couldn't bear to hurt anyone, he also couldn't stand seeing anyone in pain or in danger.

Ignoring the tightening nervousness in his stomach and the fear increasing his heart-rate, Clark breathed in and blew gently at the robber. Seeing Superman's intake of breath and knowing what would come next, the criminal tried to duck behind the hostage. Clark's super-breath hit him, and the man scrabbled for purchase.

The knife drew a gash down the hostage's arm.

The criminal crashed into the shelves behind the register and slumped to the ground, too disoriented by the chill peppering frost in his hair and the force of his fall to rise. The knife had clattered to the ground before being blown safely beneath some shelves.

Clark stared at the blood on the cashier's arm.

He couldn't move. Couldn't breathe. Couldn't think past the sight of that blood.

"Oh, thank God you were here, Superman! I don't know what I would have done if you hadn't showed up. Oh, there's the police. They'll be glad to see you dealt with them already, won't they?"

It took a long moment for the cashier's individual words to register in Clark's mind, longer for him to realize that they weren't a denunciation of him at all. In fact, the man hardly seemed to notice the blood staining his forearm and dribbling down to his wrist.

"Your arm," he said aloud, his voice as desolate as a desert. "You need a doctor."

The man glanced down at the wound and shrugged. "It's hardly a scratch at all, Superman. I'd be much worse off if you hadn't arrived when you did."

Clark shook his head, his eyes locked on the gash. How could the man not see that it was serious? That it was bleeding?

That it was his fault.

"I'll fly you to the hospital," he offered.

"You don't have to do that," the man insisted. He rounded the counter and moved to open the door for the police. "I don't want to handle the bills just for a scratch like this. I'll just put some antibiotic on it and bandage it."

"But..." Clark cut himself off. He couldn't *force* the man to go to the hospital. "Are you *sure* you're all right?"

"Yeah, fine. Thanks again, Superman. Here, officers, there's one more behind the counter."

Clark was grateful the cashier seemed to know what to do since he was almost utterly incapable of thinking past his inaction.

*I'm like a loaded gun!* he had told Lois, despair in his voice, and then he had stared down at the ruins of their doorknob. It had seemed enormous to him then, the fact that he had ruined something of theirs. He hadn't realized that the next day would see him totally demolishing their living room and entryway.

People had ended up hurt because he hadn't been able to control his powers. Now, they were ending up hurt because he didn't trust himself with his powers. Everything he did was wrong. He didn't dare go into a rescue without second-guessing his abilities, yet by second-guessing himself, he had made what could have been a fatal hesitation. Humans were so vulnerable...and he wasn't helping them any.

He wasn't sure how he made it to the Daily Planet building. He certainly didn't remember changing back into Clark clothes. And yet he found himself stepping out of the elevator and into the newsroom, his gaze instantly fixing on Lois.

As if she had developed a sixth sense concerning him--and after what they had seen of Kryptonian telepathy, perhaps she had--she looked up from her coffee and unerringly met his eyes. Her instantaneous smile faded almost before it began, and Clark wondered what exactly his expression conveyed.

"Clark?" she whispered, already rising from her chair and weaving her way through all the obstacles to meet him at the top of the ramp. "Clark, what is it? What's wrong?"

He was shaking, he realized as he reached out to tug at her sleeve and guide her into the empty stairwell. The dim lighting only made Lois seem to shine brighter, everything that was good and right about his world. It was infinitely selfish to put his own needs above her, yet he couldn't remember ever needing her more than at this moment. Unfortunately, he couldn't make any words emerge past the terror, guilt, and dread choking him. And he couldn't seem to stop trembling. Some Superman he was.

"Clark! What's wrong?" Lois ran her hands up his chest as if searching for a wound, but her large eyes never left his, seeing in him everything he couldn't voice. "Oh, Clark," she murmured, and she stepped close, slid her arms around his neck, and hugged him.

Though his arms hung limply at his sides, Clark drank in every nuance of the embrace. He opened every pore of his body and allowed her love to bathe him with as much goodness and health as the sun. Briefly, his trembling grew worse.

"Clark?" Lois drew back just enough to look into his eyes. "Please, talk to me. Tell me what's wrong! Didn't you meet with Dorian?"

"I-I hurt someone," he stammered, the three words he had dreaded his entire life and worked so hard to avoid.

"No," Lois instantly denied, conviction in every line of her body. "He's lying, Clark. There is no way he survived hitting you head-on. It's impossible. He's only try--"

"Not him." Clark lowered his forehead against Lois's, needing that extra strength in order to continue. "I apologized to him, but he wouldn't listen." His words came out disjointed and chaotic, none of the statements able to erase the mental images of blood and bruises. "He was so angry, Lois, and he thought I...he thought I...I don't know what he thought."

Lois tilted his face so she could meet his eyes, the sensation of her fingers on his chin burning through him like vital warmth. "He thought *wrong*, Clark."

"But I hurt someone." Vaguely, he was aware that he was repeating himself, but how could he move past this awful confession? Why didn't anyone besides him realize that this fact destroyed him?

"Who?" she demanded, her hands tightening on his shoulders. "If it wasn't Dorian, who was it?"

"There was a cry for help," he admitted, though he would have done anything for this story to take a different turn.

"And you answered it," she prompted.

"You're so much more certain than I was."

"I know you a lot better than you think," she teased with an impish grin. The lump in his throat grew marginally smaller, allowing his breaths to come a bit easier. "So then what happened?"

"Then...I froze. I *froze*, Lois" He gently tugged free of her embrace so he could pace in an effort to safely expend some of his excess energy. "The robber was near his victim, and I knew I should do like I always do and blow him a safe distance away, but...I couldn't. I couldn't risk turning him into a block of ice!"

"And then?" Her voice was soft as a breath, gentle as a raindrop, reassuring as only she could be.

"And then the criminal tugged the hostage closer, cut up his arm, and almost killed him before I did what I should have done to begin with and blew him clear." Clark scrubbed a hand through his hair. "It wasn't lack of control that handicapped me--it was my *fear* of its absence. I can't do this, Lois! I can't be Superman!"

"What?" He had clearly shocked her.

"Superman has to be able to make decisions and then act on them immediately. To be Superman, I have to stop being afraid. I have to convince myself that I have my powers under control."

"All right." She stepped up to him to take his hand, so brave and enthusiastic and willing that Clark remembered all the reasons he loved her more than life itself. "How do you do that?"

"I have to relearn all my powers." The plan, forming as he fled the scene of the crime and the man he hadn't helped nearly as much as he should have, crystallized in his mind. "The first time I learned them, Dad took me to an isolated field and helped me practice until I knew I could control them. So...I think I should go back to Smallville and convince myself that the effects of the red Kryptonite are completely gone."

"Okay." Lois swallowed and stepped back, releasing his hand. Clark had to bite back his protest. "You do what you have to do," she told him, just as she always gave him permission to leave her when he heard a cry for help. Only this time, the cry for help was his own.

Clark hesitated. "I...I need you with me, Lois."

He was rewarded with the beautiful smile he would do almost anything to provoke. "Okay," she agreed happily.

"It's just..." He paused, not sure how to explain his reason for bringing her into possible danger. "When I practiced by myself, it never seemed to work as well as when Dad was there. With him standing by me, I *had* to safely manage the powers. I had to make sure I didn't hurt him. I think I need that focus point, that clear reason for keeping everything in control."

"Okay," she said again, beaming at him. "I'm not afraid of you, Clark. I'd love to go with you."

"We'll have to fly there," he said uncertainly, not yet sure he should be picking her up.

"I know." Lois's smile turned mischievous as she ran a hand up his chest. "That is part of the allure of going places with you."

Despite the situation, a chuckle escaped Clark. It felt good to be reminded that his powers weren't necessarily bad. How did she always know what he needed? he wondered as he slowly spun into the Suit.

Clark couldn't remember a time when he had felt so awkward getting ready to scoop Lois up. He knew he had done it many times before, but as he looked at her, he couldn't remember how he usually did it. Did he bend down? Where exactly did he put his hands? What if he accidentally bumped into her bruise?

Her eyes softening, Lois slipped her arms around his neck. "You said it wasn't your lack of control that stopped you--it was your fear. You're *not* going to hurt me, Clark, so just fly." She kissed him lightly on the lips.

And as simply as that, it was easy to pick her up, to cradle her close to his heart, and to fly into the sapphire skies toward home. So easy he couldn't imagine life any other way.