Chapter 7: Superwoman's Pal Lois Lane

Disclaimer: All things Supergirl/Superman belong to DC. No infringement is intended.


Perry White was not sure what exactly had possessed him to agree to this. Well, there was this bothersome fact where he would have died as a young man if not for the actions of a fellow soldier by the name of Samuel Lane. They had been in deployment together and the bullet that had been earmarked for one Perry White's head had just missed him due to a tackle by his squad mate Sam. They had been friends ever since.

Well, friends was pushing it maybe. They argued over pretty much everything. Sam Lane had stayed in the military and risen through the ranks to become a general at the Pentagon. Perry had quit after his first tour and became a reporter, one that loved digging up government secrets, illegal actions, and corruption. It made them natural enemies of sorts, despite also being friends, kind of.

So when Sam had approached him with the words "Perry, I would like to ask a favor," he really should have known better.

"Do you think I'll get to meet her? What is she like? Is she really as nice as everyone says? Can she really set things on fire with her eyes? How old do you think she is? Is she really an alien?"

The barrage of questions was never-ending and Perry was beginning to develop a severe headache. He really should have said no. Heck, he should have said yes when they offered him the job of editor-in-chief last year. He hadn't felt ready to take a step back and let others do the reporting for him back then. He sure felt ready now, though. Editors-in-chief didn't have to deal with interns, after all.

Lois Lane! 14-year-old spitfire, military brat, now the newest intern at the Daily Planet, and apparently the world's biggest Superwoman fan. At this point Perry was uncertain whether she actually wanted to be a reporter one day – Sam had actually asked him to do his best to nip that notion in the bud – or if she simply wanted to get close to arguably the best source on Superwoman publically known, meaning himself.

"Lois!" he thundered, interrupting her barrage. "Didn't I ask you to bring those layouts to the print department?"

"Oh, I already did that, Mr. White, all done. Now, when you interviewed Superwoman, did you..."

"LOIS!" he thundered, actually managing to make her shut up for a second.

"Lois, a good reporter must ask questions," he told her sternly. "But it is important, and I can't stress this enough, to actually pause a moment here and there to listen to the answers!"

The girl blushed. "Oh, yeah, sorry Mr. White. I know I'm kind of excited, but I really..."

"You're a really big fan of Superwoman, yes, I think everyone here in the bullpen knows that by now. I think everyone in the entire building knows it by now."

She blushed even harder, making him feel a tiny bit bad about putting her in place. Just a smidgen, maybe.

"You are aware, though," he continued, "that I don't have Superwoman's contact details or anything, right? I was lucky enough to be in the right place at the right time, that's all!"

"But that's not true," Lois protested. "There were dozens of reporters at that launch, I read about it! You were the only one with the presence of mind to snap pictures of her. And you came up with her name, too! And you're always the guy she goes to when there is something she wants to tell the press!"

"Which is exactly my point, Lois," he told her. "She comes to me, not vice versa. I've met her maybe half a dozen times in the entire time she's been active. I've written lots of stories about her, sure, but most of them without any sort of personal contact with her. So if you are only here because you hope to get an autograph..."

"What? No, no, no! That's not it at all! Or... okay, I admit it was part of the reason why I bullied daddy into calling you, but I really do want to become a reporter! I really, really do, I promise! And I want to learn from the best!"

Perry looked at her skeptically, causing her to give him the most charming smile he had ever seen on an adolescent. Maybe there was something to this girl after all. After all, how many people had ever managed to get General Sam Lane to do something he didn't want to do? And Sam had made it clear that he really, really didn't want this daughter to become a reporter.

Which was a good enough reason all on its own, he figured, to give the girl a fair shake.

"Okay, I'm gonna take you at your word on that one," he told her. "But keep the chatter down, will you? You're here for eight weeks and there is no guarantee we'll even see Superwoman fly across town in that time. Journalism isn't just about superheroes, you know? So you..."

"Heads up, everyone!" someone yelled from across the bullpen. "There is some sort of super villain with only a skull for a head tearing up downtown! Superwoman is already on the scene!"

Lois squealed so loudly that Perry was sure he'd end up with a tinnitus.

"You are not coming," Perry told her, getting up and grabbing his jacket. "Your father will water board me if he finds out I've taken you into an ongoing fight with a super villain!"

"Oh please, Mr. White! Pleeeeeeeeeeeeeease!"


There were days when Kara figured that she could easily halve her troubles just by shutting down S.T.A.R. labs. Sure, the research company had done a lot of great work in the last few years when it came to figuring out how to contain super villains, shut down harmful technology, and be of assistance to Superwoman in general. On the other hand, though, it had been one of their facilities that had seen the creation of the Parasite, one of Kara's most dangerous foes. And now this.

"His name is Joseph Martin," Inspector Henderson told her. Metropolis somehow seemed to be a hub of superhuman activity these days for reasons no one had yet figured out – some tried to blame it on Superwoman, but she operated all over the world and wasn't even in Metropolis that often – so the city had created a Special Crimes Unit for dealing with it. Henderson was its commanding officer and Superwoman had worked with him before.

"What happened to him?" she asked, observing the obviously confused man from afar. To the naked eye it seemed as if Martin was little but a walking skeleton, but that was nonsense of course. Skeletons couldn't walk, for starters, due to the lack of muscles. Quickly skipping across various spectra, Kara could easily see that Martin's body was very much intact, but it appeared something had caused his flesh to become invisible.

"Some kind of lab accident, apparently. He was there for some sort of check-up and got blasted with radiation when some gizmo or other malfunctioned. You're gonna have to ask the eggheads for more details there. Anyway, it turned his skin invisible and he's gotten really strong. Also, the Geiger counters are going crazy around him, so we're trying to keep him away from people."

"Has he hurt anyone?"

"Mostly he seems to be confused. He's been stumbling around for some time, did some property damage, but I figure that's mostly because he doesn't know his own strength. He was in that movie theater over there for a few hours, which gave us the time to evacuate the surroundings. We really need to bring him in, Superwoman. He hasn't technically done anything illegal yet, but he's a danger to everyone around him."

She nodded, easily seeing how someone giving off potentially deadly radiation could not just be allowed to run around.

"I'll try and talk to him," she said. "Radiation doesn't hurt me, so I'll be fine."

Henderson nodded, even as she heard one of the cops whisper something along the likes of a pretty blonde woman being more likely to calm him down than someone in full radiation protection gear. She sighed. Well, it was one of the nicer things she had heard with her super hearing from men discussing her appearance.

A brief flight took her three city blocks over and she touched down on the other side of the street from where Joseph Martin was currently standing. The radiation seemed to have bulked him up quite a bit, as his clothes stretched over invisible flesh. The fact that he seemed to have nothing but a skull for a face was kind of unnerving.

"Mr. Martin," she said, slowly walking toward him. "May I have a minute of your time?"

He turned around to look at her, pressing his back against the wall. He seemed skittish, almost like a wounded animal. She would have to be very careful about this.

"Who are you?" he asked. "And who is this Martin you mentioned?"

"That is your name, Mr. Martin. You are Joseph Martin. Don't you remember? You were in an accident."

"Accident?" She really wished that she could see his actual face. A skull didn't really lend itself to interpreting facial expressions. "No, you are trying to confuse me!"

"I am trying to help you," she said, walking closer still, her hands raised and palms open to show that she meant no harm. "You are sick, Mr. Martin."

"My name is not Martin," he yelled at her. "I am… I am the Atomic Skull!"

Atomic Skull? Where had she seen that name before? Her eyes quickly flicked over to the movie theatre Henderson had mentioned a minute ago. Right there on the marquee it said "Adventures of the Atomic Skull!", which was apparently an old movie serial. He had been in there for a while. Maybe the movie had left a lasting impression on his confused mind?

"Very well, Atomic Skull it is," she said, looking to calm him down. "I really want to help you. You might not know it, but you are giving off radiation that is dangerous to other people, possibly yourself, too."

"No, you are lying!" He became more agitated. "You... I know who you are! You are Doctor Electron, my arch enemy! You are trying to trap me!"

Great, now he thought that she was a super villain. That really could have gone better.

"Please, I…" she began, hoping to calm him down again. She never got the chance to finish the sentence, though. She had been ready for a fight since the moment she touched down, just in case. She had kept her eyes on Martin's fists (skeletal fists), having been told that he had acquired super strength. What no one had mentioned, though, was that he wasn't just giving off radiation. He was apparently also capable of BLASTING off radiation in the form of intense energy bursts.

The blast, seemingly emerging from his mouth, hit her dead center and immediately sent her flying. Her flesh seemed to be on fire, it actually hurt, and she didn't have time to counteract with her own flying power before her back hit something solid. Something solid that cracked ominously.

"This just isn't my day," she muttered, looking up and seeing the wall she had crashed into beginning to crumble.


Perry White just knew he was going to burn in hell for this. Sam Lane would kill him, pure and simple, and afterwards he would burn. What had he been thinking, allowing a 14-year old to come along on a story involving a super villain? Maybe it was really time to give up the reporter beat and accept that promotion, he was obviously losing it.

Granted, it hadn't sounded that dangerous at first. The so-called super villain had actually appeared to be but a confused guy. Sure, a guy with a skull for a head, but still. Arriving on the scene, he had seen Superwoman calmly talking with the SCU cops. While all of them seemed tense, none of them were full-blown "super villain planning to destroy the city" tense, so maybe this would all turn out to be harmless. Lois would get to see Superwoman on her first day as an intern and it would all wrap up nice and easy. He really should have known better.

The police kept them too far back to see anything, but Perry knew how to get the scoop. The building behind them was an office building. Big windows all over. He quickly ran inside, barely aware that Lois was hot on his heels, and a minute later they were six stories up and got a good look at the action. Just in time to see the skull guy blast Superwoman with some kind of energy beam.

Seeing as the universe clearly wanted to see him burn in hell, it was not really a surprise that Superwoman was blasted straight towards them. She crashed into the side of the building directly below and the entire structure trembled. The big viewing window they had been looking through cracked and shattered a moment later. And Lois, who had had her face pressed to said window but a second earlier, was falling forward into empty air.

Perry swore he could feel his heart stop, even as he ran forward. He was far too slow to catch her, he knew that before he took his second step. Almost as if in slow motion he watched her fall, a scream beginning to emerge from her lips.

Suddenly there was a red and blue blur and Lois was gone. Perry's heart began beating again, for he had seen that blur before. Carefully stepping to the edge of the open window, he looked down and sighed in relief. Lois was down there, unhurt, safely in Superwoman's arms.

Great Caesar's Ghost, he was getting too old for this!


One of the many reasons Kara really didn't like super villains was that she always seemed to encounter them right in the middle of a city. Meaning property damage, meaning innocent bystanders, meaning she didn't dare go all out with her powers. Occasionally it also meant girls falling out of windows.

She heard the window shatter and also heard the beginning of a scream. Looking up, she saw a small shape tumble out of a window destroyed by her impact. Shrugging off the after effects of a rather painful radiation blast, she quickly flew up and caught the girl before she had even started falling properly. A moment later they were back on the ground.

"Wow," the girl gushed, looking up at her with wide eyes. "You're Superwoman! This is so awesome! Thank you, thank you, thank you!"

"It was my pleasure, but you really need to..." she caught the movement from the corner of her eye and quickly positioned her body between the girl and yet another energy blast coming her way. She was braced this time, but it still hurt. Rao, it hurt a lot.

"Superwoman!" the girl yelled, sounding really loud.

"Get to safety," Kara managed, right before the next blast came. This one hurt even more.

"I will not allow you to harm the innocents, Doctor Electron," the self-named Atomic Skull thundered, firing off yet another blast at her. Damn it, these things hurt, but she couldn't dodge. There was the girl and a score of other bystanders too close by.

"You are the one endangering the innocents," she yelled, putting out her hands to at least keep the blasts from hitting the rest of her body.

"You can't fool me! I am the Atomic Skull, protector of the innocent. You will not harm that girl, nor anyone else!"

"She saved my life, you moron!" the girl yelled at him. Damn, she was loud. "She is the hero here, you are the bad guy!"

The Skull paused, apparently taken aback. "What? No, you are confused, girl. I am..."

Kara didn't give him the time to get over his puzzlement. This had gone on too long already. The moment he let up with his blasts, she flashed forward at her top speed and aimed both her fists at where she estimated his chin to be.

The Atomic Skull went flying end over end and crashed to the ground right in front of the movie theater he had apparently taken his name from. Kara hadn't hit him full strength, not knowing how durable he really. She quickly followed him, seeing that he was apparently still conscious and trying to get back up again.

"Oh no, you don't!" She hit him again, a little harder than the first time, and this time he stayed down.

"Get him wrapped up, quickly!" someone yelled. A moment later several cops in radiation gear were by her side and quickly spread a heavy lead-lined blanket over the Skull's body. Right, she remembered. Walking radiation hazard.

"I think we are good," one of the cops said a moment later, checking a Geiger counter. "He's still a hazard, but the levels are safe in the short term."

"You beat him! That was so awesome!"

The girl was running towards her, making Kara's already aching head hurt even more with her shrieking. She seemed to hit frequencies only dogs and Kryptonians could hear.

"Thank you," Kara said, walking away from the Skull so as to keep the girl from getting too close to him. "And thank you for distracting him there at the end, it gave him me the chance to take him down. Just please don't make a habit of getting involved in super villain fights, all right?"

"LOIS!" she heard a familiar voice. Looking up, she saw Perry White running towards them, shouldering past the cops that surrounded the scene. "Lois, are you all right?"

"I'm great, Mr. White," the girl said. "And look, I got to meet Superwoman and help her, too!"

"A friend of yours, Perry?" Kara asked the out-of-breath reporter, who looked as if he was alternating between wanting to hug the girl and wanting to strangle her.

"I'm Lois Lane," the girl said, not waiting for Perry to make the introductions. "I'm going to be a reporter, just like Mr. White!"

The girl's enthusiasm was endearing, Kara had to admit.

"Your dad is going to kill me," Perry finally said. "If my body is found, go and arrest Sam Lane, will you? He will have done it!"

"I'll remember that," Superwoman promised. Seeing the approaching reporters, she spontaneously decided to have some more fun at her reporter friend's expense.

"How about a picture together with Metropolis' newest star reporter?" she asked the photographers, who eagerly raised their cameras. Kara made Lois stand next to her (not that the girl needed much convincing) and smiled for the pictures.

"I hate you," Perry grumbled.

"Nah, you love me," she winked at him.


Lois was sure she was going to pass out from happiness when she got her first look at the Daily Planet's front page the next day. Right there was the picture showing her standing next to Superwoman, the hero smiling at her.

SUPERWOMAN DEFEATS ATOMIC SKULL, the headline read. And directly underneath there was a subtitle, saying DAILY PLANET INTERN HELPS SAVE THE DAY. They were talking about her. She had helped save the day.

Looking up, she saw Perry White staring at the same headline with a very sour expression on his face.

"What's the matter, Mr. White? It's a great story, and thank you so much for putting me in there, too."

"The subtitle wasn't my idea, kid! Lloyd, that bastard, put that in there. He wants to punish me for not agreeing to take over his job. Man wanted to retire last year. But the joke's gonna be on him."

"Why?" Lois frowned, not understanding.

"Because I can't become editor-in-chief if your dad kills me. So..."

"PERRY WHITE!" a voice boomed across the bullpen. All eyes turned to see a big man with greying hair, dressed in a general's uniform and looking angry enough to spit nails. Spotting Lois and Perry, he quickly strode across the floor, everyone hurrying to move out his way.

"Here we go," Perry muttered.

Lois was somewhat aware of her father, General Sam Lane, chewing out Mr. White for endangering her, but she was far too happy to pay much attention to be honest. She had met Superwoman. Superwoman had thanked her for helping her. It had been the best day ever.

"Lois Lane," she muttered happily. "Superwoman's Pal!"


End Chapter 7

Author's Note: I realize Lois Lane may be somewhat out of character here, but remember that she is still an impressionable teenager and instead of meeting a handsome male superhero as an adult, she is meeting an inspirational female superhero she has read about for several years now. She won't stay a squealing fan girl, I promise! And yes, she is a few years older than Clark. Margot Kidder was four years older than Christopher Reeve and Amy Addams is nine years older than Henri Cavill. Sure, Kate Bosworth is younger than Brandon Routh, but we all wish to forget about that movie anyway, right?