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I arrived home just in time for supper and Lois gave me a tender hug as she whispered that I had done well during my date with the waitress. I hadn't pushed things and had retreated with dignity, rather than slept with the girl and possibly made things worse, and Lois was proud of me for being so mature.

We enjoyed a great meal as we talked and I told her about what really happened during my encounter with Stain and she pretty much grilled me for all of the details. When I told her that he was probably passing Pluto about now, she laughed pretty hard.

I handed her the paperwork that Rachel had given me and she detached Mei's check and told me I needed to call her and deliver it as soon as possible. Any reasonable delay was acceptable, like travelling by normal means. Keeping it until the next time I saw her was not, which was what I had planned to do.

“Call her and let her know you have it. She should tell you when you can give it to her.” Lois said with a smile on her face.

“Really? You're making a sex pun when I'm about to call my best friend's girlfriend?” I asked with a smile on my own face.

Lois laughed. “That's the best time, isn't it?”

“It is. I'm just a little surprised.” I said and took out my cell phone. I sent her a text, in case she was in the middle of inventing, and it didn't beep right away. “It looks like she's busy.”

Lois nodded and she read over my report. By the time she reached the end of it, her face showed how happy she was. “Connor, you can't know how important this review is for your future.”

“I do now.” I said and walked around the table to give her a hug from behind. “Open up the check and see what I could have made if I actually worked there for a week.”

Lois started to open it and paused. “With the caveat that you did a few extra things that were above and beyond the requirements of an intern.”

“That was your idea, remember?” I asked and she raised her eyebrows. “You told me to make myself useful to the secretaries and to stay busy by volunteering as much of my free time as possible.”

“That was to make up for your mistake with Burnin.” Lois said and I nodded.

“That was an awkward goodbye. Namely, none.” I said with a chuckle and told her what happened after the meeting.

“So, she realized she screwed up, too.” Lois said and I didn't say that Rachel said the same thing.

“I believe so.” I motioned to the envelope with my chin. “Hurry up with that. I can only hold you like this for another two hours or so.”

Lois chuckled and finished opening the envelope and pulled the check out... and dropped it onto the table. “Good lord.”

“Wow, look at those numbers.” I said and stared at the amount.

Lois picked it up with slightly shaking hands and unfolded the entire thing to see an itemized list and the check was at the top. She read about the things I had done, the arrest assists, rescues, damage clean-up, and it even had the inventory I had done on the fire damaged apartment where I burned my lungs. Surprisingly, there was compensation for that and for the damaged hand I had.

“They really covered everything.” I said, surprised. “No wonder they liked having the heroes file their reports first thing in the morning.”

“Connor, this... you earned this much after only a week.” Lois whispered.

“Special circumstances, as you said.” I responded. “We can't expect massive creature attacks over an entire district every week, can we?”

“Good god, no.” Lois said and shivered.

I tucked my chin down onto her shoulder and snuggled in. “Don't worry, Lois. I'll get stronger by the time the first provisional license exams are scheduled.”

“You're applying early?” Lois asked.

“Izuku is as well.” I said. “We're so far ahead of everyone else in class that if they had an advancement program, we could already be halfway through second year.”

Lois laughed softly. “You're really pushing Miss Aiga if you're that far ahead.”

I smiled and nuzzled her neck a little. “Her quirk really helps Izuku and I, considering our retention is about twenty times that of the least intelligent person in the class.”

“Wait, her quirk averages out that much?” Lois asked and let out a soft moan as I kissed her skin.

“She loves taking us aside for a few minutes before class and we get everything she says. When she tells the entire class after that, her quirk lets her disseminate it that much quicker because Izuku and I already know what she's talking about.”

Lois squirmed with each touch of my lips. She didn't tell me to stop, though. “You're pushing her quirk for her.”

“You got it.” I said, happy that she understood. “She's already improved past where the specialists said she would reach with teaching such a varied amount of people.”

“And while the rest of the class is just catching up to the classwork and paperwork, Miss Aiga is giving the two of you more advanced information.” Lois guessed.

“None of the others even notice.” I said with a chuckle. “We even go around and help them individually and they still don't get that Izuku and I shouldn't be able to teach them something we literally just learned at the same time as them.”

“They just don't notice the two of you working that much harder than them.” Lois said.

“Probably. They're concentrating on their own work and not paying attention to anything else.”

“Which is great for the two of you, because you get that much more time to learn more things and the entire class benefits from it.” Lois said and I nodded. “Your average scores must be near the best in the school.”

“Not officially.” I said and she huffed. “We need to pass midterm exams before it's confirmed.”

“I think you could pass the end of year exams if you haven't been boasting too much.”

I smiled against her neck and Lois laughed softly at the ticklish sensation. “Anything is possible.”

Lois folded the check up and put it back into the envelope. “We'll go to the bank tomorrow and deposit this.”

“Into your account.” I said and she opened her mouth to correct me. “You deserve it.”

“Connor.” Lois turned around in my arms to look at me. “You can't just give...”

“You've sacrificed a lot to make sure I had a good life.” I interrupted her. “I can do no less by giving you the very first paycheck I earned because of all the help you've given me.”

Lois looked into my eyes and saw I was being completely sincere. “You're not going to budge on this, are you?”

I shook my head. “How many days did you work overtime? How many nights did you put in a few extra hours to keep food on the table and to pay the mortgage on this place?”

Lois sighed. “You shouldn't have been worrying about things like that.”

I moved a hand from her waist to cup the side of her face. “I always worry about you.”

Lois looked both pleased and sad. “You're too young to understand all of this.”

I chuckled. “Says the gorgeous reporter that has a thirty-eighth... I mean thirtieth birthday coming up.”

Lois laughed. “You need a lot more practice if you're going to lie that blatantly.”

“That's not a problem.” I said and put my hand back down to her waist as I leaned in close to whisper. “On Mars, you're just over 18 years old.”

Lois caught her breath, which opened her mouth perfectly for me. I gave her a passionate kiss and she moaned into my mouth. I made out with her for about ten seconds before I broke the kiss.

“Time is relative.” I said and stepped back as I let her out of the embrace I had her in and picked up my report from Endeavor's Hero Agency. “I have to write my review of my time at the internship.”

Lois nodded and didn't say anything as I left the room. It was the first time that she hadn't reacted negatively to letting herself kiss me like that. I wasn't going to mention it and remind her, though.

I went to my room and sat at my desk as I pulled out the papers and things I would need to write. I thought about my time there and decided to focus my report on my very first rescue and how that made me feel. I wrote it out the long way and didn't use super-speed to complete it, because I wanted to savour the thoughts and emotions as I tried to relay them into the right words.

When I was done, I sat back and smiled at what I had written. It was the right mix of detail with invoking an emotional response, which was the point of writing something and sharing it.

“You did a great job.” Lois said from behind me.

I turned in my seat to see that she had a matching smile on her face. “Is this how you feel when you write out a great piece for reporting?”

Lois nodded. “It's rare to get the time to polish a piece up before it needs to be submitted, so it has to be done in the first or second draft. Otherwise, it doesn't get done.”

I opened my arms and Lois gave me an odd look, then she stepped forward and sat down on my lap. “I can definitely see why you like your job so much.” I said and hugged her close.

“I really shouldn't be encouraging you like this.” Lois whispered as she put her arms around my neck.

“Oh? You don't want me to be a reporter like you?” I asked, intentionally misinterpreting her statement.

Lois rolled her eyes. “Yes, that's what I was referring to.”

“Are you sure? I could probably out-type you by a factor of fifteen.” I joked and she huffed.

“You would break the keyboard at that speed and the computer can't accept that many signals so quickly, anyway.” Lois said and leaned her head against mine. “You would also be wasting a good portion of your talent if you sat in an office all day.”

“That I won't argue against. It was so boring when I had to do office work while I had the cast on.”

“You poor thing.” Lois said and gave me a quick kiss. “Having to do things normally? What torture!”

I had to chuckle at that. “It really was. I even told Karen that normalcy sucked.”

Lois smiled. “Now I'm tempted to have one of your hands or even a foot put in a cast occasionally to keep you humble.”

I grinned at her. “I think what you're doing right now is more than sufficient.”

Lois smirked at me. “You mean nothing?”

I laughed. “Yes, you sitting on my lap and cuddling me is nothing.”

“You know what I meant.” Lois said, a little pointedly.

“I do and I'm glad that you can joke about it.” I said and hugged her a little tighter. “We should get changed for bed.”

Lois let me go and stood up. “Is that your subtle way of asking to watch me undress?”

“I didn't think it was that subtle.” I said with an innocent look on my face.

Lois laughed and put a hand on top of my head as she rubbed her hand over my short hair. “You need to buzz this off again soon if you want to keep this look.”

“It's getting to the point that I have to use my heat vision to trim it.” I said and she smiled warmly. “I assume you know how I can do that safely?”

“You haven't figured it out?” Lois asked with a knowing smile.

“I know to use multiple mirrors and angles, so I should be okay.”

“Come with me.” Lois said and took my hand.

I followed her out of my room and into hers. She took me to a closet that I had seen hundreds of times in her room and never bothered to look inside. I regretted it at that moment, because she opened it and stepped inside with me. To my surprise, we were completely surrounded by mirrors. It was a five foot wide space and we could see our multiple reflections cascading off into infinity.

“Lois, this...”

“It was something Clark and I came up with when he started having problems with clothes fitting and getting his hair trimmed.” Lois said. “You're going to need the special shears we had commissioned to keep everything even.”

“But...” I stopped when she opened one of the mirrors and pulled out a case with different grooming tools inside. “You kept stuff like this around?”

Lois took out a green tinted straight razor. “Clark hated the feel of his heat vision on his skin. It would burn for hours after he used it on his face, so we had these specially made.”

I lightly touched them and didn't feel weakness or anything.

“You really are immune to it?” Lois asked.

“No, it's my telekinetic barrier.” I said and she looked surprised. “It's like a thin layer of invisible armor over my whole body and I practice with it constantly. It's why my suit never gets damaged when I'm wearing it.”

“Connor.” Lois whispered with awe in her voice. “You don't know how happy I am that you have that.”

I smiled and took out the electric shears. “Would you like to do the honors?”

“What?” Lois looked confused. “I thought you said...”

“I can extend and retract it slightly.” I said and then concentrated to make the hairs on my head stand straight up with my telekinesis. “Go ahead and check it for yourself.”

Lois cut a small bit of hair off of my head with an electric hum. “I'll grab a stool for you to sit on!”

I barely nodded before she was out of the closet and came back with the stool she used at her beauty table. I sat on it like I was mounting a throne and she laughed at me.

Fifteen minutes later, my buzz cut was refreshed and Lois beamed a smile at me.

“Thank you for letting me do this, Connor.” Lois said and quickly cleaned the cutter off before putting it back in the case. “You're going to need to change clothes and probably take a shower.”

“You need to brush off what's on me first or I'll be dragging bits of hair all through the house.” I said.

Lois nodded and left again for a minute. She returned with a small brush and a dustpan and cleaned off my shoulders, back, and chest first before she did my thighs and then she knelt on the floor to get the rest. She stood up when she was done and looked slightly lost as to what to do next.

“Allow me.” I said and used heat vision to burn up the hair.

“That's so handy. Thank you.” Lois said and we left the closet.

I went to my room to change and showered while she put the brush and dustpan away. We were both done at the same time.

“Goodnight, Connor.” Lois said.

“Goodnight, Lois.” I said and we closed our respective bedroom doors. I laid down on my bed and watched her as she stripped off. She wore normal underwear, as in practical and not sexy.

“Are you watching?” Lois asked and I knocked once. “I didn't expect to be seen like this because I would have worn something different. Are you disappointed?”

I knocked twice and she smiled.

“Why not? It's just a basic beige color.” Lois said and I knocked a bunch of times to make her laugh. “Okay, okay. I get it. It doesn't matter to you.”

I knocked twice.

“You are too good to be true.” Lois said and I knocked once. “You're supposed to deny it, you ass.”

I knocked twice and she laughed.

“Then be prepared to be underwhelmed.” Lois said and pulled out an old pair of shorts and a huge t-shirt. She put both on and then climbed into bed. “How was that for a show? Did you like it?”

I knocked once and she smiled.

“You are so easy to please.” Lois said with a chuckle and I knocked once. “I'm not even going to argue that you shouldn't be. I'm not stupid.”

I knocked twice and she nodded as she rolled onto her side to face me.

“You can stop staring.” Lois whispered and I knocked twice. “You are never going to stop, are you?”

I knocked twice more.

“Thank you.” Lois whispered and closed her eyes. She fell asleep almost right away.

I kept watching her for quite some time before I dozed off myself.

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