---- Chapter 40

City Council Members Handing Out Contracts To Friends, Not Bidders

Lois sat back in her chair, staring at the article she and Clark had written. It was a good article, and was going to hopefully clean up some things for the city, but they still hadn't found the evidence concretely linking Lex to it all. Sighing, she tossed the paper on her desk, looking across it to Clark, who looked similarly frustrated with taking the article to press.

Perry had, unfortunately, made some very good arguments about why the article was still going to do some good. After the article had come out that morning, three of the five councilmen they'd exposed had stepped down from their seats. The other two were still asserting innocence, but the city was now looking into them. Not that it really mattered; the mayor was just as bought and payed for as the dirty council members, they'd be replaced and Lex would buy influence again. He'd probably make sure the people in the seats could be bought.

Chloe walked up to them, standing at the junction of their desks with her arms crossed over her stomach. "You two look very... morose."

"Yeah, well, I don't know about Smallville but I always get morose when I can't link Lex to something he's almost obviously guilty of. Not that I can remember not linking Lex to something he's guilty of, since my memory ends a couple months after we linked him to arms smuggling, but you get my point."

"Since you two have done my old and now new city some good by getting rid of some corruption, we're all going out to dinner tonight, my treat. Bruce and the children are flying in this afternoon, since it's Friday, and we'll do a big family dinner. Bring Martha back with you and Jordan, Clark."

"Sounds great, Chloe. Where should we go?"

"You let me worry about that. Now if you'll excuse me, I have a an article to research."

"What did Chief assign you?"

"A piece about the state of crime in the city. Perry wants me to analyze the recent crime statistics and do a comparative piece on where the stats have been the last few years. Depending on what I find, there might be speculation on where the stats say we're headed, who knows."

"Sounds like fun."

"Yeah, it's a regular party. I'll see you guys later."

The din of movement around them didn't allow for silence, but neither Lois nor Clark said anything for a few minutes. Lois just sat there, content to stroke her hand over her stomach softly as AJ decided to do his fluttering kick thing that was becoming more and more common.

"Lois!"

Shaking her head, she focused her eyes on Clark. "What?"

"Somebody is calling for help. I'll be back soon."

"All right, quit wasting time telling me and go!"

Watching him go, she waited for the inevitable yell from Perry. She'd been back at the Planet for two weeks now and it hadn't taken her longer than a couple hours to figure out that when Perry wanted something done, he was going to yell for it to get done. Apparently things happened more quickly for him when he yelled. Not three minutes later, the yell came.

"Lois! Clark!"

Standing up out of her chair, Lois walked over to Perry's office. "What's up, Chief?"

"Where's Clark?"

"Running an errand for a source meeting." Lying for his whereabouts really did seem to come naturally for her. "What's going on?"

"A house fire."

"You called me in for a house fire? I'm sorry for the family, but that's not really my usual thing."

"This house fire was that of councilman Murphy."

Lois came to attention with that information. That was one of the dirty councilors that had resigned earlier today, and the only one that had agreed to work with officials.

"This can't possibly be a coincidence then. Is he ok?"

"He's being treated for smoke inhalation, but should be fine. I want you down there getting the story pronto."

Forty-five minutes later, Lois was standing in front of a smoldering house, trying to get quotes from people that didn't feel like giving them. She walked up to one of the arson investigators, standing next to him as he read a file.

"Reading something interesting?"

"No comment, Lane."

"You know as well as I do that this was arson. Clark and I just exposed this guy as dirty this morning, he agrees to work with officials and hours later his house is on fire with him inside it? That's a whole lot of coincidence I'm not buying into."

He turned and faced her, shutting the file as he did so. "Fine, you want something for your article? We're currently investigating the cause of this fire and will make findings public as soon as we know something."

He walked off and Lois scowled, shoving her recorder back in her pocket. Apparently this was not going to be a day where people wanted to talk about things.

"Hey, Lois!"

Turning her head, she spotted Clark jogging up to her. She threw him a smile before looking at the house again.

"Been getting anything good?"

"Not really, no."

"Been getting anything at all?"

"Not really, no."

They stayed a little while longer, doing their best to get anything but finally headed back to work after exhausting their options. When they got back, they wrote up the article with the information they had and turned it in to Perry for the evening edition. After that, they went and sat with Chloe in her office. Lois was seriously considering lobbying for an office for her and Clark after finding out Chloe got one all to herself.

"None of the others are going to utter a word to anybody now, are they."

Chloe sat down the statistics she'd been going through on her desk, raising her arms above her head and stretching. "If they do, they're a lot braver than anybody gives them credit for."

"Of course, since this is in all likelihood Lex we're dealing with, I'm not shocked this happened. Anybody and everybody is disposable to him, because he can always find a replacement." She paused for a second. "Chloe, how are your hacking skills these days."

"Workable. Not what they used to be, but I can still get around a lot of things. Why?"

"Think you could hack into the Metropolis PD systems to get anything they have on this? Not right now, of course, since it happened earlier today, but maybe sometime this weekend or Monday?"

"I can try. Will probably be more difficult than the Gotham PD since they hardly bother with securing their networks, but I'm willing to give it a shot. If you guys don't mind watching the kids for a while I'll get Bruce to help me out."

"Sounds like a plan."

They sat in silence for a few minutes when Lois realized Clark hadn't said anything in a while. She looked over at him, and he had the faraway look in his eyes he got when somebody was in trouble but he wasn't rushing to fly off.

"What are you doing, Clark?"

He blinked a couple times and focused in on her. "What?"

"Doing, as in what were you?"

"I was listening."

She leaned forward, waiting for him to finish his sentence but he didn't seem to want to. "To what, Smallville?"

"It's not the most honest thing I've ever done, but they're questioning Murphy and I wanted to see if he was actually going to say anything. I wouldn't use any of it for an article, but it'd be good to know."

"How did you even know when he was being questioned?"

He shrugged. "I've been keeping an ear on him ever since they took him to the hospital, just in case Lex tried to kill him again. I didn't tune out the questioning because... well, because I thought it could be useful."

"Of course it's useful! God, when you're a journalist everything is useful! How have you not picked this up in all our years of partnership?"

"Honestly, you usually do the snooping and I just make sure you don't get us caught."

Rolling her eyes, she couldn't argue with the fact that what he said made a lot of sense. He was like the ultimate watchdog: he could hear a person coming for miles, not to mention see them through other parts of the building. Plus, she really liked going through other people's files. Finding the evidence always made her almost as happy as actually getting the story out.

"Well then, hear anything useful?"

"No. Murphy's shut up like a clam. The only time he opened his mouth was to cough."

"That's... not useful at all. Keep doing it, though."

"I'm not going to keep spying on the man, Lois. He's being taken to a safe house, so he's being protected now."

"Well, at least we know the police think it was arson as well."

"Maybe they just want to give him a place to stay."

"If they thought it was just a normal house fire, they wouldn't be taking him to a safe house. They definitely wouldn't be questioning him about anything. That means they think that somebody torched his house, and we know that it was Lex that had the torching done. Let me guess... they asked him about the allegations against him and if he had any enemies."

"Yeah, but..."

"When he was silent after that, the questioner went into a spiel about how if he talked to them, they could keep him safe from whoever it was that didn't want him around and would make sure that justice was served."

Clark eyed her for a second. "You sound like you've heard this talk before."

"I have, but that's another story for another time. Plus, the speech isn't hard to figure out. Doesn't really matter who's saying it, it all boils down to the same thing: if you talk, they'll keep you safe."

Lois looked over at Chloe, who seemed to have picked up Clark's silence once he'd started speaking. She was reading the statistics again, frowning as she did so.

"Do you want us to go, Chloe? We can leave you to read in peace, since this is your office."

She looked up from her papers and looked like she was about to say something but when she opened her mouth she yawned. After a second, she spoke.

"No, I prefer you guys here. I don't have a stereo here to have any music to read by, which probably isn't all that professional, but what can I say, it helps. You guys are keeping my ears occupied while I read, because if I read these papers in silence I would fall asleep before getting through two pages." She looked up at them and sighed with a smile on her lips.

"The one thing I am going to miss in my office is all the noise of the bullpen when I have my door closed. It kept me energized. I didn't even really want an office, but Perry said he didn't have any desks out there and I deserved an office anyway. It's just too quiet in here." She stopped, apparently thinking about what she'd just said, and then laid her head down on her desk.

"I can't believe I just said that. I have three children who wouldn't know silence if it hit them in the ears, and I only manage to hear it when I'm falling asleep at night every now and again. Yet here I am, sitting in my office complaining about the fact that I can't feed off the sound and energy of the bullpen because I'm secluded in a big, quiet office. I must be sick."

"I think you just love your kids, Chloe," Clark said. "I think that you enjoy all the sound they make... well, most of the time. It lets you know where they are and that they're ok. If they were quiet all the time, they wouldn't really be kids."

Chloe lifted her head up and smiled at him. "When you put it that way, I sound like a loving mother instead of an insane woman that hates quiet. Thank you." She looked down at herself and shook her head. "I can't believe I'm having another baby. I guess I certainly won't have to worry about silence at home for a good long time unless all my children mature to be like their father. That seems unlikely."

"You can't believe you're having another? I can't believe I'm having one at all."

"Need I remind you that you're gestating your second?"

"How could I forget? I have a three year old that looks just like her father but acts just like her mother running around the world. I'm a little scared for the next generation because I would have sworn somebody told me they broke the mold after I was born."

Chloe laughed, sitting back in her chair again. "Oh, they did. The mold for Jordan is similar, but not the same. I mean, this is going to sound dirty, but you literally molded her after yourself with an injection from Clark to change her looks."

Lois grinned. "Yeah, that does sound dirty. Funny, too."

"I'm not surprised, though, because I don't think you could have a daughter that wasn't like you. And saying that, since you are convinced you're having a boy, I am convinced he is going to be just like Clark."

"Really? Why?"

"I think that it's the way you two AND your genes interact. You two are really very similar, you just have different thought processes. You, Lois, have the aggressive go get it streak where as Clark has the calm, thought out thing going on. Each has its merits. You can both be the way the other is, too, but I think it depends on how you see the world. Each of you see life as a challenge to be yourself.

"When you were little, Clark, you had two parents that had to hide you and be conservative in their actions so they could fly under the radar. You learned that behavior, and I really wish I knew you biological parents so that I could actually use your genes in it. I guess that will have to do, though.

"Now, when it comes to Lois, my dear cousin, I can analyze behavior learned and inherited. From what I know and remember about aunt Ellen, she was a lot like Lois, but less... I guess I'll go back to aggressive, and I think if she had lived, Lois would be less aggressive than she is. Uncle Sam, though, raised her like a soldier once aunt Ellen died, and I think the back and forth between falling into line and rebelling against him gave us the Lois we see. There was only the influence of a hard line as she grew up; the example of an adult she saw every day was an aggressive, take no bull go get 'em soldier."

"Huh."

Both the women looked over to Clark, who looked skeptical. "You don't sound like you believe her, Smallville."

"Oh, I believe every word Chloe said about any daughter of yours being like you. I've known that was a forgone conclusion since the moment you told me you were pregnant and I wondered if we were having a boy or a girl. But I also think that if we are having a son, he's going to be just like you, Lois. Jack is prime evidence of what I bet we can expect.

"I think, as a child, we look to the loudest voice we hear. It's only natural, because as a kid you're attracted to the thing that makes you the most curious and holds your attention. What held Jack's attention as a baby was his mother, who was the first and last one with him every day. She was also the more forceful of his two parents in every day life, so he heard the strong voice more.

"This is not to say it's not genetics, but I think you helped make my point for me by telling how Lois was shaped by her father. She lost the maternal influence that was so strong in her life before that, and when her mother died I think that brought Sam around to his fall in line techniques. Where once she'd been able to be herself, she now had to change.

"Ellen had been the one that knew all their fears and favorites, not him, so he did what he knew how to do and trained soldiers. When there is one voice above the rest, that's what the child reacts to, and it's why I think our son will be more like Lois when we really see his personality."

Lois had listened intently to both of them talk this through, yet she still had no idea where she fell on the issue. Since they had both spoken on the issue, though, she figured she may as well chime in.

"I think you both have valid points. Hell, I think you're both good examples of nature and nurture. Nurture, of course, in Clark, because of being raised by the Kent's. And nature, in you Chloe, because you grew up without your mom for almost as long as I did, but because uncle Gabe was never an in your face kind of guy, you were allowed to be you and didn't get changed at all.

"I think, first, when it comes to your children Chloe, we're only operating with half the story. We know what Bruce was like up until he was about Jack's age, before his parents were murdered and he became a different person. Therefore, we get into uncharted territory at some point and things we may recognize as traits inherited from you may very well be traits inherited from Bruce we don't think of. Maybe Bruce would have grown to be who he is on his own, but we don't know.

"Now, as strange as it is, when I think about Jordan I see a perfect example of letting her become who she is on her own, but being similar anyway. I see her with fresh eyes, though, and what I see is a little girl can totally ignore what's going on around her without being in the dark about it. The day after I forgot, we were all sitting on the couch and Clark and I were talking about things related to my memory loss, like we had all weekend. Out of the blue, she asks me why I'm asking daddy so many questions.

"It was something she needed to know and in that, I do kind of see myself. While it could just be her being three, one thing I know about my childhood is that I asked a lot of questions about things. She wants to know why something is going on, and is going to ask about it. She is never want for curiosity. Now, that's not to say it isn't a normal childhood thing to ask questions, but she was more observant than we gave her credit for because she knew something was off. Once I explained the situation to her, she accepted it and went to sleep. In that, I see a lot of Clark."

"I don't know whether to take that as a compliment or an insult."

"It's not meant as either. Again, it could be her being three, but I say it because when I say I asked a lot of questions as a kid, I meant it. When something was explained to me, I wanted to know why the explanation worked. I would bet money on you accepting what you were told as the truth of it with a smile. Now, yes, she is three so she might be a little young for the inquisition tactics I had when I was a couple years older, which is my basis of comparison. But, she's also kind of advanced from what I've seen. I may be biased as her mother, though."

She looked to Chloe, who just shrugged as if to say she felt the same way about all of her kids.

"Really, though, what it all boils down to is that all our children are going to be who they are meant to be. I don't say that to mean it's fated, I just mean they'll be who they want or need to be. No matter what happens, we are all who we are because of our natural predilections and how we react to what has happened in our life. Nature and nurture." Lois shrugged. "That's just how we work."

They fell into a thoughtful silence for a moment when somebody cleared his voice from the doorway. They all looked over to find Perry looking in at them, an eyebrow raised.

"You three always had interesting conversations when you two worked here and Clark was hanging around to make sure you didn't jump into anything you couldn't get out of, too. Somehow these conversations always seem to happen during the day, though, instead of after work."

He looked to Lois, smiling a little bit but not lowering his eyebrow any. "I'm going to go out on a limb and say that you're envious of Chloe having an office, Lois. Fortunately for you, Johnson in the corner office next door is leaving for a cushy assistant editor spot with a paper in Miami, so you and Clark get it."

Lois's face lit up. "Seriously?"

"Seriously. Sullivan... or should I call you Wayne now?"

"My byline still reads Chloe Sullivan, but I like to hear Wayne, so call me whatever you want."

"Alright. Chloe, how are the stats looking?"

"Like a lot of numbers. I'm going to whittle this down over the weekend to the major points and try to get the same done for the last few years. I hope to have the piece done by a week from today, but when are you wanting it?"

"If you can have it done that quickly, I'd be thrilled. I was prepared to give you a couple weeks. Now, it is three thirty in the afternoon. How about you folks get some work done and save the interesting but totally work free chatter for later? Oh, and if the kid in you isn't just like you, Lois, I'll be shocked. Sorry, Clark, but I think her genes are probably just as dominant as she is."

With that, Perry walked off. Clark stood up and offered Lois a hand to help her out of her chair, but she just got up on her own. "Not so big I can't get up on my own yet, Smallville. Chloe, we'll get out of your hair."

As they were walking out, she turned back for a second. "Hey, you haven't told us what the plan is for dinner yet. Where are we going?"

"Pizza Party Palace?"

Lois looked around the place they were in, which was abuzz with the voices and laughter of children playing on any number of things around the building. She observed at least four different play area sections, with the eating area in the middle of it all.

"Ok, maybe it's just me assuming, but when you said you wanted to take everybody out to dinner I didn't think you meant you wanted to take us to a place where kids reign supreme, at least according to the banner up there."

"Yeah, this wasn't my first choice either, cuz. I los track of time this afternoon, though, when I was originally going to set something up and apparently a lot of places like to have longer notice for a party of nine. This was the only place that didn't require us to wait hours on end for enough seating to open up at together at one time."

Lois crossed her arms, observing everything that was going on. "Does this place at least have good pizza?"

"Surprisingly, yes."

"I guess I'm sold then, especially since it's all you can eat."

Twenty minutes later, most of the adults were sitting down, eating and conversing when Clark walked back to their table. "Sorry about that guys, but... hey, where'd my food go?"

"Smallville, you left a full plate next to your insatiable pregnant wife. Eating yours meant I didn't have to get up and avoid running children there and back."

"I was only gone for ten minutes, Lo, and you had a full plate."

"Your insatiable cousin-in-law may have helped me."

"Thanks, Lo."

"Please, like Clark can ever stay mad at you. When was the last time you two didn't speak to each other purposely?"

"Good point." Lois watched Chloe grin up at Clark. "Sorry."

Lois looked up at Clark again, who looked back down at her with arms crossed in what she thought was a pose all too similar to Superman. Standing up, and stood on her toes and placed a soft kiss on his cheek.

"I'm sorry we ate all your food. As a gesture of good will, I'll go with you to get more."

"I need more than a gesture. I think I need a nice, long bit of good will right on my lips."

Lois rolled her eyes through a smile, then pulled him down softly, slowly kissing him right where he wanted to be kissed. A moment later, she pulled away just as softly and slowly as when she'd gone in. "How's that for good will?"

"That is great will, Lo. Awesome, even."

"Yeah, I thought so too."

The rest of dinner passed quickly, with everybody going separate ways once it was done. The Wayne's were staying in a hotel penthouse downtown until the renovations on the house got done, so they went that way while Clark flew Martha home and Lois took Jordan home in a cab.

Clark got home a few minutes after they did, putting Jordan down for the night not long after. They watched some television, but Lois found herself yawning every couple minutes and decided that she'd had enough for one day.

"I'm beat. Ready for bed?"

Clark nodded and got up, offering her a hand she accepted this time and pulled her up. They were both soon in pajamas and laying in bed. After another yawn, Lois snuggled her head into Clark's chest.

"I'm really glad Chloe's back. It wasn't the same without her around."

"I'm glad too, Lo." He turned his head, placing a kiss on hers. "Love you."

"Love you too, Clark. See ya in the morning."