Chapter Three Part Three- Beauty is a Curse on the World:

"Look, I'm in the nation's cream corn capital retaking calculus when I should be strolling the campus of Met U tracking down stories and getting an internship at the Daily Planet." Lois says trying her best to keep her eyes on the road of Smallville High's parking lot when she grows even more frustrated when the person on the other line decided to put her on hold.

The frustration and anger soon turned to fear when a shirtless teen appeared in front of her car causing Lois to slam into him and send his body flying over the car and landing behind the car still mumbling incoherent words.

She immediately jumped out of the car forgetting about her cell and rushing towards the young man.

It wasn't until a couple hours later that the paramedics hauled Bret into the ambulance and the deputies questioned Lois about the events that had taken place during the accident.

All the shock and daze from the accident still affected her as she turned and head back towards her car with her arms wrapped around her as a source of comfort.

"Lois!" a voice calls out from behind causing Lois to turn and see Clark rushing towards her concerned at the scene around him, "What's going on?"

She shook herself out of the daze she was in before replying, "He just ran out in front of me. The paramedics say that he'll be okay physically but they think that he lost it but I don't know what to think."

Clark looks back towards the ambulance then back at Lois, "I just saw Bret at practice an hour ago and he was fine, if they think he lost it then their obviously wrong."

"Are you sure about that? I mean, it's the start of a new season with scholarship offers and the entire town counting on you to be their hero. Who knows what that can do to someone."

Clark shook his head negatively, "If anything, Bret was too overconfident. Maybe he just didn't see you."

Lois leans towards him speaking softly, "That might explain the broken windshield but why was he running around half naked and soaking wet?"

The two contemplated ideas and theories unaware that Abby had slipped away soaking wet herself with a concerned look upon her face.

Gotham City- Same Time:

"Master Wayne…" Alfred's voice echoed through the Wayne manor only to hear silence as his response.

Alfred continued searching the grounds until he walked towards the piano where he played three notes causing the book case door to slid open revealing a steel elevator.

Once he plunged down into the dark abyss that was the underground cave, Alfred spotted his young master near the giant computer screen that housed pictures of ancient manuscripts and 3-D imagery of crystals with bizarre symbols carved into them.

"I understand that beating Lex Luthor to these stones is of grave importance but the world needs to see Bruce Wayne kissing babies and cutting ribbons." Alfred says concerned while Bruce just rose to his feet and walked towards the steel table which housed several gadgets and weapons.

"Putting on the mask of the boy billionaire isn't something I wanted when I came back to Gotham…" he picks up a bat shaped throwing device, "I wanted to be a symbol that would put fear in the hearts of the wicked and prevent crimes that took families away from their children like mine parents were taken from me."

Alfred watched Bruce throw the bat shaped device straight into a wooden pillar, "Your dark persona may have no limits but even Bruce Wayne needs to shed his armor and live the way his parents intended."

Bruce turns to face Alfred contemplating the words spoken to him before setting a hand on Alfred's shoulder asking, "What would you have me do?"

"There is only so much darkness a man can take before he is truly gone, one must endure that eternal struggle if they are to ever reach full potential…" he pauses to show his fatherly smile, "I just want you to do what's best for yourself…may I suggest a vacation to Miami or perhaps Metropolis?"

Bruce just smirked and began to walk towards the giant computer, "I think I've had enough of Metropolis for now, Lois would accuse me of stalking her and I don't really want that on my conscious along with the black eye she'd give me…" Bruce cant help but laugh before accessing the screen, "I think I'll go to Paris and see what Genevieve Teague is up to."

"Do you think she suspects Jason's intentions with Ms. Lang?" Alfred asks while watching as the screen lit up with photo of Jason in Paris alongside his mother days before ever meeting Lana Lang.

"I think that when the time comes…all will be revealed." Bruce says never once looking back at Alfred with his eyes trained on the screen in front of him.

Torch:

The slightly hilarious investigation into Bret's mysterious behavior led Lois and Clark to the boys locker room where one football player ended up with a broken nose when he tried to grab Lois's ass and the others throwing flirtatious gestures her way while Clark discovered a gold necklace with the letter A trailed with diamonds.

But in classic Mad Dog Lane behavior, she took the evidence and proceeded to investigate despite Clark's warnings of reckless behavior and the dangers of getting too close to a story.

So, she had investigated for a good full hour until she stumbled upon a website for Beachwood institute and the tagline: YOU ARE ONE PROCEDURE AWAY FROM PREFECTION.

The mouse clicked once which led to another part of the website which read: DO YOU WISH TO MAKE AN APPOINTMENT- YES/NO.

A smile appeared on her face, one that often meant getting herself into a lot of trouble and the occasional death threat.

But still she trailed the mouse towards YES and clicked it…

Hours Later…Beachwood

"My parents say that I'm too young to get plastic surgery but from the procedure you did on Abby, is it true that you only to go in once?" Lois speaks softly trying to act innocent towards Dr. Fine, Abby's mother.

Dr. Fine just smile sweetly at the seemingly innocent girl in front of her, "I developed the procedure so that my daughter wouldn't go through all the suffering that I went through."

"It must have been hard to see the same thing happen to Abby." Lois says genuinely concerned only to see Dr. Fine plaster on a fake smile despite the pain in her eyes.

"Why don't we get you scheduled in." Dr. Fine says obviously trying to change the subject until the sound of a tape swirling caused both women to pause and look at each other surprised.

"I-I should really get going…" Lois rises to her feet and prepares to leave until Dr. Fine grabs her and rips the bag from her.

"Are you recording this?" The doctor voice angrily only to see Lois's innocent drop into a determined and serious look.

"I'm going to expose you and the whole world will know what you did to your daughter…" she prepares to leave only to have Dr. Fine turn her back around demanding, "Who are you to stop people from being their best?"

Lois slips from her grip again and replies, "I've always been a firm believer that its beauty on the inside that counts…" she has the door halfway open when Dr. Fine grabs her by the back of her hair and slams her head against the door before injecting something into Lois's neck.

"The people that say that are the ones who already have it on the outside…" she watches as Lois's body sags to the floor, "I'm going to give girls like Abby the chance to be who they've always wanted to be and your going to understand first hand what its like to truly be one of the girls."

Torch:

"Lois has been doing double time on this whole façade and inner beauty thing…" Chloe says digging through her desk until she passed a printed article towards Clark saying, "She's even pulled up articles that Abby's mom did about her new procedure where the patient only has to come in once and they instantly look like Abby did."

Clark speed reads through the article, "It says here Dr. Fine was working on a suppression medication called Serythro to keep the serotonin levels in check, maybe Abby took this new procedure for a test drive."

Chloe nodded her head and turned back to Clark saying, "The only problem is that the procedure caused Abby's serotonin filled kisses to cause her victims to go through extreme emotions and adrenaline."

Clark set down the article confused, "That explains Bret but what about Lana?"

The spunky haired reporter just rolled her eyes, "I doesn't take a genius to figure out what happened, I'm thinking maybe Abby surprised Lana in order to infect her but what I don't understand is why would Abby knowingly go after Lana."

Clark thinks about theories until something on Lois's desk caught his attention and he walked towards the computer saying, "Looks like Lois has been one step ahead of us."

Chloe looks over his shoulder to see the reminder pop up on the screen, "We better get over there before…" she turns and heads back towards her desk only to turn around to see that Clark was gone, "Clark?"

Beachwood:

Lois awoke to find herself strapped to a metallic human shaped bed, "W-What are you doing?" she asks weakly while Dr. Fine finishes the final touches to the machine.

The crazed doctor walks towards Lois and replies, "I'm giving you the big scoop, your going to know what it was like for Abby everyday…" she grabs Lois's face viciously, "I knew girls like you in high school, always trying to be better then everyone else and punishing those less than beautiful by ridiculing them and judging them."

Dr. Fine walks towards the machine and activates it, Lois looks up to see the glass tank full of needles and begins to breath heavily with panic, "Without the suppressant to balance out your serotonin, you'll be writing your stories in Belle Reeve."

Lois looks from Dr. Fine then back to the needles coming closer and closer as she struggles with the binding preventing her from movement.

There was no escape…

TBC…

Slightly longer and more cliffy, I wanted the scene with Bruce to kind of flow with the story cause it does tie into the Jason/Lana relationship and why he is Smallville. The reason towards the connection between Jason and Bruce will become known later on and it will kind of cause a lot of issues in Smallville.

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