Lois could only remember feeling as lost as she did when Clark brought Jason to the hospital once before in her life, when she'd visited the Man of Steel in the same hospital.
Clark had walked into the waiting room, holding Jason close to him, comforting him. It looked so natural.
She told herself that the welling of comfortable feelings that had filled her had come because her son was there. But she knew better.
When did this happen? She asked herself, not able to look at Clark as he stood, leaving to bring them all food. He knew how much she despised the stuff, having had to force down so many meals in the past when doctors had insisted she spend the night for observation. He's always been my best friend. The only one who can keep up with me on a professional level. My partner. So when did I fall in love with him?
She looked at Jason for awhile, stroking his hair as he sat and worried about this father. She sighed to herself over her predicament, getting a sympathetic look from Perry. Shit. I can't even feel properly sad about the right things! Richard, the man who has been so kind to me, loved me and my son, given us a home and a sort of normality, is in surgery right now and all I can think about is another man's son and my best friend!
She frowned, wallowing in her guilt. Shit.
- - -
Clark walked into the bullpen, noting the overall subdued atmosphere of the place.
It had been a week. Richard was still in the hospital recovering. He was out of it due to the medications most of the time; pain meds, antibiotics…
Perry had returned to work the day after the shooting, though he'd suggested Clark and Lois take a few days. Clark, a personality so unlike what his coworkers were used to poking out for the briefest of moments, had reminded Perry that he'd been the one to prepare the evening Planet for print the afternoon of the shooting and scooped all other papers in the area on the Van Buren boy that very same evening. Lois, in an out-of-character moment of her own, had accepted the suggestion, telling them that she thought it would be better for Jason at her fiancé's bedside.
"Kent," Perry called, a little less gruffly than he had in years past. Clark dropped his briefcase on his chair and headed for the editor-in-chief's office, noticing that the blinds were down and closed, a shadow the only evidence of Perry's secret visitor. Clark x-rayed through the curtains and almost forgot to keep walking; Bruce Wayne stood, looking like the suave, impatient, playboy he was supposed to be, in the middle of Perry's office. He was looking back at Clark as though he could see through the blinds, too;
Clark had to resist the urge to smirk or roll his eyes—Bruce had always been able to do that sort of thing and, once he'd learned how it perplexed his friend, he'd done it more often.
"You wanted to see me, Chief?" Clark asked, his pitch too high, his smile too big. Bruce had to turn away to roll his eyes without Perry seeing.
"Yeah, close the door," Perry said, walking around behind his own desk and looking at the guest.
Clark did as he was told, turning around to find Bruce facing him once again, and Perry looking curious. "Mr. Wayne," Clark said, not sure how Bruce was planning on playing the meeting.
"Clark, it's been too long," Bruce said, holding his hand out warmly, practically radiating charm. Clark shook his friend's hand, raising the eyebrow farthest from Perry ever so slightly. Bruce was good at reading people, at picking up those little things other people noticed; it was part of being both a billionaire, and the Dark Knight.
"Indeed, you should make a point to stop in Gotham more often, swing by the mansion," Bruce said, releasing Clark's hand, eyes dancing; it was common banter between Batman and Superman, marking their territories—usually, though, it was threatening a slow and painful death if borders were crossed without permission. Bruce's eyes were dancing with humor; he'd be laughing if he weren't putting up a show for the old editor.
"Not all of us have p-private helicopters to fly off wherever we please at a moment's notice," Clark smiled his too-many-teeth grin; Bruce's eyes sparkled all the more.
"Superman's been talking to you a lot lately; maybe you could ask him for a lift."
Clark shook his head, glancing at his boss, looking for the purpose of Bruce's visit.
"I wasn't aware the two of you had met," Perry said, shuffling papers around on his desk.
"Yes, years ago," Clark said, able to think of a social event he had covered in Gotham with Cat Grant, the society column writer, when her usual escort had had the flu, where they could've met.
"In Tibet," Bruce explained. Okay, I guess we're going with the honest truth… Clark thought, nodding his agreement. Perry's eyebrows hitched up toward his receding hairline. "I was presumed dead at the time."
"Is that so?"
"I didn't know I was befriending a journalist, at the time," Bruce explained, as he was notorious for blowing off reporters' requests for interviews, leaving that to his CEO Lucius Fox, or other associates. He'd even shuffled PR duties onto his butler on occasion. All part of his image.
"Nor I a millionaire."
"Billionaire."
"Whatever."
Bruce scowled. Perry's eyebrows rose further up his forehead.
"That will be all Mr. White," Bruce said dismissively, turning to face Perry full-on.
"It will? What?" Perry said, not used to being dismissed from his own office.
"I just need a moment to talk to Clark in private."
"Right, well," Perry scowled, mumbling the entire way out. Clark examined his shoes, x-raying through them to look at the red boots hidden inside, until Perry was gone from the room.
"Bruce, he's the editor-in-chief! You can't just kick him out of his office!"
"I just did."
"Bruce," Clark admonished, rolling his eyes.
"It fits the persona," he waved an arrogant hand dismissively, drawing a chuckle from his long-time friend. Clark nodded his head in an 'I suppose' kind of way and waited for Bruce to move on. "I have some information for you—you won't like it."
"And you couldn't call me? I have four phone numbers, you know, and all of them have voicemail. And three different email accounts."
"You will find your inboxes very full, and not just from me, I think," Bruce answered, dropping his façade and getting serious. Clark adjusted his glasses, raising a curious eyebrow. "And you didn't answer any of your phones and I didn't want to leave a voicemail."
"Alright," Clark prompted. Bruce opened his suit coat and pulled a folded up poster from the inside pocket, unfolding it just-so so that Clark couldn't x-ray through the paper and get a glimpse of the image. I've known him too long.
"These are all over the Narrows and the other less stand-up back alleyways of Gotham," Bruce said darkly, handing it over. The poster was printed on black paper and featured Lois and Clark's black and white press pass photos screened red. The lettering was white, standing out against the darker colors. "DAILY PLANET REPORTERS WANTED DEAD—$1 MILLION REWARD" was in bold across the top. Beneath the photos was a paragraph with details. Lois and Clark's Metropolis addresses, the address for the Daily Planet, a short list of possible hostages to lure one or both of them out including Perry, Richard, and Jason. Clark was relieved to see that whoever had made the posters was unaware of the Kansas farmhouse where his mother lived, but that only made the situation so much better. There was a warning in all caps along the bottom edge to beware of Superman, as both reporters were known contacts.
"All over?"
"All over," Bruce said, nodding gravely. Clark sighed.
"They're sure to go after kryptonite, with that warning," Clark indicated the bottom line.
"There's already a black market for the stuff set up in Gotham," he said darkly. "We've cracked down on it hard, there really isn't that much available, after all. There's lots of fake stuff mixed in with a little bit of real rock."
"Great," Clark sighed, unconsciously rubbing the scar on his back. Bruce noticed.
"That's not even the scary part," Clark looked up from his second examination of the poster to listen. "The scary part is that whoever's supplying it is putting the real stuff in the hands of the people who actually have a chance at collecting."
"What do you mean?"
"I mean somebody really wants you guys dead."
"Jason saw Luthor at his school a couple of weeks ago."
"I thought he was dead."
"I'd hoped he was dead," Clark sighed. "No such luck."
"And he knows, too," Bruce said to himself, though Clark nodded anyways. "What the hell have you two been getting into that would cause this?" Bruce asked, indicating the poster and beginning pacing the office like a caged beast. Clark was still as he thought.
"We're mostly working on fluff pieces to fill space between breaks in the kidnappings case," he said after a moment. "Unless somebody's really unhappy about my article on the refilling of that crater in Centennial Park, or Lois's article on the new stone façade going up at City Hall to cover up the New Krypton damage…" he shook his head.
"So somebody involved in the kidnappings."
"We suspected Luthor for the kidnappings at first."
"Why did you stop? Especially if he showed up at Jason's school. And the kryptonite."
"He comes after me personally. His vendetta is against me."
"If he knows Jason is your son he could be going after children to make you nervous," Bruce paused in his steps to speak.
"That doesn't make sense."
"Alright," Bruce resumed his pacing. "Any other enemies?"
"The criminal population in general so far as Superman is concerned," Clark shrugged. "Could be any number of obscure people. But they're threatening Lois and Clark… All the people we've pissed off are in jail, really. Except for this new kidnapper."
"Whoever it is has a wide reach," Bruce said, shaking his head. "These posters were in Gotham, not anywhere near Metropolis."
"It's not that far."
"You know what I mean," Clark nodded, sitting down. Bruce paced the length of the room again before sitting down as well.
"I'll start with people Lois and I have put in jail that had the connections to put something like this out there and the money, if not the reputation, to have a million dollar hit out," Clark sighed, trying to think of how to tell Lois. Bruce nodded, thinking.
"How is Mr. White doing?"
"He's recovering."
"I'm surprised at how fast the word got out."
"It's not a good sign."
There was a moment of silence between them.
"If I weren't who I am, I'd be dead," Clark said softly. "And so would Lois."
"What do you mean?"
"I mean I barely got Lois out of the way of that bullet, and it hit me instead of her. If it hadn't have hit me, it would've hit Richard. The two bullets would've hit me and Lois if—you know," he sighed. "And then: mission accomplished."
"Journalism is a dangerous sport."
"I got into journalism so that I could make a difference by bringing information to the masses without drawing much attention to myself," Clark said, chuckling humorlessly. Bruce smiled, standing and clapping him on the back.
"You're too good of a journalist not to get noticed."
"Well, gee thanks, Mr. Wayne."
Bruce laughed. One of his honest laughs, too, that brought a smile to Clark's face.
"Only a guy from a different planet would even…" he trailed off, chuckling. Clark smiled back, standing as well. "I guess I'll take my leave; I've got a chopper waiting on the roof."
"That's a treacherous spot for a helicopter," Clark warned.
"A good place for a debut, though."
"Indeed."
"Watch out for yourself, Clark," Bruce said, honestly, holding out a hand for shaking.
"You too," Clark said, shaking the hand before opening the blinds. Bruce was fully back in his billionaire persona, strutting out across the bullpen and smiling genteelly at the ladies whose eyes he caught.
Perry was back in the office seconds later, Clark still fighting with the blinds. He was losing, too.
- - -
After an hour's discussion with Perry, Clark was finally allowed to leave the office. Perry was torn between excitement that his reporters were onto something huge, expectant that Planet sales would soar with the added press such a public death threat would make, and fear for his reporters. He was surprised at how calm Clark was about it, how calculating the man was; he'd expected near unintelligible stuttering and panic but he'd gotten a half dozen different options and courses of action, and a clear refusal to speak another word about his 'acquaintance-ship' with Bruce Wayne.
Leaving the office, Clark went straight to the copy machine and copied the poster. The shadows the machine left around the red letters and in the photos of the familiar faces made the poster all the more menacing. He posted one of the copies, almost victoriously, on the outer cubicle wall of his and Lois's desk area, and another on the glass wall of Perry's office. Perry looked at the back of the poster solemnly before turning back to his work.
Clark sat down at his own computer, ignoring the murmurs passing around the office as the machine booted up. His inbox dinged, altering him to twenty-two new emails. Six of them were from Bruce) the last reading simply: TURN ON YOUR DAMN PHONE) and the rest were from various sources from around Metropolis. Most were warning him of the hit, a few inquired into his well-being, not having heard the whole story of the shooting, a week previous, now.
Once he'd emptied his inbox, replying to the emails as briefly as possible, assuring his contacts that he was alright and that Richard and Lois were both recovering, he sat back in his chair with a blank word document waiting and settled into his thoughts. He'd had a week's worth of days spent at the police station in both guises listening in as detectives interviewed Juliana, peering through the walls and across town to the hospital, where Richard was still abed with Lois and Jason at his side, to the other end of town where the Van Burens celebrated the return of their youngest son. The safe return of just one of the kidnapped children brought hope back to the Napper Neighborhood and all families involved.
Surrounded by the comfortable chaos of the bullpen, Clark let his thoughts drift back to a line of thought he'd been following since he'd come across Juliana. Bill. Who the hell was this Bill person? He'd been through every Bill he knew multiple times—Bill Ganelon, from Smallville all those years ago; Bill Henderson, the dead father of Chris Henderson, Metropolis chief of police; Billy Bennett, one of Jason's classmates; Bill Engvall, who he didn't actually know …
He knew a lot of Bills, none of whom he could suspect of the accused crimes.
Clark sighed in his exasperation and closed the blank document. He needed to go flying.
Everything was quieter out over the open ocean, the waves rolling below him, crashing and rising in a way that was completely random and ordered at the same time.
Juliana's story had come through over the course of her extensive interview with the Met. Police dept. She had been born and raised in Gotham, moving to Metropolis at twenty-one to get away from the corruption. Or at least that was what she'd told the detectives—a search into the records revealed that Juliana Tholdus had been Lewis Falcone's girlfriend of sorts until the youngest son's father had been jailed by the newly arrived Batman; that was seven years ago. She'd fled the city of corruption and not looked back. It seemed she'd tried to start a new life in Metropolis, holding down a completely above-board job as a secretary in one of the office buildings downtown, only a few blocks from the Planet. Unfortunately, a man who'd lived in her building until he'd been arrested for dealing had gotten her hooked on meth. She'd drifted into the Metropolis underworld, getting evicted before her dealer was arrested, and ending up at a seedy club as a 'waitress.' It was there that she had met Bill, a married guy having trouble at home and looking for an outlet. She'd latched onto him, at first because he tipped well, then because she'd fallen in love with him. He helped her through withdrawal when she couldn't pay for her habit any more, and then kept her clean. She'd been more than willing to help him out with whatever he asked, not asking and preferring not to think about what he wanted with the children he kidnapped. He'd arrived at her apartment, the new one he'd helped her get after she'd gotten off the drugs, at the break of dawn on May 26th with Harry Ricks in his arms, unconscious. In the course of the week, Juliana had terminated the lease on her apartment and moved out, putting most of her things in storage, warehouse sixteen by the bay, locker three. They'd ended up in what she described as a bunker, eating canned foods, smoking, and watching the news. Bill was the only one who left, never telling her where he went; he came back with more canned goods, more thug friends to keep an eye on the growing number of kids stashed in the back room, and complaints about his wife and the man he called 'the Boss.'
What tore into Clark was that she had, after identifying the four kids from the Napper Neighborhood as those she'd been feeding lukewarm canned beans twice a day, had asked, "What about the rest of them?"
Apparently there were eight other kids hidden away in an underground, probably lead-lined, bunker suffering from malnutrition and secondhand smoke, getting beaten whenever they spoke louder than a whisper.
The detectives, after a brief, horrified conference with Henderson outside the interrogation room, had brought in a book of photos of children reported missing. Juliana had been able to identify two of the unknown kids from the book. The others, however, were nameless and faceless—she hadn't been able to look the kids in their faces and therefore couldn't provide more than a very basic description.
Emily Thomas, six years old, missing since May 29th. She was a blonde girl, tall for her age, brown eyes. She lived with her grandparents a few blocks from Lois and Richard. The other that Juliana had identified from the pictures the detectives had was a boy, Todd Evans. He was ten, short, blue eyes, light hair. Juliana said he stood up for the other kids, as he was the oldest, and took the most beatings for it. His nanny, Meredith Slater—an honor roll student just graduated and preparing to go to an Ivy League school next semester, had reported him missing on June 15th when he hadn't made it home from school. He went to Metropolis Private, just like Jason. His parents were both doctors at Met. General.
Neither of those cases had been linked to those from the Napper Neighborhood because the method was completely different. Todd had disappeared on his way home from school—he walked, living only a few blocks away in a safe neighborhood. Emily had been taken late at night, kicking and screaming; her grandparents had been restrained while the kidnappers snatched their granddaughter and drugged to unconsciousness as the kidnappers left.
Clark wanted to kick himself—he'd been focusing on the Napper Neighborhood the night Emily was taken, keeping an ear out in the direction of Riverside Drive without paying attention to the sounds in-between. He would have caught them in the act if he'd been a little more thorough.
- - -
Clark returned to his desk after his less-than-calming flight over the Atlantic.
When he walked into the bullpen, Perry looked more relieved than Clark had ever seen him; his face practically screaming 'Thank God you didn't die!' before the elder man schooled his features and returned to his work.
Smiling to himself, Clark hacked into Metropolis PD's network to check up on a few less-than-friendly figures from his and Lois's joint articles of the past. After an hour of scanning through visitor logs and other notes, he seriously doubted anybody in the joint was responsible for the hit. He might suggest to Henderson that a few drug tests would be more than fruitful for a few of them, but…
Closing out of his illegal search, he pulled up a different search engine and started looking for Bill; simply typing the name into a google search bar brought 306,000,000 hits. Very unhelpful.
