To Every Woman a Happy Ending
a Justice League story
by Merlin Missy
Copyright 2004
PG-13

The characters belong to DC / Warner Brothers. Spoilers
up through "Starcrossed."


Lois didn't actually want to come to this. She'd tried
making any excuse she could, had even gone so far as to
say she didn't have anything to wear.

A dress in her size, lilac and slim and strapless, had
been delivered to her apartment that same evening. With
shoes.

Perry had given her the assignment, after she'd said
they'd asked. She could have said "No" still, could have
asked one of the junior staffers to attend this afternoon
with Jimmy in a goofy tux snapping photos. She could
have. And if it had been Superman who'd asked her, she
would have. She felt confident that she would have
refused then. But Bruce had been the one to hand her the
invitation. Not as his date, not as his friend, not even
as a friend of the bride or groom. He wanted her there.
"To see," he'd said.

The ceremony was lovely, and simple, and tasteful.
Standard American secular wedding, complete with judge.
Lois had her doubts that the marriage was actually legal.
There was a law on the books forbidding legal recognition
of marriages between humans and non-humans, because
somehow that would make the millions of human-only
marriages already in existence mean less, would damage
them.

Lois's editorial on that particular piece of legislation
had been scrapped before it could be published. Perry
had told her, and rightly so, that she was too close to
the subject. She'd responded, "You think?"

No one today was going to press a legal case. Not for
that.

"Miss Lane, are you going to interview any of them?"
Jimmy had his camera ready.

"Not right now." She tasted the champagne in her glass.
"Go ahead and get some shots of the cake before they cut
it." Jimmy got closer to the table and set up his
tripod.

There was no point to interviewing anyone this afternoon.
This was a Society Page assignment; as much as she might
like to ask the guests some pointed questions, it wasn't
going to happen. She was there to see, as Bruce had
said. She would write about the decoration scheme
(green, because no one saw that coming) and the
guest list (JL, Lanterns from other sectors, a few
personal friends of the couple). She could have written
most of the article before she'd even shown up.

Stewart wore his formal Lantern uniform, complete with
the bright green trenchcoat. Most of the guests were in
some kind of formal version of their uniforms, from
Wonder Woman in her robe to Aquaman and his wife in their
court garb. The bride was one of the few people in
attendance who wasn't in uniform.

Lois took another drink.

It was funny, if she thought about it through a very
specific lens on her memory. Bruce and Superman had both
asked her to help pick out the dress. After all, what
little girl hadn't been planning weddings for herself and
her dollies since she was old enough to know what a veil
was? She could name two for a start. Wedding dresses
weren't a part of Thanagarian culture, and Wonder Woman
was no help. They wanted a woman's opinion. Lois gave
them hers, and it wasn't polite. She'd told them to ask
Batgirl and Supergirl.

She wasn't sure if Bruce had picked out the dress — he
did have awfully good taste for a straight man — or if
they'd gone with a wedding planner. It was nice,
certainly: cream-colored and lacy, picked out with tiny
pearls. Backless, of course. Lois was going to have to
have to call the designer to get the proper details right.
Everyone would want to know, when they read the article.

She found that she was making a fist. She relaxed it,
with an effort.

She knew she ought to mingle. Even if she couldn't get a
good interview today, she could make some contacts.
Maybe she could arrange a decent Q&A with Aquaman.
That would be something to put her byline under.
As tempting as they were, she'd probably stay away from
the aliens.

People didn't want to read about aliens at the moment.

Twenty dead in Dakota during the invasion. Twelve in
Gotham. Only six in Metropolis. Reports had drifted in
from other parts of the world: London hadn't seen any
casualties, but over three hundred died in Moscow from a
series of bombs planted by human rebels. There were no
numbers on the Thanagarian casualties. Hawk guards had
been torn to pieces by mobs in some of the larger cities.
Others had been shot in the streets. By the time they'd
pulled out, they'd lost dozens for certain, probably more.

Which didn't matter now. They were never coming back.

Before the ceremony, she'd eavesdropped on the Green
Lanterns. The Lantern assigned to Thanagar's sector
wasn't present, but had reported back. Without the
bypass in place, the Gordanians had completed their own
attack. The planet was overrun. Over two hundred
million dead in the first wave. Lois couldn't make
herself feel bad about their losses. In a choice between
Earth and Thanagar, she'd go with Earth every time.

It would make a nice headline tomorrow.

"Lois." She closed her eyes. "It's good to see you."

"Mm hm." She sipped at her drink again, hoping he'd go
away. The champagne was really quite good. Bruce's tab,
no doubt. He would have spared no expense on this
little exercise in Public Relations. It amazed her that
after everything, after the near-destruction of Wayne
Manor in the invasion, even after so many expenses and
activities coming directly or indirectly out of Bruce's
wallet, that no one knew his secret.

How many times had she wanted to print that
headline?

"It's all right if you don't want to talk to me."

"Don't."

"Don't what?"

"Act hurt. Act like I'm breaking your heart for not
smiling and preening on your arm. You don't get that
from me."

"I know." She wanted to shout at him. Superman was
wearing his guilty little boy face, the one that said
he'd done wrong and knew it and why wasn't she forgiving
him already? She knew that expression.

"No, you don't. It's not all better now just because you
say it is."

"Things take time, Lois. We can't change the world
overnight."

Can't you? she wanted to ask. But he was right.
They couldn't go from a police state back to a democracy
in a day. The fall of the Soviet Union wasn't that long
ago. Above all else, it needed to be a peaceful
transition. It had been.

That old chestnut about not appreciating things until
they were gone? Lois held it near and dear. When she'd
been a child, when she'd been in college, when she'd
started out as a cub reporter, she fought for her First
Amendment rights every day. And then those rights were
gone, and the press had been controlled by people who'd
told them point blank it was for their own good.

The day the invaders had left, she'd gone to the
Planet, gone to her desk, clicked on the computer,
and just started to write. Anything. Everything. For
hours. Jimmy had come in a few hours later, and she'd
hugged him like a brother, and he'd helped her typeset
the first edition. A dozen people had shown up that
first day, and they'd packed up the print run in their
cars and delivered them to the newsstands themselves.
The edition was only six pages long, almost entirely
written by Lois. The sound of the first bundle hitting
the sidewalk had been like birth.

Lois swore to herself she'd die before she let anyone
take away those rights again.

And now it was a month later, and they were all putting
the past behind them. She looked up into the face of her
past. Then she handed him her empty glass and walked to
the appetizer table.

Wonder Woman rejoined the guests, announcing that the
bride and groom were almost done with pictures, and would
be joining them shortly. Lois took that as a hint to
take only a few snacks on her tiny plate rather than the
pile she was suddenly craving. She settled on two mini-
quiches and something promising on a toothpick.

She looked for Jimmy, found him taking a picture of the
Martian standing and chatting with one of the Lanterns.
Kilobyte, maybe? She didn't see Bruce anywhere, but
then, as much as he might be a partygoer without the
mask, he surely wasn't one wearing it. He'd been present
at the actual ceremony, sitting on the bride's side.

There hadn't been many people on the bride's side. Lois
and Jimmy had been seated there, but they'd sat near the
back. A month wasn't enough time for anyone to forget
what she'd done.

Lois didn't ask how they'd reacted, when they'd
discovered that the "helpful" aliens were actually
invaders, when they'd found out that one of their own had
given their secrets and their planet up to aliens bent on
Earth's destruction. Lois had been furious, and she'd
only met the woman a handful of times. It must have been
much worse for the people who saw her every day, and
worst of all for the man she'd taken as her lover.

All they'd said, after, was that she'd chosen their side
in the end. For that, they could forgive her the rest,
even if they could not dare to trust her as one of them
ever again.

As for Stewart, apparently there had been promises made.
Whether she had intended to keep hers was a separate
matter; he was a good man, and he kept his word to her.
And so they were here today at a botanical garden funded
in part by Wayne Enterprises, so that he could fulfill
his promise, and so that everyone else in the world could
see How Normal Everything Was Again. They'd invited a
few members of the press, like Lois and Jimmy. To see.

As if any of this was normal, could possibly be normal.
Lois lost her appetite, and set down the food untouched.

Nothing would ever be normal again, but it was better day
by day. No more aliens running the world. From now on,
the people of the Earth chose their own leaders. Maybe
there would be religious dictators, maybe there would be
peaceful anarchy, maybe a little of each. Their choice.
Democracy in action. Lois had already voted in the
Spring Primary. It had felt good.

The bride and groom came out, were joined by Wonder Woman
and the Martian to form the receiving line. Lois didn't
want to do this, but lined up anyway to shake hands and
pretend like this was all normal.

She couldn't remember normal, not really. She remembered
change. She remembered the first day what she took for a
blue and red angel had saved her from a falling beam.
She remembered the day he'd gathered friends around him
and swore to protect the world from danger. She
remembered the night he'd come to her, and told her that
he'd met himself from another universe and that thoughts
of the other him robbed him of sleep, and she'd held him.
She remembered when they thought he was dead.

Normal was what happened between changes.

And then it was her turn in the line. She took
Hawkgirl's hand and shook it. The words came without
thought. "You look lovely."

"Say 'Thank you,'" said Stewart.

"Thank you." She looked younger than Lois had expected,
but who knew with aliens. Maybe all Thanagarians had
those same wide, green eyes under the helmets. Lois
wondered if it was a cultural thing, to hide their faces
away, another Thanagarian custom they'd never know.

Lois shook Stewart's hand. "Congratulations. I'm sure
you'll both be very happy."

"I'm sure," he said. He looked hot, and uncomfortable.

"I'm sure," Hawkgirl said too, and he took her hand and
squeezed it. She smiled. Lois made herself smile back.
Screaming would do no good. Maybe more of Bruce's
expensive champagne. That sounded like a fantastic idea.
The couple turned to the next person in line, and Lois
looked for a waiter.

Most changes didn't happen overnight, but some could
happen in just a few minutes. She sipped her drink,
wondered if things would have been different had they
known about the baby growing in the bride's belly,
before. She doubted it. And now, it was just a matter
of making sure their child would be provided with a home
and a family. Green Lantern would do that. He would
always take care of her and the baby, and wasn't that the
important part?

Her glass was empty again. Over the rim of it, she saw
movement in the shadows. Bruce was watching. She
couldn't see his eyes behind the cowl, but she felt that
he was watching her. Why? To watch her reactions? He'd
invited her. What had he wanted her to see that wouldn't
be in the paper tomorrow morning?

To see How Normal Everything Wasn't?

Bruce nodded inside his shadow, and was gone.

It was time for the first dance between the bride and the
groom, which under other circumstances would have been
kind of funny. Lois was pretty sure Lantern wasn't the
dancing kind, and Hawkgirl seemed the type to only enjoy
something with a beat. Nevertheless they went to what
passed for the dance floor, and he helpfully placed her
arms where they should go, and the music started.

Lois really wanted more to drink. When she noticed
Superman coming closer to her, she sidled toward another
waiter, but it appeared the champagne was being taken
away in anticipation for their meal. She stood still and
waited, praying he wouldn't ask her to dance with him,
that he wouldn't touch her. If he did, she would
start screaming, and she wasn't sure she'd stop ever.

It's better now, she told herself. Everything
is getting better.
She had her beloved press back,
could cover real stories again (even if the real story of
this particular event could never be put into words).
She could live her own life again. She could vote again.

Oh yes. Lately, the Justice Lords had been all about
democracy. And they'd voted too.

The bride and groom turned slightly, and Jimmy took
another picture. That would be the one for the front
page, Lois was sure.

Hawkgirl's veil came loose as they moved. When the song
ended, Lantern carefully brushed her hair back into place.
She didn't stop him, didn't help, just kept smiling that
same quiet smile.

Lois could barely see the two little burn marks.

The End