Dr. House.
Clark kept a neutral face as a thousand thoughts entered his head all at once, each of them vying to take control of his emotions. He’d heard of Dr. House before. Most people had. The man was supposed to be a brilliant diagnostician, solving cases no one else could, or refused to touch. Clark knew he should be immensely glad that the doctor had agreed to help him. On the other hand, Clark had heard of Dr. House and his notoriously arrogant attitude. The doctor seemed, from all the rumors Clark had heard, to place himself on par with God himself. Rude, often crude, blunt to a fault, and bitingly sarcastic were all some of the nicer descriptions Clark had heard paired with Dr. House’s name. He wasn’t entirely sure he wanted to subject himself to a person like that. And, more importantly, he didn’t feel right about making Lois and his parents be around a person like that.
I have no choice, he reminded himself with a mental sigh.
“Thank you for coming,” Clark found himself saying, as pleasantly as the heaviness in his chest would allow.
Dr. House gave him a semi-shrug. “Don’t thank me just yet. You can do that after I’ve saved your life.” He raised his eyebrows again. “Judging by the way you look – which is like hell, by the way – I’d say time is of the essence. So, let’s get started, shall we?”
Clark nodded uncertainly. “Uh, sure.”
Dr. House clapped his hands together once, a sign, perhaps, that he was ready to dive right into his work. He rubbed his hands together for a moment, then looked at the rest of the gathered crowd in the room. “Okay, anyone who isn’t currently dying or diagnosing said disease, out into the living room. Unfortunately, my little medical elves couldn’t come with me, so I need to take a history.”
Lois locked eyes with Clark and he ever so slightly inclined his head at her, letting her know that, yes, he would be fine on his own. Jonathan and Martha looked worried, but Clark knew Lois would find a way to give them the reassurance they would need, even with Sam and Ellen hovering around. Clark watched as everyone reluctantly filed out.
“Us too?” Sam asked, pausing mid-stride. He pointed between Ellen and himself.
Dr. House nodded once. “I’ve got it. We can rehash symptoms and discuss potential diagnoses later.”
“Okay,” Sam said, still wavering for a moment. But then he too left the room.
“Looks like it’s just you and me,” Dr. House said to Clark and Clark couldn’t help but notice, with a sinking heart, that everything he’d ever heard about the doctor’s perpetual sarcasm appeared to be correct.
“What do you need to know?” Clark asked, just wanting the interrogation to be over so they could skip ahead to the point where Dr. House figured out some medication or treatment that would cure him.
“Everything,” Dr. House said. He waved his hands before himself, as though dismissing something invisible. “Look, I know all of this is supposed to be secretive and you probably have your reasons for not wanting to let certain information to get out. But I need to know about your medical history. Every last bit of it, even if it seems unimportant.”
“I understand,” Clark wheezed, successfully choking back a cough. “But I’m afraid there’s not much to tell.”
“Tell me anyway,” Dr. House replied, his voice even but somehow steely and cold.
“Well…the fact of the matter is…I don’t have a medical history,” Clark explained, feeling oddly uncomfortable with the admission. While he wasn’t bragging, it felt weirdly like he was bragging about his extraordinary luck in being immune to sickness.
“There’s got to be something,” Dr. House encouraged, sounding mildly exasperated. “A cold. A bout with the flu. A scraped knee. An allergic reaction. A broken bone. Something,” he pressed.
Clark shook his head and immediately regretted expending the energy to do so as the room spun wildly around him. He lay still and closed his eyes, hoping to make the world go quiet once more. Dr. House’s hands found their way to his inner wrist, feeling for and gauging Clark’s pulse.
“I’ve never been sick before,” Clark clarified, not risking opening his eyes. “I’ve never had any broken bones or cavities or sprained ankles.”
Dr. House’s hands felt Clark’s forehead before immediately pulling away from the heat of the fever. The man harrumphed under his breath as he looked up at the ceiling. “I swear if this turns out to be a case of the sniffles…” He didn’t finish his statement – or had that been a threat?
“It’s not,” Clark instantly defended himself. “I’ve been around people long enough to know what a head cold might feel like. This is different. I feel like…”
“Like?” Dr. House prompted when Clark failed to complete his thought.
“Like I’m dying,” Clark said in a near whisper.
“So does every man with a runny nose,” Dr. House volleyed back, his words oozing sarcasm.
Clark opened his eyes to study the doctor before him. “I know what I’m talking about.”
A lightbulb seemed to go off above Dr. House’s head. “I heard a nasty rumor about a pretty green rock that seems to do a number on you,” he quipped in an almost chipper way. “I’m guessing that has something to do with this.” His words were measured and logical, each one carefully spoken as Dr. House started to build a case file in his mind.
Clark hated to admit it, but he also couldn’t lie to a man who, with any luck, would figure out what was wrong with him. “Kryptonite. Yes,” he admitted so softly Dr. House leaned forward to catch Clark’s words. Even here, even in the safety of his apartment, it was hard to talk openly about the radioactive pieces of his home world. “This illness, whatever it is, feels similar to Kryptonite poisoning. But also vastly different.” He took a breath as he tried to find the right words to explain himself.
“It’s either the same thing or it’s not. It can’t be both,” Dr. House countered gruffly, almost sounding a little annoyed, as though Clark were playing a game with him.
“It’s…hard to explain,” Clark said, struggling with his words. Why was it so hard to express himself? Was it the weight of the illness or was it how uncomfortable it was to admit anything to this stranger?
No one can ever know about your differences, he heard his father’s voice whisper from the distant past, when Clark was just a gangly teenager developing super abilities by the day. Some scientist will track you down, put you in a lab, and dissect you like a frog. You have to be careful, Clark.
Clark sighed. His father had been right, of course. People like Jason Trask had proven to Clark the ugly side of humanity. But this was an extraordinary set of circumstances. He had to be up front with Dr. House, if he wanted to stand a chance at living.
“The Kryptonite saps my powers. My strength. The pain is excruciating,” Clark explained. “When I’m exposed to it, I can literally feel my life draining away. But this is different. I can feel that I’m slipping away. My powers are gone. But the pain is different.” He coughed harshly then and had to spend several long seconds gulping enough air into his lungs when he was done. “Kryptonite feels like I’m being torn apart, burned alive, stabbed with a thousand swords. This…I feel like I’m being crushed to death. It’s so hard to breathe. And I’m hot, but in the traditional sense, not the phantom fire the Kryptonite brings.”
Dr. House sat and listened impassively, but Clark could tell by the way his eyes never flickered away that he was absorbing it all.
“Sorry,” Clark apologized after a minute. “It’s…hard to put into words.”
“I see,” Dr. House replied, steepling his fingers under his chin. “When did all of this start?”
“What…me feeling sick?” Clark asked, thinking back. “Um…I guess last night?” Could that be right? Was it really less than a day since he’d first begun to sneeze out of nowhere? “It started innocently enough,” he allowed.
“Define ‘innocently,’” Dr. House prodded.
“I sneezed.”
“And?”
Clark worked up a miniscule shrug. “That was it. I was at wo…” He cleared his throat. With his head swimming with such murkiness, he’d nearly blown his cover. “I was working on a project,” he weakly corrected himself, “and I sneezed.”
“Ah, yes, the old Hollywood ‘I sneezed and now I’m going to die’ routine,” Dr. House said, sarcastically pitching his voice higher like a damsel in distress and putting a hand to his forehead in a mock swoon.
Clark forced himself to shake his head. “You don’t understand. I’ve never really done that before. It was weird but I didn’t think much of it at the time because it appeared to be an isolated incident. Until a few hours later, I guess it was. Then I started to feel weak and like I was coming down with something.”
“And before the sneeze? Anything unusual happen?” Dr. House asked, and Clark was grateful that the man had turned serious again.
Clark thought back. “Not really. I made a few rescues. Nothing too extraordinary or out of the ordinary for me, especially at this time of the year. I took care of a few personal things in between rescues. Nothing that would have caused this, as far as I know,” he answered carefully.
“What kinds of things?”
“Day to day tasks,” Clark casually replied, unwilling to delve any deeper than that. He paused. “Actually, the last thing I did before I sneezed was a rescue, come to think of it.”
Dr. House’s eyes lit up. He sat on the edge of Clark’s bed and leaned forward in interest. “Do tell. Unless there are superhero confidentially laws I’m not aware of?” It wasn’t so much a question as it was bait.
“I stopped a woman from committing suicide,” Clark replied evenly. “She was up on a rooftop, near a billboard. I talked to her for a few minutes…told her that she had a lot to live for…the same kinds of things I usually tell people who are threatening to take their own lives, because it’s the truth.”
“Sounds almost too easy,” Dr. House taunted.
“Sometimes it’s like that,” Clark countered, though Dr. House’s remark struck him on a primal level. It had been over too quickly with Mindy Church. “Sometimes people aren’t really willing to go through with it. They just want someone to talk to, to listen to them for a minute, to offer them reassurance that things are going to get better.”
“Most people seek out therapists for that,” Dr. House quipped bitterly. “Therapists that get paid a lot more handsomely than you do, I might add. Okay, so…during this rescue, was there anything that you touched or inhaled or kissed or whatever?”
Clark didn’t like the insinuation that he would take advantage of an emotionally unstable woman. “No…” he said slowly. But something was tickling the back of his brain. “Wait…there was a billboard nearby that was letting off smoke…well, steam, I guess it was. It irritated my nose and throat for a second. But that was it.”
Dr. House didn’t appear to be listening anymore. “Okay, so let’s assume this pathogen is airborne.”
“You think the city is in danger?” Clark asked, suddenly alarmed. He tried to sit up a little, but his muscles turned to jelly as he made the attempt and he aborted the maneuver halfway through.
Dr. House shook his head and cracked his knuckles in a carefree manner. “Judging by the fact that Metropolis hasn’t seen massive amounts of people dropping like flies lately, I’d say no. It probably affects only you. Which means it’s probably not something of this Earth.”
That piqued Clark’s interest. “You mean…it might be…Kryptonian? But…how?”
“I’ll be damned if I know,” Dr. House offered with a casual shrug. “But at least we’re getting somewhere now. Still, the question remains…how do we stop it from killing you?”
***
Under a microscope.
That’s what it felt like, to Clark.
He felt like the alien in any one of those old sci-fi movies his college roommate had been obsessed with – the one who gets captured by the US Government and is subjected to testing and studied closely, locked in a cage in some desolate little lab somewhere God only knows where.
And yet, it couldn’t have been further from the truth. Clark was kept as comfortable as his friends and family could manage to keep him. His mother whipped up a batch of her famous chicken soup; never before had it tasted so good. Though Clark could really only slurp at the broth – chewing required too much strength that he didn’t have to spare – it was like sipping Ambrosia up on high Mount Olympus with the gods in his mind. Lois and Martha constantly fretted over him, much to Dr. House’s very verbal annoyance; he chased them away once or twice with a less than kind word. Jonathan paced a lot when he wasn’t wearily propped up in a chair trying to comfort Lois and Martha. Sam and Ellen worked tirelessly with Dr. House, though Clark could see the fatigue in their eyes and a growing sense of hopeless surrounded them like a little black rain cloud.
As the hours melted away, they came no closer to finding either a root cause to Clark’s illness or a way to treat it. To his credit, Dr. House – for all his arrogance and bluntness – tried an exhaustive list of treatments. Clark was layered with ice packs to try and lower his body temperature – most of them shoved into his groin, armpits, and on the back of his neck. But by then he was so hot that the ice stood no chance of helping before it melted away into lukewarm water. House even – as Clark found himself mentally referring to the doctor in a parroting of the way Sam addressed his friend – disappeared for a while and returned with a “borrowed” IV full of “broad spectrum antibiotics” that did nothing as Clark lay in bed, slipping further and further into his fever. House was constantly on the phone with his team back at Princeton-Plainsboro Hospital; as he explained it, he was getting their opinions in case the diagnosis of a never before seen on Earth Kryptonian virus, or bacterial infection, or plague was wrong. He also explained how he usually met with his team to discuss potential treatments and their likelihood of success.
“This isn’t working,” Clark commented at one point. How long had it been since House had come knocking on his front door? A few hours? A day? Half a week? “What else can we try?”
House rubbed absently at his bad leg; Clark guessed the injury still bothered him, or perhaps it was just force of habit. Outwardly, the doctor looked calm, but there was no mistaking how troubled his eyes looked. “I’m working on it,” he admitted.
“Please don’t lie to me, Dr. House,” Clark found himself saying, despite the fact that he hadn’t actually wanted to say the words aloud. “I don’t blame you for not knowing what’s wrong with me. Or for not knowing how to treat my illness. But, please, don’t sit here and lie to me to make me feel better about what’s going on.”
To Clark’s surprise, the doctor didn’t pretend that he wasn’t making up platitudes. “That’s rich, coming from you,” he said evenly.
Clark scrunched up his brow as he tried to make sense of House’s reaction. “What do you mean?”
“You don’t want me to lie to you? Fine,” House volleyed back a bit bitingly. “You’re right, I haven’t figured out the best course of treatment yet. But, unlike you, I haven’t been lying my butt off this whole time. I’ve told you the truth, no matter what.”
“I’m not sure I follow you, Dr. House,” Clark interrupted gently. “I don’t…”
House snorted a laugh; it sounded like he was about to crack under the pressure of treating Superman’s mysterious illness. “Don’t what? Don’t lie?” He waved his hand dismissively as he rolled his eyes. Then he brought his piercing, x-ray-like gaze to Clark. “Everybody lies, Superman. Even you,” Dr. House said with a hint of disgust in his voice.
“I haven’t been lying to you,” Clark swore.
Dr. House laughed again – but it wasn’t a hearty, amused sound. It was a gruff mockery of a laugh. “Oh please!” he nearly shouted. “Do you think I’m stupid? Or maybe blind?” He did a Three Stooges-like double point to his eyes. “You’re lying to the entire world, Superman! Your very existence is a lie!” He gestured almost violently out before him, as though spreading an invisible map of the world before Clark’s eyes.
Clark gave him a quizzical look before wincing in pain as a spasm twisted his chest. “I’m not following,” he managed to get out as he choked on a cough. “I’m real. I exist.”
House rolled his eyes. “Obviously.”
“Then I’m really not sure what you mean,” Clark offered, trying his best not to let his growing fear show.
“You want to play dumb? Fine. I’ll spell it out for you. It’s not like I’m doing anything else important like…oh, I don’t know…saving your life.” The sarcasm in the doctor’s voice swiftly degraded to a patronizing, mocking tone. “You’re a liar. And a bad one at that. You dress up in a blue suit, flying around, calling yourself ‘Superman.’ Which…it’s a little arrogant, isn’t it? To call yourself ‘super’ anything.”
“I’ve only used the name the public chose for me,” Clark defended himself.
“Right, because you couldn’t have stepped in and given some other, less god-like name,” House snipped easily, though there was no anger and no jealousy in his words that Clark could detect.
“Does it matter?” Clark wondered aloud.
House shrugged. “Not in the least. Just thought I’d point out the obvious. Anyway, back to the point.”
The doctor reached into his shirt pocket, pulled out a plain, amber colored prescription bottle without a label, and tipped a small white pill out into his open palm. He dry-swallowed the pill as he replaced the bottle into his pocket. It was not the first time Clark had witnessed the doctor do that and he had the uncomfortable thought – or was it certainty? – that Sam had asked a drug addict to cure him.
“You’re not really Superman.” It wasn’t a question, nor was it an accusation. It was nothing more than a cold, hard fact laid bare between the two men in the room.
Clark didn’t immediately answer, neither confirming nor denying the doctor’s theory. Instead, he simply watched as House stared down at him, his icy blue eyes calculating and analyzing every movement Clark made – voluntary or otherwise.
“Do the Lanes know?” House asked in a softer, quieter tone after they’d stared each other down for a solid two minutes. He jutted his chin in the direction of the living room to indicate Clark’s future in-laws.
“I never said that you’re right about me,” Clark replied, neatly side stepping the question.
“No, you didn’t. You don’t have to. Anyone with two working eyes and a couple of brain cells to rub together would be able to see it right now. The way your fiancée is doting over you. How distraught the Kents are. Hell, I’ve had my suspicions that Superman might walk amongst us regular people for a while now.”
Clark snorted a laugh. “Oh yeah?” he challenged; one eyebrow partially raised before a grimace of pain washed away his panicked amusement for something darker.
House nodded gravely and he folded his hands atop his cane handle before resting his head on top of it all. His eyebrows raised as he explained. “Of course. You showed up out of nowhere, a twenty-something young man from what had to be another planet. Yet you spoke perfect English. Or, rather, as I’ve heard it, perfect whatever the local language is. You knew about all our customs. Anyone watching the news could see that; your ability to melt steel with your eyeballs aside, you fit right in with regular old, boring humans.” He shrugged, as though it were only too obvious. “The languages, the customs…all of that can be learned. But that natural blending in with the crowd even while you stood apart from them?” House shook his head. “That’s not something you can pick up from a textbook or by spying on people from some spaceship. That’s something you learn only by doing, and for a long time.”
Clark wasn’t sure if that was meant as a compliment to the complicated creatures humans were, a dig at how little faith House had in Clark, or if the abrasive doctor meant nothing at all by his random observation.
“So,” House continued after a moment while Clark tried to figure out the man’s angle, “we can sit here all day and you can deny that you typically dress in more boring attire and chase stories for a major metropolitan newspaper, or you can trust that I take doctor/patient confidentiality seriously enough to stop myself from running out to the nearest tabloid.” He rolled his head on his neck as though working out a kink in his muscles. “That, and I just don’t care enough to go around spreading the truth of your identity. The choice is yours.” He spread his hands apart like a Vegas dealer showing his cards.
“Why does it matter?” Clark asked, the effort of speaking wearing him out.
House shrugged broadly. “It doesn’t. But I’m guessing mom and pop in-law don’t know yet, or they’d be a lot more concerned about your rapidly declining health.” His eyes flickered as he stared off into the distance, as if it helped him organize his thought process. “What if the worst happens, despite my best efforts, hmm? Have you given again thought to that? A grieving Kent family. A heartbroken fiancée. And no Clark Kent to support everyone.” He spread his hands, palms up, and moved them up and down as though weighing the words he was saying.
House’s words were bullet-fast and just as destructive. Clark had to admit to himself that he’d only really considered that possibility in an abstract, fleeting manner. But House was right. It shouldn’t have to fall to Lois or his parents to explain to Sam and Ellen about why Clark would suddenly vanish off the face of the Earth if Superman died. He owed his future in-laws the truth. He owed it to everyone to be the one to man-up and be responsible for getting the truth out there.
“They…don’t know,” he reluctantly admitted, wondering every second if the illness savaging his body had taken his wits along with his strength. “Only Lois. Please…don’t say anything to them.”
Again, House held up his hands in a “not my problem” manner. “It’s your call.” His tone was aloof, as though he was completely unaffected by the dying man before him. Maybe he’d seen so many that it really didn’t bother him. Clark wasn’t sure which option was worse. “But, between you and me, you might want to consider telling them.”
Clark took as deep a breath as he could without coughing and sighed. “You’re probably right,” he admitted after a moment.
“Probably?” House looked incredulous that Clark hadn’t agreed whole-heartedly.
Clark would have shrugged if he’d had the energy to. “It’s…complicated.”
“More complicated than spinning lies and hiding in the shadows? Please,” House nearly spat with a roll of his eyes, but he didn’t seem angry with Clark, just oblivious to how difficult a position Clark was in.
“Well…yeah,” Clark defended himself, though he could feel his energy flagging. He would need to rest, and soon. “I’m…not human. I may look like one, sound like one, act like one, but I was born on another planet. Imagine, for a moment, your daughter told you that she was marrying an alien. How would you take the news?”
House shrugged and he made an exaggerated “I don’t know” face. “I can’t even imagine having a daughter.”
“You probably wouldn’t take it well,” Clark offered. “Lois…Lois is a rare woman. She’s accepted who I am without so much as a heartbeat’s hesitation. She’s never cared that I’m not from Earth. But…she has a strained relationship with her parents and I don’t want to be the one to drive a further wedge between them if they can’t accept my origins.” He sighed again, sadness and the weight of responsibility filling his heart and making his chest feel even heavier than it already did. “I can’t do that to her. I love her too much.”
“You love her enough to make sure she isn’t left holding the ball if you die?” House snapped. “You love her enough to make sure she doesn’t have to explain why Clark Kent vanished from her life? Tell them,” he commanded in a harsh, biting way.
“It’s not that simple,” Clark countered once more. “What if…what if they hate the idea of Lois being with me so much they decide it’s better if they let me die?”
Clark paused. He hadn’t even been aware of that fear until he voiced it, but it was true. He was afraid that Sam and Ellen might hate his alien roots enough to let him die. Of course, if they loved Lois, they would fight for Clark’s life, but Clark couldn’t muster up enough hope in his heart that that would be the case. Perhaps it was because his head was now throbbing in pain and he was so tired he felt like he could sleep for a thousand years.
“You’re a coward,” House accused, ignoring Clark’s concerns. “Interesting.”
“I’m not a coward,” Clark shot back a bit more heatedly than he’d intended.
“Yes, you are. Which is weird, considering your choice of attire while in public,” House smirked, gesturing to the vibrant blue and eye-catching red of Clark’s tightly fitted suit. “You run the risk of people deciding to hate you every day, every time you fly out of the sky to lend a hand. From what I’ve seen, that hasn’t stopped you yet. But you can’t muster up the guts to tell your girlfriend’s parents that you’ve got the honeymoon flight all taken care of.”
His attempt at a joke came off less than funny and closer to sneering. Clark shook his head ever so slightly. “You think this is easy for me? The lies? The excuses? The hiding?”
“So tell them,” House offered, tempering his voice to a statement, rather than a command. “Stop making excuses. I know the Lanes. They’re not going to let you die. Doing that would only ensure…” House said, but he did not finish his statement. A light kindled in his eyes as some mysterious connection was made in his mind. “I have to make a phone call.” He stood, using his cane to lean on once he was up. “Tell them,” he urged once again, just before he left the room.
Clark didn’t want to. He wanted to sleep. But the idea that he might never wake up from his fevered dreams scared him more than the Lanes’ potential rejection. He gave House a minute to get out of ear-shot, then gathered his courage.
“Lois?” he called out, his voice a creaking squawk as he forced it to be loud enough to carry into the living room and be heard over the television. He could hear the rat-tat-tat of machine guns in some old war movie.
Lois was at his side in a flash. “Hey, what’s wrong?” she asked as soon as she was over the threshold.
Clark closed his eyes before making the leap. “I think we need to talk to your parents. They should know about me, in case…” He couldn’t force himself to add ‘I die tonight.’ He didn’t want to scare Lois.
“It’s not going to happen. You’re going to beat this thing, whatever it is,” Lois said staunchly.
Clark cracked a small smile. “I love that about you, you know. That stubbornness. That drive to set right all the wrong things you come across.” He had to pause and catch his breath. “I’m fighting, Lois. I promise. And I’ll keep fighting. But this thing…whatever disease this is…it’s getting stronger and I’m not sure I can win this fight, even with Dr. House and your parents on my side. And if that happens, I need to make sure you’ve got the support you’ll need…not nosy and scathing questions about where Clark is now that your friend Superman is dead.”
Lois’ lower lip trembled and she pressed two fingertips to it to hide the wobble from Clark. Water was pooled in her eyes. “I don’t…” She stopped and started again. She sat and took his hands in her own. “It’s your choice. But…when you get better, are you sure you want them both to know? Once it’s out there, we can’t just…take it back,” she gently reminded him as she put the back of her hand to his sweaty brow, checking his temperature.
Clark shook his head – a barely-there movement. “It’s not my first choice to have them know, but I don’t see any other choice under the circumstances. And, to be honest, we won’t be able to keep the secret forever. They’re bound to find out sooner or later.” He smiled again, weaker this time. “Either I’ll be called off to a rescue where we can’t explain my absence, or they’ll be babysitting and our kids will start to fly, or…” He deliberately let his voice trail off.
Lois appeared to think it over, but she did smile a little at the thought of their future together. “You’re right,” she decided.
“Can you bring them in?”
“Right now?” She seemed surprised.
“No time like the present, especially with my clock ticking as fast as it is,” he regretfully replied. He sighed. Lois stood and went to take a step, but Clark clumsily grabbed her hand, stopping her in midstride. He waited until she sat down again. “Do you think they’ll hate me?” he finally asked, trying his best to keep his worry from showing and make it sound more natural.
“How could they hate the man who’s made their daughter so happy?” she replied, skillfully side-stepping giving a ‘yes’ or ‘no.’ She took up the abandoned washrag from the night stand and dipped it into the cool, but not quite cold, water and wiped his fevered forehead. “I won’t let them hate you,” she vowed. She cleaned his brow of the beads of sweat that had long since sprouted there and gently kissed his clammy skin. “Everything’s going to be okay.”
But a knot of dread had coiled in Clark’s stomach and he suddenly felt very unprepared for the conversation ahead. “Lois? I…maybe I should let my parents know first. About what I’m going to do. It’s only fair…they shouldn’t have it dropped on them in the moment like that,” he fumbled, a bit too quickly.
Lois smiled at his nervousness. “Okay,” she said. “I’ll get them for you.”
But before she could so much as stand, House reappeared, the regular thumping of his cane against the wood floors even and measured, though quicker than usual; almost with a sense of urgency from the way it sounded. Clark wasn’t sure if that was a good thing or a bad thing. Either House had conjured up some plan of attack to beat the Kryptonian illness that was killing Clark, or Clark had run out of options and it was only a matter of waiting for Death to arrive.
“Everyone, gather around in the bedroom,” House commanded as he continued to limp his way to Clark’s bedside. Clark could see the man gesturing in a ‘hurry up’ manner out of the corner of his eye.
“What is it?” Clark heard his father ask.
“Maybe Dr. House has a new treatment or drug to try?” Martha commented hopefully.
“That was an awfully quick phone call,” Clark heard Sam muttered dubiously under his breath.
“Not everyone takes a million years to make a decision,” Ellen half-heartedly jabbed at her ex-husband. But the usual venom of their exchanges was definitely lacking, Clark noticed distractedly.
“Did you figure out how to save him?” Lois asked, loudly voicing the question burning on everyone’s tongue.
House’s eyes closed for a second as he shook his head as he drank in the tension in the air. “Nope!” The word came out sounding optimistic. He opened his eyes and lowered them, appearing to look at everyone and no one in the same instant. “I figured out how to kill him.”
***
Continued Below
