Chapter Four: The Pitfalls and Pleasantries of Kryptonian Multiplication

Chapter Four
*Rivals and Arrivals*

The next evening after work, Clark flew over the Rocky Mountains along the northwestern border between Idaho and Montana at Jimmy’s suggestion. He and Lois looked for an uninhabited, isolated valley in which Jor-El and Lara could temporarily land their ship.

Every once in a while, they would stop with a whoosh of the red cape--usually at Clark’s suggestion--and Clark would point out the benefits of one site or another to his birth parents. Each time, they would reject the site based on size limitations or proximity to any human installations. Most of these sites, Lois had already rejected for the same reasons, but Clark had insisted on stopping for every one, just in case the elder Kryptonians did not have the same objections.

Finally, after three hours, all three Kryptonians--and Lois--had agreed on a suitable landing place. The valley was large, and the mountains around it were dense with forestation, and situated on a large mesa which would be difficult--if not impossible--to reach from any direction but above. Enough rocky outcroppings slanted over the valley itself that concealing the ship from above would not be a problem either.

“*I’ll come up there and lead your ship down to the valley later tonight,*” Clark told Jor-El and Lara while speaking aloud for Lois’s benefit. “*Then from there, I’ll take the two of you to Metropolis to meet Lois and the Kents, since you might not be able to fly yet. We’ll want to move the ship later, since this valley is still too close to civilization for comfort, even with the mesa walls so difficult to climb. Jimmy also suggested the Himalayas as a more permanent hiding spot. We can move it after you’ve gotten your own powers though.*”

*Very well,* Jor-El answered. *Until later, my son*

“And I suppose I’m supposed to wait in Metropolis then?” Lois raised an eyebrow at her fiance.

“Well,” Clark prevaricated. “I was kind of hoping to meet them in person by myself first, you know? And before I leave to go get them, I’ll bring Mom and Dad to Metropolis, and you and they can meet Jor-El and Lara when I bring them.”

Lois continued to stare, bringing her arms to cross over her chest.

“Please, Lois?” Clark looked into her eyes. “I- It’s just that-”

“Yes?” Lois drawled, and he cringed at the annoyed and impatient tone in her voice.

“Well, you see,” Clark stammered some more. “They’re my biological parents, and I’ve never met them before, not once in the thirty years since I was sent here, too young to remember them. It’s kind of selfish--” Lois blinked, possibly in preparation of telling Clark he wasn’t selfish, whether he thought it of himself or not. Before she could open her mouth, he continued, “--but I was hoping to keep that one moment, the moment I first see them again, to myself.”

There was a pause. Neither reporter moved, nor even looked at the other. Then Clark mumbled, “It’s stupid.”

He watched his scuffed and dusty red boots, and then heard Lois step toward him, felt her right hand on the spandex at his shoulder as her left brought his head up so their eyes met.

“No, it’s not,” she affirmed, shaking her head slightly while maintaining eye contact. “Every once in a while, I forget that the Kents adopted you; you’re just so natural together, which I guess might be a clue to someone like me, whose family was never that great.

“I have no idea what a situation like this feels like for you, and don’t even have a way to imagine it, except for that story I did five years ago about adopted kids searching for their birth parents, and even then you’ve probably already guessed I treated it like ‘just another puff piece.’”

She caressed his cheek, bringing her other hand to his face as well. Clark heard her heart slow down from its previously agitated rhythm. Then Lois closed her eyes, and sighed as she finished, “What I’m trying to say is, as much as I really want to be here to support you when you meet Jor-El and Lara for the first time--not to mention to get the story,” she said with a quick wink before sobering again, “--you NEED this. I may not understand WHY you need it, but you do. I get that.”

She kissed him tenderly, and then, his apprehension gone, he drew his arms around her in a long, warm hug. When they finally pulled apart from each other, the stars had come out and the spring mountain air had become chilly. Silently, Clark wrapped Lois in his cape, and then swept her off her feet. Even at the languid and leisurely rate they flew that evening, the pair made it back to their respective homes in Metropolis in less than twenty minutes.

-----

“Sir,” the corporal called, not looking away from his radar screen. “We’ve got a you-foe on the map with an erratic and unusual flight pattern. No response to hails.”

“Erratic and unusual?” the colonel responded.

“Yes, Sir. Whatever it is, it flies over the mountains, then stops and disappears for a minute, like maybe it’s looking for something. And then it shows up again, headed from the last place to another one.”

“General direction?”

“North by northwest, Sir.”

“Could it be Superman?”

“Doubtful,” the corporal replied. He continued at his superior’s stern look and raised eyebrow, “The Kryptonian generally travels much faster, Sir.”

The colonel had been watching the screen during this exchange, and noticed that the corporal’s UFO, now at the upper extent of their radar range, had changed direction on this latest appearance, and did not seem to be stopping this time.

“Looks like it’s leaving now. Track it as it crosses the radar, until it’s out of range, then I want a course extrapolation.”

“Yes sir,” the corporal acknowledged. A moment later, he had the information. “The UFO was headed in a direction south by southeast when it went beyond our range, Sir.”

“What’s in that direction, Corporal?”

“Cincinnati, Trenton, and Metropolis, Sir.”

The corporal steeled himself not to flinch when the colonel’s irritation at being interrupted for such a minor sighting blew up in his face, but was surprised when he felt a hand clasp his shoulder. “Even Superman has to slow down and smell the roses sometime, Corporal. As you were.”

“Yes sir!” the corporal put a little bit more enthusiasm into his response than he intended, due to his relief at escaping the colonel’s notorious temper.

The corporal got back to work, but as he did, he heard the colonel on the line with his superiors, following the usual procedure for UFOs, even if they did turn out to be Superman. Usually, UFOs that could be Superman were just entered into the day’s log and sent to HQ at the end of the week, but this was a unique occurrence; the corporal guessed that the colonel probably thought he should call it in for further orders.

“General?” the colonel said. He didn’t bother to speak quietly; his men were “trained” not to hear conversations they weren’t privy to.

The corporal pretended not to hear when the colonel informed the general, “We’ve got a possible code 93Y in sector 6. Awaiting your orders.” He was unfamiliar with that particular code, so the corporal focused a little more closely to what the colonel was saying.

There was a pause, and then the corporal could hear the general’s voice coming over the other end of the line, although the words were no more than muffled squawkings. After an exchange of questions from the other end and answers from the colonel, the colonel uttered one final “Yes, Sir,” then hung up the telephone.

“Corporal,” the colonel barked.

“Yes, Sir!” he answered, turning and standing at attention.

“Set up a recon post around the perimeter of those last coordinates--but be discreet. Super Silent protocol at all times. Report the minute anything else happens.”

With one final “Sir!” the corporal vacated his post for the relief officer, and headed to the barracks to gather his reconnaissance team, wondering all the while if it were really possible to hide from the Man of Steel.

-----

It was nearly time for the corporal to wake up his relief for third watch when he saw it--a glowing red streak coming straight toward the last coordinates of the evening’s UFO. Shaking his head and stamping his feet to clear the fog from his mind, he put a pair of binoculars to his eyes.

What he saw nearly made him shout his surprise, before he remembered the Super Silent protocol his team was under. The red streak, magnified in the binoculars’ double lens, was a ship coming in to land! And flying ahead of that ship was Superman himself, sometimes flitting backwards and doing crazy aerial maneuvers around the ship as it came in to land. The only phrase the corporal could think of to describe such maneuvers was, “enthusiastic cavorting.”

The ship was HUGE--not Naval Destroyer huge, but large enough to fit about fifty people comfortably, and with room to spare.

Unable to pull himself away from the sight, he watched as the ship finally landed in the valley, not noticing when his relief came up beside him to watch as well.

Superman landed on the starboard side of the ship as a hatch opened and two beings stepped out wearing black outfits. The corporal, a little confused, saw Superman stand, not moving, in front of the couple who looked like they would be in their mid-to-late forties if they were human.

The man, white haired, wore a black unitard with Superman’s S on the chest in a lighter electric blue than the hero’s costume. The cuffs of the sleeves and the toes of the boots the man wore were the same color.

A red-head, the woman wore a similar unitard without the crest, but wore a long, open black coat over it, the hems at the opening in the front and at the cuffs trimmed in yellow. Both of the older people had similar stunned expressions on their faces as they looked at Superman.

He could see the couple’s mouths move, but he was not close enough to read their lips, and due to the “Super Silent” protocol, the corporal had been constrained from installing listening devices in the valley, so he could not hear what was said, especially not over the sounds of the creek rushing nearby and the night animals prowling.

All of a sudden, the three figures in the valley below converged on each other in a three-way embrace. The older male looked like he was holding back tears--was this a reunion?--and the woman’s lips moved silently.

The trio broke their embrace, and after another moment of silent conversation Superman followed them into the ship, only to return with the other two less than a minute later. The elder couple each carried a satchel on their shoulders, and Superman put an arm around each waist before the trio flew away, the hatch closing and disappearing seamlessly into the ship behind them.

According to the corporal’s compass, they were headed south by south east.

-----

Clark landed just to the right of the thirty-year-old Kryptonian space ship, as it set down in the valley he had chosen earlier that evening. He stood facing the vessel as a door opened in its side and two people stepped out. They looked almost exactly like the couple he had seen in the globe’s messages two years previously. They appeared only slightly older than the two Kryptonians he had encountered on his balcony two nights before, although they wore the same type of clothing.

Not expecting his birth parents to look younger than his adopted parents, despite his knowledge of their three-decade-long journey spent mostly in cryogenics chambers, Clark stood stock still, watching them as they watched him, unsure what to do next. From the looks on Jor-El and Lara’s faces, they did not know what to do either. To break the emotional tension of the moment, Clark spoke.

“Um,” he said. “Now what do we do?”

“What do the people of Earth do when they are reunited?” Lara asked.

“Well,” he answered. “They usually smile and greet each other enthusiastically. Then, depending on how comfortable they are with each other, they might kiss, or hug each other.” Clark smiled.

“Hug?” Lara asked.

“An . . . affectionate embrace,” Clark defined.

The tension snapped. All three of them, as they processed the last few words Clark had spoken, moved as one toward an invisible point in the center of their impromptu triangle. Just before they connected, Clark saw Jor-El screw up his face, just like he had seen his dad do when something affected him deeply, as though he were holding back the emotions, trying to keep the un-manly tears at bay.

For the first time in his own memory, Clark put his arms around parents he thought he would never meet, and they saw him, a man grown, no longer the baby they sent to the stars so long ago.

“My son, oh, my son,” Lara whispered huskily in his ear as she combed her fingertips through the fringes of hair at the nape of his neck in a gesture probably known, and used, by women across the universe to reassure themselves of the solidity of the men and children in their arms.

After a minute or two, Clark pulled back, his eyes and nose slightly red as he blinked away unshed tears. “First things first,” he rasped around the lump in his throat. “We should see if you can fly yet. Concentrate, and think about going up.”

The couple closed their eyes and concentrated, but nothing happened.

“No matter,” Jor-El said. “You did mention that it was an effect of the Earth’s yellow sun. Perhaps, despite our orbit above the Earth for the past two days both in and out of the sun, we have not yet been exposed to enough of its light at this time. And since it is night on this side of the world, it looks as though we will not be able to fly for at least the next few hours until sunrise. I believe you said that you would be able to carry us?”

“Yes, sure, no problem,” Clark answered with a smile on his face, barely able to keep his own boots on the ground. “And it’s a good thing I managed to convince Lois not to come, or I’d have had to make two trips. Why don’t we gather your things and then we’ll go?”

He followed his birth parents back through the door of the ship and stood by the navigation globe, looking in awe at the tiny corridor between the bridge cockpit and the one room which had quartered the elder couple for thirty years. As Jor-El and Lara passed that room, headed for the storage in the back of the ship, he tried to use a bit of x-ray vision to see into the sleeping quarters, but the metal was too dense, due to its Kryptonian origin.

He walked into the room for a look instead. There was a bed as well as two tubes with all sorts of dials on each long side and a glass-like panel on top, which Clark guessed were probably the cryogenics chambers. Another door on the same wall as the storage opened onto what Clark could only guess was the Kryptonian space farer’s equivalent of a bathroom.

Seconds later, Jor-El and Lara appeared in the doorway to the sleeping quarters, and the trio stepped silently back onto the bridge, Jor-El and Lara each with small satchels slung over one shoulder. All three Kryptonians made their way out the door again, Clark putting an arm around each of his parents’ waists before taking off for Metropolis.

-----

Lois paced from Clark’s balcony, through the bedroom, past the sofas to the staircase in front of the entry, and was about to turn around to go back when Martha suddenly appeared in front of her.

“Lois, honey,” she said. “You’re making me nervous.” Gently, Martha guided the other woman to the sofa.

Lois sat, weaving and unweaving her fingers together as she leaned over her lap. “I’m sorry, Martha, but shouldn’t he be back by now? What if something happened? What if--” she looked up, horrified at the thought. “When Clark’s ship landed here, it brought Kryptonite with it. What if Jor-El and Lara’s ship brought MORE Kryptonite?”

“I’m sure they’re all fine, Lois,” Jonathan spoke up from the easy chair across the room. “They’ll probably be here any--”

Just then there was a distinctive “whoosh” outside the apartment. Lois bolted off of the couch and was halfway to the balcony when there was a knock at the door.

“--minute,” Jonathan finished.

Martha wondered aloud, “Did he forget his keys or something?” as she opened the French doors in the entryway. “Can I help you?” she asked the pair on the other side of the door just as Lois walked back into the room and saw that it was not Clark at the door, but the two people she and her fiance had encountered two nights previously.

“What do you want?” she demanded, arms crossed.

“Lois!” Martha scolded.

“Martha, this is the pair I told you about earlier,” Lois hissed. “The ones who had the Kryptonite force field!”

At that news, Martha changed tack. She also folded her arms over her chest and demanded in her best Mama Bear tone, “All right, who are you, and what do you want?”

“Please,” said “Sara.” Lois tacked on an “if that IS her real name” in her head. “We very much need to speak with Kal-El, but have been unable to establish communications in the past two days.”

“Well,” Lois spoke up. “As you can see, he’s not here. I guess you’ll just have to try again later.”

“Do you know when he will return?” “David” asked.

“Right now,” Clark called from the arch way to his bedroom.

Lois watched the elder Kryptonians standing to either side of Clark as they took in the scene by the door. Lara’s eyes were narrowed at “David,” her face set in a thunderous scowl, while Jor-El looked calm--as though he thought he might just be about to enlighten everyone about something.

Sara gasped, but the only outward reaction in David Miller was a slight widening of his eyes.

Jor-El broke the silence, and every head in the room except his, Lois’s, “Sara’s” and “David’s” whipped around to look in his direction when he asked, “Lady Zara of the colony of New Krypton, I presume?”

Chapter Five