[September 4, 10:06 PM, CET: Made some changes in response to comments from HappyGirl and KathyB on the feedback thread. Thank you, guys!]
[September 5, 6:26 AM, CET: Changed the doctor's name from Light to Leit, as per IolantheAlias' suggestion in the feedback thread. Thanks for pointing out that particular misunderstanding on my part. It makes a lot more sense this way
.]
***
Have you ever been hit by lightning?
Being who you are, I suppose it doesn’t matter. Even if you had more experience as a lightning rod than the Empire State Building and the Eiffel Tower combined, you still wouldn’t know what it feels like. Neither do I, actually. And yet, it is the best description I’ve been able to come up with: a bolt of lightning striking me behind the eyes. It shatters my senses, leaving me blind, deaf and mute, and with a monster of a headache. But for a fraction of a second, it also grants me a sudden understanding of everything there is to understand about the mechanics that make the world around me tick. It is, for all intents and purposes, a flash of all-encompassing insight. And let me tell you for the record: that is definitely something I could get used to having on a regular basis.
Naturally, then, nothing I can do seems to have any effect on its duration. I could stand on my head, or hold my breath, or dance the Macarena with my fingers up my nose, and I’d still be back to my regular, scientifically challenged self before I even had a chance to blink.
That’s not to say it’s always a complete non-event, though. There are these rare occasions when I involuntarily blurt out one inscrutable nugget of scientific wisdom or another. Forget understanding it – more often than not, I need help from a dictionary just to grasp the mere semantics of it all, let alone explain to a layman – including yours truly – exactly what I just said. But in that one enlightened, singularly focused moment in time, when someone somewhere flips a switch in my brain and the fog temporarily clears, I simply know – like I’ve never known anything in my life – that it’s true.
That’s exactly how I knew, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that I could cure your blindness.
“The antidote is infrared light.”
In my defense, please be aware that under normal circumstances, my understanding of all but the most basic principles of physics is severely limited – which I’m sure some of my high school science teachers would gladly call the understatement of the century. I truly believed the good doctor Leit was carrying everything I needed in the breast pocket of that ugly striped shirt of his. All I had to do was grab the device, get you to look into the light, and wait for a miracle to happen.
Or so I thought. If only it had really been that simple.
***
“Superman, look this way!”
I’m already charging towards the doctor and his goon, who – from the sound of it – are quite busy grappling with the fall-out from whatever grief you dealt them. I silently thank you for that. It may well be my only chance to nail them.
But when I hear your call for me, I turn to you instead. In the end, that’s what I always do.
Before I get a chance to say anything, you’re pointing something at me. I obviously can’t see what it is. I do hear its mechanical snore, though, and then I feel something lukewarm slowly enveloping my eyes. I want to ask you about it, but I can’t. I’m immobilized.
So I stand there, for what could be anything between two seconds and eternity, and then your voice comes back to me.
“Can you see anything yet?”
Oh, that’s what you’re trying to do.
I focus. Not that I really expect that to make all the difference, but I don’t want to simply tell you it’s useless – not yet. So I wait. I wait for a flash of light, or a flicker in my field of vision. Or something. I wait for anything that will let me know you’re affecting my eyesight at all.
There’s only the rigid, all-encompassing emptiness that I’m trying so hard not to get used to. Meanwhile, the seconds are passing us by, and I know we can’t stand here forever. Light and his goon are still around somewhere.
I’d tell you to stop, because it’s not working. But by the time my tongue starts obeying my brain again, you already have – and when I realize why that is, my heart skips a beat. You were kicking and screaming, but now you’re just kicking. They must have gotten over themselves.
I have no idea what kind of evil these men might be capable of – I can’t even check if they’re armed. They could be delusional, but harmless. They could be a couple of really smart fanatics – the kind of antagonist you and I both know we should fear the most. But really, chances are they are something in between, and on any other day, I’d gladly take a shot at simply talking them out of whatever they’re trying to do. But today I am blind, and I’m not taking any chances – not now, and not with you.
“Lois!” I bellow, and then I lunge forward, aiming straight for the sound of your heartbeat. I have to levitate several inches off the floor just to dodge the myriad obstacles strewn all across the newsroom by my earlier bouts of super breath – I idly wonder who will get the dubious honor of explaining that one to Perry – and then my calf bumps into something roughly spherical. It bumps back. I think I can hear you grunt. I know you’re nearby.
I reach down. You’re not there.
Forward, left, right. Up, and then down again. I can feel something now – a shoulder; I think it is yours. Someone’s hand grabs my bicep, but I shrug it off. Your heartbeat speeds up. Then I’ve got you.
“Hang on to me!” I tell you, so you do. You’ve had more experience than most in that department.
We go up, and then through the window – the same window I used when I first met you here as Superman. It’s unfortunately closed, this time – a few shards of glass stick to me as we go out with a bang, but I curl up around you. I hope that’s enough.
Then I can feel the cool night air envelop my face. Finally.
“Are you all right?” I ask you softly.
“Yes.” You sound utterly breathless. “Are you?”
I tell you that I am, but in truth I’m not sure. I know the device was supposed to have cured me. I also know that it didn’t, and don’t ask me why. Maybe it was defective; maybe doctor Leit lied about the method he used to blind me; or maybe it just doesn’t work that way on Kryptonian eyes.
***
We’re back to hovering over Metropolis now, me cradled in your arms in that intimately familiar way you have of holding me; you exuding a foreboding kind of silence that I have rarely, if ever, witnessed in you. But although I’m no psychic, I don’t really need you to say anything. I can smell you piling blame upon yourself.
Doctor Leit and his hired muscle are still out there somewhere, planning to wreak God knows what kind of havoc on the city. Meanwhile, we are making agonizingly slow progress towards my apartment, or wherever it is that we’re going. And there is nothing even Superman can do.
Superman is still blind.
I’m nothing if not a problem-solver; within seconds, I’m already looking for another way out of this mess. But even now, in my heart of hearts, I’m still the competitive news reporter that I have always been; and for the second time in as many days, I consider the enormity of what I know about your current situation. I’m quite sure some would start questioning my sanity if they found out about that, and that I’ve been keeping it quiet for almost two days now. After all, here I am, prize-winning investigative reporter for the greatest newspaper in the world, sitting on something that’s almost as big as your arrival in Metropolis once was. Skyrocketing newspaper sales alone should make this a story to be remembered for years to come.
But I promised you I wouldn’t do it. And as I’m sitting here in your arms, drifting away from the latest in a seemingly infinite series of impending disasters you’ve rescued me from, blindness be damned, I know there is no way I will ever break that promise.
“Will you come back with me to my apartment now?” I ask you softly, and I can feel you tensing ever so slightly.
I suddenly remember a Metropolis P.D. psychiatrist by the name of doctor McCorckle, who once basically called you and Clark both ‘chronic do-gooders’ in the same breath. Now more than ever, I can’t help but agree with her words. Which is why your answer doesn’t surprise me in the slightest.
“I should really go back there, Lois.” you say. “I have to make sure those two don’t do any more damage than they already have.”
“The police can handle them.” I tell you, with more conviction than I feel. “I’ll call them as soon as I get home.”
“For all the good it’ll do by the time I manage to drag you there.”
You almost spit the words out, and there’s a hint of bitterness in your voice that makes my heart ache for you.
“Maybe I better set you down so you can hail a cab.”
I sigh. “Then where will you go, Superman? Let’s just find the way back to my place together, and we’ll figure it out from there.”
“No.”
There’s a hardened edge to your tone – an edge that tells me this is non-negotiable. Being who I am, I try it anyway.
“Why not? You know you’re always welcome. I don’t mind you being there in the slightest. In fact, I like it.” There, I said it.
“And whichever way you slice it, you’ll need a place to stay while you’re … well, incapacitated.”
“I just can’t keep imposing on you, Lois. I’m thankful for what you’ve done for me so far, but now it’s time for me to move on.”
Oh, yes. I’m sure you think you’re being very noble right now.
“Move on to where?” I ask. I try not to sound irritated, or disappointed, or overly concerned in any other way, but I’m not sure I succeed. I already told you, twice, that you’re not imposing at all. I should have known you wouldn’t just accept that as fact.
“I’ll …”
Silence. It dawns on me that you have absolutely no idea what you’re going to do. You weren’t planning on this – any more than I was, really. You’re blind; and as much experience as I have seeing eye to eye with mortal danger in any number of incarnations, I have no idea what to tell you now – now that you’re facing the fact that you may just have to get used to life as a blind person.
“Listen, about this device doctor Leit used on you. It’s basically just a fancy kind of flashlight, really, except that it emits ultraviolet light on one side, and infrared on the other. I don’t know much about physics, but doctor Faraday obviously did. According to the knowledge he gave me, exposure to the infrared light source should have …”
“It should have cured me.” you say, your tone still hard-edged. “I know. But it didn’t, did it?”
“Well maybe it will, if you keep trying.”
Silence. You’re obviously considering that, and I’m glad.
“Do you still have it? The device he used?”
“Yes, I …” I grab the cylindrical object from my pocket. “Oh.”
“What is it?”
“This is… not what I thought it was. It’s that other gizmo…”
“A knowledge transference device?” you cut in. “I’ve heard of it.
It’s a dangerous thing to have, Lois. I think you should take it to the police.”
“I think I will. Who told you about it?”
“A friend.”
For a long time, then, you don’t say anything.
***
I think about what’s going to happen to me now. Clark Kent is supposed to be back at your side on Monday morning – playing his part as the other half of ‘the hottest team in town’. But although there are few things I know about what my life would look like if I can’t recover my eyesight, this one I do: I won’t be much help to you blind. I’ve never heard of a blind investigative reporter – certainly not one that Lois ‘Mad Dog’ Lane would have any legitimate use for. If you decide to be nice about it, you might try to keep me around just for company, and to bounce the occasional leap of logic off of. But that’s not what I want, and that’s definitely not who you are. Either way, I can’t risk you knowing that Superman and Clark Kent are now both blind – that would be way too much of a coincidence.
I think about the good doctor Leit and his friend, and I wonder what’s going to happen to them. I want to go back there. I want to contain them, somehow, at least until I can get the police to come by – but I stay where I am. Deep down, I know there isn’t much I can do at this point. I’ve wreaked so much havoc already, I’d be lucky to find my way back inside without bringing the whole building down with me. I wonder again who will get to explain what happened to Perry. I guess you will be it; you were there. Unlike me, you saw it happen.
“Will you come back with me to my apartment?” you ask, and I tense. Mayson Drake might still be there. You’ll start asking questions, and that will be it – another knock against Clark Kent, the lying hack from Nowheresville. He stood up a woman in love. He broke a promise. Will you still trust me then?
I have to find a way to reverse this thing soon – or my life, as I’ve known it, is over.
***
“So, where will you stay until we find a way around this?”
“I’m sure Clark will take me in for a few days.”
I suppress the impulse to snort. I don’t know that I can count on Clark to do anything right now, least of all be home any time within the next two days. But Clark is your best friend. Maybe the familiar surroundings of his place, even with him gone, are exactly what you need right now.
“OK.” I concede, not sounding nearly as convincing in my support of your decision as I would have liked. “Lose a little altitude, I’ll guide you there.”
You shake your head. “No!”
The raw vehemence in your voice very much takes me aback. After all, this is Superman I’m talking to. Your tones are always calm and measured – even after you’d gone blind and you were flying me home that first time, they still were. Christ, as far as I’m concerned, you could serve as a definition for the very concept of composure in a picture dictionary!
“What’s going on, Superman? You don’t want to come with me to my place, but you won’t let me take you to Clark’s either. Why not? What aren’t you telling me?”
I can feel you taking a deep breath, and I know that you’re consciously trying to compose yourself now.
“Nothing, Lois, I just … who’s to say that Clark will even be home right now? He hasn’t been there for the past few days, as far as we can tell.”
“But Superman, if Clark isn’t home, you can’t very well stay there on your own, now can you?”
“I wasn’t planning to. The Kents are still at your place. I’m sure they have a key. They can let me in, and maybe they’ll even stay with me until Clark shows up.”
Now there’s something I hadn’t expected at all. You’re willing to accept help from Clark’s parents, who for all intents and purposes are complete strangers to you, yet you have trouble accepting my offer to let you stay with me because, of all things, you’re afraid of imposing? Something about that just doesn’t sit right with me.
I shrug. “If that’s really what you want.”
I can’t help but wonder, though, if there’s a reason you’re so desperate to get away from me.
I gently guide you back into my apartment, and for once the window survives your entrance. At that point, you smile and say
“Well, that went smoothly, don’t you think?”
I nod, and then I realize that you can’t see me. Blood starts rising to my cheeks in shame, while my heart aches for you at the same time. “Yes.” I tell you, with as much enthusiasm as I can muster. “Yes, it did.”
The Kents are eagerly awaiting us inside. So is Mayson Drake.
***
“Lois. How are you?”
Is she truly concerned? Or is she just putting up a good show of politeness for the benefit of the Kents in the room? Obviously, she would want them to like her.
“Oh, I’m fine, Mayson.” I tell her, doing my best to make it sound dismissive. “It’s not like these were the first goons ever to get the bright idea of abducting me; nor were they the smartest, or the cruelest. Not by a long shot. But on to more important things: what are you doing here? I thought you were supposed to be showing Clark all the interesting corners of your mountain cabin right about now.”
Mayson shrugs. “He never showed.”
“He didn’t?”
I’m surprised, to say the least. It’s extremely unusual for Clark not to deliver on a promise. Show up and then bolt halfway through? Sure. Simply not be there? Not so much. Something smells wrong.
Mayson doesn’t seem to want to dwell on it, though – and neither do Clark’s parents, for that matter. She just shakes her head. The Kents ignore me altogether. It doesn’t take her long to leave, after that.
“Maybe we should get going too, Lois.” Jonathan promptly announces, after he’s opened and then closed the door for Mayson. Ever the charming gentleman, he is. Like father, like son, I suppose.
“He’s right, honey.” Martha adds. “I think we’ve been abusing your hospitality for far too long already.”
It’s almost as if they’re in a hurry to get out of here. Them, too.
“No, wait a minute…” I hold up my hand in a stalling gesture. “Explain something to me. I thought that son of yours was off to the mountains with Mayson. If she’s here, then where the heck is Clark? He didn’t show up for work yesterday either, you know – didn’t even bother to call in sick or anything. We figured he’d taken an early weekend break and conveniently forgot to tell anyone about it, but…”
“Oh, you know Clark, honey.” Martha cuts in, with an overly dismissive hand gesture that somehow doesn’t ring true. “It wouldn’t be the first time he’s disappeared on short notice.”
“Well, you got that much right.”
Apparently, I’m not the only one regularly on the receiving end of Clark’s vanishing act. At least there’s some comfort in that.
Still, the apparent lack of concern on the part of Clark’s parents greatly puzzles me. He’s never before disappeared on me without even trying to come up with an excuse that at least holds the appearance of plausibility from a distance. He’s never been gone this long, either. Well, except for that one time, when he’d lost his memory. But that was different.
Come to think of it, as the alleged best friend, you don’t seem to be all that concerned about Clark, either.
“So, Superman.” Martha declares rather loudly. I think she’s a bit too obviously trying to steer the conversation away from Clark and his whereabouts, but nobody else seems to notice, or care. “How’s your vision?”
I watch you turn your gaze to the floor; it’s another one of the many things I’ve seen you do for the first time today. There’s something … off … about your behavior. Then again, something seems to be off about the behavior of just about everyone in this room – maybe it’s just me.
“Well…”
You start, and then stop. Hesitation isn’t like you, either. “No news in that department, I’m afraid.”
Martha’s reaction is… interesting, to say the least. She moves closer to you and brings up her hand halfway towards your shoulder, with a look of concern on her face that threatens to overwhelm even me – and hey, I’m just a spectator. For one interminable moment, she seems ready to cry, and I could swear she’s going to hug you. Then the moment passes, and in the split second it takes her to vanquish all overt traces of concern from her demeanor, it becomes almost too easy for me to convince myself I’ve been imagining things. Or maybe what I just witnessed was a case of hero worship nearly gone wrong. God knows what that can do to people.
“Do you guys have a key to Clark’s apartment?”
That’s you, of course – and I can’t help but notice how swiftly you’ve just changed the subject again.
Martha and Jonathan exchange a look. Both are smiling now, as if silently sharing a private joke, and I get the unpleasant feeling that a lot is going on in this room that I’m not in on.
“Well, we know how to get in, that much is for sure. Would you like us to take you there?”
“Yes, please.”
I don’t know what to think of that. With Clark missing in action, does it even make sense for you to want to spend the next few days at his place – with his parents, of all people?
“You know you’re welcome to stay here, right? I mean, with Clark off to wherever the heck he’s gone off to…”
You smile at me. I try to remember when I last saw you smile at me like that, and I fail. But it’s not because you’ve changed your mind.
“I do know that, Lois. But I also really do think it would be best for me to go with the Kents now. Like Martha said, we’ve already been abusing your hospitality for far too long. I’ll stay at Clark’s for a while and come see you in a couple of days, by which time I hope things will have been resolved, one way or another.”
Oh God, you really do want to get away from me that badly.
“Good.” says Martha, turning to her husband. “Jonathan, would you please pick up that grocery bag you brought earlier?”
Without even waiting for Jonathan to acknowledge her request, she then turns to me. “I’d leave it here for you, honey, but unless I missed something, I don’t think you drink much tea, do you?”
I smile at her. “No, I don’t. Clark’s the one with the prize-worthy collection of exotic tea leaves in his pantry. If you don’t drink it, I’m sure he will. Please, take it.”
“Good” she says again. “Superman, will you take my arm? I think that’ll be the easiest way for you to get out of here without doing too much damage.”
I think I can hear a dry chuckle escaping your throat – another unusual thing for you – but you do as you’re told, and I watch Martha gently but firmly guide you out the door. I marvel at the easiness with which you interact with this woman – and she with you. It took months for the awkwardness between you and me to go away. With Martha, there is none of that – nor is there with Jonathan, for that matter.
Oh, well. Maybe it’s just that they’re older; and that you don’t have to be afraid of Martha falling head over heels in love with while you’re not looking. Or something.
I almost don’t notice Jonathan slipping past me with the grocery bag, but then he turns and looks at me.
“Don’t be discouraged, Lois” he tells me, in that soft-spoken way of his that reminds me so much of Clark. “I’m sure Superman values your friendship just as much as he does Clark’s, if not more. It’s just that…”
“It’s just that what?” I ask him breathlessly. He’s hit upon a tender spot, all right.
“Well, he spends a lot of time at Clark’s place, you know? It probably helps to have a clear mental picture of your surroundings when you suddenly find yourself blind.”
Well, I suppose that much is true.
But there’s something else there, in Jonathan’s words. How is it that you seem so much closer to Clark than to anyone else in the world? I was the one who first talked to you. I had the first-ever published interview with you. Heck, I named you! And that’s not even taking into account my frequent flier status on the Superman Express.
Despite all that, at some point in the past year and a half, calling Clark has become by far the easiest way for me to get in touch with you. And now Jonathan Kent – of all people – stands here and tells me you spend half of your spare time at Clark’s place?
“I imagine you’re right,” I tell Jonathan grudgingly. “Although I wouldn’t know. I’ve never been blind.”
Jonathan shrugs. “Neither have I.”
For a moment, he just stands there, up against the doorframe with the paper grocery bag under his arm. I don’t know what I’m supposed to say to him.
Eventually, he points his thumb over his shoulder and says: “Well, I guess I should get going. Knowing Martha, they’ll be halfway down the block by the time I get there, if I don’t hurry.”
“I guess you should go, then” I tell him, still mulling over his earlier words.
He leaves, and while I pick up the phone to call Metropolis P.D., I watch from my living room window as Jonathan and Martha Kent get into a cab with Superman. It rings twice, and then some desk clerk asks if I can hold for a few moments. I sigh and tell him yes, I will, resigned to my fate, as I ponder what a strange sight it is – Superman getting into a cab. I wonder what that driver must be thinking.
