Superman Movieverse Forum

Title: Family Reunion
Author: Mr. Beeto
Rating: PG-13
Beta: htbthomas and Shado Librarian
Summary: AU Twist on Donner/Singer Movieverse: Tie the three films together into a cohesive whole, and provide a more credible and interesting reason for Superman to have returned to Krypton.

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Author’s Notes:
Thanks again to the beta team of htbthomas and Shado Librarian, a.k.a. dandello.

Chapter 35 – Gang Aft Agley⁽¹⁾

Wednesday, October 4, 2006 6:15PM CDT
Ben Hubbard led the family in the dinner prayer as they sat around Martha’s dining room table and eagerly anticipated her goulash.  It was another gluten-free variation, for Jason’s sake, now unnecessary but for Richard’s ignorance of the Kryptonian therapy that had cured his allergies.  The awkward tension that had defined Richard’s recent interactions with Lois and Clark persisted, though tempered by their hosts’ cheerful hospitality.  Richard had found that the conversation with the elderly couple came easily and to his great surprise, he was quickly growing fond of them.

With the prayer complete, the family dug into their meal and resumed their conversation, though Richard held his tongue, choosing instead to listen keenly to the others as he tried to decipher the enigma that was Clark Kent.  He ignored the children’s chattering and instead focused on the conversation amongst the other adults, as Lois lightheartedly commented, “You keep cooking us meals like this, and Jason’s never going to want to leave.”

“Well, I’d like my grandkids to have something to look forward to when they visit,” Martha replied pleasantly.

“Oh, they’ve got that in spades,” Lois replied mirthfully.  “How do you make these gluten-free recipes taste so wonderful?”

“It’s all in the spices,” Martha answered happily.   “I can give you the recipe, if you’d like.  It’s isn’t that difficult to make.”

“And tarnish my reputation for having the rare talent of being able to burn water?”

“Um, Lois, was that just the one time, or did something else happen while I was away?” Clark teased.

“Hey!  That doesn’t count,” Lois protested.  “And it wasn’t the water that was burning.”

“What on Earth happened?” Martha asked curiously.

Lois and Clark shared a look, and then Lois calmly explained, “Clark was trying to teach me how to make spaghetti.  He was doing the sauce and I was going to cook the noodles.  Well, someone had told me that if I added olive oil to the water it would keep the spaghetti from sticking together – only I didn’t have any olive oil…”

“…so she substituted rum instead,” Clark added.  “Some of it dribbled down the side of the pan to the burner and…”

“Flambé,” Lois added irritably.

“Oh, dear,” Martha replied, laughing lightly at the story.

“It certainly looked like the water was on fire,” Clark teased.

“Mommy, you really burned water?” Jason asked excitedly.

“No, munchkin, the water was not burning,” Lois explained.  She turned to Clark and added sarcastically, “Thanks so much for sharing that.”

“Any time,” Clark replied cheerfully.  Before Lois had a chance to reply, he held up his hand and said, “Hold on…”  He pulled out his cell phone and inspected the display before pushing himself away from the table and answering, “Hello?  …Oh, hi, Bill.”  He quickly walked out of the room as he continued the conversation.

“Wonder what that was about,” Ben muttered.

“It was probably Bill Henderson,” Lois explained.  “He’s a Metropolis Police Inspector and a friend of Clark’s and mine.”

A moment later, Clark returned to the room.  He turned to Lois and said, “Bill says that they caught a couple guys breaking into your car at the Planet–”

“What?” Lois replied incredulously.  “When did that happen and why is he calling you instead of me?”

“About an hour ago and Bill said your number’s going straight to voice mail,” Clark answered politely.  “You turned your phone off again, didn’t you?”

Lois rolled her eyes and complained, “It was ringing off the hook.”  She got up from the table and walked into the living room, fishing her phone out of her purse and turning it on.  She returned to the dining room and asked, “Did Bill say anything else about what happened?”

“Well, it didn’t look like they were trying to steal it,” Clark informed her.  “They rifled through the glove box and trunk, like they were looking for something, and they were starting to install a LoJack transmitter when they got nabbed.”
 
“Luthor’s looking for us,” Lois concluded.  “Well, he’s not likely to find us here… Oh, crap.”

“What?”

“Forty-seven new messages,” Lois replied impatiently.  “It’s going to take forever to get through them all.”

After finishing their meal and cleaning up, it was homework time, and Clark and Richard had the two children seated at the dining room table going over their schoolwork.  While the children spent the time working through their assignments, Lois went through her voice mails, deleting most of them within the first ten seconds of the message playback before finally catching up.  She finally closed her phone, and returned it to her purse before joining the others in the dining room.

Clark was the first to notice her presence, looking up at her with a worried look.  “Is everything okay?” he asked.

“Depends,” Lois replied irritably.  She turned to Richard and requested desperately, “Please tell me that you rescheduled Jason’s dentist appointment.”

“I offered to, but you said you’d take care of it,” Richard replied impatiently.  “You forgot, didn’t you?”

“If it’s serious, we could probably get Tom McClendon to squeeze him in,” Ben suggested.  “He’s the dentist up in Wichita that my family uses.  I can get the number for you, if you like.”

“Actually, Doctor Gallagher is an oral pathologist, not just a dentist,” Lois informed them.  “Jason’s had this weird thing going on in his mouth, called oral lichen planus.  It’s under control, but he’s had a recent flare-up and I don’t want to take chances with it.”  She sighed and looked away and was silent for a moment and then she quietly muttered, “We’ve also… we’ve missed the last two appointments…  They said they’d drop us if we missed another one, and I really don’t want to change horses midstream.”

“Well, what choice do we have?” Richard said testily.  “Luthor’s hunting for us, and it sounds like they’ve got the Planet garage staked out.  And if they spot you on your way out…”

“It does sound a bit risky,” Clark agreed.

Lois was quiet for a minute and then suggested, “What if we used a portal north of Metropolis and drove in?”

“I thought we were only allowed access to the three stops…” Richard interjected.

“I think we can get him to make an exception,” Lois declared.

“If Luthor’s people spotted your car, we’d have a problem,” Clark pointed out.

“Then we get a rental,” Lois countered.

“I’d still prefer to run it by Bill and our security experts,” Clark insisted.  “If they think it’s risky, then maybe you could try explaining the situation to your doctor.  If it came to it, I’m sure Doctor McClendon could give us a referral, and there’s also someone up north who could probably handle it...”

“Juvenile oral lichen planus is rather uncommon, as are doctors experienced treating children with it, and Doctor Gallagher has such a good rapport with Jason…  Besides, I don’t plan on hiding out in Smallville indefinitely,” Lois argued.  “We will be going back to our lives in Metropolis eventually, and I don’t want to burn bridges with our doctors there.”

“All right, we’ll run it by the experts,” Clark stated somberly.  He gestured to the children and added, “Let’s wait until later, though, when there aren’t any distractions.”

Lois nodded her agreement, and walked out of the room, leaving Clark and Richard to continue their review of the children’s homework.



Thursday, October 5, 2006 7:15AM CDT
Lois yawned widely as she walked into Ben Hubbard’s kitchen, dressed in jeans and a sweatshirt, and her hair still damp from her shower.  She made a beeline for the coffee pot, barely noticing Richard and Ben seated at the table, until the older man greeted her.  “Good morning, Lois,” Ben greeted her cheerfully.  “How did you sleep?”

“Fine,” Lois replied sleepily.  “Clark left already?”

“He’ll be back later,” Ben informed her.  “He just wanted to drop this morning’s Planet off for you.  He left a note, too.  It’s under that Coca-Cola magnet on the fridge.”

“He needs to put a muffler on that truck,” Lois complained.  “The alarm hadn’t even gone off once when he pulled up.”  She read the note on the fridge, which informed her of the district attorney’s press conference scheduled at ten o’clock that morning, Metropolis time.  She stuffed the note in the back pocket of her jeans and asked casually, “Do you think he got the kids off to school yet?”

“Oh, they’d normally still have another quarter hour before the bus got there,” Ben replied pleasantly.  “But school’s canceled today – too much fog.”

“Excuse me, did you say fog?” Lois asked incredulously.  “You cancel school out here for fog?”  She peeked out the kitchen window, where there was indeed a thick blanket of fog over the fields.

“Lois, it would just take one careless fool driving too fast down the highway and hitting a bus to visit tragedy to a dozen families,” Ben explained.  “These aren’t limited access expressways out here.  The side roads cross the highway, and the only traffic light is that blinker on Main Street in front of the school.  It can truly be dangerous on country roads when the fog’s thick like this.”

“You’ve got to be kidding me,” Lois muttered in disbelief, and she again peered out of the window.  “Does this happen often?”

“I think the kids get maybe a half dozen fog days a year,” Ben answered politely.  “Clark said the kids seemed pretty excited about it.”

“I’ll bet,” Lois commented.  “This’ll make things interesting with Kara when it’s time for Jason’s dentist appointment…”

“So, you’ve decided to go ahead with that?” Ben asked politely.

“Yeah, we reached an agreement with our security experts,” Lois commented, and she recalled the private discussion she and Clark had with the experts late the previous evening.  Their allies with MPD and the FBI were staunchly opposed to keeping the appointment and had strongly encouraged them to at least temporarily find another oral pathologist outside Metropolis.  However, Lois objected, citing the rarity of Jason’s condition among children and doctors experienced treating it in juveniles, as well as the apparent effectiveness of his current treatment regimen.  Their allies had only reluctantly conceded that the risk was manageable if they drove into the city from the north, directly to the doctor’s office and immediately left the city afterwards.

She and Clark had made a minor revision to the plan they’d discussed.  Instead of driving down from the north, they’d instead ride to the Fortress portal and fly from the Fortress into Metropolis with Superman.  A rental car would be waiting for them at the Meadowland Mall parking garage, and they’d drive the final two miles to the doctor’s office.  Even if Luthor tracked Superman to the mall, the madman would never be able to get anyone there in time to intercept them.  As a precaution, they’d chosen a different transfer point on the way back, and would leave the rental car at the North Bridge Municipal parking garage before flying back up to the Fortress.

Lois’ ruminations were abruptly ended by Richard’s complaint.  “I still don’t like it,” he said impatiently.  “It’s too risky with Luthor out there.”

Ben stood up and politely told them, “Well, I need to stretch my legs a bit.  I’ll be out back if you need anything.”

After the back door closed behind Ben, Lois turned to the kitchen table, and finally noticed Richard sitting there, smartly dressed in one of his suits.  She irritably told him, “Richard, we still have jobs to do and lives to live – in Metropolis.  And from the look of things, you’re planning to go into Metropolis today, too.”

“That’s completely different,” Richard argued.  “The Planet is being monitored from the portal, which is about as close as you can get to having Superman on staff as a security guard.  You and Jason will be out in the open.”

“That doesn’t mean Superman won’t be looking out for us, too,” Lois pointed out.

“But he can’t be watching you twenty-four seven,” Richard argued.  He pulled the front section of the paper out of the pile on the table, which boasted the headline “Vanderworths Accuse Luthor of Murder”.  He waved it in front of Lois and added somberly, “With this headline, Luthor is going to be out for blood.”

Lois briefly scanned the headline, and muttered, “Well, if he thinks today’s headline is bad, just wait until he sees tomorrow’s.”

“Are you intentionally provoking the man?” Richard asked in exasperation.

“And what would you have us do, Richard?  Drop the coverage and wait for him to do something crazy with Superman’s crystals?  Have you forgotten what he tried to do the last time he was out?” Lois countered sharply.  “We’re keeping the pressure on him – he’s more prone to make mistakes that way, and when he screws up, we’ll take him down.”

“Why do you need to be the one doing it?” Richard asked pointedly.  “Why not let this come from the D.A. or the feds?”

Lois sternly countered, “Richard, we’ve already been through this, and I really don’t want to repeat that argument… Look, I know you’re worried – I get that, I really do.  But you’re just going to have to learn to trust that I know what I’m doing instead of second-guessing every decision I make and arguing it to death…  I’ve already made my decision here, which is non-negotiable…  So, please drop it.”

“I can’t when you’re putting Jason at risk, too.”

“We’ve already reviewed the plan with police and FBI experts, they’re okay with it, and they’re there to back us up if there’s a problem…  So if you’re done nagging me, I need to get changed to cover the D.A.’s press conference.”

“Clark said he’d arranged for a remote feed,” Richard informed her.

“I can’t ask questions with a remote feed,” Lois protested.

“Lois, just once, would you try not to give me a stroke, and play it safe?” Richard pleaded.

“This is how I work, Richard.  Get used to it,” Lois snapped.  She sighed in frustration and in a calmer tone, she added, “We’re not taking unnecessary risks, but we’re not going to let Luthor manipulate our coverage, either, which means I’m going to that press conference and no amount of nagging is going to change my mind.  Are we clear on that?”

“Crystal,” Richard replied harshly.  “At least call me when it’s over and you’re safe.”

“I’ll consider it.  Now, if we’re done here, I need to get changed,” she replied and she then marched out of the kitchen and back up the stairs.



Thursday, October 5, 2006 10:50AM EDT
Clark Kent was seated on a hallway bench at the Metropolis courthouse, closely observing the light crowd in the hallway as he typed in the final changes to the indictment story on his laptop, with Lois peeking over at the screen from her seat beside him.  As expected, the district attorney had announced the indictment of Lex Luthor for murder in the first degree, for the death of Gertrude Vanderworth, and conspiracy to commit murder for the attempted hit on Clark Kent.  D.A. Clements had also declared that Luthor was under investigation for a number of other crimes and that additional charges would likely be added.   When Clements opened the floor for questions, Lois had not held back.

“Why did it take the district attorney’s office so long to act against Luthor?” she had asked.

“It’s taken this long to build the case against him that is strong enough to win in court,” Clements had answered.

“And his attempted genocide in ’97 wasn’t compelling enough reason to challenge his appellate victory, which used a rational for overturning the conviction that legal scholars universally consider to be untenable?”

“Our battle with Mister Luthor on that front isn’t over yet.  We’ve petitioned Chief Justice Roberts for leave to pursue an appeal of that decision, despite the late date.  We expect the request will be granted,” Clements had told her.

The questions from Lois and the other journalists present at the press conference continued for nearly thirty-five minutes before Clements excused himself.  Lois and Clark had then dashed across the street to the courthouse, where they proceeded to make the necessary updates to their pending story from a bench in the hallway while they waited for the eleven o’clock emergency hearing the probate court had scheduled for the Vanderworth case.

“I think that should do it,” Clark said quietly.

“Not quite,” Lois objected in a quiet whisper.  “You didn’t mention that Luthor’s a fugitive from justice.  Let’s squeeze that in near the top.”

“How about at the end of the first paragraph?” Clark suggested.  “I can add, ‘The alleged murderer, whose 2000 conviction was overturned last spring on questionable grounds, remains at large and is now considered a fugitive from justice’.”

“That’ll work,” Lois declared.  “Make the change and send it in…  And just in time.  Look who’s coming.”

Clark looked up and recognized Harold Vanderworth as he walked towards them with his entourage.  He quickly typed in their changes and submitted the story, closing his laptop just as Harold stopped in front of him.

“Fancy meeting you two here,” Harold greeted them cheerfully.  “You remember my lawyer, Alex Sanchez.  These two work with him – Nancy Johnson and Curt Nicholas.  These two big guys here are Paul Norris and Bruce Rodgers from our security detail.”

“It’s a pleasure to meet all of you,” Clark replied pleasantly.  He turned to Harold and said, “I assume you heard the news from the D.A. this morning?”

“Yes, wonderful news,” Harold replied enthusiastically.  “I know that it is mostly thanks to your efforts that the bastard was finally indicted, and I cannot thank you enough for that.”

“Luthor’s a threat to everyone, and it’ll be thanks enough once he’s locked up again,” Clark replied sincerely.

“That goes for me, too,” Lois added.  “So… do you think they’ll throw out the will this morning?”

Harold turned to Alex, and after a moment’s hesitation, the attorney quietly explained, “The court is certain to give Luthor’s side more time to respond to our complaints.  This morning’s hearing will mostly be about our constructive trust and property inspection motions.  That should go pretty quick, I think.  I doubt Judge Harrison will keep us for more than twenty minutes.”

“The constructive trust is the one to freeze his assets, right?” Lois asked curiously.

“Well, no, not exactly frozen.  He can still spend from the accounts, but expenditures need to be approved by the court, and we get to argue over whether they’re legitimate expenses and how much is appropriate.  Assuming that our motion carries – and I believe it will – there will probably be a fight over Morrison’s fees in the not too distant future.”

“And what about the property inspection?” Clark asked.  “Is that about the damage to the house we told you about?”

“The new will has never officially been recognized and Luthor never received title to the estate property in his possession,” Alex whispered.  “The court declared it a custodial possession, meaning he’s responsible for maintaining it properly while the matter is decided.  If we can show that he’s been a negligent custodian – say, by documenting extensive damage to the house – the court could be obliged to order Luthor to immediately relinquish all estate property.”

“Luthor’s run to ground,” Lois reminded him.  “They’re no way you’ll get anything from him that’s not bolted down, and maybe not even then.”

“Doesn’t matter.  It’s psychological warfare,” Harold told her quietly.  “We’re rubbing his nose in the fact that his plan to swindle us is falling apart.  For someone as narcissistic as Luthor to be outsmarted like this will be infuriating, which is what we’re counting on.  We’re expecting him to go ballistic and do something stupid, which could get him caught.”

“That could be incredibly dangerous,” Lois muttered.  “You heard what he tried to do to Clark.”

“We know, and we’ve beefed up security for the entire family, just to be safe,” Harold informed her.  “Well, looks like the excitement’s about to begin…  Enjoy the fireworks.”

As Harold filed into the courtroom with his entourage, Clark stuffed his laptop back into his bag, and then followed Lois into the courtroom, where they took their seats in the back just as Judge Cheryl Harrison began the hearing.



Thursday, October 5, 2006 12:15PM EDT
Luthor puzzled over the alpha scanner results that he was analyzing on his desktop computer.   The five-hundred mile range achieved by tying into the yacht’s onboard systems gave him plenty of data to study, but after analyzing it for several hours, the results were not at all what he was expecting.  His first surprise was the realization that the alpha trail dissipated completely within eighteen hours of Superman’s movements, according to the decay rate calculated from live data.  Though Luthor quickly modified his scanner to preserve the data to disk, he still had no way of gathering historical data on the alien’s flights.  The data barely went back far enough to confirm that the hero had indeed interfered with the hit on Kent Tuesday night.

The second surprise was the manner of the hero’s movements.  Luthor had expected long swooping flights, from one meddling intervention to the next, but the data instead showed numerous isolated hops.  In most cases, Luthor was able to match one endpoint of the hops to reported Superman sightings, but the other endpoint tended to be obscure – alleys, subway stations, parking garages, or the roofs of tall buildings.  He really is masquerading as one of us, Luthor concluded.  He’s jumping into action when a situation arises and hiding among us after it’s been handled.

But not all the time, Luthor corrected himself.  The scanner had also shown Superman hovering two miles above the city the past couple mornings, spying on the city prior to either swooping down to the Metropolis Police Department Headquarters, or descending on selected targets around Planet Plaza.  No wonder our subcontractors keep getting nabbed, Luthor speculated.  The freak’s scanning the crowd and protecting the Planet…  Well, that answers one of my questions – the freak is definitely working with those pests from the paper, which could make taking them out more challenging…

Luthor’s thoughtful analysis of the data was interrupted by the sharp clank of Kitty’s heels marching across the glass floor of the ballroom.  Luthor glared over at her and harshly said, “I thought I made it clear that I was not to be disturbed.”

“Fine.  Then I won’t tell you what they’re saying about you on TV,” Kitty replied casually.  She turned and started marching back out when Luthor’s voice stopped her.

“TV?” he barked.  “You’ve been wasting my satellite bandwidth on television.”

Kitty turned back to him, rolling her eyes as she said, “Well, maybe we’d have other things to do if we were hiding out on land, instead of bobbing up and down in the middle of the ocean.”

“And how many houses would have the luxury that I’ve provided for you here?” Luthor countered arrogantly.

“Luxuries like television?”

Luther glared at her for a moment and then sternly asked, “What were they saying about me?”

“They say that you killed Gertrude, and that you had a bad day in court today,” Kitty informed him.  “Doesn’t make sense to me – you’ve been here all day...”

Luthor’s brow wrinkled in confusion for a moment, and he then turned to his computer, quickly bringing up the Daily Planet web site, which boasted the headline, “Luthor Indicted for Vanderworth Murder”, and prominently displayed Luthor’s snarling prison mug shot.  The other headline on the page was almost as bad, “Vanderworths Win Constructive Trust”.  Luthor was barely able to contain his rage as he read through the two stories.

Luthor plucked his cell phone out of the top drawer and inspected the display, his rage growing even fiercer when he realized there was no signal.  He chucked the cell phone across the room, which sent Kitty scurrying out the door.  Luthor then launched the Internet phone application on his desktop and placed his call.  After a few rings, it was picked up, with the other party courteously answering, “Morrison.”

“What the hell happened this morning?” Luthor demanded angrily.

“Mister Luthor,” Morrison replied.  “We’ve been trying to get a hold of you.  Your phone’s going straight to voice mail–”

“Never mind that.  Tell me what the hell happened?” Luthor insisted emphatically.

“Vanderworth ambushed us with a half dozen motions filed yesterday afternoon, and the court scheduled an emergency hearing on them this morning.  We just saw them for the first time a little after nine, and barely had an hour to review them before we had to be in court.” Morrison explained.

“Spare me the explanations and get to the point,” Luthor commanded.

“Well, there’s a lot to go through, between the probate and criminal matters,” Morrison told him.  “I’ll start with probate.  The Vanderworths filed a motion demanding that the court declare your late wife’s deathbed will invalid on the grounds that she was not of sound mind at the time.  They are supporting their argument with the coroner’s report, which identifies high levels of psychotropic compounds in her system, along with a fatal level of arsenic.  They also presented affidavits from a half dozen highly respected experts on the effects those compounds would have had on your late wife.”

“Impossible,” Luthor declared.  “Whatever they found was clearly cross-contamination from the dumpster they found her in.”

Morrison somberly replied, “Mister Luthor…  They autopsied her Friday afternoon, almost ten hours before her body was stolen from the morgue.”

Luthor eyes flew wide and he fell silent for a full minute as his mind absorbed the scope of the astonishing failure.  Finally, he casually declared, “I’ve clearly underestimated Miss Kowalski’s obsession with me.  However, we mustn’t allow that to interfere with Gertrude’s clear wishes to leave the estate in my hands.”

“That’s going to be a tough sell, but we’ll try,” Morrison responded.  “We’ll probably have better luck using that in the criminal case.”

“They haven’t got a case!”

“You were indicted this morning for Gertrude’s murder, and for the attempt on Kent,” Morrison reminded him.

“They can’t have anything on me,” Luthor insisted.  “It’s got to be a ploy by Vanderworth and Lane and the freak to discredit me.”

“Be that as it may, the coroner’s report is going to be hard to impeach,” Morrison commented.  “In any case, we have until the nineteenth to respond to the motion.  Moving right along…  The Vanderworths also filed a wrongful death complaint against you, explicitly accusing you of marrying and murdering Gertrude for her money.  They’re asking for treble damages and one hundred million in punitive damages.”

“What!” Luthor exclaimed.

“We don’t need to worry about that quite yet,” Morrison assured him.  “We have until the nineteenth to respond and it won’t be difficult to suspend that complaint until after the criminal case is resolved.  By the time the court gets back to it, we’ll be ready for it.”

“Ready for it?” Luthor echoed.  “And have you been ready for anything they’ve thrown at you yet?”

Morrison ignored the comment and continued, “They also filed a motion to compel discovery, demanding all of your financial records.  We have until the nineteenth to respond to that as well.”

“I’m not giving them my financial records!” Luthor declared.

“I’ll attempt to quash it,” Morrison promised.  “Judge Harrison ruled from the bench on the last two motions with almost no discussion.  She claimed that the court was obliged to do so, given recent developments in the matter, such as the OCME reclassifying your late wife’s death as a homicide, your indictment for her murder, and your current status as a fugitive from justice–”

“Get to the point!” Luthor demanded.

Morrison sighed, and then said, “The first of the two motions is a property audit.  Remember, when we first started down this road, we got the court to recognize your custodial possession of the house and yacht, among other things.  The Vanderworths are demanding an inspection of the property, to make sure you’ve been a good custodian.  The court concurs, giving the, quote, ‘likelihood that plaintiffs will prevail in the matter before the court’…”

“Likelihood that they’ll prevail?” Luthor repeated incredulously.  “Just what have I been paying you for?”

“The court also issued an order demanding that you immediately return the yacht to its berth in front of the house for inspection.”

“I’ll do no such thing!”

“If that’s your decision, I’ll file an interlocutory appeal with Judge Gregory this afternoon,” Morrison promised.  “Of course, it won’t be as easy as it was last time, when there were two vacancies on the bench.  This time, we’ll have to convince one of the other judges to go along with Gregory, and we’ve not yet found the skeletons in their closets.”

“Well, look harder!” Luthor demanded.

“There was one more motion before the court this morning,” Morrison continued.  “The court has imposed a constructive trust on all of your known assets.  Furthermore, you are enjoined from making any expenditures from those named accounts until a trustee is appointed.”

“How could you have failed me like this, Albert?” Luthor demanded angrily.  “If you had cremated the old hag when I asked you to, we wouldn’t have any of these problems right now!”

“Sir, that’s simply the way things go sometimes, which brings me to our final topic,” Morrison replied.  “Given the constraints on your domestic funds, we’re going to require a retainer drawn from your offshore holdings to cover our fees.”

“What!” Luthor screamed.  “You incompetently allow both Vanderworth and the Planet to run rings around you, slandering my reputation and blocking my richly deserved inheritance, and now you have the gall to try to shake me down?”

“They have very talented representation,” Morrison countered.

“And I, apparently, do not!”

“Sir, I doubt you’d find anyone better qualified to represent you, and we did get you out of prison.”

“Only because we had Gregory in our pocket!” Luthor argued.

“I understand your disappointment, but I’m still going to have to insist on the retainer,” Morrison replied calmly.  “It is a common arrangement when the client’s future ability to pay the fees is in doubt…”

“How dare you!”

“Given what we know so far of the cases against you, it is going to be difficult and expensive to defeat,” Morrison explained.  “Our initial estimate on the cost for your defense in both the probate and criminal cases is between eight and ten million dollars.  However, I’ll only ask for a retainer of eight million.”

“You’ve got a lot of nerve,” Luthor stated in barely restrained anger.

“Sir, if we’re to continue representing you, we’ll need to guarantee that we will be compensated for our services.”

“Your services… are no longer required!” Luthor shouted and he abruptly ended the call.   He stared at the screen and angrily added, “You’ll die with the rest of them.”   He then lowered his head to his hands while he considered the new developments, which would clearly force him to alter his plans again.  He was growing weary of the forced changes and the incompetence that continually threatened his plans.

A few minutes later, he punched the intercom, and shouted, “Reilly!  Get down here, and bring everyone else with you.  We have work to do.  And I’ve got new orders for our contractors – tell them to get into position for Plan G.”



(1) “Gang Aft Agley” can be translated as “often go awry”, though for the title of this chapter, we’ll stick with the original line from the 1785 Robert Burns poem, (You need to Login or Register to view media files and links):  “The best-laid schemes o’ mice an ‘men/Gang aft agley.”

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