Oooooh. I'll be so interested in seeing what responses you get. I'm working a fic right now that addresses that very question and takes place during that very time period. So far I'm almost two weeks into the story and Clark's powers haven't returned yet - although there are other extenuating circumstances in the fic which I won't go in to here. <g>
I based my conclusions on the fact that in GGGoH, Clark lost his powers for at least a couple of days (wasn't really sure how much time they spent in Smallville) and that was after a very brief exposure to Kryptonite. However, when he gets shot by the K bullet in Madam X, he recovers almost instantaneously... there were some residual effects for a bit, but nothing that kept him from flying.
I've always wondered if the more he was exposed to K, the more tolerance he would build up to it. So after he was exposed in HoL for such a long period of time - maybe that's why the K bullet didn't affect him so much.
But I always felt in HoL that it would have taken much longer for his powers to come back. He was encased in a cage powered by Kryptonite and not only that but he was in that dark wine cellar where he was closed off from the regenerative powers of the sun. My vote is that it took a fairly good time span for his powers to come back - based on GGGoH.
There's my 2 cents worth (hopefully you'll all buy into the theories I've concocted for my next story - we'll see) And also it's worth mentioning that my story is still different in many ways from the one you've proposed above, so I'd love to see someone write the one you've proposed BJ.
-- DJ
P.S. - Sorry, I wasn't shamelessly trying to promote a new story - no really!
I was just excited to see someone else thinking along the same lines that I was. <g>
