The Shattered Prayer

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Che, Steff, and I have been participating in a short story a day activity. The short stories are based on randomly generated titles. At some point, Che challenged me to include the Superverse Wedding HellGear in a story. When the title “Gate in the Husband” came up, I knew that was the perfect place to include the HellGear. So here below, is my short story for “Gate in the Husband” starring the one and only Lois Lane.

GATE IN THE HUSBAND

Lois looked around impatiently. She wanted to get this show on the road. After all, it wasn’t every day a girl got married.

Well, it wasn’t every day that most girls got married. Lois had been married a fair number of times, and the list was (much) longer than she’d care to admit. Sometimes she found it hard to believe that in the past 13 years, she had married so many people, including Clark Kent, Jimmy Olsen, Sultan Prince Ali, Titan Master, a condemned criminal on his way to the electric chair, Bruce Wayne, a man in iron lung, an astronaut, Lex Luthor, an extra-dimensional alien. And that wasn’t even the complete list. If she were honest, it was really hard to keep them straight in her head.

To have been down the aisle so many times, she was actually very unlucky in love. None of her marriages ended happily. Either her husband died, or he turned out to be someone else in disguise, or the wedding was really some “lesson” that Superman was teaching her, or, even more confusingly, it was an “imaginary” wedding like that time she married a reformed Lex Luthor. She never could figure out how those “imaginary” weddings worked. She very clearly remembered that she and Lex had a child together, and the child grew up to be a super-criminal. Lots of people had died too, including Lex, but the next month, Lex was alive and a criminal again, no one remembered her child, she hadn’t aged a day, and everyone acted as if the whole thing had never happened.

Well, whatever. Couldn’t dwell on the inconsistencies! She was sure there was a logical explanation. It didn’t concern her much. After all, she had also died several times and come back to life. And whenever she did, there was always another dreamy guy waiting there to ask her to get married! She was so popular! Every man loved her!

Take that, Lana Lang!

No. She shouldn’t think that way. She was being uncharitable. Lana couldn’t help it if she were plain and ordinary. Thank goodness Superman’s taste in girls had improved since his teenage years!

Or rather his taste in “women.” That was so difficult for Lois to say. “Women” were old. At 32, Lois was a mere slip of a girl. Not an old maid at all! (And more importantly, she was pretty too!) She knew it was 1970 and that she should be liberated (hadn’t she shown how liberated she was when she turned Black for a whole day?), but it was oh so hard to be a card carrying member of N.O.W. when that dreamy Superman kept flying around, teaching her lessons, humiliating her. (He even spanked her sometimes!) Oh, she had some distant memories of being a feisty intrepid reporter back in the 30s and 40s (shouldn’t she have been a baby back then? Sometimes thinking was hard), but ever since the 50s, she had one thing on her mind and one thing only.

Marriage!

Oh how she longed to be Mrs. Superman. She spent hours doodling “Mr. and Mrs. Superman” or “Mrs. Lois Superman” in her reporter’s notebook (hey, that notebook had to be used for something!). But marriage to the Man of Steel never seemed to work out. She had come so close so many times, but something always messed it up. Like that time her ex-husband the Invisible Man showed up to stop the wedding (She hadn’t even remembered marrying the Invisible Man! Which, of course, made sense, his being invisible and all.) Or that time when she (silly girl!) had annulled her marriage to Superman because she had second thoughts about tricking him into it under false pretenses.

But it really didn’t matter that she couldn’t marry Superman. There were just so many men in the world! Even if she didn’t make it down the aisle, it was so much fun being engaged. There had been so many proposals and engagements, too! There was Biron the Super-horse (she still blushed thinking about that one; she hadn’t realized he was a horse at the time!), several Bizarros, Dick Grayson, Achilles, Samson, Hercules Prince Charming, Jor-El (that one was a bit awkward, dating her beloved’s father), three men from the Phantom Zone, Mr. Mxyzptlk – just too many men to keep track of. In all, as, she figured it, she had 88 marriage proposals, 28 aborted proposals, 45 engagements, 19 weddings, 9 hoax weddings, 3 additional marriages that lasted beyond the wedding day, and 3 annulments. (And she had also been twice widowed, but those were too sad to think about).

Such a full life for someone so young!

But this time it was going to be different! This time she was going to make her marriage last!

This time, she was going to marry the Devil.

And she was going to do it in style! The Devil had picked the perfect matching outfits for them to wear. She had on red tights which showed off her legs (that Klukor kept her in such great shape! She had married Van-Zee after he taught her the Karate of Krypton. It was the only polite thing to do.). She also had on a darling red tunic with fringe at the bottom. She even had a cape with a collar! Superman would be so jealous! (Why hadn’t he come? She issued the invitation personally.)

She wasn’t as sure about the cloven feet and horns, but she assumed she would get used to them. After all, they gave her Super Devil Powers of Evil, like her darling husband-to-be Lucifer, the Morning Star. He was so dishy! So muscular! (Almost as muscular as Superman!) And he had that cute little Van Dyke that tickled her when they kissed (chastely! They weren’t married yet!) And he looked just as fetching in his matching outfit (differing only in the very manly belt that he wore cinched at his waist). They made the cutest couple imaginable! It almost made up for the fact that all the wedding guests were similarly attired.

Not that there were that many people attending the wedding. None of her friends showed up. Not even Perry White (why hadn’t she ever tried to marry him? He was editor of the Daily Planet after all. An editor’s wife! What a life that would be! No, Lois. Concentrate. One man at a time. What was she thinking about? Oh, yeah! None of her friends were here.) Tons of her friends told her it was a mistake to marry the Devil (but they didn’t know him like she knew him!) Others said they were just tired of buying wedding gifts for her.

They were probably all just jealous!

The only people that seemed to be here were the Devil’s friends. At least she assumed they were his friends. He really didn’t talk about who he hung out with. And he also didn’t like to talk about his work. He did complain about an ex-supervisor every now and then (Lois couldn’t quite catch the name Jehobah? Jethro? Jabba? She couldn’t really understand him when he said it. It sounded foreign. And she didn’t want to pry. She mostly just nodded and tutted and patted his manly hands in support!) And what a friendly bunch his friends seemed to be! All of them were smiling! They were such happy people. Strangely enough they were all white. Did only white people go to Hell? She’d have to look into that. After all, she was once a reporter. Was a reporter, emphasis on the “was.” Obviously she’d have to quit her job and support Lucifer in his. It was what a wife did.

Oops! She had zoned out. (She was always doing that. She never used to do it during the Golden Age – wait a minute, what was a Golden Age?) Lucifer was saying something. She had better listen!

“By the infernal powers of Hades, I take you, Lois, as my wife!”

Oh! This was the moment! Wedding number 20! She could hardly contain her excitement.

“STOP!” A voice cried out over the nuptials!

Everyone drew in a gasp of breath! Someone had the bad manners to stop the wedding. Of all the nerve!

“Lois, stop! I can’t let you do this!”

Annoyed, Lois looked up at the interrupter, and her heart swelled with emotion.

SUPERMAN!

Her darling Superman loved her after all! He had shown up! And dramatically (but rudely) stopped her wedding!

“Superman!” She said, feigning anger, “What is the meaning of this?”

“Lois, this has gone too far!” Superman said. “I mean, Shades of Satan! You’ve turned into a demon! And look whom you are marrying!”

Lois smiled and said effusively, “I know! Isn’t he dreamy?”

“No, Lois!” Superman said sternly, “He is not dreamy! He is evil! You can’t marry him! I won’t allow it!”

Lucifer cleared his throat politely and said, “Pardon me, Superman! But you do not own her! You are not her husband, and can’t stop her from marrying the man she loves!”

Lois tilted her head and squenched up her mouth in a lopsided frown as if to say “He’s got you there!”

Superman considered and said, “I’ll make any sacrifice to save Lois! If this is what it takes to stop her from making the biggest mistake of her life, I’ll marry her!”

“OH, DARLING!” Lois proclaimed throwing her arms around Superman. Quick as a bunny, she turned to the bald demon officiating and said, “Quick! Before he changes his mind again!”

The officiant demon began to intone his unholy vows once more. Lois was practically jumping up and down on her cloven hooves. Mrs. Lois Superman! All of her dreams would come true – again.

(Oh, please, oh please, oh please don’t let this be an “imaginary” wedding! Lois chanted silently to herself)

“STOP!” a more distaff voice shouted out!

What now? Annoyed once again, Lois turned to the second interrupter, and was surprised to see Black Canary of the Justice League standing in front of her.

“Black Canary!” she exclaimed, “What brings you to my wedding?”

“Embarrassment and disgust, mostly,” Black Canary said, “What the hell happened to you, Lois? You used to be Rosalind Russell and you’ve turned into Doris Day.”

Lucifer cleared his throat politely once more and said, “That’s actually a shaky analogy. Ms. Day was a strong woman with a head for business who . . .”

“Quiet, Horns!” Black Canary said, “I stand by my analogy! I repeat Lois, what the hell happened to you?”

Lois looked at this woman standing before her, a mass of contradictions. On the one hand, Black Canary was telling Lois that she had to be a feminist icon, but on the other hand, Black Canary was wearing fishnets, high heels, a bustier, and a short waisted evening jacket. Is that what feminists wore? It was like looking at Veronica Lake, incongruously starring in one of those new X rated movies that were playing downtown.

Distracted by the outfit Lois asked “How do you do your judo in those high heels? I could never do Klukor dressed like that!”

Black Canary said, “This isn’t about me! Stop staring at my fishnets! This is about a feminist icon becoming a marriage happy doormat!”

Lois said, “I don’t understand. Every woman wants a white picket fence, two gorgeous well behaved children (one boy and one girl), and some pearls and high heels (you have to look good when your man comes home from work!) It is every woman’s dream! That is the key to female happiness!”

Black Canary could not believe her ears. “When did you start thinking that you’d find the happiness gate in a husband, Lois?” she demanded.

“July-August, 1957,” Lois responded automatically.
She did a double take. Black Canary was right. She was once a go-getter reporter. Then suddenly, in 1957, everything changed. It was as if she had become a different, less appealing person. And now that it had been pointed out to her, her mind was clearing. The old Lois was coming back! She shook her head in utter disbelief and looked over to Superman. “What the hell did happen?”

Superman looked panicked, “Lois! Where are your bold italics and exclamation points? I can’t understand what you are saying!”

Lois rolled her eyes. “Why did I start chasing you?” she demanded, “I used to be a reporter, damn it! I chased exclusives, not wedding rings!” She looked at her feet and said, “And Lucy, change my feet back.”

Lucifer sighed, doing as she requested. It looked like he wasn’t getting married either. Always the bride’s maid, never the bride. He thought he had a shot with the perpetually married Lois.

“Well, Superman?” Lois said, “I’m waiting.”

Superman sighed. “It was the 50s, Lois. No one was buying comics any more. Wertham had just outed Batman and Robin and pointed out Wonder Woman’s weird bondage fetish. Tastes had changed during Cold War paranoia, and to top it off, the Comics Code was censoring everything. If we were going to keep our audience, we had to wholesome up the place real fast. You were the logical starting place. Already popular, unlikely to take a hit with a character change. Editorial took a chance and changed your personality. With an emphasis on marriage, we’d corner the young girl (and gay boy) market. And it worked like gold! You got your own title! Sales went up! Everyone’s happy.”

Black Canary said, “But this is the 1970s. That crap doesn’t fly any more. We need to be relevant. Look at me, for instance; my husband was killed, and I’m off on an existential road trip with my new lover, the ultra-1970s type liberal Green Arrow. Hell, even G.A.’s changed with the times. He grew a goatee, lost his Robin Hood type garb, gained some muscles, lost his fortune, and had to live through his ward, Speedy, doing heroin – never should have called him Speedy; the name alone should have warned us drugs were in his future. And it doesn’t end with us. Robin became involved in campus activism, he and Batman broke up, Red Tornado’s having an identity Crisis, Saturn Girl’s wearing a pink bikini, and Cosmic Boy’s sporting a bustier. With excitement like that, we can’t have these boring marriage stories any more.”

Lois agreed emphatically, “Yeah, Clark. Besides, sales are slipping in my title. I’ll be cancelled before long!”

Superman looked surprised, and then glanced around sheepishly, saying, “Um. Clark? Who is this Clark of whom you speak. I don’t know any . . .”

Lois sighed, “Can the crap, Clark. I mean, glasses? That’s your disguise? I’m an investigative reporter, for crying out loud! Or at least I used to be.”

Lois then brushed herself off and looked around disgusted. “88 fricking proposals. That’s just embarrassing.”

Black Canary said, “At least you aren’t stuck in a bustier and fishnets.”

Lois looked at Black Canary appreciating her anew. “Hmm. There’s nothing wrong with those fishnets, B.C. In fact, they are kind of sexy. What say you we ditch Supes and G.A. and go on some existential roadtrip of our own?”

Black Canary gave Lois the once over and said, “Maybe we can convinced Wonder Woman to break out that lasso of hers on the way!”

Lois linked her arm through Black Canary’s and said, “Sounds like a plan. Things are starting to look up around here. We’ve come a long way, baby!” She looked over to Lucifer and said, “Sorry, Luce. There ain’t gonna be any wedding.”

Arm in arm, Lois and Black Canary started to trot out of hell.

Superman called after them and said, “But what about me? Where will I go? What will I do?”

Lois turned back and said, “Frankly, Clark, I don’t give a shit.”

Superman watched forlornly as Lois and Black Canary walked out of his life. He was at a loss for the first time since 1957. What would he do now?

A polite cough pulled him out of his reverie. He looked over to Lucifer at his side.

“Well, I’m still available,” the Devil said.

Superman smiled and said, “What the hell?”

Buy me a beer!

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