CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT - TRUTH
"It's weird, don't you think?" Clark says the next afternoon, over dinner in his apartment. "All the attacks with those weapons… they've just stopped. Completely."
Lois twists her fork in between her fingers. "Weird… but good. I mean, the city's a million times safer without them."
"I guess… but it's like the person making them suddenly stopped distributing. I want to know why."
"Maybe they gave up," Lois offers. "I mean, you did best every weapon he or she pitted against you. Probably wasn't worth the cost to continue making them if they were bound to fail."
He stares intently at his plate, contemplating her words. "It seems that they disappeared when Michael Polk was arrested. Do you think he has something to do with it?"
Lois shakes her head. "I don't think he has the scientific knowledge to create guns like that. Or learn about the Kryptonite."
"Well… maybe Polk knows something, and the maker is lying low in anticipation of him revealing his identity," he suggests, beginning to eat again.
"You're thinking Lex, aren't you?" Lois says after swallowing her own bite of food. "You think that when Polk squeals, it's gonna be Lex's name."
"Yes. I do," Clark declares confidently "He's still the only realistic suspect. And if the police prove it… well, we won't even need to write that article anymore, will we? He'll finally be brought to justice."
And as enticing as that possibility sounds to Lois, she still can't shake the feeling that Lex is not to blame for these particular disasters. Why would he build half the city, only to destroy it by placing lethal weapons in the hands of maniacs? Why would he crash his own charity gala, thus endangering the lives of his investors and trusted customers? Lex may do a lot of terrible things… but she doubts he would ruin his own reputation and legacy so nonchalantly.
But then again… is it possible that he harbors a strong enough hatred for Superman that he is willing to go to such extreme lengths? She would not put it beyond him. Not at all.
But the feeling in her gut is persistent, and it's telling her that something's missing.
What is that Perry is always telling her? Oh yeah… "In the spider-web of facts, many a truth is strangled."
It's some Paul Eldridge quote that Perry ran into the ground years ago, but it comes back to her now in her hesitation to accuse a man that she knows she hates. She feels like the web of facts is spelling out Lex's name, but there's another name, hidden in the details, strangled by two particular facts - that she has a personal vendetta against Lex, and that Clark does too.
But maybe she's wrong. Maybe it's just a dumb quote. Most of the time, Occam's razor rings absolutely true in the journalism field, and it maintains the simplest explanation is usually the correct one. And Lex is the simplest answer.
Suddenly, her train of thought is interrupted by the sound of her phone ringing loudly. When she looks at the caller ID, she sees that is Professor Hamilton, so she immediately answers it.
"Hello?" she greets. She sees that Clark is obviously straining his ears to listen.
"Miss Lane - you'll never believe the news!" Emil exclaims excitedly over the line, "I think I've found a connection to Lexcorp in one of the guns that Superman asked me to study."
Lois's eyes widen, incredulous that her doubts are being resolved so quickly. "Oh. Wow. That's fantastic. Do you need me to get pen and paper so I can take down the story-"
"Not yet. The connection - the component that I found in the Lexcorp databases - is intricately connected with the rest of the device. In order to get it out, I think I'm going to need Superman's precision."
Lois glances at Clark, who nods seriously, indicating that he has heard Emil's request and is agreeing to it.
"I think I can get him to come," Lois tells the professor. "When should we meet you?"
"Tonight, at midnight in my lab. The building should be mostly empty by then, so hopefully Lex won't realize what we've found until too late."
"Sounds like a plan. Thank you so much, Emil."
"Don't thank me yet! Not till we have the component!" he tells her. Then, he hangs up.
The skylight to Emil's lab is already open when they arrive there, and Clark - Superman - carries Lois inside. The professor is by his microscope, waiting anxiously for them, and he immediately stands once Superman sets her on the ground.
"Good! You came!" Emil says.
"Of course I did," Superman responds with a smile. "If it means putting an end to all this insanity, and helping a friend like you, professor, then it's no problem at all. Miss Lane told me all about what you've discovered.
Not really, Lois thinks. You heard it yourself, actually.
Now Lois really is in on Clark's lie, isn't she? It feels strange, lying to people so deliberately like this. But it's certainly not her secret to tell, and if anything, telling it is far more dangerous than failing to do so. So maybe she will have to make Clark the exception in her devotion to absolute truth.
"Excellent. The gun is right over here-" Emil tells them, gesturing toward a nearby table.
She immediately recognizes the weapon. It's the electrical rifle that Superman confiscated from the bank robber - the one televised live all over Metropolis, if not the world. She remembers how much sheer destruction it caused - the whole street was decimated, and people were terribly injured…
God, she hopes they can end the creation of the weapons, now and forever, with whatever Emil has found.
Superman approaches the table, asking, "What do you need me to do?"
Emil guides him closer to the weapon and points to a particular point on it surface. "See this panel? There's a microchip under it that's exclusively produced by Lexcorp. I was able to find it with a full-spectrum scan. "
Clark nods, confirming its existence. "Yes. I see it."
"Well… unfortunately, I can't pull it out without ruining it. I was thinking that perhaps you could use your heat vision to cut it away, like a laser," Emil suggests, pointing toward the gun again. "But you'll have to be extremely careful."
"I understand, professor. I'll begin right away," Superman assures him, and sure enough, Lois can soon see concentrated, red light shooting out of his eyes, focusing on the gun's surface. The acrid smell of melting metal fills the room as a result.
Lois sits on the sidelines, watching Clark carry out the careful process with Emil continuing to guide him from over his shoulder.
It seems like it's working - like they really will catch Lex red-handed. Is it possible that in a few days, he'll be behind bars, after months of fruitless work? The idea seems like a dream.
But then she sees something… odd. Emil is reaching very slowly inside the pocket of his lab coat. At first, she thinks he's just resting his unused hand there, but such is not ultimately the case. There's something in his hand when he pulls it back out again - something small, metallic, and with a faint green glow…
Lois is about to yell out, realizing that something is wrong, when Professor Hamilton plunges the object into Superman's neck. And to her complete astonishment… it sinks easily into his skin. His impervious skin.
Superman cries out in pain and instantly sinks to his knees, the object - which is now easily identifiable as a hypodermic needle - still stuck in his neck. "What did you… what did you do to me?" she hears him mumble, his voice feeble and weak. His heat vision has already faded from his eyes, which are blinking heavily, like he is struggling to stay awake.
Lois runs toward him, pushing the professor as far away as she can. Behind her, she hears the sound of Emil falling to the ground, but she doesn't care. Because right now, all she can think about is Clark - who may very well be dying before her eyes. In any case, he is seriously injured, and she needs to help him.
As she reaches him, it's obvious that he is losing consciousness. She drops to her knees, catching and cradling his head in her arms as it droops backwards toward the floor. His body is totally limp, his skin is clammy and warm, like he has a fever, and his eyes are shut tight.
"Superman!" she yells, shaking him fiercely in the hope of waking him. "Superman, please!"
"Come now, Miss Lane, you must realize that's useless," she hears Emil say from behind her.
She turns her head to look at him, and sees that he is struggling to his feet with a rather irritated expression on his face.
"What have you done?" she demands incredulously. "Why would you-"
And then it all clicks in Lois's mind, as she holds Clark's unconscious body. The web of facts unravels, the truth is freed from the suffocation of obscurity, and for the first time, that truth breathes deeply.
God… It was Professor Hamilton the whole time. How could she have been so dumb? He knew - studied - Superman's weaknesses. And with that knowledge… he must have easily designed the weapons meant to take Superman down, probably using his expertise from his time working at Dayton Industries.
They've been blinded by trust for Emil, and distrust for Lex. And now they're paying deeply for it.
"You're the arms dealer," she realizes numbly. "You always have been. You've been trying to kill him."
She sees Emil roll his eyes. "Please. If I wanted to kill him, I would've. He's alive right now, isn't he?"
Lois glances at Clark to verify this, and finds that he is still breathing. But she is still panicking… still worried… so she pulls the needle out his neck and feels for his pulse. She's relieved to find it beating steadily under her trembling fingertips.
But her relief is small - because they're still in big, big trouble.
"Yes. You can come inside now," Emil says from behind her, and for a moment, Lois thinks he is talking to her. But upon looking at him, she realizes otherwise. He is speaking into some sort of earpiece with complete and utter nonchalance - like he didn't just inject Superman with… something. Something dangerous.
Suddenly, four people burst into the lab from a pair of side doors, causing Lois to jump and instinctively move to shield Clark from view, even though the latter part is somewhat difficult - Clark is so much larger than she is.
The interlopers - men that are approximately the same size as Clark - are all armed with guns with suppressors. Their gaze immediately lands on Lois and Superman with a sort of laser-like, ominous intensity. As she examines them in turn, she notes that they don't exactly look like typical street criminals - they're all in suits, with body-builder level bulk, and stand with a sort of erectness that suggests something vaguely military about their past.
Mercenaries, she realizes. Hired guns tasked with… doing what? What exactly is Emil planning to do to Clark if he doesn't want to kill him?
"I'm sure your mind is positively swimming with panicked, confused thoughts," the professor remarks, approaching her with his hands tucked behind his back. "The most prominent one: whether Superman is alright."
She feels like she should say something - something biting that expresses how betrayed she feels - but her throat has gone dry as she stares at the guns in those men's hands. It's very likely that, in a few moments, she will be dead. She knows quite a bit about how bullets feel when they tear through you. It'd be a total lie to say she's ready to experience such a sensation again.
The Professor continues to speak unimpeded. "I assure you, he is. I've only injected him with a sedative, laced with traces of kryptonite to ensure its efficacy. Normally, his body rejects all drugs, bacteria, and viruses, but I used just enough of the green rock to bypass that ability without actually harming him."
So Clark really is just unconscious - not dying or wounded - placed in some sort of artificial coma by a strong sedative.
"But… why?" Lois cries. "You were… you were supposed to be helping us. I trusted you."
"And I'm certainly glad you did. Do you know how grateful I am to you, Miss Lane? If it wasn't for you, bringing him to me, I would have never been presented with this fantastic opportunity."
"To do what?" she demands, trying to ignore the sickened feeling in her stomach. This is her fault, Lois realizes. If she hadn't convinced Superman to explore his powers… his weaknesses… Emil would have never gotten so close to him… close enough to make him vulnerable.
"As despicable as it sounds… to make a proper fortune," Emil tells her somewhat embarrassedly before gesturing to Superman's body. "Do you know how much governments, scientific organizations, private collectors, or other very affluent individuals will pay for him? Millions. Billions."
"He's a person!" she protests. Internally, her heart wrenches. She loves him. And if what Emil is saying is true, then she is probably going to lose him forever.
"He's a rare commodity, Miss Lane - as a living weapon, or as a living biological sample. Imagine an army of cloned Supermen, or a serum derived from his cells that provides invincibility. And even if those endeavors fail… then he could always be an army in himself, can't he? How much would your dear father pay for that, do you think? To have his armies led by Superman, a being untouchable by even atomic bombs. Of course… Superman would need a little reprogramming, but that should prove easy with adequate effort."
It feels like the ground is falling out from under her. It's unbelievable - how badly she has screwed up. She has ruined Clark's life… all to satisfy curiosity. All those times he felt afraid around this lab, despite Lois's attempts to relieve his fears, were absolutely correct. Now Clark will live out his days in some sort of cell, being experimented on. The thought terrifies her.
"Screw you," Lois snarls. "That will never happen. You know he'll escape."
Emil reaches for something on the nearby countertop, which is a little box that she recognizes as being made of lead. The lead box that held the kryptonite.
"No, he won't. Not with this around. Whoever purchases him… will get full knowledge and access to his weaknesses, courtesy of my research. It's why I plan to make the price tag so high. He'll become a weapon with only one off switch - an off-switch in the hands of those who own him."
She eyes the little box - the box filled with something that could so easily kill the man she loves. "I don't understand… where did you even get the kryptonite? I doubt you got it from Krypton yourself."
Emil chuckles. "I may be a genius, Miss Lane, but locating Superman's home planet without proper data is beyond even my abilities. But the kryptonite… the kryptonite was a convenient connection I shared with him.
"Years ago, I was hired by the government to investigate a meteor shower in the midwest - some small, insignificant town in Kansas. Thousands of these green rocks were all over the place, littering the ground, before they were carted away to be studied by individuals such as myself. They're essentially harmless and useless to human beings, which is why I was allowed to keep such a large quantity for personal research. It took me a long time to mathematically track their trajectory to their point of origin, which I later learned was Superman's home planet.
"Imagine how surprised I was to find that Superman shares a similar chemical makeup with the rocks, thus revealing where he originated from. And imagine how even more surprised I was to see that, when I placed the rocks near a sample of Superman's cells, those cells began to rapidly deteriorate. It is, for all intensive purposes, his Achilles heel - his one true, lethal vulnerability. All I needed to prove it was a proper test, which the charity gala readily provided."
Lois feels like crying, or screaming. There is no action that could possibly display the level of horror she is experiencing right now. "And the guns? The attacks? The bounty?"
Emil shrugs. "Every weapon needs to be properly tested to demonstrate its capabilities - even Superman. The whole world watched as he took down even the most advanced devices with his bare hands, and every time he did, his price went up. The bounty, which was a down payment by a particularly eager potential customer, purely incentified those idiotic criminals to attack him. They didn't consider that they were fighting a god."
"People died because of you, Emil," she asserts angrily. "You destroyed lives. Years ago, you told me you were done creating weapons… done hurting people with your intelligence."
"A stupid resolution, to be honest - though it did gain me international recognition and awards, for all that is worth - which isn't very much. Of course, my previous profession provided even fewer benefits. The fact is that, after I deliver Superman to the proper customer, I will be done. Done struggling for money and grants and respect."
"You selfish piece of garbage! And what's worse… I was under the impression that you were somehow a good person. Someone I could rely on," Lois spits. "But you're just a self-serving monster."
"Come now. I'm not… diabolical or anything of the sort. Nothing I did was meant to be cruel. All I want… is to get what I deserve for my hard work - other than more work. I want a full bank account. I want contentment. I deserve happiness, and if this is what I must do to receive that, then so be it. I'm only human, after all, so good and evil are all relative. Besides… scientifically, the 'greater good' is ensuring the perpetual well-being of the intellectually superior members of the species, such as myself."
Lois can't help thinking about how similar he is to Lex - how he justifies actions almost robotically, accounting for facts without feeling or emotion. It goes against everything she has come to believe in.
One of the mercenaries then steps forward, raising his gun. "Move away from the alien," he orders sternly and impatiently.
Lois doesn't budge. She'll die before they left them take Clark.
"Don't make me ask again."
"Not to be particularly cliche," she says slowly as she shoots him the middle finger, "but over my cold, dead body."
The mercenary's face becomes irate, and his hand seems to twitch toward the trigger. Lois braces for death-
But then Emil makes a strangled noise, and no bullet comes.
"Not here!" he insists fervently. "You know who she is - everyone does! And when they find out that something happened to her, there will be a huge investigation - one that will lead the police to Star Labs. The last thing I need… is to be found with her DNA exploded all over my work space.
The mercenary sets his jaw with irritation. "So what do we do? We can't leave her alive. She'll tell everyone what she saw."
The professor considers this for a moment. Eventually, he decides on a solution and orders, "Knock her out. Load her in the truck with Superman. I'll tell you what to do from there."
The mercenary nods and begins to approach her.
The needle - the one that Emil used on Clark - is still in Lois's hand. She waits… waits until the mercenary is close enough for her to reach his feet.
Once the mercenary steps within proximity, Lois stabs the needle downwards into his shoe, allowing the point to pierce deeply into his foot. The man cries out loudly, grabbing his toes and shrieking in pain, obviously distracted. It's her only opportunity to get a gun - one that she can possibly use to save both herself and Clark - so she takes it.
Lois jumps to her feet, but only for a brief time. It is not long until she full-on tackles the man while he panics, thus pushing him to the ground. She manages to get a few good punches toward his nose as they wrestle for the gun, but finally, with a hard knee into his gut, Lois rips the weapon from his grasp.
She is just about to stand up and aim the gun at the other men, but before she can, something hard and blunt hits her in the back of the head. Her vision immediately goes black.
Her head is throbbing. Throbbing like her heart has suddenly taken up residence inside her skull, and there's inadequate space for it, so it presses painfully against her brain and the sides of her cranium. She's not sure if her head has ever hurt so badly before. If it has, she can't remember.
But why does her head hurt? She can't remember that either. Something must have happened - something important and bad. Lois was… was at a lab… with Clark. Yes, she remembers that. She remembers Clark carrying her inside, Clark smiling and saying something to Professor Hamilton…
And the professor… he… the professor betrayed them. He injected Clark with something that hurt him… made him go unconscious. He was… he was going to take Clark somewhere… have him turned into some sort of living weapon…she can't let it happen…
Panic floods her mind, and with it, comes adrenaline. Her heavy eyelids shoot open, driven by some sort of animal instinct to find Clark.
Her vision is blurry at first. She's inside something that looks… metallic. Metallic and cubelike. And the floor seems to be vibrating beneath her, bumping against something below. Where is she? In the back of some sort of truck? Yes… she thinks Emil mentioned a truck.
A few moments later, her vision corrects even more, and she realizes that something is in front of her, just out reach. It seems to be some sort of case - one reminiscent of casket or a sarcophagus, but perhaps it is more modern and high-tech looking, given its variety of switches and levers. Its top part is made of glass, and its bottom is made of a heavy metal with some sort of locking mechanism. Unfortunately, right now, her mind is completely unable to process what it could be.
So she squints - squints until her eyes completely focus. Soon she realizes that there's someone inside the case, lying still as a corpse. The person's face is visible under the glass, and she recognizes it immediately. The black spit-curled hair, the noble features, the lips that she has kissed so many times - she's familiar with every aspect of it. It's Clark's face, still completely unconscious.
A translucent mask has been put over his mouth and nose, like some sort of breathing apparatus. Tubing connects it to some sort of cylindrical tank that hangs on the outside of the holding device. Lois figures that they're pumping a sedative gas into his system to keep him unconscious, and there's little doubt in her mind that the gas is laced with kryptonite. Every time he takes a shaky breath, she can see green condensation on the mask, like little drops of liquid radiation.
It strikes her that they're literally feeding poison into his body - a poison that, according to Clark's personal accounts, makes him feel like his blood is boiling.
"Oh no," she murmurs, fighting the distinct need to vomit. Whether that need is caused by looking at Clark trapped like that, or her recent blow to the head, she doesn't know. All she knows is that Emil has been planning this for so long - maybe since she first brought Superman to meet him. He's thought of everything - and by the looks of that holding device, he seems to have a decent handle on how to trap Superman indefinitely. There is little doubt in her mind that Emil himself created it… crafted it to play to Superman's weaknesses. If Superman isn't conscious, then he can't escape - especially if no one but Lois knows what happened to him.
She tries to lunge forward, intending to help and free Clark, but something pulls her back and nearly breaks her wrist. A glance behind her reveals that she has been handcuffed to a metal bar in the truck, thus keeping her in place.
She struggles with the handcuffs for a while, trying to worm her way out of them. But the sound of Clark's ragged breaths keep distracting her, filling her with despair. She can't reach him. God…he's suffering, and she'll probably be killed any minute now, and she can't reach him.
Lois blinks tears out her vision and chokes down a scream of frustration. Internally, she curses whatever superior being that let her survive that day in Qurac. Why did it do such a thing, if she is going to die here? Did it want to expose her to happiness, only to suddenly rip it away in the most horrific way possible? Clark would probably have been better off if she had never lived past that bullet wound.
She hears the squeal of wheels skidding to a stop. The truck has ceased moving.
Lois blinks more tears out of her eyes, knowing what this means. She raises her head and speaks urgently to Clark, willing him to hear her.
"I'm so sorry," she tells him with a cracking voice. "I never thought that this would happen. If I had, I would've… I would've done something."
A sob escapes from her mouth, but she desperately silences it - there's no time for that right now. So she continues speaking around the thick lump her in throat. "I really love you, okay? You're the first guy I ever really loved, but I screwed it up, and I swear, I would give anything to ch-"
The back doors of the truck suddenly swing open, revealing the mercenaries and Professor Hamilton standing stiffly on the slick pavement. Behind them is Hob's Bay, glittering coldly as it reflects the light of the nearby city.
"-boat's standing by. We better take care of this quick so we can get into international waters," a mercenary says.
"I want it to be sloppy," she hears Emil request. "Make it look like a mugging gone wrong - that way, when they do find her, they won't have anyone to blame but a faceless stranger."
Lois takes one last look at Clark. She's so scared for him - maybe more fearful than she's ever been. But she's not sure that she's all that afraid of death for herself anymore. There have been so many times by now - so many times she has almost died, starting with that day in Qurac. A lot of those times, he has been there to save her. But not now. Not anymore. And maybe this is fate finally righting itself, after he interfered with her destiny by saving her. Now she's finally going to die.
One of the mercenaries - the one she stabbed with a needle - limps over to her and unlocks the handcuffs from the bar, but keeps her tightly held in his grip. He's not planning on letting his guard down this time.
He pulls her roughly toward the side of the road, which drops off into the bay. She glances over the side at the black, still water, which glints ominously up at her.
The temperature is so cold that she can see her breath in the air. She remembers flying with Clark in weather like this… remembers the heat of his lips on her own…
She stands as tall as she can as another mercenary raises his suppressed gun. It is aimed at her head, and Lois makes peace with the fact that she is going to die. There's no escaping this situation… no bulletproof savior to block what's going to kill her in a few moments.
The man begins to pull on the trigger. Lois closes her eyes, hoping it will not be painful - like the last bullet.
"I said sloppy," Emil reminds them all of a sudden.
When Lois squints her left eye open for a moment, she sees the mercenary shift the gun towards toward her chest. There is a short cracking sound, and the sensation that she has been hit by something with the concentrated force of a car. Soon she is falling backwards toward the water, completely incapacitated by pain. Her body crashes into Hob's Bay with a loud splash, but there is no one around to hear it - no one but the men who put her there.
TBC...
DISCLAIMER: I OWN NOTHING SUPERMAN RELATED
A/N: I swear there is more to this story. That's a horrible cliff-hanger, I know. But fear not! The show will go on. You'll just have to wait till next week.
Please don't hate me.
All fluff (like the last chapter) comes at a price.
Alrighty, that's it for now, unfortunately! I haven't been able to work on the sequel much. I've had lots of schoolwork. But I'm hoping to get back to it next week.
Review? (As long as you're not yelling at me)
