John Henry heard his daughter's scream and cold terror coursed through him as he ran toward the sound. It didn't take him long to figure out the cause of it as Clark was in his Superman outfit. What in the name of common sense had he been thinking? He couldn't ask him that, of course.

She stopped screaming when she caught sight of him, but she was still trembling.

He looked at Clark and Lois who had put distance between themselves and were looking at Natalie with no small amount of concern.

"It's okay," Lois said. "He's a friend of our family, a kind and gentle man."

"What is he doing here?" she asked coldly, not caring in the least how Lois viewed him.

"He was telling me about a rescue he made in Bosnia for the paper," Lois said. She didn't have to think about it. She lied so cooly and convincingly that even he almost believed her. He supposed when you'd been keeping the secret so long, covering up became second nature.

"Don't you work at a small-town paper now?" she asked.

Trust his Natalie not to take anything at face value. She got that from her mother.

"Yes, but local papers cover international news as well. And with readership of newspapers dropping, I have to peddle AP stories to make ends meet. And Superman stories do quite well."

"And I trust Ms. Lane emphatically to get my stories right. I always offer her the exclusive first. I'm sorry I scared you. It's not every day you see Superman up close and personal, right?"

Smart of him to play dumb as if he hadn't met her and didn't know the reason for her fear.

John Henry noted that she was still staring at the superhero hard as if trying to create heat vision of her own. He draped an arm across her shoulders to try to comfort and relax her. Maybe it was good that she was getting to meet him, to help her work past her issues. "He's a good guy, Nat-Bug. He's saved my life more than once since I arrived."

"And I lost count how many times he's saved mine," Lois added.

"I haven't," Superman said. "1,921."

He and Natalie both looked at Lois with mouths agape. His Lois had been no stranger to perilous situations, but that was an impressive record.

"I could have gotten myself out of those situations," Lois defended. "Most of the time. The point is you have nothing to be worried about."

"Why was he hugging you?" she asked, refusing to give him an inch.

On this question, Lois flushed. "It's like I said. We're friends. I wasn't in the best place emotionally at that moment, and he was comforting me. As a friend."

Natalie looked like she wasn't buying that.

"Look," Superman began, and he took a step forward, causing Natalie to take a step back.

Clark could see at once that she didn't want anything to do with the man in the costume at all. "I think it's best if I fly on out of here." He nodded first in his direction. "John Henry." Then Lois'. "Ms. Lane."

Clark disappeared. Presumably, he went back to camp and put on his regular clothes.

Natalie shortened the distance between her and Lois at once. "Promise me you won't have anything to do with him anymore," she begged.

"Sweetheart, I can't do that. Number one, my job requires the occasional interaction with him. And number two, he means a lot to me personally."

Natalie looked to him to back her up. "It's hard, Nat-Bug, but you have to separate the people you knew with these folks. They're not the same. They're not going to have similar fates. That danger already passed."

"I can't believe you!" she yelled and headed back to camp in a rage.

"She's having a difficult time," Lois commented.

"Yeah."

"And I'm afraid we didn't make it any easier for her just now. I'm sorry."

"Something like it was bound to happen sooner or later. It's just something she has to work through."

"She's so afraid. She had my boys showing her how to shoot a gun."

Now he was angry. "What? I specifically told her that I didn't want her firing a gun."

He started after Natalie, intent on having it out with her.

"Go easy on her," Lois said, cooling his temper just a bit.

"I'll try. I can't make any promises."

He found her inside their tent, backed into a corner and arms folded. The tent didn't allow for much privacy, not being soundproof, even if you discounted the fact that half the Kents could hear them even if they'd been inside a steel encasement. "Is it true that you asked the Kent boys to help you learn to shoot?"

"Yes. Is it true you're really working with that plastered saint?"

"Yes, and don't try to change the subject."

"He's a phony, Dad," she said, uncrossing her arms in her passionate discourse. "He was lying back there. I don't why or about what, but he's a pretender. You need to keep him away from her. Away from us. That's what you need to be worried about!"

He sighed. How could he reassure her without giving it away? "I just need you to trust me. Can you do that?"

"Dad-"

"No one is saying he's a saint. Superman would be the first to tell you that, but he's a good man."

"He's an alien."

"Fine. He's a good alien then."

"You're not going to stop working with him, are you?"

"No. He's a good person to have with you in combat."

"How can you say that? He killed Mom. And yeah, I know it wasn't really him here or even there, but the potential to overtake him and use his powers against the world is there. We've seen it in another version of him. So don't tell me that we don't have anything to worry about. And don't tell me that I don't have the right to defend myself when the worst could happen because the worst does happen!"

"Natalie-"

"Stop! You'll never convince me not to hate him. I can't stand the sight of him. And if you continue to work alongside him, you've not only betrayed Mom's memory, you've betrayed me!" She ran out of the tent.

Tears pricked his eyes. He hurt for her as he could remember his own consuming hatred and fear when he first got here. It was no way to live. He wanted to help her, but he didn't know how.

Clark had mentioned out on the lake that he'd thought up some games to play around the campfire tonight, games John Henry was sure would make them all playfully groan. But maybe that was the answer. The more she got to know the man past the cape, the less scary he would be when the time came to tell her.