Hearts United (
Table of Contents )
part 14
by Pam Jernigan
Kal wished he could stay there forever, with Lois in his arms. Although he suspected Lois might fall asleep soon, and he wasn't quite sure what they'd been doing about bedtime arrangements. Did they make love? On some level that felt wrong, but he couldn't say why. At any rate, this couch wasn't very comfortable, so he'd have to move her sooner or later...
All too soon, though, the phone rang. Lois startled, and sat up. It rang again, and while Kal was wondering if he ought to answer, she reached for the receiver. "Hello?"
"Oh, hi Brenda. Yeah, it's okay." She smiled at Kal. "He's right here."
Brenda? Come to think of it, the voice on the other end of the line did sound familiar. He concentrated on it, and it seemed as if it got louder and clearer as he listened. "Is he okay?"
"He's fine -- still can't remember much, but we're working on that."
A chuckle. "You go, girl. Remind him of the fun stuff first."
Lois grinned. "Don't worry, I have been."
"But, ah, don't take too long to tell him about Nightfall, sweetie. It's gonna hit, when, Sunday?."
The rest of the conversation passed unheeded as Kal was bombarded with images. Space, a huge mountain of rock, a desperate struggle to return to Earth... Suddenly, the crater made sense. Wow. But he'd done it, hadn't he?
No, Gwen had said there was still a threat. A suffocating heat enveloped him, as panic squeezed his heart. He had to do something...
"Kal?" Lois's voice intruded on his thoughts.
He looked up. "How am I supposed to do it?"
She blinked. "Do what?"
"Save the world," he replied. "I have to do something, I'm just not quite sure what."
Her face registered dismay. "How did you... oh, never mind." She sighed, then said cryptically, "Superhearing."
He ignored that, preoccupied with the topic at hand. "I know there's a huge chunk of an asteroid out there -- Gwen told me -- and when Brenda mentioned it, I started to remember... but not enough!"
"Yes, okay." Lois took hold of both his hands, sitting facing him. "You flew off into space to shatter Nightfall. And you did it. But I guess it was a close thing, because apparently you came back fast and, ah, out of control."
He appreciated the delicacy of that phrasing. "Barely conscious would probably describe it better. But there's still a threat."
She grimaced. "Yes, but it's not due to hit for three more days, and you're not going back out there yet."
"Lois, you have to tell me how I did it--" If he'd done it before, he could do it again, right? Only maybe a little smarter this time? "I can really fly?"
"Yes, Kal, but..." She overrode him, squeezing his hands. "I just got you back. I spent last night here without you, and I don't plan to go another night alone. You can go in the morning, maybe, but not right now."
He frowned. "Can you sleep with a killer asteroid on the way?"
"Now that I have you here, yes," she assured him. "Don't go anywhere tonight. Please?"
He fell silent, unhappy with waiting, but unwilling to distress Lois anymore. He could feel her fear and desperation rippling through his mind, far stronger than she was allowing to show in her face. Well... another twelve hours couldn't hurt, could it? And maybe by morning he'd remember. He pushed the nagging restlessness back. "Okay. So, um... where do I sleep?"
"You sleep with me, Kal," Lois said, looking calmer. Her waterfall smoothed out.
Kal glanced at her, feeling strangely uneasy. "Um, Lois... it's not that I'm not interested, but..."
She seemed to interpret that accurately, and smiled. "We're just going to cuddle and sleep. Honest."
"Oh, okay." In that case, Kal felt free to enjoy the continued intimacy. "Do I have any pajamas?"
"Yeah, sort of," she said, getting up from the sofa. "I'll get them for you."
A few minutes later he was changed, and ready to crawl into bed next to Lois. "I'm ah, glad to wear my own clothes again," he said, to fill the silence. "Those other things weren't too bad, but... they weren't mine."
She looked up. "Well, I've seen you look better. But by the time I found you, I was so glad to see you that I didn't care *what* you were wearing." She laughed. "You could have been wearing my chicken costume!"
He paused, halfway into bed. "Is this something I *want* to remember?"
She giggled, his internal waterfall shimmying slightly. "It's not high on my list of Things You Need to Know."
"Uh-huh." He crawled the rest of way into the bed and lay there, looking at Lois, only a foot away. This felt so natural, and at the same time, utterly strange.
"I was just making a point..." Her voice trailed off and her eyes lost focus. "If someone's relieved and grateful," she said slowly, thinking out loud, "they're not too picky. Kal, you need to have your superhero debut tomorrow. Fly into a press conferences, maybe. Your first public act will be saving the world."
****
Kal's eyes got wide. "Superhero?" he echoed. "Look, I'm willing to try to take care of the asteroid, or whatever it is. If I can. But it sounds like you're talking about a full-fledged career here!"
Oh, right. Even though he looked like Kal and kissed like Kal, he wasn't yet fully himself. It was hard to remember that. "Yeah, I kind of am," she agreed. "We'd talked about it before -- actually, I think it was your idea."
His eyes widened further. "What... why..." He waved a hand in the air, apparently trying to conjure up words and failing. "How?" he finally demanded.
"I'll explain it, Kal, really." She laid a hand on his arm. "I know this is weird for you. Sometimes *I* still have trouble believing the things we've talked about."
"Fill me in on that, please."
"Okay." She took a deep breath. "It's to do with you coming from another planet..."
****
It was more than an hour before Trask made good on his promise. Gwen had counted every minute in this blasted jail cell. She had expected him to send a lawyer, someone low-profile. Instead, Trask had sent a muscle-bound flunky wearing camoflague. He'd looked almost impressed when he found out about the manslaughter charge. Still, he'd gotten her released, and now she stood on the sidewalk, searching for a cab to hail.
"Where to now, ma'am?" the flunky asked.
She dismissed him with merely a glance. "You can crawl back under your rock. I am going home."
"Colonel Trask said I was to keep an eye on you, ma'am." She ignored that, and after a moment, he added, "He wants to see you."
"The Colonel will have to wait until tomorrow." She had research to do and plans to formulate, but most importantly, she needed a long hot shower. And possibly burn her suit. She spotted a taxi and whistled for it.
"Ma'am, if you don't come with me, I'll only follow you." He seemed apologetic, but determined.
The taxi pulled up, and she opened the door. "You may do whatever you like."
"I'll be watching your apartment."
"As you please." She sat herself in the back seat. "I'll go with you tomorrow, if you're there. If not, Trask knows how to contact me."
The goon looked almost impressed again. She pulled the door shut before he could get notions of sharing the cab, and gave the driver her address.
As he pulled out into traffic she inspected the seat; finding it reasonably clean, she relaxed against the back rest.
Trask was free to engage in paranoid delusions about her running away, but that was the last thing she intended to do. Kal was somewhere in Metropolis still, she assumed, and she needed to find him. After a hot shower and a good night's sleep, of course. One must be practical. But she would track him down. The fate of the world -- and her future prestige -- was at stake.
****
Powers. Abilities. She'd told him about all sorts of things he was supposed to be able to do. It seemed unreal. He couldn't even grasp the concept. And he was going to do this in public? For free?
Oddly enough, that thought steadied him. If he was doing it for free, then it was a form of service to the community. That was a concept he knew well. If he had the capability to do things that others could not, good and useful things, then... it would be his duty to do them.
He only hoped that he really *had* the capability; if so, it certainly wasn't apparent to him. But apparently he'd thought so before, and Lois thought so now. "A superhero. Right." He refocused on Lois's face. "So, you were saying something about a debut tomorrow?"
"Yeah, I thought it might be good timing." She shrugged. "We wouldn't have to, but it's a great opportunity."
He nodded slowly, trying to wrap his mind around the idea. "I can see that, I guess. Seize the publicity high ground, as it were. I don't think I'm really after publicity, though, am I?"
"No, and that's why it's perfect," she explained, a smile growing as she talked. "You've just saved the world; they'd give you just about anything."
"Well," he thought aloud, "if you want them to be that grateful, maybe we should let the rock keep coming for another day or two?"
She swatted him. "I'll assume that was a joke. You have to do it tomorrow, because if you wait until the weekend, there will probably be riots and panic all around the world, and people will get hurt. And Friday's not good for you; you're previously engaged."
"Oh, really?"
"You and I have an appointment with the justice of the peace, and we're getting married." She frowned, and looked at him in dismay. "At least, if you get your memory back. You don't want to marry a virtual stranger -- it wouldn't be fair."
He leaned across the small space between them and kissed her. "Trust me. I want to marry you. All I've lost is details."
The worry seemed to recede, though a faint trace remained. "Well, you'll probably remember everything by then, anyway."
"No doubt," he agreed. He was remembering little things here and there; in another day and a half he'd likely remember everything. And if he hadn't, he'd do his best to fake it.
"So anyway," she said, getting back on track. "You'll save the world, introduce yourself, and tell your story."
"It would help if I knew what my story was," he muttered, reluctantly amused.
"Yeah, we'll have to figure out something -- I've got some ideas on that, though, so remind me to mention them," she said. "You introduce yourself, then gracefully bow out. The humble hero. They'll love it."
"So..." He tried to picture the scene. "I just say 'hello, my name is Kal, and I'm from another planet'? 'I just saved the world, but there's no charge. Later!'?"
Lois giggled. "Something like that. Although you can't let them know your real name. Well, okay, it's really a fake name, at least partially, but it's the one you'll be using for our private life."
He contemplated that. "So I'll be an alien with an alias?"
"Yep," she confirmed, her eyes dancing with mischief. "Two of them, actually. Trouble is, we couldn't think of any superhero names for you. Can't use Superman -- that's already taken, and they'd probably sue for copyright infringement."
"Right... I'll just assume that made sense."
"Another long story. Anyway, we need a different name. A whole different kind of name," she added decisively. "Not AdjectiveMan."
He was still adrift, but decided to go with the flow. Either he'd figure it out or remember everything. Sooner or later. In the meantime it was fun to watch her think. "Then where do you start?"
"Maybe something associated with Nightfall," she mused, her eyes narrowing and staring into the middle distance. "Or would that be too negative?"
"Not if I stop it from harming anyone," he pointed out, then continued in a light tone. "And if I don't stop it, I don't think anyone will care what I call myself." The thought was chilling. Life without Lois wouldn't be worth living, he was certain.
Possibly the same thoughts were going through her mind -- he thought he saw a glimpse of fear on her face before she schooled her expression back to a smile.
"I'll stop it, Lois. I promise."
Her smile wavered just a trifle, then came back stronger. "I know you will."
"So then what will we call me?" he asked, wanting to steer her back towards happier topics.
"Names, right. You're going to wear black and burgundy, I think we decided -- assuming we can get a suit ready by tomorrow. I'll have to call Francine first thing in the morning and hope either she or Brenda can sew."
"Burgundy?" That just didn't sound right, somehow.
"It's what you wore on the ship. Sort of. We could think of it as a dark red..."
That didn't seem like much of an improvement, but if those were his colors, then those were his colors. "Yeah, I guess."
"And maybe we ought to add silver accents, to lighten it up a bit. Anyway, with a dark-colored suit like that, we don't want a dark-sounding name, either, so nothing with 'night' or 'dark' in it. We want you to look approachable and trustworthy."
She paused, and he felt it appropriate to let her know he was listening. "What else then?"
"I don't know... Tsunami? Nah, too negative. Maybe something that references your flying, like 'wing' or 'sky' or something..."
"FlyBoy?" he quipped, but she was paying no attention. Her eyes narrowed, and then she was looking at him again, wearing a triumphant expression.
"I've got it."
With some trepidation he asked, "What?"
"Windfall. The 'wind' part is for flying, and the 'fall' part is for Nightfall, as in, the hero who stopped it. But the best part is, 'windfall' means unexpected good fortune, which definitely describes you."
"Windfall," he repeated, testing out the syllables. "Well... I like the double meaning. As long as people take it that way, and not think it means I tend to fall out of the sky."
She just rolled her eyes, then scooted toward him, snuggling up to his side. "I think it'll be just fine."
He wrapped his arms around her. "How about we sleep on it, and see what we think in the morning?" With any luck, he'd remember himself by then.
"That sounds like a good idea," she said, and yawned. "Sorry -- it's been a long day."
"It's okay," he told her. "Go to sleep. I'll be right here."
tbc
