MORTAL COIL

Chapter Ten:

The World According to Lois Lane

The world according to Lois Lane was relatively simple.

You had to have rules.

Secret Rules you had to follow - like a personal code of honour. There were other rules in the world of course but your rules were the ones that helped you get around all the others. The rules were an essential to what Lois called Lane’s Guide to Survival in the Big, Bad World. Lois Lane lived her life by these rules, fashioned out of life as an army brat and all the lessons that came after which her shaped her being. No matter what she set out to accomplish in her life, the rules remained ingrained in her existence, occasionally warranting review for the changing times. However, the basic tenets remained the same because if you didn’t have rules, you just wouldn’t make it.

Rule No. 1 – Don’t take crap from anyone.

Rule No. 2 – Guilt belongs to those who get caught.

Rule No. 3 – People let you down – get over it.

Rule No. 4 – Always clean up your own mess.

Rule No. 5 – Good boyfriends are hard to find. Take all steps to prevent dissection.

Rule No. 6 – Evil corporations must always be brought down.

Rule No. 7 – If someone is too perfect, they’re usually hiding something.

See Rule No. 5 and 6.

Rule No. 8 - Never underestimate flannel. On the right guy it can be hot.

See Rule No. 5

~~~~~~~~~~~~

Lois hated traffic.

Even though she was sitting in air-conditioned comfort while the outside world was baking in hot weather, Lois could feel her patience eroding away by the gridlock traffic she was enduring. Leaving Wayne Manor, Lois had been full of determination and drive to get some answers from the elusive DeSaad Industries. However, an hour in midday traffic had deflated much of her enthusiasm and inflated her growing annoyance at the whole situation. Her hopes of making a quick investigation of the company and returning to the Manor before anyone knew she was gone, seemed more and more unlikely. Furthermore, Lois suspected there might be some fallout from her loan of one of Bruce’s vehicles.

Okay that was bullshit, he hadn’t loaned her anything. However, if Daddy Warbucks was going to leave the keys to a gorgeous black Maserati just hanging around the garage, she couldn’t be held responsible for what came next (Rule No. 2).

On this occasion however, Rule No.5 had her driving towards the imposing structure that was the DeSaad Tower. After her argument with Clark, Lois had needed to do something to put right the condition he presently found himself (Rule No.4). While she didn’t regret helping Valerie, Lois did regret the consequences for Clark. By helping a stranger, Lois had inadvertently allowed Valerie’s hunters to discover an even more valuable prize than a young woman with a sonic scream - an alien from Krypton.

With that one action, Lois had single-handedly destroyed the anonymity he had spent his whole life protecting.

The worst of it was that Clark didn’t even blame her for it.

He was too kind and noble for such a mean thought and there were times Lois feared his faith in people as much as she admired it. A long time ago, Lois had reached the conclusion that most people spent their lives disappointing each other (see Rule No.3). She did not want Clark to learn that lesson the hard way. On the face of it, it may appear that kryptonite was Clark Kent’s greatest weakness but Lois knew better. Clark’s greatest weakness was his heart.

And these days, it was more fragile than ever.

************

Already irritated by how long it took to reach her destination, Lois’ disposition did not improve when she caught her first glimpse of the DeSaad Building.

Pretty fancy for a branch office, she thought staring at the building through the windscreen of the car as she searched for a parking space. Like the Monolith in that Kubrick film, the tower that stood a modest fifty storeys high, covered in dark glass and showed no visible signs of life to the outside world. A cold shudder she could not explain ran through her as she took in the sight of it, wondering if the architecture was deliberate. To make visitors feel awe when approaching it for the first time.

If so, then their purpose was lost entirely because the only emotion it generated in Lois was a sense of menace. For an absurd moment, she found herself thinking it looked evil. Get a grip Lois, she rebuked herself as she continued searching for a space.

Finally, Lois opted to park the car in secure lot across the street out of sight of any security cameras that might be spying on her from behind all that dark glass. Unfortunately, her chosen mode of transport was conspicuous to say the least and the last thing Lois wanted was to bring any more attention to herself than necessary.

A few minutes later, she was walking through the front door, prepared for anything.

*************

Hank Cobb considered himself fortunate to be alive.

Currently exiled by his master, CEO Michael Canto of DeSaad Industries to the wilderness of Gotham, Hank knew that if Canto so wished it, his life could be forfeit at any time. Therefore, every moment he continued to breathe was a boon. Sending him to Gotham was a subtle way of getting rid of him that didn’t require the expense of a bullet. Despite being a major metropolitan centre, likened to Metropolis or New York, Gotham was infamous for its underworld influences. The crime bosses ruled in Gotham and they did so with an iron fist. People were known to die violently for random, meaningless crimes that had no social boundary.

If socialites like Thomas and Martha Wayne could be gunned down in the street, what was to keep a mugger from blowing him away?

Nothing, that’s what.

Until he regained his standing before Canto, Cobb was stuck like a rat in a maze, forced to run the labyrinth until his legs gave out or his master put him out of his misery for sheer boredom. However, Hank knew there was a way out, if he could just get a break. All he had to do was get Valerie on the phone and he could talk her right back into the fold.

And he was convinced that once they had Valerie, Canto would get the other specimen that had given him such a hard on and John Corben had failed to capture.

Valerie – what a needy bitch she was, he thought resentfully as he viewed absently the multiple screens showing the live security footage of what was happening around the building.

All the time Hank had wasted, preparing her, cajoling her with sweet words, performing a minor miracle by seducing her over the Internet and bringing her into the organisation. The first part was simple enough. Her loneliness and naiveté made her easy to drawn into his web. If it wasn’t for the fact that she was as ugly as f**k, he might have even felt sorry for her.

The same mutation that made Valerie capable of knocking out a city block with her screen had also made her a deformed mess of flesh and bone. Her family had been wise to keep her away from prying eyes because she looked like the Elephant man’s younger sister. On the Internet, it was easy to tease her and pretend that looks didn’t matter, that he loved her for her mind, her gentle spirit.

What a load of crap, he remembered thinking as he typed his responses laced with romantic nonsense that was sure to enchant any sheltered virgin. He promised her a new life, moonlight and roses and every cliché riddled declarations of love he could think of until she was ripe to break free from her parents’ gilded cage.

Hearing about her deformity and seeing it in person had been two very different things and it had taken every bit of composure he had, to keep from recoiling in horror when he first laid eyes on her. Later on that night when he had taken her into his bed, Hank had to down a bottle of scotch first before he could even stomach the thought. However, the stakes were high and he knew that one act of intimacy would be enough to bind her to him. Fortunately for a young woman denied all physical contact, Hank didn’t have to engage in any lengthy foreplay to get the results he wanted.

After he had taken her virginity, she was malleable to anything he wanted and that’s when the testing began. The eggheads went to work, under Canto’s supervision, taking the deformed freak of nature that Valerie had been and transforming her into something beautiful. Using surgical skills and technology that would put any Beverley Hills plastic surgeon to shame, the eggheads carved Valerie up like a roast, slicing away all her deformities until she became the blond goddess that Hank was more than happy to service.

Unfortunately, despite her beauty, despite the amplification of her power, Valerie was as needy as they came and Hank had little patience for spoiled little girls who wanted to monopolize his attention. When she complained about the testing, his response was to sleep with her and by then, she was beautiful enough for Hank to actually enjoy it. However, the silence didn’t last long and Valerie would be bitching again about the tests, until he needed a timeout to keep himself from beating the crap out of her.

Still, Hank hadn’t suspected she’d run out on him but run she did and now she was out there, somewhere. An ugly duckling turned into a swan on his dime, making him look bad to Canto who questioned his ability to control the woman he was screwing. Somehow, he had to get her back.

Suddenly a face appeared on the screen that made Hank sit up straighter in his chair, forgetting the melancholy brought on by his exile. The woman who stepped through the main doors of the building had Hank swivelling around in his chair to face his computer screen in an instant. Pulling up the images that had been sent to him from New York, taken during their last failed attempt to retrieve Valerie, Hank found a smile sneaking across his face when he realised who he was looking at.

Lois Lane…in Gotham City.

If she was here, was Valerie?

Still grinning, he reached for the phone and used the speed dial to get the connection he wanted. When the caller picked up, Hank wasted no time getting to the point.

“Corben, this is Hank.” He said quickly, almost with glee. “I think I’ve located your missing farm boy.”

***************

For what seemed like the hundredth time today, Clark Kent found himself on his ass.

His body ached and he could feel every muscle groaning in protest. While he had experienced pain before, it went away quickly enough however, the prolonged variety that that lasted hours was something new and Clark couldn’t get over how uncomfortable it could be. Even when he was the star quarterback of Smallville High, he was shielded from the injuries that came with the game and a part of him felt a little guilty about having that advantage. However, now that he was experiencing the aches and pains associated with a contact sport, Clark was rather grateful to have been spared all that.

The blows he sustained during his training session with Bruce were delivered through padded gloves but Clark could still feel them. Clark knew Bruce wasn’t intentionally out to hurt him but their sparring had been tough and while he had admired Bruce’s ability before, now he truly understood how dangerous the man could be. If this were what it felt like to be an opponent of Bruce Wayne when the gloves were on, what would it be like when those same gloves were off?

Worse yet, what was Bruce capable of when he really wanted to hurt somebody?

“You okay?” Bruce Wayne asked as he looked down at Clark, who hadn’t moved from place he had landed after failing to avoid Bruce’s use of a leg sweep.

“Yeah, I’m fine,” Clark grumbled, taking the hand offered as he picked himself up off the mat.

“You’re getting better,” Bruce pointed out, wiping the sweat from his forehead. “You’re staring to anticipate.”

It was true. While Clark’s skill level was still very much in the novice range right now, he was beginning to use his normal senses beyond their known limits. While Clark’s powers were something to admire, Bruce also felt that they would be terribly distracting, allowing normal abilities to atrophy from lack of use. Clark Kent had a keen mind and his prowess on the football indicated that he could be well coordinated, he just had to learn to do it without the powers.

”You think so?” Clark asked recalling the last few instances when he had managed to avoid being hit by Bruce (though not for long) and had to concede the point. Although secretly, Clark suspected that no amount of anticipation was going to prepare him to hold his own in hand to hand combat with Bruce Wayne. Having seen the man in action against men who had the skill, Bruce was in a class of his own.

“You’ve only been at it a day,” Bruce threw over his shoulder as he walked to the small refrigerator in the corner of the room. “Most people have to practise for months, years even to get good and even then, it may not be enough.”

“So where did you learn to fight like this?” Clark asked, starting to pull off his gloves. He had never really asked Bruce about his skills except in passing.

“I spent a few months with an elite bad of ninja assassins in Tibet who had some interesting views on crime and punishment.”

Clark rolled his eyes, “okay don’t tell me.”

“Seriously,” Bruce retorted, upon reaching the refrigerator and removing his own gloves. “They recruited me, trained me and finally wanted me to join them but I didn’t like their idea of justice so we parted company.”

Clark suspected there was more to it than that but he was fascinated. “So how long did it take you to learn all it?”

Bruce tossed his Kansas visitor a bottle of water. “About seven years,” he answered finding it liberating to have a friend he could trust explicitedly with such truth about himself “Thanks to an old friend, I had an epiphany so I decided to go see the world, minus my identity. I picked up a lot of things from a lot of different people.”

“What does that mean,” Clark asked with a raised brow before taking a sip of his water. “Minus your identity?”

Bruce smiled faintly to himself, as if he was enjoying a private joke, “I had to find out who I was beneath everything I felt. Back then, I wasn’t thinking straight. I was angry and dangerous. I could have gone either way so I needed to go out there and find myself so to speak, without the baggage of being Bruce Wayne.”

There was no need to ask what had been the result of his anger, Clark thought. The reason for it was carefully preserved in every room in Wayne Manor. Lex’s mansion had been no less opulent but there was a life to it, even if the walls were soaked with hidden menace. In Wayne Manor, there was nothing but emptiness. The only proof that the place had ever been anything different was the diminishing memory of happiness he saw in Bruce’s eyes.

Once again, Clark felt singularly privileged to be the son of Jonathan and Martha Kent. They had filled a small, country farmhouse with all the warmth in the world, while this large sprawling house never had the chance to be anything more than a mausoleum for the dead.

“Is that when you did your famous disappearing act for seven year?” Clark inquired, somewhat fascinated because he needed to look at the possibilities for himself if his powers didn’t return.

“That’s it,” he nodded. “I travelled the far east, spent some time in jail, learning how the other half lives.”

“Well considering you came back with serious ass kicking abilities, I guess it worked for you.”

Bruce chuckled at Clark’s description. “I suppose that’s one way to look at it.”

“Maybe I need to do that…” Clark mused. “If I don’t get these powers back, maybe I need to find out who I am without it.” Or at the very least, take Jor-El up on his training, Clark thought silently. The few minutes he had spent after raising the Fortress had opened up an entire universe to him but Chloe’s presence there and everything else that happened since, kept him from going back to complete that training.

“Don’t model yourself after me Clark,” Bruce said quickly. “I’m a poor choice.”

“Chloe seems to think otherwise,” Clark remarked. “Besides, you just need to lighten up a bit.” A small smirk crossed Clark’s face.

“Says the man everyone calls Boy Scout,” Bruce snorted when he paused at the sound of approaching footsteps.

Another thing that Clark had learned since the loss of his powers was the fact that Bruce could hear things well before he did. Quite remarkable when you remembered he didn’t have super hearing. Small, delicate footsteps against the parquet floor soon became audible to him and the stormy, broody expression on Bruce’s face dissipated like the sun emerging from behind the clouds as Chloe appeared.

Clark watched the change and smiled inwardly. Whatever reservations he had about Chloe and Bruce vanished whenever these two were near each other. Chloe brought much needed light to Bruce’s dark and tortured soul.

“Sorry to intrude on the male bonding,” Chloe replied entering the gymnasium.

“I was giving Clark a break,” Bruce tossed Clark a cocky smirk.

“Gee thanks,” Clark threw back at him sarcastically, making a face at the same time.

“Wow, no issues here,” Chloe laughed. “Actually, I wondered if you two have seen Lois around.”

“Lois?” Clark remarked, a hint of guilt creeping into his voice as he remembered how he had left things with her earlier. “She was in our room the last time I saw her but that was a while ago.”

Bruce walked to the intercom for the system installed in the house. A place like Wayne Manor was simply too big not to have one. “Alfred,” Bruce spoke into it, confident that wherever the butler was in the house, he would answer soon enough. “Have you seen Lois anywhere?”

The response came almost a minute later, “apologies for the delay in answering Master Bruce, I am in the process of preparing dinner with a little assistance from Miss Valerie. I believe I saw Miss Lane heading towards the garage earlier on. I assumed she was going into town.”

”Oh hell,” Clark groaned, now fully cognizant of where Lois was. He should have known by now that she wouldn’t take no for an answer and even if she did, would figure out some way to do it on her own. “She went to DeSaad Industries.”

“Alone?” Chloe blurted out. “With no idea if DeSaad is involved with what’s been happening to you and Valerie?”

“That’s our Lois,” Clark said through gritted teeth, with no small amount of exasperation in his voice while he started towards the door. He loved that woman but sometimes Clark suspected that even Gandhi would strangle her.

“What are you doing?” Chloe demanded, looking at Bruce for support. “Clark you can’t go out there… not in your condition. Bruce,” Chloe stared at her lover. “Tell him.”

Bruce met her gaze with an unreadable expression on his face. He knew Chloe was worried for Clark and Bruce had to admit feeling a little apprehension as well. However, Clark may very well be his best friend and Bruce was not about to let him do anything stupid alone. “Clark, wait.”

Clark halted long enough to look over his shoulder. “Don’t try and talk me out of it Bruce, I’m going to get her.”

“I know,” Bruce sighed giving Chloe an apologetic look before he started walking towards Clark. “I’ll drive.”

Chapter Eleven:

Damsel in Distress

Rule No. 6 – Evil corporations must always be brought down.

Note to self: Must amend Rule No. 6

‘Most corporations are evil. Proceed with caution. ’

****************

In retrospect, Lois should have considered the possibility that straying into the orbit of DeSaad Industries was probably not the best idea to cross her mind in recent times. She had measured DeSaad against her experiences with Luthor Corp. Lex had always been careful to ensure a veneer of respectability over his more nefarious activities. For years, Clark had been able to barge into the Luthor residence and the company towers for his stand offs with Lex, with little or no consequence. Lex was like a trapdoor spider, he waited until the opportunity to make his move.

Assuming that DeSaad would conduct their affairs in a similar manner had been a deadly miscalculation on Lois’ part, one that now saw her at their mercy no sooner than she had gotten past the doors of the place. Lois had arrived at reception and introduced herself using one of the many aliases she had fabricated whenever she needed to do uncover work. In this instance it was Lucy Bly and ‘Lucy’ was doing a piece in the financial pages of the Sunday paper, highlighting new businesses in Gotham City. It seemed innocuous enough and ‘Lucy’ was promptly shown to the office of the General Manager of the Gotham branch of DeSaad.

The instant she was shown into Hank Cobb’s office, Lois knew she was in trouble.

When the door closed behind her, Lois found she and Cobb weren’t alone in the office. Men who resembled the mercenary types that worked for private security companies in Iraq and other such areas of conflict, stepped forward ominously. She considered struggling but had been around enough military men to know these were Special Forces types and a struggle would only put her at a disadvantage. She was a general’s daughter and knew how to make a strategic withdrawal until the odds were better.

Escorted out of the DeSaad’s benign offices, Lois was taken to the penthouse, perched at the top of the dark tower. Once there, Lois had been left in a plush living room of expensive leathers and pleasing views. Her guards maintained their distance, keeping the exits covered, allowing her the freedom to move around but with the clear understanding that should any attempt to escape be made, the consequences would be dire.

“You know granting me an interview would have been enough,” she declared, glancing at her brutish guardians. “That’s about as much of a sure thing as you can get. I mean I don’t tend to run out once I land the interview. There’s no need to keep me a captive audience.” She continued to speak, proving her need to fill to awkward silences with chatter, no matter how much like blather it sounded.

The two men seemed unmoved by her speech and made Lois more and more unsettled. “So what are you guys? Green Berets? SEALs? SAS? I hear those guys kick ass.” She asked, getting off the sofa and coming to the one standing by the door to the hallway leading to the front door and private elevator.

The man towered over her, standing about the same height as Clark but his build was different, bulky and made for attrition, with a jaw you’d need a plumbers wrench to break.

“I wouldn’t waste my time, Miss Lane,” a voice said behind her and Lois turned around to see Hank Cobb emerge from one of the other rooms adjoining the one she was in. “Mr. Burgess doesn’t speak unless he has something to say and so far you haven’t given him reason to.”

“Oh he loves me,” Lois said flippantly, refusing to be insulted no matter what, still eyeing the stone faced Mr. Burgess. “He hides it well but I know he secretly adores me.” Giving him a wink for good measure, she faced Cobb again.

“And I’m afraid you got my name wrong,” Lois pointed out. “My name is Lucy Bly and I’m a free lancer with the Gotham Gazette.” She explained, reciting the quick cover story she had created for herself before entering the place.

“You’re Lois Lane,” he said shortly, “daughter of Sam Lane, with a sister named Lucy and a cousin named Chloe. Currently, girlfriend to one Clark Kent, a very special young man.”

Lois said nothing but how much they knew about her and her family was unnerving. His revelation about Clark felt even worse. “I have credentials…” she answered, feigning innocence as she walked towards her handbag on the coffee table. “I can prove who I am.”

“I’m sure you do,” Cobb replied with a laugh and went to the small bar in the corner of the room, scepticism in every bemused chuckle. “Would you like a drink?”

“No thanks,” Lois said defiantly, refusing to admit anything.

“Come now Lois, there’s no reason for us to be uncivilised about this,” Cobb gave her a somewhat patronizing stare. “I’m having one.”

Deciding she had better to play along until she knew what his game was, Lois lowered herself into leather sofa and conceded the point, “Alright then, water.”

“How boring,” he sighed but nonetheless went about pouring her a glass. Lois watched what he was doing, ensuring that he didn’t put anything in her drink that might make her talk. After a few seconds, he joined her on the sofa, nursing a scotch in parallel to her tame water.

“Now let’s talk,” he smiled with perfect charm.

Lois took a moment to study him and realised there was good reason why Valerie would have fallen prey to this man. With his gold hair, green eyes and handsome chiselled features, he would have put to test the resolve of any woman, let alone a young girl who had been sheltered most of her life and dared not dream of love capable of love looking beyond her deformity.

“Well I had come here to get a story,” Lois replied, not about to give up the façade of Lucy Bly just yet.

“You came here to find out about DeSaad because that’s where Valerie told you I worked.”

Damn. He wasn’t going to be deterred, Lois thought.

“If you say so,” she said ambiguously, “I was just interested in what you do for DeSaad Mr. Cobb.”

Cobb smiled, “let’s just say that I’m in acquisitions.”

Acquisitions.

Like Valerie, Lois realised. Jesus. How many other unsuspecting girls was this son of a bitch luring out of their homes with his sweet talk into a Dr. Frankenstein nightmare?

In world of cyberspace where desperate people sought companionship, Hank Cobb had fertile ground to cultivate.

*************

It didn’t take long for Bruce and Clark to find the car that Lois had ‘borrowed’ from the Wayne Manor. All of the vehicles in the garage had been outfitted with GPS trackers since all of them were prestige cars with a high dollar value. The signal led them to the public parking structure where Lois had left the car prior to her visit to DeSaad Industries. Throughout the ride, Clark found himself increasingly annoyed at Lois and the foolhardy risks she took with her life. It was different when he was able to zip across town faster than a speeding bullet to get her out of trouble but now that his powers were gone, Clark feared what would happen when he wasn’t able to play her knight in shining armour.

With the spare keys, Bruce was able to get into the vehicle, while Clark placed his hand against the hood of the car and noted that it was cold. The vehicle had been here for quite a while he thought unhappily before joining Bruce next to the driver’s seat of the car.

“She’s been gone for some time,” Clark announced with a frown.

“Yes,” Bruce agreed and was already searching through the glove compartment. “She left her identification here too.” He pointed out. In the glove box was Lois’ driver’s license, her press credentials and credit cards. She even left her cell phone. A smart move in case of capture, Bruce thought. All someone had to do was ring the numbers listed and put trace on it. Everyone in Lois’ life would become privy to her abductors.

“She’s gone undercover.” He stated.

“She could pull it off,” Clark shrugged but didn’t hold up too much hope. If everything had gone by the numbers, she would have called him by now and rub her victory in his face as proof of what could be done without powers.

God, she could be galling at times.

“You wouldn’t be here if you thought that,” Bruce retorted, staring ahead as he considered what their next move should be.

“No,” Clark had to admit begrudgingly. “We have to find her.”

“We’ll have to wait until dark,” Bruce looked at him. “In the meantime, you and I need to keep a watch on that building. Make sure that they don’t try to move her before then.”

“They might have done it already,” Clark pointed out, remembering what lengths these people went to in order to reach him at the farm.

“My instinct says no,” Bruce replied, part in truth and part in an effort ease Clark’s growing fears for Lois’ life. “Its one thing trying to snatch you from a little town in Kansas. Its quite another thing to smuggle someone out of a building in broad daylight. You know Lois better than I do – she wouldn’t go quietly.”

“Lois doesn’t know the meaning of the word quiet,” Clark muttered, admiring that quality most of the time and loathing it during occasions like these.

“Good then you take this car and go around the back of the DeSaad Building. There’s usually a service entrance. You keep an eye on that, take note of every vehicle that leaves, especially trucks. If they do try to get Lois out of here during the day, that will be the way they do it.”

“What will you do?” Clark asked, thinking Bruce’s plan was sound.

”I’ll take the front,” Bruce replied. “I can’t go marching in there because its public information that I’m dating Chloe. If they have her, they’ll know the connection and I won’t get very far. Our best option is to wait until dark and then try to get into the place to search for Lois.”

Deferring to Bruce’s knowledge in such matters since without his powers, he could not simply scan the building to find her, Clark looked at the older man. “Thank you Bruce. I don’t think I could do this without you.”

“Alright, alright,” Bruce retorted getting out of the car, “let’s not get sentimental.”

“You’re not good with moments are you?” Clark shook his head as he took the keys to get into the driver’s seat.

*******************

An odd thing had happened to Lois while she was sipping water, listening to Hank Cobb talk about his plans for world domination. Okay maybe not world domination but there was definitely something ominous in the way he spoke about Valerie and perhaps the others out there in the cyber world, ripe for the picking, waiting to be exploited. She had listened to him, giving nothing away, sipping at her water, waiting for the opportunity to make good her escape.

Only it never came because she fell asleep.

When Lois woke up, the sun outside the window had disappeared into the horizon, dragging the curtain of night across Gotham’s dystopian skyline. She could see the moon staring at her and a sense of panic filled her being. Sitting up, she realised she was exactly where she last remembered, on the expensive leather sofa. Lois noticed that the lights were dimmed but her captors remained exactly where they were, at the door and the entrance to the hallway, leading out.

“What happened?” She demanded, “What the hell did you do me?”

They didn’t answer and Lois could tell by their stony expressions that they weren’t about to either. They had drugged her. She knew that much. The answer was irrelevant anyway. She could feel it in the fading disorientation, which wasn’t from waking up abruptly, but rather from a drug induced slumber. She glanced at the glass on the table and took a sniff of the still remaining water. There didn’t seem anything in it that might be a drug. Had he coated the glassware?

Whatever the method of delivery, Lois was nonetheless drugged and she stood up shakily to demand a new question of her captors, in this instance Mr. Burgess. “Where is Cobb?”

“Mr. Cobb has stepped out for the evening,” Burgess answered aloofly. “However, he will be back when Mr. Corben arrives.”

“Corben?” Lois asked, not recognizing the name. “Who is Mr. Corben?”

“I’m not authorized to give you that information Miss Lane but suffice to say, they wish to speak to you together.” There was just enough hint of menace in his eyes to tell Lois that this wasn’t going to be as civilised as her earlier tête-à-tête with Cobb but a real interrogation and all that it entailed.

She had to escape before that happened.

**********************

“I see her.” Bruce stated lowering the night vision goggles as he looked across the space between DeSaad Towers and the roof of the Kane Building where he and Clark were presently standing.

“Where?” Clark demanded, reaching for the goggles.

The both of them were dressed in black with a ton of gear, half of which whose purpose was a mystery to Clark. Bruce seemed confident they needed all this equipment as they kept their presence hidden behind the parapet. Clark peered over the edge once he had retrieved the goggles and looked through them, searching for Lois.

“Top floor,” Bruce directed. “Penthouse suite.”

Clark found her a moment later. Lois looked alright but irate. She was pacing across the carpeted floor, being watched by only one guard. The reflective glass lost its potency at night and allowed Clark a good look at Lois’ prison. A surge of relief flooded him as he watched her and wished he could let her know that she wasn’t alone and that help was on the way.

“We’ve got to get her out.” He lowered the goggles and stared at Bruce.

“Of course we do,’ Bruce retorted, busily rifling through the large duffle bag he had brought up here. “She’s on the penthouse suite so that’s our best way in and out.”

Clark stared at him, a sinking feeling forming in his stomach as to what Bruce’s plan might involve. His worst fears were confirmed when Bruce pulled out what look like a gas propelled grappling hook type gun and walked to another part of the room, one that was concealed better if not in direct line of sight of Lois and the penthouse. Still it gave them some freedom to move without being immediately noticed.

“You can’t be serious,” Clark blurted out. It was almost forty stories down! Even as they stood on the roof, the high velocity winds swept past them, threatening to take them off the edge if it felt so inclined.

“What’s the matter, afraid of heights?” Bruce teased as he stood at the parapet and took aim for the maintenance side of the roof, away from the penthouse side of the building. He could see the railing and targeted that as the point of attachment.

“Just the sudden stop when you fall,” Clark said dryly. “Bruce…I have a problem with heights.”

Bruce lowered the grappling gun and stared at Clark, brows raised. “Seriously?”

“I’m okay if I can fly but take took some getting used to.” Clark declared, swallowing thickly. “I mean I don’t even like to go on a hot air balloon! When I first started to fly I had to take Lois with me because you know how she babbles about nothing and it was distracting but before that…I was just no good at it! I’m serious Bruce, I can’t be sure how I’ll manage if we have to get across that way, I could get us both killed.”

“Clark, ” Bruce returned somewhat amused by the sight of six foot three farm boy going into full panic mode. “You’re getting hysterical.”

“I AM NOT HYSTERICAL!” Clark hissed.

”Clearly,” Bruce rolled his eyes and lifted the gun before replying. “Well suck it up Kent, this is the only way in if you want to get to Lois.”

Clark groaned inwardly and knew Bruce was right. There wasn’t any other way in. With a sigh, he grumbled as the grappling hook exploded out of the gun with a bang and a hiss. “I’m going to so get her for this.”

************

After what could possibly be the most terrifying incident of his life, not counting the day he heard Lana was marrying Lex, Clark Kent arrived on the roof of the DeSaad Building.

He had done so with his eyes closed all the way across the forty-storey drop until he reached the railing where Bruce hauled him over the edge. When he was a teenager, Clark had wanted nothing but to be normal, to be rid of his powers so that he and Lana could have a normal relationship. Over the years, he had come to realise it was a blessing and the advantages to the people he cared for could not be discounted. However, until recently, he didn’t realise how much he missed being Kryptonian.

Clark missed being able to race across the fields at top speed, or being able to get his chores done in minutes as opposed to a whole day. He missed flying, feeling the wind in his hair and the stars beckoning him higher. Never was he more aware of his mortality than now, as he and Bruce Wayne prepared to storm the tower where his lady was being imprisoned. Following closely behind Bruce, Clark studied his friend and watched his movements.

Bruce was always deliberate and very prepared. The lock door of the maintenance area of the roof was no obstacle to the man as he extracted the tools form the belt around his waist. In seconds, the lock was eaten away by acid and Bruce motioned Clark to follow when he stepped through. Both their faces were concealed behind ski masks as Bruce had no desire to be recognised on any security camera. The small set of steps emptied into a narrow hallway that connected the penthouse to the fire stairs. In case of an emergency, this would be the only way out.

“When we go in, stay behind me. These men are most likely professional mercenaries and more than a match for your one day of training with me.” Bruce instructed as he went through his backpack to hand Clark something that looked like very much like a gun.

“What is this?” Clark asked wondering if Bruce expected him to shoot someone. He couldn’t imagine that was the case, considering Bruce’s natural dislike for guns in general. However, he didn’t want to complain either since Bruce’s expertise made him feel quite ineffectual already.

“Tranquiliser gun,” Bruce explained, going through the backpack to get the item he would need for the assault on the penthouse itself. “Anyone tries to go through the door, shoot them with that. Each pellet contains enough chemicals to put down a grizzly for a week. You can use that to cover me when we go in.”

“You can count on me.” Clark stated firmly, determined to be more than a fifth wheel while examining the weapon closely. Out of his depth, the best way to aid this operation was to follow Bruce’s instructions as best he could.

“I know I can,” Bruce gave him a little smile of confidence, aware that Clark was trying very hard not to get underfoot. “I’ll go in first, count to five and follow. I’m going to introduce them to an experimental project that was abandoned by Wayne Tech,” Bruce grinned as he padded stealthily towards the door, holding a silver device that was no bigger than a golf ball in his gloved hand. “Think of it as an EMP grenade. Oh and one other thing,” he paused and looked back at Clark. “Put on the night vision goggles.”

“Why?” Clark stared at him quizzically as he reached for the goggles around his neck.

“Trust me.”

******************

It wasn’t a question of how she would fold if they used stronger measures to make her talk, it was a question of when.

Lois hated feeling helpless and yet here she was faced with men who had guns. She could probably take the first guy but didn’t think she could get to the second before he raised the alarm or worse yet, shot her. While she imagined that they wouldn’t kill her, Lois could be incapacitated beyond any further ability to escape. She couldn’t risk that. She had to bide her time and await the opportunity to escape that would prevent her from risking herself or sabotaging future efforts in case of failure.

Suddenly, there was a loud bang like someone kicking in the door. This was followed by the strangely electronic screeching that culminated in an loud burst of static that made her wince. Light bulbs shattered and the room was bathed in near pitch-black darkness. If it were not for the lights in the building outside Lois would have thought she was blind. Stumbling around in the dark, she heard the sounds of scuffling and what felt like punches being thrown in rapid succession.

”Lois,” she suddenly felt a hand around her arm.

Oh, thank god! Lois Lane thought to herself as she recognised that voice. “Clark, is that you?”

“Of course its me,” Clark hissed back. “Who else would storm a building in the middle of the night to come get you?”

“Hey I’m here too,” Bruce’s voice filtered through the darkness as he finished off Lois’ guards, proving once again their training was no match for his.

“You guys got here just in time,” Lois declared as she was let out of the penthouse by Clark who was able to see with the goggles over his eyes. “Hank Cobb, Valerie’s boyfriend. He’s here and he was bringing someone else back here to interrogate me.”

“No kidding,” Clark growled as they hurried up the corridor, leaving wreckage behind them. “Lois do you know how dangerous it was to come here yourself? You’re lucky we were able to get to you. You could have been killed.”

“Hey, I had to do something,” Lois bit back defensively even though she knew he was right. Of course, only death would get her to admit it. “We needed information.”

“Well if Cobb and this other guy had come back, you would have ended up giving it.” Clark pointed out, still quite angry at the danger she had placed herself in. “Lois I can’t always be there in time to save you. You were lucky this time.”

“I can’t take care of myself Clark Kent,” she froze in her steps and jabbed him in the chest. She couldn’t see him still because it was still dark but she could hear his breathing and her aim was good. “I do not need you to come rescue me, powers or not.”

“HEY!” Bruce snapped cutting of any further argument. “You two are going to do this right now? Seriously?” His exasperation was clear even if neither could see his face.

“Sorry,” Clark apologised and turned back to Lois, “come on Lois. Let’s get out of here.”

“I’m only coming with you because you went to all this trouble,” she said haughtily. “But I would have gotten out of here myself…eventually.”

In the darkness, someone who could have been either Clark or Bruce, swore.

**************

“I expected a rescue attempt but this was really impressive,” John Corben said staring at the digitised blip on the screen. The blip was moving steadily across the digitised schematic of the building to the rooftop.

“This is the same guy you encountered in Smallville?” Hank Cobb asked from the inside of the security room of the DeSaad Building.

“Possibly,” John answered thoughtfully. “EMP grenades, high tensile grappling hooks and night vision equipment to move in the dark. That costs money and I don’t think Clark Kent has done that well in this year’s wheat harvest. Whoever this guy is, he would have been worth the money.”

“What about the tracer in her earring?” Hank asked, concerned that this was all for nothing if the circuitry implanted in Lois Lane’s earring when she was unconscious, was fried due to the EMP grenade.

“See for yourself,” John indicated the screen where the blip was moving fast. “Gotta love fiber optics.” He grinned. “We’ll track them and see where they go. Once we’re sure of their location, we’ll take Kent and Valerie.”

Chapter Twelve:

Touchable

Those who encountered him later in life could be forgiven in their belief that he had sprung fully formed from Zeus’ split skull. They would think that he was always in supreme control of himself and his surroundings, that there was nothing beyond his abilities even if he was a human being without the powers they possessed. The truth is never that reassuring and Bruce Wayne would be the first to tell the misinformed few who knew his true self that like everyone else; he had to learn and study. Nothing that truly mattered to him had ever come easily. It had been learnt through years of discipline and sacrifice.

The person Bruce Wayne would eventually become exacted great cost and not all those dues were paid in sacrifice. Some were brutal lessons seared into his memory as the sting of defeat. Defeat, he would understand, came about because of mistakes and by the time Bruce Wayne vanished completely to emerge as the Dark Knight, he learned not to make them.

Unfortunately, he wasn’t always so infallible.

In his manor surrounded by the best security provided by Wayne money, Bruce allowed himself to believe that he was somewhat untouchable. Since he was eight years old, the walls of Wayne Manor had protected him and given him respite from the madness that existed beyond, from the chaos that had taken his parents. It was the citadel from which he would launch his crusade against Gotham’s underworld and Bruce had come to believe that it was impregnable thanks to the public façade he wore for the benefit of those who did not know him.

Not for the first time tonight, he was wrong.

**********

“Bruce,” Chloe asked, lifting her head from the crook of his arm, “how long do you think we have to stay out of sight like tis?”

The question was an abrupt interruption from the comfortable sojourn they were enjoying on the patio overlooking the manicured lawns of the Manor. Sitting up to adjust his own position on the rattan sofa, so that he could look her in the eye to give an honest answer, Bruce sighed, “I don’t know. We have to find out what DeSaad knows about Clark and how many people are privy to that information.”

“For the operation they mounted at the farm, that can’t be a few.” She pointed out.

“Not necessarily,” Bruce countered, “underlings are seldom told the big picture. I suspect that a small number know that he’s from Krypton. That’s information you don’t want to leak for fear of inviting other interested parties.”

“God,” Chloe groaned inwardly, remembering those. The other interested parties ranged from LuthorCorp to Homeland Security. All of it spelled a certain end to the anonymous existence that Clark enjoyed on the Kent farm. “It may never get back to normal for him, will it?”

“No,” he answered after a long pause, debating whether or not he would lie to her and coming to the conclusion that it was a poor reason to break her trust. “To get some semblance of a normal life, he may have to disappear for awhile, make people forget about Clark Kent until everyone stops looking.”

“I don’t want him to be alone,” she turned away. “He’s finally happy Bruce, after so long…it isn’t fair.”

Bruce would often be the first one to tell her that life was seldom fair or merciful but he kept that thought to himself. He knew that he was too cynical and for a young man in his twenties, too jaded and that was why he adored Chloe Sullivan so. In some ways, she had his world weary perception but there were moments when hope and faith shined so brightly in her smile that it reached the heart so very shrouded in the dark inside him.

“I don’t think Lois would ever let him be alone,” Bruce offered with a faint smile. “I wouldn’t worry Chloe. Everyone has a journey to make in their lives, sometimes that journey gets you lost in the wilderness for awhile but when you know where you’re going, it makes you all the better for it. Clark has just started.”

“And you?” Hazel eyes locked on him “Have you reached the end?”

His mind flashed immediately to the shadowy cave beneath the mansion and answered with an enigmatic smile, “I’m just beginning.”

***********

Not far away, just within sight of Wayne Manor’s gothic over the tops of the trees surrounding the mansion, the air, previously still and pregnant with anticipation, began to cackle. Spidery tentacles of blue energy created fissures in mid air preceding a near deafening explosion of sound.

BOOM!

The wormhole opened in the middle of clearing, sending birds fleeing from the branches of trees and small wildlife scurrying away in fright. Illuminating the darkened space with its glow, the orb remained suspended as human shapes stepped through like visitors from the other side of the looking glass. Clad in black camouflage gear, carrying heavy artillery, it was difficult to distinguish them from one another and yet easy to assume menace. The leader strode forward comfortably, combat boots trudging across the grass as he stepped away and awaited his entourage to join him.

They numbered in the dozen and once they had stepped through the threshold of the wormhole, the passageway collapsed upon itself, vanishing as if it had never been and satisfied that its goal was achieved.

“Go dark,” John Corben instructed as he slid the night vision goggles over his eyes.

One by one without question, it was done and with a simple hand gesture, the troop was on the move.

“We should have used that the first time we went to get him,” Bennet pointed as he walked in stride with his team leader, “it would have save a lot of hassle.”

“Keep your voice down,” Corben grumbled as the mansion began to appear through the trees. They had selected their entry point carefully, just beyond the thick trees that framed the north side of the estate. From this point, no one would see them coming until they were almost on top of the mansion.

“Canto doesn’t like us using the speciality items unless we absolutely have to,” Corben retorted. “But he tells me Kent is worth the risk, the only one of his kind.”

Bennet nodded in agreement, “yeah as far as meteor freaks go, he’s got the full arsenal.”

“That’s one way to put it,” Corben retorted shortly before showing the cut signal to end the chatter for now. From this point onwards, they had to move fast and strike hard.

This time, there would be hell to pay if Kent got away again.

***********

It was a clear night.

Bruce Wayne studied the sky and looked for another show of lightning that had appeared in the distance following the sound that resembled a thunderclap. However, there was no further signs of disturbance and Bruce debated whether or not there was reason to worry when what they had heard could be easily attributed to lightning.

Except it was clear night.

“Chloe,” Bruce turned to her on the sofa, “go get Clark.”

“What is it?” She asked, her expression becoming alarmed.

“I don’t know…” Bruce said shaking his head. He had sophisticated security systems in place around the mansion and grounds. If someone had entered the grounds using any other entry way then the main gate, perimeter sensors would alert him to it. However, nothing had given away the presence of an intruder.

Suddenly he heard something whip past him so fast, he could feel the air shift near his cheek until it landed in Chloe’s neck. It stopped her dead in her tracks as she reached instinctively for her neck where the metal projectile had imbedded itself.

“CHLOE!” He shouted and saw her go down. With one hand, he pulled up the lightweight rattan sofa, dislodging all the cushions and using its crisscrossing beams to shield himself as he made his way to her.

Chloe was out cold and Bruce quickly identified the projectile as a tranquiliser dart. He heard the clatter of metal against wood and saw the dart meant for him bouncing of the sofa and landing on the marble floor harmlessly. They were close, he realised even though a part of him demanded to know how they breached the perimeter of the Wayne estate without being seen.

Doesn’t matter now, Bruce told himself promptly, they’re here.

Risking being hit by another shot from the tranquiliser gun, Bruce shoved away the sofa and grabbed Chloe, sweeping her up in his arms and making a beeline through the patio door to reach temporary safety. He did so feeling a dart tear through his shirt sleeve on the way past, narrowly avoiding his skin.

“Alfred!” Bruce shouted for his butler.

It took less than a second for Alfred to appear. The butler was out of breath, looking as if he had been running a marathon in as much time as it had taken for Bruce to call for him. “Master Bruce, we’ve have intruders. I don’t know how they did it but they managed to enter the grounds without setting off any of the perimeter alarms…”

“Alfred it doesn’t matter now,” Bruce said sharply. “We’re about to have guests. Take Chloe downstairs to the cave and wait there. I’ll get Clark and the others.”

Handing Chloe to the one person he trusted more than himself, Bruce raced up the stairs. A passing glimpse through a window on route allowed him to see the intruders emerging from the tree line, at least eight that he could see so far and he did not doubt that there could be more. Reaching the top of the stairs, it was another few seconds before he opened the door to the room shared by Clark and Lois and saw neither. He heard the shower running in the bathroom and guessed quickly that the battling duo had made up. It explained why neither had heard the commotion.

Bruce was about to interrupt them when he paused at Lois’ handbag and snatched it off the bureau. Emptying its contents, he saw nothing out of the ordinary but he was convinced this was how the Manor had been compromised. He should have known their rescue of Lois from DeSaad’s Gotham branch was too easy. She hadn’t been rescued…she had been let go. Bruce cursed his over confidence. It wasn’t just Clark who was in jeopardy now but also his own identity as playboy billionaire, one he cultivated so carefully for his own needs.

It wouldn’t be in her hand bag, he reasoned, it was too obvious. It had to be something on her. Scanning the room, he caught sight of a pair of earrings on the nightstand next to the bed. Retrieving them, he studied them carefully before placing them back on the bureau and smashing a heavy ornament against it, crushing the jewellery completely. When he removed the cast iron bust of some unknown model, he saw among the fragments of zirconia and hypo-allergenic steel, tiny strands of optic fibre.

”What the hell Bruce?” Clark demanded, having heard the thud and emerged from the shower, clad only in a towel.

“Get dressed Clark,” Bruce ordered shortly, not wasting time on the niceties. “DeSaad’s people are here. They planted a bug in Lois’ earrings. We need to get Lois and Valerie into the cave.”

“What?” Clark’s first impulse to look out the window and in doing so saw the men that were closing in. This would not have happened if he had his powers, Clark thought frantically. Now he had compromised not only himself but also Bruce.

“Oh God,” Lois gasped as she emerged, having heard enough to realise her earlier decision to infiltrate DeSaad was compounded into an even more catastrophic situation. “Bruce I’m so sorry.”

“Save the apologies for later,” Bruce replied approaching Clark. “Clark, come with me. We don’t have much time. Lois, make sure you and Valerie get to the cave and stay there.”

“What are you two going to do?” Lois demanded as she grabbed her clothes. Clark was already in his jeans, pulling a t-shirt over himself.

Bruce didn’t answer.

**********

Valerie had wanted to stay and fight but Lois didn’t give her the chance. Dragging the girl out of the room she had hidden herself away the last weeks, to the secret entrance leading to Bruce’s underground playpen, Lois knew that this was not the time for Valerie’s devastating siren cry. She had only been down to the cave once before but it scared the hell out of her, mostly because Lois understood better than anyone that this was the place where the real Bruce Wayne came out to play. Everything above was the façade and she prayed that Chloe knew this too and could live with it.

“What is this place?” Valerie asked anxiously, still trapped between the need to flee and the desire to fight. This was her doing, all of it. The death of her parents, the misfortune she had brought to all the people who had tried to help her. At the end of things, there would be a final accounting and Valerie knew she would have to pay.

“Billionaire’s secret club house,” Lois retorted as they stepped off the elevator and saw Alfred attending to Chloe who was lying in a chair unconscious. “What happened to Chloe?”

“She’s temporarily immobilized,” he explained, “she was struck with a tranquiliser dart Miss Lane.”

Christ this was getting worse by the minute. “Damn it,” Lois exclaimed. “I shouldn’t have gone to DeSaad. This is my fault. I did this!”

“No it’s not yours,” Valerie was quick to interject, “its mine. All of it.”

“Ladies,” Alfred said calmly, “this isn’t the time to indulge in self-recrimination. The fault lies with the men who would do us harm. Let us leave it at that, shall we? Where is Master Bruce and Mister Kent?”

“I don’t know,” Lois said shaking her head, her fears for Clark and Bruce escalating now that her thoughts had returned to them. Bruce could take care of himself well enough but Clark was vulnerable, unaccustomed of dealing with enemies without his great powers. “He told us to come down here and took Clark with him.”

Lois went to Chloe and kneeled down next to her cousin, taking her hand. “Chloe,” she called out. “Come on cuz, wake up. This isn’t the time to take a nap, too much happening around here.” She tried to inject her usual flippancy into her tone but couldn’t quite manage it. Chloe’s breathing continued as if she were nothing more than taking a light nap but Lois’ voice didn’t wake her up.

Meanwhile Alfred went monitor screens displaying the signal from the security cameras placed throughout the mansion itself, searching for an idea of where Bruce and Clark might be. While he had difficulty finding them, he had no trouble seeing the dozen men who were even now, entering the house from several different access points. Suddenly, he heard the mechanism of the old elevator that Master Bruce used to reach the cave shift into motion. However, as the elevator descended towards the foot of the cave, one thing was soon clear.

It carried only one person.

”Where’s Bruce?” Lois demanded when she saw Clark stepped out of the elevator car.

Clark’s jaw was tight, not at all liking the plan that Bruce had forced him to agree to but knowing begrudgingly that there was no other way. All their futures depended on being free of DeSaad and they couldn’t do that if they kept running. “Up there.”

“Up there?” Lois exploded. “What do you mean up there?”

“Lois, we don’t have time to discuss this right now. Bruce isn’t sure how safe we’ll be down here so we have to leave now.” He said sharply walking past her and Valerie to approach Chloe. “What’s wrong with Chloe, Alfred?”

“She was hit with a tranquiliser dart,” Alfred answered, unhappy about Bruce’s absence but astute enough to read between the lines that neither was Clark. He knew his young charge and if Bruce asked to be left behind, then there was a good reason for it. “She should wake up when the drug’s effects wear off.”

Clark nodded grimly, his insides twisting into a dozen kind of knots at having to leave Bruce behind. “Bruce asked me to tell you to take us to a safe place,” he locked blue eyes with the older man. “He said you’d know where.”

Alfred’s face betrayed nothing and yet Clark could feel in his bones, the paternal fear Alfred was feeling for Bruce’s safety. “That I do Mister Kent. Follow me.”

“Clark we can’t leave him!” Lois exclaimed. “They played nice with me because they wanted me to lead them to you but if they take Bruce, you know they won’t be as reasonable. They killed Valerie’s parents for god’s sake!”

“I KNOW THAT LOIS!” Clark fairly roared making Lois jump. “This is Bruce’s plan and it’s the only one we have that might work for all our sakes. None of us is safe now, don’t you understand? Even if I turned myself in, they’ll kill everyone here just to keep it quiet. I don’t like it any better than you Lois but it’s the only way.”

Lois swallowed thickly, trying to accustom herself to Clark’s seldom seen temper. He rarely raised her voice to her in such a manner but when he did, Lois knew when to make a strategic withdrawal. “I hope Bruce knows what he’s doing.” She muttered as she saw Clark lean over to pick up Chloe from the chair, preparing to follow Alfred as instructed by Bruce.

Clark glanced at Chloe’s unconscious face, feeling guilt so thick he could barely speak, wondering how he would explain it to her, when she woke up, that they had fled the manor, leaving Bruce behind.

Quietly, Clark whispered to himself, “I hope so too.”

************

Seated behind his desk, pretending to play the part of the billionaire airhead that served him so well in the past, Bruce Wayne could hear the enemy moving throughout the mansion. The shattering of glass, the soft sounds of feet moving across the polished wood floor, were the tell tale signs of impending captivity. When these people had invaded his home, they had forced him into a corner. No longer was this about protecting Clark’s secret or keeping DeSaad away from Valerie Beaudry, this was now about protecting the persona that was crucial to his future destiny.

Finishing off the glass of water on his desk, he eased back into the leather chair and waited for them to burst through the door, once they had finished searching the house for Clark. It wouldn’t be long before they discovered that the mansion was empty and if by some remote chance they found their way to the cave, Alfred would ensure that Clark, Lois and Valerie were long gone by then.

Less than a minute later, they finally entered the room, dressed in black camouflage gear looking every bit the hired mercenaries that they were. The leader of the group stepped forward, the night vision goggles hanging around his neck, exposing only his eyes. The rest was hidden by a black ski mask.

“Good evening gentlemen,” Bruce greeted. “Can I do something for you?”

“Where are your friends Mr. Wayne?” Corben asked, eyeing the younger man critically. While it made a certain amount of sense to discover that Lois Lane and Clark Kent were hiding out at the Wayne Manor, since Chloe Sullivan her cousin was dating Bruce Wayne, Corben was surprised to find Wayne still here, looking as if he was waiting for them. By all accounts, Wayne was a rich dilettante without an interesting thought in his overindulged head.

“Friends?” Bruce retaliated with innocence, “I have many friends. You’ll have to be more specific than that.”

“Clark Kent and Lois Lane,” Corben clarified obligingly. “We know they were here.”

“And you’d be right,” Bruce replied, not bothering to deny it since they wouldn’t have tracked Lois here if it were untrue. “They stopped by for a spot of dinner and then went on their merry little way. I believe they mentioned something about a road trip to see the Grand Canyon. If you get on the road out of town, you might just catch them.”

“Very amusing Mr. Wayne,” Corben declared coolly, “I hope you’ll be this helpful with us when the time comes.” Without further ado, he turned on his heels and barked to his comrades on the way out, “Take him.”

Chapter Thirteen:
Plans in Motion

“WELCOME TO METROPOLIS”

It had taken almost four hours of driving to reach that familiar sign and now that he saw it, Clark Kent didn’t feel any better for what he had been forced to do. Chloe was in the back seat, unaware of what they had done, still under the influence of the tranquilizer dart that had rendered her unconscious at Wayne Manor. Clark steeled himself for the reaction when she did awaken. All the accusations she would hurl at him was nothing in comparison to the abuse he had heaped on himself since they had been forced to flee Wayne Manor, leaving Bruce behind to provide a suitable distraction.

“Where do we go now?” Valerie Beaudry, the catalyst for this whole situation inquired next to Chloe, her voice sounding very small and drained. Clark supposed she was probably feeling as bad as he, if not worse, for what had happened.

“Now that they are aware that Master Bruce is involved it is likely they would be watching any residence he might own, particularly in this city,” Alfred advised next to him.

“We’re going to Oliver’s penthouse in Metropolis,” Clark announced automatically, having already thought that far ahead, his eyes fixed on the unbroken line on the road ahead, “he won’t mind.”

“Good idea,” Lois said resigned, careful not to provoke the volcanic fury that was building up in Clark while he was driving the car. Whether the others knew or not, he was enraged, she could see the tension in his jaw and the manner in which he gripped the steering wheel. If he had been fully powered, she had no doubt that the chrome and leather wheel in his hands would snap like kindling. Like a penny about to drop, Lois knew it wouldn’t take much to erupt all that fury.

Of course, fate was seldom so arbitrary when it came to the adventures of Lois and Clark as the car was suddenly filled with the sound of Chloe stirring. Her cousin, nestled between Valerie and her, shifted in her seat before lifting her head from the headrest to cast an uncertain eye on her surroundings to assess the situation.

“Office, officer, did you see the car that hit me?” Chloe asked groggily.

“Chloe,” Lois spoke, “are you alright? How do you feel?” She asked, deciding to get her questions in while Chloe was still too disorientated to think up some of her own.

“Like a bad hangover,” Chloe grumbled, sitting up. “Only I wasn’t drinking.”

“Thank God,” Lois said relieved because they hadn’t been entirely sure that the dart contained just tranquilizer. Considering that DeSaad was pursuing bigger game, there was real justification in believing that there was more in the chemical mix than just components for a sedative.

Bleary eyed, Chloe sat up and looked around the car once before her spine stiffened. “Where’s Bruce?”

“Miss Sullivan,” Alfred was first to speak up.

“Where is he?” What disorientation that had hindered her understanding was wiped away as adrenalin surged through her with her growing anxiety.

Clark’s hands became fists around the steering wheel. “We had to leave him.”

Chloe said nothing for a few seconds.

“We didn’t have a choice,” Lois was quick to explain, picking up the narrative after Clark’s somewhat final statement.

“I assure you Miss Sullivan,” Alfred chimed in, “Master Bruce is capable of taking care of himself…”

“Stop the car.” Chloe said sharply.

”What?” Lois exclaimed. “Chloe, let Clark explain.”

“I SAID STOP THE CAR NOW!” Chloe fairly roared.

Her words were like the lash of a whip and without further debate, Clark stopped the dark sedan. No sooner than the wheels had come to a stop, Chloe had jumped out of the car.

“Chloe…” Lois started to go after but Clark stopped her.

”No,” he said firmly in a voice that Lois didn’t hear often but knew well enough not to argue. It carried the steel of a five star general and a farmer who just so happened to be raising the strongest teenager on the planet. Meeting her gaze, he told Lois. “I’ll go.”

Clark climbed out of the car and had only a few steps to traverse before he saw Chloe facing the empty cornfield beyond the shoulder of the road. Only the moon and the small interior light of the car provided night from being pitch black.

“Chloe,” he walked up to her.

Chloe swung around and punched him square on the jaw.

Thanks to Bruce, Clark now knew how to take a punch without falling on his ass.

“How could you leave him?” She demanded, her voice a mixture of astonishment and fury.

”I didn’t want to Chloe,” he tried to explain, feeling lower than dirt because he knew as well as she did that Bruce had done this to keep DeSaad away from them.

“They’ll kill him Clark!” She cried out in anguish. “Just like they killed Valerie’s parents! You know him as well as I do! He’ll never tell them where we are and they’ll kill him trying to get it out of him! How could you do it?”

Rubbing his jaw, he stepped forward and almost walked into another fist. While not as physical as Lois, Chloe could give as good as she got. Catching her wrist, he looked at her and said quietly, “because he told me to, Chloe.”

“What?” She stared at him, trying not to break down. “What do you mean?”

Clark sighed and reached into the back of jeans and pulled out what looked like GPS device. “Before they took him, he swallowed a tracer. One of those things he’s been building in the cave. “They took him but with this,” he extracted the device tucked in the waistband of his jeans beneath his t-shirt, with a display revealing a digital grid of longitude and latitude coordinates. The small dot in the middle of it was stationary, “we can track him.”

Chloe’s expression softened, “oh God Clark,” she covered her lips with her hand, “I’m sorry…I should have known, I don’t want to lose him…” her apology soon became tears. “Clark, they’ll try to break him and kill him when they can’t. What was he thinking? I mean doesn’t he know he’s not indestructible? Does he know how much losing him would…”

Sparing her effort of finishing, Clark wrapped an arm around his best friend and pulled her to him. “I promise you Chloe, you won’t lose him. Bruce has a plan and so do I. We’re going to finish this once and for all. We’re going to get our lives back.”

“God,” she muttered through the tears on his t-shirt, “I’m sorry, I know you didn’t meant to leave him it’s just that he doesn’t think about the consequences or his limitations.”

No kidding, Clark thought to himself because as confident as he sounded to Chloe for her sake, Clark Kent was also just as worried about Bruce for exactly the same reasons.

*********

“Explain to me,” Hank Cobb remarked, with a somewhat gloating smirk aimed at John Corben, “how a vapid, billionaire playboy like Wayne manages to not tell us everything we want to know when we’ve dosed him with enough sodium thiopental to put down a horse?”

Unfazed by Cobb’s obvious attempt at questioning his ability, Corben answered smoothly. “It’s relatively easy to get around sodium thiopental. Black ops and most Special Forces units are trained to resist it under interrogation. The real question here how Bruce Wayne, whom by all accounts, has spent time in neither occupation, was able to do it.”

Hank, disappointed by his failure to ruffle Corben’s feathers, shrugged. “Well he did disappear for seven years, maybe that’s where he was – in the military. Stranger things have happened.”

“No,” Corben shook his head discounting the possibility. “We’ve checked and trust me, DeSaad’s intelligence is superior enough to uncover that little bit of truth if it existed. Wherever Wayne learnt to get around the thiopental, it wasn’t in the military. In fact, I’m convinced the resistance we encountered at the Kent Farm might have been Wayne – not a hired mercenary as we thought.”

Hank leaned up against the glass, looking into the room. “So Mr. Wayne has a few secrets himself. That might be worth something.”

“No,” Corben shook his head, “we’ll either break him or we won’t. He won’t give it up for anything as mundane as blackmail.”

“Bullshit,” Hank snorted. “Rich, spoilt billionaire playboys all have something to hide.”

“Most of the time I agree with you,” Corben moved away from the glass wall to the panel along its edge, “but unless we have whomever he’s protecting, we’ve got nothing to bargain with.”

“His life is a pretty good bargaining chip,” the man pointed out, wincing slightly as a flash of light across his eyes took him surprising him.

Corben did not speak, knowing what he had seen in those eyes under the influence of the thiopental – single-minded control and a will stubbornly refusing to give in. No, Hank’s thoughts of blackmail would have been useful for any other candidate but not Wayne. He knew Wayne’s history, had studied it from top to bottom as soon as they learnt where Kent had been hiding out. Something had happen to Wayne in the seven years he was in the wilderness; something that Corben was almost certain had to do with the brutal slaying of Wayne’s parents so long ago.

“We’ll see,” Corben shrugged and flicked the intercom switch. A small burst of static indicated the open channel before he spoke, “up the voltage.”

***********

He could taste blood in his mouth.

Whether it was from the beating he had received from Corben’s men right after he was taken or from biting the inside of his cheek during the thiopental interrogation session, Bruce couldn’t say. While he had resisted the thiopental well enough, there was still the matter of foreign drug in his system that eroded his normally high-powered senses and made clarity an effort.

Oh and the pain probably didn’t help either.

Another surge of current coursed through his body, making him bite down harder, causing his body to convulse like a fish on a hook. At the moment, Bruce Wayne was suspended by his arms over the floor of a concrete room that had only two noticeable fixtures aside from the hook that looked more at home in a butcher’s shop, a window with one-way glass and an electric outlet.

The outlet not only provided the fluorescent bulb in the ceiling with current but also power to the cattle prod that was making contact with his bare torso…again.

Heart rate pounding inside his chest as the current was interrupted by his interrogator’s withdrawal, Bruce thought about the bug he had swallowed before he had been taken. He had built the tiny object to withstand much but he couldn’t guarantee it wouldn’t short circuit. While the pain was intense, it was manageable but it wouldn’t stay that way. They were early into the process of physical coercion. He suspected Corben was testing his limits and probably trying to figure out how vapid Bruce Wayne developed such endurance.

“Where are they?” His interrogator, a faceless thug that could have been a cut out mould of the type, had been going to work on him for the last hour now. After the drugs didn’t make him talk, they resorted to conventional means of persuasion. His chief tormentor was this brutish hulk, masking his sadism beneath the pretext of information retrieval.

“I don’t know!” Bruce grunted, playing his part in this little drama.

The metal rod made contact with his abdomen again and sent Bruce into convulsions and this time he did bite his tongue but the stinging pain was eclipsed by the agony of electricity. The current had intensified, Bruce realised as his thoughts scattered in all directions until control drew them back together. Bruce did not scream but then he didn’t need to for the interrogator to know that that the torture was having its desired fact.

The bug had surely shorted out, Bruce thought to himself when the surge of current had reached crescendo and was withdrawn, possibly to keep him from going into cardiac arrest. However, his resistance had provoked the fury of his captor and instead of electricity; Bruce was forced to endure several powerful blows to his body.

“You’re going to tell us what you know!” The man Bruce had heard referred to as Bennet snarled as he connected with ribs and with grunt of pain, Bruce felt the sickly snap of bone. That was one of his ribs, he thought as a red haze of pain descended over him. Gritting his teeth, he remembered the techniques he had used during his training with Ducard.

Pain could be disconnected , he told himself even as he heard Bennet punctuating each blow with demands for information.

“You’ll talk Wayne! Even if I have to beat it out of you!”

Another blow, to the kidneys this time, was followed by more current until his torturer descended into a frenzied attack, snarling obscenities and making demands. Bruce could have fought back but to do at this moment would avail him nothing. So he took the assault until not all the technique in the world could keep back the pain and Bruce submitted to unconsciousness denying Bennet what he wanted most.

A scream.

***********

By the time they arrived at Oliver’s penthouse, Chloe was more or less composed although her fears for Bruce’ safety were never far from her mind. Lois had done her best to try to console her cousin but there was little she could do to calm Chloe when was just as worried about Bruce. Chloe was right, Bruce wouldn’t talk and Lois was familiar enough with interrogation to know that was not a good thing. When Luthor Corps men had tortured her to learn Oliver’s identity, Lois had been pushed to the brink of death.

“Why don’t you all sit down and I’ll brew some tea.” Alfred remarked as Lois, Chloe and Valerie settled into living room. “I think we can do with some rest and civilisation.” The butler remarked, trying to ease the fears and tensions in the room. Alfred hid his own worry for Bruce beneath years of discipline because right now, the people most dear to Bruce required it.

”Thank you Alfred,” Lois said gratefully and hugged Chloe a little closer to her. “We’ll get some rest and then go after Bruce.” She explained. “Now that we know where he is.”

The blip in the middle of the GPS display had not moved for some time and the coordinates had indicated a location outside of Gotham City. Bruce had hoped that he would be taken to DeSaad’s main complex, so they could learn who was behind the company and the orders to steal meteor-infected humans.

“This is my fault,” Valerie shook her head, standing up. “If you hadn’t helped me, none of you would be in this situation and my parents would be alive still. I did all this to you.” The blond beauty shuddered, trying not to break into sobs.

“No, don’t say that,” Chloe found her voice. “This isn’t your fault. We would have helped you no matter what. Bruce has a plan and I’m sure he wouldn’t have given himself up to those men if he didn’t think it could work.”

However, Lois could see the difficulty Chloe had in believing her own words. Still her cousin kept her chin up, denying Valerie the recrimination she was inviting upon herself.

“Damn straight,” Lois retorted, “this isn’t your fault and those guys need to be stopped. Hank played you from the start. He used your situation to get inside your head and he’s probably done it to a whole bunch of other girls. He’s the one who did this Valerie, not you.”

“Miss Lane is quite right Miss Beaudry,” Alfred agreed approaching the young woman and placing a gentle arm on her shoulder. “Please, do sit down and rest. If we are to end this, we will all need to be in our best health.”

Valerie nodded at the kindly older man, fighting the tears that wanted to come. “You’re right,” she said trying to keep her lips from quivering. “I want to help Bruce.” With that, she lowered herself into the leather tub chair.

Grateful that Valerie was appeased for now, Lois returned her attention to Chloe while Alfred made a discreet exit to the kitchen to make tea. Chloe was attempting to maintain a brave front even though her eyes spoke volumes. “So what is Bruce’s plan?”

“I think it was for us to track him to wherever he’s being kept and finding out who’s behind all this,” Lois replied. “Once we know that, we can blow the lid of these people.”

“What about Clark?” Chloe asked. “We can’t expose them without the danger of exposing Clark as well.”

“I know,” Lois sighed, “We’ll have to think about it more when we know who we’re dealing with. Right now, all we know is the corporation and the fact that they want meteor freaks really bad. I don’t think we can assume anything until we find that out.”

“She’s right,” Clark replied, having emerged from the other room where he had been making a call. “I’ve just spoken to Oliver,” he announced. “He and his team are taking care of some business in Rio but they should be back here in a few hours.”

“Does Bruce have a few hours?” Chloe threw back at him.

Clark’s jaw tightened. “I’m not waiting here to find out. Oliver said I could use one of his cars so I’m driving back to Smallville.”

Lois opened her mouth to speak when Clark cut her off. “I’m going alone.”

“What?” She exclaimed, staring at him. “What do you mean you’re going to the farm alone?” Lois was on her feet and in his face before she finished the sentence. “That’s crazy. They’ll be watching farm! They probably have the whole damn down under surveillance waiting for you to show your face! Smallville, this is a dumb idea!”

“Clark I have to agree with Lois,” Chloe added. “I want Bruce back more than anyone but you getting caught as well is not going to help us.”

“I’m not going to the farm or town,” he said firmly, meeting the blonde’s eyes. “I’m going to get my powers back and there’s only one way to do that.”

Understanding flooded Chloe’s eyes, “no way Clark – nothing ever good comes out of going to Jor-El for help.”

Lois hadn’t protested because her dealings with Jor-El had not been as negative as Chloe’s undoubtedly was. DeSaad may have some idea about Clark’s origins but they’d have no way of knowing that Clark had a way to get to the fortress that didn’t involve flying. They wouldn’t expect his return to the Kawatchee Caves, thus giving Clark a good chance t reach it without hindrance.

Furthermore, having grown up with an authoritarian father, Lois could almost recognise the tough love actions of the artificial intelligence playing at Jor-El. She was also afraid at what might happen but Lois also trusted Clark to know what was best for him in this situation. Without his powers and with DeSaad knowing who he was, Clark was in an extremely vulnerable position. They might never be safe.

“Smallville,” she went to him, moving past Chloe and reaching for his cheek. “You know I’m not good at saying how I feel, especially in front of a room full of people. If you’re doing this because there is no other way to save Bruce then I’m behind you all the way. But,” she stammered, trying not to feel self-conscious about exposing her feelings, “if you’re doing this because you don’t think you’ll be good to me or anyone else without powers then you’re an idiot. I’d love you no matter what, even if it meant we’d have to leave our lives behind and start again somewhere.”

Clark held her hand in his for a moment, feeling his guilt and anger at having to leave Bruce behind lessen somewhat when he stared into Lois’ eyes and knew she meant every word she had just spoken. He could very well believe that she would leave everything behind to love him just the way he was. For a moment, Clark couldn’t speak, overwhelmed by his emotions.

With a smile, he leaned down, kissing her deeply before remarking, “you know I can afford that Harley now.”

Lois stared blankly for a moment and then recalled the words she had said to him once about putting all the love he had into a piggy bank because one day that bike he was saving for might turn out to be a Harley. Who knew it was going to be her?

Lois laughed softly, “good memory Smallville. And was I wrong?”

“Never,” he smiled and leaned forward and kissed her. “I need to do this.” He said to her intently. “Bruce may not have much time and DeSaad needs to be stopped.”

“Okay,” Lois nodded, trusting his decision. “Then you do what you have to, I’ll hold the fort.”

“Lois!” Chloe protested, “you can’t let him do this!”

“I’ll be fine,” Clark assured them as headed towards the door. “I promise.”

“You heard him,” Lois said quietly, determined to believe that her faith in him was justified. “He’ll be fine.”

With that, Clark gave her a last look before stepping out, his eyes telling her not to worry even if Lois already was.

Chapter Fourteen:
The House That Valerie Built

Returning to the Kawatchee Caves was like returning to the womb.

So much about his destiny was revealed in the ancient pictographs he found on the walls of this cave, drawn by a tribe decimated like so many in North America’s bloody history. Through the years, the meaning of them had remained an enigma, defying him to unravel the secret behind the curious language that no one else but he seemed to understand. The Kawatchee had thought they had uncovered the language of God when what they had found was the message in a bottle for Kal-El of Krypton.

Leaving Metropolis, Clark had driven straight to Smallville, taking the back roads known only to a native of these parts to reach the caves. He was careful to avoid the main roads or wander anywhere near the Kent Farm. He did not know how vigilant these people from DeSaad were but he wasn’t taking any chances. Not when Bruce’s life hung in the balance and certainly not when his future depended on his reaching the caves without interference. The gamble worked and he arrived at the site of the abandoned archaeological excavation that took place within the caves years ago, without incident.

In recent years, the Luthor Trust to protect the caves had fallen back to the Kawatchee Tribe who decided that there was enough plunder of their tribal heritage and barred any further research from being undertaken. Fortunately, the chamber containing the most valuable artefact remained relatively anonymous due to the fact that it could only be revealed by someone possessing Kryptonian DNA. To everyone else, it was simply a cave. To Kal-El, the cave was home to one of the last remaining portals that led to the Fortress. Normally, Clark himself would have little reason to use the cave to reach Jor-El’s fortress since flying enabled him to get there on his own.

However, on this occasion, it was his only hope of making himself whole again.

Climbing over the fence that surrounded the caves, Clark landed on the gravel covered ground and took the familiar path to the entrance. There were signs posted everywhere telling trespassers to stay out but he ignored this. As he entered the mouth of the cave and immediately lost the sun on his back, he was once again overwhelmed by the shadows within. There were some lights inside the cave but not enough for him to see clearly. The loss of his enhanced vision was particularly galling at these moments. Fortunately, the passage was one he knew well though after travelling it so many times in the past. Clark followed the meandering twists and turns through rock, ignoring the pictographs that told his story to the world if they only understood the language as he closed in on his destination.

The chamber was located at the very depths of the cave, past the drawing of Naman and Seegeth that gave Lex Luthor such delusions of grandeur. Clark hardly paid attention to it, having face worst enemies since Lex to know that he couldn’t wait his whole life for an apocalyptic foe that may never come.

Waiting for doomsday was a waste of time, he decided. It would find you when it was ready.

He reached the cave and the far wall where once he had vanished for three months but this time there he felt no fear and Clark took a deep breath, praying that whatever had been done to him would not stop the portal from activating and sending him through. If this did not work, then he had no idea how else to save Bruce. Taking a deep breath, Clark put himself into the hands of fate and stepped forward into the portal, letting it take him where it would.

If anywhere at all.

Glaring bright light assaulted him so suddenly that Clark was blinded as he lost his footing and landed face first in the snow. Icy prickles made him shudder in reaction as he immediately gathered himself onto his knees and hugged his arms to his body, never realizing how debilitating cold could be. He suddenly felt guilty for the few times he had brought Chloe and Lois to this place. The icy wind blew across his face felt like lashes as Clark stood up slowly to surveyed the scene to determine where he was.

He was standing up to his shins in snow, in the middle of glacier field. In the distance he could see mountains, covered in snow. On the other side, he saw glaciers. The sun was high in the sky, blazing down with all its might but it did nothing to aid his tolerance of the biting cold. It took him a fraction of a second longer to find the Fortress and once again, he forgot how beautiful it was, gleaming in the sunlight. A dazzling jewel surrounded by ice. Clark rushed here so fast whenever he came; he never really stopped to see how incredible it was.

For a brief moment, Clark wondered if all buildings in Krypton were constructed this way and not for the first time, felt a tinge of sorrow at the loss of his home world. Krypton had its own beauty like Earth. The Fortress was a good ten minutes walk and so Clark let out a heavy sigh, watching his breath frost the air front of him as he breathed and started walking. At least, the activity would keep him warm he thought. Walking across the snow, Clark developed a new appreciation for his Kryptonian abilities and wondered how hard it must be for Lois, Chloe and Bruce to go through this everyday, to live with this pain all the time.

After what seemed to be the longest ten minutes of his life, Clark reached the uneven

steps of the Fortress walls. Walking under the crisscrossing columns, Clark made his way to the central hub of the Fortress controls. He never knew how to communicate directly with the father that supposedly lived in these unusual walls since Jor-El was always waiting for him with some terrible decree or prophetic warning.

“Father,” he spoke out loud when he reached the controls and saw it lifeless, waiting perhaps for his input to come alive. Perhaps it required some stimulus from him to do so before.

“Father, its Kal-El.” He repeated himself again, louder this time, using the Kryptonian name that still sounded odd to him. He was Clark Kent first, he always would be. He would fight being Kal-El as long as he could.

“Father, there’s something wrong with me.” He pleaded, wishing that it was a person he was speaking to and wondering if disembodied voice was so different form the man and whether flesh and blood would make Jor-El any easier to relate to. “Father, my powers are gone.”

“Your powers are not gone Kal-El.” Jor-El’s eloquent voice spoke in correspondence with the central hub coming alive with a familiar white glow. The crystals it held seemingly even brighter under the sunlight, almost luminescent. “They have been nullified.”

“Nullified?” Clark asked, wishing he could speak to the man face to face. “I don’t understand.”

“You have been infected by blue kryptonite. Blue kryptonite renders all Kryptonians powerless by nullifying the properties of the yellow sun upon our body chemistry. Remove the blue kryptonite and you shall be restored.”

Not that different from what Bruce had already theorized, Clark thought to himself. “I don’t know how,” he admitted,” feeling foolish and stupid. “It’s in my blood. It will take weeks and my friends are in trouble. I need to be restored now.”

There was a slight pause and if it seemed as if a disembodied voice could be exasperated, Clark certainly got the feeling Jor-El was experiencing that emotion in the silence that followed. Clark was suddenly gripped with the awful feeling that Jor-El wouldn’t help, that he would leave things to follow their course, as he had done on other occasions. However, a panel slid open from the side of the hub, revealing a device that looked not unlike the object Milton Fine had used to remove the silver kryptonite in his blood stream that had driven him half crazy years ago.

“This device will remove the blue kryptonite particles from your body,” Jor-El’s voice spoke again and Clark felt a surge of relief as he walked across the uneven floor to retrieve it. He had honestly thought that Jor-El would refuse him or worse yet, place some terrible price tag to this kindness or demand some retribution for his human weaknesses. Memories of what it had cost Jonathan Kent still haunted Clark to this day.

Laying his hand on the device, it felt cold like any hospital instrument. Clark wasted no time pressing it up against his skin. The extraction would be painful, Clark was under no illusions about that but Bruce was also enduring agony himself right now, of that Clark had no doubt. Bruce would do it and die protecting him because Clark understood how much Bruce cared about his friends. They were precious to him, they took the place of the family he lost and he would do anything to spare them. For that, Clark would do the same for his best friend.

“Thank you father,” Clark said as he braced himself wanting to get this over and done with as quickly as possible so that he could get back to Lois and Chloe.

Predictably however, it seemed Jor-El was not about to let him do that without a parting shot.

“Kal-El,” the cold, emotionless voice boomed once more. “The time is coming where you will be unable to hide from your destiny. Your love for your friends does you credit but until you become what you are destined to be, you will only cause them harm. These words are not spoken to deny you the right to choose your own path but as warning that you imperil them by your defiance. Accept who you are before someone you truly care about pays the price. When that happens, I will not be able to help you.”

Something about the warning cut to the bone more than Jor-El’s previous ominous warnings and Clark wondered if Jor-El was making some veiled threat. “Are you threatening me, Jor-El?” He glared into the crystal beams, daring Jor-El to show himself if he could.

“I make no threat Kal-El,” the voice sighed, “It is as I have spoken - a warning. You may take it as you will.”

“Fine,” Clark retorted and returned to what he was doing. “I’ll take it under advisement.” And with that, he pushed down the toggle that activated the device against his skin.

The pain was almost immediate. However bad it had been before, now it was worse. Possibly for the first time in his life, Clark screamed. If it was, then he had some comfort in the fact that he didn’t scream long because everything went black soon after.

***************

“Jesus Ollie,” Lois complained as she paced the floor of Oliver’s office becoming more and more exasperated. “How long does it take to fly back to Metropolis from Bulgaria? Bruce doesn’t have that much time!”

It had been hours since Clark had left and even though the GPS told them exactly where Bruce was, it offered them no comfort because until Clark got back from the fortress, they were helpless. As it was Bruce was being held in a longitudinal and latitude location that placed him two hours out of Metropolis in a sparsely populated area that was normally nothing but cornfields. A nice rural location where they could do God only knows what to meteor infected humans, Lois thought. Meanwhile, Lois and Alfred were left with trying to calm Chloe down but also preventing Valerie from slipping further and further into guilt that this was all her fault.

To assuage Chloe’s growing anxiety; Lois decided to try Oliver again hoping he might be closer than he had been the last time she had called.

“Alright Russia?” She raged when he corrected her that he was in fact in Russia and that he was still somewhere over the Atlantic and was doing the best he could to get back faster.

“You know if you superhero types are going to save the world, you might think about teleportation devices!” She snapped and then sighed because it wasn’t his fault. Oliver was doing the best he could. “I know you’re doing everything you can. I’m sorry Ollie,” she sighed. “I’ll talk to you when you get back in okay?”

“OH GOD!”

An anguished cry from the living room made Lois stop what she was doing immediately, particularly when she recognized whose voice was it was. Chloe.

“Ollie I gotta go,” Lois said abruptly, giving the Archer on the other end of the line no opportunity to respond before she hung up the phone and dashed out of his usurped office. Lois emerged into the walkway overlooking the living room of the Queen Penthouse and saw Chloe kneeling on the floor next to the coffee table where they had left the GPS. The expression on her face turned Lois’ blood to ice as Chloe clung to the device, visibly trembling. She was on the verge of a complete emotional breakdown and so shocked was Lois at seeing her normally so together cousin, that for a second, she was rooted to the spot, too terrified to ask what had driven Chloe to such an outburst.

There was only one thing, her inner voice responded automatically. Bruce.

Only when Alfred emerged from the kitchen did Lois’ brain jump start into action again and she was bounding down the steps, two at a time, to reach Chloe side.

“Chloe, what is it?” Lois demanded skidding to the floor next to her. “What’s happened?”

“The signal,” Chloe said barely able to speak, her eyes darting from Lois’ face to the display on the GPS screen. The screen whose blank face revealed all without her needing to say the words, the signal was gone. “It’s gone.”

Indeed it was. The screen that gave them the comfort of at least knowing where Bruce Wayne was now disconcertingly dark, with no sign of any life at all. Whether it was indication that the bug Bruce had implanted himself was malfunctioning or something worse, remained maddening elusive. Unfortunately, Chloe, whose hope was already hanging by a tenuous thread, was inclined to believe the worst. Considering what they knew about Bruce and his sheer refusal to yield to torture, it may well be justified.

Nevertheless Lois refused to give up on the billionaire playboy who since they met him, had turned out to be the smartest man they knew. Bruce would find a way. “Maybe it’s not working…” Lois declared, trying to think of all the explanations as to why the signal would no longer transmit although each possibility did not bode well enough for Bruce and Lois was reluctant to voice them.

“It was implanted inside Bruce!” Chloe bit back barely able to keep her voice from cracking. “They would have had to get it out of him to shut it off! Either that or it short circuited…inside of him! That much of a jolt would kill most people! Oh Bruce…”

“Chloe, this doesn’t mean anything…” Lois protested.

“She’s right Miss,” Alfred interjected in that comforting tone that reminded her so much of Jonathan Kent that hearing it sometimes made Lois miss the man all over again. She wondered if Clark felt the same way in Alfred’s company. “Master Bruce isn’t most people. If anyone can surprise me, it’s him. He wouldn’t let himself fall into a situation he couldn’t get out of. He’d find that rather…sloppy.” Alfred looked at her with a hint of smile, trying to give her some hope in the face of her despair.

Chloe met Alfred’s gaze, eyes glistening and nodded. “You’re right there,” she tried to smile but didn’t quite manage it. “If there’s one thing he knows how to do is surprise.”

He had been the surprise alright. Bruce was the Prince Charming who came out of nowhere to sweep her off her feet. At first she had thought him to be just another misunderstood celebrity, hiding a secret pain and more depth than he showed the world. Later on, she found out that he was a hero in his own right, one that stood almost on equal ground with Clark’s physical powers.

“Oh God Lois,” Chloe started to sob allowing herself to be pulled into Alfred’s embrace, “I’m so scared. I know I shouldn’t be but I can’t help it. For everything that he his, he’s still human. Even if he doesn’t always remember it.”

Behind them, watching the scene, Valerie Beaudry saw the house that she had built.

The girl listened to the pain of Chloe Sullivan, a stranger whose life she had ruined just as surely as she had ruined Clark Kent’s by exposing him to DeSaad, to say nothing about the parents who now lay dead on some mortician’s slab awaiting burial. All of it had been her fault. She had been so desperate for affection that she allowed someone like Hank into her life, allowed him to trick her with her with his promises and subsequently brought doom and grief to everyone who cared about her. Lois Lane’s act of kindness and these people’s willingness to defend her still, despite their losses taught Valerie about true friendship then all of Hank’s false promises.

She left the room silently and went to the hallway leading to the front door and peered at the mirror on the wall above a side table. Looking into the reflection, she saw a beautiful woman staring back at her whom she did not know. Even her face was Hank’s creation. She had allowed him to cut her up and turn her from an ugly duckling into a swan.

A swan with a siren song that killed.

She couldn’t let this go on. Lois and her friends would die to protect her and for that gesture, Valerie would love them dearly to the end of her days but it was not a sacrifice she would ask them to make. The keys to Oliver Queen’s fleet of cars hung on an ornate key rack on the wall. Picking one, she didn’t care which, she cast a final look at the only real friends she had made in the outside world and went out the front door.

She knew where they were keeping Bruce Wayne and before she brought their house of lies down around their ears, she would make them let him go.

And then Hank would pay.

***********

The two men made their way down the long corridor carrying between them an unconscious and battered Bruce Wayne from the windowless room where Bennet had conducted his interrogation. With toes scrapping against the concrete floor as they dragged him along and tiny droplets of blood following their trail from the red stream that ran rivulets down Wayne’s bare and pockmarked bruised chest, Wayne was in no shape to protest. A dead weight, he offered no help as they carried him back to his cell, seemingly oblivious to their presence while they carried out their rather indifferent conversation about him.

“Can’t believe this guy hasn’t broken yet,” the first man, dressed in the dark suits reserved for professional security, declared to his companion.

“Yeah,” the second man wearing the same type of suit chuckled, revealing a mouthful of yellowed teeth from too much cigarettes “I was sure Bennett was gonna pop a vein trying to get him to talk. It didn’t make him look too good in front of Corben, that’s for sure. He’s supposed to be the No.1 guy for information retrieval.”

“Well if Wayne knows what’s good for him when he wakes up,” the first remarked as they neared the end of the corridor, “he’d better talk. I hear Benton's getting more creative. Mr. Billionaire Screws Every Super Model Alive might find his style cramped if Bennett decides to find a blow torch to play with.” This seemed to strike the man as particularly funny as he spent a few minute guffawing out loud.

“Hey watch it!” His companion grumbled, “You’re getting blood on my shoes.”

Suddenly, without warning the lifeless figure they had been holding came to life. Without giving either man time to react, Bruce Wayne took a step back and promptly smashed both men’s skulls together with more force than someone in his condition should be able. A loud crack filled the empty hallway as the duo went down with a thud on either side of him. They went down quick and silently as he expected they would and when they hit the ground, he was perfectly confident they would be out cold.

Bruce stepped waste no time acting as soon as they were out. He wasn’t going to make the mistake of thinking that no one would be happening by and immediately removed the shoes one of his captors had been so particular about. Checking the size, it fit him well enough. Reaching into their jackets’, he searched them quickly, seeking out anything useful. Bruce shoved a folded Swiss Army pocket knife and a cell phone into his pocket before stripping one of the jackets. Wiping the blood off his skin, it wouldn’t do to leave any more of trail than he had.

As he hurried down the hall, he smashed the lights on the ceiling as he went, raining glass on the floor as darkness followed him. When he heard the commotion of security discovering his escape as he expected that would, almost five minute had passed and Bruce was already where he needed to be. When he was being brought to interrogation, he had studied the layout of the place as best he could. Using the Swiss Army knife he had stolen, he opened the grill of the air vent and escaped into the building ventilation system.

Once inside the narrow space, Bruce kicked off his shoes again, preferring bare feet to maintain his stealth as he moved quickly through the passage, taking himself as far as he could get away from the voices shouting orders to recapture him. He crawled for almost 15 minutes before he took a moment to rest. The escape had taken most of his reserved strength and now he needed to recuperate for a few minute before he continued moving again.

Bruce was aware he couldn’t afford to stay in one place long.

If he did, they would find him and he had just too much to do to be ready to die just yet.

Chapter Fifteen:
Equations

It was more than an hour later that they’d realized that Valerie had gone.

Each of them had retreated to their respective corners, like punch drunk fighters needing a breather after a particularly bad round. Chloe had disappeared into Oliver’s study, making the most of her time with the state of the art computer system Oliver had in place and yet even as she waited for the system to initialize, she found herself thinking that it was nowhere as sophisticated as the set up Bruce had in his cave.

Thoughts of him immediately reminded that she was hiding in this room because she was trying not to show Lois and Alfred just how terrified she was at his continued absence. He was the strongest man she knew excepting Clark and in sheer force of will; Clark did not have Bruce’s endurance. She’d seen him single minded with an intensity that alarmed her at times. There was only dark in his world, every corner of it was shadowed by the spectre of his dead parents and she wished with all her heart that she could wipe clean the blood splattered over that little boy in the alley.

And yet despite this, Chloe also knew that she had become the unexpected light in his life.

She sat at Oliver’s work station and resumed her search for any information about DeSaad which had almost no history until the arrival of its CEO, a Michael Canto. Canto like his company also had no history prior to the birth of his company. No birth records, no social security number, nothing. It could have been guarded but Chloe had also hacked into the IRS records and found a pending investigation into the man which had been placed on hold because the investigator into the case had vanished mysteriously. Furthermore, Canto didn't like to be seen. He preferred to remain in the shadows, the puppet master, pulling the strings of his corporate flunkies, acting as the face of the company.

If that didn’t sound ominous to Chloe, then she didn’t know what did.

Bruce had once told her the greater the lengths to create the illusion, the darker the secret.

*******

For her own sojourn, Lois found herself on the roof top of Oliver’s clock tower. The walkway surrounding the large clock face was almost one of the highest places in Metropolis. Standing against the railing, she felt the wind whip at her hair as she looked into the city. With amusement, she noted some of the nearby roofs had tell tale signs of Oliver’s presence; stray arrows embedded in the spaces between slates. Oliver had dropped everything to get back to Metropolis as soon as possible in answer for her plea of help. Perhaps things hadn’t worked out between them but they still had a special place in each other’s hearts and Lois would always love him a little for that.

However, on this occasion, Lois was on the balcony, standing at the top of Metropolis’ loftiest heights, because here, she felt closer to Clark, not Oliver. With the city beneath her, the wind in her hair, it almost felt as if she were flying with him again. In her heart, Lois would love Clark no matter what but she couldn’t deny that if his powers were indeed gone, what she would missed most about them was the fact that she couldn’t fly with him anymore.

She would miss that a lot.

Unfortunately, Lois knew that it was Clark who would have the most difficulty with being normal. These last few weeks had hard but the reality of permanence had yet to sink in. She feared that when he realised he could not rush off to someone's aid because what made Clark so unique was not his power but his compassion, the realisation of his helplessness would cripple him. The imperative of his life which was to help anyone, whatever the situation. Until now, he never had to worry about consequences. If he didn't get his powers back, he'd be faced with nothing but consequences.

Lois didn't know if he was strong enough to bear it.

He wasn't like Bruce, driven by a past trauma. Clark helped because Jonathan and Martha Kent had raised him with values that might seem dated to some but was a kindness the world seemed to need. He helped because he could. Lois didn't want to see that broken inside of him, for any reason.

******

Alfred Pennyworth consoled himself the way he always did when times were at their darkest.

He made tea.

Hurtling through the years of memories spent in the Wayne household, he thought of all the times that he had prepared tea whenever there was some crisis. In the beginning of his tenure, tea had just been an import he brought with him from England. Mrs. Wayne had enjoyed it when she was pregnant, finding it less vulgar than coffee. During her pregnancy, Alfred introduced her to different forms of tea, Earl Grey, Lemon Scented, Chamomile and even Chrysanthemum. Although Alfred had joined the family through his association with Thomas during the war, it was with Martha that he formed a close bond. There were many afternoons where he listened to the former socialite with a conscience talking to him about her hopes for the child she was carrying.

After the baby was born, Martha opted to remain faithful to her new found beverage, preferring white tea above all else and Alfred took pride in serving it to her as he looked upon the infant she called her 'little prince' unaware that later on in life, that moniker would follow him for a completely different reasons. When Martha and Thomas had been taken away from them, Alfred had served Bruce tea, soothing a wound that would never be healed, loving Martha's son as if he was Alfred's own. As if tea and friendship made Bruce every much his as he was Martha's.

Alfred had served tea much like this, the night the boy had been delivered back to Wayne Manor with Martha and Thomas' blood still soaked in his clothes.

The butler had tried his best to wash it clean but by then it was too late, the blood had seeped past the skin, straight into the soul. The little boy who went out with his parents that night to a picture show was gone. What came back was a force of nature in the making. Frankenstein was building a monster in the bowels of the Manor and what shape this beast would take was something Alfred was almost afraid to find out.

Having made tea and some lunch to accompany it, Alfred went to seek out the young ladies and in his quest for them, felt some light in his fears for his surrogate child. Miss Chloe had entered Master Bruce's life and brought with her friends that were as true as any the butler could have hoped for Martha's little prince. The friendships that were forming between the quartet were binding and ones that gave Alfred some comfort Bruce would never be alone after he was gone.

He found Miss Chloe easily enough; she was hunched over Master Queen's computer trying to find means to help Bruce out of his current predicament. Alfred let her know that there was lunch to which she lifted her gaze and flashed him that smile which felt like all the light in the world. In that one moment, Alfred knew right away why Bruce had fallen so hard for the girl. She was the sunlight his dark soul needed so badly.

She'd be there in a moment, she'd told him before going back to work, gracious to the last even if her eyes hide bravely how frightened she was.

Alfred left her then to go find Miss Lois on the balcony and found her staring into the city, with the wind in her hair looking like Boadicea about to face a legion of Romans, defiant. One thing he had learned about this woman was that her lack of fear near rivalled Bruce. She was in her way, a force to be reckoned with too. It explained easily why she could be the only one for the strongest being on the planet.

Like Chloe, Lois gave Alfred promises to come in shortly and so Alfred continued onwards, visiting the newest member to the group although he was unconvinced at her longevity. Valerie was the fulcrum upon which this situation had been set into motion. Having listened to snippets of Valerie's tale, he wondered if the friendship offered to her by Lois, despite all the consequences, would restore the young woman's faith in people. Certainly, she had been manipulated enough by strangers and the price for her naiveté, was too heavy for any person to pay.

Entering the room where the girl had taken refuge since their arrival here, he noted her absence and immediately frowned because he hadn't seen her elsewhere. A quick investigation of the rest of the penthouse suite forced Alfred to reach an unpleasant conclusion. Valerie was gone. It didn't take much more investigation for him to see that the tracking device that charted Master Bruce's location was gone, as was a set of keys from one of many to Oliver's collection of cars.

With a sigh, Alfred realised didn't require Bruce's deductive skills to determine where Valerie was going.

"Miss Chloe," Alfred went to her first because she was closest. "Miss Valerie is gone. I think she had gone after Master Bruce."

"Oh No!" Chloe exclaimed with dismay, cursing herself belatedly that they hadn't seen this coming. Valerie had voiced her guilt at bringing this on them and because she hadn't repeated herself in the last few hours, they had thought foolishly believed that the subject was closed. But how could it be? How could they think that when Chloe herself had gone to pieces because of Bruce's abduction, Lois was openly worried that Clark being crippled for life and her own parents being murdered? Pushing herself away from the desk, Chloe hurried past Alfred, in search of her cousin.

"Where's Lois?" she asked.

"Miss Lois is on the roof," Alfred said calmly.

"How long since you saw her? Valerie I mean?" Chloe asked, trying to determine just how much of a head start Valerie had.

"Not in the last hour," Alfred said regretfully.

"LOIS!" Chloe hollered for her cousin before returning her attention back to Alfred. "We should we able to tell from the timestamp on the security cameras in the elevators," she declared. "LOIS!"

"What?" Lois Lane hurried into the hallway, having heard her cousin's cry and fearing the worst. The pace of her footsteps indicating she was running. "What's happened?"

"Its Valerie," Chloe said meeting her in the middle of the passage, "she's gone."

"Oh hell," Lois curses. "Two guesses as to where she went," the tall brunette sighed.

"I only need one..." Chloe retorted.

"She took the tracker and a set of keys," Alfred added.

Lois cursed under her breath. "We have to go after her..."

"Go after her?" Chloe stared at Lois. "Lois, she's going to him...to Hank."

"And then he'll know where we are and what little leverage Clark might have had or any chance we've got to get Bruce back will be gone," Lois returned swiftly. "We need to get to her before she reaches him."

Chloe couldn't argue with that and a part of her wanted to do something other than just wait around. Of course it was a bad idea, she knew that. However, right now the desire to be closer to Bruce over rode her good sense. When it came to Bruce Wayne, Chloe often found herself thinking with her heart more than her brain.

It would have pleased her to know that Bruce had exactly the same problem.

***********

Bruce Wayne had assumed that he was in one of DeSaad's Corporations many research facilities.

Granted this one was a little more off the beaten track than most but then again Bruce could be forgiven for thinking that the facility where the company conducted its torture sessions would need to be placed in a remote location. However, as he explored the complex through the maze of electrical access tunnels and ventilation shafts, Bruce began to discover a very different purpose to the facility once he was able to identify what he was seeing through the cracks of vents and the steel mesh of iron grates. What he saw was enough to send cold shudders through the seemingly impregnable shell of his granite composure.

All this time, Bruce had assumed that DeSaad's purpose was to glean from the meta human subjects the company had been collecting, the secrets to their abilities for the purposes of bio-weapons development and the almighty dollar. When it came to conglomerates, Bruce knew the score. Wayne Enterprises under the guidance of Lucius Fox and his own careful eye was a profit based company that offset its fiscal pursuits by engaging in numerous charity works. The Wayne Foundation existed to give back from the community the wealth that Wayne Enterprises made because of it. Other companies like LutherCorp, Stagg Industries and now DeSaad were not so altruistic.

Until now he never imagined it was about anything else but money.

Now he realised it was about power.

It was easy to mistake one for the other. Being wealthy gave one a certain amount of power, power over one's existence and the ability to affect others but what DeSaad was attempting to do was something entirely different.

They were trying to grow super humans.

As he crawled through the vast network of tunnels and shafts leading him from section to section of the facility, one step ahead of DeSaad's formidable security force, Bruce, took the opportunity to learn all he could about the organisation that was so determined to add Clark Kent to its menagerie. Emerging onto the floor of what he had thought to be some kind of medical storage area, Bruce soon learned he was partly corrected. What he found was a Frankenstein's laboratory of human bodies suspended in viscous green fluid, inside nameless tanks where their bodies were assaulted with machines whose purpose he could not discern. Yet judging by the mutation he was seeing, the devices were altering these helpless people on a genetic level never before imagined.

Was this what they had done to Valerie? Had they changed the ugly duckling she had been into the swan that is, by placing her in a tank just like this? Was this what they had planned for Clark once they were done taking him apart to learn what it was that made so powerful? The thought horrified Bruce who had believed until now that there wasn't a great deal that could shake his composure.

Walking along the rows of tanks and there were so many it boggled the mind, Bruce stared into their empty faces. With their eyes open, they continued to stare into nothingness as tubes were inserted through their flesh pumping the noxious green fluid he was almost certain was some kind solution extracted from the properties of meteor rock. As if someone was trying to recreate the meta human transformations that had taken place in Smallville since the first meteor shower brought Clark to Earth.

Bruce observed as much as he could, until the macabre scene forced his eyes away from those tanks and its occupants. Wanting to know precisely what was being done to these people so that they could be helped when he brought the authorities back here, Bruce made his way to the front of the room where a workstation and computer were left unattended. Sliding behind the keyboard, he went to work quickly, trying to learn something of the work that was being conducted here. What he encountered straight away was the demand for an access code to view the project file whose name left him just as puzzled as the rest of this.

ANTI-LIFE EQUATION

******

"Miss Lane, I am not certain that this is a wise idea," Alfred protested as he followed Lois and Chloe into the area of the parking lot below the tower where Oliver's fleets of cars were kept.

"We don't have a choice Alfred," Lois said carrying the small duffel bag of supplies she had 'liberated' from Oliver's secret room of Green Arrow equipment. "If we don't get to Valerie before she gets to Hank, it could end up being very bad."

Chloe followed her cousin, not about to disagree but she wondered if she and Lois were really the best people qualified to go after the young woman. True, she wanted Bruce back but if there was one thing being around Bruce Wayne had taught her, it was never rush into a situation without thinking it through. This situation certainly fell into that category. Torn between her desire to help Bruce and what he would do in this situation, Chloe could do nothing more than be caught up in the tsunami that was Lois Lane on a mission.

"And if she does?" Alfred asked. "You would imperil both yourselves by attempting to retrieve her."

"Alfred, if she's gets to him before we do, then we'll sit tight and wait for Oliver to show up." She looked at the man with pure innocence.

"Oh please," Chloe rolled her eyes, "even I don't believe that."

"You are not helping the situation," Lois gave her a look. "Besides, if we're lucky we might be able to see where they've taken Bruce."

"Look," Chloe stared at her cousin critically, "I want to be there for Bruce more than anything but I know what he would say in this situation and that's to be careful. We don't want to add to the mess that this has become."

"I know," Lois said remembering Chloe's stake in this. "I promise if it's too late to get to her, we'll get out of there and wait for Ollie and his pals to show up but Chloe," Lois drew a deep breath remembering what Valerie was capable of. "Valerie has got a lot of power and she's plenty mad right now. I'm afraid if she gets there and she's provoked, she's going to go nuclear on us. We don't know what the full of extent of her powers are. She could destroy everything in sight if she gets mad enough and that could mean Bruce. She may not know what she's doing until its too late."

Hating to admit that Lois was right and wanting to go after Bruce, Chloe finally relented. "We'll be careful Alfred," she looked the old butler in the eye and meant it. "If Clark comes back, tell him what's happened and try to give him some hot chocolate or something because he will freak out."

"I'll do my best," Alfred nodded, however his expression was clearly one of disapproval. "Although I suspect it will do little good."

********

When he heard the footsteps, Bruce could have left but he didn't.

He listened closely and heard not the steps of many, which would be most conducive to a search party, but just one set of feet approaching the door at an almost languid pace. He left the work station and hid behind the tanks, watching cautiously as the door opened. A few seconds later, a shape entered and it was not the form of heavy set men like those who had had tortured him earlier but a more elegant figure. The face belonged to someone he could have met while playing the part of Bruce Wayne, playboy. Someone with whom he could have shared idle chatter over hors d'oeuvres and champagne at one charity function or another. Dressed in a suit that Bruce himself might have worn, the man made his way to the work station and paused before sweeping his gaze around the room.

"Bruce Wayne," the man spoke out. "Come out, come out wherever you are.

The smart thing would have been to stay put but Bruce wanted answers and he suspected, now would be the time to get them.

Stepping out of the shadow, Bruce kept his distance, ensuring that even if the stranger cried out, he could make it back to the air vent he had used to sneak into the place, ahead of DeSaad's security. "So is this Cadmus or DeSaad?"

"Doesn't really matter," the man shrugged his shoulders. "Its all the same and its all mine."

"And you are?" Bruce folded his arms and stared at the man, trying to place him.

"Michael Canto," he introduced himself.

"You're a man of mystery Mr. Canto," Bruce replied. "You've kept yourself out of the public eye for the CEO of a very large company."

"And yet," Canto leaned against the workstation. "You've kept yourself very much in the public eye and still managed to do the same. Very impressive. I don't think I've seen Mr. Corben quite that annoyed since I've employed him. I think you rather surprised him."

"So what is the anti-life equation?" Bruce found himself asking, eyes fixed on Canto in case the man attempted to make any sudden moves.

Canto laughed shortly before his expression sobered. "It is nothing you can imagine."

"Try me," Bruce insisted, suspecting the answer was to the key to all of this.

"Alright," Canto retorted as if he were addressing a petulant child."The anti-life equation is a mathematical formula that when relayed in precisely the right sequence, transmitted telepathically into the brain will destroy all free will because it opens the neural pathways to the understanding that life, hope and freedom are pointless and the only choice left is to submit."

"You're serious," Bruce spoke after a long moment. "You actually believe such an equation exists, to control human behaviour in that way?" It was laughable but the look on Canto's face revealed a man who thought otherwise.

Canto laughed harder, "not just human behaviour, all behaviour. Every living thing in the universe."

Bruce decided then that this guy was insane. It was impossible. Mind control he could accept but a magical formula that simply made such a thing possible? It was ridiculous and yet Canto didn't seem to be mad or for that matter, deluded. Of course, sane men could convince themselves of anything. He was proof.

"And you want to put my friend in there?" Bruce declared, gesturing to the tanks.

"Clark Kent?" Canto's eyes widened as if Bruce was the one who was mad. "Of course not, it will kill him. We were using these subjects to try and filter the equation out of human DNA. To see if the answer was there. But your friend Clark, he is Kryptonian but you know that, don't you?"

Bruce allowed his expression to betray nothing.

"Curious thing about Kryptonians, they were the most technological advanced race that existed in the last twenty thousand years. They had no peer anywhere in the universe, absolutely brilliant the lot of them. But unfortunately, short sighted. Their arrogance in the belief that their sun Rao could explode never even occurred to them and when it finally did, it was too late. They had knowledge that took centuries for other races to acquire and in the end, they couldn't even save themselves. The only survivor of their planet was the result of one terrified father's paranoia. Sad really."

And with a flash of insight, Bruce realised what Clark's role in all this was. "You think Clark knows," he stared at Canto. "You think his Kryptonian DNA, whatever, has the answer to this equation?"

Canto smiled and applauded, "Bravo Mr. Wayne. Bravo."

Chapter Sixteen:

Frankenstein's Monster Comes Home

In the story, the ugly duckling looked into her reflection and was beautiful.

All Valerie Beaudry had ever wanted was to look at her reflection and not turn away in disgust. She wanted to go outside into the world and be counted, not some outcast that needed to be hidden away at all costs but a person in her own right. Was it such a terrible thing to want to belong or to be loved? She had not thought so and everything that had brought to this moment in time, was done so that she could feel that someone loved her.

She just had not counted that the price for that external beauty would be her soul.

Her parents were dead. The friends who had shielded her were now facing anguish and loss because of her; Clark’s loss of his incredible powers and Bruce’s abduction and possible death at the hands of her pursuers. All this because she had trusted the wrong man, a man who claimed he’d loved her. She had been such a fool and Hank had played her. He’d used her, turned her into this creation and unleashed it upon the world.

She’d killed to stay free. She’d destroyed those who dared to give her shelter. When she saw Chloe’s anguish at the possibility that Bruce was dead, Valerie knew that she could not allow this to continue any further. She’d been a coward who’d let the others do the fighting for her and now it was time to deal with Hank and DeSaad herself. Whatever happened, she would endanger no one else.

Having stolen the device that allowed them to track Bruce Wayne, Valerie had studied the small display and followed the trail to the last place the signal had been detected before it was so abruptly silenced. Compelled onwards by Chloe’s terrified cry when that signal had died because the woman had assumed the worst, Valerie drove the vehicle she had stolen as it took her out of Metropolis. She’d left New Troy Island behind her and was beyond the city limits when she arrived at long last at her destination.

It was a state of the art complex a good ten miles off the main highway and she approached the tall, mesh fences that seemed to surround it, there was no denying the menace that emanated from the place. The facility stretched across the landscape, with too many windowless buildings and men patrolling the ground with dogs, men with guns strapped to their side, who looked unafraid to use them. She could see cameras perched on the tops of fences, their lenses scrutinizing the terrain with machine efficiency, missing nothing.

No doubt when the car had rolled down the road towards the main sentry box, they had seen her. She had no doubt as she brought the car to a slow halt, that Hank was already preparing the line he would use to calm her down, to assure her that this had been some terrible mistake. She almost could hear the words he would use, the smile he had charmed her with, the one he had used to convince her to let her become DeSaad’s guinea pigs.

Alright then, Hank, I’m here.

Frankenstein’s monster had come home.

*****

“Now the question of the day,” Canto stared at Bruce from the access panel behind which he was standing, “what do we do with you?”

Earlier, Bruce had seen the man’s hand move subtly across the workstation as they’d been talking. He wasn’t stupid. He didn’t think that Canto was giving him all this information about the improbable Anti-Life Equation for conversation. No, Canto had been stalling for time. Bruce had no doubt that even now, Corben and his goon squad were racing here to retrieve him and Bruce had no illusions that they intended to keep him alive. He was human and knew their secret. It was a secret they intended to keep.

“I have a few ideas of my own,” Bruce remarked as he retreated up the way he came.

Canto seemed to expect this and emerged from the work station, approaching Bruce one step at a time. Bruce studied him quickly and saw no sign of a gun. Of course that meant nothing. Canto was a mystery and in this menagerie of horror, where humans could be turned into mutations of life, anything was possible. “I’m afraid that’s not possible.”

“I gathered as much,” Bruce shifted his gaze to the ventilation shaft, calculating the amount of time it would take to get there and whether or not he could avoid Canto before that happened. “I take it that goon squad of yours in one their way here?”

Canto broke into a grin. “Mr Wayne, you surprised me and that’s not often done. This doesn’t have to end badly. You’re a resourceful man, perhaps the most resourceful I’ve encountered since my time here, and you could do worse than to ally yourself with me.”

Bruce nodded. “I suppose I could,” he was still moving slowly towards the vent. “But I’ve never been one to make the best decisions.”

Canto’s expression darkened, his eyes narrowing with calculation. “That is a shame….” He started to stay when suddenly the cell phone in his jacket began buzzing.

It was enough of an opening. Bruce sprinted forward, running in full strides as Canto looked up and cursed behind him. The man bolted after Bruce and had he looked behind, the Gothamite would have been surprised by how fast Canto could move. In a matter of strides, he was almost caught up to Bruce, choosing to ignore the phone that continued to buzz, demanding attention.

His suspicions about Canto’s ability proven somewhat correct, Bruce knew he could not be recapture. This time, he had no element of surprise even if they left him alive long enough to plan another escape, which he doubted. Making a running jump for the open mouth of the vent, Bruce leapt through the small space and slid forward when he landed, just as he felt Canto’s hands make a grab for a foot.

The smooth surface and the velocity, in which he had entered the shaft, propelled him forward across the floor on his belly out of Canto’s reach. Before he came to a stop, Bruce had already started scrambling forward, putting as much distance between them as he disappeared around the corner. He glanced briefly over his shoulder and saw Canto making no mood to pursue him, most likely deciding that it was work better suited for the paid muscle.

“Keep running Mr Wayne,” Canto called out ominously, “but you can’t hide forever, we will find you.”

Not if I can help it you sick sons of bitches, Bruce thought and continued moving, mapping out in his head what came next and how he was going to get to Clark. He had to warn Clark to stay the hell away from here because Canto and his people were insane and they’d dissect Clark into tiny little pieces to find the answer to their equation.

******

While they didn’t have the tracking device that Valerie had stolen to lead her to where Bruce was being held, Chloe and Lois had the next best thing; the GPS tracer on the vehicle she’d stolen to get there. Oliver Queen had ensured that all his vehicles had been tagged with GPS devices and it had been a relative simple process for Chloe to hack into his tracking system to find out exactly where Valerie had gone.

Their pursuit had taken them out of Metropolis to its outskirts, on the other side of the river where the industrial area thinned out into undeveloped land covered with tall grass. Instead of driving all the way down the small road that diverted off the highway, Lois and Chloe had pulled up a good mile before the tracking signal had stopped, hiding their car in the wild grass.

“We should have waited for Ollie,” Chloe frowned, “or get some help.” She said walking through the grass, swatting bugs and errand blades of out of her face. It wasn’t that she was afraid to go rescue Bruce because frankly, the waiting had been driving her insane but Chloe was accustomed to being the voice of reason when faced with her cousins driven recklessness. “If we get captured, we’re only going to give them the ammunition to make Bruce or Clark do whatever they want.”

“We’re not going to get caught,” Lois snorted, throwing her cousin a withering look. “We’re just going to see where she is and then head out. Hell we might even be able to call the police, tell them they kidnapped her and Bruce.”

Of course Lois knew that the police would do nothing to help the situation because who knew what Valerie would say once she was back in Hank’s power and Bruce was probably too well hidden for any cop to find him during a routine search. However, the tactic might buy them time until Clark got here. Inwardly, Lois feared that Clark wouldn’t get here in time or worse yet, he’d get here without his powers and they’d be in the same position, except that DeSaad would have two bargaining pieces, not just one.

Chloe’s expression was dubious as to the effectiveness of the police in this matter but she held her tongue for the moment. The truth was, she wanted to see for herself that Bruce was okay, that the sudden deactivation of the implant he’d been wearing was because it had been damaged and not because he was dead. The need in her was strong enough to override good sense which was why she had agreed to this in the first place. However, that didn’t stop the tendrils of doubt from creeping in at the first opportunity.

They had been walking up a slight hill, shielded by the vegetation and preventing them from seeing was up ahead. However as they reached the top, Lois immediately grabbed Chloe’s arm and dropped to her knees, diving for cover in the grass.

“What?” Chloe hissed, keeping her voice down just in case. Her nerves shot already, she watched Lois give her the quiet signal before glancing ahead.

In front of them, on the other side of the hill, surrounded by a chain mail fence that issued warnings of electrocution through angry red signs was an industrial complex that was the source of the GPS signal given off by Valerie’s vehicle. The fence was patrolled by security guards accompanied by dogs not to mention the security cameras that were mounted high so the perimeter would be under surveillance at all times.

“I think they’re in there,” Lois said sarcastically as she stated the obvious.

“Yeah,” Chloe nodded in agreement. “The whole place says ‘go away’.”

Lois pulled out the binoculars she had stashed in her backpack when she’d ‘borrowed’ a couple of things from Ollie’s workshop at the clock tower. Peering through it, she examined the compound, noted that the buildings were not very tall but she saw a lot of concrete on the ground and the vast dimensions of the place made her wonder if there was more going on underneath the facility than above it.

“I can’t see Valerie’s car,” Lois remarked.

“They probably got it out of sight as soon as she showed up.” Chloe offered. “She must have given herself up. There’s no way they could get close enough to her to take her captive without Valerie turning the place inside out.”

“Why would she do that?” Lois shook her head in disbelief. “She can’t possibly think these guys would be just satisfied with getting their hands on her. Not after what they did to Clark.” Even as Lois thought that, the memory of Clark bloodied and bleeding flashed in her and made her shudder.

“I don’t know,” Chloe returned, wishing she could see more than buildings and scary looking security guards trolling the compound. “I don’t think she’s naïve enough to believe that, not after what they did to her parents or think that there’s a way to placate…..” her voice drifted off as an ugly thought filled her head.

Lois saw the realization dawn on her cousin’s face, “what?”

“Lois,” Chloe looked up swallowing thickly, “what if she didn’t come here to give herself up. We don’t know how strong her powers actually are? There’s only so much a person can take, what if they’ve pushed her too far?”

*******

The first time she had come face to face with Hank, her heart had been beating so fast she could hardly breathe. He was everything she’d wanted; a handsome, charming man who saw past her ugliness and loved her. Every digital word he’d written was cherished and during the empty nights in her bed after she’d found him, she read them over and over again, convincing herself that this wasn’t some dream that he was real.

Later on when they met face to face and he gave her the means to make her beautiful beyond anything she could have imagined, she still couldn’t believe he was real. Studying herself in the mirror at the graceful, elfin creature she’d become, she was overcome so many times, with the emotion of gratitude that someone, somewhere had loved her; Valerie.

However, now as she was brought to him within the cold heart of the complex, having surrendered to the security guards at the gate, she knew that she had been right to doubt. It was a dream, all of it, an illusion of what she had so desperately wanted and he had used it. He had used her. Hank, with his charming smile and movie star good looks, who oozed poetry from his words because he knew what it was she needed to here to do as he wished.

“Val, baby!” He crossed the expensive rug of the office she’d been brought into and wrapped her in an embrace as if he were a lover worried for her welfare and not because one of his lab rats had escaped her cage. Behind her, she could imagine the man Corben and the other guards and hired mercenary snorting in derision.

The imagination wasn’t so far from the truth because they were. Inside the office, deep in the heart of the complex, a place they had to take an elevator to reach, Corben met Cobb’s gaze as they made contact while he was still hugging Valerie. A smile of triumph on his lips indicated that he was still able to pull Valerie’s strings. A little bit of kindness and he’d have the little freak on her hands and knees, begging for it.

Dumb fuck, Corben thought watching the display. Was she really buying his act?

Whether or not she was, Corben was taking no chances. Every guard in the room had tranq guns and were ready to fire if the insipid cow so much as looked at Corben the wrong way. After what had happened earlier, he was damned if he was going to let the girl get the upper hand as she did during their earlier encounters, with or without her Kryptonian protector.

“I’m sorry Hank,” Valerie said trying to remain unaffected by his embrace, her mind immediately thinking of all the nights when he’d made ardent love to her, telling Valerie all the things she wanted to hear. His warmth provoked the flame in her chest, though the passion he intended to generate was not affection but rather anger. “I’m sorry that nothing you said was ever real.” She shoved him away.

Hank’s expression showed nothing but dismay. “Val, how can you think that? Didn’t I do everything I promised? Look at you honey,” he touched her chin. “You’re beautiful. You’re the most beautiful woman in the world now because of me. I gave you that. I wouldn’t have given you that if I didn’t love you.”

Her eyes misted over because she wanted so much to believe him but it was always a lie. “You also turned me into a monster and killed my parents!” She hissed.

Behind her Corben nodded at his men who were on standby with their weapons when it looked like Cobb’s slick tongue was going to get him out of trouble with the girl.

“That wasn’t me…” Hank started to say but Valerie cut him off.

“Stop lying to me!” She shouted through her tears. “You destroyed everything, my parents, my body and now my friends!”

Suddenly without warning, Hank’s arm shot out, the tazer in his hand caught Valerie under her rib cage, delivering enough of a charge for the girl to stagger back, her body jerking around like a marionette. His expression of sympathy and kindness became dark with menace and derision.

“COBB, what the fuck!” Corben shouted as Valerie fell on the ground.

Hank didn’t answer him. Instead he crossed bent down to where Valerie was spasming on the rug and back handed across the face, a rush of blood escaping her broken nose. She was in too much pain to be able to react to the blow out of utter contempt.

“Damn right it was a lie, you little cunt!” He snorted, making sure that she got a look at his face through her glazed eyes. “I paid some little tech geek to write all that crap for me. You think I actually was actually at the keyboard writing all that crap you were salivating over every night? You think I have to use that shit to get a woman… a real woman into the sack? You are a fucking freak, long before I met you! But you were what the Boss wanted so I fed you a carrot and watched you run after it. When I fucked you, I had to get drunk first. It was the only way I could manage getting it up with a dog like you! You want the truth Val, there it is. Have a nice fucking day.”

Corben was on the man in a second, furious with disbelief. He grabbed Hank and shoved him against the wall. “What the hell do you think you’re doing? Do you know what you’ve done?”

“I gave the little cooze what she deserved!” The man hissed.

“You just shot her up with 50000 volts!” Corben slammed an elbow over the man’s neck, fairly tempted to break his neck for his stupidity and arrogance. “We can’t use the tranqs without killing her!”

Hank’s eyes widened in realization.

It wasn’t possible for Valerie to believe that anything could hurt more than the tazer he’d hit her with but each word were cuts in her flesh, every cruel thing he’d said had drawn blood. As Valerie’s thoughts gained coherence, she processed everything he’d said and realized how big a fool she’d been. She’d known he’d used her but she’d never suspected to what extent and now…now… it was worse than a lie. She had no name for what he’d done to her. The rage expanded inside her like a ball of white hot rage, permeating every corner, until her thoughts became inflamed with it, until the world in front of her eyes went from rosy to red and then black. It made her shake, made her fists clench and until it reached her skin and had no way to go except one.

Rushing up her throat like bile, it escaped her in a howl of anguish from a dying animal preparing for the end.

******

He needed to stop. Needed to catch his breath.

The injuries sustained during his torture were taking its toll on Bruce and he knew there would come a point where will alone would not allow him to continue, no matter how much of it he had. Wounded and pushed beyond the limits of his endurance, Bruce scrambled through the seemingly labyrinthine vents and air shafts that ran throughout the DeSaad complex, seeking a way out.

As it was, his ability to remain concealed indefinitely in the hollows of the facility was

dwindling as the search parties began to invade the spaces in an effort of track him down. So far, he’d avoided to near misses but Bruce was a realist, he was in pain and exhausted while his captives were fresh and many. He couldn’t keep out of their reach forever. Furthermore, the strain on his limbs, crawling on all fours, his back hunched was starting to cause his muscles to cramp up, adding a further strain to his body.

Bruce paused, catching his breath that was determined to escape him in loud pants, the sweat running down his face and his limbs from the narrow confines was not aiding his situation. Wiping his brow with his forearm, he looked up ahead to another vent and took a moment to rest before approach it to see where it might lead to. Light poured through it through louvers, illuminating the dark space slightly and attracting Bruce to it like a moth to the flame.

There were voices talking and for a moment Bruce considered heading away but those voices made no effort to conceal themselves which told Bruce they weren’t Corben or his men. If they were tracking him, they’d be silent. He was almost to the grate when suddenly he heard a scream. An angered, tortured scream that seemed to tear a whole in the world. It belonged to a woman and with surge of alarm, Bruce realized he recognized it.

Valerie.

It was his last thought before the entire world went mad.

Valerie’s anguished cry was only a prelude to the full torrent of her rage and when she sucked in air and screamed again, the walls around him were suddenly swept like leaves caught in hurricane. Metal ripped with a high pitched screech that would have made Bruce wince if not for the fact that he was too busy trying to hold onto something and failing because everything around him was in the same position, hurtling through the air, caught in a gale, helplessly.

The force in which Valerie unleashed her fury tore not only the room apart but also the building. As Bruce hurtled through the air, undoubtedly rushing to meet his eminent death when he landed, he found himself caught in a shockwave that was radiating outward with Valerie at its epicentre. Disorientated as he tumbled through the air with no control whatsoever and being bombarded by virtually anything on the ground that had been caught in the wake of Valerie’s rage, he was battered and bruised, getting bloodier by the minute.

If the landing didn’t kill him, the assault by the wreckage in the maelstrom would.

Even with his heightened senses, he could barely make out what was happening on the ground, there was too much flying at him and past him for Bruce to focus clearly. However, what he could see was the DeSaad facility crumbling around Valerie. The large sprawl was being demolished in a manner not unlike those film clips of the 1950’s showing the effect of an atomic explosion on a model Nevada town.

He could see her continuing to scream, until it was not just his body that was in the air. He saw others, some where alive, arms flaying, trying to find some way to get to the ground without dying, while others had not been so lucky. Like Bruce, they too had been assaulted by the wreckage and had not survived it. The facility had completely destroyed but Valerie was not done yet, he could still hear her banshee’s wail through the rushing of air through his ears as he started to descend, the ground rushing up to greet him.

He was going to die, he realized and for the first time in his life, he was rather at a loss at what to do. He had no tricks to play, no clever way to get himself out of the situation. For once, Bruce was completely helpless and it was going to cost him everything. He closed his eyes, trying to shut out Valerie’s sonic onslaught and the pain that gripped his body. Coming to the conclusion that he would not fight death when there was no way to escape it, Bruce chose to meet his end by revisiting the things that held any meaning for him and the person that mattered most.

Chloe.

Of all the things he would miss, it was the life he would have had with her that stung the most. She had brought light into his life when he did not think it possible to every have any part of his soul brightened again. Furthermore, it rankled knowing that he could have made her happy. Him, Bruce Wayne who was tragically wounded from childhood, was capable of making anyone happy was revelation. Yet, he knew with certainty that he could have given Chloe that. Now it was too….

“I got you Bruce.”

Bruce blinked and opened his eyes to see Clark having a firm grip on him, halting his crash landing and superseding it with a controlled descent.

Stupefied and yet eternally grateful, Bruce managed a hoarse reply. “Clark?”

“Yeah,” Clark smiled and nodded, not needing to elaborate that his visit to Jor-El had not been in vain. As the gale from Valerie’s onslaught continued to bellow around them, Clark said with similar gratitude and relief that he was able to get here in time, that he was able to save his best friend.

“I got your back Bruce,” he declared. “I got your back.”

And Bruce was never more grateful for that in his life than at this moment.

Chapter Seventeen:

Pandora

In the story the ugly duckling becomes the swan and is loved.

But that story had never been hers. Hers was the story of Pandora. A cautionary tale of wanting too much and then learning in the worst possible way that wanting a thing and having were two distinct things. In Pandora’s case, she was forever despised for unleashing destruction upon the entire human race.

As Valerie stood in the epicentre of destruction, her powerful scream reducing everything about her to rubble, she prayed that it would destroy her too. The violent fury that had propelled her at the onset of this was exhausting itself, the pent up rage nearly spent and in its wake there was nothing but cold, empty despair. For this visage of beauty, she had sacrificed everything; her family, her friends and her soul.

The debris above her head was a swirling vortex of ruin, some of it had landed but most of it was still in the air. Within the maelstrom she could see objects hurtling about and was reminded of the leaves in the park caught by a particularly focused gale. Trees had become uprooted, ripped away from the ground, their roots dangling beneath them, the earth struggling to keep them alive in clumps of soil. A computer monitor screen, a piece of glass from a broken window and a fragment of shattered concrete made up the mix.

The ground beneath her had fissured, the sonic assault had dug out a crater and she wondered fleetingly if she screamed loud enough, would the world crack open like an egg and swallow her? She didn’t care, she wanted to obliterate everything, to fight off the empty despair with anything as long as she didn’t feel the pain. If it had to be mindless violence then so be it.

Suddenly her eyes caught sight of something in the maelstrom and the screaming died abruptly in her throat. The voice withering out of her like her soul being burnt from her flesh. Amidst the destruction of metal, plastic and wood, Valerie saw something that made her blood run cold.

A body.

Ruined and bloodied, it belonged to a woman and was being jerked about like a marionette under the control of an unskilled puppeteer. She was not alone. It was more than just one body but rather bodies. How many of them were there? She hadn’t even considered the innocents that might have been employed by DeSaad, not the puppet masters that had turned her into this terrible thing but the office workers and the custodial staff who had no idea what it was their corporation really did for its profit. People who were now dead because of her. Collateral damage to her rage.

Valerie tumbled to her knees, doubling over in a sob as the sky started to rain the airborne debris around her ears as she withdrew her power from the storm above her. She barely noticed the deadly barrage that could very well bury her, paying no heed to the tremors in the ground as the collective rubble of DeSaad complex was scattered across the landscape.

What she did hear was a powerful explosion of sound, a near deafening boom that did not come from her. Lifting her head, she saw and then blinked once or twice, as Michael Canto emerged out fissure radiating bright, white light that materialized out of thin air, with no discernible source. For an instance, Valerie did not know what she was seeing. It was as if he’d found a way to rip through reality.

He stepped out and looked at the devastation and began to applaud.

“Brava! Valerie.” His grin broad, he approached her without fear, lowering himself to his feet to take her hand. “Come now my dear, this is not the time to weep. Look at what you have done. Its magnificent.”

“Its not magnificent!” She spat, scrambling backwards as if his attempt to comfort was scalding. “All those people…” she glanced at a body of a man she could see not far away from her, lying in a pile of wreckage that comprised of a chair, a bathroom sink and torn partitions of a wall. “I killed all those people…” she began to sob with large gasps.

“Yes you did,” Canto agreed but for him this was not a bad thing, though for the sake of the present argument, he hid that fact from the girl. “That’s because you have little or no control over your powers. Nothing great is simply given Valerie,” he closed the distance between them and took her hand, “it has to be earned by work and focus. You were made this thing and I regret that you weren’t nurtured, that things became as bad as it did but it doesn’t have to be this way. Hank Cobb lied to you, he was a salesman and he treated you like property, I won’t.”

Valerie wanted to protest but he was right, this had happened because of rage. She had killed people because she could not control this thing that had been done to her. She couldn’t allow that to continue. Too many had been hurt because of her already. Wiping her tears, she looked at him with wet eyes. “What…what do you want me to do?”

*****

It was the hill that saved them.

There had been no time to react when Lois heard that scream. Jolted into action by the memory of what had followed when she last heard Valerie raise her voice to the heavens, Lois didn’t wait to see the imminent destruction. She simply grabbed Chloe and ran, aware that they had almost no time to get clear of what was coming. Dragging her cousin back the way they’d come, Chloe offered no protest as she as she heard the roar of wind and rushing wave of power erupting behind them. It overtook them easily and swept them off their feet like rag dolls, throwing them forward until they landed face first in the dirt and crushed grass.

There was no time to recover as they scrambled on their hands and knees to take shelter behind the steep incline of the hill, using it to shield themselves from the devastating wave of Valerie’s siren cry. As they pressed their backs against the ground, they saw the full extent of Valerie Beaudry’s rage. Cars and telephone poles flew over their heads, people were flung past them screaming, flaying their arms wildly as they were caught by the violent expulsion of energy like debris. Hiding in the shadow of the hill, there was nothing to do but gape in transfixed horror as the destruction passed them over like an arch angel on a mission.

Even though they were keeping their heads down, huddled together as they tried to avoid being hit by the raining torrent of debris and objects landing haphazardly around them like artillery fire, Lois could see the fear in Chloe’s eyes was not out of fear of her own safety or that of her cousin. No, Chloe was thinking about Bruce, clinging to hope that he could have survived this carnage even though what they had seen so far was rapidly discounting the possibility.

Suddenly something wet and heavy landed a few feet away from them, a sickly squelching sound that somehow penetrated the noise around them. It was the body of man whose white coverall were now stained with dirt and blood. His features unrecognizable as he lay dead and the image of him, snapped the last vestiges of reason in Chloe.

“BRUCE!” She exclaimed and started frantically crawling up the hill, trying to get to the top so that she could see what was happening and maybe find him.

“Chloe!” Lois cried out and scrambled after her. “Come back!”

Chloe wasn’t listening. Unlike Lois, she wasn’t given to impulsiveness. Being Clark Kent’s friend had taught her patience but seeing that body was more than she could stand. She loved Bruce Wayne more than she’d ever loved any man, even more than that girlish crush on Clark so many years ago. The thought that everything that he was, the extraordinary man he had made himself, dying so soon after she found him was beyond her ability to imagine. Climbing up the hill, her fingers digging in the dirt, she was determined that if she couldn’t find him, then she wanted to die with him.

“Chloe! Are you crazy….” Lois shouted when suddenly the chaos came to an abrupt halt. Objects fell down around their heads and Lois had to pull her legs under her chin in a fetal position to stop from being hit.

Chloe reached the crest of the hill and looked at the place where DeSaad had been. It looked like the middle of a war zone. There were fragments and debris everywhere. She was reminded of a scene she’d seen in the news once, on the site a plane had crashed. Even the grass on the hill was flattened. Where DeSaad had been as a small crater surrounded by wreckage. Chloe couldn’t even begin to imagine where Bruce might be in all this.

Lois was still covering her head in her hands when she heard something that made her look up, a subtle breath of a wind that was familiar to her. What she saw made her expelled the air from her lungs in a soft, grateful gasp as two familiar figures began to descend from the sky.

“Clark!” She called out, not caring who heard. Clark was flying! Not only was she overjoyed at seeing him but she was relieved that he had been made whole again. So much of him lay in his ability to help people. Lois had been so afraid that had Clark lost that ability, it would have left his spirit even more crippled than his body.

At Lois’ cry, Chloe looked over her shoulder and saw Clark descending…with Bruce. She let out a strangled sob of relief and practically tumbled down the hill to join her cousin who was running towards the two men.

Lois’ joy at seeing Clark was short lived when she saw what state Bruce was in. There didn’t seem to be an inch of Bruce’s upper body that wasn’t covered with a bruise of some kind. His face was just as badly injured and it was hard to remember that his was a face that graced magazine covers on a daily basis.

“Oh my God Bruce,” Lois glanced at Clark who looked sombre. “He’s alright but we need to get him to a hospital.”

“Bruce!” Chloe exclaimed and threw her arms around Bruce, embracing him even though it was Clark who was holding him up. “You came back to me,” she was weeping as she took his ravaged face in her hands covered it in kisses.

“Always,” Bruce whispered, savouring her touch, grateful for her after what he’d been through today.

With one hand still firmly gripped around Bruce’s arm to keep the man on his feet as he and Chloe continued their reunion, Clark also found himself on the receiving end of a heated kiss as Lois wrapped one arm around him and pulled him close. Never one able to refuse Lois anything, Clark allowed himself to savour the warmth of her mouth after the cold hostility in the fortress. When she pulled back, her eyes were shinning with happiness.

“It worked,” she said without him needing to explain.

“Yeah,” Clark nodded, “but it wasn’t any fun getting that stuff out of me.” He admitted readily. Nor was he able to shake the warning given by Jor-El that sooner or later, his refusal to train would bring harm to someone he loved. However, Clark didn’t want to spoil the moment between him and Lois by dredging that up today.

“Clark,” Bruce spoke up, reminding them that there was still unfinished business left with DeSaad, even if their facility was destroyed. “We need to find Valerie.”

“Valerie!” Lois exclaimed remembering the cause of all this destruction. “We followed her here. She snuck out of the clock tower and stole one of Ollie’s cars.”

“We tried to catch up to her before she gave herself up,” Chloe took up the narrative, still holding on to Bruce. “We were too late.”

“Could she still be alive?” Lois asked, not expecting an answer.

“Let me check,” Clark said automatically, turning his head in the direction of the site where DeSaad used to stand, scanning the debris covered plain for any sign of the girl. “I see her…she’s not alone. She’s with some guy. Well dressed.”

“Describe him,” Bruce said quickly, the adrenaline coursing through his body and the respite from Clark’s rescue allowing him to regain some strength. He started to disengage himself from the Kryptonian’s grip and stand on his own two feet.

“It sounds like Canto,” he declared when Clark gave him a description. “Clark we need to get to her.”

“I’ll go,” he said quickly, preparing to leave. “You get Bruce to a hospital…”

“I’m going with you,” Bruce said firmly, having none of that.

“What no Bruce,” Chloe protested. “You’re in no shape to deal with DeSaad and Valerie if she goes critical again.” She had refused to let him go, too shaken by his injuries to let him go.

“Bruce she’s right,” Clark answered, still concerned about Bruce’s state. “I got this.”

“Clark you can’t go by yourself,” Bruce said firmly, his jaw set as he faced off his best friend. “Canto is not human, I’m sure of it. He spoke about Krypton like he knew it personally and considering that he knew what blue kryptonite does, it’s a safe bet to assume that if you went at him again he might have some other trick up his sleep.”

“Not human?” Lois exclaimed, another flash of Clark’s bleeding body surfaced in her mind and suddenly, she wasn’t all that agreeable to let him go off on his own either.

“Yes,” Bruce nodded, “I got loose when they captured me and I ran into him, Michael Canto. Clark he’s believes that the key to solving some universal equation of mind control lies in DNA. Specifically your DNA because you’re from Krypton. He thinks that because the Kryptonians were so advanced technologically it’s your genes that may have the answer. You can’t fall into his hands again. I saw what they were doing to people in there,” he turned away and gestured to the wreckage before them. “Not all the bodies in this mess worked for DeSaad, There were people being mutated in some kind of maturation tank. Whatever they did to Valerie, they were doing to hundreds.”

“Then we should wait,” Chloe interjected, happy at the idea of either of them going. What Bruce had said made Clark their prize and what he knew, would need silencing permanently.

Clark took all this in and recalled what Bruce had taught him these last few weeks about his power making him reckless. “I won’t leave her,” Clark said firmly, wanting it clear that he wasn’t going to leave Valerie to her fate just to save himself.

“Then don’t,” Bruce understood the conflict in his eyes but knew that Clark was in the mind to listen to alternatives. “But I’m coming with you.”

“Bruce….” Chloe started to protest, torn by the desire to help Valerie and her fears for his life. “I just got you back.” She tried not to sound so weak but she couldn’t help it.

“Hey,” Bruce took her face in his hands and kissed her lips gently, “I got this far didn’t I?” He asked, his eyes filled with affection. “I’m just going along to make sure Clark doesn’t do anything stupid.”

“Thanks,” Clark shot him a withering look and then asked in a more sober tone. “Bruce, are you up to this?” He had to hear it from the man himself. The evidence of his eyes indicated otherwise but Bruce Wayne was no ordinary human. Sheer will drove him and weakness was something he would not submit to, no matter what the price. In some ways, he was a harder task master on himself that Lionel Luther was on Lex. However, Bruce’s ambitions for himself had a nobler purpose and at the heart of him, once you got past the granite, was a good man trying hard to remember what it was to connect.

“I’ll be fine,” Bruce answered, seeing that Clark didn’t doubt his word and took some pride in that. It was good to have a friend who understood you on a fundamental level.

“Smallville,” Lois started to speak but Clark cut her off, perfectly aware of what was coming.

“You and Chloe, get back to the car and wait there,” he ordered. “No arguments Lane.”

“But…” Lois wanted to protest but the intensity of his blue eyes on her silenced her. She hated being left behind, it cut to the core of insecurities but she also trusted this man more than any other. If he asked, she would do because he wasn’t asking it lightly of her or Chloe. If this was a bad as Bruce indicated, her presence and that of Chloe’s would only be a hindrance to Clark and possibly leverage if this Canto wanted the upper hand. No she couldn’t let that happen.

“Alright,” she conceded defeat, glancing at Chloe to back her up on this because begrudgingly, she knew it was the right call. “We’ll go. You just be careful.” She gave him a quick hug and backed off.

“Ditto,” Chloe whispered, her gaze meeting Bruce’s. It should have been easier for her to do this, after all these years of watching Clark hurry off to fight one enemy after another but it wasn’t. Not when it came to Bruce.

“I’ll be okay,” he assured her, kissing her on the forehead before turning to Clark, “let’s go finish this.”

*****

“Take my hand Valerie,” Canto gave Valerie Beaudry his hand. “Take my hand and you’ll never be alone again. I promise.”

Valerie hesitated. What Canto offered was inviting but she knew that Hank had offered her things too and it had been all gone wrong. Yet she could not refuse him despite her fear because she had understood a few things herself as she stood amongst the destruction she had caused.

She was dangerous.

“Where are we going?” She asked half heartedly even though she knew the answer did not matter. She would go with him nonetheless. Besides, the question was rhetorical because the answer lay beyond that fissure radiating energy behind him. Beyond it was a world she did not know or could possibly imagine. It was a world she might not be able to escape once entering but seeing what carnage she had wrought in this one, there was no doubt she would not go.

“To a world where power is appreciated,” Canto replied, paying the question lip service because it was the usual human nonsense that was making her ask these things. Still, he knew that it was necessary to play the part she needed, just a little longer. “We will show your how to refine your talents, turn your scream into song. Isn’t this what you wanted?” He asked, gazing at her intently,

It was.

And with that decision solidifying in her brain, Valerie wiped the moisture of her damp cheeks, swallowed away her hesitation and fear for good, deciding then and there that she would have no more to do with it and closed her fists around his hand.

“Yes,” she nodded. Its what I want. Take me away from this. Take me away before I hurt anyone else.”

“That’s what I wanted to hear Valerie, my beautiful siren,” he smiled at her, flashing her those movie star looks that women so often surrendered to. “My beautiful swan.” He said leading her towards the portal.

“Valerie, don’t do it!” Clark Kent’s voice halted them both in their steps.

Clark had landed on the ground a respectful distance away from the duo, mindful of Bruce’s warning about Canto’s knowledge of his Kryptonian heritage and more specifically how to neutralize his abilities. Canto and DeSaad had already once robbed him of his powers, Clark was not giving them the opportunity to do it again.

“Mr. Kent,” Canto’s eyes lit up, suddenly filled with the warm, glowing prospect that he may not only deliver a swan but also a Kryptonian. “Finally we meet. It’s a pleasure.”

The charming smile that Canto had offered to Valerie to cajole her into going with him turned into something more serpentine and calculating, though Clark doubted that Valerie saw it.

“I wish I could say the same,” Clark retorted, trying to use his enhanced vision to see what was inside the fissure but it would not penetrate the energy radiating from it. However, he had enough experience with portals, particularly those that on occasion had deposited him in the Phantom Zone, to know that what was on the other side was probably not good. As it was, he could hear something odd emanating from it, the sound of wings beating, the way a flock of geese made when they flying south.

“Clark go away,” Valerie declared, “I know what I’m doing.” She insisted. “I’m hurting too many people with my powers. I can’t control it and I’ve brought you nothing but danger and pain.” She looked at him and implored him to leave her because she did not want to be talked out of her decision.

“Valerie, I know this sounds like the easy way out but it isn’t,” Clark tried to convince her. “This man, isn’t what he says he is!” Clark turned to him, inching closer, intending to spirit Valerie away before either of them had a chance to act. As Bruce had instructed, he had to use his head. “You’re going to use her for your equation aren’t you?” He accused.

“Oh I think Valerie understands all too well what I am,” Canto answered nonplussed by the mention of the Anti-Life Equation, “and what she is. In my world, she will be celebrated, a sword that will be sharpened and tempered. An instrument of power and envy, not revulsion and exploitation. You can come too Clark, you could be second to none in my world, a warrior and a new god. A king if you wish it. All you have to do is join me.”

Clark knew a ‘dark side’ pitch when he heard one and he wasn’t biting. “No,” Clark shook his head. “I think got what you’re selling and its no interest to me.” He said finally risking the use of his powers by racing ahead, disappearing in a blink of an eye as he moved across the place like a red blur towards Valerie.

Suddenly two strobes of reddish energy shot out through the crack and struck Clark full in the hest before he could reach her. The power that hit him was like nothing Clark had ever felt in his life. It struck him the way a bat would hit a ball and send the damn thing out of the park. Clark was halted in his steps and thrown across the ground like a rag doll. He slammed into the earth, plough a trail in his wake before hitting a pile of wreckage, his whole body aching.

What the hell was that? Clark managed to think disjointedly.

“Clark!” He heard Valerie cry out. “Please let me go.” She begged.

“Come my dear,” Canto declared, reaching for something in his jacket and as they continued towards the fissure. The object in his hand looked like somewhat stylized version of the modern I Phone, though Canto knew that it was farthest thing from the truth. “Its time go."

“Valerie, don’t,” Clark got to his feet shakily, feeling the pain of that blast through his invulnerability but refusing to let it stop him. “There are people here who can help you, who care about you,” he tried once more to reach her. “Don’t give up on us.”

“Clark you don’t understand,” Valerie shook her head, “I’m giving up on me.”

The beating wings that Clark could hear was growing louder and it took him an instant to know that it was coming through the portal. He couldn’t see what was coming but it didn’t take a genius to realize that it was not something he wanted to unleash into this world. Making another effort to reach Valerie again, Clark shot forward when suddenly the beams of energy shot through the opening again and this time Clark moved to avoid it except…

…it followed him.

The beams were following him. Suddenly, Clark found himself on the defensive, racing to outrun the beams of energy that appeared to have a will of their own. He zigzagged in and out of the piles of wreckage, hoping to dispel it against the debris but there was no such respite. The beams of energy continued to chase and Clark wondered if he could outrun them indefinitely.

“Michael,” Valerie shot the man a look. “Stop it! I said I’d go with you.”

“This is not your affair Valerie,” Canto said coolly, “my master needs the Kryptonian and I aim to bring Clark to him.”

“No I won’t let you!,” Valerie hissed, not about to let the man harm Clark. She was leaving with him because she wanted to keep from endangering the friends who had gone out of their way to help her, despite the personal cost. She opened her mouth to scream, to halt this but Canto was too fast for her, anticipating the reaction. Grabbing her by the arms, he shoved her into the fissure before she could utter her destructive siren cry.

The scream Valerie finally emitted as she disappeared into the light was as piercing as any she’d uttered before but unfortunately for her, too little too late.

*****

Bruce Wayne watched in secret.

He’d asked Clark to set him down a short distance away from where Valerie was, so he could approach stealthily and act if it was necessary, if Clark found himself on the defensive as he was now. He’d made his way through the obstacle of wreckage and debris that was the former DeSaad facility, hoping that he wouldn’t have to step in. However, as he felt the rush of wind that was generated as Clark ran to avoid the energy beams chasing him, Bruce knew he had to act.

Unfortunately, he was not in time to save Valerie.

She’d made her devil’s bargain with Canto and realized at the end what a tragic mistake she’d made but it was too late for that. Wherever, she was now, Bruce knew that it was some place they could not follow. Worse yet, he was hearing sounds emanating from the fissure that was clearly disturbing. Something other than those deadly energy beams was approaching the portal, preparing to enter this world.

Canto was not following Valerie, waiting for Clark to exhaust himself, Bruce realized and saw the device in his hand. He kept glancing at it and Bruce wondered if he was using it to keep the fissure open. If Bruce could get to it, then perhaps he could shut down the doorway between the worlds and help Clark.

It was worth a shot.

*****

Meanwhile Clark was continuing to run, zigzagging through the maze of destruction, trying to avoid the energy beams that were intent on catching up to him. Whatever it was, it was able to keep up with him and worst yet, follow the uneven path he’d taken to shake it off. Clark knew he couldn’t keep this up forever and this was keeping him from helping Valerie.

Think Clark, think. Stop reacting, not acting.

An idea struck him at that moment. It was crazy but then again, it was the best shot he had. Veering away from the wreckage, Clark kept ahead of the beams but left the DeSaad premises entirely. Crossing over the empty fields surrounding the former complex, he reached the road and kept going, the beams continuing their relentless pursuit. Clark knew where he was headed but he had to take the shortest route, devoid of innocent bystanders so they would not fall prey to beam’s deadly onslaught.

Skirting the edge of the city, Clark headed for Metropolis Bay, his destination in mind as he passed the shore and slammed into the water, creating a loud splash as he entered the depths. Moving through the murkiness, the heat from the energy beams caused the ocean to sizzle, boiling it as it passed through the water. Clark knew that there was no way to prevent it from hitting something but at least he could minimize the damage.

Skimming the seabed, Clark knew where he was headed. A few weeks ago, he’d seen something on TV about an all WWII destroyer that had sunk outside of Metropolis Bay. Home to coral and seaweed for the last seventy years, Clark saw the silhouette of the ship in front of him and headed right for it. Looking over his shoulder, he saw the energy beam still behind him, running him down even under water.

Clark hastened his speed, widening the gap until he was able to round the vessel. Grabbing the metal hull, Clark grabbed the aging wreck and tore it from its undersea floor, flinging it in the path of the energy blast. Sediment shaken loose, the water turned from blue to near grey and if not for his enhanced vision, he would have seen nothing. Schools of fish scattered away from the scene of the battle, broken fragments of coral floated freely through the water, drifting on the wave of the artificial current.

The ship exploded in mid stern, snapping apart in half with a tremendous explosion that no doubt would be seen from the surface. The shock wave threw the water threw him back a little and for a moment, there was nothing in front of him but silt and frothy bubbles. Clark imagined the undersea eruption would have been seen by ships up above, an unexplained water spout appearing out of nowhere. However, when the water settled, Clark was rewarded by the sight of the ship scattered across the floor of the seabed, the beams of energy no more.

Now it was time to get back to Valerie and Bruce.

*****

The speed in which he returned ensured that his clothes were dry by the time he made it back to the ruined DeSaad facility a few minutes later. However, only Michael Canto remained and Valerie Beaudry was nowhere in sight. Scanning the area with his enhanced vision, Clark soon determined that Bruce was attempting a stealthy approached on the CEO of DeSaad but Valerie was nowhere in sight. With a sinking feeling, Clark came to the realization that he might have been too late, that Valerie had already stepped through the portal.

“Where is she?” Clark demanded.

“She’s where she should be,” Canto smiled triumphantly, “as you will be.”

The sound of beating wings, continued to grow and Clark saw the silhouettes of something attempting to the emerged through the portal.

“Clark!” Bruce finally emerged from behind the upturned car lying a few feet away, “he’s carrying some kind of alien device, get it and destroy it!”

Canto shot Bruce Wayne a look of open hostility and at the mention of the device, instantly reached for the jacket pocket in which he kept it. Clark gave him no time to react beyond that look of surprise. It took less than a second for Clark to snatch the object that Bruce was determined they have.

“Give that back to me!” the man hissed and hurried to the portal. “Hurry!” He shouted at the fissure, “come through!”

“Destroy it Clark!” Bruce shouted, unaware whether or not the device really controlled the gateway between the worlds but at the moment, it was the best hunch he had. Besides, it appeared Canto was calling for reinforcements.

Never one to doubt Bruce, particularly when he could hear the approach of something through the portal…a large number of something’s as a matter of fact, Clark crushed the device in his fist, shattering it completely. It met its demise with a spike of energy that created spidery tendrils around his forearm before vanishing entirely. Clark discarded the remains at his feet and looked up to see the fissure beginning to waver, the light radiating form it appeared to be fracturing as if something had disrupted its energy supply.

“Clark,” Bruce said hurrying forward, tying to recoup his strength because his injuries were making themselves felt again. “We need to get to Canto,” he cried out. “We need him to get Valerie back.”

“Right,” Clark nodded having already leapt to that conclusion himself and sped towards the man preparing to deny him his escape..

However, Canto had already anticipated this and retaliated with a smirk of triumph, “Heroes.” He snorted. “You are so damn predictable. I’m afraid I have to take my leave of you gentlemen, but rest assured, we will meet again, someday.”

And with that, he slipped into the diminishing doorway, the energy offering the two men a final wink of contempt before vanishing all together.

Taking Valerie with it.

Epilogue

They searched but Valerie was nowhere to be found.

Clark scoured one end of the ruined facility to the other, scanning every pile of debris, turning over upturned cars, scanning the maze of collapsed tunnels beneath the main complex and still found nothing. He’d even taken to the air in case she’d run off on her own and was wandering the countryside alone but there was no sign of her. With a sickening realisation, Clark had to admit begrudgingly that Valerie may have slipped through the portal into that other world Canto had promised her would be so much better than this one.

Bruce was hardly surprised by his lack of success. He’d actually warned Clark not to get his hopes up in finding her. Bruce hadn’t seen Valerie step through the portal but the fact that she had vanished without a trace, seemed to indicate the she had indeed taken Canto’s offer. Whatever happened to her now, he told Clark, it was out of their hands. One could only help a person so much. At some point, Valerie had to bear the consequences of her actions. He hoped for her sake, she had made the right choice but he was too much a pessimist to hold out hope that things had turned out as rosy as all that for the young woman.

Of course Clark knew Bruce was right. There was no other explanation and all evidence pointed to the fact that Valerie had left them. He remembered the Phantom Zone and considered how fortunate he had been to find a way out of it again. However, he remembered those who had no such escape and what had happened to those poor trapped souls. Whether or not they’d deserved it, he could not banish anyone to a prison for all eternity unless he had no other choice.

He hoped wherever Valerie was; she would not have to endure her fate for that long.

In any case, he had more immediate concerns after he’d abandoned his search for Valerie. In the wreckage, he’d found that not all the bodies lying in the debris were dead. Some were alive and clinging to their mortality with the thin thread of life that remained in their broken bodies. They could be saved and with the ratio of dead being so much greater than those who still lived, Clark was determined to save as many of them as he could.

Among the dead however and there was a lot of them, was Hank Cobb, Valerie’s duplicitous lover. He’d only been identifiable by his wallet. His handsome face which had been the instrument of his deception for so many young women was near unrecognisable when he was crushed by the section of wall Clark found him under. It was almost poetic justice, Bruce thought.

Before the authorities could be notified about what had gone on at this complex, Clark needed to get Bruce, Chloe and Lois away from here. There would be too many questions otherwise. With his x-ray vision, Clark could tell just how badly injured Bruce was, despite his claims to the contrary. It was a testament to the man’s will that he’d been able to function this far. From the tortures suffered at the hands of Canto’s men, one of whom was found dead, to the battering he received when he’d been caught in the maelstrom of Valerie’s deadly sonic scream, Bruce was at the limits of his strength

Bruce would only agree to leave the scene if Clark took him to the manor. The Gothamite was unprepared to face the questions by the authorities, as well as explain why DeSaad had abducted him when he had no discernible connection to the company. Clark would have preferred taking him to the hospital but Bruce would hear none of it. There was only one person who could attend his injuries and that would be a dignified aging butler who seemed to think that tea was the remedy for everything.

It surprised Bruce how much he wanted Alfred to bring him some.

In the end, after consultation with Chloe and Lois, Clark took only Bruce and Chloe back to Gotham City, leaving them at Wayne Manor. Bruce had assured him that he would be contacting a doctor that he knew, a Leslie Tompkins who would tend his injuries without asking too many questions. In the meantime, Clark let Alfred know he could return to the manor and was not surprised to learn that the butler was soon in the air, on his way home to treat his young master.

Lois had opted to stay behind and while Clark protested this first, she won him over with her arguments. First; someone had to call the authorities and let them know what it was they’d be dealing with. It couldn’t be either Clark or Bruce. Neither of them could be connected to this as it would raise uncomfortable questions. Clark thrived on anonymity and Bruce had cultivated a persona for the media that would be destroyed if it became entangled with DeSaad. Chloe needed to remain with Bruce leaving Lois, with her credentials as a reporter, the only person with a legitimate reason for being here.

It was disturbing enough that John Corben knew Clark’s secret. His body had not been found in the wreckage amongst Cobbs as well as Bennett, the sniper who had shot Clark. Lois had no doubt that Corben would be turning up sooner or later and Lois wanted to be ready for him when he did. There were enough bodies in the rubble for Lois to be able to ensure that he’d be made Public Enemy No.1 by the time she was through with him. She wanted everyone to know what had happened here; that what had been done to Valerie by DeSaad would never be repeated again.

Finally and this was somewhat selfish, she knew that but Lois Lane to stay because she had a story.

An honest to God exclusive with enough intrigue and scandal to ensure that she get that place in the Daily Planet she so desperately wanted.

Thus when the authorities finally arrived on the scene, Lois was there to greet them. She passed herself off as a freelance reporter working for the Daily Planet who’d been led her by a source named Valerie Beaudry. Valerie had told her about being subjected to torturous genetic experiments and had fled from her captors who then proceeded to harm the people in her life in their efforts to retrieve her. The death of the Beaudry’s parents seemed to corroborate Lois’ claims and how she had traced Valerie to this facility only to find this destruction. She had no idea where Valerie was now. If she was even alive.

That part at least, Lois thought ironically, was true.

Once the forensic teams began sifting through the wreckage, unearthing dead bodies, maturation tanks and other biological samples that revealed in grisly detail just what was happening at the DeSaad facility, Lois’ story seemed to have credence. The site was soon cordoned off and Lois was escorted to her car but she did so knowing Clark had her cell phone with enough images on it to act as proof when she wrote her story.

She drove straight to the Daily Planet and asked the use of an empty desk (in the basement) to begin writing her story, determined to put DeSaad out of business once and for all and to ensure that Lois Lane, reporter for the Daily Planet had arrived.

*****

DESAAD CORPORATION

OR FRANKENSTEIN’S LABORATORY?

By Lois Lane

“Not bad if I say so myself,” Lois Lane beamed as she sat on the edge of Perry White’s desk in the bullpen of the Daily Planet where other senior reporters were going about their business, rushing back and forth, gathering research as they filed their own stories.

It was early the next morning and her story had hit the stands. Lois had come to the Daily Planet to use its premises for some follow up reporting as well as to catch up with her mentor who had advised her during its writing. Working with the man had cemented Lois’ admiration for him. It seemed Perry knew just how to phrase things so she’d listen and he had a no nonsense attitude and a way of looking at this that was not unlike her own, except he seemed to know how to make it work for him instead of being an obstacle.

She really did adore him.

“Don’t get cocky kid,” Perry offered her a little smirk through the cigar he was holding in between his teeth, oblivious to the no-smoking sign as tendrils of the stuff curled around the air in front of him. “Have you been to DeSaad’s head office in Gotham?”

“Heading there now,” Lois made a face as she waved away the noxious smoke. “Jeez Perry, lung cancer much?” She frowned at him making a grab for the cigar, which he prevented by swatting her hand away.

“You gotta die of something Lane,” Perry grinned, ignoring the jibe. “And that’s Mr. White to you, rookie.”

“Hey there’s no smoking in here!” Someone shouted from across the bullpen.

“Stick your head out of a window and that should help!” Perry hollered back.

“Nice, Perry,” Lois ignored the comment and gave him a wink of mischief because his cantankerous self was so damn entertaining. “I’ve got an interview scheduled with the acting CEO, a guy named Paul Westfield. I want to ask him about Project Cadmus since Michael Canto has gone AWOL.”

Of course Lois knew where Michael Canto had gone but that bit of information was not subject for print, at least without exposing Clark and Bruce.

“Cadmus?” Perry asked.

“Yeah, Valerie mentioned it.” Lois explained, “And I didn’t want to use it in the story because we really don’t have any proof on paper that it exists or that it has any connection to DeSaad. I think it might have been some super secret genetic laboratory but I’ve only got Valerie’s word on that and no corroboration. I want to ask him and see what his reaction to it. Whether he knows about it or not, before he has a chance to give me a prepared answer.”

“Good,” Perry nodded in approval, glad the young woman was thinking like a good reporter who wanted real facts, not innuendo that made for tabloid fodder. “Any sign of her?”

“No,” Lois returned sombrely, saddened not only because she wasn’t giving Perry the whole truth but also because she really didn’t know where Valerie was and worried that the girl was somewhere in a hell of her own making. “I don’t know where she is. I just hope she’s okay.”

“Hey look,” Perry said kindly, “you got her story out there so wherever she is, at least these DeSaad bastards can’t come after her.”

“I hope so,” Lois said glumly, “I really hope so.”

******

Her throat was hoarse from screaming but Valerie had tried nonetheless.

However, the walls that surrounded her were of a substance she did not know and even though she’d unleashed the full torrent of her powers upon it, the walls had not tumbled. They remained standing in place, indifferent to her plight, maintaining their position as components of her prison cell. She thought she had known hell when Hank had delivered her to DeSaad but she was wrong. She had been so terribly wrong.

She thought of Clark’s words and wept fresh tears. He’d begged her to stay and she had ignored him, despite everything he’d gone through for her, she’d ignored him and taken the hand of a stranger…again. Now she was in this place, thrown into this cell after she’d been forced through the portal. Every night the small slot in her door opened and food passed through. It was barely edible but Valerie was so hungry she didn’t care. She ate it gratefully and prayed that more would come the next day.

There was no window in her cell so she had no idea of where she was, no sound seemed to penetrate the wall and she was left in pitch black darkness. For a moment, Valerie wondered if she was dead. But she couldn’t be, she reasoned. Dead people didn’t get hungry. Robbed of all senses, Valerie knew she’d go mad if she was forced to endure this any longer. Why were they doing this! She screamed and wept, fists pounding the walls so hard that she knew that they were bleeding.

And then one day, the door opened.

Light fell on the small space, illuminating her world with such bright intensity that she could neither see nor focus for a few seconds as someone walked in. It was hard to make out the shape and while Valerie should have been glad to have company at last, she was also terrified. Scrambling to the rear of the room, she hugged her knees to her chest and stared with wide eyed terror at her visitor.

“There, there, little one,” a decided gruff voice spoke but it was also female.

Valerie blinked again, wiping the tears and looking up, reacting to the kindness.

“I know this is difficult,” the woman’s hand brushed her hair. “It always is in the beginning but its for your own good. You’ve got so many impurities in your system; we had to flush it out so that we could start fresh.”

Valerie barely heard the words but she reacted to the soothing touch. “Why are you doing this to me?” She asked, lips quivering. “Where am I? What are you going to do with me?”

“Hush now,” the older woman with wild white hair spoke, her blue eyes displaying an odd kind of tenderness that did not put Valerie at ease. “I’m going to take care of you now. I’ll be your family. You can be my swan, my beautiful silver swan. ”

Valerie reached for her hand on her cheek, felt comforted by the warmth. “I…I want that.”

“Of course you do,” the woman smiled kissing her on the forehead. “Don’t worry, I will take care of you now. Just trust Granny. ”

******

John Corben felt odd.

He didn’t know how he felt odd, he just did.

The last things he remembered before waking up was the fact that he’d been barking at that dumb ass Hank Cobb, who’d endangered them all by using a taser on Valerie Beaudry, making it problematic for John and his men to tranquilise her. It gave the girl the opportunity to use her scream and after that, things went to complete hell. He remembered the walls of the room being blown away, being borne off his feet, his arms flailing as he tried to grab something but there was nothing to grab. He felt like a piece of food disappearing down a drain hole.

The pain came from multiple places, things battered him from all angles, until the world became a vortex of swirling images where he couldn’t focus. Then it mercifully went black.

When he woke up, he found himself staring at the bright lights overhead and immediately thought hospital. The ceiling above him had all the antiseptic charm of a hospital and powerful white lights made him wince but when he blinked, the lights seemed to dim and the illumination reduced to more tolerable levels. He must have been injured, John thought to himself but hell if he could figure out where. He didn’t feel any kind of pain and considering what he had just gone through, that made him the luckiest son of a bitch on the planet.

Sitting up, a wave of disorientation hit him and for a moment, John felt oddly disconnected from his body, like his brain was trying to reconnect. It was a peculiar sensation devoid of the familiar aches and pulls that muscle made when forced into movement after a period of lethargy. In fact everything felt odd when he tried to move. For a moment, he was struck by the memory of parachuting from an airplane, when he was still doing it for King and Country. It felt like that now, like he was freefalling and couldn’t make sense of anything.

“You shouldn’t be up,” a voice said next to him and John turned from where he was lying and saw one of the doctors from DeSaad….a scientist named Vale entering through the door on the far right of the room. John had seen him hovering about the facility though he’d never spoken to the man directly.

“Your systems aren’t configured yet,” Vale explained, a short man with thinning hair and round rim glasses, a squint in every sense of the word.

“What are you talking about?” John spoke and then felt silent, his voice sounded strange, like it was hearing it through a speaker.

“You have to understand,” Vale’s expression looked grave. “You were barely alive. We found as many of you as we could but your body suffered extensive injuries, more than was repairable.”

“What do you mean?” John demanded, suddenly feeling his stomach contract but that too didn’t feel right. He dropped his gaze to his hands and looked at his palms except it wasn’t skin he was looking at.

It was metal.

His hands were made out steel and iron, servos working in the place of muscles. His fingers clicked as he moved them and gleamed under the harsh lighting in the room. Turning towards Vale he got out of the bed, the sheet fell away from his torso and he saw more machinery, more lengths of steel, he was…he was…what the fuck was he?

“WHAT THE HELL DID YOU DO TO ME!” John demanded.

“Your body was almost destroyed!” Vale tried rapidly to answer, back pedalling out of the room, trying to make a strategic retreat if the fear John could see in his eyes was anything to go by. “We had no choice, we had to use radical treatment or else you’d be dead!”

John stood up and heard his feet clanging against the floor, his movements were smooth, too calculated and he couldn’t feel anything. He couldn’t feel the floor underneath his feet or the cold air against his skin. He couldn’t smell the antiseptic stench of hospital disinfectant. Something was wrong, really, really wrong.

He saw a mirror and made his way to it, despite Vale’s attempt to talk him out of it.

“Mr Corben!” Vale shouted desperately wanting to stop this patient from seeing what he was convinced John Corben would not be able to handle right now without great shock. “Please give yourself time to get used to it. This is a chance of a new life. I realise it’s not perfect but its something. ”

John ignored him and continued to approach the mirror, ignoring Vale’s attempts to stop him and sickening sound of hard clanging against the tiled floor he knew was his footsteps. Daring not to breathe, though he couldn’t bear it if he discovered he couldn’t do it, John tried to stave off the raw edge of panic threatening to break his composure into a thousand fragments.

Until he reached the mirror and stared at his reflection and understood at least how totally fucked he was.

Where there had been a face, stubble, blue eyes and a strong jaw that had been called ruggedly handsome by more than one woman, was something inhuman. What stared back at him was a obscenity of machinery parodying a human face. He thought absurdly, that he looked like the cyborg in that movie with Arnold Schwarzeneggar except that was a fantasy and this, this was a nightmare he couldn’t wake up from. His flesh was metal, his features appeared skeletal his eyes, his eyes were camera lenses.

And when he started screaming, it wasn’t even his voice.

*****

“Its probably Bill Haydon.” Bruce Wayne revealed to the room and immediately engendered a series of groans and complaints from the gallery that included Chloe, Clark and Lois.

“Really Bruce?” Lois grumbled, tossing a lone morsel of popcorn at the billionaire playboy’s head from the bowl she was nursing on her lap as she cuddled up next to Clark on the leather sofa in what was loosely called the ‘entertainment room’ of Wayne Manor.

“I could be wrong,” Bruce offered, unrepentant as he glanced at the screen at the movie currently playing on the huge television set hanging off the wall.

“Right,” Chloe rolled her eyes and nudged him gently in the arm, showing him, that like Lois and Clark, she did not believe for one minute that he was wrong about the identity of the double agent in the spy movie they were watching. “When are you ever wrong about these things? You know, you keep this up, the next movie we’re watching is the Transformers. ”

“Ouch,” Clark winced.

Bruce made a face at the suggestion. “I can’t help it is if its obvious,” he said knowing full well it wasn’t really.

Clark laughed. “Only to you,” he said giving the screen another glance. “It’s our fault anyway, we should have learnt our lesson when we watched the Davinci Code. ”

It had been a week since their final confrontation with the DeSaad Corporation and Michael Canto. Bruce had been mending privately at the manor with Chloe staying in Gotham during that time. Now that their relationship was in the public eye, it wasn’t out of the ordinary that she remained at the manor for extended periods. While technically she was on leave from the Planet, Chloe was considering making a move to Gotham in the near future. After almost losing him at DeSaad’s hands, she wasn’t eager to let him out of her sight again. She suspected Bruce needed someone close by to remind him that he wasn’t infallible, to make him consider before he took dangerous risks with his life.

It was also the first time they’d been together since Valerie’s disappearance and the destruction of the DeSaad facility. Without DeSaad was hunting them to get their hands on Clark and Valerie, they were able to return to some semblance of a normal life and with Canto gone, presumably back to wherever he had come from, it appeared that Clark’s secret was safe for the time being. There continued to be no signs of John Corben resurfacing and Lois had ensured that the former henchman was connected to the illegal experiments perpetrated by the company in her articles for the Daily Planet.

With Canto gone and Cobb dead, Corben was the only one left that the authorities could prosecute for the atrocities committed by the company. If the man knew what was good for him, he’d stay hidden.

For now, it was nice to just share an evening where they could just hang out as friends and not have to worry about clandestine organisations, which they still knew little about other than its possibly extra-terrestrial origins, looking over their shoulder. Even if it was watching a movie like Tinker, Tailor, Soldier and Spy, Chloe felt that Bruce needed normal more than person she ever knew.

“Well it was obvious,” Bruce tried to defend himself. “And this thing,” he gestured to the screen with the hand not wrapped around Chloe, “I mean the only reason that a guy this smart would sleep with a colleagues’ wife is if he knows that’s the man’s weak spot.”

“Okay, okay,” Lois interjected. “Leave some of the mystery for those of us who like to be surprised…”

“Ha!” Chloe retorted, knowing that was Lois was the last person to let any mystery lie. She was almost as bad as Bruce. “I know for a fact that you’re the one who just has to read the last page of the book right?” She teased her cousin.

“No fair,” Lois tossed more popcorn but at Chloe this time, “You’re not meant to give up my secrets.”

“Alright, alright, lay of the control freaks Chloe,” Clark teased. “You can’t blame these two if they have issues.” He winked at Lois and got jabbed in the ribs for his trouble.

“Says the man who has trouble with heights even though he flies.” Bruce retorted smoothly.

Chloe burst out laughing and swore Clark turned a shade redder at that remark but then he broke into a grin and Chloe couldn’t help smile at the corresponding smirk she saw on Bruce. They were good together, all four of them and for once, all was good in Chloe Sullivan’ world.

She hoped it would always be this way.

THE END

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