Fic: Aliens 601, For Humans (Part 2) (1/2) (complete)
Title: Aliens 601, For Humans (Part 2)
Author: josephina_x
Fandom: Smallville
Pairing: pre-Clex
Rating: PG-13 (mild cursing)
Spoilers: Up through the end of Vengeance in season 5. Goes slightly AU at Lexmas ("when given a nail..."). Things start to snowball here. Doesn't quite get to Tomb yet; we're still dealing with the aftermath of Vengeance.
Word count: 17,000+
Summary: Lex may be missing a few prerequisites for this one. He wants Clark to tutor him, but Clark is barely muddling through on his own as it is. Unfortunately, failure is not an option that either of them can live with, and they're worried they're being graded on a curve... because this curve seems to be set to a particular pass-fail ratio. But with Clark unable or unwilling to help Lex out...
Warnings: Un-beta'd. Even more Evil Italics Of Doom, emphasis FTW. More thinky!Lex. Lots of up-and-downtime.
Disclaimer: Not mine, not-for-profit.
Comments: Yes, please! :)
Author's Note: In the interest of fruitbat00 not killing me, I'm releasing this one a little earlier than intended. (I think I've got a better handle on why Lex is reacting the way he is here, now, but worst-case, this fic is subject to major revision, ok? Ok. *nods firmly*)
...And no, I don't have any more in the queue right now, so please try not to freak out too much at the ending of this one -- I tried not to make it too cliff-hanger-y, I swear! *hopeful*
Previous fic in the series starts here
~*~*~*~*~*~
Lex woke with an enormous headache, face-down in bed. He groaned softly and blinked open his eyes.
He remembered feeling great. He wasn't feeling so great now.
He sighed and snuggled under the throw blanket, warming up cold bits -- one foot, half a forearm -- that had ended up poking out overnight.
Then he frowned at his forearm, because he didn't remember getting undreeee--essed oh-shit --Clark!!!
Lex damn near performed a stationary leap from the bed at the door--
...and ended up on the floor in a heap, tangled up in the blankets.
Ow.
Bedsheet 1, Adrenaline 0.
~*~*~*~*~*~
Right.
He'd given the packet of pictures to Clark last night. Because he was an idiot. And too drunk to remember his last name. (Because a real Luthor would never have screwed up that way. Not in such epic and royal fashion as to actually hand over sensitive information to the enemy!) But mostly because he was an idiot.
Lex cursed for awhile, pacing about. Then he cursed for awhile getting dressed. ...Then he cursed for awhile getting undressed before hopping into the shower and taking care of his usual morning ritual (with a lot more cursing than usual), because it was too late now and he was damned if he was going out there without being fully armed and armored.
He got dressed in his most comfortable and smart-looking dark suit and his favorite purple shirt, and he put on and took off his badass black longcoat (previously hidden in the back of his closet) a good fifteen times before he decided that wearing it might be overkill. So he took it off and laid it over the back of a chair with finality.
Then he thought 'to hell with it' and put it on again.
He looked at the door. Then he paced around his room some more.
Idiot. Fool. What the hell were you thinking?!?
But he hadn't been thinking, not really.
See, this is what happens when you talk to Clark -- Kalel -- Clark for too long in a casual social setting like the Talon: you get all confused and forget he's an alien and then you stop classifying him as an alien and then you stop classifying him as a threat and then you hand him compromising material without thinking and you are such an idiot! Idiot!
He really needed to go out there.
Lex stopped pacing and stared at the door some more.
...He didn't really want to go out there.
He went back to pacing.
He's either going to be out there, or he isn't, Lex told himself. You're going to have to deal with him sometime.
...No, I don't. I can stay in here forever.
...
Yeah, that's not happening. That's cowardly. Plus, the aliens will just have the invasion without you.
...Damnit.
Ok, so he needed to go out there, and he needed to go out there prepared. Besides, what was the worst that could happen? Clark killing him?
...Actually, why hadn't he done that already?
Lex's pounding head tried to spin that bit of factual information off into the most likely scenarios: Clark gone, Clark still there and lying in wait, Clark just as panicked as he was, Clark not panicked at all, Clark having told Martha-- wait, how would Martha figure in to all this?
Lex took a break, went back into the bathroom, and drank down some more tap water. (Ugh.)
He laid his head down on the counter and tried to think things through again with Martha added in.
Would Clark and Martha run? Would they stay and confront him? Would they fight? There would be witnesses if they tried to -- did -- decided to kill him. They couldn't risk it with the mansion staff around.
...
...
...
Lex's head snapped up and his blood went cold. Clark wouldn't kill my staff just to leave no witnesses to my murder, would he?
Jonathan wouldn't hear of it. But Jonathan wasn't around anymore.
And Martha's always seemed more practical...
After all, when Lionel had been attacked by the old town Sheriff, and Jonathan had been framed for it, Martha had thought Jonathan might have done it after all. Lex had found that out far after the fact, and it had been one of the few things that had let him forgive Clark his accusation against Lex -- Clark's obvious duress and desperation at the time being the other, because he hadn't been thinking clearly at all. Even Lex hadn't believed Jonathan had done it, but apparently Martha's lack of faith had badly shaken Clark's own.
But when it came right down to it, when someone thought someone else capable of a particular act, when that really wasn't the case, then it generally meant that they were projecting their own fears and doubts onto that other person. Which meant that Martha considered herself capable of killing Lionel.Which meant that Martha considered herself capable of killing.
And Lex knew how coldly ruthless Martha could be from looking at her work when she'd been Lionel's personal assistant, back when he'd been temporarily blind. She was fully capable of studying the situation, thinking through all the options with cold calculating logic, and give Clark his marching orders with brutal efficiency. And Clark didn't contradict her often. If she decided that they were better off with Lex dead...
Lex staggered back into his bedroom, mind whirling.
No. Shit. Clark wouldn't go for it, he just wouldn't. He'd at least want to hear what Lex had to say first, before doing anything drastic. Even if Martha told him to, he wouldn't--
...How do you discipline an alien child who is stronger than you and invulnerable to physical harm?
No. No, Lex was not going there. Martha would not use green meteor rock on her own child, her own son. Not something that could, would kill him.
But he's not really her son, now is he?
No. Just no. No, no, no.
...No, that hadn't happened. She hadn't done anything to Clark, because their rooms were right across the hall from his and Lex would have heard something.
Unless Martha had dragged Clark outside to discipline him. And then Clark could have grabbed each of your staff one-by-one and sped off into the woods with them to... do what he'd been told. You wouldn't have heard them then...
No, that was just...
...out of character? He's an alien, pretending to be human. How much more effort would it take to not act like himself, when he's already not acting like himself?
No. That wasn't true, and that couldn't have happened either, by the simple fact that he himself was still alive. It was morning. It had been hours. It wouldn't have taken hours if that was what they'd done.
Unless they need or want to keep you alive for some reason.
Lex couldn't think of one, though.
...Maybe they weren't in the mansion. Maybe they'd fled.
Maybe Martha didn't have that much control over Clark, after all. Maybe they were (still) fighting amongst themselves over what to do, how to handle things.
Maybe I should sneak down to the library to the safe and grab some green meteor rock, just in case...
But if he did that, he'd be instigating a fight if they hadn't decided on that course of action, and they'd close ranks to deal with him. He'd be drawing lines, choosing sides, and doing exactly what he'd warned Lana against the day before.
Lex started pacing again.
The meteor rock probably wouldn't work out anyway. Clark might go down, but his mother wouldn't.
The only way that could work was if he managed to sneak up on them, toss the meteor rock at Clark before he could respond or get out of range, and shoot them both before they even had the chance to twitch.
Right. Because instead of them going through with a pre-emptive strike, it'd be so much better if I did that, instead.
...And Clark totally didn't have a chance in hell of getting resurrected from the dead again and then not have a mother or a father to help keep him under control and sane anymore. Because he wasn't one of those alien world-conquering types that was inclined to do that sort of thing, come back to life after dying, oh no. He'd only done it just the once before.
Yeah, that's a great idea. Best one yet. Let's go with that one.
Lex decided that his sarcasm could bite him.
This is ridiculous. I just need to go out there.
He stopped pacing, stared at the door, and actually took a step towards it this time.
And besides, maybe it wasn't all that bad. Worst-case, he'd already be dead, and that hadn't happened, now had it?
No, actually, the worst-case would be walking out of here, realizing that the entirety of humanity had been slaughtered last night while I was asleep, finding Clark laughing his ass off at me, and then being killed by him.
With maybe some torture in-between to liven things up.
Or somehow ending up an unwilling slave, while the last little bit of my mind is stuck without control of my body, screaming away while I help the invaders in their killing spree. Or a willing slave, with my mind twisted and turned until I enjoyed it.
Lex shuddered.
Oh yes, it could be much worse. Much, much worse.
But maybe it wasn't, or wouldn't be. After all, Chloe had found out, and she was fine, right? That hadn't been the end of the world. And Pete had found out even before that. No end of the world there, either.
Maybe if Lex was careful, and figured out how they'd managed it, he could do the same?
Pete hadn't gotten pulled in too deep. He'd stayed his own man, and even set out for himself. ...But he was completely separate from everything now -- Pete didn't have a say in the alien business anymore -- and Lex didn't think he himself could handle that.
Chloe was in on it, and right in the thick of things. ...But Chloe was pretty much Clark's bitch at this point. She'd sniffed out the warehouse for him, after all.
Speaking of which, Chloe was generally the curious one. Clark tended to just get dragged along on whatever crazy thing she was researching. He wasn't all that naturally curious on his own, so maybe he hadn't even looked at the pictures.
...Maybe he hadn't even looked at the pictures?!?
Lex mentally slapped himself.
Then he smacked both palms into his forehead, because that hadn't been enough.
Then he winced because that made his headache worse.
You know, you could at least go through the five stages of grief in the right order, at least! Because denial was supposed to come first, damnit, not twenty-seventh.
Lex took a deep breath and let it out slowly. Then he did this a few more times, because between the header off the bed, the pounding in his skull from the ungodly amount of brandy from the night before, and his panic, he really needed to calm down and reorder his thought processes.
Ok, so what did he need to do, exactly?
--Accept that what had happened had happened, and move on out that door and down the hallway and find a way to handle the situation.
Because damnit, what I am doing right now is unproductive, and not helpful, and I am not going to resolve anything by remaining in here, and I am going to walk out that door to get the information I need. Right now.
Riiiiiiight now.
...Ok, maybe I need another minute for a little more denial.
~*~*~*~*~*~
When Lex had finally gotten up enough nerve to actually leave his bedroom, and then enough to walk across the hallway to talk to Clark, and then found Clark's and Martha's rooms empty, he wasn't sure whether he was more relieved or worried that Clark hadn't been there.
No, let's face it, you were probably more worried about what Martha would do than what Clark would do. You have no idea how to respond when confronted by her. You never do.
He did feel a little safer when he saw other people as he walked down the hallway towards the dining room -- some of his live-in staff were dusting various random suits of armor, tables, and mounted paintings. He wasn't alone in the mansion. Everyone he saw looked perfectly fine.
When he made it to the dining room, he paused, frowned at himself, and ended up taking a step back and continuing on towards the kitchen. He really didn't feel like eating alone, let alone being in a huge rooms with multiple points of entry all alone, at the moment, and he could use some comfort breakfast.
He pushed open the door to the kitchen and froze.
Clark and Martha were sitting around the large food preparation area table in the middle of the kitchen, and Martha was chatting it up with his Cook and the kitchen staff like they were all on holiday.
"Oh, Mr. Luthor!" one of the staff said, and they all turned to stare up at him.
"Ah, Lex! you're up!" Martha said sunnily. She got up from her chair and came over to him.
Oh crap. Lex braced himself.
"Here, sit down, sit down," she said, lightly taking him by the arm and steering him over to the large table, then patting him on the shoulder to plop him down on a seat.
...What the f--?
"Clark told me what happened last night. Here, drink this," she said, grabbing a glass off something from off to the side and plopping it down on the flat surface in front of him.
"He... told you..." We're actually going to talk about this here? NOW?!
"That you had a bit too much to drink," Martha explained as she sat down next to him.
Oh. ...So we're going with that, are we? Lex thought as he critically examined the contents of the glass. "What is-- nngh!" he said after only taking a whiff of it. "Oh god!" He couldn't set it down quickly enough. "What is that?!"
"Hair Of The Dog," Mrs. Kent said matter-of-factly.
Lex stared at her. He glanced over at Clark, who was determinedly focused on munching down his own breakfast.
He eyed the glass and couldn't imagine how the stuff hadn't eaten through the sides of its container yet.
"I, ah. ...I don't think that what I need this morning is a little more alcohol," Lex put forward carefully, pushing it away from him slightly and wondering if she was trying to poison him with some weird concoction.
From the stifled titters of the rest of his kitchen staff, who had probably watched her make it and knew what was in it, he decided that the probability of the mixture containing a poison was unlikely, but he was not about to discount the idea that the 'cure' might be worse than the 'disease'. --Not when it smelled like that.
"Oh, this recipe doesn't have alcohol in it, dear. It'll make you feel better. I usually tell Jonathan to drink it down all at once; it's not quite so awful that way."
Lex didn't correct her verb tense. He did wonder if this was some sort of bizarre Kent hazing ritual. Then he actually recognized something floating in the glass and staring up at him. "Is that a raw egg?"
"Yes."
"...Do I have to drink it?"
Martha gave him a measured look, and Lex got the feeling that he was failing some sort of test.
Deciding that a lack of kill order from Martha to Clark was a state he'd like to prolong, he grimaced, reached out for it again, lifted the glass to his lips, and downed it as fast as humanly possible.
When he came up for air, in-between trying not to hack up his stomach (or a lung -- it was truly that awful), he noticed Clark watching him with a sympathetic look.
Martha patted him on the back, then got up and moved back to her own original seat. Lex felt a little relieved that he'd survived (barely) thus far, so far.
Then he got a good look at what Clark was eating for breakfast, and the morning got just that much more surreal.
"Are you eating cereal?" Lex asked incredulously.
Clark glanced up at him again, pausing mid-chew. He glanced down at his bowl, then back up at Lex, and gave him a one-shoulder shrug that was more a 'yes' than a 'no'.
"I have cereal?" he said in amazement, glancing around the table and realizing that some of his other staff were eating cereal, as well. Multiple different types, even! He looked around for his cook as Clark continued to munch down his cornflakes. Why didn't he ever get cereal?
"Oh, Mr. Luthor sir, you shouldna be eating cold cereal for your breakfast, sir! I'll just fix you a nice bit of pancakes and eggs, don'tcha worry a bit, dear," his stout, matronly cook scolded him, turning away and continuing what she was doing on the stove.
Oh no. Not one of those breakfasts. He remembered now why he usually hid in the dining room to eat -- so Cook wouldn't see him. Sometimes Cook got it into her head that he was too skinny and he got one of those breakfasts. Those breakfasts were huge, and he always hated it when he couldn't finish them.
"Do I have to have the eggs? I already had one," he tried rather pitifully, and not particularly caring how he sounded just so long as it worked. Please say no, please say no...
"Oh sir, but that wasn'na a proper egg," his Cook told him with a sorry expression and a shake of her head.
...damn. He sighed.
Clark looked up at him like he was trying not to laugh.
Oh yeah, I bet you think this is funny, Lex glared back. Then he remembered that Clark was a deadly alien menace, and looked away quickly, dropping the challenge.
Clark... frowned at him a little, and... Lex didn't actually understand the look Clark gave him, then, before he went back to staring down at his bowl as he ate.
Lex did get his morning coffee, finally, and not only did it help wash away the godawful aftertaste from Martha's concoction, but it helped his brain start to unstick a little, and settled his stomach. And when Cook set down the huge spread in front of him, he prided himself for not panicking and running away screaming at the sheer quantity of food he was expected to somehow devour. He quietly munched his way through as much as he could manage, and Clark helped out by sneaking fairly large portions when nobody was paying attention. --At least until Cook caught Clark at it and smacked him on the back of his hand for it, then gave him the hairy eyeball. Lex meekly and silently listened in on the boisterous conversation that was going on between Martha and the others, and watching Clark's mother happily play the enchanting socialite completely at home in the center of a large circle of his people, he was reminded of the fact that Martha had once been a Clark, and a member of high-middle class Metropolitan society at that.
It was one of the most curious breakfasts he'd sat through in a long time. He'd never felt inobtrusive, being in the same room as other people and not joining in a conversation before -- not and still felt included, while actually being basically ignored, without somehow also feeling as though he was being looked down upon or slighted because of it.
It wasn't quite comfortable, exactly, but he didn't feel uncomfortable or shut out, either. And no-one seemed... malicious... about it. It was very odd.
He made it to the end of breakfast unscathed, though almost painfully stuffed full of food, at which point Martha said:
"So, Clark, what are you doing today?"
Clark blinked up at her and opened his mouth, said, "I was thinking about--" but his face went blank a moment later as his thought process rather obviously stalled out.
Lex finally spoke up, saying, "I thought you were going to be shadowing Chloe at the Daily Planet most days?"
"Uh, yeah, but..." Clark grimaced.
"...But?" Lex prompted.
"Well, today's her day off, and she and Lois probably have plans."
And you don't want to be hanging around with Lois all day -- fair enough, Lex thought as he downed the rest of his glass of orange juice.
"Lex, would you mind if Clark came with you to work today, instead?"
...Only good breeding and years of etiquette lessons kept Lex from doing a spit-take.
"Huh?" went Clark, turning to his mother and tilting his head in confusion.
What is she up to? was the only complete thought that crossed Lex's mind. "I'm not sure I follow..."
"Well, I doubt that you have much on the grounds here to keep Clark busy in the gardens or around the house..."
"No, I have groundskeeping and cleaning staff that I pay well for that sort of thing..." Lex admitted tentatively, glancing around at said staff, most of whom had gravitated to the kitchen for their own breakfasts by this point. ...but generally I am too busy at work doing workto entertain anyone! Surely you know that--!
"...but you do have educational tours and other sorts of things at LuthorCorp that Clark could do, don't you?"
...Oh. "Ah, yes, we do," Lex said slowly, glancing over at Clark.
"I never really did get to see a tour of the whole plant. I guess I could do that?" Clark said.
"I'll see if I can arrange for there not to be any hostage-taking this time around," Lex said laconically, with an internal wince.
Clark gave a visible wince, but Martha just smiled.
"But sir, don't you have that board meeting this morning?" one of his staff said, looking concerned.
"Well, yes, I did, but--" Lex frowned. Was there something he didn't know?
From the looks his on-site secretarial staff exchanged, apparently there was. "Well, it's just that your father arrived at LuthorCorp Towers twenty minutes ago and--"
Lex choked on a bite of croissant.
What the hell??? Had he not been perfectly clear last night?
Maybe he thinks I won't go through with it, Lex thought, eyes narrowing, as he tried to stifle his coughing jag.
"Lex, are you ok?" Clark asked, half-up from his chair and looking worried.
"M'fine," he muttered around another cough, taking a sip of water. "Bailey, tell the boys to get the 'chopper ready, would you?" he said lightly, putting down the glass, then standing and shoving his chair away from the countertop-table.
Lex exited the room abruptly, mind focused on picking up all the threads he'd dropped the evening before, and finding things in just as dire straits as they had been when he'd let go of them. Idiot, you should have spent the night trying to find a short-term fix to bulletproof the company against this sort of thing, not laying about on the couch drinking yourself stupid! He grabbed his briefcase on autopilot, and was striding out to the helipad before he realized Clark was following him.
"Clark," he said, stopping to turn and face his young houseguest, "I'm headed to Metropolis, not Plant No. 3."
"I know, but mom told me to--" Clark looked a little off-put, and grimaced as he glanced away. "I don't want to get in the way," he ended apologetically, shuffling his feet and looking a little lost.
He's got his marching orders from Martha. That's not something I'm going to be able to countermand, Lex thought, then his whole mental state shifted with what felt like an audible 'slam'ming into place of an entirely different set of thoughts into the forefront of his mind, as he again remembered the whole mess with the packet of--
"Here," said Clark, thrusting the packet at him.
Is he a mindreader? ...If he was then Lex was fucked, no two ways about it.
Lex stared at it for a moment, then took it from Clark's outstretched hand. It looked untouched.
"Sorry, I should've given it back to you earlier. I didn't think that you might not have remembered giving it to me last night. I didn't mean for you to panic or anything."
"Panic? Why would I panic?" Lex said as he slipped the packet of highly dangerous photographic evidence into his inner coat pocket again, and told himself to shut up before he started babbling.
"Well..." Clark looked uncertain, then said carefully, "You were a little weird about it last night, and you looked a little freaked out when you came into the kitchen this morning... and went kinda pale just now, and..." Clark trailed off, looking like he didn't really want to continue, then bit his lip and glanced over at the helicopter as the blades started up. He stood there, looking at Lex for a moment, then took a deep breath, leaned in, and said, right next to Lex's ear, so he didn't have to yell, "I don't want you to worry... about it. Ok?"
Lex took a quick step backwards, startled, and stared at Clark a moment.
"Clark, did you--?" Lex started.
But the blades had spun up and the pilots were motioning that they needed to go, so Lex motioned for Clark to follow, and they both made their way across the rest of the tarmac, hoisted themselves up into the interior of the helicopter, and strapped themselves in.
And the headsets weren't private, so Lex couldn't ask him what he really wanted to know.
Clark, did you look at those photos, or didn't you?
~*~*~*~*~*~
By the time they landed on the roof of LuthorCorp Towers, Lex had effectively tied himself up in knots about it.
Luckily, it was only a thirty minute flight.
Unluckily, the only conclusion he'd really been able to come to was this:
If Clark looked at them, he knows that I know about his basic power set, but he can't have told his mother because she would've reacted differently. But if he didn't look at them, he knows I have probably have something on him, from what I said last night and how I said it, but not exactly what. Either way, he knows I have something on him, but that it's not definitive proof, and Martha doesn't know about it.
But why wouldn't Clark have said something to his mother about it?
...Was he worried that Martha might go for the nuclear "kill Lex" option?
Maybe there was another reason for Clark's unwillingness to share. Lex could be reading too much into things. ...Or not enough into things.
Lex then had to force himself to wrench his thoughts back onto a more corporate set of tracks, with a sickening mental lurch. It spoke a bit ill of him that he couldn't seamlessly think about alien matters and then shift to corporate matters without feeling like he was suffering a severe disconnect from reality in-between. ...That was, of course, assuming that the need itself -- to perform such a drastic shift in his thought processes to cope -- wasn't an indication of a much more basic and systemic problem with the way Lex dealt with things in general.
"Lex! So glad you could make it," Lionel enthused with false cheer as Lex stepped out of the elevator and walked into the fray.
Try to steal a march on me, will you? Lex thought coldly, and he was angry as hell that he couldn't back the threat up. And Lionel looked almost pleased as he caught sight of Lex's barely-suppressed fury.
But then Lionel's expression froze for just a moment as he looked over Lex's shoulder, and he looked...
Lex reflexively glanced back, following his father's gaze, and found himself looking at Clark.
By the time Lex glanced back at Lionel, the crack in the facade had been smoothed away, but...
Wait just a minute. Lionel's confident, relaxed bearing is really all just a front? It was a little frightening for Lex, because, before today, during those times Lionel lost control, he had never seen Lionel exhibit anything other than a deep and abiding anger hidden underneath the surface. Never panic... or fear. Had he just imagined it, or misread him somehow? ...He must have.
"What's going on?" Clark whispered to Lex over his shoulder, catching up to Lex and proceeding to trail close behind him into the main cubicle area of the top floor proper.
"Dad's trying to stage a hostile takeover of LuthorCorp," Lex murmured back.
Clark looked shocked. "Can he do that?" he asked, more than a little concerned.
"Quite probably, yes," Lex said lowly.
"...Is this what that problem text message yesterday afternoon was about?" Clark added, frowning.
Lex nearly stumbled as he slowed to a halt, glancing back at Clark. I shouldn't be surprised that he put that together. Then he nodded once, briefly, as he grimly scanned the room, taking in the current state of things.
"So!" Lionel said, clapping his hands together and surveying the boardroom crowd. "It seems everyone is here. Why don't we all go into the conference room, and we can discuss the offer that the Apex Group has kindly made to--"
"--What?!?" Clark yelped, rather loudly.
Lex froze, then swiveled about to look up at Clark, who was openly glaring at Lionel.
"That's who's trying to buy out LuthorCorp? Those Apex Group guys?" Clark looked indignant. He looked down and locked gaze with Lex. "Lex, you can't do business with them, they're criminals!"
"Clark--" Lex started, getting a headache for the second time that morning, because it was one thing for Clark to think ill of having to put a price on people's safety and make tradeoffs in business, such as whether to ship jobs overseas, but quite another for him to be openly and loudly disrupting Lex's LuthorCorp business with the Chinese--
"Lex, you don't understand," Clark said.
And Lex heard Lionel chuckle and murmur something misdirecting to the board member nearest him, before starting to steer the rest of them into the board room.
And Lex couldn't help but think, That's interesting. I wonder why Lionel didn't engage Clark directly? Because, to his knowledge, Lionel had never walked away from putting someone in their place when it was an easy and decisive win that would make his opponent look like an idiot.
And in a split-second decision, Lex decided to take a chance.
And so Lex said, projecting his voice so that everyone on the floor could hear, with a patiently suffering tone -- not that the latter took much effort on his part -- "All right, Clark, then why don't you explain it to me?"
And Clark, being Clark, did. "The Apex Group has been trying to buy up land in Suicide Slums and tear down the tenement buildings there recently. The people living there have banded together into this group called Akrada and were fighting the sale -- successfully, too. It's been a back and forth between Akrada and the violence and corporate greed in the area for awhile, but it's only gotten really bad since the Apex Group got involved. And that's because Apex has been using bullying tactics and hiring gangbangers and criminals to go in and shoot the rallymakers." And Clark looked up and glared at Lionel. "And all that started happening right around the time he got in on it, apparently," Clark said, tilting his chin at Lionel. "The police are involved now, and they're going to trace it all back to him."
Jesus. That was why Clark was MIA last night? He'd been running around... shadowing my father? Lex thought Clark had been chasing down the bastard who had mugged his mother, not ...oh Christ. Suicide Slums.
"Oh, and how do you know all this, if the police don't?" one of Lex's board members asked, snidely, looking Clark over, and Lex saw the exact moment the man mentally dismissed Clark. (Lex, conversely, made a mental note to fire the man whenever the earliest opportunity presented itself.)
Clark, however, took it in stride, and answered his accuser directly. "I know because I spent last night with a witness to one of the hits. I was helping her track down the people behind it all. Guess where it led."
"Where?" one of the others asked, looking interested. It was one of the old guard, one of the veteran board members, who was spending equal time splitting his attention between Clark and Lionel both. No dummy he.
"Here. In that office." Clark pointed to Lex's office. "Where Lionel was. And the witness nearly killed him in revenge for what he'd done. I almost didn't talk her down."
Jesus Fucking Christ.
"And it's a good thing you did, because I doubt she'd want another senseless violent death on her conscience," Lionel said smoothly.
Clark just glared back, and it was obvious to Lex that Clark was second-guessing last-night's decision right now. "You don't know what you're talking about."
"Actually, I do. I took the liberty of looking up your little friend -- Andrea, was it? -- after she'd left last night. It's quite a pity, she seemed rather enchanting for a murderess," Lionel smiled. "It's a pity that she killed the man who allegedly killed her mother. The police won't be able to get much of anything out of him now to prove her rather baseless theory. Assuming, of course, that anyone would believe the words of criminals over those of someone like myself," Lionel chuckled, as if the idea of accusing an upstanding high-society citizen like himself of such wrongdoing was ludicrous, pure nonsense.
Clark squared his shoulders and his nostrils flared. He stomped towards Lionel. "You are a criminal. A convicted felon, who was sent to prison for murdering his own parents. I trust your word exactly as much as I trust a criminal's," Clark ended, towering over Lionel and glaring down at him with the most judgmental, disgusted look Lex had ever seen cross Clark's face. "If there was any justice in this world--" Clark started coldly, his hands clenching into fists.
"Clark, that's enough!" Lex said, having made it through the crowd (where had all these people come from anyway, all of a sudden?) by slipping through in Clark's wake, and grabbed him by the arm. Clark almost didn't let Lex pull him away. "If there's a point you're trying to make that you can prove," -- with hard evidence, preferably! -- "then I think you should just make it."
Clark took a deep breath, two, and then turned to Lex again, pointedly turning his back on Lionel in the process. "The point is, Lex, that even if they can't directly pin in on Lionel this time, they will at least trace it back as far as the Apex Group. Chloe was working on it with me, we forwarded all the information we had to the police, and she got permission to run the story in this evening's edition of the Daily Planet, because they said they'd have it all wrapped up by then and she wouldn't be putting the investigation in jeopardy by printing it so soon. And I'm pretty sure that nobody is going to force you to sell LuthorCorp to a bunch of mobsters, or honor any agreement made under duress to do the same. Criminals don't get to make legal bids for multinational corporations," Clark said. "Not unless there's something really wrong with this country, in which case I guess somebody ought to do something about that."
You could have heard a pin drop.
"Hm. Well, I suppose that hearing Apex Group's bid is off the agenda, then," Lex said cooly. "Since that was the main reason for calling this meeting on such short notice, I assume everyone has better things to do?" he said, making eye contact with everyone as he glanced around the crowd.
The crowd dispersed, and the board members made their relieved farewells as they left to take care of their own section matters.
Which left Lionel, Lex, and Clark.
"Having fun, dad? I'm having a blast," Lex said with a smirk, though inside he was panicking a little, because Clark's fists were still clenched, and he still looked like he wanted to hit someone -- preferably Lionel, from the look Clark was sending his way.
Lionel did not looked pleased. At all.
"Son, you're on the wrong side," Lionel said sadly, patiently.
Lex almost shot back a scathing retort, except that his brain caught up with him first and he was left speechless as he realized that Lionel was talking to Clark.
"I am not your 'son'." Clark hissed out ferally, bristling at Lionel's words as if they had been the worst sort of insult.
"Clark, no!" Lex panicked, moving partially in front of Clark and grabbing him with both hands. A small part of his brain warned him that it was a bad, bad idea to get between this alien and his soon-to-be-victim. Soon-to-be-very-dead-victim. (As much as Lionel could be a victim.) That there was no way that Lex could possibly push Clark back, forcibly clamp down on his arm and drag him away, physically make him move, keep them separated--
Lex looked up into Clark's eyes, that were wholly focused on Lionel, and for a second he could have sworn that the irises went pure red.
Clark gritted his teeth and shook violently with rage as he stared at Lionel. He glanced down briefly at Lex... then paused for a moment.
Somehow, from looking at Lex, Clark seemed to get ahold of himself. He closed his eyes, then opened them again, glancing up at Lionel again.
Clark clenched his jaw, but with an effort, Clark also took a step back and forced some of the tension out of his shoulders, uncurling his hands a little. He actually backed down on his own, without needing to be forced to. Lex moved back with him and felt a nearly overwhelming sense of relief.
Then Clark's lips curled up in something between a jeer and a snarl, an almost atavistic baring of fangs, and he tilted his chin downwards slightly like he was two steps away from rushing someone. Lex tensed all over again, and glanced back just in time to see Lionel's fading smug smirk before it completely vanished.
"Dad, get out before I have to call security and have you thrown out," Lex warned.
"Really, Lex, I can tell where I'm not wanted," Lionel said smoothly, straightening his cuffs. "Do tell Martha I look forward to seeing her tonight, will you?"
"You aren't going anywhere near her!" Clark spat out.
"I think that's up to her, now, isn't it?" Lionel said, sounding like he'd already won.
"I've revoked your access to the mansion grounds; you aren't getting in," Lex grated out slowly, reminding him of that fact.
"Yes, I'd heard. Not a very sporting move, Lex. You knew she was going to be staying at the mansion, having invited her yourself just earlier that day, and yet you tried to restrict my access after that sort of blackmail?" Lionel gave him a look he usually held in reserve for the sharks. Outsiders. "That was not quite our agreement, Lex." And Lex got the distinct impression that Lionel thought that Lex would not dare to share what he'd learned about that night with Martha.
Lex shivered, and it had nothing to do with what Lionel thought of him just then. No, it was because he suddenly had a vision of what would happen if he told Clark what had happened that night, here and now: he'd have to remodel the entire floor, because no cleaning service would ever get the blood out of the walls...
"Leave him alone," Clark said quietly, far too intensely for Lex to be comfortable hearing, and at this point his survival instinct was well beyond merely screaming at him to get the hell out of there, now.
"Or you will -- what, Clark? You know better than to trust him, I hope?" Lionel looked almost concerned. It made Lex want to break things.
Then Lionel said in a chiding tone, "Surely Jonathan taught you better than that."
Lex had to bodily throw himself at Clark as Lionel walked away, and after all was said and done -- and Lex had Clark sequestered in his office with him and away from the gossiping eyes and ears of his secretarial staff -- Lex honestly had no idea how he'd managed to drag Clark away and force him into the room.
But looking at him now, it wasn't such a stretch to see it having been possible. There was no fight left in him behind closed doors.
Clark was visibly shaking at this point, and he dropped onto the couch like a stone, his legs seemingly unable to support him.
Lex watched Clark put his head in his hands.
He listened to Clark say in a reedy, shaking voice, "I hate him."
His own fear slowly drained away, and what it left behind was...
He stood there and watched Clark continue to shiver and repeat himself. Again. And again. And...
Lex sat down next to him on the couch and wrapped his arms around him.
Clark leaned into him and sobbed.
And all Lex could coherently think just then, feeling so very cold, was a thought with edges so sharp they cut into him every time it made another pass through his mind.
And the thought was: He called you 'son'.
And Lionel had meant it, without sarcasm, not as a taunt, not spoken with derision. He called you 'son.' Because he wanted Clark. As a son.
He called you 'son.'
Fucking alien.
He called you 'son.'
It looped in his gut and bit down hard.
He called you 'son.'
And he shouldn't be jealous.
But he was.
~*~*~*~*~*~
Next section is here.
Author: josephina_x
Fandom: Smallville
Pairing: pre-Clex
Rating: PG-13 (mild cursing)
Spoilers: Up through the end of Vengeance in season 5. Goes slightly AU at Lexmas ("when given a nail..."). Things start to snowball here. Doesn't quite get to Tomb yet; we're still dealing with the aftermath of Vengeance.
Word count: 17,000+
Summary: Lex may be missing a few prerequisites for this one. He wants Clark to tutor him, but Clark is barely muddling through on his own as it is. Unfortunately, failure is not an option that either of them can live with, and they're worried they're being graded on a curve... because this curve seems to be set to a particular pass-fail ratio. But with Clark unable or unwilling to help Lex out...
Warnings: Un-beta'd. Even more Evil Italics Of Doom, emphasis FTW. More thinky!Lex. Lots of up-and-downtime.
Disclaimer: Not mine, not-for-profit.
Comments: Yes, please! :)
Author's Note: In the interest of fruitbat00 not killing me, I'm releasing this one a little earlier than intended. (I think I've got a better handle on why Lex is reacting the way he is here, now, but worst-case, this fic is subject to major revision, ok? Ok. *nods firmly*)
...And no, I don't have any more in the queue right now, so please try not to freak out too much at the ending of this one -- I tried not to make it too cliff-hanger-y, I swear! *hopeful*
Previous fic in the series starts here
~*~*~*~*~*~
Lex woke with an enormous headache, face-down in bed. He groaned softly and blinked open his eyes.
He remembered feeling great. He wasn't feeling so great now.
He sighed and snuggled under the throw blanket, warming up cold bits -- one foot, half a forearm -- that had ended up poking out overnight.
Then he frowned at his forearm, because he didn't remember getting undreeee--essed oh-shit --Clark!!!
Lex damn near performed a stationary leap from the bed at the door--
...and ended up on the floor in a heap, tangled up in the blankets.
Ow.
Bedsheet 1, Adrenaline 0.
~*~*~*~*~*~
Right.
He'd given the packet of pictures to Clark last night. Because he was an idiot. And too drunk to remember his last name. (Because a real Luthor would never have screwed up that way. Not in such epic and royal fashion as to actually hand over sensitive information to the enemy!) But mostly because he was an idiot.
Lex cursed for awhile, pacing about. Then he cursed for awhile getting dressed. ...Then he cursed for awhile getting undressed before hopping into the shower and taking care of his usual morning ritual (with a lot more cursing than usual), because it was too late now and he was damned if he was going out there without being fully armed and armored.
He got dressed in his most comfortable and smart-looking dark suit and his favorite purple shirt, and he put on and took off his badass black longcoat (previously hidden in the back of his closet) a good fifteen times before he decided that wearing it might be overkill. So he took it off and laid it over the back of a chair with finality.
Then he thought 'to hell with it' and put it on again.
He looked at the door. Then he paced around his room some more.
Idiot. Fool. What the hell were you thinking?!?
But he hadn't been thinking, not really.
See, this is what happens when you talk to Clark -- Kalel -- Clark for too long in a casual social setting like the Talon: you get all confused and forget he's an alien and then you stop classifying him as an alien and then you stop classifying him as a threat and then you hand him compromising material without thinking and you are such an idiot! Idiot!
He really needed to go out there.
Lex stopped pacing and stared at the door some more.
...He didn't really want to go out there.
He went back to pacing.
He's either going to be out there, or he isn't, Lex told himself. You're going to have to deal with him sometime.
...No, I don't. I can stay in here forever.
...
Yeah, that's not happening. That's cowardly. Plus, the aliens will just have the invasion without you.
...Damnit.
Ok, so he needed to go out there, and he needed to go out there prepared. Besides, what was the worst that could happen? Clark killing him?
...Actually, why hadn't he done that already?
Lex's pounding head tried to spin that bit of factual information off into the most likely scenarios: Clark gone, Clark still there and lying in wait, Clark just as panicked as he was, Clark not panicked at all, Clark having told Martha-- wait, how would Martha figure in to all this?
Lex took a break, went back into the bathroom, and drank down some more tap water. (Ugh.)
He laid his head down on the counter and tried to think things through again with Martha added in.
Would Clark and Martha run? Would they stay and confront him? Would they fight? There would be witnesses if they tried to -- did -- decided to kill him. They couldn't risk it with the mansion staff around.
...
...
...
Lex's head snapped up and his blood went cold. Clark wouldn't kill my staff just to leave no witnesses to my murder, would he?
Jonathan wouldn't hear of it. But Jonathan wasn't around anymore.
And Martha's always seemed more practical...
After all, when Lionel had been attacked by the old town Sheriff, and Jonathan had been framed for it, Martha had thought Jonathan might have done it after all. Lex had found that out far after the fact, and it had been one of the few things that had let him forgive Clark his accusation against Lex -- Clark's obvious duress and desperation at the time being the other, because he hadn't been thinking clearly at all. Even Lex hadn't believed Jonathan had done it, but apparently Martha's lack of faith had badly shaken Clark's own.
But when it came right down to it, when someone thought someone else capable of a particular act, when that really wasn't the case, then it generally meant that they were projecting their own fears and doubts onto that other person. Which meant that Martha considered herself capable of killing Lionel.Which meant that Martha considered herself capable of killing.
And Lex knew how coldly ruthless Martha could be from looking at her work when she'd been Lionel's personal assistant, back when he'd been temporarily blind. She was fully capable of studying the situation, thinking through all the options with cold calculating logic, and give Clark his marching orders with brutal efficiency. And Clark didn't contradict her often. If she decided that they were better off with Lex dead...
Lex staggered back into his bedroom, mind whirling.
No. Shit. Clark wouldn't go for it, he just wouldn't. He'd at least want to hear what Lex had to say first, before doing anything drastic. Even if Martha told him to, he wouldn't--
...How do you discipline an alien child who is stronger than you and invulnerable to physical harm?
No. No, Lex was not going there. Martha would not use green meteor rock on her own child, her own son. Not something that could, would kill him.
But he's not really her son, now is he?
No. Just no. No, no, no.
...No, that hadn't happened. She hadn't done anything to Clark, because their rooms were right across the hall from his and Lex would have heard something.
Unless Martha had dragged Clark outside to discipline him. And then Clark could have grabbed each of your staff one-by-one and sped off into the woods with them to... do what he'd been told. You wouldn't have heard them then...
No, that was just...
...out of character? He's an alien, pretending to be human. How much more effort would it take to not act like himself, when he's already not acting like himself?
No. That wasn't true, and that couldn't have happened either, by the simple fact that he himself was still alive. It was morning. It had been hours. It wouldn't have taken hours if that was what they'd done.
Unless they need or want to keep you alive for some reason.
Lex couldn't think of one, though.
...Maybe they weren't in the mansion. Maybe they'd fled.
Maybe Martha didn't have that much control over Clark, after all. Maybe they were (still) fighting amongst themselves over what to do, how to handle things.
Maybe I should sneak down to the library to the safe and grab some green meteor rock, just in case...
But if he did that, he'd be instigating a fight if they hadn't decided on that course of action, and they'd close ranks to deal with him. He'd be drawing lines, choosing sides, and doing exactly what he'd warned Lana against the day before.
Lex started pacing again.
The meteor rock probably wouldn't work out anyway. Clark might go down, but his mother wouldn't.
The only way that could work was if he managed to sneak up on them, toss the meteor rock at Clark before he could respond or get out of range, and shoot them both before they even had the chance to twitch.
Right. Because instead of them going through with a pre-emptive strike, it'd be so much better if I did that, instead.
...And Clark totally didn't have a chance in hell of getting resurrected from the dead again and then not have a mother or a father to help keep him under control and sane anymore. Because he wasn't one of those alien world-conquering types that was inclined to do that sort of thing, come back to life after dying, oh no. He'd only done it just the once before.
Yeah, that's a great idea. Best one yet. Let's go with that one.
Lex decided that his sarcasm could bite him.
This is ridiculous. I just need to go out there.
He stopped pacing, stared at the door, and actually took a step towards it this time.
And besides, maybe it wasn't all that bad. Worst-case, he'd already be dead, and that hadn't happened, now had it?
No, actually, the worst-case would be walking out of here, realizing that the entirety of humanity had been slaughtered last night while I was asleep, finding Clark laughing his ass off at me, and then being killed by him.
With maybe some torture in-between to liven things up.
Or somehow ending up an unwilling slave, while the last little bit of my mind is stuck without control of my body, screaming away while I help the invaders in their killing spree. Or a willing slave, with my mind twisted and turned until I enjoyed it.
Lex shuddered.
Oh yes, it could be much worse. Much, much worse.
But maybe it wasn't, or wouldn't be. After all, Chloe had found out, and she was fine, right? That hadn't been the end of the world. And Pete had found out even before that. No end of the world there, either.
Maybe if Lex was careful, and figured out how they'd managed it, he could do the same?
Pete hadn't gotten pulled in too deep. He'd stayed his own man, and even set out for himself. ...But he was completely separate from everything now -- Pete didn't have a say in the alien business anymore -- and Lex didn't think he himself could handle that.
Chloe was in on it, and right in the thick of things. ...But Chloe was pretty much Clark's bitch at this point. She'd sniffed out the warehouse for him, after all.
Speaking of which, Chloe was generally the curious one. Clark tended to just get dragged along on whatever crazy thing she was researching. He wasn't all that naturally curious on his own, so maybe he hadn't even looked at the pictures.
...Maybe he hadn't even looked at the pictures?!?
Lex mentally slapped himself.
Then he smacked both palms into his forehead, because that hadn't been enough.
Then he winced because that made his headache worse.
You know, you could at least go through the five stages of grief in the right order, at least! Because denial was supposed to come first, damnit, not twenty-seventh.
Lex took a deep breath and let it out slowly. Then he did this a few more times, because between the header off the bed, the pounding in his skull from the ungodly amount of brandy from the night before, and his panic, he really needed to calm down and reorder his thought processes.
Ok, so what did he need to do, exactly?
--Accept that what had happened had happened, and move on out that door and down the hallway and find a way to handle the situation.
Because damnit, what I am doing right now is unproductive, and not helpful, and I am not going to resolve anything by remaining in here, and I am going to walk out that door to get the information I need. Right now.
Riiiiiiight now.
...Ok, maybe I need another minute for a little more denial.
~*~*~*~*~*~
When Lex had finally gotten up enough nerve to actually leave his bedroom, and then enough to walk across the hallway to talk to Clark, and then found Clark's and Martha's rooms empty, he wasn't sure whether he was more relieved or worried that Clark hadn't been there.
No, let's face it, you were probably more worried about what Martha would do than what Clark would do. You have no idea how to respond when confronted by her. You never do.
He did feel a little safer when he saw other people as he walked down the hallway towards the dining room -- some of his live-in staff were dusting various random suits of armor, tables, and mounted paintings. He wasn't alone in the mansion. Everyone he saw looked perfectly fine.
When he made it to the dining room, he paused, frowned at himself, and ended up taking a step back and continuing on towards the kitchen. He really didn't feel like eating alone, let alone being in a huge rooms with multiple points of entry all alone, at the moment, and he could use some comfort breakfast.
He pushed open the door to the kitchen and froze.
Clark and Martha were sitting around the large food preparation area table in the middle of the kitchen, and Martha was chatting it up with his Cook and the kitchen staff like they were all on holiday.
"Oh, Mr. Luthor!" one of the staff said, and they all turned to stare up at him.
"Ah, Lex! you're up!" Martha said sunnily. She got up from her chair and came over to him.
Oh crap. Lex braced himself.
"Here, sit down, sit down," she said, lightly taking him by the arm and steering him over to the large table, then patting him on the shoulder to plop him down on a seat.
...What the f--?
"Clark told me what happened last night. Here, drink this," she said, grabbing a glass off something from off to the side and plopping it down on the flat surface in front of him.
"He... told you..." We're actually going to talk about this here? NOW?!
"That you had a bit too much to drink," Martha explained as she sat down next to him.
Oh. ...So we're going with that, are we? Lex thought as he critically examined the contents of the glass. "What is-- nngh!" he said after only taking a whiff of it. "Oh god!" He couldn't set it down quickly enough. "What is that?!"
"Hair Of The Dog," Mrs. Kent said matter-of-factly.
Lex stared at her. He glanced over at Clark, who was determinedly focused on munching down his own breakfast.
He eyed the glass and couldn't imagine how the stuff hadn't eaten through the sides of its container yet.
"I, ah. ...I don't think that what I need this morning is a little more alcohol," Lex put forward carefully, pushing it away from him slightly and wondering if she was trying to poison him with some weird concoction.
From the stifled titters of the rest of his kitchen staff, who had probably watched her make it and knew what was in it, he decided that the probability of the mixture containing a poison was unlikely, but he was not about to discount the idea that the 'cure' might be worse than the 'disease'. --Not when it smelled like that.
"Oh, this recipe doesn't have alcohol in it, dear. It'll make you feel better. I usually tell Jonathan to drink it down all at once; it's not quite so awful that way."
Lex didn't correct her verb tense. He did wonder if this was some sort of bizarre Kent hazing ritual. Then he actually recognized something floating in the glass and staring up at him. "Is that a raw egg?"
"Yes."
"...Do I have to drink it?"
Martha gave him a measured look, and Lex got the feeling that he was failing some sort of test.
Deciding that a lack of kill order from Martha to Clark was a state he'd like to prolong, he grimaced, reached out for it again, lifted the glass to his lips, and downed it as fast as humanly possible.
When he came up for air, in-between trying not to hack up his stomach (or a lung -- it was truly that awful), he noticed Clark watching him with a sympathetic look.
Martha patted him on the back, then got up and moved back to her own original seat. Lex felt a little relieved that he'd survived (barely) thus far, so far.
Then he got a good look at what Clark was eating for breakfast, and the morning got just that much more surreal.
"Are you eating cereal?" Lex asked incredulously.
Clark glanced up at him again, pausing mid-chew. He glanced down at his bowl, then back up at Lex, and gave him a one-shoulder shrug that was more a 'yes' than a 'no'.
"I have cereal?" he said in amazement, glancing around the table and realizing that some of his other staff were eating cereal, as well. Multiple different types, even! He looked around for his cook as Clark continued to munch down his cornflakes. Why didn't he ever get cereal?
"Oh, Mr. Luthor sir, you shouldna be eating cold cereal for your breakfast, sir! I'll just fix you a nice bit of pancakes and eggs, don'tcha worry a bit, dear," his stout, matronly cook scolded him, turning away and continuing what she was doing on the stove.
Oh no. Not one of those breakfasts. He remembered now why he usually hid in the dining room to eat -- so Cook wouldn't see him. Sometimes Cook got it into her head that he was too skinny and he got one of those breakfasts. Those breakfasts were huge, and he always hated it when he couldn't finish them.
"Do I have to have the eggs? I already had one," he tried rather pitifully, and not particularly caring how he sounded just so long as it worked. Please say no, please say no...
"Oh sir, but that wasn'na a proper egg," his Cook told him with a sorry expression and a shake of her head.
...damn. He sighed.
Clark looked up at him like he was trying not to laugh.
Oh yeah, I bet you think this is funny, Lex glared back. Then he remembered that Clark was a deadly alien menace, and looked away quickly, dropping the challenge.
Clark... frowned at him a little, and... Lex didn't actually understand the look Clark gave him, then, before he went back to staring down at his bowl as he ate.
Lex did get his morning coffee, finally, and not only did it help wash away the godawful aftertaste from Martha's concoction, but it helped his brain start to unstick a little, and settled his stomach. And when Cook set down the huge spread in front of him, he prided himself for not panicking and running away screaming at the sheer quantity of food he was expected to somehow devour. He quietly munched his way through as much as he could manage, and Clark helped out by sneaking fairly large portions when nobody was paying attention. --At least until Cook caught Clark at it and smacked him on the back of his hand for it, then gave him the hairy eyeball. Lex meekly and silently listened in on the boisterous conversation that was going on between Martha and the others, and watching Clark's mother happily play the enchanting socialite completely at home in the center of a large circle of his people, he was reminded of the fact that Martha had once been a Clark, and a member of high-middle class Metropolitan society at that.
It was one of the most curious breakfasts he'd sat through in a long time. He'd never felt inobtrusive, being in the same room as other people and not joining in a conversation before -- not and still felt included, while actually being basically ignored, without somehow also feeling as though he was being looked down upon or slighted because of it.
It wasn't quite comfortable, exactly, but he didn't feel uncomfortable or shut out, either. And no-one seemed... malicious... about it. It was very odd.
He made it to the end of breakfast unscathed, though almost painfully stuffed full of food, at which point Martha said:
"So, Clark, what are you doing today?"
Clark blinked up at her and opened his mouth, said, "I was thinking about--" but his face went blank a moment later as his thought process rather obviously stalled out.
Lex finally spoke up, saying, "I thought you were going to be shadowing Chloe at the Daily Planet most days?"
"Uh, yeah, but..." Clark grimaced.
"...But?" Lex prompted.
"Well, today's her day off, and she and Lois probably have plans."
And you don't want to be hanging around with Lois all day -- fair enough, Lex thought as he downed the rest of his glass of orange juice.
"Lex, would you mind if Clark came with you to work today, instead?"
...Only good breeding and years of etiquette lessons kept Lex from doing a spit-take.
"Huh?" went Clark, turning to his mother and tilting his head in confusion.
What is she up to? was the only complete thought that crossed Lex's mind. "I'm not sure I follow..."
"Well, I doubt that you have much on the grounds here to keep Clark busy in the gardens or around the house..."
"No, I have groundskeeping and cleaning staff that I pay well for that sort of thing..." Lex admitted tentatively, glancing around at said staff, most of whom had gravitated to the kitchen for their own breakfasts by this point. ...but generally I am too busy at work doing workto entertain anyone! Surely you know that--!
"...but you do have educational tours and other sorts of things at LuthorCorp that Clark could do, don't you?"
...Oh. "Ah, yes, we do," Lex said slowly, glancing over at Clark.
"I never really did get to see a tour of the whole plant. I guess I could do that?" Clark said.
"I'll see if I can arrange for there not to be any hostage-taking this time around," Lex said laconically, with an internal wince.
Clark gave a visible wince, but Martha just smiled.
"But sir, don't you have that board meeting this morning?" one of his staff said, looking concerned.
"Well, yes, I did, but--" Lex frowned. Was there something he didn't know?
From the looks his on-site secretarial staff exchanged, apparently there was. "Well, it's just that your father arrived at LuthorCorp Towers twenty minutes ago and--"
Lex choked on a bite of croissant.
What the hell??? Had he not been perfectly clear last night?
Maybe he thinks I won't go through with it, Lex thought, eyes narrowing, as he tried to stifle his coughing jag.
"Lex, are you ok?" Clark asked, half-up from his chair and looking worried.
"M'fine," he muttered around another cough, taking a sip of water. "Bailey, tell the boys to get the 'chopper ready, would you?" he said lightly, putting down the glass, then standing and shoving his chair away from the countertop-table.
Lex exited the room abruptly, mind focused on picking up all the threads he'd dropped the evening before, and finding things in just as dire straits as they had been when he'd let go of them. Idiot, you should have spent the night trying to find a short-term fix to bulletproof the company against this sort of thing, not laying about on the couch drinking yourself stupid! He grabbed his briefcase on autopilot, and was striding out to the helipad before he realized Clark was following him.
"Clark," he said, stopping to turn and face his young houseguest, "I'm headed to Metropolis, not Plant No. 3."
"I know, but mom told me to--" Clark looked a little off-put, and grimaced as he glanced away. "I don't want to get in the way," he ended apologetically, shuffling his feet and looking a little lost.
He's got his marching orders from Martha. That's not something I'm going to be able to countermand, Lex thought, then his whole mental state shifted with what felt like an audible 'slam'ming into place of an entirely different set of thoughts into the forefront of his mind, as he again remembered the whole mess with the packet of--
"Here," said Clark, thrusting the packet at him.
Is he a mindreader? ...If he was then Lex was fucked, no two ways about it.
Lex stared at it for a moment, then took it from Clark's outstretched hand. It looked untouched.
"Sorry, I should've given it back to you earlier. I didn't think that you might not have remembered giving it to me last night. I didn't mean for you to panic or anything."
"Panic? Why would I panic?" Lex said as he slipped the packet of highly dangerous photographic evidence into his inner coat pocket again, and told himself to shut up before he started babbling.
"Well..." Clark looked uncertain, then said carefully, "You were a little weird about it last night, and you looked a little freaked out when you came into the kitchen this morning... and went kinda pale just now, and..." Clark trailed off, looking like he didn't really want to continue, then bit his lip and glanced over at the helicopter as the blades started up. He stood there, looking at Lex for a moment, then took a deep breath, leaned in, and said, right next to Lex's ear, so he didn't have to yell, "I don't want you to worry... about it. Ok?"
Lex took a quick step backwards, startled, and stared at Clark a moment.
"Clark, did you--?" Lex started.
But the blades had spun up and the pilots were motioning that they needed to go, so Lex motioned for Clark to follow, and they both made their way across the rest of the tarmac, hoisted themselves up into the interior of the helicopter, and strapped themselves in.
And the headsets weren't private, so Lex couldn't ask him what he really wanted to know.
Clark, did you look at those photos, or didn't you?
~*~*~*~*~*~
By the time they landed on the roof of LuthorCorp Towers, Lex had effectively tied himself up in knots about it.
Luckily, it was only a thirty minute flight.
Unluckily, the only conclusion he'd really been able to come to was this:
If Clark looked at them, he knows that I know about his basic power set, but he can't have told his mother because she would've reacted differently. But if he didn't look at them, he knows I have probably have something on him, from what I said last night and how I said it, but not exactly what. Either way, he knows I have something on him, but that it's not definitive proof, and Martha doesn't know about it.
But why wouldn't Clark have said something to his mother about it?
...Was he worried that Martha might go for the nuclear "kill Lex" option?
Maybe there was another reason for Clark's unwillingness to share. Lex could be reading too much into things. ...Or not enough into things.
Lex then had to force himself to wrench his thoughts back onto a more corporate set of tracks, with a sickening mental lurch. It spoke a bit ill of him that he couldn't seamlessly think about alien matters and then shift to corporate matters without feeling like he was suffering a severe disconnect from reality in-between. ...That was, of course, assuming that the need itself -- to perform such a drastic shift in his thought processes to cope -- wasn't an indication of a much more basic and systemic problem with the way Lex dealt with things in general.
"Lex! So glad you could make it," Lionel enthused with false cheer as Lex stepped out of the elevator and walked into the fray.
Try to steal a march on me, will you? Lex thought coldly, and he was angry as hell that he couldn't back the threat up. And Lionel looked almost pleased as he caught sight of Lex's barely-suppressed fury.
But then Lionel's expression froze for just a moment as he looked over Lex's shoulder, and he looked...
Lex reflexively glanced back, following his father's gaze, and found himself looking at Clark.
By the time Lex glanced back at Lionel, the crack in the facade had been smoothed away, but...
Wait just a minute. Lionel's confident, relaxed bearing is really all just a front? It was a little frightening for Lex, because, before today, during those times Lionel lost control, he had never seen Lionel exhibit anything other than a deep and abiding anger hidden underneath the surface. Never panic... or fear. Had he just imagined it, or misread him somehow? ...He must have.
"What's going on?" Clark whispered to Lex over his shoulder, catching up to Lex and proceeding to trail close behind him into the main cubicle area of the top floor proper.
"Dad's trying to stage a hostile takeover of LuthorCorp," Lex murmured back.
Clark looked shocked. "Can he do that?" he asked, more than a little concerned.
"Quite probably, yes," Lex said lowly.
"...Is this what that problem text message yesterday afternoon was about?" Clark added, frowning.
Lex nearly stumbled as he slowed to a halt, glancing back at Clark. I shouldn't be surprised that he put that together. Then he nodded once, briefly, as he grimly scanned the room, taking in the current state of things.
"So!" Lionel said, clapping his hands together and surveying the boardroom crowd. "It seems everyone is here. Why don't we all go into the conference room, and we can discuss the offer that the Apex Group has kindly made to--"
"--What?!?" Clark yelped, rather loudly.
Lex froze, then swiveled about to look up at Clark, who was openly glaring at Lionel.
"That's who's trying to buy out LuthorCorp? Those Apex Group guys?" Clark looked indignant. He looked down and locked gaze with Lex. "Lex, you can't do business with them, they're criminals!"
"Clark--" Lex started, getting a headache for the second time that morning, because it was one thing for Clark to think ill of having to put a price on people's safety and make tradeoffs in business, such as whether to ship jobs overseas, but quite another for him to be openly and loudly disrupting Lex's LuthorCorp business with the Chinese--
"Lex, you don't understand," Clark said.
And Lex heard Lionel chuckle and murmur something misdirecting to the board member nearest him, before starting to steer the rest of them into the board room.
And Lex couldn't help but think, That's interesting. I wonder why Lionel didn't engage Clark directly? Because, to his knowledge, Lionel had never walked away from putting someone in their place when it was an easy and decisive win that would make his opponent look like an idiot.
And in a split-second decision, Lex decided to take a chance.
And so Lex said, projecting his voice so that everyone on the floor could hear, with a patiently suffering tone -- not that the latter took much effort on his part -- "All right, Clark, then why don't you explain it to me?"
And Clark, being Clark, did. "The Apex Group has been trying to buy up land in Suicide Slums and tear down the tenement buildings there recently. The people living there have banded together into this group called Akrada and were fighting the sale -- successfully, too. It's been a back and forth between Akrada and the violence and corporate greed in the area for awhile, but it's only gotten really bad since the Apex Group got involved. And that's because Apex has been using bullying tactics and hiring gangbangers and criminals to go in and shoot the rallymakers." And Clark looked up and glared at Lionel. "And all that started happening right around the time he got in on it, apparently," Clark said, tilting his chin at Lionel. "The police are involved now, and they're going to trace it all back to him."
Jesus. That was why Clark was MIA last night? He'd been running around... shadowing my father? Lex thought Clark had been chasing down the bastard who had mugged his mother, not ...oh Christ. Suicide Slums.
"Oh, and how do you know all this, if the police don't?" one of Lex's board members asked, snidely, looking Clark over, and Lex saw the exact moment the man mentally dismissed Clark. (Lex, conversely, made a mental note to fire the man whenever the earliest opportunity presented itself.)
Clark, however, took it in stride, and answered his accuser directly. "I know because I spent last night with a witness to one of the hits. I was helping her track down the people behind it all. Guess where it led."
"Where?" one of the others asked, looking interested. It was one of the old guard, one of the veteran board members, who was spending equal time splitting his attention between Clark and Lionel both. No dummy he.
"Here. In that office." Clark pointed to Lex's office. "Where Lionel was. And the witness nearly killed him in revenge for what he'd done. I almost didn't talk her down."
Jesus Fucking Christ.
"And it's a good thing you did, because I doubt she'd want another senseless violent death on her conscience," Lionel said smoothly.
Clark just glared back, and it was obvious to Lex that Clark was second-guessing last-night's decision right now. "You don't know what you're talking about."
"Actually, I do. I took the liberty of looking up your little friend -- Andrea, was it? -- after she'd left last night. It's quite a pity, she seemed rather enchanting for a murderess," Lionel smiled. "It's a pity that she killed the man who allegedly killed her mother. The police won't be able to get much of anything out of him now to prove her rather baseless theory. Assuming, of course, that anyone would believe the words of criminals over those of someone like myself," Lionel chuckled, as if the idea of accusing an upstanding high-society citizen like himself of such wrongdoing was ludicrous, pure nonsense.
Clark squared his shoulders and his nostrils flared. He stomped towards Lionel. "You are a criminal. A convicted felon, who was sent to prison for murdering his own parents. I trust your word exactly as much as I trust a criminal's," Clark ended, towering over Lionel and glaring down at him with the most judgmental, disgusted look Lex had ever seen cross Clark's face. "If there was any justice in this world--" Clark started coldly, his hands clenching into fists.
"Clark, that's enough!" Lex said, having made it through the crowd (where had all these people come from anyway, all of a sudden?) by slipping through in Clark's wake, and grabbed him by the arm. Clark almost didn't let Lex pull him away. "If there's a point you're trying to make that you can prove," -- with hard evidence, preferably! -- "then I think you should just make it."
Clark took a deep breath, two, and then turned to Lex again, pointedly turning his back on Lionel in the process. "The point is, Lex, that even if they can't directly pin in on Lionel this time, they will at least trace it back as far as the Apex Group. Chloe was working on it with me, we forwarded all the information we had to the police, and she got permission to run the story in this evening's edition of the Daily Planet, because they said they'd have it all wrapped up by then and she wouldn't be putting the investigation in jeopardy by printing it so soon. And I'm pretty sure that nobody is going to force you to sell LuthorCorp to a bunch of mobsters, or honor any agreement made under duress to do the same. Criminals don't get to make legal bids for multinational corporations," Clark said. "Not unless there's something really wrong with this country, in which case I guess somebody ought to do something about that."
You could have heard a pin drop.
"Hm. Well, I suppose that hearing Apex Group's bid is off the agenda, then," Lex said cooly. "Since that was the main reason for calling this meeting on such short notice, I assume everyone has better things to do?" he said, making eye contact with everyone as he glanced around the crowd.
The crowd dispersed, and the board members made their relieved farewells as they left to take care of their own section matters.
Which left Lionel, Lex, and Clark.
"Having fun, dad? I'm having a blast," Lex said with a smirk, though inside he was panicking a little, because Clark's fists were still clenched, and he still looked like he wanted to hit someone -- preferably Lionel, from the look Clark was sending his way.
Lionel did not looked pleased. At all.
"Son, you're on the wrong side," Lionel said sadly, patiently.
Lex almost shot back a scathing retort, except that his brain caught up with him first and he was left speechless as he realized that Lionel was talking to Clark.
"I am not your 'son'." Clark hissed out ferally, bristling at Lionel's words as if they had been the worst sort of insult.
"Clark, no!" Lex panicked, moving partially in front of Clark and grabbing him with both hands. A small part of his brain warned him that it was a bad, bad idea to get between this alien and his soon-to-be-victim. Soon-to-be-very-dead-victim. (As much as Lionel could be a victim.) That there was no way that Lex could possibly push Clark back, forcibly clamp down on his arm and drag him away, physically make him move, keep them separated--
Lex looked up into Clark's eyes, that were wholly focused on Lionel, and for a second he could have sworn that the irises went pure red.
Clark gritted his teeth and shook violently with rage as he stared at Lionel. He glanced down briefly at Lex... then paused for a moment.
Somehow, from looking at Lex, Clark seemed to get ahold of himself. He closed his eyes, then opened them again, glancing up at Lionel again.
Clark clenched his jaw, but with an effort, Clark also took a step back and forced some of the tension out of his shoulders, uncurling his hands a little. He actually backed down on his own, without needing to be forced to. Lex moved back with him and felt a nearly overwhelming sense of relief.
Then Clark's lips curled up in something between a jeer and a snarl, an almost atavistic baring of fangs, and he tilted his chin downwards slightly like he was two steps away from rushing someone. Lex tensed all over again, and glanced back just in time to see Lionel's fading smug smirk before it completely vanished.
"Dad, get out before I have to call security and have you thrown out," Lex warned.
"Really, Lex, I can tell where I'm not wanted," Lionel said smoothly, straightening his cuffs. "Do tell Martha I look forward to seeing her tonight, will you?"
"You aren't going anywhere near her!" Clark spat out.
"I think that's up to her, now, isn't it?" Lionel said, sounding like he'd already won.
"I've revoked your access to the mansion grounds; you aren't getting in," Lex grated out slowly, reminding him of that fact.
"Yes, I'd heard. Not a very sporting move, Lex. You knew she was going to be staying at the mansion, having invited her yourself just earlier that day, and yet you tried to restrict my access after that sort of blackmail?" Lionel gave him a look he usually held in reserve for the sharks. Outsiders. "That was not quite our agreement, Lex." And Lex got the distinct impression that Lionel thought that Lex would not dare to share what he'd learned about that night with Martha.
Lex shivered, and it had nothing to do with what Lionel thought of him just then. No, it was because he suddenly had a vision of what would happen if he told Clark what had happened that night, here and now: he'd have to remodel the entire floor, because no cleaning service would ever get the blood out of the walls...
"Leave him alone," Clark said quietly, far too intensely for Lex to be comfortable hearing, and at this point his survival instinct was well beyond merely screaming at him to get the hell out of there, now.
"Or you will -- what, Clark? You know better than to trust him, I hope?" Lionel looked almost concerned. It made Lex want to break things.
Then Lionel said in a chiding tone, "Surely Jonathan taught you better than that."
Lex had to bodily throw himself at Clark as Lionel walked away, and after all was said and done -- and Lex had Clark sequestered in his office with him and away from the gossiping eyes and ears of his secretarial staff -- Lex honestly had no idea how he'd managed to drag Clark away and force him into the room.
But looking at him now, it wasn't such a stretch to see it having been possible. There was no fight left in him behind closed doors.
Clark was visibly shaking at this point, and he dropped onto the couch like a stone, his legs seemingly unable to support him.
Lex watched Clark put his head in his hands.
He listened to Clark say in a reedy, shaking voice, "I hate him."
His own fear slowly drained away, and what it left behind was...
He stood there and watched Clark continue to shiver and repeat himself. Again. And again. And...
Lex sat down next to him on the couch and wrapped his arms around him.
Clark leaned into him and sobbed.
And all Lex could coherently think just then, feeling so very cold, was a thought with edges so sharp they cut into him every time it made another pass through his mind.
And the thought was: He called you 'son'.
And Lionel had meant it, without sarcasm, not as a taunt, not spoken with derision. He called you 'son.' Because he wanted Clark. As a son.
He called you 'son.'
Fucking alien.
He called you 'son.'
It looped in his gut and bit down hard.
He called you 'son.'
And he shouldn't be jealous.
But he was.
~*~*~*~*~*~
Next section is here.