- Good Life Gone -
-Chapter 1
Diving out of the way of a punch she really wanted to avoid taking, Lois rolled to her feet only to find herself ducking an elbow. Coming back up, she aimed a punch at her aggressor's chin as she rose but caught only empty air and was rewarded for her effort by being kicked in the back, sending her sprawling into a wall. Spinning, she launched herself into an attack, throwing what she knew were reckless punches, and had them easily swatted away before being sent on the defensive again.
Pivoting away from a kick, she came around with a swinging backhand, which was ducked and took a punch to the stomach as a result. She stumbled backwards a couple steps, taking a second to catch her breath. Stupid. She should have seen that coming.
"Stop being predictable."
Lashing out with her right foot, Lois forced her to take a step back, and followed with a combination move Bruce had taught her years ago. She'd have never thought about it had there been no comment about being predictable. It was only effective in allowing her to stay on the attack, which she probably should have foreseen, but it ended with her moving with more control than she had been, which was a positive. She'd been too focused on landing something, anything, that she'd throw caution and her balance to the wind.
As quickly as she'd gone on the offensive, she found herself being pulled in as a punch she'd thrown had been trapped, and was being tossed unceremoniously a few feet away. Knowing what could be coming, she used the momentum of the throw to keep rolling, putting a few more feet between them and had time enough to stand up before leaning backwards to avoid another elbow. She leaned too much, though, and ended up flailing a bit to keep from falling over. That was enough. She took a kick to the stomach that sent her onto her back, and a blink later a fist connected with her stomach and was headed for her face. She closed her eyes, expecting impact, and opened them only after she felt none. A fist was stopped right in front of her face, and she got her nose flicked not a second after. Blinking, she scowled. "Hey!"
Chloe grinned at her and offered her a hand up, which she took and used to get herself back on her feet. "So you want full contact, but a little flick to the nose elicits an indignant 'Hey!' does it?"
Rubbing at her nose, she pulled at the straps of her headgear with her other hand until it came loose and she could pull it off. "Punches are fine. Flicking my nose? It leaves a weird, lingering feeling that makes my nose all scrunchy. You know I hate that."
"Yes, I do, so consider it punishment for leaning back ridiculously like you did. I thought I'd broken you of that habit since we started all our training together."
Frowning, Lois started unstrapping her gloves. "I thought the gratuitous punch to the stomach was the punishment!"
"Gratuitous?" Chloe shook her head and started removing her own headgear, prompting Lois to toss her gloves and head gear aside and head over to grab her water, taking a long swig. "That was just me reminding you how lucky you were that I wasn't somebody that had knife or other pointy object at hand. You ever do that in a real fight and I'll take offense to it both as your training partner AND cousin. It's just sloppy."
"I know, I know," Lois grumbled, wiping water off her lips.
"Then stop doing it!"
Lois rolled her eyes and took another drink of water, finishing off what she had. "I'll stop leaning back as soon as I figure out a better way to get out of the way of your annoyingly fast fists and elbows! I don't have to do it with other people because other people didn't spend six months training with Bruce Wayne before being sent off to train in different places throughout the world for almost three years. It's been three months since you got home and we've been doing these sparring sessions for two of those months. That doesn't even take into account the fact that you have yet to come back to the Planet and are spending most of your excessive free time training."
"I meditate, too."
"Point being," Lois said as she fought the urge to roll her eyes at the useless inclusion of meditation, "I'm still catching up!" God it sucked having to say that. Until Chloe had left, Lois had always been better at the physical aspects of life than her cousin. Now she was not only behind, but she was probably totally outclassed, at least when it came to fighting. "I'm closer, but I'm still not landing anything."
Chloe moved closer and smiled, shrugging her shoulders. "Like you said, it's been about three and a half years. I spent all that time studying intensely and soaking up every bit of martial arts knowledge I could, training body and mind. You spent that time being a renowned journalist, being a wife and mother and focusing on more important things than training like this."
"Yeah, well, as proud as I am of you, and I am proud of how you've grown since you left, it just makes me a bit sad that I've been passed by."
Chloe stared off into space for a second before raising an eyebrow. "You passed me in journalism and I passed you in martial arts. Call it even?"
It hardly seemed an even trade, considering journalism had been Chloe's first love, but Lois nodded. "Deal. Also, I think I should get credit for not taking any jabs about your 'being a wife and mother' remark. Normally I'd say something, but I really am working on it."
"What do you call this?"
"An attempt at getting some credit. A jab would have been me saying you need to stop sequestering yourself here in your monstrous apartment through excessive training and meditation and start getting out to meet people and reintegrate into life in Metropolis. Then within a couple years you could fill this monstrous apartment with people that aren't my family and Lucy's family, also referred to as a family of your own. THAT would have been a jab. What I was doing was just trying to get some credit for not taking a jab. And this isn't to say there's anything wrong with being alone, but it can be kind of a lonely thing to be."
"And now you've lost all credit you would have earned. Good job."
"I am better about things now, right?"
Chloe shrugged. "Considering you couldn't be much worse than you once were?" Making a show of thinking about it, Chloe finally said, "Taking that into consideration, it's a relative better."
"Better is better." Lois led the way out of the room Bruce had converted into a training room for Chloe - the man really did think of everything - and into the living room. "Now, I'm gonna hit the shower. I suggest you do the same so you're all squeaky clean when we meet Clark, Jacob and Cassidy for dinner."
Chloe shook her head. "I'm going to shower, but I'm not getting decked out for McDonald's. Why are we going there, by the way?"
"We let Jacob pick where we are going for dinner tonight. He wanted to go to the McDonald's with the big playscape, so there we go. And don't forget, the playgroup party is in six days, which I think you'll enjoy. Obviously more children are going to be around than you're used to, but the other parents are good people, which is why I want you to come and meet them. While I'm awesome and Clark is pretty great, you need friends that live in Metropolis and aren't your family."
"I still think it's weird that you're making me go to Jacob's playgroup party, but I'll go and be totally out of place. In the grand scheme of things you, Clark and the kids are happy. I'm happier than I've been in a long time. Basically there's happiness abound, so we must be doing something right."
"You're waiting for the other shoe to drop, aren't you?" Lois asked.
Lois watched as Chloe sucked her lip, not saying anything for a minute. "Does seem to be the pattern for me when things are going well." Chloe shrugged and walked back towards her room, leaving Lois alone in the living room. Unable to decide if she wanted to sigh at Chloe's unfortunately accurate statement or roll her eyes at her negative attitude, she ultimately did neither. A shower would be a better way to spend her time.
Running a hand through what proved to be hair that was still a little shorter than how she'd once worn it, Chloe cracked her neck and walked into Lois and Clark's house, only to be greeted by the sound of children being loud. This was hardly a foreign sound, considering they had two children, but this was an onslaught of party proportions. She was surprised that the house was decorated, though it made sense that Clark might like to do something like that. His upbringing of partial seclusion by Martha and Jonathan probably lent itself to him going a bit overboard for these occasions.
Bobbing and weaving through a running group of children, Chloe reached the kitchen, which appeared to be the chosen sanctuary for many of the attending parents. She recognized a few, having met them since she had returned to Metropolis, but most were strangers. Could be worse; Lois could have used the opportunity to set her up with single dads. She really was trying to be better about social interaction, but her 'better' often left something to be desired in Lois' mind.
As if bidden by the thought, Lois came walking into the kitchen and spotted her. "Chloe, hey! About time you got here!"
Chloe held up the bag she was holding and shrugged. "I was running some errands and lost track of the time. I brought some snacks for the kids, though, just in case you forgot to get something extra sugary." She pulled out two twelve packs of cupcakes from the bag and put them on the counter. "I figured that would be enough to cover the kids and a few parents."
Lois raised an eyebrow as she pulled milk out of the fridge and put it on the counter. "You lost track of time while shopping? You look and sound like Chloe Sullivan, but you act like somebody I've never met before."
"Very funny."
"Easy joke. Would have worked harder but been trying to keep track of bunches of children. It's tiring." Lois paused a second and looked at her, causing Chloe to fidget. "You look uneasy and antsy. Of course, you probably know that. What's wrong?"
As much as she wanted to say she was fine, it was, as Lois said, obvious that she wasn't. No point in beating around the bush when you've been called on something. "It's just... it's been a while since I've been to a party."
Lois stashed the milk back in the fridge before taking her by the wrist, pulling her through people and the house until they were out the front door. "I take it we're out here for the relative peace and quiet?" she asked.
Lois nodded. "That, and I wanted to talk to you before things inside get crazy and I'm too busy."
Wow, she really had been away a long time if what had been going on in the house didn't yet qualify as crazy. "Um, ok. I mean, I don't really need to talk about being uncomfortable at a party because it's not like I was ever really into any social scene."
"Chlo, this isn't some college party or a bar we're talking about. It's Jacob's playgroup. What about that makes you feel uncomfortable?"
"I barely know anybody, Lois. As good as I was at talking to people as a reporter, I've spent most of the past three years listening and learning in some pretty secluded places. I ran into some chaos here and there, but nothing like this party. I haven't been to a kid's party since I was one of the kids! Of the adults in there, I know you, Clark, Juliet, Adam and Mary. I don't even know why I'm here!"
"It's because I want you to meet people."
"What? Lois, please, don't try to fix me up at a party. That's just ridiculous and..." She trailed off as Lois held up a hand.
"Give me some credit, would you? You asked me not to, so I won't. When I said I want you to meet people, what I want is for you to interact, Chloe. I mean, didn't we just have this conversation? You hardly leave your apartment if you aren't meeting me somewhere. It's time to stop secluding yourself and start living again. I feel ridiculous that I even have to do this because when you got back you were uncomfortable having that apartment and the thought of being cooped up inside all the time made you shudder. Three months later you spend basically every hour of every day in your apartment. Why did you come back to Metropolis if you're just going to hide?"
"I tried to kill him, Lois," Chloe said quietly.
"What?"
"I tried to kill Lex. You were there. I pulled the trigger and almost killed Clark because he was trying to stop me from becoming a murderer. But that didn't save me, Lois. I thought I was at peace with what I'd done, but it's different being home than it is being in the middle of nowhere. I spent almost as much time on the mental aspect of my training as I did the physical, but I'm back in this great bastion of civilization and half the time I have to meditate just to keep my mind at ease. When you take the action but it fails because of intervention intent is the same as the deed, and if we lived in a world where there wasn't a Superman, I would have murdered Lex. You sent me to a man you thought had been through something similar, but I went farther than Bruce did. I didn't just have the gun, I took the shot. So yeah, I'm hiding, because that's right here inside of me," she said, pointing to her head. "I'm no different than Lex."
Lois stared at her for a second before heaving a sigh. "Well that's just crazy talk. Lex isn't dead by your hand, Chloe, which means that there is no blood on your hands. Lex is in jail because he is covered in the blood of innocent people. By my calculations that means there is a world of difference between you two, and you are a much, much better person than he could ever hope to be. Now where is all this coming from? When you got back you were you, except now with kung fu grip."
"I was happy to be home, to see my family again and basking in the glow of getting to know Jacob, Cassidy and Lucy's daughter Bridget. Now life is mundane again and I have time to think."
"First time I've ever been against thinking," Lois grumbled. "So, because of what happened that night you don't feel like you should interact with people anymore? I don't get it. I don't get how seclusion makes anything better."
"It's just... easier, I guess, when I'm not around people."
"Well that makes no sense. Being around people will get you out of your head and thinking about other things. Now, I've heard enough mopey, depressing bullshit for one day, especially at a party! You are going to come inside, mingle, make small talk and eat cake until you enjoy yourself against your will. Am I understood?"
"Lo, you can't order me around like one of your kids." Lois crossed her arms and raised an eyebrow, tapping her foot slowly as she did so. Chloe frowned; apparently being a mom had made Lois figure out how to have an even better glare. "Fine, but I refuse to enjoy myself."
Holding a slumbering Cassidy, Clark made his way up the stairs and into her room, placing her down gently in bed. Giving her a soft kiss goodnight, he left the door cracked open behind him as he walked out and headed back downstairs. Entering the kitchen, he spotted Lois and with a mischievous grin, wrapped her up from behind. "Through some sort of witchery or hoodoo voodoo, you seem to be more beautiful than the day I met you. Granted, I don't remember that day, but still..." She reached back around and ran a hand through his hair, mussing it up a bit before turning in his arms to face him. He still couldn't believe how lucky he'd gotten, marrying Lois and making a life with her. This was something he'd though would always be out of reach, but fortunately Lois Lane had a habit of taking things that were just out of reach and jumping to get them. He considered himself extremely lucky she'd decided to jump to him, and then jump him. That might be the luckiest thing of all, and had led to the best things of all, Jacob and Cassidy.
Shaking her head, she smiled at him. "Are you getting all sappy and romantic on me again, Smallville?"
"Me?" Clark asked, feigning at being offended. "I think everybody knows that you're the sappy and romantic one in this marriage."
Lois made a sound Clark thought he may never have heard before, some sort of half snort, half grunt, in her disbelief. "Yeah, right."
"It's true. See, the thing is that despite the fact that I'm pretty sappy and romantic, down deep in your heart there's a whole reservoir of romanticism trying to break free. Hide it as you might, I know it's there, and it dwarfs the romanticism I bring to the table. I wear mine on my sleeve, as a constant reminder. You have to build a dam between yours and the world, but sometimes the dam can't hold it back anymore and then it just gushes out until you build a new dam. So in the end, my romanticism is a nice, calm stream. Yours is a dammed river that can barely be held back."
She shot him an incredulous look, one he'd grown used to getting from her earlier in life. It was basically her holding back from asking if he'd lost his mind and was done rambling. "Is this something you've put some thought into, or was all that just off the cuff?"
"First time I've thought about the difference."
"Huh."
She bit her lip for a second in an entirely too sexy way, then took in a deep breath before letting it out slowly. She did it again and Clark couldn't help himself after the first, glancing down for a second. When she did it again, he nearly groaned. "Now you're just teasing me."
"Of course I am, and I'm happy to do so." She kissed his forehead and slipped out of his arms, back to where she'd been at the sink. "Maybe, just maybe, if you play your cards right tonight, there could be a bit more than teasing... after."
"After?"
"After everything is cleaned up, Jacob is sleeping and Chloe goes home."
"She's still here? I thought she'd gone home all ready."
Lois's head moved a bit, a tell tale sign that she was rolling her eyes. "With an attitude like that it's no wonder Chloe wanted to leave as soon as she got here. Did you even say five words to her today?"
This was an unfortunate turn in the conversation. No, that wasn't right; he obviously had no problem talking about Chloe. He'd just kinda gotten fixated on what was potentially happening later. "Of course I talked to her, Lois. I mean, I didn't get a chance to say much more than hi until the party was over because I was keeping an eye on everything and had to make a save, but we talked for a few minutes once things had died down. Where is she now?"
"She and Jacob are out back playing catch. Look, when Chloe got here she was looking for a way to get out of staying. But when we got right down to it, we opened a whole different can of worms, the wormiest of which is her thinking that she's no better a person than Lex Luthor."
"What? Of course she's a better person than Lex. How did she even come to that conclusion?"
"She feels that the intent is the same as the deed when it comes to her attempted murder of Lex."
Clark started to speak to the contrary of that belief, but snapped his mouth shut as soon as it opened. Thinking for a second, he couldn't really come up with much to say. "She makes an interesting point."
Lois spun, her eyes filled with fire. He had to fight to keep his hands in place instead of checking if there were scorch marks anywhere on his clothes or face. "She what?"
"If it had been anybody else that had tried to kill Lex that night, Lois, I would have saved him but I would have turned in the person trying to shoot him. It's attempted murder, even if it's Chloe."
"But it's still Chloe! Do you think I'd leave our son alone with a murderer?"
Clark took a step forward and placed his hands gently on Lois's shoulders, trying to find the right words to explain his position. "I know that the world isn't black and white, Lois. Lex pushed Chloe, and that would have been fine, but life piled on and Lex pushed her again causing her to take action. But she took the wrong kind of action. Instead of using all of her skills to show the world that her article about him doing unsanctioned tests on second generation meteor infected wasn't a lie, she used her skills to get into LexCorp and try to kill him, and she almost succeeded. If anybody could have talked her out of it, it would have been you, but she was going to shoot him in front of you.
"I know that you love her, probably as much or more than you love me, but I don't know if you see how much she's changed. She isn't who she used to be, and she never will be. You still see Chloe Sullivan the reporter, but she hasn't been that person for a long time now. She might still go back to the Planet someday, because Perry would take her back in a second, but I don't think that's what she wants from life anymore. You'd have to ask her about that.
"I remember what it's like, carrying around a ton of guilt. You know that it still gets me from time to time. I know what it's like to know that you're capable of killing somebody in vengeance for something they've done. I've toed that line before. Remember what happened when Alicia was killed?"
"I know you, Clark. You could never kill somebody."
He smiled for a second, but it slipped away. "Chloe found out that she's capable of taking a life, Lois. She pulled the trigger, twice, and if I hadn't taken those bullets... she and I were in the same situation. We both intended murder, and both of us had you there to talk us down. I heard you, but Chloe didn't. She didn't want to. Now she has to learn to live with that guilt here in the world she knows, in the city where she did it. Nobody knows what kind of time that will take." Running his hands slowly down her arms, he entwined his hands with hers. "In the meantime, just be patient with her. I know that's not your strength, but I have confidence in you."
Lois looked down at the floor for a moment before looking back up into his eyes. "I love her too much to lose her to this again, Smallville. She's going to be ok if I have to will her to it. If she has to learn to live with her guilt in Metropolis, then I'll be there for every step."
"And so will I, Lois."
She glanced back at the sink, scowling for a second before turning back to him. "Screw it. The cleaning can wait. Let's go join Jacob and Chloe."
Clark smiled, running his hands down her arms a second before kissing her softly. "Go ahead. I'm going to fly into the city, make sure everything is ok."
"All right. I love you, Clark."
"I love you too, Lois. I'll see you later."
"Why is golf called golf, daddy?"
Clark glanced down at Jacob, who was sitting next to him on the couch, then looked back up at the television, which had baseball on it. How in the world had he come up with that question? He hadn't even been aware that Jacob knew what golf was, let alone contemplated why it was called what it was. Why was it called golf? "Well buddy, I'm not really sure why. Honestly, I'm not much of a golf fan, so I think it's something you should ask your mom."
"Does she like golf?"
Probably no more than he did. "Can't hurt to ask, right?"
"Right," Jacob agreed as he popped up off the couch and made his way upstairs, where Lois was working on a human interest piece Perry had assigned her after she'd annoyed him a little too much. Any other and Sunday he would be the one upstairs working on an article about the positive effects the Girl Scout troops had on the area through helping keep parks clean.
Settling back, Clark lowered his glasses and surreptitiously x-rayed the ceiling, finding Lois with what appeared to be a now awake Cassidy in her lap, trying to type as she listened to Jacob. Suddenly she looked down at the floor, almost as if she knew what he was doing, scowling like she could see him just as easily as he could her. Blinking, he stopped looking through the ceiling, and despite knowing she couldn't see him, cleared his throat and flipped the channel to the news, turning the volume up as he did so. They were showing a map of a rural part of India, with a group of towns highlighted and an arrow pointing to the area they were talking about.
"...and after an especially wet couple months, the nearly fourteen inches of rain over the last three days was too much for the dam to hold. Within the last hour two villages have been flooded and four more are in serious danger of going under by six o'clock this morning, local time. For more on this we go to..."
Jumping into super speed, Clark was changed into his tights and flying out of the house, leaving a note on Lois's desk as he flew out. Arms plastered to his side, he felt his hair being whipped around as he flew. For some reason that always stood out to him; he figured it was probably because Lois always seemed to point out what flying at high speeds did to her hair. She'd always been a strange influence on him, even when she wasn't trying.
He started his descent, and landed with a soft thud on a hill looking down on the area that just moments ago had been nothing but a spot on a map to him. Scanning the area, he took off again a second later as he spotted a person in the water, a young woman, flailing as she was being swept away from the wood she'd been using to stay afloat. Picking her out of the water, he placed her gently ashore, giving her a reassuring smile before returning to the work at hand.
Blinking once as a wind swept through the study, Lois looked around for a second before spotting a folded piece of paper sitting on the desk in front of her. Keeping one arm around Cassidy, she grabbed the note and read it. A dam burst in India. Well, at least he was getting something done today. The same could not be said for her.
"What does dad's note say, mom?"
Lois looked down at Jacob, who was standing next to her chair. "How did you know it was from your dad?"
"I saw him fly through. I tried to wave but he didn't see me. I guess I'm not fast enough yet."
"Not... not..." Oh crap. He was four! She didn't think she'd have to deal with any powers until at least... well, she'd been hoping double digits, but she'd have been happy with eight. Four, though... he wasn't even in school yet! Wait... not fast enough? She made eye contact with him, shifting Cassidy a little bit as she rested in her lap. "How fast are you, Jacob?"
His eyes lit up and a big, goofy grin reminiscent of his father's stretched across his face. "I can go really fast mom! Watch!" And with a little puff of wind, he disappeared from sight.
Lois closed her eyes and groaned, hugging Cassidy a little tighter to herself. "Please tell mommy that you won't grow up and have crazy powers, Cass. It would do her heart some good." Unfortunately, at two, she assumed Cassidy was too young to tell her what she wanted to hear. That, or she was already aware she shouldn't make promises she couldn't keep. Hopefully, if she got really lucky, both her children would inherit his invulnerability along with the ineffectiveness of using kryptonite on her. Her human genes had to be good for something, damn it. 'But if nothing else, please let them both have the invulnerability,' she thought.
She sat there in silence with Cassidy for upwards of ten minutes, each minute exponentially adding to her anxiety about where Jacob was, until a little gust of air announced his presence, Jacob appearing in front of them, trying to catch his breath. "Where did you go?" Lois asked, wishing she had it in her at the moment to be stern rather than just happy he was back.
"I ran to Grandma's farm and back."
Rubbing at the spot between her eyes, Lois felt the beginnings of a serious headache starting. "How in the world do you know how to run to the farm?"
"Dad ran Cassidy and me out there on my birthday!"
"Cassidy and I," she corrected, more by habit than anything. Her interruption barely delayed him.
"When you were training with Aunt Chloe, we went to the farm for a little while. We saw Krypto and talked. He asked me if I could do anything special, and that's when I told him that I could run fast."
Clark Kent was a dead man flying. He had known about this and hadn't told her? The fact that one of her children can literally run like the wind is not something she should be in the dark about! That man... if it wasn't punishing herself as much as it was him, she would cut him off for, like, a month. No, she was going to have to be less conventional about it than that. Something devious yet unnoticeable by the kids. Maybe she could deck herself out in pink and act like Lana. That would freak him out.
"I'm thirsty, mama."
Without looking down, Lois softly ran a hand through Cassidy's hair before standing and settling her up on a hip. "Jacob, come downstairs with us, please." Once in the kitchen, Lois set Cassidy up with a glass of milk before sitting Jacob down at the table, kneeling down in front of him so they could speak face to face. "I don't know what dad told you about using your... gift, I guess we'll call it, but I imagine he told you that you need to be very careful about using it. For now, I'm going to ask you not to use it unless your father or I are around, especially your father, so that he can keep an eye on you."
"That's what Dad said, Mom, especially because I still have trouble stopping sometimes."
Fantastic. It was a good thing Clark had super speed and was good at fixing things or else they were going to have to figure out how to explain the holes in their walls to the neighbors. And if he couldn't fix it, he could at least do a good patch job. God, she need time to think things through. Just an hour or two of peace and quiet so she could get a grip on things. Of course, before she started gripping things, she was going to have to finish her article, which still needed at least an hour or two of work. And of course Clark was off being heroic. One of these days he was going to have to stop doing that so she had an easier time staying mad at him.
That only left one thing to do.
Not quite sure how it had all happened, Chloe found herself walking down the streets of downtown Metropolis, pushing a stroller that held Cassidy with one hand and holding Jacob's hand with her other so that he didn't take off on her. Tilting her shoulder a bit to adjust the bag Lois had sent her off with for Cassidy, Chloe decided right then and there that she was going to have to take some time and study her cousin's method of persuasion. It was disturbingly effective.
"Where are we going, Aunt Chloe?"
Grinding her teeth as she tried to think of something to say, she spotted an ice cream parlor about a block away, and figured that was as good a place as any to sit them down, load them up on sugar and really make life difficult. "What do you think about ice cream?"
"I love it!"
"Good, because we're going to go get some."
Lowering a felled tree down onto the pile, Clark surveyed his work for a moment, using his x-ray vision to check and make sure the jury-rigged dam he'd built would hold for the time being. Using trees uprooted from the initial floods, and others that wouldn't have survived, he'd been able to divert the flow of the river just enough to allow villages further down river to avoid major flooding. He had been able to save all the people that he could find alive, which hadn't been nearly enough in his mind. When he'd stopped finding people, Clark had taken to surveying the land to see where the river would flow depending on where he built the dam. He'd taken as much time as he could to make sure where he built it was sound, but he hadn't had long, and had built the thing in a slow rush to make sure that it stayed together. Never in his life had he felt more like a beaver. Never in his life, prior to this, had he actually felt like a beaver.
With one last nod at the structure, Clark was about to take off to start searching for survivors again when he heard a noise behind him. Turning, he squinted and tried to see what was making the noise when a rock the size of his head flew out of the tree line, looking more launched than thrown. Frowning, he prepared to catch it when the rock began glowing green, weakness and sickness washing over him right before it slammed into his stomach, knocking the air out of him as he fell to the ground.
Gasping for air, Clark turned onto his stomach and pushed himself to his knees, only to be kicked in the stomach, forcing a groan out of him as he curled into the fetal position. Opening his eyes, he spotted at least five men in front of him, each holding kryptonite. The one furthest from him was holding a phone to his ear, grinning as she spoke.
"Target acquired."
Gnawing on a pencil as she typed, Lois stopped and flexed her fingers before continuing. If having to stop and give her fingers a second to recover wasn't a sign she was getting old, she didn't know what was. When she had started at the Planet she could type for four or five hours without having to stop, though she'd often had to due to not knowing her voice as well as she did now. Rewrites had always bugged the crap out of her, but time had made her voice more clear, eliminating such annoyances for the most part.
Giving her hands a good shake, she put them to the keyboard to finish off the last couple paragraphs when she froze at the sound of glass breaking downstairs. Perfect. Probably some of the kids from down the street throwing a ball around and getting out of hand. Popping up out of her chair, Lois was about to walk out of the study when glass crashed two more times. Jogging down the hall, she started down the stairs when she smelled smoke. Taking the stairs two at a time, she had to stop as she reached the bottom step, shocked at what she saw.
Her house was on fire.
Almost all of the downstairs she could see was covered in fire. The couches, the pictures... everything was burning. Running back upstairs, she coughed some smoke out of her lungs before focusing her mind. There was no time for sentiment. She hadn't had any candles going, and the glass breaking sounds had preceded the fire, so what could it be? Crouching while she still had time before the fire engulfed the whole house, she crawled to the big bay window that overlooked the front yard. Peeking out, she saw three men in dark, military style uniforms, half crouching behind some bushes but not really making a lot of effort besides that to stay hidden. Ballsy of them to attack while in the afternoon instead of waiting until dark.
Backing away, Lois noticed that the floor was beginning to get hot before she stood up. No time for thinking now; they probably had people watching the rest of the house as well. Thank God she'd gotten Jacob and Cassidy out to be with Chloe while she worked. That statement ran through her mind a dozen times as she grabbed an old wooden baseball bat Clark had from his childhood, testing its weight as she allowed herself one last series of thoughts: 'I love you Jacob. I love you Cassidy. And I love you, too, Clark.'
Taking a breath, Lois ran and launched herself at the window.
Walking into the ice cream parlor, Chloe let her eyes sweep the room, noting what appeared to be a small birthday party off in a corner near the front window. The dad, or at least the man she assumed was the dad, was filming the kids getting ice cream all over themselves. She didn't envy that cleanup job. Granted, it was something she had to look forward to after Jacob and Cassidy stuffed themselves. Guiding the stroller along, she brought it to a halt in the far corner from the birthday party. "How about this table back here?" Chloe asked, getting Jacob set up in his chair and making sure Cassidy was OK in her stroller for the moment before dumping Cassidy's diaper bag and sitting down, slumping a little as she did so.
She'd been alone with Jacob and Cassidy before, babysitting either at their house or her apartment while Lois and Clark had a night to themselves. That wouldn't have been anything extraordinary. But Lois had been so convincing that it was a nice day and they should be outside, soaking up the sun while she showed the kids the city... of course, this was right about the time her cousin had dropped the bombshell that Jacob had at least one of his father's abilities. Chloe had been so shell shocked by the news that she had been downtown with children in tow before she knew what was happening.
Clark had never told her when he'd developed his super speed, but it seemed like four was too young for that sort of thing. Or, maybe it was normal in this situation. Unless Kara was out there somewhere having children and not telling anybody, which seemed unlikely, nobody knew what normal was.
"Ok guys, what kind of ice cream do you wa-"
Jumping as a man burst into the ice cream parlor noisily, Chloe put herself between the man and the children as he pulled a gun out from the back of his jeans. "Everybody out! Now!" He pointed his gun at the clerks behind the counter. "Run!" Before Chloe could scoop up Jacob and Cassidy he had his gun pointed at her, stepping closer. "Not you guys! You stay right there!"
Chloe simply nodded, keeping herself crouched with her body between the gunman and the kids. He took a few steps back, watching everybody else run away from the store with a calmer demeanor than he'd shown coming in. This wasn't just a robbery. Putting her head down, she positioned her mouth next to Jacob's ear. "I know this is scary, but we're going to be all right. I'm going to ask you something; you don't need to say anything, just nod or shake your head, ok?" He nodded, and at the moment she could never have loved Lois and Clark more for raising a smart child.
"I need you to carry your sister to safety. Your mom told me about your gift, about what you can do. I know you're not supposed to run really fast unless your parents are around, but I need you to carry your sister and run to the farm as fast as you can, ok? Not your house, but the farm. I know you know how to get there. Can you do that for me?" There was a pause for a second, and she knew he was wondering if he could carry his sister, but true to his Lane and Kent genes, he nodded. With a quick motion, Chloe unhooked the clip keeping Cassidy in the stroller and had her in his arms, and with a breeze across her face they were gone.
Rising, she took a glance back over her shoulder before spinning and running at the gunman, covering the distance between them in just a few fluid steps. A shot rang out but missed, and that was all the opening she needed as she caught his gun hand with her left and jammed the palm of her hand into his elbow, which immediately cracked. As he cried out Chloe was rebounding off the blow to his elbow and ramming her elbow into his nose with a loud crack.
He fell backwards, the gun dropping from his hand. With a quick flick of her leg, she clipped him across the jaw with her foot and knocked him out, doing her best not to break his jaw in the process. If it did happen he deserved it, but with a broken jaw the police wouldn't get much of a statement from him. Kneeling down, she started feeling around for other weapons under his clothes. Frowning when she felt strange lumps, she frowned and pulled up his shirt, only to find herself staring C4 in the face, with a timer on it. "Shit," she bit out, rising and running as fast she could out the front door. She'd made it about ten steps from the store when the explosion went off, sending her flying. Colliding with a parked car, the world went black.