Superman Movieverse Forum

Lois only vaguely recalled going to bed, she could remember falling asleep on the couch then Richard and Chloe helping her to bed after a long night spent watching the news for any more information. Jason was curled up next to her, his back against hers. Skye was on the other side, one hand resting on Lois’ swollen stomach, the rest of her sprawled across half the bed.

The glowing clock on the bedside table read 7.26am and Lois had a brief moment of worry before remembering that she was well into her maternity leave. Jason shifted against her a yawned, “Mom?” He asked, having to take care not to fall off the edge of the bed.

“Morning,” Lois turned around to embrace him in a hug, wondering for a moment what had happened to her curtains before the events of the previous day came crashing down on her.

“Do we have to go to school today?” Jason asked, “I want to stay home with you and listen to the news.”

“No, sweetie,” Lois swung her legs out of the bed. “You and Skye both have to go to school today. But I promise you, if you go today, you don’t have to go tomorrow or the next day, Okay?”

Jason rolled his eyes, “It’s Friday, Mom.” But despite his complaining he jumped onto the floor and made his way to the bathroom.

Lois turned around awkwardly and gently shook Skye on the shoulder but the girl just turned over and kept right on sleeping. Lois sighed, it had been worth a shot. Clark, Jason and herself were all rather light sleepers but Skye seemed to have taken after her Grandma Ella and her Aunt Lucy, when she closed her eyes she was out like a light and nothing short of a nuclear explosion was likely to rouse her. Fortunately, Lois had something better: Lane Ingenuity™.

Thanks to the triplets she couldn’t maneuver as well as she usually did and pull all the sheets off the bed in one go. So instead she reached over to the edge of the duvet and flipped up the end revealing two pink feet. Skye shifted slightly as the cold hit her toes but her eyes remained stubbornly closed. Lois smiled and tugged on her big toe before moving to tickle the bottom of her feet. This time the girl’s eyes flickered open and she scooted away from her mother.

“Mo-om,” She complained, “Don’t do that.”

Lois held out her arms and Skye hesitated slightly, wondering if she should forgive her so quickly for waking her up, but she eventually scurried over to give her mom a hug. “Mom?”

“Hmm?” Lois asked, savoring the moment of peace.

“Can I stay home today? I feel sick.”

Ten minutes later poor Skye had had her temperature taken more than once, her throat examined, heart rate and breathing timed several times and answered hundreds of questions from Richard, Chloe and Lois.

“It’s just my tummy feels all sick,” Skye protested when they asked her for the eighth time what exactly felt the matter. “Not like how Daddy fainted.”

Lois sighed and Chloe and Richard shared a look. They were obviously not fooling her as well as they’d hoped. “We don’t think you’ve got what Daddy has, darling.” Lois assured her, “We’re just being very careful.”

Jason looked up from his place at the table having just finished his cereal, “If Skye stays home, can I too?”

Lois frowned, she was supposed to be taking things easy. The doctors had given her three different meds to help her pregnancy last as long as possible, triplets had a high rate of premature births, but she still had to keep rested and calm.

Jason saw her thinking and pressed his advantage, “I can take care of Skye and that way Aunt Chloe and Uncle Richard can still go to work and you can rest on the couch like the doctor said.” He looked hopefully at her.

Lois looked at Chloe and Richard for help but both of them were looking at her with expressions that clearly said they thought it was a good idea but didn’t want to interfere when it was her children. “Okay,” Lois relented, not having the energy to argue more, and it really would help to have someone looking after Skye. “But when you’re not helping me or your sister, you’re doing homework.”

Jason jumped up and punched the air. “I will,” He promised, running over to unpack the bags that Chloe had brought over for them.

Lois turned back to her daughter, “Do you want to go back to bed?” Skye nodded, looking very pale and unwell. Chloe picked her up and carried her back into the guest room.

Richard looked worriedly at Lois, “We can stay if you want. Perry would understand, he thinks Clark’s sick remember? We’ll just call in and tell him you need help witi the kids.”

“No,” Lois shook her head, “I don’t think it’s a good idea for all of Clark’s closest friends to suddenly take a sick day when one of the biggest stories of the year is breaking. Don’t you think that’s a little suspicious?”

Richard nodded, “You’re right.”

“As usual,” She replied, managing to crack a smile for what felt like the first time in days. “I’ll need my laptop and cell phone and can you turn the TV onto CNN?” She asked, “I know they’re usually hopeless but it’s better than nothing.”

“Will do,” He nodded, helping her to the couch, “But even if you must work, try and keep physically inactive at least, we want to keep those three in there as long as possible. You shouldn’t even have gone to the hospital, I know they have those new drugs that keep them to full term but-“

“Richard, calm down,” Lois ordered, “I’m fine and so are the triplets. Dr. Heath knows what she’s doing, it’s a lot safer now days.”

Richard looked about to protest further but he was prevented from doing so by the return of his girlfriend. “Skye’s asleep,” She informed them, “Out like a light as soon as her head hit the pillow. I’ve put a drink bottle on the table for her and left the door open so you can hear her.” She frowned in thought, “Anything else? We can stay if you-“

“No, go to work.” Lois insisted, “And call me if anything, and I mean anything happens, okay?”

Chloe and Richard didn’t look happy but nodded anyway. Jason returned from washing his breakfast bowl, “Don’t worry Aunt Chloe,” He said, trying to sound as grown up as he could, “I can look after Mom and Skye.”

“I’m sure you can, big guy,” Richard bent down to give the boy a hug, “Just make sure your Mom doesn’t work too much, okay?”

“Okay,” Jason nodded seriously.

Once Chloe and Richard were gone Lois told Jason to start doing some homework, flipped open her cell phone and called the first on her long list of calls to make.

“Hi, Martha, it’s Lois”

--
The first thing Chloe did upon reaching the Daily Planet was to pull up all of Lois’s Superman articles from back to the time Clark had first adopted the caped identity the related to him being injured, ill or anything-less than ‘Super’. She also pulled up articles about anyone who had had anything to do with kryptonite dealings in the past.

“Five?” Richard said in shock, when she showed them to him, “Only five?”

“Only five?” Chloe’s eyebrows shot into her hair, “Richard the man’s near invincible and the only thing that can hurt him is pretty much the rarest substance on Earth, five is a lot for someone like that.”

Richard just sighed, “Well, what do we have?”

“Let’s see,” Chloe opened the first article, “Lex Luthor attacks Superman with kryptonite right after his first appearance, next up is the General Zod incident, Supes gets beat up pretty bad, but I don’t think that will help now, then we skip five years…and come to: The New Krypton fiasco, first time he was in hospital, coma, left within two days, absolutely no symptoms like what he’s got now. A year after that a teenage girl named Kathleen Quinn tries to shoot him with a kryptonite bullet.”

“The doctors have already ruled out kryptonite,” Richard pointed out, “And she only got his shoulder, he didn’t even need a bandage and the cops busted the supplier.”

“Yeah,” Chloe nodded, “But the supplier was a former associate of Luthor, maybe he knows about other so called ‘back-up’ plans that could be more effective than selling kryptonite to teenage criminals.”

“Like a super-virus that could cause him to collapse in the middle of a rescue.” He nodded, following her train of thought.

“Exactly. But for the moment I don’t think this Kathleen thing will lead anywhere so we’ll leave that one for now. I think we should check out this one.” She held up her last sheet, an article that was accompanied by a picture of a middle-aged man. “Timothy Summers,” Chloe announced, “Another former associate of Mr. Luthor also connected to the lovely Miss Quinn and her kryptonite buddies but the cops couldn’t make anything stick.”

“Well,” Richard stood up and shrugged on his jacket, “What are we waiting for? Let’s go talk to Mr. Summers.” He started walking purposefully towards the door.

“Uh, honey?” Chloe called sweetly.

“Are you coming?” Richard asked, surprised to see her still in the same spot by his desk.

“Timothy Summers lives in Canada.”

“Oh,” Richard felt a slight blush appear on his face. “So, maybe we should phone him then?” He walked back to his desk like that had been when he was going all along.

“That would be a good idea.” Chloe agreed with a smirk.

--