The more I write this story the more fascinated I am with Lois Lane and with Amy Adams' portrayal of her; I really hope I do her justice. And as I think about the movie and Clark & Lois' friendship/romance, I keep finding all these interesting little gaps that Zack Snyder left completely to his audience's imagination! So my creative muse has given me little rest since I started this story. And that's okay; I'm at my happiest when I have an exciting project ;)

"Ouch, doggone-it!" I hissed, drawing my hand back from the barrette that had just pinched my finger. Mom stepped up and swatted my other hand away, fastening the barrette gracefully.

"There now," she said, giving me a long, critical look. "I really think you ought to color your hair a shade darker than it is now. In some lighting it has the vibrance of straw."

I fluffed the long curls I'd worked for with the patience of a saint. "It looks red enough right now, Mother, and I don't think Mr. Pollard is going to be worrying about my hair color."

"Well, just keep this side draped over your shoulder like so, and for heaven's sake, Lois, be friendly. Mr. Pollard is an especial friend of Mrs. Boudreaux and probably will be the most distinguished man there tonight. Please don't humiliate me in front of everybody."

I smothered an exasperated sigh. Mr. Pollard, filthy-rich and single, owned a major oil company and Mom was almost giddy over the prospect of introducing me to him. Never mind that he was a good fifteen years older than me. As Mom would say, "He's an opportunity."

The charity benefit was at the home of a friend of Mom's and would include several members of the press, including Perry. As soon as we got there I skillfully maneuvered my way towards him. Perry was an island of common sense in this glittering mess of shallow conversation.

"Enjoying yourself?" he asked quietly as I sidled up to him.

"Just got here and I'm already half-smothered by the perfume. You look dapper this evening."

He extended his arms from the side, as if to show off his perfectly-fitted suit. "Thank you. You don't look so bad yourself."

Coming from no-nonsense Perry, that was a compliment of the first order. "Well get a good look, because it's not often you get to see me acting or looking like a socialite."

Perry snorted. "You may look like one but you'll never act like one. You're not that good of an actress."

I was going to laugh, but my mother's voice at my elbow cut me off. "Lois, this is Mr. Jay W. Pollard, of Pollard & Sons Oil. Jay, this is my daughter Lois Lane, and her editor, Mr. Perry White of The Daily Planet?"

Mr. Pollard, a tall, razor-thin man whose suit didn't fit him nearly as well as Perry's did, held out his hand to me. I took it and barely suppressed a shudder; his skin was like ice.

"Pleased to meet you, Miss Lane, Mr. White."

Thank God, Perry spoke before I had to. "Congratulations on your new business acquisition, sir. Read about it in the Wall Street Journal just the other day. That gives you some promising new territories, doesn't it?"

Mr. Pollard made some answer but my attention was already lost; keeping my eyes on his face to spare myself Mother's scolding glares, my mind drifted back to the problem of Will MacFarlane, AKA Joe Wilder. It was the end of July, and I hadn't had any substantial leads since I found out Will—thank goodness he was still using that name—was a volunteer fireman in Juneau last year, from February to April.

The fireman I talked to identified Will in my lone photo and gave me another one of a clean-shaven, younger Will with the rest of the fire crew. The photo was taken soon after Will joined the crew, he explained. When the city cut emergency staff in April, Will moved on.

"He said he was on a fishing boat or something before he came to Juneau," the fireman said before a siren cut us off and I had to jump out of the way to avoid being run over by a fire truck.

But I hadn't been able to trace Will MacFarlane back to a fishing crew. There were hundreds, thousands of fishing boats venturing out from the coast of Alaska every day. My worst fear, that he'd changed his name again, may have materialized and I was at a loss.

" . . . oil rig explosion off the coast of Alaska." Mr. Pollard was still talking to Perry, but my ears only perked up at the word "explosion." I blinked, glanced around; Perry frowned with obvious interest, and my mom looked like this was the most fascinating subject she'd heard in years. I cleared my throat, tried to focus on the conversation again.

"I heard that was one of the worst offshore accidents in the history of the oil business," Perry said.

"It was," Mr. Pollard agreeing, sipping from his martini glass. "It would've been worse, too, I'm told, if we hadn't had a bit of a phenomenon. Not sure if I believe the story, but you know . . ."

"Wait, what happened?" I asked. Any "phenomenal" stories caught my ear these days.

Mom shot me a scolding glare; Mr. Pollard didn't seem to take much offense. "The men who were picked up off the rig by the Coast Guard swear they were rescued by a man who the fire couldn't touch. One of the men I talked to described him as a 'burning angel.' I think they were probably hallucinating from the fumes . . ."

"Where did this happen?" I blurted out. "Where on the coast of Alaska?"

This time Mr. Pollard hesitated, looked at me hard, while Perry and Mom stared at me with varying degrees of surprise and horror. My face grew hot and I lowered my voice to a more respectable level.

"I'm sorry, Mr. Pollard . . . I'm doing a—a research project on paranormal stories." I felt my cheeks turn an even deeper shade of red and I dared not look at Perry. "When exactly did this happen?"

"January of last year," Mr. Pollard said, and shot a glance at my mother.

January . . . Will was a fireman in February . . .

"And where did it happen?" I asked. Before Mr. Pollard could answer, Mom had me by the elbow.

"Mr. Pollard, I hate to break this up, but I believe I just saw Miss Jackson come in and I'd like to introduce her to Lois before she gets caught up at the refreshment table. Excuse us!"

Mr. Pollard nodded; I glanced at Perry and saw him watching me with narrowed eyes. Darn it. I'd be in hot water tomorrow morning.

"What do you think you're doing?" Mom hissed as soon as she got me into a quiet corner.

"I'm asking him honest questions," I hissed back.

"With the tone of a Gestapo agent, yes indeed you are! If you'd been listening you would've already known he was talking about Alaska and that this incident happened more than a year ago, but no, you come in five minutes late and make him repeat half the details for your own benefit.'

I clamped my lips together, knowing she was at least partly right and yet feeling the sting of her contempt. She smoothed the front of her form-fitting gown and fluffed the back of her hair.

"Now," she said, "you can just snap out of this interrogation mode and conduct yourself with more grace for the rest of the evening. If that means you keep your mouth shut, so be it. You obviously can't have an intelligent conversation without showing off or dragging your work into it."

"You know, maybe I don't belong here," I whispered. "Maybe I should just leave."

"No," Mother said quickly. "You leave, and it'll be a worse embarrassment."

"Then you deal with it!" I snapped, and with that I brushed past her so fast, she wobbled in her high heels. Some of the other guests paused, glanced in my direction, but I kept my eyes fixed straight ahead.

"Lois Joanne!" my mother called sharply. I ignored her. I grabbed my purse where I'd set it in a corner beside her own, and stormed out of the building.

I was terrified Perry would call me into his office the next morning and confront me about my "paranormal research," but he never did. I sat in my cubicle on pins and needles all day and worked on my latest assignment—working conditions among Hispanic immigrants in Metropolis—with more-than-usual diligence. Only when I got back to my flat that evening did I allow myself to relax and start researching this oil rig disaster off the coast of Alaska.

The lead was promising, and the information easy to find on the Internet. I got the names of several witnesses—rig workers and Coast Guards alike—simply from a few news articles, and promptly booked a weekend flight to the Kodiak Archipelago.

The story would've been thrilling enough even if I didn't have a specific interest in it. One of the survivors, a man who still carried the heavy scars of severe burns on his face, told me he and several friends had been cornered in a room, simply waiting for the fire to reach them. There was no way out and they huddled together, making their peace with God.

"And then without warning, that door just burst wide-open!" the man said, swinging his arm as if to convey the speed of the opening door. "This man walked in, and I swear, ma'am, the flames were licking at his body and had pretty much burned every stitch of clothing off of him, but the fire didn't seem to hurt him. He'd found a path out of the inside of the rig for us, and he even half-carried one of our guys who'd had his leg burned so bad he could hardly walk."

The Coast Guards were equally informative. "Last we saw of him, he was holding back a steel frame that would've otherwise crushed our helicopter."

"And then what happened?" I demanded.

The Guards glanced at each other; one of them finally answered in a lower voice. "The frame collapsed . . . guess even he couldn't hold it up forever. We weren't five minutes from the rig before it blew up completely."

I showed the pictures of Joe Wilder and Will MacFarlane to the survivors and to the Coast Guards. The Guards hadn't seen the man long enough to recognize him, but the survivors had. They all invariably pointed to the bearded Joe Wilder.

"If you could meet this man again, what would you say to him?" I asked the man with the burned face.

He looked at me for a moment. One eye was blind and cloudy; the other, however, looked at me with such feeling, I felt my throat tighten.

"Ma'am, I have five kids at home, and my wife was pregnant with the youngest when this happened. I'd tell him 'thank you.' Not sure what else I could say."

When I learned from the Coast Guards that another boat—a fishing boat—had raced to the scene in an attempt to help with the rescue, I immediately contacted the captain. Will MacFarlane . . . have I finally found your fishing boat?

When I talked to the captain, however—a gruff, weather-beaten man who obviously thought little of lady reporters—I found out there wasn't a Will MacFarlane on his crew at the time. My disappointment was mounting when the captain, while tying the Debbie Sue to the pier, suddenly growled:

"During the rescue, one of my men jumped overboard and tried to grab hold of a worker who was swimming away from the rig. He managed to get the fellow onto our boat and went out to see if he could find anymore. He never came back, though. Reckon he got caught in that flaming mess when the whole rig came crashing down."

"And what was his name?" I asked, trying not to sound terribly interested.

The captain thought a moment, slung a coil of rope onto the deck of his boat. "Luke Marshall. We called him 'Greenhorn,' seeing as how he'd only been with my crew a few weeks."

I held my breath and reached into my satchel, pulled out the two photos. "Could you identify the man in these photos as Luke Marshall?"

The captain gave the photos a glance, then did a double-take. He narrowed his eyes and stared at the photos for a moment; then, as if realizing he was showing too much interest, he drew back.

"Yep. That's Luke."

The evening after I got back from Alaska, I tacked my new evidence onto my bulletin board. The two photos of my mystery man were now surrounded by the testimonies I'd typed up over the past month and a half, along with a map. I'd marked the trail from Ellesmere Island, Baker Lake, Yellowknife, Juneau, Kodiak.

The captain of the Debbie Sue had also told me that Luke said he was originally from Seattle. At this point I knew my friend's information was always changing—but Mr. Eubanks had said Joe Wilder claimed to be from that very city. I dragged the point of my Sharpie from Kodiak to Seattle and stuck my tongue out, playfully, at the two photos.

"You think you're so clever, changing your name like that," I said, shaking my finger at the photos. "I'm going to find you, Joe-Will-Luke, or I'm at least going to find out where you came from."

I had jumped off the step-stool and slipped my Sharpie behind my ear when I heard a knock at the door. I glanced at the clock, saw it was well after nine o'clock; startled, I went to the door and looked through the peephole.

Perry White stood in the hallway.

I threw the door open. He stood there with his briefcase, looking like he'd spent the whole weekend in his office; his chin was covered in rough stubble and his eyes were bloodshot. And yet those bloodshot eyes were levelled at me like he was trying to decide how to scold me.

I forced the brightest, cheeriest smile I could manage. "Perry! I didn't expect to see you here tonight! What's up?"

"Can I talk to you for a minute?" he asked, his voice very low and measured.

"Sure," I said, swallowing down my panic; I didn't want him to see that bulletin board, but if I didn't invite him in, it might make him more suspicious.

As soon as he walked into my living room his eyes went to the bulletin board, almost as if he already knew it was there. I closed the door behind him and stood there, waiting for his verdict.

"I know what you're doing, Lane," he said.

My voice came out much stronger and firmer than I would've expected. "Perry, this is my personal investigation. I'm not using the Planet's time or resources, it's all coming out of my own pocket, and I won't be putting anything about it on your desk. I swear."

Because it's all going to Glen Woodburn's desk, my conscience snapped. I dug my nails into the palm of my hand in an attempt to silence that nagging little voice.

Perry's frown deepened. "Why are you doing this?"

"Because I want to know who that man is. I want to thank him and I want to tell his story."

"Did it ever occur to you that he might not want his story told? There's got to be a reason why his identity was completely falsified. People like that don't want to be found, Lois!"

"Why did you come here anyway?" I snapped. "And how did you find out what I've been up to?"

He raised an eyebrow. "Flights into Canada every weekend in June? A trip back from Alaska this morning? A mutual friend of ours by the name of Lombard saw you at the airport this morning on his way back from Denver to report on a ball game. I did a little research of my own and found out all about your flights."

I looked away, embarrassed and infuriated. Steve Lombard, you are worse than the NSA.

"It doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure it out, Lane, especially since you've been back to Ellesmere and spending time in the Canadian interior." Perry glanced at the bulletin board. "So that's your alien man?"

I bristled again. "You didn't answer my first question. Why did you come?"

Perry sighed and looked back at me. His eyes were stern, and I felt like a child who's about to receive a sharp chastisement.

"I can't stop you from this," he said, pointing at the bulletin board. "But I don't want to see the name of General Sam Lane dragged through the mud because his daughter hopped on the conspiracy theory bandwagon. He might not have been respected by his own wife but he was admired by most of the people in this country."

I blinked, felt the stiffness of my body cracking loose. Perry stepped closer and patted my shoulder.

"Just remember that, okay? Don't forget people still see him when they see his daughter."

I lowered my eyes and turned my head away, not wanting him to see any hint of the conflict I felt. Perry patted my shoulder again and walked out, and as soon as I heard the door click shut behind him I sank onto my couch and buried my face in my hands.

After a long moment I drew a deep breath and lifted my head. I kept my eyes well away from the bulletin board and instead fixed them on the coffee table in front of me. If Perry was right, then my reputation was very much at stake. I was General Samuel Lane's daughter. Everyone knew I was headstrong, hard-working, adventurous, just like him. The man who'd presented my Pulitzer to me on a brightly-lit stage even described me as my father's daughter.

If Perry was right, then if I opened myself to ridicule, I also risked my dad's reputation.

I shut my eyes, drew another long breath. I could see myself sitting in the tire swing in our backyard in Texas . . . seven years old, scrawny, and tall for my age. My dad sat in a lawn chair nearby in his uniform, wrinkled after a day's work at the fort; his square, handsome face was lined with anxiety, but his eyes were soft as he watched me and talked with me about anything and everything.

"Don't take anything in this life for granted, Little Lo," he murmured, gazing at the sky with that dreamy look he sometimes had when something weighed on his mind. "No matter what anyone says, no matter what happens, you live in gratitude. It's the man—or woman—who lives his or her life complaining about anything and everything that gets eaten up with bitterness."

I'd pushed against the ground with my foot, making the swing rock slightly. "Is that what's wrong with Mom?"

I was only seven years old, yet I'd heard the word "divorce" at school, knew what it meant, and nursed a vague fear that it would happen to my family one day. Dad turned his eyes from the sky to me, and I saw in that moment the full depth of his regret and sadness.

"Yes, Lois," he whispered. "That's what's wrong with you mother. Don't let it happen to you, baby girl. You live in humility and gratitude, and you live life to the hilt. Don't let anyone hold you back, all right?"

I had smiled, nodded until my pigtails bobbed. "All right."

Back in the flat, the memory over, I opened my eyes. Humility, gratitude . . . live life to the hilt. I wasn't the humblest person on the planet, that was for sure; my mouth twisted in a sardonic smile at the very thought. But gratitude was one reason for this frustrating yet rewarding search . . . and if pursuing the biggest story of the 21st century wasn't living life to the hilt, I didn't know what was.

I stood up and popped my elbows back, stretching; kicking off my shoes, I walked over to my laptop. If I could prove that Joe Wilder, Will MacFarlane, and Luke Marshall were one and the same, and if I could prove that this man was indeed from another world, that he and the Ellesmere Island mystery were intimately connected, and if I could tell his remarkable story . . . then my name would go untarnished.

Dad would have no reason to be ashamed of me.