End: Lois Goes Home

Cut your losses, Lane, Lois thought to herself as she left the bathroom. Something happened to you tonight, you got sick, you need to get out of here. Go home. There's always tomorrow night.

It irked the reporter to leave without the answers she'd come for...but she told herself this was a tactical retreat, not her giving up. The moment she hit the sidewalk, sucked in the cool air, away from the noise and smell of unwashed bodies in the club, she felt better. Not a hundred percent, as her stomach still felt bloated and off, and rivulets of vomit or something ran down her legs inside her tight red pants, but...well, she could take care of that when she got home.

She choose the long route, skirting around Suicide Slum, then walk along the low wall by the park...keeping well away from the shadows. Metropolis wasn't Gotham, but Lois Lane was still a woman walking alone at night, and not feeling her best. The last thing she wanted was to get mugged...or worse, attacked.

Lois shivered, despite the fact that it wasn't that cold out.

What happened to me tonight? Why can't I remember it?

The reporter could still feel some of that goo in her pussy...her panties must be an absolute mess. She walked a little faster, rubbed at her flat stomach, still feeling those phantom pains inside. A part of her knew she needed water...a shower...maybe a douche. Normally she didn't, but every step she could feel the wet squelch in her pants, as though she'd had a nasty accident.

By the time she reached her apartment building, Lois Lane's head was clear...but her memory remained a stubborn blank. It irked her. She kept trying to remember...something. Come at the blank space from different directions. Lois found she could remember clearly up through taking that drink and...and there should be something after that. Even **** weren't usually that sharp of a cut-off.

"Maybe I should go to the hospital," Lois said out loud as she walked into her apartment. She stripped in the kitchen. Clothes in the hamper, panties in the trash. Her pubic hair was an absolute mess, full of half-grey globs, and the reporter knew she was going to have to do something she normally didn't...shave it all off.

A shot of pepto bismol to ease her upset stomach. A swig of distilled water to clear the taste from her mouth. Clorox wipes from under the kitchen sink cleaned the gunk off of her legs. Lois straddled the edge of the tub, with a towel and a pink safety razor when the phone rang. She glanced at the screen: Clark Kent.

Lois put him on speaker.

"Smallville," she said. "What's up?"

She held the pink handle and carefully drew it along her skin. The clumpy grey goo and fine black hair disappeared in a strip, ending just before it reached her clit. Lois wiped the blade off on the towel and proceeded to clear a patch right next to the one she'd just shaved.

"Just got back into town," he said. "Thought maybe we could do a video chat...talk about that article you were working on?"

Lois grinned. "No video tonight, Clark. I'm shaving my pussy."

There was an embarrassed cough on the other end of the line. Lois felt a trickle of humor cut through her worry.

"I mean, unless you want to see that."

"Lois, you shouldn't kid," he said...but Lois grinned wider. She loved teasing him. "If you're too busy to talk, then..."

"No! No, don't hang up!" Lois said, as desperation gripped her stomach. Her hand nearly slipped as she shaved. "I actually want to talk. Something...something weird happened tonight."

Whatever else Clark Kent was, he was a good friend and a good listener. So Lois kept shaving...and kept talking. Walking him through the case of the missing women, the pieces of the puzzle that led her to the club. She ran the razor down now, over her labia. Stretching her legs as wide as possible, using her fingers to draw the skin taut. There were always a few little hairs it was hard to get, and Lois didn't want to pluck.

She got to the bit about the missing time.

"I just don't get it," the reporter said. "I mean it's...I've never felt anything like that."

She spritzed her newly bald pussy with aftershave, grimacing at the sting.

"Lois, speaking as your friend," he said. "I think you should get checked out by a doctor, immediately."

"Clark, it's three in the morning," Lois said, glancing at the time on the clock. "Who the heck is going to be open? Plus, I'm exhausted."

"I have a friend. He's a doctor. We can be there in a few minutes."

There was real worry in his voice, and for a moment Lois felt genuinely touched.

"Clark, you really don't have to...I haven't even douched yet."

"Don't," he said. "You want to leave any evidence intact for the **** kit."

"**** kit? Smallville, I don't think—"

There was a knock on the door.

Lois rose, incredulous. She grabbed a bathrobe and draped it around her, stalked to the door and ripped it open and...

There was an older man in a costume there. Dark goggles over his eyes, an old-fashioned doctor's bad in one hand. Clark Kent stood behind him, looking pensive.

"Miss Lane?" he said. "I'm—"

"Doctor Midnite," she said, taken aback. "From the Justice League. How are you—"

She looked at Clark. He took off his glasses—very deliberately—and Lois Lane's eyes widened in a shock of recognition.

The reporter stepped back to let them inside.

"You...all this time...you never..." Lois managed.

Clark gently closed the door. She punched him in the chest. It was like punching a mountain.

"You jerk! You...you..." Lois scrunched up her face. "You owe me an interview!"

On her bed, Doctor Midnite laid out a clean towel, and laid on it a series of instruments. Lois watched him run a blue light over them.

"Ultrasonic and ultraviolet sterilization," he said. "Superman told me a few things over the phone, but I'd like to ask you a few questions...and conduct a physical examination of your pelvis."

Lois looked at Clark.

"I'll stay here in the kitchen," he said. "Make coffee."

It all suddenly seemed very real to Lois. She stepped into the bedroom. The old man looked harmless, almost silly in his black cape and mask and goggles.

"Disrobe, please," he said. "And lay down on the bed. This won't hurt, I promise."

He was right. His voice was calm and assuring. Doctor Midnite asked a few questions, and she answered. She felt his gloved hands spread her labia.

"Have you been sexually active lately?" He asked.

"Not for months," she said.

"Hmm. There is...material inside your vagina." He noted.

"I puked. When I woke up on the toilet." She explained.

"Yes, I understand that. However, the material is inside your vagina. While you wiped away the external traces, this is coming from deeper...near your cervix. And there are broken blood vessels near the entrance, characteristic of forcible entry. I wouldn't be surprised if you had a little spotting or bleeding over the next few days."

Lois swallowed as she digested the meaning of his words. She saw him take out a slim speculum. He raised his head. The reporter couldn't see his eyes, because of the goggles, but she felt like he was trying to make eye contact.

"I'm going to insert the speculum, do a cervical swab and take a sample of the material for analysis. There will be some discomfort, I'm afraid."

"Was I ****?" Lois heard her voice was quiet, barely a whisper. Her pulse pounded in her ears.

He waited a moment before answering. "I believe so."

Cold, cold and wet as the lubricated speculum slid into her hole...and now Lois thought she could recognize the signs of post-sex aches and tiredness. She winced as she felt the little swab poke around inside of her. Then, in very little time, it was done. He slid the speculum back out, and Lois just felt...empty.

"Sit up please," Doctor Midnite said. "Almost done. I just want a blood sample."

She sat up, bared her left arm...a little tapping, the sharp piercing of the needle. The sight of blood filling a vial...and then it was done.

"You can dress now," he looked away from her, conscious now of the reporter's nudity as he packed up his things.

"I have access to the medical technology laboratory at S.T.A.R. Labs," he said. "I'll be able to run more thorough tests there for foreign substances, ****, sexually transmitted disease...but I have to tell you that the material does appear to be semen. We'll sequence the DNA, of course, but I have to tell you that pregnancy is a distinct possibility. It's too soon to tell, but...if you need to discuss options, contact me. We can handle things discreetly and easily."

Lois nodded numbly. She had been ****. This just didn't seem real.

Clark came out with coffee. Lois took it from his hands. He spoke a few words to Doctor Midnite that Lois didn't catch...and then the old man was gone.

The reporter began to shake.

"Clark?" She said. "Stay with me, tonight."

"Of course, Lois," he said, shoulders hunched, the steam from the coffee fogging his glasses to hide his eyes. "As long as you want."

Not all nights out end well. Not all stories have a happy ending. Lois Lane thought back to the choices she had made this night, and wondered what might have happened if she had made different choices. Gone left instead of right, done something, anything different...and she shivered to think of all the other Lois Lanes that might have been, and how they had fared on their own nights out. Because right now she was afraid, as she had never been afraid before, about what her future might hold...and there was gaping hole in her memory that she now dreaded to imagine what might have happened.

Something told her that one day she would find out...but that is a different story.