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Wrong Place, Wrong Time, Wrong Clark TOC can be found Here

Where we left off in Part 130 …

Remy returned to the conference room and shot into the ceiling, dropping more debris onto the conference table. “That sure sounded a hell of a lot like flinching to me,” she said.

They all instantly shut up and jumped back in their chairs.

Clark heard another gunshot and a scream of pain, but didn’t dare look away from this woman. It had been quiet enough, he doubted the others had heard it with their ears ringing from Remy’s shot.

“That’s better. You and you, come with me,” Remy said, pointing at the Jimmys.

Their eyes widened in fear.

Jimmy gulped. “Why?”

“That’s for me to know, and you to find out,” Remy taunted sweetly, but her sweetness came out as pure villainy. “You did just say you wanted to die, didn’t you?”

“Take me instead,” Clark insisted, standing up.

“Clark?” Lois sputtered, stumbling to her feet. Luckily, it took a lot to knock him off balance.

Remy came over and ran her hand from Clark’s shoulder to his elbow and back to his shoulder, pausing to squeeze his muscle. “Awww. Is she torturing you enough that you want me to put you out of your misery, four-eyes? Too bad. If we need you, we’ll call you.” She pushed Clark back down into his seat and opened Perry’s office door, leading the Jimmys inside and shutting the door behind them.

Part 131

Clark and Lois rushed to the window. Perry and Luthor followed more slowly, having to make it around the table.

“What’s she doing?” Lois said, taking Clark’s hand in hers. He appreciated the gesture.

If Remy, that crazy female terrorist, shot at the Jimmys, Clark would give up his real life to save them. He loved Lois, but he wouldn’t hide behind a pair of glasses and let his friends die.

“Take this desk and move it against the wall, there,” Remy told the Jimmys, who were still handcuffed together. She waved the gun towards the back wall with the bookcases.

“She’s having them move furniture,” Clark explained just in time for the others to witness Jimmy and Jimbo each take a corner of the desk and push.

Lois exhaled against Clark’s chest.

“Throw that box of junk into the corner, too,” Remy ordered, after they had moved the desk against the back wall.

“Oh, no! Not my Elvis box!” Perry gasped, pressing his free hand against the window.

“Be careful,” Jimmy said to his cousin as he lifted up the box. “That’s the Chief’s most prized stuff.”

Jimbo nodded in understanding.

“Wait!” Remy said, peering into the box. “You’ve got to be kidding? Elvis junk? We should do him a favor and throw it out the window.”

“Could you tell what she said about my box?” Perry said, glancing at Clark. “Lois told me that you can read lips.”

Clark cleared his throat. “She was just checking to see if there was anything in there she wanted to keep for herself. There wasn’t.”

“It just goes to show…” Perry grumbled, but he gazed in relief as Jimbo set his prized Elvis box down gently on his desk. “That woman has no class.”

Lois looked up at Clark, and they shared a smile.

“I beg to differ, Perry. ‘Madame Butterfly’ has class. Elvis was… well…” Luthor seemed at a loss for exactly what Elvis was.

“I recommend for the future of your health, Lex, that you don’t finish that sentence,” Perry warned.

Luthor returned his stare, not backing down from the challenge. “Very pedestrian.”

“Damn straight, Lex. Elvis was one of the people. He grew up poor, he gave back to community, and he fought for his country,” Perry argued, taking the most positive interpretation of that word possible.

“So, in many ways he sounds like me,” Luthor drawled, making Clark sick to his stomach. “Although, I leave singing to those who are up to the task.” He took Lois’s left hand in his and bent down to kiss it.

“Watch it, Luthor,” Clark said, fixing his gaze on the man.

“Just because Lois is currently attached to you, Kent, doesn’t mean that she belongs to you,” Luthor replied.

“And being her date doesn’t mean she belongs to you either,” Clark returned, patting Luthor’s cheek with his left hand, which was also brought close to Luthor’s face with Lois’s hand. “I just don’t want you to kiss my hand by mistake.”

“For the six billionth time, boys, I belong to nobody but myself. I’m not a prized possession for you to fight over,” Lois said, jerking her hand away.

Luthor winced as Clark’s hand bumped his arm during this motion.

“Sorry. How’s your shoulder?” Clark asked, glancing at Luthor’s wound over the top of his glasses. It looked like his little intervention had stopped most of the major bleeding, at least from the entry wound. The exit wound, though larger, didn’t seem as bad. He wondered why that was.

“Oh, please, I don’t want any of your false sympathies,” Luthor returned.

“You’d be bleeding to death if it weren’t for him,” Perry said.

Luthor stared at him as if he saw Clark in a new light. “Is that true? You saved my life, Kent?”

The retort ‘Don’t ask me if I’d do it again’ froze on Clark’s lips. In Luthor’s eyes, Clark saw awe and admiration, along with the unasked question: ‘Why?’ Clark cleared his throat. “You were dying, and I couldn’t let the bad guys win. Anyone would have done the same.” The phrase ‘don’t ask me if I’d do it again’ passed through his mind once more, but he kept it at bay.

Clark felt Lois softly touch his stomach with her hand, telling him that not ‘anyone’ would have done the same. He returned the gesture, by brushing her hand with his index finger, to let her know that he had received her message.

“Oh, man, not my carpet,” Perry groaned, raising his hand to his forehead.

Clark returned his gaze to the Chief’s office and saw that Remy was now having the Jimmys cut and pull up the carpeting.

“Well, it looks like we found Dragonetti’s vault,” Jimmy said wryly to Jimbo.

“It’s been here all the time,” Jimbo replied with a grin towards his cousin. “Right under the Chief’s…”

Jimmy shot Jimbo a hard glare.

“…nose,” Jimbo finished. “But it’s not exactly what I was hoping for as an epitaph.”

“Yeah, me either. I wanted something more like: ‘Here lies James Olsen. He lived a long full life, loved by his friends, his wife, and his children’,” Jimmy said, his voice growing quieter with each word. “I’m not getting to get any of that, am I?”

“What happened to ‘inventor of the hover car’?” Jimbo teased.

Jimmy glanced over at his friends watching them in the windows. “My priorities have changed since we were five, Cuz.”

“What did he just say?” Perry asked, glancing at Clark.

Clark cleared his throat. “He doesn’t want to die,” he murmured.

“Enough of this,” Lois said, stepping back and forcing Clark to do likewise. “Someone has got to get us out of this mess.” She lifted their joined hands up and over her head twisting them around until their arms were uncrossed, but now her front faced Clark’s back.

“I don’t see this as an improvement unless you’d like me to sit your lap now,” Clark said.

“I’m not done,” Lois snapped, raising their hands over their heads again, flipping them around as if they were doing some sort of dance move. When she finished, they were in the same position they had been in when they had started, only now their arms were no longer crossed.

“Well, I’ll be…” Perry said.

Lois pulled a bobby pin out of her hair and started to work on their handcuffs again. “You two keep an eye on the door to the office. Let us know if Remy starts acting serious with her gun again,” she said, tugging Clark back over to the conference table.

Clark wrapped his arms around her briefly and murmured in her ear, “Have I told you lately how much I love you?”

She paused and glanced up at him. “No, Chuck, you haven’t,” she said, and then continued working on the cuffs. She lowered her voice to a soft whisper, but didn’t glance his way again. “Minha already knows how much you love her. She…”

The chimes of the elevator interrupted Lois.

“Guys,” Perry said, nodding towards the newsroom.

Fuentes exited the elevator, pushing a cleaning cart full of equipment.

***

Asabi wasn’t quite sure why he had killed that man in the van; he only knew that the man could be an unknown factor while he rescued the Lex-Clone from this situation it had gotten itself into. Killing the man was the simplest and quickest way to accomplish that task. Once Mr. Luthor knew that Asabi did as much as he could to rescue the Lex-Clone, he might be more lenient on Asabi for the blunder of letting it and Ms. Lane go to the Daily Planet at all.

Although, Asabi wasn’t sure exactly what he could have done otherwise. Ms. Lane had asked him point blank to stop by the Daily Planet because she needed to make a change to her article. When Asabi had looked to the Lex-Clone to countermand that order and insist they continue on to the opera, the Lex-Clone hadn’t done it. Sure, it had tried to mention the lack of time, but when Ms. Lane had pushed right past its arguments and said she would only take five minutes the Lex-Clone had relented.

Therefore, when five minutes had stretched into ten, and then an hour, Asabi hadn’t been surprised in the least. He had figured Mr. Luthor would consider this clone a failure like the others, only this time as a pushover, and his boss soon to be on to the Lex-D clone. Asabi had tried to warn Mr. Luthor that the Lex-C was too eager to please and didn’t have its father’s killer streak, not that Asabi had used those exact words.

Asabi had been in a janitorial closet in the parking garage, washing off his hands, when he saw Ms. Grant pass by. An older man, who seemed to be very protective of her, accompanied her. He waited a few moments and then followed them out of the parking garage, where he learned that the older gentleman was not only a policeman, but had also found the body in the van. Asabi thought it funny that anyone would consider his actions that of a vigilante, and allowed himself a brief smile.

He didn’t follow them when they went to go meet up with S.W.A.T., knowing even the MPD should be able to handle one gunman and that hot-tempered woman, and free the Lex-Clone and the other hostages. His boss’s clone would soon be rushed off to hospital to deal with its gunshot wound, and Asabi had to do everything in his power to stop that from happening.

Mr. Luthor only allowed his own private doctors, even in case of an emergency, to tend to him. That was truer in this scenario, since Mr. Luthor’s clone was part frog and needed specialized medicine to heal properly. It was still maturing mentally and aging physically. One of Dr. Leek’s breakthroughs with the fast-maturing clones was that they healed faster as well.

***

“Do you have the office ready?” Fuentes called as he pushed the cleaning cart, which Lois supposed was full of the equipment that had made all that noise downstairs earlier.

“Ready and waiting,” Remy replied from Perry’s open office door.

While Remy and the Jimmys had been busy destroying Perry’s office, the Chief had opened the door a crack so that they all could hear what Remy was saying.

“Terrific,” Fuentes said.

“Where are the guys?” Remy asked.

“Newberry is still knocked out. Blackman has burns across his chest, and Schumack has been shot,” Fuentes explained, pushing his cart to the office door. “Apparently, Superman jumped them after they all were distracted by some woman changing her clothes on the sidewalk down below.”

Lois rolled her eyes. That sounded like Cat all right.

“And you worried about bringing me on?” Remy scoffed with a shake of her head.

Lex whispered. “Superman doesn’t shoot people, does he?”

“No,” Lois said abruptly to his stupid question.

“That guy shot Schumack,” Clark said, nodding towards Fuentes, but didn’t offer any explanation on how he knew this.

Fuentes stopped short at the door and stared at the Jimmys. “What are they doing in there?”

“My minions,” Remy informed him.

“Well, get rid of ‘em. We don’t need ‘em anymore,” Fuentes said.

The Jimmys backed up and lifted their hands as Remy raised her weapon to fire upon them.

The handcuff fell from Clark’s wrist, and Lois’s wide eyes jumped to Clark’s face. Was that woman really going to shoot the guys?

Clark took a step forward, straining against the other handcuff, when Fuentes set his hand on his associate’s arm.

“Put them back in the pen with the others,” Fuentes clarified. “I don’t need the stench of their dead bodies distracting me.”

A disappointed Remy nodded and shoved the Jimmys towards the conference room. Clark turned Lois away from the door and wrapped his arms back around her as if they were still in the pretzel position that Remy had cuffed them in.

For a second there, Lois had thought Clark was going to enter Perry’s office, damning their future by revealing his secret identity. Never before had she ever been thankful for the actions of a terrorist, even a non-political type one. If Clark had shown himself to be Superman in front of Lex or the other bad guys, then their relationship would be back to square one: Clark wouldn’t be able to have a relationship with Lois due to his superhero status.

It suddenly made a lot more sense to her than it had done before why Clark or Superman, or whoever was his true self, needed to have that other persona. Still, that didn’t explain why he couldn’t have just told her instead of playing this merry tune and making her dance. If she had known from the beginning… hell, at this point, she would have been happy knowing from the middle!... their lives would’ve been a whole lot less complicated.

Instead of working on taxes and making faux dates with creepy billionaires and whoring reporters from other news outlets, they could have been off on a romantic clothing-optional weekend. On the other hand, if she and Clark were off making love on a deserted island, Perry and the Jimmys would be dealing with these psychos on their own, and Superman wouldn’t have been around to save Secretary Wallace’s life when Carpenter tried to off him for a headline the previous day.

So much for a complication-free relationship.

Just as Remy set her hand on the doorknob to the conference room, the phone in Perry’s office began to ring.

Lois could hear Fuentes yelling at Remy. “What’s going on? I thought you said the phones were down.”

“They are!” Remy retorted. “I knocked out all the phone lines above the first floor.”

“The line died while I was in the middle of my pizza order,” Jimbo said.

“You!” Fuentes said, pointing at Jimbo. “Answer the phone.”

“I don’t really work…” Jimbo tried to explain, but Remy’s gun pointed at his head changed his mind for him. “Hello, Daily Planet. James Olsen speaking,” he said into the phone. “Uh-huh… Newsroom?”

Clark released Lois and turned back towards the doors so that she could see what was happening.

“Uh-huh… um… six?” Jimbo said uncertainly, glancing at his captors. “That’s right.”

Fuentes pushed the ‘speaker’ button on Perry’s telephone, and they could all hear the deep tones of some man whose voice Lois didn’t know.

“…ists are there?” the man asked.

Jimbo cleared his throat and set down the receiver, keeping his eyes on Fuentes. “Two, Detective Tuzzolino, and you’re now on speakerphone,” he said, holding out his hand towards the phone as if to say to Fuentes that ‘you’re on’.

“This is Detective Tuzzolino of the Metropolis Police Department. To whom do I have the pleasure of speaking?” the man on the phone said.

“The man in charge,” Fuentes answered.

“Fair enough. Is there a name I should call you? It’s quite a mouthful saying ‘man in charge’ every time I address you,” the detective responded.

“No.”

“Fine, then I’ll call you ‘Mic’, the abbreviation of Man in Charge. Is that okay with you?”

“Yeah, fine, Tuzzo. What do you want?” Fuentes demanded. “I’ve got things to do and people to kill.”

Jimbo swallowed, and he and Jimmy took another step backwards towards the conference room.

“Oh, now, let’s not get hasty. I just wanted to let you know that we set up this phone line to talk directly with you. If you lift up the receiver, you’ll be instantly connected to us, or vice-versa. Also, the Daily Planet building is now surrounded by our S.W.A.T. team and that your partner William Robertson has given himself up.”

Fuentes scowled and cursed under his breath.

Perry’s shoulders fell. He looked over at Lois and Clark and mouthed ‘Willie’. Lois squeezed Clark’s hand.

“Your three men on the floor below you have been subdued as well as the driver of your getaway van,” Tuzzolino went on. “So, that leaves you and the woman holding the six hostages. I recommend that you two give up and let your hostages go before any more of them are hurt, which would make things worse for you.”

“They know about Lex,” Lois mouthed more than whispered to Perry, and he agreed with a nod.

“You seem well informed, Tuzzo,” Fuentes snapped. “How is that? Has Superman been spying on us?”

Clark stiffened and yet stepped closer to the door.

“It’s Tuzzolino, but that’s not important,” the detective said. “We were informed of your actions by a witness who escaped and Robertson has willingly thrown you under the bus since you ‘reneged on your deal’, or so he says, about ‘no guns’,” Tuzzolino said, being more than candid about where he got his information. At least, the detective hadn’t mentioned Cat by name. He had neither confirmed nor denied Superman’s involvement as well. “Now, are you going to release the hostages?”

“No,” Fuentes answered. “Did your so-called witness mention my bomb?” He pulled the small transistor radio sized bomb off his belt and held it up to the Jimmys.

“Bomb? No… no… it wasn’t mentioned. Why don’t you tell me about that bomb, Mic?” Tuzzolino asked.

From his casual tone, Lois was quite sure he had heard of it. How had Cat learned all about that and told Inspector Henderson? And how had Clark known about Cat and Henderson in the first place?

“It’s a dirty nuclear bomb, which I’m going to detonate if I see one greased-back hair on Superman’s head or anyone creeping around in black flak jackets. Got it?”

“Er… got it. Do you mind if I just verify this information with your hostage James Olsen?” Tuzzolino asked, and even Lois could hear the slight shake to his voice.

Fuentes pointed his pistol at Jimbo and indicated the phone. “Yeah. He’s got a bomb, Detective, and he seems serious about using it too.”

“Do you think you could describe…” the detective started before Fuentes interrupted him.

“Enough talk. I’ve got things to do. Call back if you have something better to offer me instead of life in prison,” Fuentes replied, and pressed the ‘speaker’ button, essentially ending that call. He pointed his gun into Jimbo’s face. “You’re lucky I don’t want your blood slicking up my workspace.”

Jimbo nodded repeatedly in agreement.

Remy opened the conference room door, releasing the Jimmys back into the wilds of the conference room with a kick to Jimbo’s backside, and quickly slammed the door again.

“I thought I was a goner,” Jimbo gulped, plopping back down in his chair.

“It really puts a new perspective on life, making it through such a situation,” Jimmy announced.

“It isn’t over yet, boys,” Lois reminded them. “We’ve still gotta capture those guys and get rid of that bomb.”

“Help, Superman?” Jimmy suggested very, very softly.

“I’m sure he kept an eye on you during that whole ordeal, Jimmy,” Clark said, his voice sounding strained.

Lois set her free hand on Jimmy’s shoulder to reassure him. If Jimmy only knew that Superman had almost risked his entire private life for him...

“So, MPD is here and knows about us. That’s good,” Lex said with confidence Lois did not feel. “We should be out of here soon.”

Perry shot his handcuff-mate a skeptical expression as he and Lex returned to their seats at the table. “I’ve been thinking,” he said, ignoring Lex’s foolhardy optimism. “Jimmy, can I have those notes on what we know about these guys that you two took earlier?”

Jimmy and Jimbo exchanged a silent look and then shrugged. Jimbo bent down and pulled the papers from the floor under the table, where they had dumped them when Fuentes had barged in demanding to know how they had contacted Superman. Jimmy slid the papers across the table to the Chief.

“What’s up?” Lois asked, sitting back down on Clark’s knee. This position was a bit more professional than being in her partner’s embrace, although she had to admit, not as pleasant. She started working on the other handcuff to keep her mind off how having Clark hold her for the past half-hour had made her feel.

Jimbo pointed at Lois. “That’s how you got free from the chairs before,” he exclaimed, earning himself an elbow in the ribs from his cousin.

“Jimmy, why don’t you start working on yours?” Lois suggested, pulling another bobby pin from her hair and tossing it across the table.

“Go on, Chief,” Clark said. “Have you come up with something?”

Perry flipped quickly through the Jimmys’ notes. “Lois, did you say that Fuentes carried that bomb on his belt?”

Lois nodded without more than a quick glance in his direction before returning to picking of the lock on the handcuffs.

“Yeah,” Jimbo agreed. “That’s where he pulled it from just now.”

“That’s what I thought. My idea is in no way conclusive,” Perry warned. “But I’ve had a couple of thoughts. Firstly, I’ve never heard of a nuclear bomb that could fit into such a small package. The smallest I’ve heard of is a suitcase-sized bomb, and even those are rare. Secondly, in my limited experience, nuclear bombs are always, always treated with kid gloves. People tip-toe around them, even to the point of whispering as so not to set them off.” He pointed towards his office where the sounds of a jackhammer started up again. “Clearly, this bozo doesn’t care whether or not this bomb will go off.”

Clark leaned forward. “You don’t think it’s a nuclear bomb?”

“Exactly,” Perry replied. “That isn’t a nuclear bomb.”

“But it still could be another type of bomb,” Lex pointed out.

“True,” Perry reluctantly admitted.

“Or it could just be a transmitter to a real nuclear bomb, which is located somewhere nearby,” Clark said.

Perry pointed at him. “That, or it’s just a decoy. A real bomb could have easily gone off with all the jostling he’s done with it.”

“I’m not feeling any better about this,” Jimbo grumbled.

“Don’t worry,” Lois said, popping the second lock on their handcuffs with a grin. “Superman’s on the case. Clark, why don’t you run up to the roof, while they’re distracted and see if you can contact Superman? I’ll hide under the conference table and pretend we’re trying to sleep.”

Clark stared at her for ten whole seconds, nodded, and then stood up, just as the phone in Perry’s office began to ring once more.

Lois stood up with him. “Do you think it might be the MPD again so soon?”

“Might be,” Perry murmured.

Clark and Lois stepped up to the door, mocking their pretzel position once more, and cracked it open, so that everyone could hear what was going on in Perry’s office.

The jackhammer turned off, and Fuentes nodded to Remy to answer the phone this time.

“What do you want?” Remy demanded, after pressing the ‘speaker’ button on the phone.

“Ah, hello. You must be Mic’s associate. I’m Detective Tuzzolino. What may I call you, Miss?” the policeman asked.

“You can call me impatient. What do you want?” Remy answered.

“Oh, ‘impatiens’? Like the flowering plant? Beautiful,” Tuzzolino said.

Jimmy glanced up in disbelief. “Our lives are in this guy’s hands?”

Lois couldn’t help but agree. Thankfully, she only put her life in Superman’s caring hands. “Superman will save us,” she reminded him, giving Clark’s hand a light squeeze.

Clark returned a brief smile before returning his attention to Perry’s office.

Remy sneered at Fuentes. “Can I just shoot the phone?”

Fuentes waved her off. “What do you want, Tuzzo? I believe I told you to leave us alone.”

“Oh, you did, Mic, you did. Unfortunately, it’s my job to try to get those hostages out by any means possible, so my boss is insisting that I keep the lines of communication open until we get some reassurances from you that you’re willing to negotiate,” the detective replied.

“Unfortunately?” Lois repeated.

“He’s trying to be folksy with them and build some rapport with him,” Perry whispered. “Now, hush!”

Lois rolled her eyes at Tuzzolino’s technique. If Fuentes didn’t even trust his own men, why would he trust a police detective trying to bring him in?

“My boss is willing to negotiate with you. So, what would it take for you to let the injured man go?” Tuzzolino asked.

Of course, Lex would be the first to be let go. Big surprise there.

“Since I’ve already declined Mr. Luthor’s offer of sixty million dollars, I doubt there is much you can do to persuade me otherwise,” replied Fuentes.

Sixty million dollars? Lois turned and stared at Lex aghast. He appeared equally surprised.

“Did he just say that there is thirty million dollars in Dragonetti’s vault?” Jimmy asked.

“I believe he did, son,” Perry replied. “I believe he did.”

Jimbo let off a soft, low whistle. “Hey, I bet that would solve lots of the Daily Planet’s circulation problems in a jiffy. ‘Daily Planet offers monthly sweepstakes to subscribers’,” he suggested.

“The Daily Planet is perfectly sound and doesn’t need to buy readers,” Lois corrected Jimbo. Pulling her gaze away from Lex, she shot Jimbo a glare she wished would silence him. The last thing the Daily Planet needed was for Lex to sense blood in the water and decide a takeover bid was the way to go.

“I’ll keep it under advisement,” Perry said.

“Shhh!” Clark whispered with a finger to his lips.

“Come on, Mic. Work with me here. At least, let the woman go…” Tuzzolino started.

“Woman? Woman!” Remy snapped. “Let me tell you one thing, Detective, that Lane woman isn’t some wilting flower in need of special treatment.” She pointed her gun at the telephone. “Do we have to listen to this jerk? One more sexist remark out of him, and I swear I’ll shoot that phone to kingdom come.”

Lois wasn’t sure if she appreciated having Remy as her women’s rights advocate.

“Uh-oh, you’ve got Lois Lane hostage? Hold on a second,” Tuzzolino said.

“What does he mean by that?” Lois asked, turning to Clark. He merely shrugged and shook his head.

“My boss says he’d be okay with you releasing Ms. Lane, even though she’ll interfere with our operation here on the ground,” Tuzzolino said, coming back on the line. “Anyway, he figures you’d probably want her off your hands by now. Me, personally, I’ve heard about her. You can keep her.”

“Is this guy serious?” Lois hissed. “I’m beginning to think it’s Ralph pulling some sick joke.”

“Pay him no heed, my dear,” Lex said in a soothing tone.

“He’s using reverse psychology, Lois, to get them to release you,” Clark mumbled in her ear, making her feel better about their chances and Detective Tuzzolino, not that she fully believed Clark.

“My boss is saying if I can’t get any results from negotiation, he’s going to have to turn off the power to the building,” Tuzzolino warned. “You wouldn’t want that, now would you?”

“Maybe we should all sneak out the back way now, while the MPD is keeping the two of them busy,” Jimmy suggested in a low voice, leaning across the table. He had just finished unlocking his handcuff and was rubbing his wrist.

“Best idea I’ve heard all day,” Perry agreed, rising to his feet.

Suddenly, Remy was at the door, tapping the glass with the muzzle of her gun and shaking her head.

Perry sat back down. “Or not.”

“Well, you tell your boss that the hostages are hungry because they never got their pizza order, so send up a couple of extra large cheese pies and some soda while we think about what we want to do next,” Fuentes said, hanging up.

“All right,” Jimbo said, relaxing into his chair with a smile. The rest of them looked to him in amazement. “What? I’m hungry.”

Perry pulled an apple out of the fruit basket and tossed it to him.

“That should shut MPD up for a while,” Fuentes told Remy. “I’m almost through to the vault and I don’t need electricity or light for the blowtorch. If he calls back, tell him we want him to set free a couple of the criminals Lois Lane and the Daily Planet have put away over the years, in exchange for our hostages.”

“Which one?” Remy asked, gazing over a list she pulled from her pocket.

Fuentes shrugged. “Does it matter? They’ll think it political, and it’ll buy us more time.” He looked over her shoulder at the list. “What about that guy?”

“Kyle Griffin? Isn’t he a gunrunner?” she asked.

Psycho is more like it, Lois corrected in her mind. She glanced back at Perry, and saw that he too remembered Griffin from her first big story.

“Sounds good to me,” Fuentes said with a smile. “You keep an eye on the hostages, in case they get any crazy ideas.”

“Terrific. We’ll have the money, but no way to escape,” Remy retorted.

“We’ll contact our helicopter pilot to fly back by with a rope ladder,” Fuentes said.

“I should shoot these people now,” Remy said, gazing at them through the window. “They’re more hassle than they’re worth.”

“They were. Now, they’re our bargaining chips to freedom,” Fuentes replied, putting his safety glasses back over his eyes and starting up the jackhammer once more.

***End of Part 131***

Part 132

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