“Uh,” Chloe moaned again. “I’m tired of walking. Can’t you carry me and just run there super fast or something? You said you could do that.”

Clark looked back at her and smiled. “Sure, except I don’t know where I’m going,” he pointed out. “It’s your friend we’re after, remember?”

“So, I can give you directions.” She knelt down and rubbed her calf muscles. “I’m really tired now.”

“Not a good idea to run through the woods that fast. I mean, I’d survive if I trip or run into a tree, but you probably wouldn’t.” He glanced over at a dead looking tree branch. It was almost three inches thick. With one hand, he reached out and snapped it off, leaving the exposed, jagged end sticking out. “Catch my drift?” he asked her. She stared at the inch long splinters sticking out from the branch and nodded. “We can take a break though,” he told her. She sighed gratefully and flopped down on the ground. He smiled at her and then walked over to the edge of the forest, looking out into the fields.

They had been walking since it had gotten dark hours ago. Chloe had said that a friend of hers could help them stay hidden, but unfortunately he lived on the other side of town. With Luthorcorp soldiers after them, it wasn’t like they could just cut through the town, so they were forced to take the long way around, past the farms and fields on the outskirts. Staying just inside the forest gave them cover from the air, in case any of the Luthercorp helicopters passed over head. It had been a while though, since they’d seen any sign of their pursuers.

“Sorry if I’m slowing you down,” Chloe said, sitting up. He looked back at her and shook his head.

“Don’t worry about it. If anyone should be sorry, it’s me, I got you into this.”

“Heh, I guess you should be. If you’d just kept me out of it, you’d be here alone right now and I’d be dog food,” she remarked. “Remember? Besides, it’s not like you knew what would happen.”

“Still,” he said, “I don’t… I didn’t mean for any of this. Soldiers after us, getting shot at.” He stopped, looking troubled. “People are dead because of me. Just because I was near them, they were… They barely gave them a warning.” Chloe looked down and rubbed her ankle absently. “I didn’t mean to even be here,” he went on. “I was just walking home and then... I don’t know why, or how any of this…,” he trailed off. “I just wish I was home,” he said dejectedly.

Chloe shifted her eyes away awkwardly and picked a bit of grass out of the ground. “Well, there’s not much I can do about that,” she admitted quietly. “I mean, if you need someone to tell you about what bands are good, how to hotwire a car, or pick a lock, then I’m your girl. Aliens and parallel worlds, not so much. Best I can do is get you somewhere safe and maybe help you on the way.” She smiled at him and he had to smile back.

“And for what it’s worth: there’s one person who’s glad you’re here,” she told him. “You took on the Luthorcorps and won. No one’s ever done that. Keep it up; you’ll be our very own superhero.”

He snorted and shook his head. “You know what that makes you then?” he asked her.

She narrowed her eyes and gave him a dirty look. “If you say ‘sidekick’, I’m going to have to hate you.” He smiled at her. “But if you decided to carry me for the rest of the way though,” she remarked, “I might agree to be the comic relief. Or devoted fan.”

“Ready to move on yet?” he asked her. She groaned and sat up noisily.

“Sure, whatever. What’s a few more miles anyways?”

They traveled slowly through the woods. With his sharper vision, Clark was able to keep her from tripping over any roots and low lying branches, so they made good time. He was even able to create a path for her through some of the rougher undergrowth. Chloe for her part, complained all the while, but she kept up with him, no easy task, he realized. He didn’t get tired or scratched up from the bushes and tiny branches that grasped at them from the sides of the path. When the temperature started to drop, he passed her back his coat, not needing the extra warmth himself. She smiled gratefully at him and kept close behind him.

After a half hour more, suddenly she gave a cry and almost collapsed on the path. He rushed back to her and knelt down beside her.

“What is it?” he asked.

She was curled up, holding onto her left calf tightly. “Fucking leg,” she hissed. “It just tightened up and I can’t move it.” Ignoring the string of curses she was muttering under her breath, he concentrated his vision on her leg for a moment.

“Nothing’s broken,” he said quietly, then nodded as he pulled his vision back, seeing only the muscles and tissues in her leg. “Cramp,” he announced. “No wonder, walking for hours in the cold air. Painful, but not too serious.”

“No kidding,” she muttered through clenched teeth.

“Now there’s my Chloe,” he remarked dryly. She arched an eyebrow at him and he looked down at her leg quickly. He started to massage her leg gently. She winced a little as he tried to loosen the cramp out. After a while, he could feel her muscles start to relax and unknot. “How’s that feel?” he asked her.

If you stumble upon this narrative on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen from Royal Road. Please report it.

“Not bad,” she smiled at him wickedly. “If I say, ‘move a bit higher’, what happens then?”

He blinked and then felt himself go red. She laughed and started to climb to her feet, but stopped her. “No, I think you should rest for a bit,” he said, quickly. He turned around and bent over. “Well, come on. Looks like you’re getting a ride after all.” He was glad it was too dark for her to see how red his face and ears were.

“Knew you’d see it my way,” she told him and hobbled over to him. She climbed onto his back, and he straightened up, carrying her piggy-back. “Um,” she said slowly, “I’m not going to be too heavy, am I?”

“Hey, super strength, remember? Uh… not that I would need it or anything,” he recovered quickly.

“Swift move there,” she muttered into his ear. Grunting, he adjusted his grip on her legs and started down the path. Chloe was small enough so that she could rest her head on his shoulders and it wouldn’t be that uncomfortable. Being uncomfortable like this wasn’t the problem, he thought slowly. Quite the opposite in fact.

Warmth was a concept Clark had always had trouble with. He could easily withstand temperatures that might have scalded the flesh from anyone else, but that didn’t mean that he didn’t feel them. He could tell when something was hot, or cold, but it was the degrees that were harder to define. To him there was little difference between room temperature and sticking his hand in a fire. If he really concentrated, he could tell one was hotter than the other, but the difference was truly slight to him. Carrying Chloe through the forest, feeling her pressed against his back; gave him a new insight into what warmth really meant.

It might have just been an overactive imagination, or his powers picking up the slight vibrations, but he could have sworn he felt her heart beating against his back. What he knew he could feel was her breath against his neck and her arms draped around his shoulders. He carried her through the forest, staying at a steady jog and trying not to jostle her too badly. When they came to a rather steep ravine, she tightened her arms across his chest as he slid down the one side. It wasn’t until they had climbed out the other side that she loosened them again. She had a strong grip, he thought to himself.

“Like at the dance,” he said quietly, not realize it had slipped out.

“What dance?” she asked him.

“Uh, nothing. Forget I said anything.” She shrugged and put her head down on his shoulder. This might not have been such a good idea, he thought to himself. I keep forgetting that even though she looks like Chloe, she’s not my Chloe. Heck, I don’t even know how I feel about my Chloe. I shouldn’t be leading her on like this.

You’re just carrying her, he argued with himself. What’s so bad about that? And who’s leading who on here? You just met the girl today; you’re just friends, that’s all.

“It’s not that easy,” he muttered.

“Hmm?” she said. She sounded just on the verge of falling asleep.

“Hey, are you awake? You’re supposed to be leading me here,” he reminded her, shrugging his shoulders gently to wake her. “I don’t even know where we are.”

“Thought you were supposed to be from around here,” she muttered and yawned. “Well, via Jupiter or something.”

“Very funny. Where I come from, the forest doesn’t start until about three more miles back. It’s all farmland and houses.” He paused for a moment. “A lot of what I remember is different now.”

“Then let me down and I’ll see where we are. Shouldn’t be too much farther.” He knelt slightly and she slid off him. Keeping on her good leg, she flexed her other gently and then tried standing on it. When she was comfortable doing that she hobbled slightly over to the forest’s edge and peered out across the fields. Clark watched her quietly, staying back in the shadows.

“What did you see?” he asked when she finally hobbled back. Chloe steadied herself and zipped up the coat he had lent her.

“We’re about a half a mile from his place. We just need to cross over this field and a road and we should be there.”

He nodded and stood up quickly. “Do you still need…” he started to ask, but she shook her head.

“I can make it. Besides, if anyone passes us, it’ll look more suspicious if you’re carrying me.”

“Yeah, I guess I didn’t think of that,” he admitted.

“I told you,” she pointed out with a hint of pride, “hotwiring a car, or acting inconspicuous, I’m your girl.”

He didn’t know quite how to respond to that, so he just let it past. They left the forest’s shelter quietly, keeping low to the ground as they crept into the corn field beyond it. Luckily, it was late enough in the season for the stalks to be high enough to shelter them. He could hear Chloe crashing around behind him, but he didn’t look back to check on her. He kept his eyes forward, scanning with his x-ray vision for any potential dangers. There was a darkened farmhouse at the far end of the field, but it was far enough away not to worry about. Past the road though, was a different matter. An entire row of houses faced the road’s edge, and more than half of them were brightly lit. Sneaking past them wouldn’t be easy.

They reached the end of the field and paused, crouched behind the last of the corn stalks. Chloe waited beside him tensely, looking up and down the road. “Well?” she asked impatiently after a moment. “It’s clear, let’s go.” She started forwards, but he caught her hand and pulled her back.

“Car’s coming,” he whispered quietly to her. He saw her puzzled look and shrugged. “I can hear it.”

“There’s no lights,” she said, looking down the road in both directions.

“That’s what worries me.”

After a moment, they could both hear a car engine rumbling towards them and a darkened jeep appeared slowly out of the darkness. It coasted by the road at a crawl. Clark stared inside for a moment and then quietly pulled Chloe back farther into the field. She didn’t resist, never taking her eyes off the jeep. It pulled past them and then slowed to a halt. They both waited tensely as it sat there. Chloe glanced at him quickly, and then angled her head back towards the forest. He shook his head slightly in response and stared inside the car with his x-ray vision.

Finally, the jeep started on again, but they waited till it was out of sight before they breathed a sigh of relief. Chloe leaned back, almost panting and shook her head. “Okay,” she said, “that’s it. We have to find some cover now. I can’t take much more of this.”

Clark was forced to agree with her. It felt like he hadn’t stopped moving since this afternoon. Then again, as he realized, he actually hadn’t. “Lead the way,” he told her, gesturing towards the road.

Nodding, she got up and hesitantly walked out of the field. He followed after her, glancing around quickly. They both stopped at the edge of the road and glanced down it in both directions. Then they did it again. Chloe breathed out in irritation. “What, are we in preschool?” she muttered and deliberately started across the road. Clark blinked and then caught up to her, walking close behind.

With Chloe leading, they walked up someone’s front lawn and slipped through the grass section between two neighboring houses. Another pair of backyards were joined onto the first two, and past that, another street. “It’s that one,” she muttered to him, pointing at a certain house on the opposite side of the street.

“Right,” he said quietly and followed her across the lawns to the next street. So far, no one seemed to have noticed them.

“What did I tell you?” she asked, as they headed across the street and up the sidewalk. “No problem.” He nodded as they reached the door. He glanced back nervously for a moment, checking the street. Chloe run the doorbell quickly, glancing through the tiny windows in the side of the doorway. The house looked darkened and it seemed to be empty.

“What if they’re not here?” Clark asked her.

“Trust me,” she smirked. “This guy doesn’t have anywhere else to go. Not much of a life. He had a store in town, until some people set it on fire. Town thinks he’s a big jerk, and I have to agree, but he hates Luthorcorp more than anyone else I know. He’ll help us.”

“He sound’s promising.”

“Hey, he’s the best I got,” she snapped. “I mean, I know a lot people, but I don’t really have many… friends. At least, friends, or family, who wouldn’t turn us both in.” Clark shrugged and glanced at the mail slot set into wall next to them. She rang the doorbell again and they saw a light flick on inside. “See, like I said,” she smiled.

“Yeah, no problem,” Clark muttered, reading the name above the slot. It was ‘Fordman.’