Chapter 62

Superman held Lois' hand as he led her through the tunnel underneath Star Labs. Cobwebs were thick in every corner and there was only a minimum of light by which to see them. Lois kept brushing them away even when she knew they couldn't be on her because she had just finished brushing them off of her.

"This is the way you come here each time?"

"Yes. We all do. No one in the building but the two doctors knows exactly what's going on with these tests. Oliver wants to keep it that way. So do I."

"You'd think he'd at least have it cleaned it up a bit." She swatted at another gossamer tendril hanging directly in front of her. "Yuck!"

Superman smiled back at her. "I thought you were tough? It's just a few spiders."

"A few? There are whole squadrons of them!"

"Actually, I think the correct term is a clutter of spiders."

"Really? You're doing entirely too much reading lately!" She swatted away another cobweb. "So what's the plural term for irritated girlfriends?"

"There isn't one, because," he paused and looked back at her, smiling, "you're not supposed to have more than one."

"Wise answer. So why are there tunnels here at all?"

"Left over from the Lionel Luthor days, when he owned the complex. I think he always wanted a quick exit from anywhere he frequented."

"Probably a good idea considering the life he led."

"Maybe. He redeemed himself in the end though."

"He did? Why would you say that?"

"It's a long story. I'll tell you someday. But here we are…"

He opened a huge steel door that, surprisingly, did not squeak at all. At least the upkeep begins here, she thought.

As he ushered her through into a lonely, well-lit hallway, he leaned down and whispered yet again, "Remember, be careful."

"Cl—Superman, if you say that word one more time, I'm going to—"

"Shhh!"

She socked him in the shoulder.

"Last time you did that around here, they drew your blood. I should think you'd learn."

"Oh, like it hurts you!" she answered, keeping her voice at a soft whisper too.

"The point is that it doesn't hurt you."

"You're flinching."

"No, I'm not."

"You're faster than a speeding bullet last time I heard. So don't tell me you can't tell when I'm going to do that and you don't draw back so the full punch doesn't land."

"Speeding bullets aren't as distracting."

"Nice one. I like that." She reached up to kiss him, but he pushed her away quickly.

"Lois!"

"You mean to tell me you really haven't been flinching."

"No. I never see it coming from you. Every time it's a complete surprise. It always has been. For that matter, most of what you do is a complete surprise to me. Now, come on. It's this way."

A smiling Lois followed him down the corridor.

********

Dr. Kline sat at the desk, desperately searching for one piece of paper underneath a pile of charts, graphs, and books.

"Dr. Kline?" Superman said from the doorway, and Lois turned her head to stare at him. The voice he used as Superman was so deep, so rich, it never ceased to amaze her when Clark turned it on so easily.

"Ah, Superman, there you are. I'm sorry, but Dr. Hamilton has gone home for—" He noticed Lois emerge from behind Superman. "Miss Lane? How nice of you to come!" He looked questioningly at them both, obviously wondering why she was here.

"Dr. Kline, Miss Lane is one of my most trusted friends. I'd like her to hear any results you have found in your tests, and also… there are those samples you took from her. We'd like to hear about those too."

That seemed to satisfy the good doctor and he turned to her. "Uh, Miss Lane, HIPPA laws, you know…do I have your permission to speak freely in front of Superman?"

Lois laughed, leaned in toward Dr. Kline, and winked at him. "I think we can trust him, don't you? It's not as if you could stop him from finding out anything he'd want to know anyway, is it?"

"Quite. Quite," he answered nervously. "Well, your blood was interesting, Miss Lane. For one thing, there was an extraordinary amount of basophils in your blood, and—"

"What are those?"

"Oh, a type of white blood cells. Had you been sick with a cold perhaps prior to giving that blood sample? Did you have some kind of infection? Do you have asthma?"

"No." She wanted to make the joke so badly that she'd been dead at the time, but it was fairly obvious Dr. Kline didn't know about her "death." Mad scientists probably didn't read the newspapers or watch too much television.

"Hm. Then maybe it was so mild you didn't notice. They usually increase in times of illness. They're the rarest form of white blood cell, so we know comparatively little about them except that they seem to—"

"Are you saying Miss Lane could be ill with some—" Superman stepped forward, concern written all over his face.

"Oh, no, no. I'm sure there's nothing to worry about there. It was just… unusual…the amount we found. It's almost impossible to come up with one on your average slide, but to come up with hundreds. Most unusual. But the real puzzle, as it were," he stopped and frowned, "or is it 'was'? Oh, well, 'was' or 'were,' hardly makes a difference, I suppose—"

"Dr. Kline?" Superman knew very well how difficult it was to keep the man focused. "The real puzzle?"

"Oh, yes. Well, it was," he frowned again, "or they were the mitochondria!"

"The what?" Lois asked.

"Mitochondria. The powerhouse of the cell!" he said dramatically and hit the desk with his fist. When his audience of two didn't react, he swallowed meekly and continued, "Miss Lane's are a little bit different in shape than normal ones, and one of the amino acids within the genome of the mitochondria cell itself… quite unusual. We've never seen anything like it!"

"What does that mean?" Lois asked.

"We have no idea." Dr. Kline seemed very pleased, and that grated on Superman's nerves.

Superman crossed his arms as if trying to contain himself. He looked at Lois, widened his eyes, and nodded toward the doctor, as if giving her a cue.

Lois nodded, knowingly. "Dr. Kline," she smiled her most charming smile, "I'm sure you have some kind of theory?"

"Oh yes, loads of them!" He smiled back at her but didn't expound on a one.

Lois walked around the desk and leaned against it, striking a pose that showed off some of her best assets as she knew it would. Superman turned away, trying hard not to laugh.

"You know, I just love it when someone talks all… sciency… like you do." She leaned forward and straightened his tie. "I'll bet you have a very good idea of what those mightycondy things mean, don't you?"

"Mitochondria," he corrected her, as his eyes went all dreamy, and he licked his lips nervously as Lois continued to keep her hands moving about his shoulders and face as he tried to talk to her. "Well, before I get too far into that… I really should get your signatures for our records… HIPPA, you know…I mean…"

"Oh, we'll do all that later, and I don't mind at all, and Superman doesn't mind either. Do you, Superman?"

"Uh, no," he spoke up from across the room where he'd retreated. "Miss Lane is a good friend and I trust her explicitly. You can tell her, but only her, anything about my tests, Dr. Kline."

The doctor was still enthralled by Lois and the smiling eyes she was giving him. "Oh, then…I guess…well, you see, Dr. Hamilton and I think that, at some point, you, uh…Miss Lane, must have been affected by something that resulted in a modification of the genome sequence within your mitochondria."

"Like what?" The two of them asked at once.

"Well, we don't know. But we think it's what contributes to your resistance to bruising and possibly other small bodily assaults."

Superman crossed the room at lightning speed and leaned on the desk until he was within inches of Dr. Kline, looking into his eyes with some degree of desperation. "You mean Lois may have a degree of invulnerability?"

"Well, yes. Maybe. In a way. It's not like yours, of course. Not even Wonder Woman has …"

Lois' eyes sparked fire at that. "Let's get back to me and my results, okay?"

"Oh, yes, yes. Well, it's just a theory, you understand, but the mitochondria are indeed similar to some of the ones we've isolated in Superman's blood. He's got loads of types. Quite unique. Very impressive when you see those under a microscope, let me tell you. Probably has to have many types, considering he's storing so much solar energy in every cell of his body that—"

"Dr. Kline, we were talking about Miss Lane's results."

"Ah, yes. Well, if we take what we know about adverse mitochondrial changes and apply that to this instance, in which the mitochondrial changes seem to be a marked improvement, then it follows that the effect might just be to increase cell strength throughout the body, increase lifespan…In effect, a sort of, well, not invulnerability, but more like a durability or a sort."

Dr. Kline looked up to see Superman and Miss Lane gazing at each other intently and he looked from one to the other and back again several times.

"Did I say something important?"