Chapter 6

On her way to Chloe's, Lois kept thinking why she had reacted so strongly to Clark getting back. She was the General's daughter, showing emotions had never been a choice. She remembered right after her mother had died, when she was so sad she kept crying all the time, until the General had said to her that she was the big sister, she was the one responsible for setting the example for Lucy. That was a big responsibility for a six year-old.

She tried to convince herself that she had been mad at Clark for leaving his parents, for worrying them, heck, even worrying her, but she knew that wasn't really the reason. She had been mad at him for leaving her.

It wasn't like she was in love with him or anything, come on, it was Smallville! But living with him and his parents for months had finally given her a sense of security, of stability, that she had never had before. And the stupid meteor shower had taken that away from her. She couldn't yell at the meteors, she couldn't blame the Kents and she hadn't known if she could blame Clark, since she didn't know what had happened to him, but when he came back without a real reason for being gone, she knew she had found a real target to focus her anger on. But she was still glad he was back.

Arriving at Chloe's she got out of the car and knocked on the door.

Clark had been staring at the pictures Chloe had shown him when they heard the knock on the door and she got up to answer it.

Clark anxiously looked at the picture in his hands. The inside walls of the ship were covered with drawings, many he had already seen on the cave walls, and one word written in Kryptonian, over and over again: Kal-el.

"Hey" he heard Lois' voice. He smiled. As much as he hated to admit it, being around her made him happy. He had missed it.

"What is that?" she said, taking the picture from Clark's hands. Clark and Chloe exchanged looks. Chloe told Lois to sit down.

"Why didn't you tell me about this sooner, Chloe?"

"Because I didn't want you to worry."

"And how am I not supposed to worry when you do things like this! The guy you bribed works for Lex. What if he tells Lex you've been paying him for inside information?"

"If I hadn't done anything, we would never know what was inside the ship."

"And what good did it do knowing what was inside it? How are we gonna figure out what it means?"

"We?" both Clark and Chloe asked in unison.

"I know you, Chlo, and I know you're not dropping this until you get to the bottom of it. I'm not going to let you do this alone. Last time you decide to go up against a Luthor, I received a message telling me you were dead. I'm not taking that chance."

"She's not doing this alone, Lois. Lana and I are going to help her."

"No offense, but what exactly are two going to do? Lana has already been helping Chloe and they still don't know anything. You think you can solve the mistery, Kent?" Lois smirked.

"And you think you can, Lane?" Clark answered back.

"Guys!" Chloe intervened. "This isn't getting us anywhere near a solution. If you can be civil towards each other, maybe we can try to come up with a plan. What do you think?"

Lois and Clark looked at each other.

"Fine." They answered.

After deciding to go to the Talon to meet up with Lana, they got out of the house and Chloe headed for her car. Clark followed Lois to hers.

Getting inside, he noticed that the bags she was packing when he left were in the back seat.

"You're going back to Metropolis?" he said, indicating the bags.

Looking at the back seat, Lois remembered why she had gone to Chloe's house in the first place. She had gotten so immersed into the spaceship situation that she had completely forgotten about her decision to leave. "I guess that will have to wait" she thought to herself.

"Not anymore." she answered.

Clark didn't know what to say. He knew it would be useless to try to convince her to go. And deep down, he wanted her to stay. He knew she wouldn't stay forever. Lois would eventually go back to college, find a major she felt passionate about, meet a lot of new and interesting people, get on with her life... forget him. Was that why he didn't want her to go? Why should he care if she forgot about him? Then he remembered all the times he had thought about Lois during those last two months: every time he discovered something new about Krypton, he would picture Lois rolling her eyes at all this "alien stuff"; every night when he went to sleep, he thought that she was not there to get him out of his own bed; when he went to take a shower, he would smile to himself that he didn't have to worry about her barging in. He suddenly realized he had thought more about Lois than about anyone else.

Interrupting his thoughts, Lois announced "We're here."

To be continued