Fic: Full Disclosure | SV/SR | SR!Clark/SV!Lois | PG-13 | 1/1
Title: Full Disclosure
Fandom: Smallville/Superman Returns (DCU fusion)
Pairing: SR!Clark Kent/SV!Lois Lane
Rating: PG-13
Word Count: 2,233
Prompt: For Porn Battle XII: substitute, glasses, grief, Multiverse, lost, replacement; For the 2011 DCU FFA Summer Clois Fest Challenge: Clois Mix and Match, Multiverse, Vulnerable, Heal
Summary: After the dust settles from the Convergence event, Clark shows up unexpectedly at Lois's apartment. Their talk doesn't go so smoothly.
Disclaimer: DC and WB own everything, though they don't deserve the privilege.
Author's Notes: This is the first official fic from my Convergence-verse. I've decided to make it a little bit diffuse, more like a series of loosely-interconnected ficlets, with the main story (the main Convergence event, where the DCU verses collide) taking place over the course of just a handful of installments. All you need to know for this installment is that SR!Clark, Richard, and Jason, SV!Lois, YJ!Conner, and L&C!Martha & Jonathan survived the Convergence, and things are still getting back to some semblance of 'normal'. Originally posted here at PB XII, though I obviously didn't get to the porn yet. :p
Full Disclosure
Answering the knock on the door, only to find Clark-the other Clark, never her Clark-on the other side, Lois only barely stopped herself from slamming the door in his face, a few choice words perched on the tip of her tongue.
“What the hell do you want?” she snapped, her grip tightening on the knob. If she'd had his powers, she might've snapped it off, she was so tense.
Clark just sort of fidgeted and stared down at his feet, his hair hanging down over glasses that he seemed far more comfortable wearing than her Clark ever had. “Um, I just wanted to-”
“What, apologize?” she cut him off, feeling that familiar heat of anger-blame-rise up in her chest, dancing along her spine. “Newsflash, Clark, you don't get to apologize for this. You didn't-”
But the rest of her sentence caught in her throat as she realized what she was about to say was the truth. He hadn't caused the collapse. He hadn't been among the fuck-ups that made this a permanent situation. It wasn't his fault that her Clark was gone. That he was out there, somewhere, wondering where she'd disappeared to after the Multiverse had been restored while their patchwork universe remained with its stolen population.
Swiping a hand over her face, Lois sighed and shook her head, unable to look this replacement Clark in the eyes. She just... couldn't. Couldn't acknowledge him for what he was supposed to be. Certainly not when he looked so much like her own Clark and so very different at the same time, in his blue t-shirt, thread-bare jeans, and bright red Converse, as if he'd just run all the way from the farm but had never touched the ground.
“Look,” he started, reaching out for her but aborting the motion halfway, as if he remembered too late that she wasn't his Lois, either. “I really... wish I knew what to say to you, but I don't. I just wanted... to talk, I guess. I dunno, there are some things I figured you might want to know, but it doesn't matter right now,” he shrugged, floundering as he shoved his hands down in the pockets of his jeans. Shaking his head, he started to turn away. “This was stupid. I'm sorry, Lois. I... I guess I'll see you in the office, if you're still coming back to work.”
Realizing as he turned that she hadn't seen him look so... so utterly lost before, that he looked maybe even as lost as she felt, Lois pried her hand from the doorknob and called after him, “Why?”
Clark turned partially back to her, eyebrows raised behind those thick glasses. “Why what?”
Lois shook her head, clenching her jaw for just a moment, then took a deep breath to fortify herself. “Why... why do you even care? Why are you even here?”
A shy, sad smile moved over Clark's face, and he adjusted his glasses with an index finger-a move that her own Clark had never had the chance to perfect in their universe-the motion making him look entirely too young to be the hero he was. “I spent the morning at the farm,” he explained with a shrug, “talking to my... my parents. I figure, if this is my life now, then I should at least try to adjust, maybe get reacquainted with people I knew on another world. Even if they aren't the same. You deserve to know the whole story about, I dunno, everything. I was hoping... maybe we could compare notes? I mean, besides the obvious.”
Something about the way he moved raised a red flag in her brain. It was almost as if... as if he was falling into a persona that wasn't really him. Obviously, it wasn't; she knew damn well that the nerd personality was only a construct, something for Clark to use as a shield against prying eyes, but the way this Clark fell into it, as if he was suddenly hiding... from her... it just felt wrong. Especially if he was here in the interest of disclosing his life history.
“What are you doing?” she asked after a moment, suddenly feeling exasperated with him, the urge to... to do something getting stronger with the moment. “Okay. So, you want to figure out who you're supposed to be to all these people that had never even met you before the collapse, but how the hell do you think hiding behind those glasses and that awful posture is gonna help?”
At that, Clark froze, his eyes widening. “Um....”
But Lois crossed her arms over her chest and raised an eyebrow at him, and when Clark let out a heavy breath, standing straight, she knew she'd won.
Slowly, he took off the glasses and folded them into his hand, staring at them as if they were the bane of his existence. “Can I come in?” he asked at last, his voice suddenly a lot deeper and more even, more sure as he looked back up at her with an intense gaze.
Letting her shoulders drop, Lois allowed herself a smile, despite the ache in her chest at seeing this stronger side. “Yeah,” she answered, and stepping aside, she ushered him into her apartment.
~*~*~*~
“Wait a minute,” she stopped him mid-sentence, setting her coffee on the table and turning toward him on the couch, all the other little things he'd told her since he'd come in to talk dissolving into so many pointless details as this last revelation blew them all out of the water. “So, you mean to tell me that the little boy that's been hanging around the bullpen-and don't get me wrong, he is adorable, and I just knew there was something up with him-that he's your son? And... and hers?”
Lois could hardly believe it, that her counterpart would've been so sloppy as to get herself knocked up by a man she hardly knew, and then leave him out of the picture when he'd returned from his interstellar expedition, Clark having not even known she'd been expecting. She would never have been so irresponsible or so callous.
“Um, yeah,” Clark nodded, averting his gaze as he cradled his mug in his hands and stared into the depths of his coffee. “Technically... that makes Jason yours, too.”
“Oh. Right,” Lois breathed, taking a moment to let it sink in. She... had a kid. That certainly hadn't been on her agenda for the next decade. More surprising was how well she seemed to be handling the news. But considering everything that'd changed, that some people that had been alive were now dead, or missing, and vice versa, including Clark's father-his parents weren't even the same Martha and Jonathan that either of them had ever known-this was hardly the most shocking thing that'd come to light. Hell, they'd learned that Conner wasn't even the one either of them had known-and that this Clark had never known him at all-a week ago, before the Multiversal reestablishment, so at least the strangest point of divergence had already been hashed out.
But then something else hit her. “When the hell were you gonna tell me?” she demanded, just barely resisting the urge to punch him in the bicep. “Was that the only reason you even showed up here? And if I'd let you walk away, were you gonna let it slip into conversation over a latte some afternoon in the bullpen? Or were you just gonna agonize over finding the right time to tell me, and never do it?”
The wince that twisted Clark's face told her that she'd gone too far, but still, this was vital info; she had a right to know, and she knew he was well aware of that point.
“I'm sorry,” he sighed, glancing at her with the most defeated look she'd ever seen on a man. “Richard and I... were just trying to protect Jason. If all that he knows is that his mother is gone, then it'll be easier for him to grieve and adjust. But... I couldn't just keep him from you.”
“You're damned right. And hey, another newsflash,” Lois said, standing and looming over him with crossed arms. “Familial relationships aren't so simple anymore. People can't just cut ties completely because someone they knew isn't the same as before. You said it yourself. You went to the farm to see your parents, didn't you? And they still welcomed you in, right? So why didn't I get included in this decision? You tell me I've got a kid, and the other me was married to a guy that I haven't even spoken to twice since the collapse, and neither of you saw the need to clue me in first thing?”
Clark seemed to curl up into himself at that, and the sight of it just set Lois's blood to boiling. “Oh, for fuck's sake, Smallville, you can't seriously expect me to-”
But she stopped dead in her tracks as she realized what she'd called him, his head lifting and eyes darting up to meet hers, both their gazes wide with shock. Her hand flew to her mouth as her chest twisted with agony, seeing his eyes, those bright blue eyes that couldn't have been human, while her Clark's had been so much calmer, closer to green, like the sea after a storm.
The man on the couch before her wasn't her Clark. He wasn't 'Smallville'. He was a stranger.
How the hell could she have forgotten that? How could comparing notes over coffee have gone so wrong so fast? And how the hell hadn't she expected something like this to happen in the first place?
Practically flying out of the room, Lois locked herself in the bathroom, turned on the sink, and splashed water over her face as if it could temper the anger and adrenaline surging through her. Of course it couldn't, but she couldn't just let herself sit on the toilet lid and bawl, now could she? Certainly not with the kicked-puppy she'd left in her living room.
When an unexpected knock on the bathroom door startled her out of her whirling thoughts, Lois let out a heavy breath, toweling off her face. She gave herself a once-over in the mirror, and dammit, she looked like hell. Perfect.
“Hang on,” she groused.
Pulling the door open, she looked up at Clark. “Sorry,” she said simply, willing away the turmoil that his revelations had brought up in her. “Can we just try this again, but without all the drama? Because I'd really like to move on with my life, and we're gonna have to be completely honest with one another if that's ever gonna happen, right? You wanted to compare notes, so let's do that. You tell me everything, and I promise not to fly off the handle again.”
Surprisingly, Clark nodded, giving her a faint, crooked smile. It wasn't close to any expression her Clark would've worn, and for once, that was a relief. Better to see him as a different person altogether. “I'd like that, Lois,” he agreed. “I don't want to keep anything from you.”
“Good. I'm glad we're on the same page,” she nodded in return, and when he moved to let her pass, she paused just a moment, figuring she ought to at least offer a real apology for yelling at him. Leaning up on her tip-toes, she dropped a quick kiss on his cheek, her fingertips just barely touching his jaw.
The gasp he took in at the gesture was even more surprising, as was the hand that landed on her shoulder, and Lois found herself frozen, her breath caught in her throat. She should move. Should step away from him. Should head back out to the kitchen and pour herself a stiff drink. Anything. Anything but stand here, held in his suddenly heated gaze, trapped in his gravitational pull.
But she couldn't move, her feet rooted to the spot as she involuntarily leaned into him, his arms going around her back as hers slipped around his middle. His chest was warm and firm beneath her cheek as she melted into his embrace, her body working on autopilot. God, he was so much warmer than... than....
It didn't matter. Every comparison she'd tallied up seemed to evaporate as he nuzzled into her hair, his voice low as he tightened his arms around her and murmured, “I'm so sorry, Lois. I know I can't ever be him.”
“And I can't ever be her,” she whispered against his t-shirt, acknowledging for the first time that maybe he'd been making just as many comparisons as she had, and that they'd probably never quite measure up in each other's eyes, no matter how hard they tried-and dammit, Lois couldn't deny now that she wanted to try.
A short, bitter laugh, and Clark went on, “She was never even mine, you know. She didn't even know the real me.”
Pulling back, Lois caught his gaze, everything clicking into place at last. “This must be hell for you. For... all of you.”
“Pretty much,” he nodded sadly, and with a raised brow, he added, “So, fresh start?”
“Absolutely. Full disclosure, no judgment?”
“Agreed.”
Drawing out of his arms, she stepped back and offered her hand. “Lois Lane, Daily Planet. Nice to meet you, Mister-?”
Clark grinned and grasped her hand firmly, and it was like the sun had come out, finally. “Clark Kent, also Daily Planet. Likewise, Miss Lane. Likewise.”
And as far as first meetings went, this one was off to a good start.
~*~*~*~
Fandom: Smallville/Superman Returns (DCU fusion)
Pairing: SR!Clark Kent/SV!Lois Lane
Rating: PG-13
Word Count: 2,233
Prompt: For Porn Battle XII: substitute, glasses, grief, Multiverse, lost, replacement; For the 2011 DCU FFA Summer Clois Fest Challenge: Clois Mix and Match, Multiverse, Vulnerable, Heal
Summary: After the dust settles from the Convergence event, Clark shows up unexpectedly at Lois's apartment. Their talk doesn't go so smoothly.
Disclaimer: DC and WB own everything, though they don't deserve the privilege.
Author's Notes: This is the first official fic from my Convergence-verse. I've decided to make it a little bit diffuse, more like a series of loosely-interconnected ficlets, with the main story (the main Convergence event, where the DCU verses collide) taking place over the course of just a handful of installments. All you need to know for this installment is that SR!Clark, Richard, and Jason, SV!Lois, YJ!Conner, and L&C!Martha & Jonathan survived the Convergence, and things are still getting back to some semblance of 'normal'. Originally posted here at PB XII, though I obviously didn't get to the porn yet. :p
Full Disclosure
Answering the knock on the door, only to find Clark-the other Clark, never her Clark-on the other side, Lois only barely stopped herself from slamming the door in his face, a few choice words perched on the tip of her tongue.
“What the hell do you want?” she snapped, her grip tightening on the knob. If she'd had his powers, she might've snapped it off, she was so tense.
Clark just sort of fidgeted and stared down at his feet, his hair hanging down over glasses that he seemed far more comfortable wearing than her Clark ever had. “Um, I just wanted to-”
“What, apologize?” she cut him off, feeling that familiar heat of anger-blame-rise up in her chest, dancing along her spine. “Newsflash, Clark, you don't get to apologize for this. You didn't-”
But the rest of her sentence caught in her throat as she realized what she was about to say was the truth. He hadn't caused the collapse. He hadn't been among the fuck-ups that made this a permanent situation. It wasn't his fault that her Clark was gone. That he was out there, somewhere, wondering where she'd disappeared to after the Multiverse had been restored while their patchwork universe remained with its stolen population.
Swiping a hand over her face, Lois sighed and shook her head, unable to look this replacement Clark in the eyes. She just... couldn't. Couldn't acknowledge him for what he was supposed to be. Certainly not when he looked so much like her own Clark and so very different at the same time, in his blue t-shirt, thread-bare jeans, and bright red Converse, as if he'd just run all the way from the farm but had never touched the ground.
“Look,” he started, reaching out for her but aborting the motion halfway, as if he remembered too late that she wasn't his Lois, either. “I really... wish I knew what to say to you, but I don't. I just wanted... to talk, I guess. I dunno, there are some things I figured you might want to know, but it doesn't matter right now,” he shrugged, floundering as he shoved his hands down in the pockets of his jeans. Shaking his head, he started to turn away. “This was stupid. I'm sorry, Lois. I... I guess I'll see you in the office, if you're still coming back to work.”
Realizing as he turned that she hadn't seen him look so... so utterly lost before, that he looked maybe even as lost as she felt, Lois pried her hand from the doorknob and called after him, “Why?”
Clark turned partially back to her, eyebrows raised behind those thick glasses. “Why what?”
Lois shook her head, clenching her jaw for just a moment, then took a deep breath to fortify herself. “Why... why do you even care? Why are you even here?”
A shy, sad smile moved over Clark's face, and he adjusted his glasses with an index finger-a move that her own Clark had never had the chance to perfect in their universe-the motion making him look entirely too young to be the hero he was. “I spent the morning at the farm,” he explained with a shrug, “talking to my... my parents. I figure, if this is my life now, then I should at least try to adjust, maybe get reacquainted with people I knew on another world. Even if they aren't the same. You deserve to know the whole story about, I dunno, everything. I was hoping... maybe we could compare notes? I mean, besides the obvious.”
Something about the way he moved raised a red flag in her brain. It was almost as if... as if he was falling into a persona that wasn't really him. Obviously, it wasn't; she knew damn well that the nerd personality was only a construct, something for Clark to use as a shield against prying eyes, but the way this Clark fell into it, as if he was suddenly hiding... from her... it just felt wrong. Especially if he was here in the interest of disclosing his life history.
“What are you doing?” she asked after a moment, suddenly feeling exasperated with him, the urge to... to do something getting stronger with the moment. “Okay. So, you want to figure out who you're supposed to be to all these people that had never even met you before the collapse, but how the hell do you think hiding behind those glasses and that awful posture is gonna help?”
At that, Clark froze, his eyes widening. “Um....”
But Lois crossed her arms over her chest and raised an eyebrow at him, and when Clark let out a heavy breath, standing straight, she knew she'd won.
Slowly, he took off the glasses and folded them into his hand, staring at them as if they were the bane of his existence. “Can I come in?” he asked at last, his voice suddenly a lot deeper and more even, more sure as he looked back up at her with an intense gaze.
Letting her shoulders drop, Lois allowed herself a smile, despite the ache in her chest at seeing this stronger side. “Yeah,” she answered, and stepping aside, she ushered him into her apartment.
~*~*~*~
“Wait a minute,” she stopped him mid-sentence, setting her coffee on the table and turning toward him on the couch, all the other little things he'd told her since he'd come in to talk dissolving into so many pointless details as this last revelation blew them all out of the water. “So, you mean to tell me that the little boy that's been hanging around the bullpen-and don't get me wrong, he is adorable, and I just knew there was something up with him-that he's your son? And... and hers?”
Lois could hardly believe it, that her counterpart would've been so sloppy as to get herself knocked up by a man she hardly knew, and then leave him out of the picture when he'd returned from his interstellar expedition, Clark having not even known she'd been expecting. She would never have been so irresponsible or so callous.
“Um, yeah,” Clark nodded, averting his gaze as he cradled his mug in his hands and stared into the depths of his coffee. “Technically... that makes Jason yours, too.”
“Oh. Right,” Lois breathed, taking a moment to let it sink in. She... had a kid. That certainly hadn't been on her agenda for the next decade. More surprising was how well she seemed to be handling the news. But considering everything that'd changed, that some people that had been alive were now dead, or missing, and vice versa, including Clark's father-his parents weren't even the same Martha and Jonathan that either of them had ever known-this was hardly the most shocking thing that'd come to light. Hell, they'd learned that Conner wasn't even the one either of them had known-and that this Clark had never known him at all-a week ago, before the Multiversal reestablishment, so at least the strangest point of divergence had already been hashed out.
But then something else hit her. “When the hell were you gonna tell me?” she demanded, just barely resisting the urge to punch him in the bicep. “Was that the only reason you even showed up here? And if I'd let you walk away, were you gonna let it slip into conversation over a latte some afternoon in the bullpen? Or were you just gonna agonize over finding the right time to tell me, and never do it?”
The wince that twisted Clark's face told her that she'd gone too far, but still, this was vital info; she had a right to know, and she knew he was well aware of that point.
“I'm sorry,” he sighed, glancing at her with the most defeated look she'd ever seen on a man. “Richard and I... were just trying to protect Jason. If all that he knows is that his mother is gone, then it'll be easier for him to grieve and adjust. But... I couldn't just keep him from you.”
“You're damned right. And hey, another newsflash,” Lois said, standing and looming over him with crossed arms. “Familial relationships aren't so simple anymore. People can't just cut ties completely because someone they knew isn't the same as before. You said it yourself. You went to the farm to see your parents, didn't you? And they still welcomed you in, right? So why didn't I get included in this decision? You tell me I've got a kid, and the other me was married to a guy that I haven't even spoken to twice since the collapse, and neither of you saw the need to clue me in first thing?”
Clark seemed to curl up into himself at that, and the sight of it just set Lois's blood to boiling. “Oh, for fuck's sake, Smallville, you can't seriously expect me to-”
But she stopped dead in her tracks as she realized what she'd called him, his head lifting and eyes darting up to meet hers, both their gazes wide with shock. Her hand flew to her mouth as her chest twisted with agony, seeing his eyes, those bright blue eyes that couldn't have been human, while her Clark's had been so much calmer, closer to green, like the sea after a storm.
The man on the couch before her wasn't her Clark. He wasn't 'Smallville'. He was a stranger.
How the hell could she have forgotten that? How could comparing notes over coffee have gone so wrong so fast? And how the hell hadn't she expected something like this to happen in the first place?
Practically flying out of the room, Lois locked herself in the bathroom, turned on the sink, and splashed water over her face as if it could temper the anger and adrenaline surging through her. Of course it couldn't, but she couldn't just let herself sit on the toilet lid and bawl, now could she? Certainly not with the kicked-puppy she'd left in her living room.
When an unexpected knock on the bathroom door startled her out of her whirling thoughts, Lois let out a heavy breath, toweling off her face. She gave herself a once-over in the mirror, and dammit, she looked like hell. Perfect.
“Hang on,” she groused.
Pulling the door open, she looked up at Clark. “Sorry,” she said simply, willing away the turmoil that his revelations had brought up in her. “Can we just try this again, but without all the drama? Because I'd really like to move on with my life, and we're gonna have to be completely honest with one another if that's ever gonna happen, right? You wanted to compare notes, so let's do that. You tell me everything, and I promise not to fly off the handle again.”
Surprisingly, Clark nodded, giving her a faint, crooked smile. It wasn't close to any expression her Clark would've worn, and for once, that was a relief. Better to see him as a different person altogether. “I'd like that, Lois,” he agreed. “I don't want to keep anything from you.”
“Good. I'm glad we're on the same page,” she nodded in return, and when he moved to let her pass, she paused just a moment, figuring she ought to at least offer a real apology for yelling at him. Leaning up on her tip-toes, she dropped a quick kiss on his cheek, her fingertips just barely touching his jaw.
The gasp he took in at the gesture was even more surprising, as was the hand that landed on her shoulder, and Lois found herself frozen, her breath caught in her throat. She should move. Should step away from him. Should head back out to the kitchen and pour herself a stiff drink. Anything. Anything but stand here, held in his suddenly heated gaze, trapped in his gravitational pull.
But she couldn't move, her feet rooted to the spot as she involuntarily leaned into him, his arms going around her back as hers slipped around his middle. His chest was warm and firm beneath her cheek as she melted into his embrace, her body working on autopilot. God, he was so much warmer than... than....
It didn't matter. Every comparison she'd tallied up seemed to evaporate as he nuzzled into her hair, his voice low as he tightened his arms around her and murmured, “I'm so sorry, Lois. I know I can't ever be him.”
“And I can't ever be her,” she whispered against his t-shirt, acknowledging for the first time that maybe he'd been making just as many comparisons as she had, and that they'd probably never quite measure up in each other's eyes, no matter how hard they tried-and dammit, Lois couldn't deny now that she wanted to try.
A short, bitter laugh, and Clark went on, “She was never even mine, you know. She didn't even know the real me.”
Pulling back, Lois caught his gaze, everything clicking into place at last. “This must be hell for you. For... all of you.”
“Pretty much,” he nodded sadly, and with a raised brow, he added, “So, fresh start?”
“Absolutely. Full disclosure, no judgment?”
“Agreed.”
Drawing out of his arms, she stepped back and offered her hand. “Lois Lane, Daily Planet. Nice to meet you, Mister-?”
Clark grinned and grasped her hand firmly, and it was like the sun had come out, finally. “Clark Kent, also Daily Planet. Likewise, Miss Lane. Likewise.”
And as far as first meetings went, this one was off to a good start.
~*~*~*~