I get it, Rat - you break the MBs when it's time to post my story part, then bring them back up again to post yours.
Thank heavens you decided to leave them up so you could get FDK...
Ok, part 3... wonderful! I was on the edge of my seat for about 2/3 of the segment. I think that may be why this part seemed so much longer - I wasn't breathing for most of it! :p
As others have said, the writing was amazing. I could really feel everything Clark was feeling, and his emotional roller-coaster was awesome. The part where he thought he was going to get killed protecting Lois...
And I was cheering when he managed to cover their trail - though I agree, it's going to take more than that to keep the baddies from picking it up again. Maybe a good, solid snowfall overnight - once they're safely under that roof!!!!
About the superpowers - his strength came back earlier only *just* enough to let him heave the tree out of the road, so I have no problem with his invulnerability coming back just enough to bounce the bullets but not enough to heal his arm. It didn't even occur to me to wonder in the story context.
Then the Norman reference - I got that straight off in spite of never having seen the movie. I certainly wouldn't have got a reference to "Jason"!
And finally, the ellipses. I was aware that there were an awful lot of them, but it didn't annoy me; however, I was consciously aware of the device rather than just registering their breathlessness. I have to say, though, that I have a special dislike for too many ellipses, as a result of trying to read Barbara Cartland novels in my youth (her heroines couldn't string two words together without ellipses, it seems) so the fact that they *didn't* irritate me is a testament to your writing.
Modern writing theory says ellipses are used for when the words (or thoughts) tail off, dashes for when they're interrupted. Seems to me either would work for breathlessness - the words tail off because they're interrupted by a breath.
I didn't feel, like Yvonne, that they were pauses for the wrong reasons - a pause is a pause, and it's up to the writer to make it clear why the pause is there.
I'll read part 4 later... I think I'm going to follow your example, Rat, and have a bath first.
![[Linked Image]](http://www.cosgan.de/images/smilie/haushalt/a051.gif)
Mere
Edited to add thoughts that occurred to me while I was in the bath... "I *knew* that diner waitress had shifty eyes!" Lois exclaimed in a soft hiss and then, "I told you we shouldn’t have stopped there for lunch."
Clark gaped at her. As he recalled, it had been her idea that they combine a little snooping around the town in their hunt for the smuggling gang Perry had sicced them on with refueling both themselves and the car.
Though, knowing his partner, by the time he felt able to bring this up again she'd probably have an entirely different version of how things had gone in her head and refuse to believe he'd been right at all.
You know, I've been getting flak for the S1 Lois behaviour over in R&R, but this is the part of S1 Lois that I actively hate - the fact that she doesn't just twist past events to suit her purposes, she actually revises them. And yet, here as in (I think it was) Burnout, somehow you manage to make this trait of hers almost acceptable... one can even believe that Clark might find it endearing!
