Dahr-Nel
Dahr-Nel
In February of 1969, Lois Lane finds herself experiencing a series of unusual blackouts, whereby she ends up in one place without any knowledge of how she gets there. She consequently takes a week of sick leave from the Daily Planet in order to relax at the Lane family's farm in Pittsdale. While at the farm, she experiences another dizzy spell...she nearly falls off of a bridge. However, she is rescued by the handsome "Dr. Rick Darnell," who takes her to his strange lab and deems her "a perfect specimen of young womanhood."
After the two witness an automobile accident and Dr. Darnell demonstrates superior knowledge and skill in medicine, Lois comments that no doctor in this world is capable of such things. She is right, for "Dr. Darnell" soon admits that he is actually Dahr-Nel, a surgeon and survivor of Old Krypton. He shows her many of the implements in his laboratory as proof (including a plastimold) and asks Lois to marry him. After a week of deliberation, and an episode where she becomes very angry with Superman for pretending to marry her in order to catch a gang of criminals, she agrees. Dahr-Nel prepares the following inscription, before the two are to enter suspended animation:
HERE IN SUSPENDED ANIMATION,
SLEEP DAHR-NEL OF KRYPTON
AND HIS BRIDE, LOIS OF EARTH,
WHO WILL AWAKEN IN THE YEAR 2169
TO BEGIN A NEW AND HAPPY LIFE TOGETHER
As the Dormigen Gas is released and Lois falls asleep, Dahr-Nel realizes that he's made a mistake; given his increased powers on Earth, the gas will not affect him the same way that it affects Lois. He quickly retrieves a piece of Green Kryptonite from Superman's Fortress of Solitude, to decrease his powers and allow himself to be sedated by the gas.
Meanwhile, Superman, sorry that he's upset Lois, comes to their mountain cavern and yells "Lois, come back! I was a fool! A FOOL!" while remorsefully smashing the stone inscription to tiny bits. Lois, not yet fully affected by the gas, awakens and comes to Superman. Alas, to their horror, Lois' new husband is already dead. Because of the dual effects of kryptonite poisoning and the sedative gas, Dahr-Nel has tragically crystallized into Green Kryptonite.
Lois is devastated. When she cries the rhetorical "Why?", Superman answers with a scientific answer: Dahr-Nel wasn't used to his superpowers, so instead of flying her through the time barrier, he had used kryptonite and accidentally killed himself. Superman tries to reassure Lois that she will someday be Mrs. Superman, while sealing up Dahr-Nel's final resting place.
The archives do not record whether anything Superman said on that tragic day was comforting to Lois (SGLL No. 90, "Lois Lane's Future Husband").
