The Foundling - Matchmaker Style
Rated PG-13
* * denotes emphasis
< > denotes thoughts
As always comments are welcome. (ken.janney@kjanney.com)
Previously
Cat was actually sensing blood in the water. This had to be a sure thing, "What are the stakes?"
Clark had finished going through his e-mail and was starting to pay attention to the discussion just as Jimmy announced the stakes, "If I win … a night of passion."
Cat sneered, "Whose … yours or mine?"
Jimmy, in a voice lacking some confidence said, "Optimistically, ours." His voice faded almost to inaudibility as he finished, "Realistically, mine."
Lois spoke up, "And if you lose?"
Cat scoffed, "
When you lose."
Jimmy, fearing the worst said, "Name it."
Cat's bravado had returned along with that blood in the water scent, "You repaint my apartment, every room, top to bottom." In an aside to Lois she added, "Pink fades."
Jimmy was crushed at what his penalty would be, but then his confidence reasserted itself and he reached out to shake on it.
Without being asked to be the judge, Lois assumed that position, "I expect detailed family histories including charts from both of you no later than tomorrow. Also, blood tests."
Perry was dressed in a shirt and tie with his vest on and his sleeves rolled up as he walked out into the bull pen. He stopped near Lois's desk and clearing his throat said, in a loud voice, "Everyone, listen up. Your editor-in-chief has an announcement."
Cat, Jimmy and Lois were so engrossed in their conversation that they completely ignored Perry. The rest of the newsroom staff didn't have even that excuse, but the result was the same, total disinterest.
Cat spluttered out, "Why … why blood tests?"
Jimmy tried to minimize it, "She's kidding."
Lois looked at him and said, emphatically, "No, I'm not!"
Perry tried once more, "Your editor-in-chief has an announcement to make to anyone currently employed by the Daily Planet and about to undergo their quarterly salary and expense review."
The word ‘salary' penetrated the fog of the discussion and grabbed everyone's attention. Silence reigned and Perry looked around in gratification. He said, "Much better."
He waved some papers that he was holding in the air as he said, "It is my pleasure to announce that this year's candidates for the Meriwether Award for Journalistic Excellence have just been released and the Daily Planet's very own writing team," he used his hands to indicate Lois and Clark, "of Lois Lane and Clark Kent are among the nominees."
There was a burst of applause from around the room along with shouted congratulations.
Lois wanted to stand up and take a bow, but decided that it would be best to appear honored and humble so she simply smiled and said a general, "Thank you."
Clark was pleased, but truly humble and simply smiled and nodded.
Over his shoulder, Jimmy shouted to Clark, "C.K.! You're the man!" Then he caught sight of Lois's glare, after all she was part of the team as well, and in a small voice he added, "And, Lois, you're the woman."
Cat added, "More or less. I guess more, now that she's married to Clark. He seems to bring it out in her; of course
he would do that with any woman."
Perry deemed that enough adulation had been bestowed and decided to call a halt, "All right, all right, back to work. It's an announcement, not a national holiday."
As everyone returned to their tasks, Perry turned to his star reporting team and said, "Good job you two. Just don't expect to rest on your laurels." He turned to Lois and asked, "How you coming on that piece on the recent rise in crime in Metropolis?"
Lois tried to be vague as she replied, "You know, gathering information, checking sources, compiling data. That sort of thing."
Perry was not easily fooled and asked, "That bad, huh?"
Lois shrugged and replied, "I'm still looking for an angle."
Lois started nervously tapping her desk with the eraser of her pencil as Perry delivered some pearls of wisdom, "Angles, unlike angels or demigods in capes, don't just drop from the sky, Lois." To emphasize his point, he pointed to the heavens and Lois stopped tapping and followed his pointing finger automatically as he continued, "We have to create them." He looked back and forth between Lois and Clark as he continued in a semi-conspiratorial manner, "The Committee vote on the Meriwether Award is only a couple of days away. Be nice to show them a strong finishing kick."
Lois gave her desk a few more, even harder taps before she threw her pencil down and buried her face in her hands in frustration.
Just then Clark's phone rang. Perry took that as his cue to leave and headed back toward his office.
Clark lifted the receiver and said, "Daily Planet, Clark Kent."
Clark listened intently and a look of concern creased his features, then he said, "We'll be right there, thanks," and hung the phone up.
Lifting her head and looking at Clark, Lois gave him a questioning look and asked, "What?"
"That was our neighbor, our apartment has been robbed!" Standing he grabbed his coat and shouted to Perry who was just about to disappear into his office, "Perry, we have to go. Our apartment has been robbed."
Upon hearing his name, Perry had turned and hearing what Clark said, waved them off and said, "Go. Deal with it."
Lois was shocked and started mumbling, "This is awful. To be violated that way again. To have absolute strangers pawing through our personal belongings, to endure it ... AGAIN!"
As they entered the elevator, Lois said, "Look on the bright side. Maybe this is the angle I've been looking for."
As the doors closed he whispered, "I hope they didn't find the spare Suits … or … or the globe. Things that will tie us to Superman."
The ramifications of what had happened finally hit her and she growled in frustration at the old elevator, "Can't this thing move any faster?"
And Now
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
Chapter 3
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
When they arrived at the apartment they found an absolute mess. Clark's books had been scattered and thrown around as if they had been examined and cast aside. This was logical since many of them were not even in English. Any robber, unable to read the contents would probably have gotten rather frustrated with the literature. Drawers had been pulled out and overturned, the contents mixed with the books. From the first look it was hard to tell if this had been a simple case of vandalism or a robbery. Most of the items in the apartment still were Clark's. Lois had moved some personal items like pictures, but her furniture had been left for Lucy. Looking around, Lois was thanking her luck stars that she had procrastinated in moving the bulk of her possessions to the apartment.
Clark was in a daze as he wandered through the clutter however, Lois was furious. She had felt like she had been invaded when Luthor had sent his goons to examine her apartment while they were in Smallville. They had gone so far as to rifle through her lingerie and duplicate it. That invasion of Lois's privacy had been the final straw for her fueling her resolve to bring Luthor down. As a result she knew just how Clark was feeling. She watched with sympathy as he knelt down and started to pick up a book that was lying open.
Gently, Lois said, "Clark, you shouldn't touch anything. This is a crime scene."
Clark picked up the book anyhow and said, "Lois, this is
our crime scene."
"If you go messing up fingerprints, how do you expect the police to catch whoever did this …"
With a shake of his head he interrupted her flow of words, and said, in a flat tone, "I don't."
She finished, almost as an afterthought, "If you insist on tainting the evidence ..."
Lois was interrupted when Bill Henderson stepped in through the door and said, "Someone call a cop?"
Lois let out a sigh of relief, "
Finally." Then surprise took over, "Henderson? What are you doing here? I thought you headed up Homicide."
As if instructing a six-year-old, Henderson replied, "I do, but when I saw the name on the report, I stepped in. I put out a directive that any time your names show up, I'm to be notified. I don't want to inflict you on anyone else. It's bad enough that
I have to deal with you, but I think I've gotten used to you. You know, I think you've mellowed a little since you married Kent."
Lois smiled, "Maybe I have … a little."
Turning to Clark he said, "You've been a good influence on her."
Starting to feel a little uncomfortable, Lois said, "Okay, Henderson, what's our first move?"
Henderson turned to her and asked, "You live here, Lois?"
She put her hands on her hips and replied, "Of course I live here! We are
married, after all!"
Undeterred, he replied, "Oh? I think Detective Sergeant Reed said something about you still having your apartment over on …"
Lois interrupted him, "All right, all right, I do, but my sister Lucy is taking over that lease. Clark and I live here … together."
"Now that we have that straightened out," Henderson turned to Clark and asked, "Anything missing?"
Clark was still shaken and replied, unsteadily, "Yes, Inspector. I mean, we haven't … checked everything."
Henderson reached into his inside jacket pocket and pulled out a folded sheet of paper, "Fill this out. Bring it down to the station."
Clark looked at the paper, blankly, "What is it?"
Henderson could see that Clark was shaken by this experience and took pity on him, "Inventory of stolen items. Don't forget serial numbers. Something turns up, we'll call you." He started to turn away, but thought better of it and faced Clark again, "Don't hold your breath. We've had a lot of these type break-ins in this neighborhood lately."
As Henderson finally turned to leave, he was accosted by Lois, "That's it? That's all? Don't you look for clues? Dust for prints?"
Henderson stopped and addressed Lois in his normal, phlegmatic tone, "Waste of time."
Lois had really been hoping for something a little more helpful and this no help response just served to irritate her, "Waste of … let me tell you a little story, Henderson."
Humoring her, Henderson said, "Shoot."
Lois warmed to her topic and started painting a word picture, "It's late at night. A sweet, innocent little old lady, probably someone's grandmother, is preparing for bed. Suddenly, burglars burst in, knock her down, and steal her life savings from underneath her mattress." She paused for a reaction. When she didn't receive the reaction she had hoped for she asked, "Wanna know why?"
Henderson, deadpanned, "I'll bite. Why?"
Lois, confident that she was about to score a point against Henderson, replied in an almost scornful manner, "Because some cop like you was too lazy to dust for prints on a prior, so the burglars were never caught."
Unmoved by Lois's story, Bill deadpanned, "Good story."
Smugly, Lois replied, "Thank you."
Henderson replied, "Now I got one for you. Wanna hear it?"
Lois threw Henderson's words back at him when she said, "Shoot."
Henderson put his hands in his pockets and rocked somewhat on his feet as he spoke, "That same sweet, innocent, little old grandmother is preparing for bed when she hears burglars breaking into her house. She rushes to the phone and dials 911, but, by the time help comes, it's too late. Wanna know why?"
Lois was a little afraid to ask, but couldn't avoid it, "Why?"
Henderson could very well have been a smug in his reply as Lois had been with hers, but he maintained his deadpan delivery as he replied, "Because all the good cops are out somewhere else
dusting for prints." Henderson turned his head and nodded to Clark then turned on his heel and walked out of the apartment leaving a fuming Lois in his wake.
Clark walked over to her and said, "Calm down, Lois. He's right and you know it."
"Yeah, but I don't have to like it."
Together they walked into the bedroom. They both breathed a sigh of relief when they realized that the closet with their clothes and the secret compartment with his spare Suits was untouched. Lois pointed and said, "Thank heaven for small favors. At least the secret is safe."
The rest of the room was in as much disarray as the living room had been. Standing in the doorway, Clark used his telescopic vision to examine the space.
Suddenly, he gasped and sped over to the area by the wall. Lois asked, "What is it?"
Clark picked up the little chest and displayed it to Lois. In disheartened tones, he said, "The globe, it's gone."
Lois looked stricken, "Oh, no. After all this time … you were about to find out your history. You know, I've been looking for an angle on the robbery story, this could be it. It isn't so much the monetary value, although that is something, it's the emotional trauma of losing keepsakes. Forget the monetary loss: It's stealing parts of a person's past. The sense of vulnerability, of invasion. Urban angst. You feel violated. The memories involved. Those kinds of things are irreplaceable. Let's just hope that this doesn't fall into that category. Look, let's think about this. The globe said that there would be five messages, right?"
Clark nodded absently.
Lois persisted, "It said that it was attuned to you and since we were, what, attuned to each other, then it was also attuned to me, right?"
Starting to see where she was going with this, he perked up some, "Right. Attuned to you and me."
She was thinking out loud, bouncing ideas off of him the way they did when they were working on a story, "Will it work for anyone else?"
He was deep in thought for a few seconds before he answered, "I don't know. I wasn't even aware that it would do anything until the other morning."
"Let's assume that it will only work for you or me. Does one of us have to be holding it for it to work?"
"Again, we don't know. It started by itself the other day. It lit up by itself. After I touched it the hologram started."
"Well, unless the light turns on again, maybe whoever took it will think it's just a plain old globe." She grabbed her bag and slung the strap over her shoulder then she reached for Clark's arm and said, "Don't worry, Clark. We'll get it back, maybe the rest of our stuff as well. Maybe the
police can't help, but
I know who
can." She dragged him toward the door.
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
In an alley in a rundown section of Suicide Slum, a young boy of perhaps sixteen was cautiously making his way, constantly checking to make sure he wasn't being followed. Suddenly in the near distance he heard a police siren and flattened against a wall, behind a dumpster. Once the police car was past he peeked out to assure himself that the coast was in fact clear before coming out from behind the dumpster. Making his way further down the alley he spotted his objective, but before hazarding an entrance, he had to be certain that he wasn't being followed. He crouched down behind a pile of debris and scouted the area with his eyes and ears. He could hear some vermin crawling around in the garbage with which the alley was littered, but no other noises intruded. Looking around he concentrated on the shadows. When none of the shadows had moved for a minute he broke from his cover and sprinted, as well as he could bearing the burden that he had, for the boarded up doorway to the abandoned building. His skinny frame slid easily through the gap in the boards that covered the entrance. Once inside he held his breath and listened again. This time all he heard the soft snoring of his brother and he started to relax.
Making his way deeper into the building he finally entered a room that had a couple of beds a makeshift table and some cartons as chairs. His brother was dozing on one of the beds. He unslung the canvas bag that he'd had over his shoulder and dumped it on the unoccupied bed. Out tumbled a miscellaneous pile of odds and ends, mostly sports trophies and personal property like a CD player with CDs and a VCR. In amongst these odds and ends was a small globe and an instant camera.
Suddenly, the globe started to glow while the face melted and flowed, changing from a representation of Earth to once again assuming the map of Krypton.
The thief reached down to pick it up. The globe floated up out of his hand and beams of coherent light started to emanate from it. Just as the picture of a man started to solidify, he muttered, "What
are you?" and as if responding to his voice it suddenly stopped and fell to the bed.
The noise of the stuff clattering onto the bed had awakened the sleeper.
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
As Lois was attempting to comfort Clark, suddenly they both ‘heard'
"This is the second of the five times I will appear," but that was a far as the message went before it was suddenly cut off.
Lois and Clark exchanged a look and both muttered, "The globe."
Clark had a worried expression as he said, "I wonder if whoever has it now can see and hear the messages."
Lois replied, "We can only hope not. We don't want too many people knowing too much about Superman. They might be able to fit the puzzle pieces together and that could be dangerous, especially in the wrong hands ..."
With chagrin, Clark replied, "Yeah, like Luthor."
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
The sleeper called from the bed, "Jack?"
Turning from looking at the globe and said, "Yeah, Denny. I'm here. Thirsty?"
Denny was sitting on the edge of the cot, rubbing sleep from his eyes when he nodded in reply to Jack's question and accepted the canteen from his older brother.
After taking a deep draught he asked, "How'd you do?"
Jack had an odd expression on his face as he replied, "I did good."
Denny got up from the cot and moved to Jack's bed. Seeing the pile of stuff he started rifling through it. He saw and instant camera and picking it up, pointed it at Jack and said, "Smile," as he clicked the shutter triggering the flash. The camera spit out the picture as Jack grabbed the camera from his brother.
Chiding him, Jack said, "Cut it out!"
Spotting the globe Denny started to reach for it. As he did, he asked, "What's that thing?"
With a crooked grin, Jack answered, "That's our ticket out of here." He looked significantly around the room indicating their surroundings.
Denny started to reach for the globe, but Jack stopped him, saying, "Careful! Don't touch it!"
Denny had been about to make contact when Jack said that and jerked his hand back as if from a hot stove. Once he had retreated some, he asked, "What'll happen?"
With a conspiratorial air, Jack said, "Never mind."
Denny picked up on Jack's mood and looked at the globe, suspicion in his eyes, "Think it's worth something?"
Jack considered for a few seconds before he answered, "Yeah. A lot. But we've got to find the right buyer."
Denny was quizzical, "How do we do that?"
Suddenly realizing that he was still holding the camera and an idea forming with that knowledge, he said, "We advertise."
Jack removed the picture Danny had taken of him and prepared the camera for more pictures. Once it was ready, he picked up the globe …
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