“It is not my time, reaper. You may not take me.” The man stood in the shadows, swaying. A moment later he stepped out into the light.
“Abomination,” he muttered, staring at them with his good eye. His other eye was covered with a dirty rag which did not conceal a crusted matte of something nasty seeping from the other one.
Lois stood frozen, unable to speak. The sick feeling at the pit of her stomach had never gone away, though it had gradually faded into the background over the past few days.
It was back in full force.
There was something about the way the man was staring at her. His single eye stared at her as though he knew all her secrets and despised them.
He was a tall man, dressed in multiple layers of clothing. His clothing reeked of stale urine and body odor.
“I was the hand of God, and the eye, and now I am nothing.” The man shook his head. He had a full, matted beard, and crumbs fell from it.
“Olaf?” Clark asked. “My name is Clark Kent, and this is Lois Lane. We are reporters-“
“I know who you are.” The man scowled. “I know what you are. This is not your place, not your home. This is our place, MY place.”
“We just wanted to ask some questions about the other members of your order.” Clark glanced at Lois and she shook her head a little. She didn’t feel ready o speak yet.
“Dead. All dead because I could not see.” The man’s expression turned morose. “I was to be the eye, and they were the hand.”
“The Hand?” Clark asked.
“Of God, fool!” Olaf stepped forward, his eye blazing. “We were the hand of God, ready to smite the Enemy.”
“And you failed.” Lois spoke, and she realized that her voice was flat.
“The Beast was too strong. Mortal hands had no chance.” The man was becoming agitated. “Damn her back to hell!”
Lois shared a look with Clark before turning back to the questioning.
Olaf hadn’t been an old man. His posture and bearing was that of someone who had been broken. He stooped, and although he had once been a big man, he was now skinny and he swayed.
It looked as though he hadn’t eaten in a while. His eyes were sunken in his head.
“You came to America to find the Beast?” Lois asked, finally regaining her voice.
Olaf stared at her. “No one seeks the Beast. To meet her is death.” He closed his remaining eye. “Beautiful death.”
“Then why?”
“The Key must be destroyed.”
“You were looking for a key,” Lois said. “And it took a hundred of you?”
“The Key was hidden. It was our holy duty.” The man looked suddenly morose. “We could not kill her.”
“The Beast?” Lois asked.
“They Key! The Key was a girl, the sun’s morning light.”
Lois scowled. Talking to Olaf was like trying to swim through tar. Every question only led to more, and nothing ever seemed to go anywhere.
“We were talking about the Beast.” Lois said. “What did she look like? Was she tall, short, blonde…?”
“If you are seeking the Beast, you are a fool!” Olaf scowled and stepped closer to Lois. “You’ll get what I got. Cold hands reaching into your head…stealing it all away.”
Lois glanced at Clark again, remembering a fingernail embedded in a man’s skull.
“Did she do this to your eye?” Lois asked. Despite the filth, she found herself leaning forward to look under the rag. She was repulsed, yet fascinated.
Even though she knew she’d regret it, she couldn’t not look.
Olaf batted her hand away and said, “No touching. I did this.”
“Why?” Lois asked, repelled. What could make a man gouge out his own eye?
“If thine eye offends thee….” Olaf lifted the rag to reveal the ruined socket where an eye had once been. “My eyes failed my brothers. I was to be their seer. Now I see better.”
Lois stepped back, and leaned in toward Clark. “I’m not sure he’s capable of telling us anything more.”
“We need to get him some assistance,” Clark said. “That socket looks infected, and I’d hate for him to try to blind the other one.”
“I am not blind!” Olaf said. His hearing was apparently quite good. “You are both the blind ones. Cannot see what is right before you. I may not see the now, but I see what will come.”
“You’re saying you are some sort of prophet,” Lois said skeptically.
“I said it before,” the man said irritably. “I was the seer, only I did not see. Now I see but the connections are lost.”
“So what’s in the future?”
“Darkness and death, killer of men. Dark days are coming for this city of Angels. The angels will reject it and the others will come.”
“I’d thought the Angels left a long time ago,” Lois said.
“You perhaps, when the darkness entered your soul.” Olaf chuckled, and the short laugh turned into a cough heavy with phlegm. “You still dream about it, every night.”
Chilled, Lois stepped back. “I dream about my next big story. You apparently aren’t it.”
“Galactically stupid,” Olaf said. “You seek the alien and inhuman when the truth is beside you, inside you, all around.”
Lois glanced at Clark, who shrugged uncomfortably.
It was time to end this, and it looked like Clark knew it. He stepped carefully back then stepped further down the alley while pulling out his cell phone. Lois presumed that he intended to call the police to get Olaf the help he needed.
“You know what’s in you,” Olaf said quietly. He fumbled in the rancid layers of clothes he was wearing, searching through his pockets.
Glancing back to see that Clark was engrossed in his conversation with the police dispatcher, Lois turned to Olaf.
“What do you know about me?”
“Always craving Daddy’s love.” Olaf coughed again. “Mama a drunk. What don’t I know?”
“What’s happening to me?” There were so many questions, and so few places to find answers.
“You know what’s happening. You’ve had the dreams. Evil to fight evil. The fools.” Olaf stared at her. “You will kill again.”
Lois shook her head. “You don’t know what you are talking about. I don’t have to do anything.”
“It infests you. You must cut it out before it takes you over.”
Olaf fumbled through his pockets. Most of his body was still in the darkness, but as he lunged forward, Lois could see the gleam of something metallic in his hand.
The world seemed to slow around her, and without conscious thought she grabbed his wrist and twisted just as her sensei had always taught her.
The bones in his wrist made a cracking, and he shrieked. The knife fell to the floor of the alley and Lois kicked it behind her.
He yanked ineffectually at his arm, shrieking again, and Lois felt the bones of his wrist grinding together under her hand.
She let go convulsively, and Olaf staggered back to land in a heap against the wall. He did not move again, although she could hear him moaning in a low voice.
Lois shuddered violently, and she stared at her hands. Olaf was right. There was something inside her, and she didn’t know how to get rid of it.
She staggered backward, and then Clark was there.
**********
The flashing lights of the ambulance were interspersed with the flashes of the camera as pictures were taken of the knife. Lois was wrapped in a blanket that Clark had found from somewhere.
For some reason, she couldn’t seem to get warm.
“He didn’t say anything before he attacked you, Ms. Lane?” The police detective had been competent and clinical. Undoubtedly she dealt with assault victims every day.
Not that Lois had been the victim.
“He said I had an infection that had to be cut out,” Lois said.
The woman nodded. In the distance, Lois could see Clark being interrogated by another officer. Jimmy was in the background, wide eyed.
“So you came to ask him questions about a religious group he’d belonged to, one involved in a mass murder over in Sunnydale.”
“Outside of Sunnydale,” Lois said absently.
“And he became violent and tried to stab you?”
Lois nodded.
“Are you trained in the martial arts, Ms. Lane?”
“I’m a brown belt in Tae Kwon Do,” Lois said. She hesitated. “I haven’t had time to take the formal test, but my sensei tells me I am.”
“So you should have been able to disarm him without hurting him?” The officer’s face was expressionless.
Lois sighed. “I don’t understand how it happened. I got the knife away from him, and something just popped.”
It was a lie. Something had crunched under her fingers. Lois rubbed them together again compulsively.
“It all just seemed to happen so fast.” Lois said. She found herself staring at the ground. She felt exhausted suddenly, even though she’d slept until noon.
The woman touched her shoulder and Lois flinched. “I wouldn’t worry about this, Ms. Lane. You are the victim here.”
If only that were true.
“If this goes to trial, you might have to testify,” the detective said quietly. “But I doubt this will ever go to trial.”
“He said he injured his eye himself,” Lois said. “He’s clearly a danger to himself.”
“We have enough evidence that a judge will sign an emergency detention order. They can hold him for up to seventy two hours at the psych ward. After that, we’ll see what we can do about getting him the help he needs.”
“How did he ever get out in the first place?” Lois asked.
“I’m sure he’s much clearer when he’s taking his meds.” The detective shook her head. “The system is overloaded. They have to let people go to make room for the next ones, whether they are all the way ready or not.”
They were done shortly afterward.
*************
“So you broke the guy’s wrist?” Jimmy asked. Lois didn’t like the wide eyed enthusiasm on his face, or the admiration in his voice. “I always knew you could take care of yourself. After you put that guy Mitchell in the hospital…”
Lois scowled. “That was my cooking. How was I to know that he was allergic to curry powder?”
“I’m sure he was surprised to find it in an omelet.” Jimmy said, grinning.
Lois shrugged, relieved when she saw a slight smile from Clark. Somehow they’d ended up in a diner that didn’t look much different than the one they’d been in on the night they’d first visited Angelica.
It felt like that was an eternity ago. Lois had felt different then, and she felt even more different now.
She kept feeling bone cracking under her hands. It was more than just Olaf, although that was part of it.
She tried to smile at Clark, although she could tell by his expression that she wasn’t fooling him. They were going to have to talk soon, and Lois wasn’t sure what she was going to say to him.
Telling him the truth was out of the question. How was she going to tell him that she wondered sometimes if she was even human anymore?
Her hands hadn’t stopped trembling.
“I’m sorry,” Clark said finally. “I should have seen that he had a knife.”
Lois grimaced. “What were you going to do, frisk him? I wouldn’t have touched him at all if I hadn’t had to.”
She’d washed her hand repeatedly after the officer had left, and it still felt dirty. Lois was going to take a bath as soon as she got home.
Lice were a complication she didn’t need in her life right now.
“I should have been watching more closely.” Clark said. He’d been staring at the table for much of the conversation, even more quiet than usual.
“I can take care of myself, Smallville.” Lois said irritably.
Clark smiled slightly. “I can tell.”
“Olaf was a dead end,” Lois said. “So where do we go from here?”
“I think we should go back to the Teen shelter.” Jimmy said.
“Looking for a date?” Lois said, instantly regretting it. Jimmy meant well. It wasn’t his fault she was going through an existential crisis.
“She was in Sunnydale, and she probably knows a lot of the kids that came from there.” Jimmy said. “It can’t hurt.”
Lois sighed. He was right. They’d have to find some way to make the girl talk.
“Plus,” Jimmy said, “She’s kind of cute.”
He grinned, and for a moment Lois felt better.
