THIRD AND FINAL CHAPTER
Clark waited around at the Daily Planet newspaper building for Chloe, the budding reporter. He was sure she was just zipping around running errands for her bosses, trying to make a good impression as she had only just landed the job and her only article so far was about a European man who kidnapped Lois. She also had to purchase her afternoon latte, which was loaded with caffeine so she could get through the day. After a while of watching people walk in and out of the basement floor of the Planet, Clark finally spotted the short-haired blonde. She looked like she was exhausted.
"Phew…" she said as she reached her desk and saw Clark sitting down in her chair. She placed the coffee, along with a stack of paperwork on the desk and motioned for him to move out of her seat. "Talk about a big day," she continued as she picked up the cup and took a sip. She spat the coffee out, narrowly missing the paper and the keyboard of her computer.
"Ice cold," she muttered as the look on her face resembled disgust, "Clark…. You know what to do."
He grabbed the cup out of her hand and focused his eyes on it. Then beams of heat came out of his retinas and soon steam was coming out of Chloe's latte.
"Thank you so much," she said, "I've been having such a crazy day."
Clark nodded. He knew the feeling. He had been trying to hide from Lana and dodge Lois, as well as about thirty other girls who suddenly thought he was Prince Charming.
"This whole situation with the obsessed young women, it's doing my head in," he told her. "I thought you were going to be the next one to declare your undying love for me."
Chloe once again chuckled, then after sipping the coffee which was now piping hot thanks to Clark's in-built microwave, she pulled up a file on the computer.
"I've been looking into the mysterious activity that's been occurring in Crater Lake, and well… you might want to take a look at this," Chloe began, as Clark moved closer to get a better view. On the screen he could see a few pictures of what looked like a pink rock, at first he just thought it was some kind of jewel but then was astounded to discover it was a type of kryptonite. Chloe zoomed in and enhanced the image, which was taken with an underwater camera.
"Pink Krypto?" she asked, "I didn't know it existed," she continued.
"That's because it doesn't. I know of red, but pink?" he replied, scratching his head.
"It could explain why all the girls are drawn to you," Chloe suggested.
"Maybe red K turns pink when it's been underwater for a period of time," Clark said, "But wouldn't it affect my personality? Not theirs'."
"It's definitely strange. And we need to find a way to get rid of it. If there's anything we've learned, it's that meteor rocks turn people dangerous."
Lana was walking through Metropolis University campus trying to get a hold of Clark on her phone. She wasn't sure what had happened the previous night, she had kind of blacked it out. But she'd returned to her normal self, not the crazy jealous girlfriend she had been at the barn when she saw Clark with all the pretty former high school girls. Clark knocking her out must have got rid of the pink meteor rock in her system. She dialled for about the fifth time, but Clark wasn't picking up.
"Hi, it's me… Lana, again. I'm sorry about the way I acted last night. I wasn't myself, it's just you were with all those… that's no excuse, I behaved like a green-eyed monster. Just call me back and we'll talk."
Lana hung up, put her phone away and then was struck in the back by an unknown force and knocked to the ground. She turned around to see what had attacked her- it was Lois, who had a look of fury in her eyes. She also had a pretty devastating karate kick. Lana grabbed her back in agony as she tried to pick herself up, but Lois grabbed her hair and began to pull.
"Ow!" she cried, but her assailant did not let up. Lana's instincts kicked into gear. She remembered her training with Lex as she crawled free from Lois' grasp and jumped to her feet, sizing her opponent up.
"There's something wrong with you Lois," she said as she met Lois' stare, and then aimed a kick at her stomach. It almost knocked the wind out of the feisty Miss Lane and she stumbled back, but was resolute about trying to off Lana.
"If I get you out of the way, he'll be all mine," Lois told her as she puffed, and then ran towards Lana with a full head of steam, tackling the college freshman. Lana had acted out this charade before with Chloe at Smallville High, when she was brainwashed. Although this time Lois was the one not thinking straight. A crowd had gathered to watch the fight, all cheering and hollering and some wolf-whistling at the prospect of a cat fight. Lois and Lana rolled along the ground, Lois getting the upper hand with her bigger frame and upper-body strength. She was the daughter of a general after all. Lana got in a few scratches and slaps to the face of her opponent before campus security arrived and separated the fiery young women. Lana was pretty angry as she tried to break free from their grasps and Lois almost did, clawing at the air in the direction of Lana.
Clark and Chloe did a little more digging back at her dorm at Met U and discovered that the pink kryptonite was dumped in the water and written off as a failed experiment by Luthorcorp. Which of course meant that Clark would once again go head-to-head with the younger Luthor. He arrived at the Mansion with his usual indignant look on his face when suspected Lex of doing something corrupt. Lex was in his study, reading some reports quietly when Clark stormed in.
"Lex! You've been dumping in the water again. Didn't you learn your lesson after what happened with Leviathan?" Clark accused.
"Hi Lex. How have you been? Is that really so hard? Why do you always have to interrogate me in my own house? Security!" Lex returned serve.
"If you weren't doing anything dodgy I wouldn't have to ask questions. But your actions affect the people around you, the environment." Clark turned even redder, especially when as usual it appeared that Lex didn't give a crap.
"If your moral lesson is over, I have more important matters to attend to," Lex replied with a smirk, then resumed looking at the documents on the desk. He then told the guards that he would let himself out.
Lana and Lois nursed their injuries as they laughed about what had occurred in the last couple of days. Lois was back to normal after sleeping off whatever kryptonite was in her system.
"I cant believe you almost got me kicked out of the university," Lana told Lois as she kept an ice-pack on her shoulder, which had copped quite a blow when Lois crash tackled her.
"I'm so sorry, that was the evil Mortal Kombat version of Lois Lane. I still can't believe we were fighting over Clark Kent. As if I would ever have any romantic feelings for him. I mean, you've seen us… we're practically enemies."
Lana giggled as she straightened and combed her hair, which was in a tangled mess after the altercation.
"Yeah, you guys do have that love-to-hate relationship going on. I was acting really jealous too at the farm when I saw some of my friends from high school cuddled up to him," Lana revealed.
"How does that guy turn into Brad Pitt overnight?" asked Lois as she took a painkiller and grabbed her forehead.
"Sorry about the backhander," Lana apologised.
"Don't mention it. I was the one who started it," Lois admitted. They sat on the floor of the Talon apartment, a place that held a lot of memories for Lana, and continued to bond over their unlikely feud.
Clark super-sped to the lake after his short and pointless conversation with Lex at the Mansion, he should have known by now that confronting the rich bald man is futile. He used his X-ray vision to scan the lake for every trace of Pink K he could find and then quickly swam and grabbed each piece out one by one. There were truckloads of the stuff but of course he's faster than a speeding bullet so he retrieved it all in about 5 seconds. He then piled it all on the sand and used his heat vision to burn the rocks to a cinder. He breathed a sigh of relief. There would be no more young girls creepily chasing him, and his two female friends were back to their quiet and abrasive selves.
Clark joined Chloe, Lois and Lana at the Talon to celebrate things going back to normal. Well, for Clark that was never going to be a reality.
"So, pink meteor rock?" Lana repeated, after Chloe had explained the source of the sudden, passionate attraction they had to Clark.
"Yeah, Luthor Jr. was dumping it into the lake after a botched experiment," Chloe confirmed.
"I gave him an earful about it. Of course, a leopard never changes his spots," Clark added. They all nodded, except for Lana. She knew that sometimes Lex could be untrustworthy, but she was still friends with him. And she refused to believe he was the villain everyone else was painting him to be. As the four young people were sitting at a table sipping milkshakes, Lois dared ask the question.
"So, what do you want to do tomorrow? Anyone up for swimming?" Lois asked cheerfully. They all grinned and rolled their eyes at Lois' bad attempt at humour…