A/N: And here we are... the last part. In order to rescue a doomed plot, I had to do the one thing I had promised myself I wasn't going to do with this story. After months and months of not being able to fix it, I decided that this was the only way. I hope you (and especially Elisabeth) will forgive me.
~.~.~.~.~.~.~.~
When Clark came out of Perry's office, his ears were ringing to the tune of "facts, facts, facts!"
Caught in the excitement of it all - starting with STAR Lab's confirmation of what Pratt had been saying all along - both Clark and Lois had been very much convinced that they had what they needed for their exposé. Of course, in hindsight, all they had were shaky facts, circumstantial evidence, and a lot of Lois's opinions...but that was it.
Clark shot a dirty look toward the Planet's new owner who was surrounded by a group of women apparently hanging on his every word. The man made it so easy to think he was one of the good guys - elegant, charming and seductive, he had more than enough charisma to win just about anyone to his cause. Clark shook his head; the best way to look innocent was to act it, and Bruce Wayne certainly deserved an Oscar for his performance.
Meanwhile, Lois had run off to god only knew where, Clark had landed himself in his editor's doghouse, and worse yet, the launch of space station Prometheus still stood a very good chance of being cancelled, opening doors wide for private investors wanting to get in on the very lucrative race for medical research in space.
Eyes wide, Clark hit his forehead with his palm. That was it! Private investors. Other private investors. Why hadn't they thought of that?
While Wayne Aerospace was EPRAD's main supplier of parts, they weren't the only ones. There were others... Plenty of them: Queen Industries, Kord Enterprises, even LuthorCorp - the latter being notorious for coming in second and constantly losing bids to Wayne Enterprises, and its owner for holding a grudge against Bruce Wayne himself for well over a decade now.
Clark sat at his desk and started running searches on his computer, looking for any sort of correlation he could possibly find between these companies and all the facts he had on this case so far. Nervously, he tapped the side of the keyboard with his fingers, willing his computer to come up with something faster. If only databases could work at super speed, too...
And then all of a sudden, as he scrolled through the impressive amount of information that his searches had come up with, he found his answer. They'd been wrong all along, except on one count: Antoinette Baines was definitely hiding something.
Grabbing his jacket off the chair, Clark hurried over to the stairs. He didn't know where Lois had gone, but he had a pretty good hunch, and if he was right, she was likely to land herself in a whole heap of trouble.
~.~.~
Lois found breaking into the main hangar at EPRAD to be child's play. She'd gone through security like a hot knife through butter, and had found an unlocked door, far enough from the main entrance to be able to enter unnoticed. She hadn't even had to pick a lock, or even knock out a guard. This was almost too easy, she thought, as she walked inside and tried to find her way around the place.
However, Lois's luck ran out just as she'd found the jackpot - the wreckage from the space capsule that had exploded earlier that week - and someone came up behind her, hitting her solidly on the side of the head. She fell to the floor, unconscious.
When she came to, she was sitting on the floor, her back to some sort metal tubing around which she was handcuffed. Her legs were bound as well. So much for breaking into the place without being noticed, she thought as she looked around. For a moment, she considered shouting for help, but the only people around were more than likely not going to help her - quite the contrary.
Instead, Lois tried a different tactic. "You'll never get away with this!" she shouted over her shoulder to the two figures she could see in the shadows. "Everyone at the Planet knows where I am."
Just as she heard a woman's laughter, there was a loud noise and a door came flying into view. Lois's head snapped to the right and, from the entrance where the door used to be, she saw Clark walking in.
"Let her go," he told the two people still hidden in the shadows behind Lois.
They both came into view then. The woman was Antoinette Baines, just as he'd suspected. The man she was with looked like some sort of bodyguard. He was holding a machine gun aimed straight at Clark's chest.
"Put down that gun, or I'll..." Clark started before he realized what he was saying. He had nothing to threaten them with. At least not without exposing himself, and he wasn't ready to do that. Not now, not here. Not like this.
"Or you'll what?" asked Antoinette Baines, an eyebrow raised, looking quite unimpressed by the reporter's apparent macho display.
When Clark just shrugged and said nothing. Lois rolled her eyes and sighed in complete frustration. Leave it to a man to come barging into the lion's den, instead of using his head to get them out of this mess!
~.~.~
In a matter of minutes, Clark was tied up to the same metal pipe that Lois was already bound to.
"Answer one question..." Lois asked Baines. "Why?"
"It's simple, Lois," the woman replied in a falsely sweet tone. "Profit. Outer space is no different than any new frontier, it'll belong to those who get there first and seize the high ground. Sorry you won't be around to witness it..."
With that she laughed and walked away, an arm around her accomplice's shoulders.
"Lois, we were wrong," Clark said once he was sure their captors were out of hearing range.
Exasperated, Lois shot back, "You don't say! And by the way, nice going barreling in here like some five hundred pound gorilla. If you really thought we were in trouble, why didn't you bring the police?"
"Look--"
"Don't tell me, because I already know! You're like every other man in Metropolis. You've got this testosterone surplus that says 'I can do it myself!' Baines is going to kill us now... I don't know why she hasn't done it already."
Taken aback, Clark resisted the urge to tell her once again that he wasn't anything like every other man in Metropolis - or any other man on the planet, for that matter - but he was quite certain she wouldn't believe a word he'd say unless he could do something to get them out of here. So, he pulled on the chains that were keeping his hands bound together, and broke himself loose.
"Lois," he said calmly, "I've somehow managed to--"
"Mess everything up?" she shot back, still angry. "No kidding!"
"Now, hold on a second," Clark protested, frustration starting to bubble inside him. "I'm not the one who snuck in here--"
Outraged, Lois immediately replied, "What are you saying? Are you saying that this is my fault? At least, I had the guts to come in here and..." She paused, realizing that coming in here hadn't exactly amounted to anything positive so far. "What am I saying? This probably is my fault."
"Look, Lois, they're going to come back any minute now. There's something I need to tell you--"
"What difference does it make anyway?" she said dejectedly. "We're just going to die..."
"No, we're not!" Clark insisted. He stood up, went around to where Lois was sitting and started untying her.
"Clark? How did you...?" she asked so perplexed she could barely manage to order her thoughts enough to complete her sentence.
"Missing link," he replied, pulling her up. "That's what I've been trying to tell you."
As they ran out of the place, several shots were fired. Clark made sure Lois ran ahead of him the entire time. When they got to her car, he hoped she wouldn't notice the bullet holes that were undoubtedly visible on the back of his jacket.
They'd barely driven away from the main gates when, high in the sky above, a small helicopter that had just taken off from the hangar's rooftop exploded in a fiery rain of torn metal and broken glass.
Lois didn't need any visual proof to know exactly who'd been in the helicopter...
~.~.~
On the drive back to the Daily Planet, Clark explained how he'd figured out just who was responsible and why...
"Wayne pulled the plug on Baines' research a few weeks after she was awarded her prize," he told Lois. "Maybe a month or so. From one day to the next, her entire research team was reassigned, she was fired, and the entire project was literally swept under a rug somewhere."
"Yes, but that doesn't mean anything," Lois argued. "These rich types pull the plug on research all the time - they get bored of it, it doesn't look like it's going to bring in as much cash as they expected... You name it, the list of reasons is this long."
Clark nodded. "You're right, it doesn't mean anything." When Lois shot him a confused look, he added, "Other than the fact that she might have held a grudge. However, right after she was fired, she started working for someone else who holds a grudge against our dear new owner. Someone who's suspected of having ties with organized crime and who would have everything to gain, should Wayne Aerospace suddenly stop supplying parts to EPRAD... Lex Luthor."
"Luthor! Why didn't I think of that?" Lois gripped the steering wheel tightly, frustrated at herself for not looking any further than the surface.
Apparently, working with a handsome partner was seriously distracting her from doing her job properly. She'd have to ask Perry to get him assigned to whatever other beat he could that wasn't her own. And just when she was starting to realize that having a partner wasn't all that bad, after all...
Absently, she added, "I wonder if it's too late to try and finagle that interview out of Bruce Wayne now..."
Clark shrugged, opting to remain silent the rest of the drive back.
~.~.~
By the next morning, Antoinette Baines had been exposed as a saboteur; Wayne Aerospace had been cleared of all suspicion, and space station Prometheus was about to be launched, as originally planned.
Clark had flown back to Smallville to enlist his mother's help in creating some sort of costume he could wear that would enable him to help out in an emergency, without the need to reveal to the entire world that under his cheap business suits hid a man more powerful than anyone could possibly imagine.
Meanwhile, Lois had begged Perry for a chance to be on the station when it went up. She had hoped to give the Planet an exclusive account of what it was like to be on the colonist transport as it was launched into space. Her request had been denied almost immediately, much to her regret.
Of course, denied requests, rules and regulations had rarely ever stopped Lois Lane from doing anything...
~.~.~
Forty-five seconds before the scheduled launch of the space station Prometheus, Lois, having managed to get on board, strapped herself to a seat, out of view from the surveillance cameras.
All of a sudden, she heard a small beeping noise coming from a small display on the wall, on which there seemed to be a timer, counting down. Lois unhooked her seatbelt and ran over to the display.
"It's a bomb!" she said, blanching. "A bomb!"
She ran to the exit, but found it was now sealed. There was no way out. She started banging on the door, frantic, yelling, "Someone help! There's a bomb! Help!"
When it became obvious that no one had heard her and that no one would be coming to their rescue, Lois hurried back to where the bomb was stuck to the wall. She started looking around for anything that might enable her to defuse the explosive device. Grabbing a pair of pliers, she started hacking away at some wires, desperately willing that to be the right answer.
When she heard a voice over the speakers saying that the launch had been suspended due to an electrical malfunction, she knew that she'd at least accomplished something - perhaps in the thirty seconds they had left someone would open the sealed door, find the bomb and stop it in time before it killed her and everyone else on the transport.
As if by miracle, when Lois looked over her shoulder, she saw a man walking into the room - at least she thought he was a man. He wore an odd sort of getup, tight-fitting grey costume with what seemed to be black underwear on the outside. He had a black cape and, most surprisingly, a weird cowl with pointy ears on top, like a cat's.
"Who the hell are you? Darth Vader?" she asked, taking a few steps back and getting ready to defend herself against the potential attacker. Thank goodness for her Tae Kwon Do training.
"I'm Batman," he said in a low, gravely voice.
"What-man?" she asked, confused. Who was this weirdo? Though, more importantly, could he help?
Ignoring her question completely, Batman walked over to the wall where the bomb was. He ripped the front panel off of it and, pulling out some sort of Swiss army knife from a compartment on his belt, proceeded to defuse the explosive.
That's when another man came rushing into the room. He had on the same type of tight-fitting costume, complete with the underwear on the outside and the cape – though his attire was blue and red and he wasn't wearing a mask. As a completing touch, he had a huge diamond-shaped crest on his chest, with a big red S inside.
"Wait, let me guess," Lois said, rolling her eyes. "S-- something... Sparrow? Squirrel? Spider-Man, maybe? Is CostMart is having a sale on Halloween costumes, or what?"
The newcomer took one look at her and his eyes grew wide. Lois wasn't supposed to be here, he knew. Immediately he hoped that his mother had been right and that no one would recognize him in this costume. One thing was certain, if Lois Lane didn't recognize him as Clark Kent, he had the secret identity thing pretty much nailed.
He shook his head, clearing his thoughts and immediately headed for the man on his left who was still messing around with the bomb. One quick glance at the timer that was dangling on the side of the box told him they had less than ten seconds before the bomb went off. He waited about a millionth of a second before deciding that the other man's efforts were futile.
"Oh, give me that!" Clark told him, in an annoyed tone.
He reached in and grabbed the explosive from the box. Then, at Lois and Batman's complete astonishment, he popped it inside his mouth and swallowed it. An instant later, the bomb exploded and a strange gurgling sound emanated from somewhere around the area of his stomach. Small puffs of smoke came out of his nose and mouth.
"What are you?" Lois asked, looking at him in wide-eyed wonder.
"Show off!" Batman complained in that odd, gravely voice he had, which Clark was just about certain wasn't his regular one. "Just because you're some sort of super...man, doesn't mean you have to--"
"Superman," Lois echoed. She was completely mesmerized.
Clark had to fight against a smile that was threatening to split his face from ear to ear. Oh yeah, he thought, he had the secret identity bit covered for very sure. He even had a name to call himself from now on.
"Oh, for crying out loud," Batman mumbled, grabbing his cape and pulling it in toward his chest. As he left the room, he noted that the Superman's expression had suddenly turned into a confused frown.
~.~.~
Superman flew Lois back to the Daily Planet, coming into the newsroom through one of its large windows at the sheer astonishment of everyone there. They'd all heard about the man who'd saved the colonist transport and somehow lifted it up the platform and launched it into space. All by himself. No one had any idea how he'd done such a thing, but as they watched him fly into the newsroom, there was no longer any doubt in anyone's mind that he was capable of everything they'd heard about him - and maybe more.
They all gathered around Lois and the newcomer, much to her regret - she'd had less than five minutes with him, during which she'd let herself imagine that he was hers and hers alone, but now that they'd landed, Lois was quite sure she'd never have Superman all to herself again. She sighed and tried to be gracious about letting others come close enough to shake his hand and talk to him.
The crowd suddenly parted like the red sea, and through it walked Bruce Wayne, with the air of a man who - rightfully - owned the place.
"Welcome to the Daily Planet," he said, extending a hand to Superman. "And thank you for making sure that a very important part of the space program was saved today."
Superman shook his hand lightly, wondering just how much of the man's profit margin he'd just saved while doing so, and whether that was why he was smiling so much.
"That's what I'm here for," Superman replied. Lifting off the floor slightly, he added, "Now, if you'll excuse me, there are other matters for me to attend to."
"Oh, wait!" Lois called to him, "Superman? Wait... I think, considering the fact that I saw you first, you owe me an exclusive."
"Is that the rule?" he asked, smiling. He hoped no one would notice that he was a bit awed by her boldness. Under the flashy spandex suit, he was still just Clark Kent, and this woman was nothing short of fascinating.
She blushed before admitting, "Well, um, no. But... I'd appreciate it. Very much."
"Then I'm sure something can be arranged," he told her, nodding.
Still smiling in way that seemed exaggerated, Bruce Wayne cut it, "Feel free to drop by the Daily Planet any time you like. You'll always be welcome here."
Superman wasn't quite sure what to make of the man just yet. It seemed like he might have been counting hypothetical profits in his head while saying this... Then again, he'd also shown up at the launch and tried to help defuse a bomb. There was no telling if he would have been able to do so, had Superman not swallowed the thing, but he'd tried... Perhaps it was worth giving him the benefit of the doubt for now.
"Thank you," said Superman. As an afterthought, he added, "This does seem like a friendly place. I could tell... right off the bat." With that he gave Bruce an enigmatic smile before lifting several feet up in the air and flying out the open window.
Giving the man the benefit of the doubt was one thing, but that didn't mean he wasn't going to keep his eye on him...
A few short minutes later, when an out-of-breath Clark Kent came into the newsroom, people were slowly starting to return to their desks and their assignments.
"Did I miss anything?" he asked Lois, as he walked up to her. She was deep in conversation with the Planet's new owner - probably trying to secure her interview, Clark thought. He wasn't exactly unhappy to interrupt them.
"Where have you been?" Lois asked him, looking at Clark like he'd just asked the most ridiculous question in the history of ridiculous questions. "Superman was just here..."
"Super--?" Clark faked a confused look, hoping she'd believe him. "He was here? In the newsroom? You're kidding..."
Bruce chuckled lightly, and patted him on the shoulder amicably. "I'm sure you'll get another chance to see him, Kent. Just keep an eye out for blue tights and a red cape."
He shook his head and left in the direction of Perry White's office. Halfway there, Bruce looked over his shoulder toward Clark and, whispering to himself, said, "I'll certainly be keeping an eye on you myself... Superman."
=> The End.
