AN: Here it is! The last chapter of the saga! Enjoy! Mostly fluff

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Chapter Eight: Back to the Future

"Love is everything it's cracked up to be…It really is worth fighting for, being brave for, risking everything for." ~Eric Jong

"The best way to predict the future is to invent it." ~Alan Kay

"We must use time as a tool, not as a crutch." ~John F. Kennedy

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The blue suit, stretched tight across well-toned muscles. The red S snaking over his broad chest. The red cape billowing out behind him as they flew. Her arms had wrapped automatically around his neck when he caught her and they remained there securely as he carried her through the air. This was normal. This was safe. Oh yes, Lois definitely knew who had saved her.

"Clark," she breathed. She grabbed his face with both hands and pulled him to her in a passionate kiss.

"Lois," Clark said when she had finally released him. "Are you alright? What were you thinking going after that big airport security story without me?"

"Yes, Clark, I'm fine," Lois said. She stroked his cheek and then pulled him back in for another kiss.

"I'm glad to see you too," Clark said. A huge grin stretched across his face. "I'm not complaining or anything with this warm reception, but we've been working for years on calling me 'Superman' in these situations."

Lois was much too excited to listen to him about this again. "Clark, it happened. It finally happened!"

"What happened?" Clark said, focusing on her even as he flew.

"Remember when you first told me about your powers?" Lois said.

"How could I forget?" Clark chuckled. "I've never seen you rotate between so many emotions so fast."

"I had good reason too, Superman," Lois exaggerated the last word. "No, but do you remember when we went to talk to Jor-El? We asked him about how I had managed to travel through time?"

"I remember," Clark said, nodding. "After I told you about who I was you had so many questions. You immediately asked if Lois from the future had known my secret when she came back. And when we went to Jor-El you asked him about that first and he told us about the portal."

"Of course I asked him about that first, it had to do with me," Lois said. "That was only about a year after I…she had come back. That made a big difference in our lives. Do you remember what Jor-El told me about my memories?"

"He said that you wouldn't remember the alternate future until the moment when future Lois would have returned to the future, or something like that," Clark said. "Basically eleven years from when she came to us in the past you would get the memories from her timeline."

"It's been about eleven years. During that fall from the plane, Clark," Lois said. "I got those memories!"

"You did?" Clark said. He lowered them onto the roof of the nearest building and took a step back from her, looking over her carefully. She knew he was using his x-ray vision but she didn't let go of his upper arms. "You don't look any different. Do you feel any different?"

"Superman," Lois said sternly, knowing he had gone into his over-protective mode. "I'm fine. Seriously. I just have all these different memories in my head now. It's a bit overwhelming actually."

Clark wrapped his arms around her but left enough space so that they could still look at each other and talk. "What's it like? What do you remember?"

"Bits and pieces, for the most part," Lois said. "Only fragments of an alternate eleven years. I still remember more from our real life together, of course." Lois suddenly looked at her left hand. She examined all five of her fingers. "Do you remember? She was missing the pinky on her left hand."

"How could I forget?" Clark said. "You've taken so much care during the years to make sure you didn't lose that." He took her hand in his and matched each of his fingers to hers. Then he twirled the wedding band on her ring finger. "I like your hand just the way it is."

"Me too," Lois said with a smile. "Wow, Clark, all these other memories are crazy. I can't believe some of this. Almost everyone was dead or missing. I worked at an underground newspaper and had to run from these Enforcer squads. Lex Luthor was president. I had this nasty little apartment on the edge of the city. There are a lot of disjointed chases. Some truly awful hiding places. Oh, god, bodies in a sewer," Lois rubbed her forehead and grimaced. "And you weren't there."

"That's why you went back in time," Clark said gently. "You fixed all of that. Without you, none of what we have now would have happened. Our marriage, the kids, the lives of our friends…all of that would have been lost."

"Everything is so empty in that timeline," Lois said quietly. "There's no you. There's no us. I wasn't even thinking about the possibility of having Jonathan or Jane. It's so different."

Clark's face had that look where he wished he could do something to fix her pain. "I can't even imagine what that would be like. At least now you know why she came back. I mean, really know."

"She made all of what we have possible," Lois said. "It's strange, though, even with her memories, I'm still not exactly like her."

"Of course you're not," Clark said easily. "You're my Lois. She may have had your memories and a lot of your personality, but you're not her. Your experiences made you different. You're my wife and the mother of my children, Lois. No one else is."

Lois was touched by his sincerity. Even after all these years and all they had been through, his love for her could sometimes catch her off-guard. "So you don't want me to adopt that whole 'survive at all costs' mentality? I shouldn't try and get weird powers?"

"Definitely not," Clark said. "Lois Lane-Kent doesn't need superpowers to be awesome."

Lois laughed at this and let him pull her close to him again.

"Just imagine what would have happened if she hadn't come back," Lois said from his shoulder.

"It would be what your new memories are," Clark said. "I can only imagine that world. She told me a little bit about it, but you have it all now."

His cape flapped in the wind around them on the roof. "A world without Superman," Lois said. "Now that's a terrible thought."

Clark chuckled. "But not surprising if there isn't an us."

Lois pulled back out of his arms. "If you're gonna start talking like that, we should get off of this roof where anyone can see what I'm going to do to you."

Clark's eyebrow rose. "That's true. We wouldn't want Superman's image disturbed by a roof-top liaison."

"Superman?" Lois scoffed. "What about me? I'm a married woman!"

"I'm Superman!" Clark said. "People trust me to stand for truth and justice. I've got a whole moral code."

"So do I," Lois said. "I don't need my reputation tarnished because I'm suddenly an adulteress with a thing for capes and tights. Try and explain all the terrible things that people would say about mommy to the kids. Plus, Chloe and Oliver would never stop laughing at us. People trust me to provide them with news and investigative journalism of the highest caliber."

"They trust me to do that, too," Clark said with a grin. "Whose name is next to yours on many of those stories?"

"It certainly isn't yours, Superman," Lois said with a twinkle in her eye as she poked him in the middle of the S on his chest.

"Then who is the lucky guy?" Clark said, his eyes also sparkling.

"That would be my amazingly handsome husband," Lois said. "And you had better bring me to him pronto, Superman, because we're going to be late for picking the kids up at school. I'm taking my wonderful family out to dinner tonight to celebrate me having all ten fingers."

Clark laughed and picked her back up in his arms before taking flight again. "That sounds like a great thing to celebrate. Did you take the car to the airport?"

"No, I left the car at the Planet," Lois said. "I took a cab so you could use the car if you needed it."

"Even though I don't really need it," Clark said.

"I don't know how you would pick up the kids without it," Lois pointed out. "If I had been running late I would like to think their school wouldn't let you carry them off in a blur."

"I don't think they could stop me," Clark said as he landed on the roof of the Daily Planet and set her down carefully. "It's just a public school." He did his super-spin-change and emerged in the work suit he had worn that day.

"Well, let's just hope that no other Kryptonian comes along and tries to haul our children away, Clark," Lois said. She reached up and adjusted his tie slightly before kissing him again.

Somewhere at the very beginning of her relationships with Superman and Clark they had gotten into the habit of kissing on the roof of the Daily Planet. When they had arguments they yelled and talked them out on the roof and wouldn't leave until they had been able to make up and make out. Depending on Clark's mood as Superman, and depending on how harrowing his rescue of her had been, her kisses from Superman would either be on the cheek or intensely passionate full on smooches. The roof was their place. It was usually the first place they looked for the other one. They were usually undisturbed as they looked out over the city. From up there, Metropolis was theirs and they were each other's.

"Lois, are you sure that you're alright?" Clark said. "You just got a major download of information."

"And it's still processing," Lois said. "I'll be fine, Smallville. Just a weird set of memories. They might as well be dreams."

"I didn't think about that," Clark said, looking worried. "You're going to have all sorts of terrible nightmares now."

"I've gone through plenty of real things that produce nightmares," Lois said with a sigh. "It's not like you have to worry about me killing you in your sleep as I battle off alternate reality bad guys."

Clark smirked but didn't look convinced.

Lois moved to the door but then turned around and placed her fully intact left hand lightly on his chest. Her wedding band glinted as the sun hit it. "Tell you what, I'll guarantee you that I'll be so exhausted tonight that I'll sleep so deep and I won't even dream." Her smile and mischievous look in her eyes made it perfectly clear to her husband what she meant.

"Well," Clark smiled and nodded thoughtfully. "I suppose that would make me feel better about whether you would kill me while I slept."

"Good," Lois said and winked. "Because I intend to remind myself very fully that you exist in this timeline."

"Oooo," Clark said. "You know, I have been thinking that it might be time for another addition to our family…"

Lois' response was to capture his mouth with hers again. Her fingers speared through his hair and he wrapped his strong arms around her waist and pulled her close. She may have had the memories from Future Lois, but she still couldn't really believe that she could have lived eleven years without these moments, without Clark.

He was the man who made up her world and she was the woman who had saved his.

The End

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Author's Note:

That's right, the roof belongs to Clark and Lois! No one else! Sorry, that was just a major annoyance during Lana arc.

That's all folks! Thank you all for reading! An especially big thanks to those of you who reviewed and kept me slogging away at this *better* version of "Bride" through "Requiem." I needed to do this to shake off the bad taste Lana left and I'm glad that so many of you enjoyed it. I'm really looking forward the return of Lois Lane on March 12th with "Infamous!!!!!" It looks like it's going to be AWESOME! Shameless plug now for the rest of my stories: I'm particularly proud of Distraction and Noticing You Two, just if you're in the mood for some more Clois fun! Clois forever!

Reviews are loved!