- Lois Lane: I have to admit, this assignment... a little out of my strike zone. I mean, I was raised by a very grounded 4-star general who believed in what you can see, touch, blow up...
- Carter Hall: Things that can be explained.
- Lois Lane: It's just... you can live your whole live without any prove of something, like a god or whatever, and then one day you look up and realize the guy sitting across from you is... Ra.
- Carter Hall: You think the guy sitting across from you is an ancient sun god?
- Lois Lane: No, of course not. But what if he were? One minute you know you know what you know, and the next you realize you don't really know anything but you want to know everything. What is the world like for him? Does he feel pain? How does he heal? When does he sleep? *Does* he even sleep.
- Carter Hall: This is going to require something stronger than tea.
- Lois Lane: How can he stand driving in a car when they move so much slower than he does? That would drive me crazy.
- Carter Hall: Maybe you should just ask Clark. Now, why don't you sit down before you drive *me* crazy.
- Carter Hall: You know, the philosopher Nietzsche believed we shouldn't live for the future, but for the present. He thought that people who chased after some far-off future dream were really running away from their true destiny.
- Lois Lane: Yeah, well, Nietzsche can call me a chicken if he wants, but he has never dated someone like Clark Kent.
- Carter Hall: It wouldn't have mattered. To him, the true hero was the person who embraced the life that he or she was given and made it better. He called that person "Übermensch."
- Lois Lane: A superman.
- Carter Hall: Nietzsche believed we could all be one. In our own way.
- Carter Hall: I'd like you to have something. It was given to me by my wife. It's a story, about two star-crossed lovers. Prince Khufu and Shayera were murdered by an evil man, but their love was so strong they were bonded for all eternity. Lifetime after lifetime they were reborn, to find their one true love. Only to lose each other in death again.
- Lois Lane: That's a terrible story.
- Carter Hall: I like it.
- Lois Lane: If you're into the whole Egyptian "Groundhog Day" thing.
- Carter Hall: After many years, Khufu grew tired of always waiting to find his beloved. So he traveled the world, seeking other women, trying to forget Shayera. Unable to rid her from his heart, he returned home, resigned to his fate. No sooner did he arrive at the palace than he saw her. She was there all along but he didn't recognize her because the time wasn't right. He needed to wait, because it made their love stronger. And their kiss that much sweeter.
- Tess Mercer: I got your message. I have to say, it wasn't the call I was expecting.
- Oliver Queen: Chloe's gone.
- Tess Mercer: Well, you've been with her for five months, right? Sounds like things are right on schedule.
- Oliver Queen: No, it's not like that. She just disappeared. No warning, no phone call, nothing.
- Tess Mercer: Trust never was the golden rule for the kids in this clubhouse.
- Oliver Queen: Well, you'd just fit right in, then, wouldn't you? Now, if you think I'm gonna sit around here and do nothing just waiting for my girlfriend to come back like Clark's doing, you don't know me very well at all.
- Tess Mercer: Low blow. I'd say Clark's using every ounce of strength he has not to skip over the Azores and bring Lois home. He respects Lois enough.
- Oliver Queen: Maybe that's because Lois hasn't completely disappeared. There's no digital record of Chloe Sullivan anywhere. It's like she never existed.
- Cat Grant: Why are you doing this to me? I didn't do anything.
- Deadshot: Funny thing about fate. You can't outrun it. Either it's your day or it's not, sweet pea.
- Cat Grant: Please, no. My son... he's just two years old. I'm all he's got.
- Deadshot: Trust me. He'll get over you. Three or four years, he won't even remember your face. People about to die always think that that special loved one won't be able to go on without ' em. But the truth is, that person just finds someone else to love. Everyone is replaceable.
- Cat Grant: I used to think everyone could be saved. Even those superhero freaks. But now I realize... some people are just born dead.
- Lois Lane: [slapping Carter after he kisses her] Try that again, and the next thing kissing your lips will be my fist.
- Carter Hall: About last night, I'm sorry. I guess I got a little too caught up in my story.
- Lois Lane: You forgot to mention the most important part. It was an autobiography.
- [handing him a piece of paper]
- Lois Lane: I found this in the book.
- Carter Hall: [unfolding it, he sees it's a note from Shayera in 1824] Lois, surely you don't think that...
- Lois Lane: Let's just say I wasn't born yesterday. You're not the only one of Clark's friends with a... mysterious past.
- Carter Hall: Clark did say you were wise beyond your years.
- Carter Hall: I hope last night will remain between us. I'm not sure Clark would forgive me if he knew.
- Lois Lane: Some leads are better left buried. So, if you're just here to babysit me as a favor to Clark, what was with the heart-to-heart? Something tells me that story time wasn't exactly part of the agreement.
- Carter Hall: It's... my wife. I've been hearing her in my thoughts, and last night, I had a vision of her. When that happens, I know I'll be joining her soon in a new life. But to do that, I must first leave this one.
- Lois Lane: Leave? Like... die?
- Carter Hall: It's time I meet my destiny, Lois. But before I go, I wanted you to meet yours. He can't do it without you. You're his Shayera.
- Oliver Queen: Chloe is, uh, gone.
- Clark Kent: What do you mean?
- Oliver Queen: Those people who were holding me at that old brewery, she... she traded herself in so I could be free.
- Clark Kent: Who are these people? What do they want with Chloe?
- Oliver Queen: Just a group of people that call themselves crime fighters. They think we should all remain hidden in the shadows. They tried to torture her, Clark. She beat them at their own game. She took a cyanide pill.
- Clark Kent: No. Chloe wouldn't...
- Oliver Queen: [tossing him a vial] And then she took this. I found that at her apartment. I had it tested, and there's... traces of a cyanide antidote in there. She faked her own death.
- Clark Kent: She was planning to go. She saw the future. She put on Dr. Fate's helmet trying to find you and said it was gonna be okay.
- Oliver Queen: You just let her go?
- Clark Kent: I had no idea she was leaving.
- Oliver Queen: She put on the fate helmet, Clark. That should have told you something.
- Clark Kent: Look, I understand how much she means to you, Oliver, but for years she's been asking us to treat her as one of us. She begged me to trust her and the decisions that she made. If she put this much planning and thought into leaving, she knew what she was doing.
- Oliver Queen: I go out every night and I protect unfamiliar faces so that they can go home and be with the people that they care about. And the one person that I should have been protecting the most... I failed her.
- Clark Kent: We didn't choose this. We both know this is what we were born to do.
- Oliver Queen: You playing the fate card? Is that what you're doing again? That's what gets you through the day? You sit around and do nothing while these people that we protect, they paint us as vigilantes, Clark! The woman that you love ran away!
- Clark Kent: You think I don't wanna go get Lois and bring her back? They left us, Oliver. With our lives, we can't blame them.
- Oliver Queen: Well, what if we hadn't remained hidden? Huh? What if we didn't put out identities out there to be held hostage? Would this still be happening? Clark, I think we have to forge a new fate here. We've lost way too much. Something's gotta change.
- Rick Flag: Did you miss me? You know, I got to say, we had something special. You didn't crack on the first beating. You made me work for it.
- Oliver Queen: Well, I'm glad it was good for you, too.
- Rick Flag: You're wasting your talent, Queen. You could make a real difference out there. Tide is turning. People are getting nervous about vigilantes roaming the streets, taking the decisions and the glory out of the hands of the suits in power.
- Oliver Queen: I'm not running for office. I'm just puttin' bad guys in jail.
- Rick Flag: Well, it's gonna get tougher the longer you and your little league of heroes stay half in, half out. That's the beauty of my group. Everybody thinks we're dead. We could use you. But this is your one and only offer.
- Oliver Queen: You raise a good point.
- [he draws his crossbow and gets an arrow off just as Flag fires his gun]
- Oliver Queen: On the other hand, you did just shoot me.
- Oliver Queen: [kicking Flag on the ground] Where... is Chloe Sullivan? Where is she? I'm sorry. I can't hear you. Where is Chloe... Sullivan?
- Rick Flag: It wasn't a kidnapping. It was a trade.
- Oliver Queen: [punching him] Trade for what?
- Rick Flag: You! You would have been proud of her. She didn't crack. She downed a cyanide pill just to save your life. She's dead.
- Clark Kent: [saving Cat from Deadshot] Are you okay?
- Cat Grant: I'm fine. Thanks to my bulletproof vest. Don't leave home without it, Clark Kent. You can never be too safe.
- Clark Kent: Well, I'll be sure to pick one up.
- Cat Grant: See? I don't need a masked hero to rescue me. I've got a real flesh-and-blood one right here. People need to see someone's heart to believe in them. We need to be inspired by people who stand out in the light. Not people who shrink into the shadows. We need a good all-American hero in red, white, and blue. Or at least red and blue.
- Tess Mercer: I had LuthorCorp's ballistic people up all night taking apart that slug from Cat's car.
- Clark Kent: I appreciate that. Thanks.
- Tess Mercer: I'm not asking for your thanks, Clark. Just your trust. You need me.
- Clark Kent: You said this was urgent.
- Tess Mercer: After the lab techs pulled apart the bullet and reassembled it, they found this.
- [turning her computer monitor around, she shows him that it was his name etched into the bullet]
- Clark Kent: The target is me.
- Tess Mercer: Guess our assassin never was after "Hello Kitty".
- Clark Kent: This guy doesn't know that car explosions and bullets don't hurt me.
- Tess Mercer: It's possible was just testing you. To see what you're made of.
- Clark Kent: Why hasn't he come after me again?
- Tess Mercer: Maybe he didn't realize how difficult of a target you are.
- Clark Kent: This guy never gives up. And he gets every detail right. There must be more to his plan.
- Tess Mercer: If he knows you're faster than his bullets, the only place to aim is at someone he knows you'll save. And maybe you'll be there to...
- Clark Kent: Act as a shield. It's Cat. I have to get back to Smallville.
- Tess Mercer: [glancing at her computer] Too late. Our kitten reporter is already on the move.
- Lois Lane: It feels like somehow I was destined to be with Clark, but his destiny is so much bigger, and the last thing that I would ever want is to be the one thing that holds him back or stands in the way.
- Carter Hall: And what if you're exactly the thing that might help him be the person you know he can be? What if you're the one who makes his burden easier to bear?
- Lois Lane: Do you think that's why he sent you? To make sure I was safe?
- Carter Hall: He worries about you. He still thinks you don't know about his powers.
- Lois Lane: See, that's another reason for me to be here. When it comes to big secrets, I'm not exactly Mata Hari. I could blow it all for him.
- Carter Hall: With every great relationship, Lois, comes a great burden and the strength to carry it.
- Cat Grant: You know, you should really get yourself a bulletproof vest like me. We all think we're made of steel, but... really we're just made of marshmallows.
- Clark Kent: Cat, are you all right?
- Cat Grant: Well, I was just attacked by Green Arrow. I mean, this is all part of that vigilante agenda.
- Clark Kent: And why would he want to hurt you?
- Cat Grant: The last thing they want is an honest-Abe reporter like me working at the Planet and exposing the truth about them.
- Clark Kent: If you're really about the truth, then why'd you lie to me? You seem to be hiding a few secrets of your own.
- Cat Grant: No idea what you're talking about.
- Clark Kent: Why'd you change your name?
- Cat Grant: That's Adam. My son. He's with his grandparents until this all blows over. His dad and I went out for almost two years. I thought I'd found my Prince Charming, but little did I know they don't exist.
- Clark Kent: You just have to be patient. You know, I thought I had found somebody who could make me happy.
- Cat Grant: Really? Think you'll get back together?
- Clark Kent: I used to. But now I'm not sure. It's funny. When doing what you think is right for someone, it can feel so... wrong. How about you and this guy?
- Cat Grant: Well, Clark, not every guy's as nice as you. I had to get Adam away from him.
- Clark Kent: I'm sorry. Does he know where you are?
- Cat Grant: I changed my name so he couldn't find us. You know, I had so much I was fighting for. Trying to change the world. And now I have to hide behind the power of the pen and a new name, making sure nobody knows who's behind the words I'm printing.
- Clark Kent: Kind of like the vigilantes. Must have been scary escaping from him.
- Cat Grant: All I know is I protected my son. You know, the world may never see me as some big hero. But maybe someday my son will.
- Tess Mercer: [finding Clark looking through Cat's personnel file] All you had to do was ask.
- Clark Kent: Cat Grant isn't who she says she is.
- Tess Mercer: I knew you two would have a lot in common.
- Clark Kent: Her real name is Mary Louise Shroger, and that's not the only secret she's keeping.
- Tess Mercer: Let's face it, Clark. You're not gonna like anyone sitting in Lois' chair. So why don't you just take a coffee break and run to the Sahara and bring her back?
- Clark Kent: Lois left for a reason. If I care for her, I'll respect that.
- Tess Mercer: How progressive of you. If you really believe it.
- Clark Kent: Something weird is going on with Cat. She's making suspicious phone calls. And this morning, she almost got blown up in her car. An explosion was caused by a bullet somehow lodged perfectly in the combustion chamber. It's engraved. The only letters visible are A, R, N, T.
- Tess Mercer: "Cat Grant". I think I've seen this work before. Let's hope I'm wrong.
- Clark Kent: You know who did this?
- Tess Mercer: If it's the op I'm thinking of, it was a top target of Checkmate. One of the few they never got, and one of the even fewer they feared.
- Clark Kent: I can see why. Number three on Interpol's most wanted, and top five on FBI and CIA.
- Tess Mercer: Strikes targets with surgical precision. And assassinates all witnesses.
- Clark Kent: What's his name?
- Tess Mercer: Checkmate never could ID him. They just called him Deadshot.
- Green Arrow: Don't move.
- Cat Grant: My self-defense teacher said never stop moving unless you're dead.
- [taking out a can of pepper spray, then turning around]
- Cat Grant: Oh, my gosh. It's you.
- Cat Grant: Oh, just get it over with! I should have known you masked creeps were following me after your little car bomb backfired this morning! You call yourself a hero, but really you're just an arrow for hire!
- Green Arrow: Trust me, I'm not doing this for the money.
- Cat Grant: Face it, Robin Hood. You and your boys do this for no one but yourselves.
- Green Arrow: I'm not a criminal, lady.
- Cat Grant: Oh, yeah. That's what they all say. But I've got eyewitness testimony. And photos to back it up that a group of you heroes have been torturing innocent people by the old brewery at the docks!
- Green Arrow: [grabbing her phone] Give me that.
- [while he's occupied, she runs to the door; hearing a window creak, she turns around and sees he's gone]
- Cat Grant: See? That's exactly what I'm talking about.
- Clark Kent: You want to tell me what you got caught up in? I mean, someone did just try to kill you.
- Cat Grant: I was valedictorian. I mean, trust me, nobody wants to kill a valedictorian.
- Clark Kent: Maybe they got you mixed up with someone else.
- Cat Grant: Would you listen to yourself? You sound an awful lot like Lois Lane. Conspiracy around every corner. Always railing against the establishment against the normal people.
- Clark Kent: Normal?
- Cat Grant: Like you and me. God, it must have been hard listening to Lois' justifications for all these alternative values and lifestyles.
- Clark Kent: Lifestyles.
- Cat Grant: Oh. Don't act like some good, corn-fed boy next door like you is going to try to tell me that these vigilantes are part of the natural plan. I mean, it would be one thing if they actually had remorse. Or wanted to change, but, you know, they have no moral center.
- Clark Kent: Well, that's easy to say when they can't come out and defend themselves.
- Cat Grant: Sure they can. They could come out of the shadowy gutters into the light so we could see them any day. They just choose not to. You know, Godfrey says that they...
- Clark Kent: Look, stop. I found something. The police found a bullet in the engine block.
- Cat Grant: Oh, my god. Why would anyone want to kill me?
- Clark Kent: Look, we should get you some place safe. My friends won't mind if you stay at their apartment. No one will be looking for you in Smallville.
- Lois Lane: [picking up a jeweled necklace] And I thought those "Sex and the City" girls had gaudy taste.
- Carter Hall: You might tell that to its owner, the goddess Queen Isis. She spent eternity searching for the cut-up pieces of her dead husband.
- Lois Lane: Yeah, I can relate to that. My relationship just broke up into a zillion tiny pieces, and I don't know how to put it all back together again.
- Lois Lane: So, you're a bona fide Indiana Jones? They fly you in to make sure that these aren't lifted from some souvenir shop in Cairo?
- Carter Hall: And that they're intact and well-preserved. In other words, hands off.
- Lois Lane: I know the Egyptians were big on the afterlife, but burying your pet bird? Someone needs therapy.
- Carter Hall: That is the Sun God, Ra, bringer of light and life. He was revered.
- Lois Lane: He has the head of a parakeet.
- Carter Hall: It's a falcon.
- Lois Lane: Potato, po-tah-to.
- Lois Lane: So, why was this hawk guy so important?
- Carter Hall: It's said that each day, he traveled across the sky and through the underworld, to be born again at sunrise.
- Lois Lane: A god reborn with the sun.
- Tess Mercer: The only one who could erase Chloe is Chloe.
- Oliver Queen: Oh, god. Come on, now, Tess. Don't underestimate yourself. Although, I do have to say I thought the e-mail was a touch much.
- Tess Mercer: [taking a sheet of paper] "Oliver. I never thought I'd have to tell you how I feel about us because the smile on my lips when I looked at you pretty much said it all. But now that you won't be seeing it anymore, I'll have to use words to tell you. I've never loved anyone the way I've loved you. And I never will again. You will always be my brightest star. My knight in shining leather, my hero." Oliver, this might be difficult for you to face, but I didn't write this. We both know Chloe did. I did help her reset the system, though. And in a bizarre way, she knew that I was the only one who would understand.
- Oliver Queen: Why'd she do this?
- Tess Mercer: I just know it's what she wanted. I trusted that she had a plan. Maybe it's time you trust her, too.
- Clark Kent: [seeing a purse on Lois' desk] Lois.
- Cat Grant: [setting a box of belongings down] No. It's Catherine. But my friends call me Cat. Cat Grant. With a "C".
- [offering a cookie tin]
- Cat Grant: Want a cookie? I just baked them this morning. Really gooey, so be careful. I use twice the sugar.
- Clark Kent: Um...
- Cat Grant: No relation to that woman on TV. I get that a lot.
- Cat Grant: Can I tell you how excited I am to be working at the Planet? After all those weeks at the small-town paper, my words are finally going to have a real impact.
- Clark Kent: I'm sorry, you said "weeks"?
- Cat Grant: Classic overachiever. Got that from my granddaddy. Back home, I basically owned the front page of the paper.
- Clark Kent: Let's find you a permanent desk. This one belongs to someone on temporary leave.
- Cat Grant: Lois Lane?
- [scoffing]
- Cat Grant: She's the one who got this whole thing started. Calling those costumed vigilantes heroes? Please. Like it's not totally obvious she's in love with the Blur.
- [she throws Lois' name plate into the trash; behind her back, he takes it back and throws her cookie away]
- Clark Kent: Lois Lane is the best crime reporter this paper ever had. Now, there is a desk available over here by the copy machine.
- Cat Grant: Whoa, whoa, whoa. Wait a minute, Mr. Busy Boots. I don't think you get it. I'm your new partner.
- Lois Lane: Perry, it's Lane. I really hope this story is worth it, because so far, my dream assignment is turning into 1,001 Arabian Nightmares. And you know what? I really hope per diem covers the eleven-hour camel ride. And as for this newly unearthed tomb of Isis, all I see are some rocks and a couple of tents. Call me.