Paid leave and new plans

The next morning, Lois Lane sat in front of her office desk at the Daily Bugle, leaning back and smiling as she held a cup of coffee in her hands, still remembering the wild night she had with Clark, the woman hummed to herself squirming in her chair. She never remembered being that wild in bed before, or ever! They had gone at it for over an hour on the couch before she dragged him to the bedroom for another hour.

She even managed to tire him out when she found herself waking up on top of him in the morning, the big lug still snoring despite being at half mast inside if her. Smiling fondly at the memory, Lois took a sip of her coffee and looked over her paperwork and findings she hard stored on her system. Her attempt to break in the R&D complex to get hard evidence on Lex’s weapons didn’t pan out, but she was hoping she might get another chance. It worried her that the military who were funding the project thought Lex was creating laser weaponry with lithium batteries built small enough and powerful enough to pierce steel, it never occurred to them to check and find they were being powered by kryptonite crystals.

“What the…” Going back and forth over her own files, Lois discovered all her findings and sources had been deleted from her laptop. “That bald son of a…”

Lex Luthor had deleted all her findings AND her sources, probably over night as he gave her a ride back to her apartment. Now she had nothing except the knowledge of where the facilities were but no means of proving any foul play. She was back to square one, WORSE than square one, now she had nothing.

“LOIS? Get in my office, NOW!” Called out Perry from his door, going back out of sight and waiting for her to meet her inside. Sharing a look with Jimmy and Clark at their desks, Lois stood up and joined her boss at his office and closed the door behind her.

“Psk… What are they talking about?” Jimmy asked, leaning up to Kent so no one else could hear.

Looking into the office where the two talked, Clark grimaced when it started getting more and more heated, with Lois waving her arms out to the window to point at Lex Tower before Perry waved her off. Storming out of the office, Lois returned to her desk and began gathering her coat and things. “Mrs. Lane? What happened?”

“Perry put me on suspension for breaking and entering Lex’s R&D lab, he’s not pressing charges but Perry’s putting me off the story for 2 weeks with pay. What’s WORSE is all my evidence is gone!”

“What? How?”

“How do you think? Lex must have wiped my hard drive, the bastard!” Huffing in frustration, Lois stopped fishing for her stuff when Clark got up from his seat and gave his wife a hug, calming her down enough to slow down. “It’s okay Lois, its not the first time he’s gotten away with this kind of thing but you know what he’s like, he’ll slip soon enough and we’ll get him.”

“I’m more worried about you, what if those things get out into the streets?”

“We’ll figure something out when…” Darting his head to look out the window, Clark kissed his wife on the forehead and made his way out the door. “Sorry Lois, I just have to do something.”

Standing there in the middle of the work floor, Lois sighed to herself while turning her attention to Jimmy who just shook his head. “Jeez, priorities, right?”

Looking out the window, Lois could see the thin red blur in the sky of Superman flying off to save the day somewhere, somewhere his ears picked up someone crying for help. “I think I’m going to follow my husband’s idea and get some fresh air Jimmy, see you in 2 weeks.” Seeing the young man wave her off, Lois took her things and went to the elevator, pressing the roof floor button so she could go up to the roof to think and be alone. Getting up to the roof, Lois set her things down near the door and held herself as she made her way to the roof’s edge to look out onto the city, letting the wind blow her hair and sigh with disappointment. Right in front of her was the tall spire of Lex Tower sticking up in front of her like a big shiny middle finger.

She was mad, mad at her damn luck and mad at HIM for screwing with her investigation. Now in just a few weeks there were going to be a bunch of guns that had the potential to KILL Superman, it made her furious that she screwed up so badly that now it was going to happen. Gritting her teeth in a sneer, Lois balled up her fist and slammed it into the railing at the roof’s edge… And nearly took it off its moorings!

“What the hell?!” Looking down at the bent railing pipe, the thing now had a bend deep enough to fit her fist in, because it had molded to the shape of it. Confused and curious, Lois gripped at the 3-inch diameter metal pipe and squeezed with her fingers, surprised to find the solid steel squishing between her fingers like play dough. She was strong, like REALLY strong! Looking down at her hands she tried to think of what else she could do. Shrugging her shoulders, she bent at the knees and jumped as hard as she could… And ended up 40 feet in the air before landing on her feet and breaking her heels in the landing. Rolling onto her back, she quickly scrambled back to her bare feet after taking off her ruined shoes.

“How did this happen?” she wondered out loud, thinking about what the cause could be until she finally concluded. “The KRYPTONITE! But how? Eating that stuff should have made my hair fall out and killed me with radiation poisoning.” But then she remembered the Geiger counter read blank when she was scanned by it back at the R&D facility. Somehow, she had become a… Disposal unit for radioactive material, for kryptonite, and as an added bonus she was now strong enough to bend steel and leap over buildings.

A new idea cropped into her head, one that sounded better and better the longer she led it settle in her mind. “If I can’t expose Lex’s plans to the public, then maybe I can RUIN them, eat all the kryptonite stores he’s got, and make it so he could never hurt Clark ever again!” Smiling with renewed purpose, Lois spun around and gathered her things, heading back to the elevator to plan for tonight.