Lois & Clark Forums Forums Fan Fiction Fanfic Related Favourite Revelations: Fanfic Quiz III

Lois lay back on the bed, unmoving, her body limp. There was no rise and fall of her chest. Clark was beginning to panic when suddenly Lois coughed and drew in a long ragged breath.

Clark cradled her head in his hands, the worry clearly etched on his face.

"Clark? What happened?"

"Oh Lois, I'm so sorry, I sometimes forget myself."

Lois tried to shake the confusion out of her head as she focused on the clearly upset partner of hers. "I can't believe it. You nearly suffocated me with that kiss! I've never known anyone who could hold their breath that long." Lois reached up and pulled off his glasses. "No one, that is, except... Superman." Her voice betrayed the wonder of her own recognition.

Lois was touched by his statement. "Yeah, I wish we could have met too -- properly, I mean." At her words, his expression became abstracted, as if he were straining to listen to something, but after a moment he shook himself out of it, and began setting up boxes in front of her bookcase.

He moved with an easy grace, but was obviously in no hurry. She stood across the room, watching his muscles ripple and flow beneath his dress shirt. It really wasn't fair. The best-looking, nicest guy she'd seen in ages, and he literally didn't know she existed.

Methodically, he packed up her books, beginning with the lowest shelf and filling two boxes before he got to the top shelf. He was able to reach a shelf higher than she could, but there was another one above that. She saw him look around the room, and wished she could tell him where she stored her step-stool. It wasn't in sight, however, so he shrugged. And then noiselessly rose into the air, his feet dangling a foot above the floor as he calmly gathered an armful of books.

Lois felt her mouth drop open. Was it possible this was all just a bizarre dream? Everything and everyone else was behaving normally. Even her imagination wasn't lurid enough to create a floating man, was it? Meanwhile, Clark had cleared out the top shelf and filled the third box. His feet were once again on the floor, and she doubted her own memories. Except that the top shelf was empty. And, come to think of it, those boxes would be heavy, yet he was carrying them with ease. Not to mention his amazingly fast arrival at her apartment, when he'd been in Perry's office scant moments before. This definitely called for further observation.

He moved into the kitchen and began working on her meager collection of cookware. Nonchalantly floating when necessary to reach items on the top shelves of her cupboards. It was the contrast of using such an unusual method to accomplish such a mundane task that finally convinced her that what she was seeing was real. Normal men didn't float, but somehow, Clark Kent did.

"So. ***. Care to tell me *exactly* what went on up there?"

He tensed, all the nerves in his body jangling in warning. Breathing heavily, he answered, "You know. The pulley must have given way. And they'd already loosened the wires to your harness so - "

"I don't mean that," she interrupted fiercely. "I mean, what the hell did*you* do?"

He stared at her. What did she mean... could she have guessed?

She continued. "One second we were in free-fall, the next we were... floating. I can't think of any other way to describe it. We went *up.* And we weren't being pulled up. And I know I didn't do anything, so that just leaves you, ***!"

*** swallowed. She *had* noticed. And it was time to stop pretending to himself that these things weren't happening. He'd done that for too many years now. He took a sip from his glass and sighed heavily. "###, I don't have a clue what happened, except that *something* was telling me to concentrate on not falling. Then we were - flying. Or something. And I have no idea why, or what caused it."

"Superman flies," ### said inconsequentially. *** stared at her, puzzled. "Superman is strong, too. And Superman has super-hearing."

*** took a step backwards, as if trying to ward off the meaning of her words. "###, what on earth are you talking about?"

"You, ***!" she yelled. "*You* can do all these things! Have you never wondered about it? Never thought it was strange that you can do things
other people can't?"

She had made her revelation, and now it was time to
make his. The rational part of him told him it was only
fair. There was a time when he would wonder what such a
revelation would mean to her, what she would think of him
if she knew his secret, but he no longer cared. It didn't
matter, anyway. Their relationship was over.

"Lois," he said, his voice calm and authoritative. He
clenched his jaw and placed his hands on his hips, striking
the posed that Superman was famous for. As he gazed at her,
he molded his face into an expression that left no doubt
that there would be no escaping her fate this time.

She stared at him for a moment, her expression unchanged,
before she narrowed her eyes and turned her head ever so
slightly. She gazed at his face for what seemed like an
eternity, then slowly shifted her attention to his chest.
The realization of who and what he was set in slowly,
revealing itself in her eyes, which widened as far as he
thought they possibly could, before widening even further.
Her shoulders hunched over and her chest heaved with heavy
intake of breath before she let out a whimper, and the gun,
once clenched so tightly in her hands, fell to the ground
with a dull clatter.

"Clark...." she whispered, backing hastily toward the wall.
The revelation seemed to have jarred her back into reality,
chasing away all the bad thoughts that she had once held.
In their stead came an irrational, almost child-like fear.
In all the scenarios that he had run through in his mind,
he had imagined her reaction to the fact that he was
Superman to be severe, ranging from anger to hurt to shear
disbelief. But never had he envisioned the raw fear that
she was feeling.

"Lois, Clark tells me you need to see me."

She couldn't remember when she had last felt so
uncomfortable. Damn Clark for suggesting this.

"Superman, I'm really sorry to take you away from whatever you were doing, but..." She had to get this right, and every way she thought of to say it sounded galactically stupid. "I'm sorry if this sounds crazy, and I know the only reason you kissed me yesterday was because the pheromones were affecting you, but, Superman, would you mind kissing me again, just once?"

She had barely gotten the words out when he stepped toward her and wrapped her in his arms and kissed her. It was intoxicating. It was smoldering. She could barely stand up, so it was just as well that he had her molded to his body
and was holding her firmly in place.

This was awful. This was the worst possible reaction she could have had. This was exactly how she had felt when kissing Clark.

He separated from her just enough to speak. "Was this what you had in mind?" And his lips were on her neck, working their way down her nearly bare shoulder as he slipped off her robe.

Lois felt as though she were falling into a pit of pain and pleasure. This was solving nothing. She wanted Superman every bit as much as she had wanted Clark. How could she feel the same way with two different men in a matter of minutes? She could hear herself telling Clark that his idea had indeed backfired.

Then something happened. Lois was aware that her heart was racing, her breath was short, and her brain was beginning to glaze over. Not to mention that an aching longing to get naked with this man was gnawing at her. So it was not surprising that she barely recognized the sense of deja vu that was playing at the edge of her consciousness, aroused by her sense of smell. She forced her brain to confront it.

"Clark!" she gasped.

The intriguing concept occupied her for a few moments, then she decided probably not. Such an experience would be etched on his face, she thought, as her eyes studied every inch and plane of the features in question intently. And he looked so at peace. He looked so...

She stopped in her tracks.

He looked so...

Familiar.

Not...not *Clark* familiar. Familiar in ways she had never expected to....

She found that she was trembling.

The light in the room had brightened as she'd been lost in her thoughts and she could see his features more clearly now. She had smoothed his hair back from his forehead as she'd sought to relax him back into peaceful sleep, undisturbed by whatever dreams had made him restless. Sometime during the night he had apparently taken off his glasses....

He looked...

No...

No, that was...that was impossible.

That couldn't be.

Lois eased herself clear of the arms enfolding her, as carefully as though it were a sleeping tiger she sought to escape and not a man -

/Man?/

The shaky thought interrupted as she slipped over the side of the bed and rose to her feet. She backed up slowly.

What...who...was it who lay there on her bed? Man? Or...

...Superman...

The silence in the car shook him out of his reverie, and he realised that they were parked outside the Apollo Hotel and Lois was giving him a quizzical look. “Earth to Clark!” she said as he blinked and looked at her. “Falling asleep?”

“Uh... no,” he admitted. “I was just distracted for a minute. Sorry.”

“Good,” she said decisively. “We need to talk, and I think we'd better do it now.”

Startled, Clark stared at her. Had he been wrong? Did she want to discuss their kiss after all? Or... was it just that she was regretting her near-deathbed confidences and wanted to make sure that he'd never breathe a word of any of it?

“You don't have to worry, Lois. I won't say a thing...” he began.

But she cut across him, her words striking fear into his heart.

“You did some pretty amazing things tonight. You thought I didn't notice, but I did. Just who - or what - are you, Clark Kent?”

Perry quickly lifted the chunk of kryptonite out of his briefcase and snapped it shut. Before he realized what had happened, Clark let out a weak "No!" and collapsed back against the corner of the couch, his head hitting the carved wood and twisting away from the edge too late. He hit the floor with a sickening thud, crumpled up between the protruding edge of the sofa and the legs of the armchair that Lois was sitting in. Lois gave a little cry and jumped out the chair faster than Perry thought possible. She was kneeling on the floor next to Clark in an instant, her hand going to the blood seeping into his hair on the back of his head. His face was turn away from the edge of the sofa and his skin was paler that Perry had ever seen it before. He was still holding the chunk of kryptonite out above the desk when Lois suddenly looked toward him, her face almost as white as Clark's.

"Get it away!" she hissed. Seeing Perry was still staring at Clark's fallen form in front of his desk, she leapt up, grabbed the chunk of kryptonite, went around the desk, and stuffed the chunk in his coat.

<snip...>

He quickly moved over Clark and put the piece of kryptonite in the small pouch. Almost immediately, Clark's breathing returned to normal, and he groaned slightly. Lois bent over him and turned his head farther to the side. She took out some dripping wet paper napkins from her shoulder bag and began to wipe the blood from the back of her husband's head.

Perry, still somewhat in shock, watched Lois kneeling on the floor. He looked at Clark's face, the color now fully returned to it, and back up to Lois' calm one. Clark opened his eyes a crack and looked at the base of Perry's desk. He tried to move, but Lois' hand prevented him from turning his head. Perry watched as Clark closed his eyes again. Suddenly, the strangeness of seeing Clark without his glasses struck him, and he gasped. He looked closer, and suddenly all the strange pieces fell together for him. Why Lois was so calm...why she wasn't in tears, why Clark was so strangely calm, too. Why everything had happened so fast. Perry blinked to confirm that he was, indeed, not dreaming the whole thing.

"Great Caesar's Ghost!" he breathed, plopping back down into his chair, in one hand, Clark's broken glasses, and in the other, the lead-lined pouch.

He took on hand and began to remove his glasses. He almost stopped because he was afraid of losing the love he saw in her eyes. However, he knew that for them to share that love he needed to do this. He placed his glasses on the table beside the couch.
At first she was confused, then it hit her all at once. The excuses, taking off at unexpected moments, Clark never being around when a major news story broke. He was Superman! She felt all kinds of emotions at that moment, hurt, anger, relief, and finally love. Hurt because she was supposed to be his best friend, why couldn't he tell her something like this. Anger, mostly at herself for not being able to figure it out sooner. Here she was, Lois Lane, ace reporter, the other half of the best investigative reporting team in Metropolis. To think, two identities separated by a simple pair of glasses. Relief began to set in. She was relieved to know he wasn't running from her. This thing keeping them apart had been set free. She felt a surge of love for him, knowing what it must have done to him to bring himself to
finally tell her. Finally! They could finally love each other, open and honestly.

Her eyes flew to his in astonishment. "Well, that's
just..." she began. "I had no idea..."

Clark stood motionless as he watched the effect his words
had on her. His skin still tingled where her fingers had
been. He was afraid to move, to breathe, to blink an eye
for fear of unsettling her completely.

"But... if this is Superman..." she stammered, holding the
calendar in one hand. "And you posed for it, then
you're..." Her eyes wandered from the glossy photograph to
the man standing before her and back to the photo. "It's
you," she whispered. "You're him. He's you."

Lois pounced on his last comment. "Superman and Clark? Uncle Mike,
they don't look alike. Well, okay, they both have dark hair and brown eyes, and I think they're about the same height and weight, and Clark does have lots of muscles - I saw him half-naked once; don't worry it was perfectly innocent - and we know that Superman has muscles, too, because the suit does nothing to hide them, and ...Oh, my God! They do look alike!" She looked up at her uncle with an appalled expression on her face. "Oh, my God! Clark... and Superman... and they both... Oh, my God!" Much to her uncle's dismay, Lois started to hyperventilate.

"Sweetie, calm down! Take a deep breath ... That's good. Take another."

Lois complied with her uncle's suggestion, taking deep breaths until she was able to sit and look at him relatively calmly.

"Are you okay?" Mike asked in concern.

Lois nodded, her eyes still looking a little wild.

"Let's look at this logically, honey. Have you ever seen the two of them together?"

She waited there for a few minutes before heading to the
restroom with the letter clutched tightly in her hand.
There she could be alone to read the all-important note.
She walked into a stall and latched it behind her. She
would not be interrupted now. She opened the letter and
began to read.

"Dear Lois,

I'm sorry, but I have to leave Metropolis. What I told you
before about going to Smallville isn't true; I really don't
know where I'm going. Please believe me when I say that I
don't want to leave you.

Lois, before I leave, I want you to know that I love you. I
have loved you from the moment I saw you in Perry's office.
I know that you probably want to know the real reason that
I have to leave. Here's my answer: I am Superman. If I
stay, I put the entire city in danger. More importantly, I
put *you* in danger. I can't stand the thought of somehow
hurting you. So I'm leaving. I love you, Lois.

Yours Forever,

Clark Kent