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From Part 14:What else could Lane possibly know about?
Nothing, so far as he knew. But that didn’t necessarily mean that she wasn’t... curious. He’d observed her from a distance for the past couple of years, after all: it didn’t do for a man in his position to ignore the journalist who, three years running, had walked off with the Kerth Award for Best Investigative Journalism. For investigative read nosy, naturally.
He would just have to take precautions.
And as for Kent... Lex scowled as he remembered the way the younger man had spoken to him. Kent had all but accused him of publicity-seeking in offering Allan Morris a new job. That kind of disrespect couldn’t go ignored. Perhaps... well, some sort of accident should do nicely. A couple of broken bones would suffice as punishment.
Nigel would see to it.
Smiling again, Lex Luthor turned away from the window and stabbed the bell to summon his assistant.
**********
Now read on...It wasn’t until he noticed the Sears Tower directly beneath him that Clark realised just how distracted he was. He was on his way to Kansas, and yet he’d drifted considerably further north. He didn’t even have the excuse that airlines had. He didn’t need to make allowances for the curvature of the Earth.
Lois Lane had him so distracted that he didn’t even know what he was doing.
Was it a mistake inviting her to stay?
On reflection, he didn’t think so. Apart from anything else, she was his friend and she was homeless and desperately upset about it - though, being Lois, she was doing her utmost not to show it in any way. He’d admired her enormously for her show of utter casualness in front of Luthor. But she was devastated, and he knew it. To send her to stay in a hotel now would be the worst act of callousness, and from someone who was supposed to be her best friend... It would be incredibly cruel.
Apart from that... he wanted her to stay.
Despite the fact that her presence was already driving him crazy. Despite the fact that, when she’d come to stand beside him when he was showing her the balcony, he’d wanted to wrench her into his arms and kiss her senseless. Despite the fact that the last thing he needed was to be in intimate proximity with the woman he loved and could never have. He wanted her to stay.
So he’d just have to get a firm grip on his libido. And look forward to at least daily dips in the Arctic Ocean.
At least he had a couple of hours now in which to regroup, to strengthen his resolve. He’d hinted to Lois that he’d be gone for some time, and she had stuff to do herself anyway, so it wasn’t as if he was being a lousy host. He’d get what he needed from his folks’ home, sure; but he could also take the opportunity to spend time with them. It had only been last night, after all, that he’d acknowledged that he needed to talk to them about Trask and what had happened to them all.
Seeing the farmhouse in the distance now, Clark began to lose altitude; in seconds, he was dropping down to the ground just behind the back door.
“Clark!” His mom was at the door before he even had time to grab the handle. “What a lovely surprise! Are you staying for dinner?”
He shook his head as he entered the kitchen. “I can’t - Lois will be expecting me to eat with her. I’m just here because I need a favour.”
“Lois is expecting you to eat with her?”
The grin on his mom’s face told Clark that he should have been more cautious with his choice of words. Now she was going to put two and two together... But there was an easy solution, of course.
“She’s staying with me for a while,” he explained. “Her apartment was burned down this morning.”
“Oh my!” Martha Kent clapped a hand over her mouth, her expression horrified. “What happened, Clark? And is the poor girl all right?”
He shrugged. “She’s as okay as she could be in the circumstances. Shaken, but doing her best to put a brave face on it, as always. As for what happened, it looks like arson. We’re looking into it.”
“Arson? But who would want to burn down Lois’s apartment?”
“That’s what we don’t know yet,” Clark explained. “But we intend to find out. And it wasn’t just her apartment; it was the whole building. So it might or might not have anything to do with the fact that Lois lived there. Anyway, in the meantime, she’s staying with me, and I want to make a bedroom for her up on the gallery in my apartment. So I need some furniture...”
“And you want the stuff from our old spare bedroom? Of course you can have it! And tell that poor girl that I’m so sorry about what happened, and if there’s any way your father and I can help, she should just pick up the phone. You should bring her here for dinner too, you know. In fact, Clark, you should have brought her today!”
Yes. He could have. But he hadn’t wanted to. Quite apart from the fact that he wanted to talk to his parents alone, he’d needed space from Lois. Just enough to give him time to regroup, that was all.
“Another time, Mom. I’ll ask her,” he promised. He gestured towards the hall. “I’m going to go look at that furniture, see what I need,” he added. “I’d like to talk to you and Dad, though, before I leave. You got time?”
“We always have time for you, Clark, you know that,” his mother said, rolling her eyes slightly. “When have you ever had to ask if you can talk to us?”
“Okay.” He grinned. “See you in a half-hour or so.”
Sorting through the furniture wasn’t difficult. Deciding what he could take with him was slightly more problematic, though: it was a question of what would fit in his gallery and what Lois would actually like. The bed, certainly. It was only a small bed, but then there wasn’t room for a double anyway. Not if she wanted any other furniture up there. There was a nightstand, and even a small lamp to go on it. The closet would stand against the wall, and there was a chest of drawers - that would be useful, too. There was a comfortable chair, but... No. There was something Lois would prefer, he knew. He looked around the attic - nothing there of any use. He thought for a moment, then it came to him. He knew where he’d find what he wanted.
He ran down the stairs and into his old bedroom. “Perfect.” His old desk was in the corner; a bit battered now, true, plus it was marked where he’d scored his name in the mellow wood when he’d been bored. But he could sand it down and polish it in seconds. As for a chair - well, his old one would do for the time being, and if it wasn’t comfortable enough he’d buy Lois a new one. Or she could buy one herself once her insurance came through.
Yes, the desk was looking much better now, Clark thought some time later, giving it a final polish with a cloth. It really helped being amazingly strong and invulnerable - he hadn’t even needed sandpaper to do the job. He stood back and admired his handiwork. Yes, Lois should be perfectly comfortable working at this desk.
“Clark? Are you coming down?”
His father’s voice broke into his thoughts, and Clark realised what he’d been doing. Procrastinating. Spending far longer than needed to be spent on this simple task - in order to put off the moment when he had to speak to his parents.
He sighed and headed downstairs. It was time to face his nightmares.
*********
Lex Luthor was definitely getting careless. Lois looked again at the notes she’d taken of her phone conversation with Jimmy, and smiled. Craig Allen had been a construction worker, all right, but up until about a month ago he’d worked for Luthor Construction. Jimmy hadn’t been able to find out why he’d left Luthor’s company, but another couple of phone calls had got her that information. He’d been fired - carelessness and disregard for safety practices, her source at Luthor Construction had said.
Sure, that might appear to tie in neatly with his setting fire to 1058 Carter Avenue - but the foreman had mentioned carelessness, not deliberate malice. And if Allen was the type to engage in sabotage over some petty grievance, then why not set fire to a Luthor Construction project? Since apparently he’d also been fired by Norton, and this was seemingly the alleged motive for burning down the building, why hadn’t he done the same while working out his notice for his previous employer?
And it was, Lois was convinced, far more than a mere coincidence that Allen had worked for Luthor Construction.
Good. She was getting closer to nailing Luthor.
And, after the last couple of days - especially after the last couple of hours - she wanted to see him nailed so hard he would scream and beg for mercy. The man was utterly without a scruple - and such a hypocrite.
He could have her apartment burned down one minute, making several other people homeless just to achieve his objective with regard to herself, and the next minute turn up at the Planet, all sympathy and concern, as if butter wouldn't melt in his mouth.
He was truly the most evil person Lois had ever encountered in her years of crime reporting.
And, as if making her homeless wasn't enough, then he'd planned to spy on her in the
shower! Lois shivered again as she thought of that beautiful apartment full of bugs. He could have watched her from every room. He could have let anyone watch the cameras, or the tapes. She'd met that butler, or aide, of his - Nigel, she remembered. Imagining that man with the cold eyes watching her dressing or undressing, or in the bathroom... her blood ran cold.
She could understand the listening devices. Luthor was clearly worried that she was too interested in his activities. But the cameras? Why those?
But the answer was obvious. Voyeurism.
What man in his right mind - or even his wrong mind, for that matter - would pass up the opportunity to be a Peeping Tom if he could get away with it? Of course Luthor had had the cameras installed.
She shuddered again as the thought of how close she'd come to being Luthor's victim occurred to her. If she hadn't already been as suspicious of him as she was - which was Clark's doing, of course - she might have accepted the offer of the apartment.
Clark. The thought crossed her mind that she was staying with a man who, if he wanted to spy on her in the shower, wouldn't need cameras.
Clark could see through walls simply by staring at them. He could listen to conversations up to half a mile away.
But the thought of Clark using his powers to spy on her made her laugh in disbelief. The man she knew as Clark Kent and Superman would never do that. No, she told herself; not all men were voyeurs.
There really was one decent man in the world. The only shame of it was that he wasn't interested in her.
She sighed and pushed Clark out of her mind, trying to dismiss the sick feeling in her stomach over Luthor's apartment at the same time. She needed to focus on the investigation.
So. Allen had been fired from Luthor Construction. And he’d been working for Norton for about three weeks, from what she’d been able to find out. His work record had been, she’d been told, acceptable over those few weeks. There didn’t appear to have been any signs of the problems he’d exhibited in his previous job. And then suddenly, the previous day, he’d been fired. The Norton foreman on the Carter Avenue site, who had been reluctant at first to talk to a reporter until she’d told him that she’d been given the tip-off from the MPD and that nothing would be printed until the police had confirmed the story, had told her that he’d had to fire Allen. Out of the blue, the guy had turned insubordinate. He’d refused to obey a direct order, and he’d put workers’ lives at risk as a result. He’d also damaged some equipment by failing to follow correct procedure. The only reason he hadn’t been ordered off the premises immediately, the foreman had said, was that they were short of workers and he was needed.
On the face of it, here was a recurrence of the reasons he’d been fired by Luthor Construction. But all Lois’s instincts were screaming at her that there was more to it. Why would an employee who had been fired and just got a new job, and had worked well in his first couple of weeks on the job, suddenly change his behaviour so completely? Listening to the foreman catalogue the incidents which had made him fire Allen, Lois had been convinced that this was the behaviour of someone who actually *wanted* to be fired.
Why? Because he was acting under instructions? Instructions from his previous employer?
What had he been promised? Money? That was the most obvious. Unless Luthor, or someone reporting to Luthor, had some sort of hold over Allen. If he was being blackmailed, then it would be a simple job to persuade him to get himself fired and then torch the building, taking the blame. He’d probably been told that, while he’d get a prison sentence, he’d be looked after in jail and there would be a large sum of money waiting for him at the end of it.
It was so clearly a set-up. And as if the information she’d collected in the last couple of hours wasn’t enough, Lois re-read the section of her notes which, to her, was the clincher.
There had already been an act of sabotage at Carter Avenue before Allen had been fired.
She’d gone over that point with the foreman several times, and each time he’d confirmed it: although Allen’s behaviour had been causing concern before the first explosion, he hadn’t got around to firing the guy until an hour or so afterwards, when a dangerous act on his part had risked other members of the team.
So that meant that either two people had been trying to wreck the apartment building, or there was just one person behind it, but using different means of achieving the end result.
Had Henderson come to the same conclusions as she had? Lois wondered. She was certainly aware that he agreed with her that Allen hadn’t been working alone - but had he put all this together? She was actually tempted, for a moment, to call him and share what she had, but then she caught herself. What was she doing? Giving away important information to the police before she’d had time to see where else it took her and what she could prove? Let alone before she’d even discussed it with her partner!
On the other hand, it was unlikely that Henderson would be thinking along the same lines as she was, Lois reflected, leaning back and flexing her shoulder muscles. She’d been sitting in the same place for too long. Henderson would have no reason to make the connection to Luthor - she hadn’t told him about Luthor’s offer of an apartment, after all, or the fact that it was bugged. She assumed, in fact, that the inspector had no reason to believe that Luthor was anything other than the upstanding businessman that he pretended.
So sharing information probably wouldn’t get her anywhere anyway. Except that one thing she did need to have checked out was the state of Allen’s finances. Had he had any sudden influxes of cash into a bank account? Or had any large sums been found at his home? Henderson was by far the best source for that sort of information - far better than Jimmy.
Maybe there would be something to gain from meeting Henderson. She’d have to discuss it with Clark.
Getting up to make herself another coffee, Lois reflected in wry amusement that the notion of discussing something with a partner before making a decision was something she wouldn’t even have contemplated mere weeks earlier. Yet now it was axiomatic.
Clark Kent was having a very bad influence on her. And she liked it.
**********
“Clark? You’ve already reheated that coffee twice. You going to tell us what this is about?”
Startled, and suddenly guilty at the realisation that he’d sat with his parents at their kitchen table for over half an hour making mindless, banal conversation, Clark swallowed. “Sorry, Dad. I just - I thought this was going to be easy, but it’s not.”
“Take your time, honey.” His mom patted his arm. “We can wait.”
“I don’t know - I do have cattle to feed.” But as Clark met his father’s gaze, the twinkle in the older man’s eye belied the sentiment.
Clark took a deep breath and sat upright in his chair. “Okay. I wanted to talk... I needed to ask... Um...” He hesitated, despairing at his inability to start a simple conversation. Except this wasn’t exactly a simple conversation.
His parents waited patiently, their expressions encouraging. And then the words, or at least some words, came. “We’ve never really talked about... about Trask. And what happened,” he began.
His father’s expression darkened. “I think we were all just glad to get out of there alive. If it hadn’t been for Lois...”
“Yes, we owe Lois everything,” his mom said, and Clark could see her shiver. Guilt assailed him; he hadn’t had to bring this up again, had he? Why had he raised painful memories for her?
But then she smiled at him. “You said we’ve never talked about it, and you’re right. Jonathan and I do talk about it,” she added, giving his father a quick smile. “But you seemed to want to forget it. At least, the one time I mentioned it afterwards you changed the subject, so we decided to wait until you were ready. I knew you’d want to talk sooner or later.” She squeezed his arm. “Should I have pushed you to talk sooner, honey?”
“I don’t know. No,” he decided then. “No, I wasn’t ready. I’d have insisted there wasn’t a problem.”
“But there is a problem.” It was a statement, not a question.
“Yeah,” he admitted. And then it all came tumbling out. The sleepless nights. The nightmares when he did sleep. Trask’s vile words haunting him. Torn apart inside by the knowledge that he was different, not human, sub-human,
alien. That he didn’t belong, either on this planet or with normal people. That he had no right to exist. That he should apologise for even being himself.
Being tormented by the knowledge that it was his fault that his parents had been hurt, had been exposed to that maniac’s diabolical scheming.
Racked with guilt for having been able to do
nothing to help them. For all his incredible powers, despite everything he was able to do, he’d had to lie there and watch them being tortured. Listen to his mom crying. Hear his father plead and beg - a man who should never have to beg anyone for anything.
His fault. All their bruises, all their cuts, all their inner scars... all his fault.
They just let him talk, and he talked for a long time. His voice sometimes shaking, he recounted his nightmares and his recollection of the actual events, realising as he did so that he’d almost ceased to be able to distinguish between dream and reality. He broke off several times as his voice faltered, only to resume again almost immediately, the words flowing, tumbling over each other in his need to say it all, to vocalise the full horror of it.
As if by putting it all into words he could somehow exorcise the atrocity from his mind. As if talking about it would diminish the awfulness in his memory by shining light on what he’d been hiding away, keeping to himself all these weeks. As if confessing it all would give him permission to forgive himself for making it happen - for being who he was.
He drew breath at last, raking a hand through his hair; the spiky ends which met his touch told him that this was far from the first time he’d done that during his monologue. And then he realised that he was shaking. He looked at his hand as he lowered it again; it was definitely trembling. And there was moisture on his cheeks.
“Clark, it is
not your fault!” his father said sharply, before he could speak again. “Blame that madman Trask! He’s the one who did this. He was the one with the twisted mind, who thought that terrorising innocent people and a good man who’s done nothing but help people was okay!”
“I know.” Clark closed his eyes briefly before turning to look at his father. “In the light of day, like this, I know. I tell myself that all the time. That it’s not my fault. That I didn’t do anything. That he was... a monster. A xenophobe. And I even believe it some of the time. And then at night, when the dreams come...”
“Oh, honey!” And suddenly he was in his mom’s arms, and he was transported back to his childhood days, when a cuddle from his mother could cure any problem. But he wasn’t a child any more, and he knew that this wasn’t something which would go away because his mom kissed it better.
But he’d talked about it. It was a start.
“And you’ve been having these nightmares ever since?”
He straightened, but held onto his mom’s hand. “Yeah. Well, not every night. And they’d got less frequent - but last night it was bad.”
“I wish you’d told us about this sooner, honey.”
He grimaced. “I should have, I guess. But I was hoping that they’d just go away. And I guess I just didn’t want to remind you guys of it all if you’d put it behind you. I think last night made me wonder if maybe I was wrong to assume that you’d got over it so easily.”
“It hasn’t been easy, son,” his father said quietly. “But, like your mom said, we talked about it. Especially the first couple of nights after it happened, when neither of us could sleep. Bottling the feelings up inside only makes something like this worse.”
“Yeah, well, I guess I know that now!” Clark laughed ruefully. “I thought I was over it. And, really, I’ve been refusing to let Trask’s xenophobia affect me. I mean, it’s not as if anyone else has had that kind of reaction to Superman. People know that he’s an alien - I let Lois write that in the Planet - and mostly the response is curiosity. And, of course, some groups were delighted because Superman confirms their belief that there’s life on other planets. And then there’s Lois,” he added with a slight smile.
“Yes?” His mom smiled back.
“Well, she knows who I am. Who Superman is. And it hasn’t affected the way she sees me one bit. She doesn’t think that I’m... repulsive, or that I don’t belong, or that I’m about to take over the world. And so I tell myself that Trask and his minions were completely unrepresentative.”
“Don’t forget crazy, Clark,” his father pointed out dryly.
“That, too,” he agreed.
“You keep on telling yourself that, Clark,” his mom encouraged. “And you know you can call us any time. Even if it’s three o’clock in the morning. You’ll get past this.”
“I know. And with you guys to help...” Clark smiled, feeling lighter inside than he had for some time. “Believe me, talking about it did help. A lot. I feel much better now.”
“Good.” His mom hugged him again.
“And you guys - you sure you’re okay?”
His father nodded. “It took a while. But, yes, we’re fine. We all survived, Clark. That’s what matters.”
“And... I have to ask, because that’s what tortures me most... you don’t blame me, do you?”
“Clark Jerome Kent!” his mother exclaimed, dropping his hand - had he really been holding her hand all that time? Panicking momentarily, he X-rayed it discreetly. No damage. That was a relief. He really had to be more careful. As if what Trask had done to them hadn’t been bad enough!
Then the tone of his mom’s voice registered, and he switched his gaze quickly to her. She seemed angry, but then her expression softened, became sympathetic. “Oh, honey! How could you ever think that? Haven’t you been listening to anything we’ve been saying? Of course we don’t blame you! And shame on you for even thinking it for one second!”
Clark gave her a rueful look, running his hand through his hair again. “Sorry. Like I said, most of the time I don’t think that kind of thing - but when I’m awake at three in the morning...”
“Next time you wake up at three in the morning, you call us,” his father admonished. But at the same time he placed his hand on Clark’s shoulder, giving a reassuring squeeze.
He really had the best parents in the world. He had no idea how he’d got to be so lucky, but it was something he would never cease to be thankful for.
*********
...tbc
