J is for Jet Set, part 4
by Pam Jernigan
Table of Contents from the end of part 3:
"Okay, okay, so I'm a little nervous. Which is ridiculous, I know, when you think about all the shady characters I run into on a daily basis. I can deal with them, no problem. It's just..."
"That my parents *aren't* shady characters?" Clark suggested, amused at the thought.
After a startled second, she nodded. "Yes, that's exactly it. They're *nice*! I mean, I haven't met them but if they raised you they have to be nice, and, well... I don't... have much practice at that. At being nice, I mean."
Clark hugged her closer. "You do just fine, Lois. Really." And even if she did get somewhat abrasive, Clark was sure his parents would understand. He didn't think it would be helpful to say so, though, and the remainder of the trip was fairly quiet.
and now part 4:
By the time Clark set her down in front of a big farmhouse, Lois was a nervous wreck. She took a few deep breaths, staring up at the house. There was a brief blast of wind, and she instinctively turned to Clark for reassurance -- and found that he'd changed into jeans and a denim shirt. She blinked.
He smiled at her, reaching out to hold her hand. "You'll be fine, Lois, really." He pulled her up to the door and knocked loudly before pulling the door open. He stuck his head inside. "Mom, Dad? Anybody home?"
Lois felt her stomach clench even tighter as the silence stretched out.
Clark looked at her. "Um... they're not home."
Lois stared at him in confused disbelief.
"I looked everywhere," he said, pointing towards his glasses-free face, "and I don't hear them, either. I guess they're... out. Somewhere."
The embarrassed look on his face, coupled with the sudden release of tension, was too much for her. She laughed. "You mean you brought me to an abandoned building? Perry's warned me against guys who do that." She leaned against Clark, briefly, taking the moment of reassurance to calm herself down. "Well, that's what you get for not calling ahead, I guess."
Clark looked around, and Lois followed his gaze. There was a house, a barn, and a free-standing garage which held a tractor and an empty space. Was that where the Kents parked?
"Looks like they took the truck," Clark murmured, confirming her guess. "And I don't see a lot of damage to worry about, either." He sounded chagrined, and wouldn't quite meet her gaze.
"So... now what do we do?" She glanced into the dim interior of the house. She thought she could see a sofa. And Clark probably had his very own bedroom... "Well, we *are* here...." No, that was just too dangerous. "It's a beautiful day. Want to show me around?"
Clark nodded slowly. "Yeah... or maybe we could take a walk." His voice gained enthusiasm as he spoke. "We could talk about some of that stuff we keep saying we're going to talk about."
A twinge of Lois's earlier nervousness returned, but she ignored it. "Good idea, Clark. There are lots of things I've been curious about."
"Okay, then." Clark smiled at her, setting her duffel bag down on the porch beside the door.
Holding hands, they began a slow walk across the lawn. A slow *quiet* walk; now that Lois had the freedom to ask any question she wanted to, she couldn't decide which one she wanted to have answered first. "Why did you sleep with me?" The question surprised her as much as it did Clark.
He was looking sidelong at her, carefully weighing his response. "I really don't know," he finally said. "I was ready to kick myself once I realized what I'd done. I mean, I was in- interested in a relationship, but I knew you weren't. And I've never... well, jumped into bed on a first date. And it wasn't even a date!"
Lois nodded, mulling over this new information. "It did feel like one, though," she admitted. "And I was pretty sure that wasn't your usual pattern. Once I calmed down, I mean." She was quiet for a moment, then realized he deserved some answers from her, as well. "I'm not sure why I did it, either. I knew you were... attracted to me. And..." This was getting harder to say out loud.
Clark squeezed her fingers in gentle reassurance.
"Well, I guess I needed that. It'd been such a long time since someone really looked at me like he cared. Lex was charming and all, but I had no idea how he saw me, really. And Superman..." She glanced upwards at him and caught him in an embarrassed grimace. "Well, I was drawn to him, but there didn't seem to be much hope there, at least that's how I felt at the time. But I was drawn to you, too, you know... and you were there." She winced at that bald statement, and rushed into speech again. "I know that makes me sound like such a slut. Like I was settling for you since I couldn't have my first two choices, and I don't know, maybe that was true -- but even then, Clark, there was this... *thing* between us. You know?"
She held her breath, waiting to see if this confession would disgust or anger him.
"A *thing,*" he repeated thoughtfully. "Yeah, I felt it, too. Up until that night I hadn't had much trouble containing myself, but I'd been attracted to you from the beginning."
"And I'd been ignoring it, as you could tell. But that night... and after that kiss on the plane..." She paused, searching for an explanation. "It was just like I didn't have any defenses anymore. That scared me."
"Scared you?" Clark sounded confused and faintly hurt. "Why?"
"Oh, Clark, it's not you personally, just... me, actually. I've had some bad experiences -- I told you about Claude, and he's not the only one, worse luck -- and I'd decided that, well, I wasn't going to make the same mistake again... and then you showed up." She looked up at him, frustrated at her inability to explain.
He glanced down at her, smiling faintly. He untangled his fingers from hers, and she had a moment of panic, thinking he didn't want her anymore. Then he put his arm around her shoulders, drawing her into a hug. She closed her eyes and breathed a sigh of relief.
"Mr. Wells said we share some kind of... bond, I guess," he spoke into her hair. "I thought he was nuts at the time, of course, but it might explain a few things."
Lois frowned. "He *was* nuts, Clark. Forget about him. Although..." She paused as a strange new thought popped up. "Maybe we do owe him something. If he hadn't shown up to distract us from that fight..."
"Things could have gotten ugly. We might not have talked to each other again for months, if ever."
She looked up at him in alarm. "Not talked for months? That would have been awful," she said without thinking, then flushed. "But it didn't happen that way, so I guess we don't need to worry."
"You like talking to me?" Clark asked in gentle teasing. He drew back from the hug and retook her hand, gently pulling her along as he resumed walking.
"Yep," she agreed in a breezy tone. "And flying with you is pretty cool, too. I always wanted to join the jet set."
Clark laughed. "Just stick with me, baby. I'll show you the world."
****
"--so then you said I should bring a change of clothes to work, which got me thinking. I told Mom I needed an outfit of some kind, and, well... you saw the result." Clark shrugged.
Lois blinked. "Your mother made that suit for you? Well, I guess you couldn't have gone to a tailor or anything. She's a pretty good seamstress."
"Yeah, although she doesn't sew much anymore. Now she's being an 'artiste,' as my Dad says. Last I heard, she was welding metal sculpture, but she might have moved on by now."
There was a pause, then Lois asked, "Um... welding?"
"Yeah, Mom likes to try new things. She takes all these adult education classes." Clark tried to gauge Lois's reaction, but her face was hard to read. "It's pretty cool, really."
She pondered that for a few more seconds, then said, "You know what? I think I'm really going to like your mom."
Clark wasn't quite sure how Lois had come to that conclusion, but he didn't want to discourage it. "She's really gonna like you, too."
They walked up a grassy hill and paused at the top to gaze around. From this modest elevation they could see a fair distance. "Okay," Clark said, "Over there is the field where my space ship landed."
"Wow. Can we go see it?"
He shrugged. "There's really nothing to see, anymore. Dad took the ship and buried it while I was still a baby. Mom had wanted him to burn it, but he just couldn't do it -- plus, you know, a ship that came all that way through space and then landed intact would *not* be easy to destroy."
"Hmm, good point."
Some motion in the distance over Lois's shoulder caught his eye. He reached to pull down his glasses, then remembered he wasn't wearing them. "Hey, I think I found my parents."
Lois turned in his arms, squinting. "Over by that big building?"
"Yep." He pointed. "That's Mr. Irig's house. The truck's there, anyway... yeah, there they are. Come on." He led her down the other side of the hill.
As he took in more details of the scene, he chuckled. "Remember how I wanted to come here to help my dad clear out storm damage?"
"Yeah..."
"Looks like he had the same idea; Mr. Irig lives alone and my folks keep an eye out for him. My dad's in the side yard helping him cut up a fallen branch."
As they passed a stand of young trees and scrub, they were able to see more of the farm yard. "Wow," Lois said. "That's one big tree." An entire oak tree had toppled sideways, its root system now upended and extending several feet in the air, leaving a corresponding bare patch where it had been ripped out of the ground.
Clark winced. "Yeah, he's lucky it didn't hit the house. See, now that's the kind of stuff I came to help out with." They changed course slightly to get a closer look at how the tree had fallen. "And look -- it's taken out part of a fence. I hope none of his animals have gotten out yet."
Lois tilted her head. "I think all the branches and leaves are covering the gap pretty well. I guess it would depend on how badly his animals wanted to escape." She turned away to study the farm house. "Is your mom in there?"
"Yeah, it looks like she's doing something in the kitchen." He took an experimental sniff of the air. "And something smells good. Maybe she's making a pie," he suggested hopefully.
Lois laughed. "Well, we should go investigate that, then. Since that's what we do for a living, and all." She paused, then added morosely, "Not that you'd know it, where you're concerned."
"Hey, don't beat yourself up over that, Lois." He squeezed her hand gently. "You're the one who figured me out on very little evidence."
"Well... that's true." She brightened. "Actually, I think I didn't figure you out earlier because I was trying to ignore you, not analyze you. Especially after we slept together."
"Hmm, I'll have to keep that technique in mind, next time I'm worried about a reporter figuring me out."
She bumped him with her hip. "Don't even think about it."
Clark laughed. "No, ma'am."
Lois rolled her eyes, and they walked a few more steps in silence. "So, tell me -- did your dad ever dig up your space ship?" she inquired. "Have you ever seen it?"
"Yes and no." He glanced at her, wondering how she'd take this. "Well, we tried to dig it up back when Trask was snooping around. But it wasn't there -- and then I found it in that warehouse Bureau 39 had on Bessolo, when we were snooping around."
Her head came around sharply. "What? You never said anything. Well, of course you couldn't say anything," she answered her own question with barely a pause for breath. "You were there as Clark, not Superman, and you would *not* have wanted me to make that connection then. And then we were thrown out of a plane..." Her lips quirked up. "At least now I know how Superman happened to be close enough to catch me."
"Yeah. They must have thought I was nuts -- I jumped out of that plane after you."
Lois turned her body towards him, moving slightly closer. She reached up and gave him a short kiss. "Thanks, Clark."
Clark shifted uncomfortably. "It was just part of the job, Lois. Although I've gotta admit, I didn't mind having an excuse to hold you close again."
She grinned. "Yeah, me neither -- at least once I saw that I wasn't going to die."
He returned the smile, pulling her in for a swift hug. "Not while I'm around, you won't."
As they approached the tree, it seemed a thick cloud had blotted out the sun; the world went gray and blurry. A step later, Clark noticed that the enticing scent of apple pie had disappeared. On the next step, sudden intense pain swept over every joint and muscle. "Lois..." he managed to say, grabbing at her arm before falling to his knees. He heard her asking him what was wrong, but the words were thin and far away. He continued falling, and was barely able to turn so that he landed on his side rather than his face. Pain seemed to center in his gut. He instinctively curled up, but the pain wasn't mollified. The ground itself seemed to hurt, against his cheek. He felt a wave of cramps, aware of nothing more than pain. Then even that faded away.
****
"Clark!" Lois stared at his fallen form for one panicked moment, then knelt beside him, checking for a pulse with trembling hands. She found one, but it was thready, and his skin had a sickening greenish tinge. "Oh, my god, wake up, Clark!" She looked over towards the farmhouse and called for help, but there wasn't any movement. They were probably too far away.
She smoothed his hair back from his face, hoping his eyes would flutter open on their own. They stayed stubbornly closed. And was that sweat on his forehead...? "Okay, I've gotta do something. Think, Lois, think."
Her head came up, looking around, searching for the cause of this sudden collapse. He hadn't seemed sick earlier -- in fact, he'd been fine coming down the hill. It wasn't until the last one or two steps... could he have reacted to something in the area? She couldn't see how, but it didn't seem any weirder than anything else, and it gave her something to do. "Okay Clark, I'm going to move you away."
She moved to his back, and began trying to drag him by his armpits. "Or at least I'm going to try!" He was utterly limp, and too heavy for her to get an arm under him for a firm grip. And she was at a bad angle, anyway. She rolled him onto his back and grabbed his hands. He moaned, very faintly, and she grimaced. "I'm sorry, Clark. I'm trying -- umph -- to help." She stood up, drew his arms up, and began dragging him backwards, angling towards the farmhouse and help.
He didn't wake up, or show any improvement, and she feared she was doing him more harm than good. But she had to do something. She dragged him at least a foot, maybe more, before needing to stop to rest and check him again. "Please, please, please..." Was it her imagination, or was his color starting to come back? Heartened, she pulled him another foot. He groaned, and twitched, which in the circumstances seemed very reassuring. "Come on, Clark, wake up. I need some help here."
She turned around, trying to locate the people Clark had said were here. "Hello -- help!" Her voice didn't carry as much as she'd wanted it to. She glanced back and forth between Clark and the farmhouse. She didn't think she'd be able to drag him all that way, but she hated to leave him.
She tugged again, pulling Clark a little further. Her arms felt as if they were going to come out of their sockets, and she was breathing heavily. Clark, however, was beginning to breathe easier. He moaned, feebly pulling his arms back towards his body. Lois folded his arms back over his chest and knelt next to him again. "Wake up, wake up..."
His eyelids fluttered, and then opened partway before closing again, followed by a moan that could have been an attempt to say her name.
"Okay, that's a little better." She rose to her feet, looking toward the farmhouse again. "There's no way I can drag you that far, Clark. Stay here," she told him, not even caring how stupid that sounded, and swiped a hand over her face. She was either sweating or crying or both, she hardly knew. "I'll be right back."
With one last worried look, she turned and sprinted for the farmhouse. She stumbled up the stairs to the porch, and began banging on the door. "Hello? Help, I need help. Please, someone be there..."
The door was yanked open from the inside, and a woman peered out, looking concerned. "Oh my goodness! What happened? Come in, come in!"
"No." Lois shook her head, trying not to gasp between every word. "It's Clark... out there."
The woman's eyes widened, then narrowed in alarm. She was out the door and down the stairs before Lois could explain further. She halted there for a moment, then yelled, "Jonathan! Clark needs help!" She covered the remaining distance to Clark's side in a remarkably short time.
Belatedly, it occurred to Lois that the woman had to be Mrs. Kent. Two men came around the corner of the house, meeting Lois as she came back down the stairs. "Clark needs help?" asked one man, sounding confused. Lois didn't know which one was Jonathan and didn't much care.
"This way," she said, stumbling back towards Clark.
Mrs. Kent was already kneeling next to Clark, with his head cradled in her lap. Lois arrived in time to hear the rounder of the two men say, "I'll go back the truck up closer," before heading off to the right of the house.
"It hasn't got a back seat!" Martha objected, looking worried.
"You could borrow my sedan," the other man offered. "Oh, no, wait -- I was in town for supplies this morning, and the back's pretty full, still."
"Well, if we have to, we have to," Martha muttered to herself, then looked up at the man who must be Wayne Irig. "Could you go fetch us some blankets and pillows, Wayne?"
"Of course, Martha. I know just where to get 'em." Puzzled but cooperative, he headed off toward the back door.
Lois was puzzled, too, until a look at the slowly-approaching truck cleared it up. "You're going to put him in the bed of the pick-up."
Martha nodded. "I don't like it, but there's no other way. The bedding will help."
"I can ride in the back to keep him from sliding," Lois added.
The truck seemed to be moving with agonizing slowness, then suddenly it was there, only a few feet away. The engine was abruptly silenced, and then Jonathan was out of the cab, hurrying past the truck to check on them. "How is he?"
"No worse," Martha replied. "But I can't figure out how..." She looked up at Lois. "What happened?"
"I don't know! We were walking, and then all of a sudden he fell over. We'd just come down the hill, over that way, near the tree. Then whatever it was hit him. All I could think of was to get him away, over toward the house. I think it helped..."
"Oh, there's Wayne," Martha pointed out.
He had his arms full, almost to the point where he couldn't see. He was probably going as fast as he could, but it still seemed way too slow to Lois. She contained herself until he dropped a pillow. "Oh, for Pete's sake," she muttered, and sprinted over to help him. She picked up the pillow he'd dropped and helped herself to the top few items from his stack and took off. By the time he reached the truck, she'd already laid down a blanket and a line of pillows. Martha arrived at about the same time, helping her distribute the rest of the bedding.
When they were done, Lois and Martha turned to check on Clark -- and saw that Wayne had already joined Jonathan. The two of them began to carry Clark's body toward the truck.
"Time to get ourselves in," Martha said, turning and grabbing the side of the truck. Lois grabbed her other hand to steady her as she climbed in and over the make-shift bed, then followed the same path, herself.
Wayne and Jonathan had almost reached the truck, and it was only a few more moments until they lifted Clark up and into the truck. Clark moaned faintly at the jolt. Lois found herself sitting next to Clark's legs. Now that she was in the truck, she realized that she didn't have any clear idea of what she could do, but she knew she couldn't leave Clark. She glanced at Martha, who was carefully cradling Clark's head.
Martha glanced over at her. "I'm Martha Kent," she said. "Thank you."
Jonathan motioned for them to slide Clark further into the bed of the truck. "Hold him," he said curtly, then flipped the tailgate closed.
"Hi," Lois said briefly. "Lois Lane, Daily Planet." The familiar terse introduction slipped out without conscious thought. To soften it, she added, "I work with Clark."
Martha looked at her sharply for a second, but then Clark stirred, riveting both their attentions. Martha was closer to his head, and she touched him lightly on the face. Lois, further away, contented herself with holding one of Clark's hands and squeezing gently. He remained stubbornly unconscious.
****
tbc
