Hearts United (
Table of Contents )
part 16 of 16
by Pam Jernigan
"There. How's that?" Francine stood back to evaluate her handiwork. After some time working backstage, they had moved back into the office for inspection; the light was better. This latest outfit really was pretty good, if she did say so herself. Of course, Kal would probably make anything look good, but the dark colors and tight fit... mmm.
He looked down, frowning. "I don't know... it seems awfully... tight."
"You need it to be tight," Lois told him. Again. "It helps keep you aerodynamic. We could add a cape, though... what do you think, Francine?"
A cape? Francine tilted her head. "Well, maybe. But I kinda like it this way."
"No cape," said Brenda, leaning on a desk behind him. "Definitely no cape."
Kal frowned over his shoulder at her, a faint flush staining his cheekbones. "I am not going out just in this."
"Yeah, but a cape is just too derivative," Lois argued.
He looked frustrated, then brightened. "How about a vest? I think I remember wearing a long vest."
Francine looked at Lois, who seemed to be considering it. "Yeah, you did. Something straight, just fabric on the back, and with the front sides just hanging down from the collar to the floor..."
"Elegant but different," Francine offered, trying to picture it. "I can do that. You'll just have to give me a little while."
Kal looked relieved. "That would be good."
Lois laughed. "Don't mind us, Kal. You look splendid, really. You need to stand taller, though. Pretend you're addressing the New Kryptonian Council."
He gave her a dubious look, but then straightened up, squared his shoulders, and crossed his arms.
"Oh, yeah." Lois sounded smug. "You look fabulous."
"Drool over him on your own time, Lois," Francine said, taking pity on Kal. "Let me measure for the vest..."
"Okay, and then--"
A knock at the door stunned them all for a second. Francine's eyes widened. Kal couldn't be seen in here with that costume on. "Who is it?" she asked, trying to sound normal.
Kal and Lois started grabbing up the scraps of cloth and sewing equipment, then vanished through the other door.
"It's Henderson. Let me in, Franny."
Oh, god. She shot a warning glare at Brenda, then opened the door. "Hi, Bill." That sounded casual. "What's up?"
He leaned against the door jamb, his eyes sweeping the room. "Nice office. Doing a little sewing?"
Damn. She thought they'd gotten rid of all that. "Yeah, you know, costumes."
"Dresses for the dancers, mostly," Brenda chimed in, moving closer. "So you're Bill Henderson?"
He stuck out a hand. "You must be Brenda." The corner of his mouth twitched. "I've heard a lot about you."
Brenda thought she could interpret that, if her brief scowl in Francine's direction had anything to say about it. She shook Bill's hand. "Don't believe everything you hear."
Bill raised an eyebrow. "Oh, so you're not really a great choreographer? Huh."
It took half a second, but then Brenda rallied. "Well, *that* part's true. Nice to meet you."
"You, too."
"Not that it's not nice to see you, Bill," Francine drawled. "But you don't usually drop by just to chat."
He nodded. "I just wanted to let you know," he said, stuffing his hands into his pockets. "Your Doctor Porter made bail."
That was so unexpected she could only blink.
Brenda rushed in to fill the silence. "How the hell'd she do that? And how much was it, anyway?"
"Last night, after my shift, someone came in to post bond for her. One hundred thousand. Front desk said he looked military, but no uniform."
"A hundred thou?" Brenda whistled. "Man, she's got some connections."
"Yeah," Francine agreed, thinking out loud. "And if she makes the connection between--" She stopped herself, and settled for meeting Brenda's eyes before giving a significant glace to the theater door.
"Connection?" Bill asked. His tone was casual, but his eyes were shrewd.
She should have known thinking out loud was dangerous around him. "Oh, it's nothing."
He just looked at her.
"Okay, so it's something, but it's nothing you could arrest her for."
"I'd like a chance to decide that for myself," he said mildly, his expression turning subtly cooler. "It wouldn't involve your missing person friend, would it?"
She raised her chin and met his gaze squarely, not giving an inch. "It's personal. Nothing that could help your case at all."
He tilted his head a fraction.
"Look, Bill, I've been hanging out with petty crooks and crime bosses for--" oops, better not say how long it had really been; she'd seem even older than she was. "for at least a decade now. I know who the good guys and bad guys are." She hadn't always cared, but she'd known. "Kal's a good guy." He'd been hiding so much more than she could have imagined, but she'd still known he was a decent man.
"And that doctor is definitely a bad guy. I promise I'll tell you if I find out anything that can help you get her."
He looked at her for another long moment, then shrugged. "You do that, Franny. I'll check back with you later, then."
"Drop by anytime, sugar," Brenda invited, a suspiciously innocent look on her face. "Franny's almost always here."
Well, it could have been worse. Brenda was going to pay for calling her that nickname, though. To forestall further banter, she said, "Thanks for coming by, Bill. Let me walk you out."
He nodded, and stepped back to allow her passage through the door into the back hallway. She led him to the side door, the official entrance for both the theater and Lois's office. "If you have any more news, I'd appreciate a call."
"I've got your number," he said easily.
No kidding.
"You could call me, too, you know." He reached into his wallet to pull out a business card.
This was looking promising.
"If you remember or find anything about Doctor Porter, of course."
Or maybe not. She faked a smile. "Oh, of course."
He glanced down at his watch and muttered something that sounded profane. "I gotta go. See you later."
She sure hoped so. "Take care." She watched him go down the street until he turned the corner, and then stepped back inside. They had much more important things to think about.
****
Lois hovered nervously by the door. Kal reached for the doorknob, but she gently knocked his hand away. She didn't want to open it until she was certain Henderson was gone.
The door abruptly opened, and Brenda was standing there. "It's okay, the coast is clear."
"Thanks, Bren," Lois laughed a little as they re-entered the office. "That was a close one."
Kal sat in the chair facing Francine's desk. "So, we've got another problem."
She frowned at him, but Brenda was nodding. "Yeah. I can't believe somebody got that woman out of jail."
"Would one of you like to tell me what you're talking about?"
Kal glanced up in surprise. "Henderson said someone had bailed out Dr. Porter. Weren't you listening?"
She sighed. "Not everybody hears as well as you do, Kal." He gave her a brief recap of the conversation.
"What sort of damage could she do, anyway?" Brenda asked.
"That is a very good question." Lois stood behind Kal, draping her arms over his shoulders, chewing on her lip. "She knows a lot, I think."
Kal nodded. "She's the one who told me about New Krypton. And I think she suspects what I can do. She doesn't know my last name, at least. But once Windfall goes public she could probably put the pieces together pretty easily."
"And the thing that bothers me," Lois said slowly, "is that someone bailed her out. She's bad enough working on her own. Who knows who she's hooked up with?"
"She did get a phone call once. Actually, I think that was when she learned about Nightfall, though I don't know how much."
"Still, while rumored about, it's not public knowledge yet."
"It's what I said," Brenda said. Looking up, Lois realized Francine must have slipped back into the room while she'd been thinking. "She's got connections."
There was a moment of gloom, but then Kal stirred. "We can't do anything about that right now," he pointed out, and stood. "Let's focus on what we *can* do."
****
A surprisingly short time later, they were standing in the alley behind the theater. Kal glanced down at the finished costume. With the vest added, he liked it better; it swirled gently as he moved.
"So now what?" Francine asked.
Kal looked up at the three faces surrounding him -- two pale, one dark -- all wearing similar expressions of mingled hope and fear. "I don't know. I still don't remember how to fly."
Lois smiled encouragingly. "You'll remember. We'll help."
"Yeah, it looked easy," Brenda interjected. "One minute you were on the ground, the next one you weren't."
"Thanks, Brenda," he said dryly. "I never would have thought of that."
"Oh, any time, Kal," she assured him airily.
Lois stepped closer to him, drawing his attention. The faith and trust in her expression humbled him. He glanced up at the sky, a bright blue ribbon between tall buildings, with a few wispy clouds drifting along. "You're sure I can do this?"
She smiled at him, with only the faintest trace of anxiety shimmering beneath the surface. "You can do this. You are Lord Kal-El of the House of El, after all." With one finger she traced the symbol on his chest. "And soon, you'll be Windfall, a distant relative of the Kryptonian H.G. Wells knew and called Superman."
"Don't forget my favorite," he said, cupping her cheek in one hand. "Husband of Lois Lane." He leaned in to kiss her, concentrating on feeling her with his lips, his hands, his mind... just as he'd done a few days ago. She pressed herself nearer to him, wrapping her arms around his neck. Just as she'd done, when he'd taken her flying... He wrapped his arms around her waist and closed his eyes.
Eventually, he had to pull back, but he didn't let her go, instead burying his face in her hair. "But in order to win the fair maiden, I guess I need to slay the dragon -- if I can remember how."
She giggled softly. "I don't think it'll be that hard."
He pulled back to look at her, then noticed they were slowly spinning, about a foot above the pavement. He laughed. "Maybe not." Gently, he returned them to the ground, re-gaining confidence as they moved.
Brenda and Francine, he noted, were laughing by the side of the building. He was too happy to care. He remembered!
Lois was smiling at him, her eyes shining for a moment before the glow faded into worry. "Be more careful this time, huh?"
"Smarter, you mean? I don't know exactly what I did last time..." He thought he could make a pretty shrewd guess, actually, but if he was right, he'd rather not admit to it. "But shattering didn't really get the job done, so I guess I'll just have to nudge that big chunk onto another course. Some of the other ones, too, maybe."
"As long as you don't stay out there too long," Lois cautioned.
He smiled at her. "I'll be careful. I have a lot to live for." That called for one more kiss, then he stood back, and began drifting upwards. "Okay. Time to go save the world. I *will* be home before dinner."
"You'd better be," Lois muttered, though he suspected she hadn't intended for him to hear that. He winked at her, then looked up and accelerated into the sky.
****
Lois watched until he dwindled out of sight, her heart contracting painfully. He was going to come back to her. He had before, and this was much easier. All she had to do was wait.
She hated waiting. And there was something she could do. She turned towards her friends. "Francine, Brenda, want to help me on one more little investigation? I'm going to start working on tracking down Doctor Porter."
Brenda pursed her lips. "Yeah, that's a good idea, but how are you gonna do it?"
"Come on back inside," she urged them. "We can check out her office, see if she's been back there. And I'll bet I can dig up a home address, too. Francine, could you ask Kari if she knows anything?"
"No problem, Lois."
"Good. If that woman is out there, we'll find her."
****
This time, Kal had a healthy respect for the mass and inertia of the tumbling rocks. He spent some time planning his approach, enjoying the warmth of the sun's rays, and thinking back. He was beginning to get all his memories back, if in somewhat jumbled order. A mental picture of Lois dancing in a chicken suit appeared, and he choked back a laugh. No wonder she hadn't been keen on his remembering that. But even then, he'd felt drawn to her. He remembered that part very clearly.
As he was maneuvering some of the smaller rocks, another memory surfaced. He must have been on New Krypton, in this one; he was wearing the same sort of outfit he'd remembered earlier. A body suit with a long overvest, in his house colors. He was in a court of some kind, making an appeal to a group of hard-faced elders.
It was the trial of the man who'd threatened Lois. He remembered having been almost desperate for success, feeling that a guilty verdict was a foregone conclusion, but insignificant on its own. What had he been trying?
He watched the memory almost as if it were a play being performed for him. He'd been addressing the council, tricking or manipulating them into something. Kal frowned. The council was always right; so to go against them was... had he been a traitor?
And yet, it didn't seem as if he'd wanted anything but the best for the people of New Krypton. They were his responsibility, after all. The council had agreed with whatever he had proposed, and a fierce elation had shot through him. Now he could tell what he'd been doing -- setting things up so that he could leave his home in good hands. So that he could be with Lois.
Feeling that his resources were getting a little depleted, he flew back to the Earth's upper atmosphere to breathe in some oxygen. More memories and details were flooding into his mind as he hung there, standing on nothing.
He flew back out to take care of the last rock, then turned back to Earth for good. His home. He smiled.
The smile faded as the realization hit him: There were one or two little crucially important details that he had forgotten to take care of. He sped up, planning as he flew. That was definitely going to be his first priority.
****
"So, Francine, you bringing a date to their wedding?"
Francine frowned across the office at Brenda. "It's not really going to be that kind of wedding, Bren."
She shrugged. "Well, sure, but we're putting on a party afterwards. And it's an easy invite, too. Everybody knows you have to bring a date to a wedding, so nobody thinks too much of being asked."
"He'd see through that pretty quick," Francine predicted gloomily. "Probably as soon as I tried it, which is why it ain't happening."
"Well, you know, that wouldn't be a bad thing, altogether -- that way, he knows you're interested, without you actually saying so."
"I don't think so, Brenda." She was a mature woman, not a high schooler. She didn't need to resort to ploys. Besides, if he wasn't interested, what would it matter whether she'd been direct or not? They'd both still know what had happened, and it would be embarrassing. There were *degrees* of humiliation, maybe, but she didn't want to face any sort of rejection. Subtle or otherwise.
Besides, Bill was so damn obscure most days anyway, she'd never be able to figure out what he'd meant by it.
"Aww, come on, Francine. Take a chance. You never know--" The phone rang, cutting her off. Brenda looked at Francine, who waved for her to pick it up.
Brenda went into professional mode and answered the phone. After a moment, though, the professional face wore off and was replaced by a wicked grin. "Yeah, she's right here." She looked across the office to Francine and said cheerfully, "Run for it, Francine. You're wanted by the cops."
"I've got it!" Francine lunged for the phone. "Hello?"
"Hello, Francine."
She relaxed as she recognized the voice. He was the one cop she wouldn't mind being wanted by. With a pointed glance at Brenda, she swung her chair toward the wall for a little privacy. "Hi. What can I do for you, Inspector?"
"Oh, I had some news I thought you'd want to know."
"What's that?"
"We've found Dr. Porter. She's dead."
"Really?" She felt a rush of guilty relief, then reconsidered. Why should she feel guilty? The woman had been a menace. "How?"
"We received an anonymous tip that there'd been a shooting in the warehouse district. When the beat cop checked it out, he found the good doctor on the floor, shot through the heart."
"Wow." She didn't know what to say. Would he think less of her if he knew she was glad to hear it?
His voice went soft. "You wouldn't happen to know anything about that, would you, Francine?"
"What? No!" Did he really think so little of her?
"Okay, okay," he said, sounding more apologetic. "I had to ask -- procedure."
Well, that was better, at least. After how mysterious she'd been with him earlier, she probably shouldn't blame him for asking. "For the record, I don't know anything."
"She was killed mid-morning, they think," he continued, his voice regaining its usual dry tone. "There are a few leads."
A shake of the chair drew her attention to Brenda, standing next to her desk and looking worried. "Yeah, hang on a second, Bill." Cupping her hand over the phone for a moment, she said, "Porter got herself whacked this morning. Well, shot, anyway. Go across the hall and tell Lois, okay?"
She turned her attention back to the phone and her chair away from Brenda. "So you're investigating? That's why you called?"
"Yes and no. I thought you'd want to know."
"I did. Thanks." That was a loose end they wouldn't have to worry about anymore.
"Least I could do. We'll keep looking into it -- there might be some kind of paramilitary group involved. Point is, none of the stuff so far points toward you or your friends, so you're officially off the hook."
"Oh. Good." Damn. No more investigation meant no more excuses to talk to him. Was this a subtle brush off? She slumped back against the back of the chair. "Well, thanks for letting me know."
"No problem. So, uh, Franny..."
She sat upright again. "Yeah?"
"The Tigers are playing tonight. There's a guy here in the department who gets season tickets. I snagged two of them."
"Tonight? Uh, yeah. My schedule's open." Of course, that hadn't exactly been an invitation, but then, what else could it have meant?
"He's got some pretty good seats. What do you say?"
"I love football."
There was a huff of laughter on the other end of the line. "Good. I'll pick you up after my shift, okay? Should give us lots of time."
"Sounds good." Us. What a nice word. Daringly, she added, "It's a date."
He chuckled. "Yep. See you around six? Dress warm."
"I'll be ready. See you later, then. Bye."
She hung up the phone and slowly turned her chair around toward the office again. Brenda was sitting at her desk, regarding her with a fascinated expression. "A date?"
Francine shrugged. "He's taking me to the Tigers game tonight."
"Excellent. And after that?"
"I don't know," she confessed. "But I think I'm looking forward to finding out."
"Well, okay, now it's official," Brenda declared, with a grin. "Kal had better save the world, 'cause you have a lot to live for -- and I wanna watch."
****
Lois sat in her office, staring into space and idly turning in her chair. It had been a relief to hear that Dr. Porter was no longer a threat -- although who knew what she had in her notes. And Kal had said she'd tape recorded the sessions. Maybe she ought to visit that office to destroy whatever evidence remained.
Nonetheless, they would continue with Kal's debut. A press conference about the near miraculous reprieve from planetary disaster still seemed like the best opportunity they had. Assuming there was a miraculous reprieve; she had faith in Kal but he'd been gone for hours and she wouldn't have thought it would take that much time, judging from what she'd heard about interceptor missiles.
Well, he would doubtless be back soon -- and they weren't going to run and hide just because one or two people might know too much. The whole world knew too much. She made a mental rude gesture toward the ghost of H. G. Wells. Of course everyone would be searching for Windfall's secret identity, but Lois meant to establish Windfall as entirely separate from Superman -- different backstory, different life, different supporting cast. They might get away with it.
Or not. Only one way to tell.
Even so, it would all be worth it, if only Kal would come back to himself, and come back to her, too. The man she'd spent the last day with was wonderful, but he wasn't really her fiance. If he still didn't remember by tomorrow, she'd have to postpone the wedding. She couldn't let him make such an important choice if he wasn't legally competent.
Still, assuming everything was going well out there in space -- she involuntarily glanced upwards -- they would have lots of time to deal with his memory loss and recovery. Whatever happened, they would handle it. Even if Kal never remembered, he was still her partner. They were bonded. She wanted to spend her life with him, one way or another.
The fictional Lois Lane never backed down from a challenge. Neither would the former Army Lieutenant Lois Lane.
There was a diffident knock on the door; she swung her chair around to see Kal standing there, smiling at her.
She jumped up and gave him a hug. "It worked?"
"Like a charm." His light-hearted words seemed at odd with the seriousness of his expression. "I remembered some more things, too."
"Oh, good -- like what?"
"I remembered that I'd forgotten an important step in our relationship." Holding her gaze, he went down on one knee and produced a small velvet box. "Lois Lane -- will you marry me?"
She moved her mouth, but her voice refused to emerge. She swallowed and tried again, then paused, her eyes narrowing. Had he remembered, or was this AmnesiaMan? "Who's asking?"
He smiled. "The sexist creep."
"Kal!" She choked out a laugh. "Of course I'll marry you."
She tugged on his shoulders, but he stayed where he was and opened the little box.
"Oh, it's beautiful."
He pulled it out and slipped it on her finger. The gold band was two-toned, wrapping around two small heart-shaped diamonds. It was the most lovely thing she'd ever seen. "I wanted to find something special," Kal said as he got back to his feet. "And I was having no luck. But then, I found this... remember what shey-ana means?"
"Hearts united." She smiled and blinked to hold back tears. "It's perfect."
He bent to kiss her, and as she reciprocated, she realized. As unlikely as it had sometimes seemed, and no matter what name he went by, she finally had her very own personal Clark Kent.
****
The End
