Trinity

Clark was late.

As Superman, he was able to move fast than a speeding bullet, able to crisscross the globe in a matter of minutes to attend one crisis after another. Secretly, he had to admit that there were few things in life that could compare with streaking across the sky, unfettered by limitations of gravity. Once he had even chased a shooting star through the night, following its trajectory to ensure that it did not land anywhere inconvenient, like a city. The sensation was exhilarating and heady and during those moments, Clark was more at peace with who he was than at any other time in his life.

However as Clark Kent, there just wasn’t enough hours in the day.

After dealing with a mining accident in Virginia, Clark had rushed back to Metropolis in the hopes of giving Lois some assistance with the piece they were doing together when a massive tenement fire in downtown Chicago caught his attention and he was diverted there. There was no question or for that matter even hesitation that he should leave this to the local authorities but as reporter, he had seen just how catastrophic these things could be. All those bodies trapped in dungeon like apartments in ten storey prisons, it was not enough to assume that fire fighters could manage. Like the people they were trying to save, they were human too.

Superman had made a timely arrival, extinguishing the fire with his super breath as Lois had dubbed it in some of her Superman articles (where did she come up with these names?) and blowing away the noxious smoke into the upper atmosphere. He then resumed his journey to Metropolis, confident that the fire fighters would be able to deal with the rest.

Heading home, more specifically the Daily Planet, Superman took the familiar route to the building rooftop where he was able to change back into Clark Kent. His frequent trips to the rooftop had given the impression that he smoked and though Clark couldn’t imagine polluting his body with that vice, it served a purpose and he made no attempt to deny it. Within minutes, he was stepping through the door of the fire stairs onto the floor where the newsroom waited.

Lois was at her desk, legs crossed, tapping her pencil against her keyboard, her eyes fixed in his direction. An internal alarm sounded in his head because her expression didn’t seem to change when she saw him and he couldn’t read that particular look. Klaxons were screaming in his head in readiness to go to battle mode because this was Lois with something on her mind and it didn’t look good. Thinking furiously, Clark ran a checklist of things he might have forgotten. Nope, it wasn’t an anniversary. It couldn’t be Diana, he hadn’t seen her today and last he recalled, he had put the toilet seat down before he left Lois’ apartment this morning.

Clark took his customary seat at his desk and asked cautiously. “Lois is something wrong?”

“Wrong?” She said fairly fuming. “What could be wrong?” She retorted, dropping her pencil on the desk and proceeded to tidy it up, sweeping a crumpled piece of tissue and an apple core into the waste paper basket as she talked.

“Well, you …”

“I mean, so we were supposed to work on this article together,” she bit back before he had a chance to finish the sentence. “But so far, I’m working it all on my own. You know that I needed your notes to finish it and here you are, so busy with your extra curricular activities that you completely bailed on me! Just because we’re sleeping together doesn’t mean you get to slack off Rookie!”

Woah.

“Uh Lois,” Clark stood up and stared at her with disbelief, wondering what the hell had come over her. “Let’s take this outside. ”

“I don’t need to take this outside Smallville!” She shouted indignantly, almost hysterical in fact.

Clark looked around to see if anyone else was listening to this, they had to be. Something had to be wrong with Lois. No matter how angry she became, there was always some measure of restraint whenever it came to his secret. Lois knew how important it was to both their lives and she was practised at it by now, even with a five year hiatus. She wouldn’t just blurt it out like that unless something was very wrong.

Clark looked around hastily to see was listening and suddenly noticed that no one was paying any attention.

At all.

What he normally attributed to the frenzy of the newsroom took a decidedly ominous shape when he saw the other people in the room were in an increasingly agitated state. Listening closely, he could hear the rising cadence of multiple heartbeats to correspond by the loud conversations being hurled across the room like artillery fire. Whether it was talking on the phone, addressing each other or even working, the reporters of the news floor looked like they were ready to climb the walls. Glancing at Perry’s office, he spied Jimmy learning across the desk of their cigar chomping Editor in Chief with challenge in his stance.

“….in Bosnia and Iraq! I’m not just some mascot! I’m a photo-journalist and I want some goddamn respect!”

Hell, Clark sucked in his breath almost afraid to look at Perry to see what reaction that statement was going to engender when Lois’ angry voice barked at him.

“Smallville! Pay attention when I’m talking to you!”

“Trouble in paradise?” Catherine Grant, gossip columnist extraordinaire and society page scribe, smirked snidely as she drifted past Lois and came to a stop next to Clark.

As always, Cat wore her sexuality like a neon sign and had no use for subtlety. Clad in something that was far too tight and left little to the imagination, she was a stark contrast to Lois who was wearing a smartly cut suit and silk shirt. Taking another bite of the apple in her hand, she coiled her hand over his shoulder and gave him a look that was filled with invitation.

“You know Clark,” Cat leaned her face closer to his, “if Lane here is too much of a cold fish to treat you right, I can always oblige.”

He so did not need this right now, Clark thought inwardly. After finally calming Lois down about his relationship with Diana, Clark did not need the added fuel from Cat too, especially when Lois seemed to be on a tear.

“Cat,” Lois tapped the blond on her shoulder, stepping in with a sweet (and dangerous) smile on her face.

Cat Grant had just enough time to turn her head towards Lois when a fist flashed past Clark and struck the woman on the face with enough force to send her flying backwards into a desk and then over it. Cat slid across the desk, taking with her everything on it.

“LOIS!” Clark shouted.

Lois wasn’t listening. She was already clambering over the desk after Cat. “This is what you get for messing with my boyfriend!”

If this wasn’t unfolding in front of his eyes involving his normally rational lover, Clark Kent would have almost found this funny. However, there was real murder in Lois’ eyes and Clark knew that if Lois felt the need she could do some serious damage. Lois’ impressive combat ability came from her general father who was of the impression that there was nothing he couldn’t teach a daughter that he couldn’t teach a son. Clark strongly suspected that the only combat Cat had ever seen was fighting for a pair of Italian pumps at a sale.

This time the commotion did attract attention and naturally it was all bad as Clark hurried after Lois and grabbed her before she had a chance to pounce on the dazed gossip columnist. A few of the male reporters had come to watch the fight and Clark swore he heard someone shout ‘catfight’.

“Lois, come on,” he picked her up by the waist and hauled her over the desk, away from Cat. “Calm down!”

“Let me go Smallville!” she struggled indignantly. “Its time people know that you are mine! I’m sick of everyone and her dog thinking that you’re ripe to get their hooks into!” She jabbed him in the chest.

“Lois this is crazy!” Clark took her by the hand, prepared to drag her off the floor if he had to. “We’ve got a situation here and I don’t have time to deal with this!”

“BITCH!” Cat screeched all of a sudden and flung herself at Lois.

This time they both went down and suddenly people were cheering them on as the two women rolled around on the floor, their skirts bunching up as they fought like they were in the scrum. Clark made his way to them about to pull both women apart when someone shouted at him.

“Hey Kent, stay out of it!”

Clark recognised the voice belonging to Steve Lombardi, the Planet’s sport writer who considered himself something of a ladies man and was one of those guys to which the term ‘hound’ could be aptly applied.

“Steve, something is wrong with them!” Clark ignored the man’s voice and leaned over to get Lois when the man grabbed him by the shoulder and threw a punch.

The blow did more damage to Steve who uttered a groan of pain as he clutched his probably broken hand, as he staggered away in agony. Suddenly the already incendiary situation ignited further out of control. Steve’s act of violence swept through the rest of the floor like an inferno. Colleagues who had known each other for years began throwing punches and hurling furniture. Clark watched the proceedings with disbelief, trying to understand what was the cause of all this.

However, first things first, he thought looking for Lois.

The ace reporter of the Daily Planet was at present in a stapler, hole punch exchange with Cat as the two women had graduated from rolling around the floor (no doubt giving most of their male colleagues fodders for amusement for the next decade) to hurling objects at each other. Using his super speed, he moved through the room faster than the eye could detect and grabbed Lois just as a keyboard was thrown at her. It ended hitting Lombardi in the head and bringing the former football star down faster than a 300 pound line backer.

In seconds Clark was in the closet with Lois.

“Lois stay here,” he ordered and knew that would have as much impact as spitting in the wind but he had to give it a shot nevertheless.

“Smallville,” she looked at him, the fight in her seemingly dissipated for the moment. “I don’t feel so good.”

Clark was about to switch costumes and blow out of there when he stopped short and looked at her. “What?”

She didn’t look well. Her skin appeared flushed which Clark had initially attributed to her exertions with Cat but now he could see it was more than that. Her skin wasn’t just flushed, he realised when he touched her forehead. She was burning up and slowly descending delirium.

“Lois,” he questioned her, “can you remember when you started feeling like this?” While it was a somewhat forgone conclusion that this had been caused by something, Clark needed answers to put a stop to this before it spread beyond the Daily Planet pool of reporters.

“I don’t know,” she shook her head as her legs started to give up on her and Clark caught her before she hit the floor. “After that fruit delivery maybe….” She muttered.

“Fruit delivery?” Clark raised a brow. Coffee was a staple yes. Bagels an essential but fruit? That was unusual.

“Yeah,” she nodded as he gently lowered her to the floor, “nice red ones from … from… Queen Hippolyta as a thank you for all the nice press we’ve been giving her and Diana.”

“Apples,” Clark frowned, “poetic.” Looking back at Lois, he kissed her gently on the forehead and spoke, “Lois, I’ll be back soon. Stay here.”

Changing into the suit, Superman stepped out of the closet, leaving Clark Kent behind. He turned to the door and melted the knob with his heat vision, ensuring that Lois didn’t leave without help. Speeding back to the newsroom, he saw Cat being ganged up one or two of the apprentices, about to be brained by a handbag and a photograph frame. He disarmed them before any real damage could be done when a shatter of glass and someone’s scream had him streaking through the room and out the window. Superman caught Joe the copy editor as he plunged past floor thirty on a hard collision course with the sidewalk outside the Daily Planet’s main entrance.

“Superman,” Joe remarked, somewhat dazed. “What are you doing here?”

Like Lois, his temperature was rising and he was starting to lose consciousness. What was happening to them? Clark wondered with increasing fear as he returned Joe to the bullpen.

Upon returning, Clark discovered that while the fighting continued in its frenzied state, it was starting to lose steam as more and more people faltered, leaving them at the mercy of those who hadn’t. Through the wall of his office, Clark saw Jimmy and Perry choking each other over the chief’s desk. Zipping through the office, causing papers and objects to be blown away in the wake of his trail, Clark arrived in time to stop Jimmy from throttling Perry with what looked to be a mounted sturgeon.

“Put that fish down OLSEN!”

“Make me!”

“Enough you two!” Superman pulled both men apart and sat Jimmy down in the metal chair across from Perry’s desk, bending the steel around the younger man to ensure he didn’t try and cause any further harm before doing the same to Perry. Both men started to curse at him indignantly, acquiring an odd sort of solidarity in their outrage. Stepping out of Perry’s office, Clark decided that he was done trying to pull people apart one by one, he needed a faster solution.

Lifting his gaze to the sprinkle nozzles spaced intermittently across the ceiling, Clark let loose a light blast of heat vision, not enough to damage the devices but activate their sensors. Water burst forth across the newsroom floor, unleashing a heavy spray of water over everyone. The sudden soaking distracted people enough to snap out of their violent rage and across the room, Clark saw some semblance of reason return to the faces of the people he worked with and called friends.

What satisfaction Clark could derive from this action was brief. It seemed that the malaise that gripped Lois was spreading through the rest of the Daily Planet cadre of reporters now that they were no longer focussed on aggression. People started dropping around him like flies, weakened and clearly afflicted. Amidst the blood and bruises, something more sinister was taking place and Clark was faced with the one thing his great powers could never prevent.

Sickness.

“Superman!”

Clark turned around and saw Bruce and Diana at the window. Eyes widening in surprise because neither were in costume and their civilian clothes were torn and bloodied, Clark realised he wasn’t the only one with an eventful evening. Bruce climbed through the window first and wiped the water out of his eyes as he approached.

“Bruce…you’re…”

“Long story,” Bruce said shortly, throwing Diana a glance. “What’s happened here?”

“I don’t know,” Clark answered shaking his head as Diana went up to Lombardi who was lying flat across the table, disorientated. “I came back to everyone tearing at each other. Lois said that they got a delivery of apples from Hippolyta.”

Diana straightened up and stared sharply at him. “Apples?”

“Damn,” Bruce sucked in his breath and looked at her. “Is that who I think it is? Eris?”

“Eris?” Clark asked, feeling like he walked in mid act. “Who or what is an Eris?”

“If I remember my mythology, Eris was the goddess of discord. When she was left off the guest list for the wedding of the Thetis, she threw a golden apple in the middle of the feast and said it was to go to the fairest. Naturally this sparked an argument among the goddesses as to who should have it which led to the Judgement of Paris and eventually the destruction of Troy in the Trojan War.”

“And you think these apples were sent by Eris?” Clark exclaimed, still having wrapping his mind around the fact that the Daily Planet had been attacked by a Greek goddess.

“Clark, I just spent the evening trying to avoid a gorgon while Diana was fighting a cyclops in downtown Gotham, I think its safe to say that this is within the realm of possibility.”

“These people need Menalippe’s healing immediately,” Diana joined the conversation, a grim expression on her face. “They have been poisoned. Nothing in your science can stop what ails them. We need Amazon healing.” Pausing, she looked at both men. “And yes, this is the work of Eris. She does her father’s bidding.”

“Her father?” Clark asked.

“Yes,” Diana nodded. “Eris is the child of the war god, Ares.”

***********


How could she do this to him?

General Steven Hayes sat in his car after leaving Elizabeth’s, tears running down his face as he recalled in terrible detail everything he had heard when he stood outside her bedroom door. After arriving unexpectedly with roses and wine, he had hoped to give her a romantic surprise. Instead, he was the only one surprised when it appeared Elizabeth wasn’t alone.

Had it only been a few months ago that he was a happily married man with a wife who loved and children he adored. However, when Elizabeth had entered his life, nothing else seemed to matter, not the life he had built himself with a woman had endured much being an army wife, not the children she had given. None of it seemed important in the face of Elizabeth. She had shown him how empty his existence was, how passionless it had become. Younger and certainly more beautiful, his need for Elizabeth was like a fever and his every thought became filled with possessing her.

Elizabeth had accepted him into her bed and he thought, her heart. She had furnished with kisses and pleasure within the heated confines of the apartment he was paying to house her. He came and went as he pleased, making up one excuse after another so he could escape into her arms at every opportunity. It was as if they were meant for each other and everything else before this had been some vague dream that diminished with each moment he spent in her company.

But all that ended today.

Today he had entered the apartment and found her in the bedroom in deep conversation with someone who remained anonymous through the telephone. He had opened his mouth to announce himself when suddenly, Elizabeth who claimed to be from North Dakota, who had never travelled anywhere, began to speak in Chinese. Steven, who spent some years in overseas assignments in the Orient, was fluent enough in the language, which in this case was perfect Mandarin, to understand everything she was saying. He listened with growing horror and despair, as the words impacted upon his psyche like blows from a hammer.

"Yes, it is safe to talk."

"No, I still haven’t got access to the information at the base."

"He will trust me soon enough, be patient."

"I am no happier by this than the People’s Army. I don’t care how much I’m being paid, you don’t have to sleep with him."

He listened in stunned silence and drifted out of the apartment without giving away his presence. He reached the car across the street without being aware of anything but this growing black pit of pain that was widening inside his heart. As a man in his position, he was aware that enemy agents could attempt to infiltrate his live. It was the nature of the arm’s race, even if its prominence had slipped from notice in recent years and most of the general public believed that there was no longer any competition between the superpowers. However, Hayes had thought himself able of spot an impostor or at the very least, be expert enough to notice a plant in his life.

How could she do this to him? Didn’t she know he loved her? Was everything she had said to him, about the lives they would share together, the places they would see, was it all a lie? He knew the answer to that even as his ravaged heart brayed the question. Of course it was, his inner voice said cynically. She is a Chinese agent, bought and paid for to be whore to you so that you would give her access to everything at the base. Think of it, a few months more after he had divorced Renee, he would have married Elizabeth and she would have become his wife, able to come and go as she pleased.

All this time, she was just playing him.

The Chinese, he snorted disgustingly. They haven’t changed since Nam`. Always lurking in the background, giving aid and support to the Cong even though they had no claim to the country. Providing the enemy with arms, trying to keep their names out of it, lacking the decency to come out and voice their opposition, unlike the Russians. He hated them. He hated them and their ways. He hated them for using him and for making him love Elizabeth and most of all he hated the disgust in her voice when she said she was the one who was sleeping with him.

He wished them dead. All of them. They shouldn’t be able to do this to people. Shouldn’t be able to tear out a man’s heart for the sake of information. They had no right. People like that had no right to anything, no right to breathe the air as everyone else. He wanted to hurt them, wanted to make them know this pain and this shame. He wanted Elizabeth to burn in agony for what she did to him even though killing was too good for her.

Killing was too good for her.

She needed to know that she could not play with people’s emotions, that there were consequences for her actions, no matter who her masters were. Suddenly it hit him that he had the perfect way to show Elizabeth what she had done to him, a way to show the world, not just the f**king Chinese but everyone.

He stared at the signet ring on his finger, the one she had given to him as a present, feeling it burn into his skin, a mockery to all that she had professed to feel for him and knew exactly how he would make her pay. Those Chinese wanted to know about American missiles? He would give them a closer look than they possible imagined.

With love, from Elizabeth.