Clark and Lois - Hope Realized - Matchmaker Chronicle Volume 5 04/25
By Ken Janney
Rating PG-13
Disclaimers: The characters in this story are property of DC, December 3rd productions and Warner Bros. No Copyright infringement is intended. I have just borrowed the characters for a short time.
* * denotes emphasis
< > denotes thoughts
(#) footnotes
/ denotes telepathic communication/
[ playback of a recording or TV Commentary]For reference purposes the following will hold true throughout.
Universal Locator Designation
Alpha 023 x Gamma 004 x Tau -120 - Canon Lois and Clark universe also called – Prime
Alpha 023 x Gamma 025 x Tau 036 – Canon Alt Clark universe also called – Alt 1
Alpha -120 x Gamma 255 x Tau -190 New universe called Alt 2
As always comments are welcome. (ken.janney@kjanney.com)
Clark and Lois – Hope Realized - The Matchmaker Chronicles Volume 5
Before we continue the story:
A short history for:
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Universal Locator Designation
Alpha -120 x Gamma 255 x Tau -190
Common name –Alt2
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The Clark Kent of this universe had determined early on that we would use his powers for the benefit of others. As soon as he had started flying he had gone to his Mom and Dad and asked them how he could help and yet have a private life. They came up with the idea for the costume.
His debut occurred only a couple of weeks after the Suit had been created. A twister had threatened Smallville. He had been at Smallville Lake when the news reports had gone out over the radio and they heard the twister warning sirens go off.
He had managed to separate himself from Rachel Harris, the girl he was dating and had gone to the lake with while everyone scrambled for shelter.
He had headed for the woods and changed into the Suit. He had been able to deflect the twister away from the Kent and Irig farms. At this point he made an error in judgment. He stopped to check on his parents. Unfortunately the Wilson farm was now in the direct path and the twister took out the outbuildings and damaged the house. Fortunately the family had made it into the storm shelter and all were safe. The twister cut a half mile wide swath of destruction through the Wilson farm and the fields of a couple of adjacent farms before he caught up with it and started flying around it in a counter direction eventually neutralizing it.
Several people had seen him in action; some had even taken pictures and notified the papers. In order to keep from being identified with Smallville he started doing patrols and helping with natural disasters and interrupting criminal activity all over the US. He would take a city or region a week and move around.
He kept this up even when he started college in 1984. On days when he had no classes he would travel and patrol.
The ruse worked. No one associated him with Smallville and his secret identity was preserved.
Instead of touring the world, in 1988 when he graduated with honors from the Journalism program at Midwest U. he moved to Metropolis and started at the Planet.
He worked his way up through the ranks, ‘paying his dues’ as first gofer, then research assistant, then cub reporter and finally, Perry White seeing the promise in his style, moving him to reporter status.
Shortly after he moved to reporter, Lois Lane was hired and she followed the same progression as anyone else.
The day that Lois came in for her interview Clark had burst in to ask Perry something about a story he had been assigned. It was the story about the destruction of an old opera house. That was when he first set eyes on Lois Lane and it was love at first sight.
During the time that Lois was the gofer he went out of his way to be nice to her and she appreciated it and the advice he gave her.
When she moved to research, he requested her help on a number of stories. Working with him on these stories was a very pleasant chore and as soon as she was moved to cub reporter status Clark asked to have her as his partner. Perry obliged him the request.
The first story they worked on as partners was a case where a criminal gang had appropriated a number of invisibility suits. It had gone in a fashion similar to “I’m Looking Through You.” This had been the first time that Lois had interacted with Superman. She had been working with Clark for a while now and showed somewhat less interest in him than canon Lois because she was happy being with Clark.
Shortly after that they had to deal with some very smart children, A-LA “Smart Kids.” This particular case had been somewhat different in that the kids did not know the source of their increased brain power. They were manipulated into doing some things that Lois and Clark were able to convince them were wrong and when the remorse set in the emotional release counteracted the effects of the drugs and the children were able to return home, to their parents.
About this time Lois and Clark had begun dating.
One of their snitches had given them a lead on an illegal arms deal and they had gone undercover as newlyweds in the honeymoon suite of the Lexor to perform surveillance on the office. It was during this assignment that in an attempt to conceal just what they were doing, Clark had thrown Lois on the bed and initiated a kiss. That kiss was such as left Lois breathless. It had been a kiss such as she had never experienced before. It was a kiss she would never forget.
Shortly after that the Planet was invaded by Bureau 39 in their attempt to lure Superman out into the open. They had eventually grabbed Lois and Clark because of their perceived association with the superhero.
When the rocket attack on the hero failed Bureau 39 went underground.
A short time later Clark had a call from his parents that the EPA was there digging up the Irig farm claiming that they were investigating the use of hazardous materials. In actuality it was Bureau 39 looking for Kryptonite.
Clark and Lois went on assignment to Smallville and had their second encounter with Bureau 39.
While there Rachel Harris, who was now sheriff tried her best to get Clark back into a dating relationship. Lois saw what was happening and took steps to counter Rachel’s moves. Lois won out to Rachel’s disappointment.
Trask was killed while attempting to shoot Clark and after the Bureau 39 personnel had all been rounded up they returned to Metropolis. Lois had a call from an old friend who dropped a dime about what was happening in the local boxing scene. Superman got involved and tangled with the cyborg fighters after finding out that Lois’ father was involved.
Her father hinted to Lois that the money behind the replacement limbs, the smart kids and the illegal arms was a single source. He wasn’t sure just who it was but he warned her to stay away because her life could be in jeopardy if she investigated. Of course this was like waving a red cloth in front of a bull.
Before they had gotten too far into this investigation the Earth was threatened with destruction by collision with an asteroid. Lois had been at the Eprad briefing when Superman was going to be flying up in an attempt to deflect it. Before he was able to take off, impetuously, Lois crossed the barrier and wishing him luck threw her arms around his neck and kissed him. As she did, she suddenly realized that she had kissed him before. She remembered the kiss in the honeymoon suite of the Lexor and knew that he was Clark. She was stunned and stepping back put her fingers to her lips and said, softly, so that no one else could hear, “Good luck. Come back to me.”
Clark was mystified by her statement but the immediacy of the mission demanded that he concentrate of the business at hand.
When he returned he crashed to earth after being only partially successful. Lois had reported Clark missing and Henderson had helped to find him. When he was located he immediately notified Lois and she took custody of him and called his parents.
When his parents arrived she explained first that she had figured out his secret, second that she was in love with him and third that he had amnesia. Together they worked to restore his memory. After he recovered he took off to finish the job he had started on the asteroid.
After a number of other adventures they started seeing that more and more criminal enterprises were pointing to a single source of control but they weren’t able to identify the ‘Boss’ as yet.
This was when they confessed their love for each other. Lois still had not revealed her knowledge, but she helped cover for him.
There was then the incident with the Messenger capsule and Toni Banes attempt to kill them. Shortly after that they prevented the tragedy with the Prometheus transport.
This was shortly before the White Orchid Ball.
Previously:
In a basement workshop the Newtrich sisters were working on a project. Actually, to be more correct Nell was working on a project. Nell was the technical brain of the operation and Lucille was the operational brain. They had both been laid off from their respective positions, Nell as a technician in the Enhanced Optical Weapons Systems Division of LexLabs and Lucille from her position as a reporter for LNN, another subsidiary of LuthorCorp. Neither had been able in the last six months to find alternate employment and their funds were starting to be depleted. They had been contacted a couple of months ago with an offer of employment, however it was something that neither of them would consider. They had an outstanding loan on their car and had been told that they had better maintain the payments or else. After being informed of this they had been contacted by a woman named Constance with an offer of employment. When it was explained that they would be hired as ‘Hostesses’ they had both flatly refused. They knew the source of the offer and were very angry. They had developed a determination to take out their frustrations on and have revenge against Lex Luthor as the head of LuthorCorp and the author of their difficulties. In order to do that they needed money. They had a plan to rob a delivery truck that would be carrying old money from ATM machines. In order to do this they needed to dispense with Superman, at least temporarily.
Nell had been working on a Laser which was housed in the case of a video cam, very effectively disguising it. Power would be provided by a belt battery pack just like that used by TV crews. The only problem had been the crystal, but, that was solved by their brother. Their brother, who was in prison, had told them about a chunk of red crystal that had seemed to cause Superman to become apathetic, though he had no idea as to exactly what it was. All he knew was that should affect Superman. He had told them where to find it, but when they went to get it, it wasn’t red it was red and green unlike a ruby which was all red but should focus the beam the way she wanted.
She wasn’t sure exactly how well it would work though. It seemed like in the dark it emitted a muddy brown glow of its own, obviously a mix of the red and green colors, and she didn’t know if that might not interfere with the laser beam as it was emitted. They would just have to try.
Lucille walked in while Nell was working. She was very obviously impatient with her sister. “That truck is on a schedule. If we’re going to make this score we have to have that ready by the day after tomorrow.
“I know, I know. I’m working on it. I just need a little more time. Polishing the ends of this crystal took longer than I had imagined that it would. The ends had to be perfectly parallel in order to prevent scatter or attenuation due to deflection.” She fumbled and dropped the crystal as she was trying to get it placed in its holder within the laser. Fortunately it only fell to the desktop. If it had fallen to the floor it might have shattered. Nell quickly grabbed for it but it skittered out of reach. Lucille reached out calmly and corralled the wayward crystal. Nell was somewhat appalled when she did this because she was not wearing gloves and was getting her fingerprints and body oils all over the crystal as a result. She then handed it to Nell who opened both gloved hands to receive it.
“Nell, be careful! Don’t break that, you know we can’t afford a replacement. I thought you said I could count on you.”
“You can! It just slipped, that’s all.” She continued, muttering to herself, “Now I’ve got to clean it again.”
“Nell, things are always slipping with you. You are the most *clumsy*, butterfingered person I know. That’s one of the things that got you fired from LexLabs. You dropped that weapon you were working on. What was it called the Quinton debilitator or some such idiotic name?”
As Nell was busy re-cleaning the crystal she was shocked at the name her sister had given the weapon she had been working on. She replied with some exasperation, “It was called a Quantum Disruptor!”
“Whatever! When you dropped it, it fried the scientist that invented it before he had a chance to complete the drawings just before destroying itself!. Now it’s an incomplete project. They don’t even have the prototype to look at!”
“But it wasn’t my fault! There was a grease spot on the floor and I slipped on it! It was an accident.”
“Nell, you’re an accident just looking for a place to happen. Now tell me about this laser again. How is it going to work?”
“Well, this is my own design. I needed to take some shortcuts because we didn’t have the money to buy what I really wanted. I was able to scavenge some of the parts from old TV sets. I built the circuit board from scratch. Here, you see these? These are the capacitors. The power comes from the battery pack and passes through this inverter which changes the current from DC to AC and then this module steps up the voltage and feeds it to this bank of capacitors. They store the energy and supply it in a burst to the exciter which initiates the source … “
“Whoa, you lost me back at AC and DC. Can’t you put all of that into simple terms?”
Nell, with an exasperated look at her sister pointed at the power leads and said, “The power comes in on this wire.” Pointing at the inverter “It goes through here and gets changed from one type of energy to another.” Pointing at the capacitors she said, “The energy gets stored here until the trigger is pushed. Then it lights the lamp and this directs the beam to the crystal.” She pointed at the red crystal. “and then it comes out here.” She pointed at the lens.
“That’s more like it. Don’t most lasers use a ruby?”
Nell, starting to lose patience with her sister and her complete ignorance of technical matters almost shouted, “Do you really think we could afford a ruby? Where was I supposed to get the money for that?”
”Okay, okay, no ruby. So we’re using this red and green crystal from the stash.”
“Yes, but I don’t know how well it will work. The thing that concerns me is the fact that it glows in the dark. I don’t know if that will interfere with the beam or not. That’s one of the things that I need to test.”
“There we go back to tests again. When are you going to start testing this thing?”
Nell, her frustration becoming even more evident raised her voice even higher “I’d be able to test it sooner if you didn’t ask me so many questions!”
“Shouldn’t you be working on putting it together so that you can start the tests?”
Nell said “I know!” as she picked up the crystal and finally succeeded in placing it in the clips, pinching her finger in the process. She let out an “Ouch” and yanking off her glove stuck the injured finger in her mouth to suck on it.
“How much more needs to be done on this? It looks like you’re finished. It’s not like this has to burn anything. We just need to expose Superman to the radiation to make it so that he doesn’t care about what we are doing.”
With her head close to the mechanism Nell answered in a somewhat distracted manner as she had her hands working inside the mechanism. “No, it’s not finished. I have to check and then confirm the alignment then I have to check the exciter and the power supply. Then I need to check the collimator. Then I have to recheck the alignment and then we have to run a low power test … “
“Just tell me that this is going to work!”
“It’s going to work!”
“Tell me why.”
“Because we have to get back at Lex Luthor for firing us and we don’t care how we do it. But we need money if we are going to do that.”
“Can’t we skip some of those steps? It sounds like it’s going to take you more time than we have!”
Nell looked away from her work and at Lucille, her hands still buried in the mechanism and said “No, we can’t skip any step, not if you want to be sure it’s going to work the way it’s supposed to.”
“When are you going to start the testing?”
“I should be ready to start the testing tomorrow."
“All right then, keep working. Just work faster I don’t want to miss the truck.”
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Flashback TBC
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And now:
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Chapter 3 - The Making of a Superwoman
Friday, December 10, 1993 Flashback continues
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Universal Locator Designation
Common name – ALT2
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A call had come in that there was a child trapped in the wishing well in Centennial Park. Lois Lane and her fiancé Clark Kent were in the bullpen when the call came in.
Lois looked at him. He gave the flying hand signal and she nodded. They both headed for the stairwell. When they got to the vicinity Clark landed and dropped Lois off behind some shrubbery close to the scene and took off again. Lois headed for the wishing well.
When Lois arrived at the wishing well the area had been cordoned off by the police and there was a news crew from LNN on the scene consisting of two women.
As Lois took up her position a red and blue blur dove out of the sky and straight down the well. Seconds later the primary color clad superhero came back up out of the well. He landed near her. She asked, “Is the baby okay?”
A bitter laugh escaped him as he replied, “I think that the batteries need to be replaced.” He opened the blanket to reveal a doll with a tape player duct taped to its abdomen.
“What a sick joke! Who could have done something like this?”
Just then Superman heard the sound of capacitors charging. Looking around he saw that the ‘news’ crew had their camera aimed at him. A quick check with his x-ray vision disclosed the fact that this was in fact a weapon. He threw himself in between it and Lois and enclosed her in his arms to shield her from this apparent weapon. He felt a burning sensation as the brownish beam impacted his back. When it did his aura started to flare and manifested as a bright red for a few seconds. At the same time Lois manifested an aura also only hers was blue. This only lasted a few seconds however. Clark's aura moved through the spectrum to purple and then to blue while Lois' aura moved in the opposite direction reaching purple at the same time as Clark’s finally hitting red and staying there. A wave of nausea and weakness swept over him as the beam continued to play on his back. Mystified by this he continued to shield Lois until suddenly he heard a small explosion. As soon as he heard this the beam stopped. He turned to confront the perpetrators and saw that it was too late. They had been standing very close together when the weapon had exploded, killing both of them.
He tried to use his x-ray vision to determine if there was any chance of saving either of them and found that he couldn’t see anything other than the bodies lying there. He shook his head because the effort to use his x-ray vision had strained his eyes and it hurt. He could almost understand the failure of his vision, but not the pain associated with the attempt. It wasn’t very often that he experienced pain. He decided to try to conceal just what the problem was so he moved over to the bodies on the ground and started to do a quick check for vitals.
Lois knew that this was very unusual behavior for her fiancé so she moved over and knelt next to him. She whispered, “What’s the matter?”
Also in a whisper he replied, “I've lost my powers. I couldn’t x-ray them. We need to see how much of this weapon we can recover. We need to get it to Dr. Klein to find out just what happened.”
Lois started looking around and suddenly she could see each individual blade of grass like it was a tree. She reached out and grabbed Superman’s arm. He winced and whispered, “Ouch, not so hard. Wait a minute. How did you squeeze my arm so hard?”
Lois said, "Let’s get out of here. We can come back later and find the pieces.”
Noting the strained intensity in her voice he replied, “Okay.”
Superman said to the policeman on the scene, “I’ll be back later to give a statement.”
The patrolman replied, “No problem Superman. We know how busy you are.” He stood there scratching his head when he saw Superman run off at normal human speed instead of flying off but thought that he must have a good reason for doing so.
As soon as they were out of sight in an alley Clark tried to fly and only succeeded in a hop of about a foot and a half. “I can’t fly. How were you able to squeeze my arm so hard?”
”I don’t know. All of a sudden I just feel terrific.”
Clark said, “Close your eyes and think about floating like a balloon.”
Lois did and Clark watched as slowly she floated first a foot then two feet off the ground. He said, “Lois, open your eyes!”
When she did she saw that she was above him and realizing what was happening suddenly dropped to the ground. “Clark, what happened to me? It’s like I have your powers.”
Clark was almost thinking out loud as he said, “The beam from that weapon must have been from red Kryptonite. It looks like my powers have been transferred to you. Probably because I was holding you to protect you when it struck, though we may never know how it was done. They were both killed in the explosion.”
The strain was showing in her voice as Lois said, “I wonder how long this is going to last?”
Trying to allay her fears somewhat, Clark said, “We don’t have any way to know. The effects of red Kryptonite are unpredictable and different every time. Right now I need to get out of the Suit and I can’t do my normal change so my regular clothes aren’t available. I need to get back to my place. Do you think you could fly me there?”
She was starting to panic and it was coming out in her voice, “How could I do that? Don’t you think it would look strange for me to be carrying Superman in my arms? That and the fact that everyone would recognize me!”
Trying to calm her down a little he said, “How about we do it this way. Here, stand next to me. We put our arms around each other … right. Now, start to fly. It’ll look like I’m flying you just a different position.”
Lois was sounding more and more panicky all the time. She asked, “How do I do this? I haven’t flown before!”
Trying to calm her down some he said, “It’s easy. Do it just like you did when you floated only think of a speed and a direction. It helps if you are looking where you want to go. Try it. Just look up and think fast.”
Looking up as directed she said, “Okay, here goes nothing.” They shot up so fast that Clark almost lost his grip. This time it was Clark’s turn to panic and you could hear it in his voice as he shouted, “Slow down! Think hover!”
They came to a stop. After catching his breath and calming down from the fright he said, “Wow! Okay. Whewh, well at least now we know you can go fast. Let’s try for direction accuracy and controlling your speed. Look toward my apartment and think fast,” he hastily added, “but not so fast, okay?”
“I’ll give it a try. Where’s your apartment? Everything looks different from up here.”
Pointing off to the right he said, “That way.”
Looking in the direction that he was pointing she saw a familiar landmark and said, “Okay, I think I know where it is.” With a somewhat resigned tone she said, “Well, here we go again.” They started moving, basically in the right direction and not quite so fast. Eventually they made it to his apartment. Entering from the balcony Clark went to the phone and called Smallville. His mom picked up the phone and said, “Hello?”
“Mom?”
“Clark! Hi, Honey! How come you’re calling at this time of the day?”
“Mom, we’ve got a problem. Can we come out to the farm for a few days?”
“Who? You and Lois?”
“Yeah, me and Lois.”
“Of course Honey, you know that you and Lois can come out here anytime you want. This is still your home.”
“Thanks Mom, we’ll be there in a little while.”
With a quizzical look Lois asked, “We’re going to the farm?”
“Yeah, you need a crash course in how to control your powers and I can’t think of a better place to do it. Besides, you’re going to need a costume. I think Mom still has material from when she made the Suit.”
“Don’t you think that may be a little premature? After all we don’t even know if this is going to last!”
“We can’t take the chance that it won’t. We need to act like this is permanent.”
Sounding very worried and in full babble mode Lois asked, “What if it is? What if I can’t give these powers back to you!? What if I’m going to have your powers forever? How will this effect *us*? You’re the one that’s supposed to be the hero, not me. I don’t *want* this. We *need* to see Bernie Klein. We need to see how we can *reverse* this. Maybe he can build a machine to transfer them back to you. *I’m* no hero – that’s *your* thing. *My* job is to *cover* for *you*.”
“I’m sorry Lois, but right now our roles are reversed. You’re the one with the powers now.”
After placing another call to Perry to let him know that they would not be back at the office until Monday because they were following up on some leads in the wishing well incident, Clark put on one of his business suits over the uniform and packed a backpack with casual clothes for a couple of days. They walked to Lois’ apartment where she packed similarly.
Clark changed back into the uniform and after Lois locked up her apartment they put their arms around each other and left from her back window headed west. Lois had some trouble navigating, she might have been trying too hard, and Clark had to correct their direction several times. They finally landed safely in the front yard of the Kent farm.
Walking into the house they were greeted by Martha who gave both of them hugs. “Okay, what’s the special occasion? What brings you out here in the middle of the week? What’s this problem you mentioned?”
“You know how I’ve always wanted to be a ‘normal’ guy? Well, I just got my wish.”
“What? What happened?”
“We’re not sure. I think it was red Kryptonite.” Clark related the incident at the wishing well.
When he was finished the ever practical Martha looked at Lois and said, “Well, I guess you need to go out and start working on learning to handle your powers. While you guys are doing that I’ll get out the fabric, patterns and my sewing machine so we can whip up a uniform. Go on, get out of here and let me get to work.”
Laughing Clark said, “Okay Lois, you heard the boss. Let’s go work on you learning to control you powers.”
That started a whirlwind weekend of working on her powers and trying on different costumes until she found one she was happy with.
The uniform that they finally decided on was a very deliberate choice as far as color scheme and they knew as soon as she had it on that it was the right choice.
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December 13, 1993
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Monday morning they returned to the Planet. Lois had her new uniform and basic control over her powers. Now they just had to wait for something to happen which needed super assistance.
They were at their desks working when Perry burst out of his office shouting, “Turn up the sound!” Obviously he was referring to the big screen TV located off on one side of the bullpen. Jimmy grabbed the remote and kicked the volume off mute. A LNN reporter’s voice came blasting out of the speakers.
[”The bank robbers have taken a number of hostages and have sealed the building. Their demands are for a helicopter to land on the roof to take them to the airport where a plane is waiting for them. If not they threaten to kill a hostage an hour until their demands are met.”]As soon as Perry had shouted for sound Lois had headed for the stairwell. A few seconds later everyone heard a sonic boom and a few started cheering. All eyes were glued to the TV. The cameras had pulled back for a wide shot. Suddenly into the frame came a red and blue blur. The cheering only got louder. The superhero was travelling almost too fast to be seen and was crashing in through a window.
Less than a minute later the front doors opened and the hostages started coming out, followed by their previous captors who had been disarmed and were walking out with their hands in the air. The security guard escorted them out with his gun on them.
After the security guard came a red, blue and yellow clad superhero. At first everyone thought it was Superman but then everyone realized that the individual was too small to be Superman. This was a petite woman in a costume strikingly similar to Superman’s. This was a woman in a blue body suit, almost like a Speedo swim suit, with a pleated red miniskirt, red boots that came to mid-calf leaving the rest of the legs bare, a red cape which only came down to mid thigh and a yellow belt. The same stylized ‘S’ which Superman wore in a somewhat smaller size graced her chest. The main difference was the mask she wore. It covered most of her face from her hairline to a point below her eyes and crossing her nose and was made of the same stretchy material as the uniform.
The LNN newscaster was going frantic.
[”A new superhero has appeared! This is a woman and her uniform is just like Superman’s! I’m going to try to get a comment!”] The reporter shouted to the cameraman to follow as he ran to try to intercept the superhero.
[”Miss, uh, Miss, would you care to make a comment for the viewers?”] Everyone in the bullpen was watching the scene unfold on the big screen TV as with some apparent reluctance the new superhero turned to the camera. It was a good thing that they had taken the time to prepare a story beforehand. Everyone who was watching felt like she was looking directly at each of them as she fisted her hands and placed them on her hips in what was an intimidating stance and looked directly into the camera as she used a strong, impersonal tone to launch into her statement.
[”I am Superwoman. I came at Superman’s request to fill in for him while he was called away on a special mission. I will be with you until his return.”] As she completed her statement she waved to the camera and took off straight up until she was out of sight. The camera followed as well as it could and then returned to center on the reporter. The reporter came out of his stupor and realizing he was back on the air said,
[”Well, there you have it folks! We have a new superhero in town. Superwoman is going to be filling in for Superman while he is away on a special mission. Don’t forget you heard it first, right here, on LNN – live. We now return you to the Studio and Linda King - Reporting”] Just about this time Lois walked up to Clark and looking around asked, “What’d I miss?”
Clark winked at her and responded, “Apparently there is a new superhero in town. A woman and she said that she is going to be filling in for Superman while he’s away on some kind of mission.”
Clark was looking at his watch as if he was timing something. As if on cue Perry shouted, “Lane, Kent, my office! NOW!”
Sotto voce, Clark said, “Twenty seconds. The Chief must be slipping.”
Lois started laughing as they moved together to Perry’s office. Perry was fuming. They both knew what was coming but Lois was still laughing as they sat on his couch after closing the door. He addressed them turning his initial fury on Lois, “You think this is funny, do you?”
Lois sobered instantly, “No, Chief. Sorry.”
Perry wasn’t really mollified by her apparent contrition. He continued, “Okay you two. What’s the story? Why didn’t you say anything about this? With as close as you two are to Superman I’d be very surprised if he didn’t tell you about this beforehand.”
“Well, actually, he did Chief, but he swore us to secrecy.”
“Okay, I might accept that if you hadn’t allowed *LNN* to *scoop* us! Why’d you let that happen?”
Lois responded, “That was Superman’s request. He felt that there has been too close an association between him and the Planet and that it has put some of us in unnecessary danger, me in particular. He wanted to lessen that so he wants to spread out the coverage some.”
“But, why now? This is such a big story and it should have been ours! Well, at least get out there and find her and get me a follow-up.”
”You got it Chief! We’ll get what we can.”
Across town, Luthor had been watching the coverage of the bank robbery. It hadn’t been one of his robbery teams. If it had they wouldn’t have done anything so stupid and been captured by the local superhero. He was shocked to learn that Superman was no longer around and that a woman had taken his place. He thought, <All that work, all those tests to determine just what he could do, wasted. I’ll need to start all over and test her. I wonder if she will be as powerful. Oh well, let the games begin - again.>
He depressed a switch on his intercom and said, “Nigel, my office, if you please.”
He heard back, “Right away, Sir.”
When Nigel knocked on the office door he heard, “Come in.” He opened the door and entered.
Luthor didn’t beat around the bush. He asked, “What progress have you made on getting rid of Clark Kent? I am growing impatient. I want Lane and he’s in the way.”
Nigel replied, “I have a particular individual in mind. He has the finesse to do the job and make it look like an accident.”
“Hire him; I don’t care how much it costs.”
“As soon as he’s available.”
“Why isn’t he able to do the job now?”
“He’s currently in prison, but, he is scheduled to be out soon.”
“Isn’t there anyone else that could do the job?
“Not with his level of expertise.”
“Oh, alright, but I won’t wait forever. Get him on the job as soon as he’s available.”
‘I’ll be sure to do that, Sir. As soon as he is out, I will put him to work and rest assured, it *will* look like an accident.”
“See to it. Send in Mrs. Cox on your way out.” Lex reached for his humidor and pulled out a cigar as Nigel turned and left.
Mrs. Cox entered his office and stood in front of his desk. Lex said, “I want you to contact Lois Lane and set up a follow-up meeting for that ’interview’ she asked for.”
Mrs. Cox, because not only of her position but the more personal services she rendered to her boss felt free to challenge him and asked, “Why her? What do you see in her? What can she give you that I can’t?”
“I’m sorry, my dear, you simply are not her, so you can’t give me what she can, herself and her body.”
Resigned, Mrs. Cox said, “As you wish, Lex.” She turned and left his office as he leaned back I his chair and enjoyed his cigar.
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Flashback TBC
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comments go here To be continued in Chapter 04 – Valentine’s day
