Chapter 30: Cruise (Day 4) Rescue...
Clark continues through the murky water, pointing the flash light Lucy gave him to shine his way. The light falls on the blast sight, a black scorched mark etched into the opposite wall were the explosion took place in the vault room. Luckily it appeared that everyone had gotten out the area before the room completely filled, there were no bodies, but there were quite a few bill floating around that were lost by the robbers trying to escape.
Clark come in view of the huge hole as he rounds the corner of the wall, entering in the vault area. He sees AC on the outside creating a whirlpool, slowing down the water flow coming in the ship, but Clark had to stop the flow completely, though it was slow for the time being, the ship was still filling up and sinking, risking the lives of everyone on board.
The metal is stripped back, a chunk of it missing in the middle, he sees as he inspects the damage, he was going to have to find something to replace it. He slowly moves his hand holding the flashlight around the area, looking for anything that would due. Slowly he shines the light from one thing to another and halts it, his lips smiling as he sees something that would definitely work.
He kicks his legs pushing himself forward to the the huge vault door that lade abandon on the floor from the blast, he firmly places his feet on the floor and grips tightly onto the door and without any trouble at all he picks it up easily with his super-strength. Only struggling with balance as he swims back toward the gapping whole, he slams the door against the wall that completely covers the massive hole.
In a rush to seal up the whole as the boat starts to lean more to one side from the heavy amount of water it takes on, Clark quickly pushes his hand onto the edges of the raw steel of the door, it folds easily from the pressure of his hand like it was made of clay.
Doing the same all around the door, flattening out the edges so it was pressed tightly onto the metal wall of the ship and sealing the edges as he uses his heat vision to ensure that not a drop of water could leak through.
Slowly the cruise moans and creaks as it tips back upright to it's correct position, Clark watches all around, expecting something else to happen but luckily the ship is corrected from the seal up and the sinking nearly stops.
In a flash like a torpedo in full speed through the water, Clark makes his way back to the stair well that brought him down there and follows it up till he reaches a level where the water has stopped and enters the door to that floor.
Clark pushes the door open, it bangs into the wall the sound echoes loudly into the empty hall, catching the attention of one person who quickly turns around and smiles seeing the old time friend coming through the door.
"And he finally makes his appearance Ladies and Gentelmen...Clark Kent, the one and only..." Lex rants as he leans against the wall some, wobbling as he walked. His body tired from fighting against the rising water to dry land. "...Everyone's favorite person here in the flesh!"
Clark looks up to see Lex a few feet ahead of him down the hall, instantly his eyes narrow at the sight of him, his heart pumping faster with hate. His whole body seem to be on defense, his hands clamped tightly into fists as his eyes falls on the wicked smile curled upon Lex's lips, Clark feeling such rage like he never known before builds up inside him.
"You really are here..." Clark says, not really in disbelief but seeing him after all this made it all the more real.
"Of which you're not surprised...which I shouldn't be either, I should have known she would find some way to tell you of my presence on board. I really shouldn't underestimate that one so much..."
Clark eyes him over, seeing the many bruises and cut on his cheek, no doubt he knew Lois did to him.
"I agree, but I'm guessing you've found out all about that, many times already." Clark says, a hint of a smirk on his lips.
"Yes, well what can you expect from a like her...but that's not to say she had all the fun..."
"Where's Lois!" Clark shouts, holding his fierce gaze as if ready to attack.
Lex mockingly looks around, feigning as if he didn't know she wasn't with him and lets out a sickening laugh as he holds his hands up and shrugs.
"You mean she's not with you?" Lex says in a taunting tone as he looks back to Clark. "I'm sure you would have found her by now...Since you're so good at it!"
Clark clenches his teeth together, flexing the small muscles in his jaw as his glares burn through him, just wishing this once to be able to use his heat vision on Lex and get rid of that Bastard once and for all. His dark demons inside tempting him to not even think twice about it and just do it. Rage was all he could feel at that moment, all his brain would allow him to concentrate on.
"But I'm sure she's "around", somewhere..." Lex smirks, not even trying to stop the humor from his voice. "...you might want to hurry, though...I'm pretty sure those pretty little lungs of hers are filling up with water by now."
Clark couldn't hold back anymore, Lex teasing look of "knowing where Lois was and not saying" as he let out another bout of laughter made him snap. He rushes at a more then normal pace toward Lex, but he didn't care anymore, he already made up in his mind that Lex was going to die by his hands no matter what.
He snatches Lex by his throat and slams him hard into the wall he leaned on, he could he cracks coming from Lex's body from the force Clark had rammed him into the wall. Lex lets out a painful yell from the impact and grabs at Clark's hand that held firmly in place around his neck.
"Don't think for a moment that I won't kill you." Clark sneers as his grip only seeks out to become tighter around his throat.
"Come now, Clark...you actually kill someone, especially with all the times you could have killed, not even avenging the death of your sweet Alicia." Lex gaps out roughly, his skin becoming red as oxygen slows to his brain.
This makes Clark put all the more pressure around Lex's throat for his words, in rage Clark pulls Lex from the wall and runs him even harder into the opposite wall, causing more grotesque cracks to come from Lex's bones, sure that something would break inside him soon with this kind of continuing beating.
Lex unable to overpower Clark's strength has no choice but to take the torture and cry out in pain from it as blood comes into his mouth staining his white teeth as he bares them out, panting heavily in pain.
"Alicia isn't Lois!" Clark shouts so loud it seem to rock the huge Cruise Liner. "All the those times I could of killed someone, Lois was there to stop me. She is the only one I could ever really kill for, she's the only one who could ever stop me...but unfortunately for you, she isn't here!"
"No...she isn't..." Lex states in a evil tone.
Clark doesn't hold back he wails his fist across Lex's jaw and pulls back, plowing his fist again against Lex's face as returned his head to face Clark.
"DO IT!" Lex yells, blood flowing from his mouth and spits some onto the floor, Clark stops, his fist comes to a halt half way to his face from Lex's outburst.
Lex's head feebly rocks against the wall, purple bruises and swelling appears on his once flawless skin as he looks doubtingly with a glare into Clark's eyes.
"You don't have it in you!" he shouts, lifting his head off the wall some before weakly placing it back to wall. "You're not a Luthor, Kent! it's not in you to kill. You're weak...you don't the ball to!"
Clark's hand clamps tightly around the collar of Lex's suite, his teeth showing in a snarl as he looks into his once good friend's eyes, but now all he saw was a evil, corrupt man, who he no longer blamed himself for not being able to save. Lex choose to be this way, no matter what help was given to him.
"No, you're wrong...I have more then enough balls to kill you, but you know where Lois is and if I do take away your worthless life, I won't find her..."
"Yes Exactly! I know where she is!" Lex shouts in a mad rant. "...and I'm willing to bet my life that one of you scobby gang wannabes have my disk! Chloe to be exact...if anyone of y'all have the brain cells to figure out Lois hiding spot it's her."
Clark drops his fist down, breathing heavily through his nose as his rage continued to war inside. Lex couldn't be trusted, but Lois was in trouble, even though it was truly their only pawn against him...
"Tick-Tock, Mr Kent, what's it going to be?" Lex smirks sarcastically. "I seriously doubt your girlfriend has grown gills to breath under water...either way her blood is on your head!"
"NO!" Clark growls loudly, slamming Lex down into the foot of water that had claimed the floor and sends another blow to Lex's face. "I'm not stupid to give you the one thing you want, that's keeping you from putting a bullet into all of us"
He pushes Lex underwater who thrashes around wildly trying to surface badly for air as Clark holds him under for a long time. After awhile, Clark yanks his head from the water, Lex wheezes in loudly, forcing air into his deprived lungs as Clark's fingers hold tighter to his shirt.
"WHERE IS SHE?!"
x
Lois eyes slowly flutters opes, she wakes up dazed and confused, and finds herself under water. She panickly shakes her head as eruptions of air bubbles escape her mouth. She quickly pushes up from the floor and instinctively heads up in search for air but fearfully her head hits only the metal vent ducts.
She panickly squirms around as her hands hits upward frantically trying to find a place where she can surface. Only to discover in horror that the water has completely reached the ceiling. Her lungs burn and ache as they scream for a release from the pain. Lois tries to calm herself, knowing that more she struggles the more oxygen from her body she uses.
She couldn't stop thrashing around though, she's been under too long and lost too much oxygen to think rationally. Her body screams for air and all she could think about at that moment was finding it. She feels as her body slowly starts to drain, her heart becoming nothing more then a small tap instead of its usual strong pound inside her chest.
In her ears, all she could hear is her heart as it gradually comes to a deafening halt. Images of her life passes before her eyes, it was good, and sad but mainly good and for once it was really getting better, and the fact she only gotten a taste of it made her fight a little harder, as much as she could.
She was fighting...a losing battle, but she wasn't going to give up easily, even as the cold darkness of death crept over her, she fought, holding onto her friends, loves...Clark who gave her the strength to fight more...just a bit more, not to give into the tempting subcoming force that try to get her to give up.
Her hands furiously searching up for any means of help, and to her delusion, so she thinks anyway when her hand reaches dry air, not thinking it's real and just a figment of her mind, she slowly allows herself to give in, to slowly allow death to drag her down to her watery sleep. Once she realizes it's real she rushes to surface toward the small air pocket that collected near the surface, leaving only enough room for her head to come up.
Coughing wildly, forcing the deadly water from her throat and moving around in a panic way trying to stay a float, her eyes darting around in the dim lights to see how little space of air she has. She takes in a deep breath letting out a deep groan trying to calm herself from the frightful near death experience. Lifting her hand to the ceiling her head is pressed against, she bangs on it and yells as loud as she could, praying to God Clark hearing is as super as he claims it is.
"CLAAAAAAARK!!!!" She shouts, as her hands pounds against the metal air vents and stops and listen as if for a reply as she wipes with her free hand the water from her face.
"Please..." she whispers to herself before she goes on to insult the air duct with her hand again" CLAAAAAAAAAAAARK!!!! CLAAAAAAAARK!!!"
She fustrately beats onto it again, feeling as the panic starts to well up in her again and leans her head back, looking helpless up at the ceiling centimeters from her face. Tears, unfought comes to the edges of her red eye, as she presses her hand against the ceiling.
"Please find me Clark..." her voice low, almost in despair, as she floats there laying on her back as only her face sticks from the water in the small air space.
She closes her eyes pressing the fear away as she tries to keep from loosing control, picturing Clark's face and thinking of his warm, strong arms safely around her as she tries to not let the chill of the water get to her.
"CLAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAARK!!!!" she cries loudly, her voice sounding helpless and weak.
x
"DAMN YOU!" Clark growls in rage. "Tell me where she is!"
Clark strikes his fist against Lex's face again, then again, and a third time, connecting each time with his jaw in a sound that would have made anyone cringe, but not using the full extent of his powers even though it was deliciously tempting to do so, he held back for Lois. The third time Lex head falls back into the water in a small splash, Clark grabs his shirts and pulls him partly up to keep from drowning.
Lex only letting out a weak evil laugh, as a horrible grin stay glued to his lips, he lifts his hand wiping the blood that poured from his nose.
"I've been through torture, Remember?! I know HELL!" he yells in a maniac like voice, appearing as one of those crazies from Belle Reeve.
"Just give up I'm going and I'm taking Lois with me!" he laughs in such an evil laughter that it made the hairs on the back of Clark's neck stand up.
Clark grinds his teeth together and plunges Lex into the depth of the water again filled with hate hotter then the deepest reds of burning coals, holding him under far longer then he had before, watching without care as air bubbles from his nostrils sprouted to the surface of the water, and disappear as quickly as other followed behind. Not caring anymore what he did to him, he wanted Lex to suffer as much as he did and as much as Lois must have...
"Smallville, what do you think you're doing?"
Clark looks up in shock to see Lois leaning there against the wall, bone dry and looking at him curiously but smiling beautifully at him, like every smile is from her, perfect just like her in every way. But he only shakes his head and looks back down at Lex still under the water fighting the little he can but to no anvil since Clark was just too strong for him.
"I'm going to kill him...he deserves to die." Clark replies bitterly, through clamped teeth. "Now go away...you're not her, you're not my Lois."
"Maybe not so..." she replies in soft words, so light like a feather floating down in the air, he turns his head to the side at her sudden appearance, kneeling down next to him.
"...but right now, you need me to be...to help you..." she speaks, her words still just as soft, as she slowly lifts her hand to his face and lightly touches her fingers tips to his skin.
Clark instinctively closes his eyes, god she smelt like Lois and even her touches were the same, his heart skips beats at her presence, he wanted to lose himself in this moment, but he knew it wasn't real...she wasn't real, just all in his mind.
"You know you can't do this...you know it isn't right..." she whispers, as her lips closes in on his, and touches softer then silk upon his mouth.
He pulls away, tears burn in his eyes from the pain of her not being real as he shakes his head angrily. "No! I have to do this...he has to pay for what he did to you...for what he did to her..."
"And, what the hell do you think I would be doing right now?!" She asks in a sarcastic tone that could have only came from Lois.
Clark shakes his head he didn't want to listen to reason, he didn't want to stop the pain-stop not going after the blood the darkness inside of him cried for.
"What would "she" be doing right now?!" she asks again in a loud voice, as she places her hand on his shoulder.
"You're not a murderer Clark...don't stoop to his level, you'll only make yourself like him...and you're far too great in value to this world...too good to ever become something like that monster...Don't...please..." she begs in a pleading voice that brings Clark to face her and to tears.
He reaches out to the image of Lois, that no doubt could only be but his conscious trying to get him to do what was right, his hand slips into her silk locks.
"How can I stop?" he asks in a sad voice, his hand taking in every feel of her hair and face as tears rolled down his cheek. "He took you away from me...you could be...de-dead..."
He snaps back to looking down at Lex through the shallow water barely in life, the anger back fiery in his eyes as he pulls his hand back in place on Lex's throat.
"No...all I have is this and now...he's going to pay...with his life he's going to pay for taking yours..." he yells in bitter agony and anger that it even made her, a non-realistic thing, fearful.
She gently cups her hands around his face and turns them toward her. "I'm not dead...Lois Joanne Lane is very much alive..."
"What?!...Where?!...Where is sh-..."
She places her finger gently on his lips. "Shut up...Listen..."
Clark did as instructed, but heard nothing at first and looked up at her worried, she only gives an encouraging nod and smiles. Soon faint words are heard, unable to comprehend or tell whose voice they belonged to.
He zones in on the direction the sound is coming from, through walls, past thick broad pipes, wooden floors, and down a few levels he hears clearly his name from the one person who sent his demons away, and brought his heart back to life...
"CLAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAARK!"
Clark snaps back to reality and looks around, the entity or whatever it was in the image of Lois was nowhere to be seen, his focus soon comes back to Lex. A couple bubbles come up instead of many like before in the water. He snatches him up and gives a firm hard pound to his chest, reviving him as he spits up the fluid from his lungs in takes in a deep harsh gasp of air.
Lex opens his own eyes as he breathes heavily to see that he's alone, sitting upright in the shallow foot of water, turning his head to look behind him, he sees that Clark is really gone.
x
"CLAAAAAAAAAAAARK!!!!" she shouts to the the point her throat becomes soar, and sight out heavily in frustration. "Damn it Clark, where are you?!"
She lays there floating on her back, in the dimness of the emergency of the emergency light, listening to the eerie stillness around her.
"Ok,you can do this Lois...Just stay calm." she whispers to herself as she closes her eyes and wipes her face with some of the water on her hand.
As her mind is plagued with all that has happen and wondering whats happening now, if Lana and Lucy got safely to Clark and the others. If everyone is alright, god she hated being like this, stuck and not able to help anyone, not even herself...
Lois tears herself from her thoughts and opes her eyes, making up her mind that she wasn't going to just wait there and try nothing any longer. She takes a few calming breaths as she tries to steady her nerves as she prepares herself, taking in one final deep breath before submerging under.
She kicks out her legs, pushing off against the ceiling and strokes out her arms to swim forward, but doesn't get far as the light disappears the further she goes becoming but a black void. Lois not able to seen even an inch in front of her face, quickly turns around swimming back where the air pocket is before she forgets it's exact location.
Suddenly out of nowhere a strange looking fish swims in her path, close to her face scaring the breath from her mouth that she was holding, lacking oxygen she quickly swims up forgetting the water level and plows her head into the ceiling.
She hits her head hard but doesn't black out she quickly swims over in the direction the air pocket is and surfaces coughing hard from the water that found it's way inside her.
"Damn it!" she screams, slamming her fist into the ceiling. "Clark you better get you're ass here!"
A few seconds later a big splash of water comes up next to her, scaring the hell from her; all ready experiencing the scare from that ugly fish, that she acts on her first instinct and plows her fist out...hitting Clark square in his face; luckily she didn't put her full force into it.
Clark is taken back by her action as he holds his face like he felt it and look at her curiously.
"What twas that for?" Clark asks in a perplexed voice. "You did call for help this time!"
Lois holds her hands over her mouth in shock that she did that but still couldn't help but find it amusing. "Oh my God, Clark I'm so sorry, you scared the hell out of me. I thought you were some freakishly ugly fish that I seen..." she quickly says, excited to see him and throws her arms around his neck, sending her lips crashing down on his.
He laughs, but eagerly parts his mouth and accepts hers hungrily as he wraps his arms protectively around her.
"God, I missed you so much!" Clark whispers against her lips, as he lifts his wet hand and slides it through her chestnut hair.
She smiles onto his mouth. "Prove it."
Clark pulls back from her face to look into her beautiful hazel eyes that shinned softly into his from the soft glow of light around, and smiles widely at her as he runs his fingers down the side of her face. She closes her eyes at his soft touch, goosebumps spreads over her body as he runs his thumb over her petal like lips.
He slowly slides his hands down her body, careful to touch ever spot she likes as his hands make their way down to wrap around her hips. Lois leans her face close to his as she looks playfully into his eyes, a wide smile on her lips.
"Getting kinda fresh there, Smallivlle." she says in a soft teasing whisper.
Clark's lips curl up in his charming Kent smile, and leans his forehead against hers. "No, just trying to prove to my girlfriend how much I miss her."
"Well, I don't think she's convinced yet." Lois' voice low and playful.
"Maybe this will..."' he smiles and lightly touches his lips upon hers, kissing her softly, allowing his lips to take in every feel of hers before lips deepens onto hers.
"I love you..." he says in quite voice.
Lois moans into his mouth, savoring the feel of his touch, the taste of his lips that made her mouth water, missing him badly. Her hands slide down his face, releasing her right hand she pulls it back decks him across the face with a loud grunt.
"Ow!" she shouts shaking her hand in pain. "I forgot how hard your head is!"
"Wha...I just told you, I love you and you hit me?!" he asks confused as he stares at her strangely.
Lois only gives him a sneaky smile back as the pain subsides from her hand.
"That's for taking too long." she smirks teasingly.
He shakes his head in disbelief at her as she smiles and grabs his face, pulling his lips to meet hers, kissing him hard as she shows him just how much she missed him also.
"I love you took, Smallville..." she replies back to his words.
Clark smiles back widely on her lips and hugs her tighter to his body, never wanting to release her and overjoyed with relief to have her in his arms again. He pulls back, breaking the kiss early as he stares at her, she now giving him ma weird look.
"What's wrong?"
"Promise me you won't ever hold anything like that from me again." he says seriously, his blues falling into hers deeply.
She cocks her head to the side giving him a pointed look and leans in to kiss him again as she lets out a soft laugh.
"I promies..." she lays and tries to kiss him, but he quickly pulls back, the serious expression still on his face.
"I'm serious Lois..." he says in a tone that let her know he was. "Why didn't you tell me...about everything, the disk, Lex..."
Lois rolls her eyes and lets out a deep breath, as she bites on her lower lip nervously and shrugs.
"We weren't together then..." she replies, and turns her head slightly away.
Clark places his hand under her chin, gently forcing her to look at him. "When we were, you could have told me..."
"You've seen the disk?" Lois sighs, her question sounding more like a statement, she didn't doubt at all that Chloe would be able to find.
"Yea, I've seen it...and you've known all this time about me?"
"Not everything..." she says shaking her head. "...I mean I wouldn't ever imagine you were ET, and had all these amazing gifts."
"Lois." he says in a warning tone.
She softly laughs and traces her thumb down his cheek. "...but yea, I figured you were something special, especially seeing the graphs of you getting hit by Lex's car and not even a scratch on you, along with other things he had collected on you. Plus it's not like I wasn't suspicious about you already with all the weird things that seem to happen around you..."
"Why didn't you ever say anything?" he asks and raises his brow up at her. "I'm pretty sure you didn't buy half of the lame..."
"...lies you told me?" she finishes off and smiles at the look he gives her. "No, not a single one actually, I just figured if it was important enough for me to know, you would tell me...and when I did come to a conclusion that you must be one of those..."
"Meteor Freaks..." Clark says his face dropping down some.
"No, one of thoes affected by the meteors I never classified you as a "freak", cuz you're not, and you never gave me a reason to think of you as such. Before I even knew what you really were, and just thought you were a meteor victim I still just saw you the same...you are selfless, kind, you save countless lives, lots of those saves being my own life..." she laughs, forcing a smile to his lips. "...so I couldn't see you as one of those psychos..."
"So, why not just tell me about Lex and the disk?"
"Beside the fact I thought I was dying, and things were just really screwed up...Lex had the disk longer then me, I'm sure he's figured some things out about you too, and I believe he has especially how he was hinting it in his words...call me crazy but I didn't want you to get hurt, I didn't want anyone falling into the mess I gotten myself into and I don't know if you haven't notice, but I like to do things on my own."
Clark gives her a sarcastic look. "Yea, among others things I noticed about you..."
"Like what?" she smiles, playfulness hinting in her words.
"Oh I don't know, how you're rude, bossy, a pain, loud...very loud..." Clark smirks, teasingly "...a tease, and oh yea, has an incredible ass..."
Lois playfully punches his arm, as she smiles at him. "So, do you forgive me?"
Clark captures her mouth, kissing her passionately, making her loose her breath as she kissing him back with the same spark.
"Now I do..." he whispers on her lips as she smiles widely in return.
A/N: PLEASE READ and REVIEW!!!! THANKS!!!