Disclaimer: I own nothing.

Chapter Three: Destiny

“Kal?” Jimmy questioned in utter confusion. “Who's Kal? Is that you, CK?”

“Yes,” Clark nodded. “My birth name is Kal-El, but I've always preferred Clark.”

“Kal, now is not the time,” Rokk interrupted, still holding Lois in his arms. “We must speak with you about Doomsday's defeat.”

“Why? Is there something wrong? Do you think he's going to return?”

“That's what we need to talk to you about,” he spoke in a firm tone. “In private.”

“Whatever you want to say to me, you can say in front of Chloe, Jimmy and Davis. They're my friends.”

“All right.”

“But first I want to know where Lois went. Why did the Legion ring even active when she found it?”

“Okay, before we dive any further into this little superhero reunion,” Chloe spoke up, still standing next to Jimmy and Davis. “Why don't we put Lois on the couch so she can rest?”

The others agreed and she showed the purple and black clad leader the couch in the following room. Rokk gently placed Lois down on the magenta-colored couch, then walked back into the office where Clark was waiting for answers.

“Lois did not travel to the 31st century if that's what you're worried about.”

“Then where did she go?”

“You used a Legion ring once before when you jumped two days into the past to stop that meteor-infected journalist from trying to exploit your abilities to the world, right?”

“Yes, but I don't understand what that has to do with Lois now.”

“When you used it last time, this was a conscious decision on your part for the ring to take you back in time. However, the Legion rings also have the ability to take its holder anywhere in time by unconscious desire of a future or past destination as well.”

“So even though Lois didn't know what the ring could do, she wanted to go somewhere in the past or future and it took her there?”

“Yes, exactly.”

“Where did Lois go?”

“Metropolis, 2019. We found her wandering the streets of the city almost as soon as we arrived in that time period. And as a precaution, we had to knock Lois unconscious so Imra could enter her mind without her knowledge. When she wakes up, Lois will no have memories of being in the future or several hours prior the incident occurred here in the present.”

“It's probably better that way, but why did Lois want to travel ten years into the future in the first place? What happens in 2019?”

“Oh, man, I wish you could have seen it, Kal,” Garth came up to his idol with a bright grin on his face. “You may not fly or wear the blue tights now, but someday you will and then everyone in Metropolis will know you as the Man of St—”

“Garth!” Rokk yelled at him. “You know the code. Telling Kal-El anything about his future is breaching protocol.”

“Then why did you return to tell me about my death two days ago?” Clark questioned the leader. “If it's against your Legion code to tell me anything about my future, why come back to change it?”

“Because I didn't have a choice. It was just like before when the Persuader stole one of our Legion rings and came to the past to attack you and destroy the red crystal, which we thought was the only way to defeat Brainiac without killing the human host he was inhabiting. Your life was in danger, so we had no choice but to step in and help you to protect all of our futures.”

“Then I'm still known in the future? I still exist in a thousand years?”

“For now, yes, but that could change now that you've altered the course of history. The future of your friends are a different story, too.”

“Why do you say that?”

“After we returned to 3009, Imra and I did extensive research on your friends in this century to see if there was any chance they were a part of your life after you fully accepted your Kryptonian destiny, yet the names Chloe Sullivan and Davis Bloome were nowhere to be found in the archives of your history.”

“It's like they never existed,” the blonde Legionnaire interjected, staring at the pair.

“That was one of the reasons why we came back to the past. Your future and the future of your friends may be safe now. The only question that remain is for how long?”

“I thought you said that as long as Doomsday was defeated, the future would be safe,” Clark countered.

“Which is why you're still here today. However, that doesn't necessarily mean he won't return.”

“I had him buried a mile in the ground with the help of Oliver's team. I didn't hear his heartbeat, and he hasn't resurfaced—”

“You didn't send him to the future. If you had, the Legion could have destroyed him there and your future would still be safe. But now that you've split Davis from Doomsday and buried the beast underground, it only makes your future existence that much more unpredictable.”

“So the security of my future is more important to you than saving a life? You would have been willing to let Davis die to make sure I'd still be alive a thousand years from now?”

“I don't think you realize how serious the situation really is, Kal. If you don't exist in the future, neither will we. If you die, our future does not exist. I know you don't believe in taking a life for the greater good today, but someday you—”

“I'd never put myself over someone else's life,” Clark said in a dangerously low voice, looking straight into Rokk's eyes. “Especially over someone I care about. And if you truly knew who I was, you would know that.”

“Kal...” Garth started but was quickly stopped when the red and blue clad farm boy gave him and then Rokk a glare.

“The last time all three of you were here, you almost killed Chloe because she was infected by Brainiac. Now you're all looking down upon me because I wouldn't send Davis to the 31st century, where you would have killed him for being the human alter ego to Doomsday? You say it's because of me that the human race eventually learns to accept aliens on Earth. You've followed my history and treat me like I'm some sort of worshiped war hero... But you don't know me at all, because if you did, then you'd know if there's one thing my adopted parents taught me, it was this: You never kill to solve a problem. There's always another way.”

“Perhaps our ideas of your personal code of ethics from your early life were a little misguided,” Rokk stood his ground. “But you can't underestimate our knowledge of your beliefs when you're older, Kal. We know what greatness lies ahead for you, Lois and Jimmy Olsen as a result of the many experiences you will come to face in the future. You cannot escape your destiny.”

“You know what's going to happen to me?” Jimmy inquired, interrupting the two men in their argument. “People know who I am a thousand years in the future?”

“Who is this guy?” Garth pointed to him with his thumb.

“I'm Jimmy Olsen.”

“What?” the redhead turned around to eye him with disbelief. “I thought Super—I thought Kal's photographer pal from the Daily Planet was ten years younger than him and Lois? Hey, in fact, I just saw a hologram of the three of them working together back in 2019 the other day, so I know this guy can't be the real Jimmy Olsen. He looks nothing like him.”

“That's because he isn't,” Imra answered coolly. “This is Henry James Olsen, Jimmy's older brother.”

“My younger brother is going to work at the Daily Planet someday?” the ex-photographer asked, almost completely stunned by the news. “He's going to know Clark too?”

“Yes,” Rokk nodded. “That's all we can say, though.”

“Wait,” Clark stopped him, realizing something Garth had just said. “Did you say Lois and I will still be working together at the Daily Planet in ten years? That's where she went in the future.”

The black and purple clad Legionnaire sighed, knowing exactly what the future Man of Steel was going to ask next.

“What happens in ten years? Why did Lois travel there? What aren't you telling me?”

“I can't tell you. I'm sorry. That's something you'll have to learn on your own in time.”

That was the last straw for Clark.

“I don't care about your stupid code!” he yelled out in frustration, as he used his super-strength to slam Rokk into the nearest wall. “I care about Lois!”

“Clark, don't!” Chloe came up to her best friend, touching his shoulder in attempt to help get through to him. “Brute force won't solve anything here. Let him go.”

After staring at his friends and the other future superheroes, the Kryptonian took a deep breath and finally released Rokk as large pieces of the wall fell to the ground.

“I'm sorry if I hurt you...” he apologized, stepping a couple of feet away from him. “...but I still want to know what you're hiding from me. Lois went ten years into the future because of that ring, which never would have happened if you hadn't given it to me in the first place. Now, tell me why she did and what she went through while she was there. Chloe and I have a right to know the truth.”

“All right,” Rokk agreed with a small nod. “I'll tell you what you need to know about Lois, but nothing else.”

“Thank you,” Chloe breathed out, still standing right beside her best friend.

“She traveled ten years into the future because of you, Kal.”

“Me?” Clark asked, bewildered. “Why did Lois go to the future because of me?”

“As I'm sure you're well aware, Lois has become increasingly intrigued by the Red-Blue Blur in the past few months. She's wanted to see you use your powers, write the first face-to-face interview about who you are and where you came from, and even went as far as pretending to be a superhero herself to get the chance to finally meet you. So when Lois found the ring last night, by her unconscious desire to meet you, it took her to a time where you'd be more willing to admit the truth to her.”

“In ten years? What you're saying is I'll finally admit to Lois who I really am in ten years?”

“The choice is up to you. All I really can say is that one day all of Metropolis will know you as Clark Kent, investigative reporter for the Daily Planet...but the world will recognize you for much more. And when they do, your biological father will finally see his son embrace the Kryptonian destiny he always hoped you would accept when you came to Earth.”

“But...Jor-El's gone now,” Clark said, even more perplexed than before. “He...I—I thought he disappeared when Brainiac corrupted the Fortress.”

“Although we can't tell you how it'll happen,” Imra explained as he turned around to look at her, “We can promise you that one day you will find a way to restore the Fortress and bring your father back, Kal-El. It is a day in history that people will remember well in the future.”

“Unless Doomsday returns.” He couldn't help but remind them of the dark possibility now that he let their words from before sink in. “Then all of our futures will be history.”

Rokk walked past him and stood beside his teammates, then looked at Clark straight in the eye. “You made a choice, Kal. It was the one you thought was best under the circumstances of the grim situation you were put into. You didn't want to send Davis to the future because you knew that would have been sending him to his death. Instead you used Black Kryptonite to split him from the beast to give Davis a second chance to live. I'll still admit it was a great risk towards your future, but a risk I can see now that you would've made again in order to save him or anyone else.”

“Without a second thought,” he affirmed his words. “And no matter what the future may hold for me, the support of my friends will always keep me going. Chloe is my best friend and the best sidekick anyone could ask for.” The blonde looked up at him, who stared down at her with a smile, and a small blush began rising in her cheeks from his compliment. Then Clark looked over at his two other friends. “Jimmy figured out everything about me and Davis before anyone else. Even though no one believed him at first, he never stopped trying to convince us that he was right. He's been a great friend and I'm glad he knows my secret now. Davis had a hard life growing up, which was partially my fault. He did everything he could stop Doomsday from harming innocent people once he found out what he was. In one way or another, they've all saved me. I don't know where I'd be right now without any of them. So if you ever think price of trying to save a life is too high, just think about what happened here and remember what my parents taught me.”

“Well, if we didn't understand that before, forgive us. I can assure you, though, that the Legion will abide by your code of ethics from now on.”

“Thank you,” Clark smiled, extending his hand out for the leader to shake and he accepted.

After letting go of his hand, Rokk took two steps backwards so the others could say their good-byes.

Imra came forward and kissed Clark on the cheek. “Don't forget to look for us when you reach 3009. We'll be there waiting for you.”

As the red and white clad heroine stepped back, Garth stepped forward. “Hey, Kal, do you think there's any chance a girl like Lois would be willing to hook up with a guy like me?”

“Garth!” Rokk and Imra yelled out in unison.

“I was just kidding!” the redhead shot back at them before grinning at his idol and whispering to him, “Or not.”

Clark gave him a toothy grin in return, shaking his head in humorous disbelief.

“Kal, one more thing,” the black and purple clad Legionnaire spoke with seriousness again. “Be careful of your friend, Tess Mercer. Although her intentions towards helping you may have been underhanded yet true at heart in the past, she cannot be trusted.”

Clark nodded, understanding the threat she could still pose for knowing his secret, and therefore didn't trust her. “I'll be on my guard.”

The leader gave him a nod, then turned around to face his teammates, forming a small circle while the others watched them. Making a fist with their right hands, each holding their own Legion ring, the three future superheroes raised them up in the air preparation for the time travel.

“Long live the Legion,” Rokk said in a commanding tone.

A bright, purple light illuminated themselves, and when it disappeared, they were gone....

In the next room, Lois groggily awoke to the sound of what she could have sworn was an earthquake. Her head hurt and the muscles in her arms and legs were a little sore. Entirely confused as to how she got to the Isis Foundation in the first place, or why she was sore for that matter, the reporter sat herself up on the couch.

“Hello? Is anybody here?”

Clark immediately walked through the hallway and into the room. “Lois, are you all right?”

Looking up, she was surprised to see him there as well. “Yeah, I'm fine, Smallville. I have no idea how I got here, though. Do you?”

“I brought you here after I found you unconscious at the Daily Planet a few hours ago,” he explained, lying through his teeth. “Do you remember anything before passing out?”

“I don't even remember passing out. The last thing I remember was working at the Daily Planet. Jimmy had just run off after we located Chloe and Davis in Edge City.” That's was it hit her. “Oh, my God, Chloe! Clark, Chloe's in Edge City. You have to go get her before—”

“Calm down, Lois. She's fine.”

“What do you mean, she's fine? My cousin is out on the run with a psychopathic serial killer and you think she's fine?”

“If you don't believe me, see for yourself.”

“Huh?”

Clark smiled, stepping off to the side and Chloe appeared in the doorway with a bright grin on her face. “Hey, coz.”

“Chloe!” Lois gasped and got up from the couch, running straight to her cousin's arms. With tears of joy springing out of their eyes, they embraced each other happily, reunited after being apart for several weeks. Neither could say anything for several moments while they continued holding onto one another. Lois could hardly believe it was really her. “Chloe,” she said almost out of breath, finally letting go of her younger cousin after hugging her for what seemed half a lifetime. “I was so afraid I was never gonna see you again.”

“For a while there I thought the same thing, too.”

“Where have you been all this time? How did you even get back here? Were you finally able to escape from the evil clutches of tall, dark and scary?”

“Davis never took me against my will, Lois. I went with him all on my own because I was trying to protect him from the police.”

“But why? I mean, I could totally tell that you had the hots for the guy, but he's a murderer. His face has been on the front page of every major newspaper in the country for weeks. How could you protect Davis when you know he killed so many people?”

“Davis didn't commit those murders,” Clark spoke up again. “He was framed.”

“Who did then?”

“Remember the monster from my wedding six months ago?” the blonde reminded her.

“Oh, my God. That thing killed all those people? Is it still out there somewhere? Can it even be destroyed?”

“Well, according to the news, it was—” he started to say, but was quickly interrupted by his best friend.

“Metropolis' newest crime-fighting superhero, the Red-Blue Blur,” Chloe admitted truthfully, much to Clark's discomfort. “He was able to stop the creature by burying it alive.”

Lois' heart nearly jumped up in her throat when she heard that name. Just the mention of him sent shivers of excitement and curiosity down her spine. Though, her reporter instincts quickly made Lois snap back to reality and went back to focusing on the situation she was discussing with Clark and her cousin. “Then who framed Davis?”

“The LuthorCorp diva herself.”

“Tess?” she questioned, finding that incredibly hard to believe. “Why? That doesn't make any sense. I mean, I know she was the one who started the whole manhunt for Davis, but why would she go after him at all? He's just a paramedic. How do they even know each other?”

Just as Jimmy and Davis walked into the room, the two best friends looked at one another for a brief moment before Chloe turned to her older cousin again.

“It's a long story.”

Only minutes after Chloe finished informing Lois of the “whole story”, Dr. Hamilton showed up to examine both her and Davis. Much to Chloe and Clark's immense relief, Emil gave them both a clean bill of health. And once Lois left for her apartment, the blonde was able to get in contact with Oliver's team to call off the search for her cousin. Then after much deliberation, Clark insisted that Davis stay with him at the farm until the manhunt for his arrest was over, and with the help of his lawyers, Oliver was able to make his case in court. The four friends agreed that was probably their best option under the circumstances, and for all of them, excluding Davis, to stick to their daily routines as much as possible until things were finally settled down.

“It may take a little time,” Clark said to Davis that evening as he finished bringing the last of the hay from his truck into the barn with his super-strength. “But you'll get used to the smell. My cousin Kara didn't care too much for it at first when she lived here, either.”

“No, it's fine. I lived on a farm once with one of my foster families.”

“Really? Where?”

“Granville.”

“Where else have you lived?”

“Pretty much everywhere from Coast City to Metropolis.”

“I guess Chloe was right.... You really did bounce around from home to home while you were growing up.”

Davis let out a long sigh before looking back up at him again. “That was a long time ago, Clark, and I'd rather just forget about my sob story childhood anyway. They aren't exactly fond memories to look back on.”

“You shouldn't have had that kind of childhood, Davis. You should have been raised here with me by my parents.”

“Why, so your parents could find out about my recurring blackouts, have no idea why I got them, only to one day learn that whenever I had them, the beast went out on a killing spree and I'd wake up covered in the blood of all its dead victims?”

“Maybe if you had lived with us, we could have found out about that sooner and found a way to stop them.”

“It doesn't matter now. You had me split from the beast and got rid of him. End of story. There's no sense in dwelling on the past, right?”

Clark stared at him acutely, eyes not even blinking for several moments until his facial expression finally began to soften. “Yeah, I guess you're right. But the point is, if my parents had found you in that field along with me, they would have still—”

“If you're anything like your parents, I know they would have still taken me in.... I know....”

He smiled at him for a few seconds while the two young men stood in silence until speaking up once more. “I think I'm gonna go to bed. I have to be at the Daily Planet by exactly 8:00 AM tomorrow, or I'll never hear the end of it from General Lois.”

“Okay,” Davis chuckled, taking his word for it.

“Are you coming in too?”

“No, I'm gonna stay out here and look at the stars for a little while. Maybe call Chloe and say good night to her before she goes to bed.”

“Are you sure? I mean, I know Dr. Hamilton cleared you medically this afternoon, but you should probably get some rest like he recommended.”

“I'm only gonna be out here for a few more minutes, okay, Dad? I'll be fine.”

“All right,” Clark finally gave in. “I'll see you in the morning.” He started walking away and was just about to leave the barn when he heard Davis calling out to him. “Yeah?”

“Thanks. For everything.”

“That's what brothers are for. They help each other.”

“I know, but we're not really—”

“You're welcome,” the red and blue clad farm boy stopped him at mid-sentence, not wanting to hear his protests. “Say good night to Chloe for me.”

Davis opened his mouth to say something, but he had already left the barn. Clark was gone, leaving Davis to do nothing except stare at the door for a couple of moments until he decided to pull out his BlackBerry from the back pocket of his jeans so he could call Chloe. He turned on his phone and was about to dial her number when Davis heard something from behind him. He turned around to find Tess stepping out of the shadows and into the light of the barn wearing an expensive black coat over her black dress pants and silky violet blouse, clutching a black leather purse that was slung over her right shoulder.

“Well, I must admit that this was the last place I expected to find you,” she spoke with ease. “I never actually thought Clark would be willing to harbor a fugitive in his very own home like Ms. Sullivan was. Guess I underestimated his willingness to help you out after all, didn't I, Mr. Bloome?”

“What are you doing here? Are you going to have me arrested?”

She scoffed at his inquiries. “If I wanted you arrested, I would've done that hours ago while you were still in Metropolis... Especially now that you're free from the beast.”

As strange as it may have seemed considering he had only met the woman once, Davis wasn't very surprised to hear that the CEO of LuthorCorp knew about his split from Doomsday. She had probably been tracking his every move ever since she attempted to kill him. “Then what do you want from me, lady?”

The devious redhead stepped closer to him. “To once and for all help you fulfill your destiny...Judas.”

Davis' eyes grew wide before he suddenly felt the sting of a sharp needle from a small dart in the back of his neck. Seconds later, he could feel his limbs grow numb. His eyelids grew heavy, drowsy from the drug that had been injected into his system. All of his surroundings started to go blurry until his eyes finally closed shut, the phone dropped out of his hand, which broke as a result, and he fell to dirt ground in unconsciousness.

Two men dressed in black uniforms with bulletproof vests came out from behind where he was standing, patiently waiting for Tess' orders.

“I guess Beauty doesn't always save the Beast,” she smirked at Davis in satisfaction. “Take him away.”

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