By Sammi Burleigh <Sammy149@aol.com>
Rated PG
Submitted March 1999
Summary: What would have happened if everyone had been tied up with Clark in the episode "Green Green Glow of Home"? Everyone would have found out his secret, that's what … Find out more in this fun story. Disclaimer: These characters are not mine. I just borrowed them. No harm intended.
* denote words, phrases, and/or sentences with emphasis
In Green, Green Glow of Home, Clark revealed his identity to Jason Trask. Lois and Jimmy were both in Smallville at the time, so I started thinking: what if Trask had Clark, Lois, and Jimmy tied up in the barn with Martha, Jonathan, and Wayne; AND Clark was forced to reveal his secret to them as well? Well, here's what would have happened. By the way, I've taken some artistic liberties with the time frame of the show. This happens in mid first season, during Green, Green Glow of Home. I assumed that The Rival and The Foundling came before Glow. Also, if this had happened in the actual show Justin Whalen would be playing Jimmy. I'm sorry for any mistakes. This is my first fanfiction.
***
"What do you know about Superman, Mr. Kent?" Jason Trask asked Clark Kent.
"I've already told you. *Absolutely* nothing!" Clark replied uneasily, with a tired sigh.
"Wrong answer! I will give you a half hour to decide to tell me what you know about the alien. If you don't, I'll kill your friends." After giving Clark this last warning, Trask left the old barn.
Trask was truly crazy and Clark knew that he could and would carry out his threat. Martha and Jonathan Kent were tied up with Wayne Irig. Lois Lane and Jimmy Olsen were also tied up. Clark, himself, was chained to the wall. Clark sighed again and thought about how drastically his life had changed over the past two days.
After a recent thunderstorm, Wayne had discovered a meteorite under a tree in his back field. This meteorite would later be known as Kryptonite. He sent a piece to a lab to be tested and kept the rest, thinking that it might be valuable. A few days later Bureau 39 had shown up. Wayne had given the rock to Jonathan for safe keeping. From what Wayne had told him, Jonathan figured out that the rock was probably from the same planet as his son. Martha and Jonathan decided to tell Clark about the meteorite when he came to Smallville. They were unaware that he would not be alone.
Clark, Lois, and Jimmy had come to Smallville on assignment for the Daily Planet to investigate the government search for pesticides on Wayne's farm. Clark had known something was up from the beginning. Wayne had never used pesticides, *and* his property was right next to Schuster's field, the place where Clark had landed on Earth over twenty-five years before. It couldn't be coincidence. The three reporters had questioned the government officials and then headed for town. They had been told the inspection was nothing out of the ordinary, and Wayne had been relocated. Clark hadn't believed them. He told Lois and Jimmy that they were in luck. It was the weekend of the Smallville Corn Festival. Every person in town would be there. They had talked to nearly everyone, but nobody had seen Wayne Irig in several days.
All three had decided to stay at the Kent's farmhouse. After Lois and Jimmy had gone to bed, Jonathan had shown the green, glowing rock to his son and explained how he had gotten it. Clark passed out from exposure to the meteorite. He recovered quickly, but his powers were gone.
Looking at his family and closet friends, Clark knew what he had to do.
"Trask, get in here." Clark called. "I'm ready to deal."
Trask walked in, with a smug expression on his face.
"I hardly think that *you* are in a position to make deals, Mr. Kent."
"I've got information that you want. *And* you can't get it from anyone else. Here's the deal. I want you to promise me that, after I tell, you'll let *them*," he nodded at Lois, Martha, Jonathan, Jimmy and Wayne, "go. You'll get Superman."
"Clark, *no*! You can't tell him!" Martha cried in a desperate attempt to keep her son's secret.
Before Clark could reply, Lois shouted angrily, "I can't believe that you would actually *betray* Superman!"
Clark looked hurt. Her contempt of him and infatuation of Superman was painful.
"Relax, Lois. The only person I'm betraying is myself," he said dryly.
By then Trask was intrigued. "I promise they will not be harmed. Now talk!"
"The truth is," He hesitated for a moment before continuing. "I am Superman."
Lois and Jimmy were shocked by his revelation. Wayne, Martha, and Jonathan were worried.
Trask looked skeptical. "Really? Then *Superman* why haven't you broken the chains, arrested me, or flown your friends off to safety in Metropolis? Where's the suit?" He pointed a gun at Clark. "And why are you afraid of this gun? Bullets bounce off of you. Do you think I'm stupid?" He ended his sarcastic interrogation.
"Your intelligence level is open for debate." Clark muttered under his breath. "Look, Trask, I really *am* Superman. The suit is in the house. I don't have my powers. I was exposed to that green rock of yours. Not long enough to kill me, but it took away my powers."
"You could have heard my theory about the meteorite anywhere. I admire your bravery, but this is not a joke." Trask looked at his watch. "You have twenty-two minutes to tell me the truth. If you don't I *will* execute one of your friends every hour until you do spill the beans. Starting with *her*."
He pointed to Lois and left the barn. Silence dominated the barn for several minutes. Wayne was the first to speak.
"I always suspected that you were him, but I never brought it up."
Jimmy looked amazed. "Wow. CK is *Superman*."
Lois shot a disgusted look at Wayne and Jimmy.
"You didn't actually *believe* him, did you?" She turned her head and glared at Clark. "This is serious, Kent. If you're going to make up stories, *at least* make them believable."
"I *am* Superman, Lois." He protested weakly.
Lois looked at him with an expression that told Clark that she didn't - or wouldn't - believe him. Jimmy appeared to be considering Lois' opinion.
"You're right, Lois. CK couldn't be Superman."
Clark sighed and gave up. He leaned back against the wall, trying to decide what to do next. Martha, Jonathan, and Wayne looked at Clark sympathetically. Time was nearly up when Clark heard a high-pitched beeping. Clark grinned even though the beeping gave him a headache. It was coming from Jimmy's hypersonic watch.
"Jimmy turn that thing off. It's giving me a headache."
"What thing, CK?"
"Your watch."
"How did you know that it's on?"
"*Superman is back*!" Clark broke the chains that were binding him and crushed them into powder. Lois was flabbergasted. Clark untied everyone at superspeed and helped them stand up. Lois was still to shocked to speak, but Jimmy had no trouble talking.
"Wow, this will make some exclusive!"
Clark spun around and stared at his young friend, stunned.
"Jimmy, you *wouldn't*!" He cried despairingly.
"Well, CK … Superman … whoever, it is news. I mean really big … news." Jimmy stammered self- consciously.
"If the rest of the world found out, my life would be ruined. Clark Kent would disappear, I'd have no kind of life!" Clark pleaded.
"Excuse me. Clark, would you fly us out of here? You're in danger if you stay here. Ya'll can settle this later."
Lois finally seemed to find her voice.
"He's right. There *is* still a madman trying to kill Superman." Clark winced at her words. Referring to him as Superman instead of as Clark was the best way to show that she was furious.
"They're right son. You need to get out of here." Jonathan intervened.
Clark nodded and flew them off to Rocky Cove, a deserted place a few miles outside of Smallville. After he put them down, Clark turned away, obviously about to head back to face Trask. He felt a hand on his shoulder. It was Lois.
"Clark, you can't go back. He'll kill you." She was worried about him, despite her anger.
"I have to. Trask has gone too far this time, dragging all of you into this. I'm going back. I've got my powers again. I'll avoid the rock. Trask is certainly not the person who should be running Bureau 39. In fact he's obviously not a person who should be allowed out by himself. I'll try to arrest him."
Lois was about to protest, this time with the support of Martha, Wayne, and Jimmy, but Jonathan spoke first.
He turned towards Clark and said, "Be careful. And wear the suit. No one *else* can find out about you. Trask is so crazy that nobody will believe him when he claims Clark Kent and Superman are one in the same."
Clark smiled, grateful for his father's backing and flew off. Jonathan turned to the others, who were horrified. He looked directly at Lois, although he was speaking to the whole group.
"When he gets that look in his eyes and takes that tone of voice, he's going to do what he wants. No use to fight. He's gonna need our help, though. Wayne, head over to your place and call Rachel Harris. The rest of us will go try to help Clark."
Lois took out her cellular phone and handed it to Wayne.
"Rachel will get there sooner if you use this."
Wayne dialed the sheriff's office. "Hi, Rachel. This is Wayne Irig. You had better get over to the Kent's place. What? Oh. Some lunatic is there, trying to kill Superman. Yeah, it's possible. I didn't think it was either. but apparently it is. Clark might also be there. If he is, he'll be in danger too. Yeah, thanks. Bye." He handed the phone back to Lois. "She's on her way and we should be too. Let's go."
Meanwhile, Trask was walking back to the barn, ready to kill Lois. He had briefly wondered if Kent could be the alien. The famous blue suit *had* been found in the house. Trask ruminated for a while and then dismissed the thought. It was absurd. He swung the door open and was startled at what he saw in the barn. Well, more precisely, at what he *didn't* see. They were gone. Trask heard the door slam. He turned to see Clark Kent, looking straight at him and hovering several feet above the ground. Trask tried to hide his surprise and fear from the angry man floating above him.
"*Why*, Trask? Why did you hold them hostage? Why do you want to kill me? What kind of a threat do you think I am?" Clark asked quietly, still in the air.
"You're a peril to this planet's security. *You* are the public relations man, the one who'll soften us up. You'll get the people to trust you and then the others will come and take us over. Well, *I'm* not going to let you. I'll kill you and that will dissuade the others from coming!" The madman cried wildly.
By this time Clark's friends were behind Trask, ready to charge if Trask would do the slightest thing to harm Clark.
"Trask there *are no others*. You *know* that. I've seen your files about me. I came here as a baby. Bureau 39 stole the craft that I came to Earth in. I know *nothing* about Krypton or the Kryptonians." Clark replied.
Trask, unaware of the crowd behind him, slyly pulled a piece of the meteorite out of his pocket and threw it at Clark. It hit him it the chest. Clark yelped in pain and fell to the ground. Jonathan and Wayne tackled Trask, while Jimmy ran over to where the rock had landed and wrapped it in his jacket. Lois and Martha helped Clark stand up. He was bleeding.
Trask fought off the two old men, grabbed his gun, and aimed at Clark. Rachel entered the barn and shot Trask before he could pull the trigger. Jason Trask muttered something inaudible under his breathe and died.
Lois stood beside Clark, supporting her still weak friend. Martha helped Jonathan and Wayne up. Jimmy stuck the stone in his pocket before Rachel could see it.
"What happened?" Rachel cried, looking at the three bruised men.
Lois answered at once. She pointed to Trask's dead body and said, "*That* was Jason Trask. He believed that it was his job to hunt down and kill Superman. He was *obsessed*. Once he threw us out of a *plane* to get Superman. He even tried to kill poor *Clark* over there, thinking that *he* is Superman." Lois stopped babbling and forced herself to laugh. The Kents gave Lois a grateful look. Rachel had an expression of disbelief on her face. Clark took over.
"She's right, Rachel."
"Are ya'll okay?" Rachel asked.
"I reckon we'll be fine, Rachel." Wayne answered. Rachel looked around the barn, suspiciously. "Hey, where's Superman? You said he was here." Her question stumped everybody.
"He was here a few hours ago. Trask *did* find a way to injure him. He managed to get away and fly to Metropolis. That was long before Trask started beating up on us. There wasn't any way to contact him." Jimmy quickly improvised.
Rachel seemed to accept this explanation. "Why don't you folks go in to the house and rest. I'll come in and get ya'll if I need you."
"Thanks, Rachel." Jonathan said as they filed out of the barn.
When they were inside the farmhouse Martha asked Clark,
"Are you all right? He hit you with that stuff."
Clark tested his powers. "I'm fine, only the powers are gone again." He turned to Lois and Jimmy. "I guess we have some things to talk about."
"Are you sure you're up to it?" Lois asked, concerned.
He was still pale.
"Now's as good a time as any."
"We'll give you kids some privacy." Martha said as she herded Jonathan and Wayne out of the kitchen and into the living room. As she left, she whispered to Clark, "Good luck."
Clark was at a loss of what to say. Finally Lois spoke. "Why didn't you tell us?"
"Like I said before, protection. If the general population found out, I would have no life and my parents would be in danger. Anybody with a grudge against either one of me would use Mom and Dad to get to me. And then there's the government. Look at this whole mess for example."
"Do you trust us?" Jimmy asked.
"I honestly don't know. Can I? Are you gonna tell Perry? How much of this are you going to print?" He challenged.
"We aren't going to tell Perry that you're Superman. Why would you think that?" Jimmy asked, hurt.
"You said earlier that you would print everything." Clark retorted.
Lois answered that one. "That was before we thought it over. You're right. If this got out you wouldn't have a life. We're your friends. We wouldn't do that to you."
Clark smiled, gratefully. "Thanks. Any more questions?"
Lois muttered under her breath, "Wouldn't you know that when I'd get the exclusive interview with Superman, it'd be off the record."
Clark's powers were back, so he heard her. "Well, you always said that you'd get the Superman exclusive, Lois. You just never said that it would be *on* the record." He teased.
"You heard me?"
"My powers are back." He explained.
"Why so quickly? It took you two days, last time." Lois asked, pouting about his teasing.
"I guess I sort of got used to it. Besides, I've been in the sun more. The sun recharges my powers."
Jimmy was intrigued. "Why does that rock take away your powers?"
"It's probably from Krypton. The planet exploded, just as I was leaving the outer part of the atmosphere. There were some natural disasters on Krypton at the time, volcano eruptions and earthquakes mostly. The lava and magma were poisonous. During the explosion, some chunks of rock were probably coated with the lava and some poisonous gases. The stone would most likely kill me if I got too close to it, for too long." Clark explained ruefully, sad that the only existing pieces of his home planet could harm him.
"How did these rocks get to Earth?" Lois quietly asked, still trying to accept the fact that Clark was Superman.
"The ship was traveling much faster than the speed of light. The pieces of Krypton got sucked along the path of the ship and landed on Earth with me."
"Why does the sun recharge your powers?"
"Krypton had a red sun, Jimmy. The Earth's yellow sun is more powerful, so it makes me more powerful."
"If you only lived on Krypton for a few weeks and left when you were a baby, then why do you know so much about the place?" Lois queried, suspiciously.
Clark grinned sheepishly. "Um, do you remember when we broke into the Bureau 39 warehouse?" She nodded. "Well, among all those bagged, tagged, and processed UFO's, was my ship. They had stolen it. Anyway there was a globe in it. I picked it up and put it in my pocket. It was a navigational device, with maps of Earth and Krypton, that guided the ship. It also had stored messages from my birth parents, Jor-El and Lara." Seeing their confused faces, Clark explained, "Holograms of a man and woman appeared. The man said that he was my father. They were in a room filled with machines, and in the middle of the room was a bassinet with a baby in it, me. He said that time was growing short and they were anxiously trying to find a place to send me before the planet blew up. I watched as information came to them from a probe that they had sent into space. The device advised them to send me to Earth. Jor-El told me that Earth is a planet very similar to Krypton and the people had similar ethics to Kryptonians and were the closest match to me, biologically. Lara, my mother, laid me in the ship. Jor-El placed the globe on the ship and said that he was sending me to a realm called America and a place called Kansas. There was another earthquake, worse than the others. Lara and Jor-El held on to each other. He told me not to be sad about their deaths, because they were content that they were together and I had the chance to live. The last thing I saw in the message was my ship flying away from Krypton, just as it exploded." By the time Clark had finished relaying the story his father had told him, there were tears in his eyes.
"What's your name? They obviously didn't call you Clark." Jimmy teased, trying to cheer Clark up.
"They called me Kal-El. That's what the S stands for. It's the Kryptonian symbol for El."
"What did you mean by files?" Lois asked, referring to something Clark had said to Trask.
"Bureau 39 has a huge file on Superman. Remember George Thompson? I X-rayed his briefcase. There was a file in it titled Smallville, 1966. You dragged me out before I could read it."
Clark turned to Jimmy. "Rachel and her staff are cleaning up the mess Trask made and getting ready to bring out his body. You should go take some pictures or Perry will kill you."
Jimmy jumped up, grabbed his camera, and ran out the door. Lois smiled, amused at Jimmy's fear of Perry, and turned to Clark.
"While he's gone, I want to talk about something else," she said, leading him out on the porch for more privacy.
"What?" Clark asked, puzzled.
Lois took a deep breath and started to speak. "Us. You know I've been … infatuated with Superman. Well, I guess since I've put you through all of these confessions, I should confess something myself. I've also been attracted to you, but I hide that through my crush on Superman. You know about Claude and Paul. And Lex treats me that way too. I don't trust men; I've been hurt too many times and I was afraid that you'd hurt me too."
Clark started to protest, but Lois held up her hand to stop him. "I know that you would never deliberately hurt me, and I just want to say that I'm sorry for everything I've put you through. I love you." She looked away, embarrassed. "Please forget everything I said so that we can still be friends."
"Why do you want me to forget it?" Clark inquired, bemused, but with a glimmer of hope in his eyes.
"Because you don't feel the same way."
"Oh, yes I do." He said as he kissed her lightly.
"Really?" She asked, not daring to hope that he might actually love her too.
"Really. I've loved you from the day you barged into Perry's office when he was interviewing me. I just didn't think that you felt the same way."
She kissed him again, more passionately. When they came up for air, Clark turned his head, listening to something.
"Jimmy's on his way back. And *we* still need to write the story and do the follow up work."
Lois pouted, but said, "I suppose we can finish this later." Clark grinned.
Jimmy walked on to the porch and asked, "Did I miss anything?"
Lois smiled innocently. "Clark and I were discussing how to write the story." She turned to Clark. "Which angle should we use?"
"I don't know but, I'm sure you'll tell me."
Jimmy interrupted, eager to stop yet another fight between Lois and Clark. "How about this for a headline? *Madman's murderous obsession ends in his downfall*."
"Sounds good, Jimmy." Clark replied.
Lois started to give orders. "Clark, go talk to Wayne and your parents and get their story of what Trask did to them. Then talk to Rachel. Jimmy go to the jail and get some pictures of the Bureau 39 people who were arrested. Then go back to the Irig property and get some pictures. I'm going to talk to Ms. Sherman to get some inside information. We'll meet back here in three hours."
Clark hurried into the house. Jimmy saluted Lois and grabbed his camera. Things were back to normal. Almost. ***
Three days later, Lois, Clark, and Jimmy walked into the Daily Planet newsroom. Perry walked out of his office to greet them.
"Hi, kids. How are ya'll doing? Great story, you'll win a Kerth for it. And Kent, *what in the name of all that is Graceland* were you thinking, fighting with that loony, Trask?" He scolded, lightly.
"Trask attacked *me*. I didn't *want* to fight him."
"Well, just be more careful. Oh, and what is that rock called? The one that Trask thought could kill Superman."
"Name, chief? We didn't even see it. Who knows if it even existed, besides in Trask's mind." Jimmy said. As part of the cover up, Lois and Clark had given a mythical light to the meteorite.
"Elvis knows, that might be true, but this copy would sing a lot sweeter if you gave it a name."
"Well, it's supposedly from Krypton, so let's call it Kryptonium." Lois suggested.
"But it's a meteorite, so how about Kryptonite?" Clark proposed.
Lois glared at him. Jimmy stayed to watch the upcoming fireworks. Perry, not wanting to be in the middle of the storm when an argument started, fled to his office saying,
"Well, you kids sort it out."
Lois and Clark didn't notice his escape. "*You* are always trying to edit *my* copy!" She fumed.
"Fine, next time *you* fight the bad guy and *I'll* write the story." He retorted.
She gave up. "*Fine. Kryptonite*." She changed the story, LANed it to Perry, and the turned to Clark. "Happy now?"
He grinned at her annoyed expression and she had to smile back. Things were going well for them, except for a few minor arguments. They were in love, had no secrets, and were getting along. Everything was absolutely perfect.
For now …
THE END