A/N: This story sort of slots in between Tomorrow Never Comes and The Sound of Time Passing , though it sort of renders the first one redundant, I think. Sorry about that. Anyway, I do hope you enjoy it at least a little. 
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It was two o' clock in the morning when Clark jolted awake. He rolled over, trying to get back to sleep, but it was no use. After several minutes of tossing and turning, he gave up.
He stared at the blackness between him and the ceiling, dreading the moment mere hours from now when he would have to get up and face the day... and face nightfall. He knew it had to be done. He knew he was the only one who could do it. So, it naturally followed that he had to do it. But that didn't mean he wanted to.
He sat up, wincing as the springs of the mattress creaked beneath him and hoping that he didn't wake Lois. The thought of slamming head-first into seventeen miles of solid—
—wait. Lois? Why on earth...? He turned and looked down at the empty space beside him on the bed, running a hand over it for good measure. Lois wasn't there.
Of *course* Lois wasn't there, he chided himself. Why would Lois even be in his apartment, much less his bed, at this hour of the night? Perhaps he'd been having a dream. He lay back down and resumed his study of the darkened ceiling. He was only hours away from risking his very life in the ultimate test of his abilities.
Where was Lois?
He sat up, frowning at the question that persisted in his mind. If anything, Lois was probably in her own apartment right now, in her own bed. Assuming, of course, that the impending end of the world didn't mean—he shook his head. Lois would never do that to him.
...Do *what* to him?! He raked a hand through his hair. Lois was his colleague, perhaps even his friend, and—and she should be there. Feeling like an idiot, he softly called out into the darkness. “Lois?”
The room remained still and quiet, cementing his feelings of foolishness. Then, after a moment, he heard a soft voice answer, “Clark?”
His eyes widened in the darkness as she came down the steps of the loft to stand beside his bed. She was staring at him, her heart rate beginning to pick up speed.
“You're...here?” Clark asked, his confusion growing by the second.
She hesitantly nodded. “Yes.”
A thought nagged at him as they watched each other in awkward silence. “You...” No, it was impossible. “Are you...” It made no sense. “Have you been here before?” Realizing how silly that question was, he amended, “at night? With me? Like this?”
She stepped closer, and he could hear her heart hammering. “Yes,” she whispered.
Clark struggled with the nagging thought and lost. “Are you... here every night?”
She sat down beside him on the bed, gaping. “You remember?”
He shook his head. “No. I mean... I don't know. Remember what?”
Lois reached down and took his hand in both of hers. “Clark,” she said softly, “It's 1999. You stopped Nightfall a little over five years ago.”
“What?!” He opened his mouth, closed it, then shook his head. “I think I'd remember...” he trailed off, frowning in confusion at the woman who, logically, should be across town trying to call her family members for a final farewell chat. “...wouldn't I?”
“It did a number on your head,” she said, giving his hand a squeeze. “You've had a hard time remembering things that happen since the asteroid.”
“Things like...what?” he asked her, letting his hand close around one of hers.
Lois withdrew her other hand and reached toward some kind of radio that he hadn't noticed sitting on the nightstand. She turned it on, but instead of music or news reports, Clark only heard the soft sounds of a baby burbling contentedly. “Get some sleep,” she said, smiling at him. “I'll tell you in the morning.”
The End
