Epilogue: The Gods Choose Lois For A Special Task

Lois Lane's hands shook as she ripped open the pregnancy test. Blaze had assured her, every day of the last few weeks, that the reporter was pregnant—and Lois wanted to believe it. Yet a part of her knew that she wouldn't be convinced, not until she peed on a stick and the lines changed, and then maybe not even until she'd had a chance to go to the doctor to confirm it...

Yet here she was, in the most sequestered bathroom in the Daily Planet building. She hadn't been able to squeeze a drop before she'd left the apartment this morning, so Lois had taken the test with her. Waited until her third cup of coffee had hit, and then rushed upstairs. Nobody ever used the women's bathroom on the floor just below roof-level; all the offices were empty right now, usually leased out to political campaigns but it wasn't the right season.

So she'd hovered over the seat and barely been able to contain her excitement. Panties around her ankles, two fingers spreading her labia so that she could aim the golden stream at the strip...success. The reporter felt her heart thunder in her chest as she set it aside to do its thing, and sat down on the seat to finish peeing.

Which is when the lights flickered and went out.

Figures, Lois thought, as she reached blindly for her phone.

Then a voice called out to her.

"Lois Lane..."

It was a man's voice. Old, sonorous, echoing as though it was spoken in a subway tunnel. Yet what caught her attention was the accent. It was like Angie's. Something faintly exotic, but nothing specific. Like many different accents rolled together into something new...or very, very old.

Lois knew she had closed the stall door, but now she looked ahead and saw a flickering fire from a brazier, far off in the distance. In the dim light the flames cast, she saw an old man in a white robe atop a stone throne. The bald head gleamed, the silvery hair that ringed his head fell down to his shoulders, the curled beard covered his chest.

"The gods have chosen you, Lois Lane, for a great act of redemption," he leaned forward, mirroring her pose on the potty. "Your feet are already set on the path, of leading the demon Blaze toward the light...and paving the way for a vast new future. The hopes of the world rest now in the fruit of thy womb, and you must be strengthened for the trials that lay ahead."

The reporter was speechless...but her instincts took over.

Treat it like an interview, Lane, she told herself.

"Who are you?" She asked.

"I am the wizard Shazam," the venerable old man said. "Blaze's father."

The reporter's lips went into a surprised 'O.'

"Over the centuries, the gods have made it my duty to empower many champions," he said. "You know them as the Marvel Family...Captain Marvel, Mary Marvel, Captain Marvel Jr., Tawky Tawny..."

Lois Lane's brow furrowed. "We call them Shazam, Lady Shazam..."

"I AM SHAZAM!" The wizard's voice thundered, then sagged, as if the outburst had sapped some of his strength. "Time is short. If you wish to carry my daughter's children safely to term, you will need the power I grant to you."

"Okay?" Lois said. "Like...can I leap tall buildings in a single bound? Faster than a speeding bullet?"

"You shall have the attributes of the gods and goddesses of old," he said...

The fertility of Shub-Niggurath
The wisdom of Hecate
The beauty of Ashtoreth
The ardor of Zeus
The stamina of Artemis
The strength of Meskhenet

"...but say my name...and it shall be yours..."

The fluorescent lights overhead flickered. The reporter caught one last glimpse of the old man...and then the lights died again, and she was back in the bathroom, as if she had never left. If, indeed, she had left at all. In the dark, the reporter finished her business, pulled up her panties, and grabbed the pregnancy test. She took the stairs to the roof two at a time, stepping out into the bright sunlight of a cloudless day.

Maybe it was an hallucination, the reporter thought. Maybe with all the sex we've been having at night, I haven't been getting enough sleep.

Lois looked at the test. Two blue lines.

"Shazam!" she whispered.

Lightning burst from heavens. Lois Lane stood transfixed, power surging through her body. The stone about her feet blackened and turned glassy. The pregnancy test burnt away, crumbling to ash...and when the surge of magic lightning was finished...

The reporter stared at her body. Her old clothes were gone, replaced with a pink maternity dress, with a cape hung over one shoulder. Lois gasped as her mind reeled, flooded suddenly with knowledge...wisdom...new senses...

The senses of pregnant women become more acute, the reporter realized...and then wondered how she knew that. Yet it was true. She could smell the hotdogs being sold on the street twenty-two stories below. Hear the gurgle of blood through her veins, the snap and crackle of electricity along her nerves.

"I'm not just pregnant," Lois realized. "I'm super-pregnant! I'm...Mother Marvel!"

Little did Lois Lane know...though she would soon learn...that with great fecundity soon comes great responsibility.