[closed] Never-ending battle

[wherethestoryis]

Characters: Hannibal Lecter, Lois Lane, Kal-El, Jor-El (may edit as needed)
Date: Backdated to the exact time Zatanna's spell finally ends.
Location: The air, a couple different sectors
Situation: Someone’s using Kryptonian powers to kill. Lois objects strongly—but then the spell goes down. It ends predictably.
Warnings/Rating: Violence, injury, probable swearing, angry Kryptonians, possibly some mention of gore.

Comments

Pre-event end (superpowered Hannibal + Lois)

[wherethestoryis]

Lois has been hearing… some odd things, the last day and a half or so. Literally hearing, with her ears--but she could never pin it down, especially not to separate it from anything happening in her immediate vicinity. She's not so good at the echolocation thing--but eventually she started coming across some bodies. Murders, fairly grisly ones—luckily she has a strong stomach, from the years on the crime beat before she really hit it big time. Every experience since has only reinforced that. But these are making her feel slightly ill despite that.

Of course, the reason it makes her ill is quite simple. She’s the best investigative reporter around (though occasionally scooped by Clark, but he could cheat). She’s been dealing with Kryptonians for years, heroes and villains both. She’s married to one. And right now, she’s got all the talents of one and has been enjoying them immensely. But it’s been a near-constant worry that there are two Kryptonians without powers and they only know where one set of powers went. They’re not even sure which one (and privately, Lois is more than a little concerned about it; Hal had mentioned it to). But if she had to guess…

Whoever it was, they were doing the thing Clark hated most.

She’s still not used to how to keep an eye and ear out, but after the way the last forty-eight or so hours have gone, she’s actively on patrol. Worse, she has no idea who or what to warn anyone about, and doesn't want to get every cape on the turtle riled up in what is probably going to be a fruitless search. As a result, she keeps it quiet and just does her best to do... well, what she does best: investigate. With any luck she’ll be able to finally catch sight and sound of her quarry.

[bonvivant]

He'd only been at this for a few days; not quite enough time to get all the bloodstains out of the rags he was using as a disguise. Not that it mattered too much to him, because he was planning on burning these things to get rid of the evidence after all was said and done, but it would definitely out him as the murderer to anyone who was specifically looking for him. He only disguised himself when he was out for a kill, so if anyone happened to see him, well...

Perhaps he was a little arrogant in assuming that the powers he had would be enough to take on anybody here, but he came from a world where nothing of the sort existed and from his general observations of superhumans the last two months he'd rank the abilities he currently possessed on the high end.

While he was certainly taking advantage of flight, rarely went up all that high, darting in and out of alleys and between buildings, less bird or plane than a creature stalking its prey in the night. So it was that he came upon Lois - maybe by fate or just a stroke of bad luck on his part - and didn't assume she'd be any sort of challenge in his current state. He landed on top of a nearby building to observe the situation a bit.

Post-even (human Hannibal + Lois)

[wherethestoryis]

Despite the years of watching him, Lois hadn’t quite realized just how much work it was to take on supervillains—particularly other Kryptonians, and whoever this was, they definitely had the powers. As naturally as some of the powers had come—listening she couldn’t help, and flying was almost like breathing after all the years of envying it—she’s not good enough yet to multitask well. As a result, she hasn’t been able to use X-ray vision (or hasn’t even thought to). It does worry her, though, that she’s almost certain the other guy is a little stronger than she is. (It implies that it’s Jor-El’s powers she has, not Clark’s; for whatever reason she can’t imagine her father-in-law is stronger than his son.)

But then when she finally thinks of it, after having been slammed into a building (she tries to make a note of which, to apologize for it later), sometime in those few seconds something goes… wrong. At first she thinks maybe she just can’t focus right, and pushes herself up with one hand. It comes as rather a nasty shock that a rather sharp piece of metal leaves a cut on her hand. For a moment she stares at the blood.

Oh. …Shit.

Hannibal's escape + Kal and Jor

[wherethestoryis]

She’s been hurt before. She’s been hurt worse than this before, even. (There was that memorable time she was shot and he somehow broke his speed records to get to her—and, of course, not that long ago when a bomb in the newsroom nearly killed her and he had to take extreme measures.) Right now, however, past experiences didn’t so much matter. Right now, she hurt.

Lois has just enough presence of mind left to activate the panic button in her engagement ring before passing out. With any luck, Clark’s got his powers back and not someone else. He’ll know what it means.

Then her consciousness just checks out.

[andaway]

The fact that Clark didn't have superhearing anymore didn't mean he had automatically shut his ears down. Keeping an ear out wasn't something he was consciously doing, and it didn't make much of a difference when the littlest sound he could hear was the sound of someone shuffling papers on the next room if he really, really concentrated.

Then his powers came back.

Not slowly and gradually like most times, there was like a sudden vacuum, a 'pop' on his ears and suddenly he felt so full of energy, the familiar feeling of a being like a fully-charged battery confirming the suspicions he'd had when he could suddenly hear the sap running up and down the tree. And then there's an alarm, a very (extremely) loud sound he'd set specifically so he wouldn't be able to overhear it.

And he's flying out, up up and away and he's picking up Lois and he can smell blood and he can't even hug her because how did she manage to get this injured and it's too much, too much and he doesn't even realize he's landing near the clinic until he's there.