Thump-thump

Lois stood by the empty gravesite, his ring on her finger as she held a handful of rich soil and let it fall. 'You can't stay here forever, Lane,' she mentally scolded herself. 'You have to be strong. Be the woman he loved. Walk.'

The words had no meaning to her. She didn't want to be strong. She didn't want to turn away. She wanted to stay until she could be with him again. Bruce and Diana watched from a distance. Lois turned but she did not move away. Everything that meant something to her was lying in that hole and she hated the thought of leaving him.

'Be strong, Lois,' she heard his voice in her own mind.

Thump-thump

"You should go to her," Diana said, her brow furrowed. "Help her take the first step."

"No," Bruce replied. "She has to do it for herself."

Thump-thump

Lois lifted her right foot and placed it down again; her left followed. The world was not ready for Superman. They didn't appreciate Kal-El of Krypton. Her knees buckled beneath her. God-damn it, they didn't even spare a thought for Clark Kent but she loved the man that was all three of them. The tears she'd been holding back came and she screamed in outrage at the injustice of it.

Thump-thump

Bruce moved swiftly to help Lois to her feet. She'd taken the first step herself. That was enough. He put his arm around her and helped her to stand.

Thump-thump

Diana jumped into the grave and pulled the lid from Clark Kent's coffin. The baby faced farm boy was lying there still with no visible signs of life about him. She lifted him in her arms carefully as she lept out of the grave and placed him carefully on the ground.

"What the hell are you doing?" Bruce shouted. "Stay here, Ms. Lane."

Lois scrambled to get next to Clark, to rest his head in her lap as she stroked his dark curls while silent tears streamed down her cheeks which she roughly pushed away with her soiled hand. For all the world, he looked exactly as he did when he slept next to her. The warmth of his skin was a welcome hallucination or perhaps it was the sun skewing her perceptions.

The sun should never shine on a day like this. It should rain and be gray and miserable as the feeling of losing someone so loved.

"He's not dead," Diana whispered to Bruce. "I could feel the vibration of his heartbeat. It is slow and weak, but he lives."

Bruce's brow was the one to furrow now. "Are you sure?" he asked. "I know the kid meant a lot to her but I don't want to offer her false hope. Not even I can be that cruel."

"I am certain of it," Diana replied. "He will recover given enough time and care but I am equally certain that he has a long road ahead of him. We should tell his mother."

Bruce took the long trek up to the Kent's farmhouse where Martha sat at her kitchen table looking at her family photo albums. The page was opened to a happy young couple standing in on the front porch of the house in their wedding clothes. She traced the lines of Jonathan's face with her finger.

"Take care of our boy, Jonathan," she said to the photograph. "Not sure when I'll be with you both again. I miss you."

Bruce knocked on the screen door. "Martha? May I come in?"

Martha wiped a few tears away with the dish towel she was holding and nodded. "It's not locked, Mister Wayne. Come in."

She flipped the page and smiled as he stepped in. He looked down to see a young Martha holding a little wrapped up baby looking up at her and her face fraught with worry.

"The night we found him," she explained. "He was having trouble breathing. The wheezing was so bad. Jonathan had to run out to the Walmart over in Evansville and beg the manager to let him in before they all went home to get one of those little suction bulbs and a humidifier. Of course, it was impossible to know what to do with him that would work and he was too weak to even cry. Just this wheeze as he struggled to… breathe… it about broke my heart."

"Martha…" he said, taking her hand in his. "Your son…"

"My son survived as a little baby. He lived to help people and he died doing that," Martha said. "And do you think anyone gave a damn about…"

Bruce put his hand over her mouth. "He's not dead."

Her eyes grew large and her hands trembled as she knocked the chair over and raced out of the house. "Clark."

She saw Diana carrying her son's body toward the house as if he weighed nothing with Lois running to keep up with the taller woman's strides. Bruce opened the screen door as Diana brought him in and took him to his own bed. Clark's hand twitched.

Lois raced to open the curtains. "Sunlight, he needs as much sunlight as we can get him."

Diana started to unbutton his shirt and then stopped. "Mrs. Kent, you may not wish to see this. The wound was very bad."

"Miss, I have held this boy in my arms all his life," Martha said. "I have worn every bodily fluid a child can leave on a mother. However bad it is, if my son's still living; I will see it."

Diana pulled the shirt away and the gaping wound that had gone clear through his body was slowly closing in the back. The muscles and tissues that had been rent when he was impaled were open and raw but he was not bleeding as one might have expected he should. Martha took in a sharp breath before kissing Clark's forehead and holding his hand. He had to be in pain.

"Clark," Martha whispered into his ear, "It's mom. If you can hear me, you listen to me. You have to fight, Son. Fight to live, Honey."

A moan came from the young man which gave both his mother and his lover a swell of hope. Before anything could be discussed, Bruce was on the telephone arranging for medical equipment to be brought from Gotham City to Smallville. To Bruce, Clark looked so young; little more than a boy despite his thirty five years.

'Maybe I'm just getting old,' he thought morosely. 'Or maybe those Kryptonians just mature slower than humans. I'm not exactly ready for the Shady Oaks Rest Home yet.'

Meanwhile, Martha had brought the rocking chair from her bedroom and parked it next to the bed.

"We'll take turns," she told Lois.

Author's Note: This story is being done PURELY from the movie Batman vs. Superman: Dawn of Justice and I am doing my best not to include any comic material within. As always, I don't own any parts of DC, Superman, Batman, Wonder Woman or anything. This is just my brain going off the rails with a "after the movie" story.