Fic: Aliens 601, For Humans (Part 2) (2/2) (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 section here.
~*~*~*~*~*~
Lex didn't want to be angry with Clark, but he didn't know why.
...Actually, that was a lie -- he did know why: it was because it hurt. Badly.
Clark didn't want Lionel as a father, and he didn't want Lionel's approval.
Lex, on the other hand, would damn near kill for it, what Clark was being offered -- no, straight-up given -- free and clear.
Am I just not good enough? ...But Lionel didn't want Lex good, Lionel had only ever wanted Lex to behave, to do as he said, as he wanted... whenever he didn't want Lex to fight him and be a challenge. I can't be better than him and willing to follow him around like a good little dog. They're mutually exclusive. Because to be better at business than Lionel was to be willing to serve no-one; Lex had had that drilled into him from damn near birth.
It's not fair. Lex couldn't be whatever Lionel wanted him to be. He wasn't even sure what thatwas, anymore.
He knew better by now than to want it, to want Lionel's approval and his love (what love a Luthor could feel for another person, anyway), but he still ached for it so badly that it hurt, too. ...It hurt worse to be angry at Clark about it, but not by much.
Why does he want the 'perfect son' in Clark, anyway? He's just some farm boy.
...Except he really isn't, now is he?
But no -- Lionel couldn't know that Clark was Kalel. He couldn't. He'd have done something about it, used the green meteor rock on Kalel that he knew was a weakness of the aliens. Lionel would have immediately tried to gain control of Clark and subvert him by force, locked him up and...
Lex shuddered from behind his desk. He looked up and over at Clark, who was lying on the couch in his office, curled up, facing the room but fitfully tense in his sleep.
Lionel couldn't have already done it, at least. Clark hasn't been out of anyone's sight for any significant period of time since the aliens landed ...in the second meteor shower. Chloe would've noticed if something was wrong, too, more than likely. Martha, too. And Clark outright hates him. And that scared Lex a little, because he saw what had happened to Clark when he felt that shaky hatred, how it was poisoning him, even now. He could just look up at him and see it, plain as day.
Clark shouldn't hate. There was something really wrong with even the idea of it.
God help him, he didn't want Clark to ever kill anyone, and it wasn't even because he was worried that it would break Clark afterwards and shake his core beliefs, instilled in him by Jonathan as they had been over the years. ...No, Lex was deathly afraid of something else entirely. Now he was afraid that Clark might actually enjoy it. The power. The feeling of control. Because Lex had felt it; he'd felt it all. ...And yes, he'd gotten sick well afterwards, but not during it all. And with the way Clark seemed to be twisting in the wind right now, and with Lionel's death the easy solution, the quick way out, and what a relief it would be for Clark to not have to worry about him any more, Clark could easily become addicted to the feeling. Clark might become a killer, and decide he enjoyed it.
...Really? Is that what I'm most afraid of?
No. No, it wasn't. Because if he were honest with himself...
...Clark wasn't the one Lex was worried about 'going to the dark side', as it were.
He was projecting.
Because it would be so easy. And Lionel wouldn't be a problem anymore.
He was family. He could do it himself. It had a rightness to it, almost. Keep it in the family. Luthors deal with their own.
...Clark would never forgive him if he ever found out. And he would find out.
Wouldn't he?
Or would he?
Clark wasn't all that inquisitive on his own. And Clark wanted Lionel dead, too. Maybe he'd be happy Lionel died. Maybe he'd be grateful.
Maybe he'd thank Lex for doing it. For helping make him safe.
But even if Clark didn't find out, someone would. Chloe would probably suspect and tell him. And even if Clark agreed with Lex to start with, for doing what needed to be done, he'd either end up getting turned against Lex by Chloe later, or have to do something about Chloe having found out what Lex had done, and Lex wouldn't want Clark put in either position. Because Chloe knew Clark's secret, and Lex doubted very much that Chloe would be comfortable serving under an alien master that was ok with murder. If Lex killed Lionel and Clark was ok with it, then he'd be risking the very real chance that Chloe would, in her fear and anger at Clark's inaction, then go off and blow Clark's cover, turning him over to those less-inclined to be reasonable about the existence of aliens on Earth so long as they didn't threaten the status quo. And since keeping Clark safe from just that sort of outcome -- himself and his abilities a secret from those who would misuse them -- that meant that Lex would have to kill Chloe, too. Unfortunately, if Lex killed Chloe, there was no way Clark would be ok with it. Which would lead to exactly the same problem as if Clark hadn't been ok with Lex killing Lionel in the first place -- in direct opposition to Lex. Which would mean that Lex would either have to become the subjugating oppressor himself, or let Clark take him out of the picture, thus leaving the Earth wide open and vulnerable to attack without someone in power to put forth any real opposition to an invasion. Which meant that Lex killing Lionel was a very bad idea, that had a near-zero chance of a good outcome.
Lex brushed a hand through Clark's soft hair, then started slightly as he realized what he was doing. He'd hardly remembered walking over to the couch and crouching down in front of it.
But, now that he was here...
And already had a hand in Clark's hair...
And Clark's eyes were open.
SHIT!
Lex froze where he was.
Clark's eyes were focused on Lex. He blinked at him.
"What are you doing?" he said, in a voice still a little low and rough from too much crying.
"I'm not sure," said Lex, because it was true. "I think I may hate you a little," he said. Which was also true.
Clark's eyes widened. He pulled away and sat up abruptly. Lex remained crouched at Clark's knees.
"You hate me?" Clark looked a little scared. More than a little scared. Very scared.
"Maybe. Just a little." Lex stood up slowly, until he was the one towering over Clark. "I'm very angry with you right now."
"Why?" Clark said, sounding desperately sorry. "I... I... am I, was I being too loud? Lois said I snore, but..."
lex felt a severe mental disconnect for a moment. He sat down on the couch next to Clark. "You don't snore."
"Oh." Clark looked a little relieved, then a little annoyed, probably all with Lois. "But..." Then Clark looked confused and worried. "What did I do? Should I have... not been in here?"
"Clark, you've hardly disrupted my work when you've camped out in the library at the mansion awake; what makes you think you were disrupting my work here while asleep?"
"I don't know, you said you were angry with me!" Clark said, rubbing at his eyes tiredly. "And you weren't this morning..." Then he frowned a little, started slightly in realization, and said, in a lowering tone, "I shouldn't have said anything this morning. You didn't want me to say anything; you were really trying to tell me to stop and I didn't..." he ended on a note of horror and shame.
"No, Clark. That's not it."
Clark looked up at him and went blank for a moment. "I... I don't understand. You did want me to tell you?" He frowned again. "Oh. Just you, not everybody."
"No, Clark. You did very well, saying what you did. It was damn near perfect timing, in fact."
"...I don't get it."
"You saved the day."
"...Huh?"
"If you hadn't said what you did, Lionel would have walked right into that boardroom and started the hostile takeover, right then and there."
"But you would've stopped him!"
"No, Clark. I couldn't."
"But you did! You just did! You told everyone no!"
"I couldn't have done that with any authority if you hadn't said what you had."
"But they wouldn't have listened to just me! You did that!"
"And if you hadn't been there--"
"--Then you would've just read about it in the Planet later tonight and called it all off then!"
"It's your damn article, Clark!"
"It... It's not really mine, it's Chloe's; she wrote it," Clark said, looking affronted. "Why are you so mad that I helped? If you really couldn't stop him yourself, why wouldn't you be happy that I could help you so you could stop him?" he asked, sounding confused.
Pride. Vanity. This is why they're sins. It still hurt, though, and Lex was still angry. "Doesn't Chloe ever get angry after you've helped her out?"
"Yeah, but not with paper-stuff."
"Oh? What's the difference?" Lex asked with dry sarcasm.
...which apparently Clark hadn't yet been exposed to enough to pick up on. "With the paper-stuff, like the Planet articles, and the Torch and Wall of Weird stuff, I ask Chloe how I can help out, and she tells me what's going on and how I can help, so I know what to do. Then she only gets mad if I don't manage to do whatever-it-is, and that makes sense, because I'd told her I would and just screwed it up somehow. It's everything else that she gets all weird about. I mean, I get the personal stuff -- she doesn't like being wrong about people, so she especially doesn't want to hear it when the boyfriend she's dating is actually homicidal and a total liar and cheating on her, because it means she was really really wrong about somebody, but when that happens she's just gonna be angry in general about everything afterwards, not just me -- so I get that now."
And the last bit implied that Clark hadn't gotten it at the time, but was 'older and wiser' now, and Lex had to choke down a laugh, because he knew which meteor freak situation Clark was referring to -- he'd learned about Ian second-hand from the deceased-patient Belle Reeve files that had been transferred to the Level 3 docket -- ...and it really wasn't all that funny, honestly. Clark either didn't notice his reaction, or he'd successfully suppressed it, because Clark kept going.
"But I don't get it when something goes wrong and maybe she doesn't know about it, so I go and try to fix it on my own because she can't do anything about it, and maybe I'm the only one who can... because I'm there --and then she gets mad because I did that..." Clark trailed off, and seemed to be expending a lot of brain power in pulling parallels between Chloe and Lex, though Lex had thought it all quite obvious just listening to him talk.
Though if Clark was pulling parallels between Chloe and Ian and him and Desiree... -- well, he hadn't gone off on Clark once he was no longer under the influence; he'd thanked him for trying. Though it would have helped if Clark had outright told me that Desiree was a meteor freak, instead of the mess afterwards, with her nearly escaping jail and-- Lex shook his head to clear it. Clark had probably thought it obvious at the time... or thought Lex had known when he'd said what he had about 'passion' and being more careful, since he had nearly fought off her control more than once on his own during their short... 'courtship'...
"Is it because I didn't ask first? Because that doesn't seem very fair..." Clark said after awhile, pulling a face. "I shouldn't have to worry about whether you guys are going to be mad at me later, just because I went ahead and did something you probably weren't expecting because you didn't know about something that was going on, and I don't see why either of you would think I need to get permission from you just to do what I think is right."
"Clark, that's not--" god, that's totally unreasonable, he can't actually think that we--
"--And even if I did feel like doing that, I don't usually have time to ask anyway, if I'm in the middle of stuff with a meteor freak, or your dad, or whatever. I mean, I can't just ask whoever to stop what they're doing for awhile because I need to call Chloe and Lex now, so I can get their approval on what I want to do and maybe have them tell me to do something totally different and argue it out with them first, and expect whoever to be all like 'Oh, ok. I'll just stop trying to kill you and your friends and sit over here while you figure things out, no rush.' "
Jesus.
"Clark..."
"I mean, I get that your dad wasn't trying to kill you this morning? But he was trying to ruin a bunch of people's lives, so..."
Context is really not for the weak. Is this how Clark usually thinks about things? Lex thought, rubbing a hand across his face. "Clark, I don't expect that from you" -- though I wouldn't mind at the very least being extended the common courtesy of being told the truth about things after the fact! -- "and that's really not the point."
"Ok, then what is the point?" Clark said in exasperation.
"The point is that people" -- human beings -- "have emotions, and emotions are not rational, and sometimes I am going to be angry" -- I'll get over it, you can't do anything about it, but I can't help feeling it -- "when you do things that I can't do!"
"But you could have done it!" Clark said hotly. "You do research into companies all the time, and I know you know how to dig up dirt on people. You could have done it!"
--And that fucking hurt. Lex jumped up and shouted down at Clark. "No, I couldn't -- I didn't know!" And god, I should have, Lex berated himself I should have looked into the company Lionel was using to force the buyout, but it didn't even fucking occur to me, when it should have been the very first thing I did. Anyone willing to do business with Lionel would be-- because of course they would have to be--
Clark got to his feet and yelled right back, fists clenched: "I know you didn't know -- that's why I told you!!!"
Silence.
"Why the hell is it so wrong for me to help?!" Clark demanded, pacing away and making fists in his hair, before rounding on Lex again. "You didn't used to get angry when I helped! Chloe's always been like that, but you never used to be!"
...No, he hadn't. "But that was years ago." ...What changed?
"Then why aren't you 'rational' about it now??" Clark asked, throwing his arms out to the side and stopping in front of him.
Lex realized then that he'd said that out loud. And his thought process derailed a little bit, from vague snippets of you've lied to me so many times since then, and I know now that you don't trust me, and I didn't know back then that I probably couldn't do anything to earn your trust, and you may never decide to trust me, and at best I may only be able to demand compliance and force noninterference, and you're an alien, and you keep acting like we might be friends even though you said we're not anymore, and I might be having trouble reconciling that with the whole your-race-is-trying-to-subjugate-mine thing, and I'm not sure I can trust you anymore, and damnit, I'm allowed to feel whatever I want in the privacy of my own damn brain! I'm not acting on it, I'm just warning you about it, to...
Why am I not as rational about things now as I used to be?
No, a better question was: when had that first changed? And... I think I know that... he realized morosely.
"...You may remember that I had an extended stay at Belle Reeve at one point, Lex drew out, softly and very slowly, tucking his chin down against his chest and closing his eyes.
"Yeah, I remember that," Clark grated out, hunching his shoulders a little. "I--" Then Clark looked a little scared, then angry. "Lex, you're fine now, you-- you're better now. You got over it. You recovered, and got over it."
"Clark, people generally don't 'get over' a psychotic break like nothing ever happened," he said quietly, opening his eyes to stare at the floor. And that hurt to admit, but if he couldn't even be honest with himself... If nothing else, he had to be able to do that, or he really would be too far gone to...
Clark stared at him for a long time, and Lex kept his gaze lowered and was a littel afraid that he might have made a tactical error there. He was trying to be more honest and open with Clark, to help inspire the possibility of a more open working relationship with him, and a more balanced exchange of information in the future, because there were some things that he really needed to know about -- alien things chief among them. But. Admitting that he might not be completely sane was not the best way to inspire trust, and...
Clark had power of attorney over him for medical decisions. If Clark thought he wasn't well, Clark could send him right back to Belle Reeve, and Lex wouldn't be able to do a damn thing about it.
...No, Clark could send him back to Belle Reeve any time he felt like it. For any reason. Like if he got too close to Clark's secrets. Clark was living at the mansion now, he saw him all the time, he could say he'd seen Lex acting oddly; Clark could just lie about the why of it, and--
Oh, fuck. What have I done?!? Lex realized, going very cold. Oh god, I gave a young alien complete power over me, within my own culture's governmental legal power base. I-- Lex started to panic. If I withdraw the power of attorney, he'll know something's up and want to know why, and when he figures it out... But if I don't, I remain in constant danger, subject to his whims and suspicions. And who else could he appoint in Clark's stead? He couldn't give that power back over to Lionel, the traitor; Lionel wouldn't hesitate to use it against him, Lex knew that now -- Lionel wanted him and Clark separated, post-haste. I am well and truly fucked--
"You're not crazy."
Lex's head snapped up.
"Lex, you-- you're not crazy. You never were."
What?
"You-- you think... you really thought...? --Didn't Chloe tell you?" Clark said, lookng a little panicky.
What?!?
"I-- You two were together that whole summer before Lionel's trial, weren't you? I mean, you checked up on her a lot while she was in protective custody, you talked... I thought you both were getting along. I... I thought... --She really didn't tell you?!"
"Clark." Lex licked his dry lips and continued slowly. He felt like he was standing on a knife's edge, and didn't know why. "Clark, I had a psychotic break..."
"You were drugged."
"...Yes, Clark. They usually do that in mental--"
"--No, I mean before."
Lex paused, then said quietly, "...I know that they needed to subdue me with tranquilizers, but--" Clark was shaking his head.
"Lex, not that. It was in your scotch. And it wasn't tranquilizers in there."
Lex was having trouble breathing, because, somehow, this felt... true. He couldn't remember, but some part of him... did. He sat back down on the couch, hard.
"Lionel and Morgan Edge were working together to drive you crazy. They paid Darius to drug your scotch, and there was a bunch of other crazy stuff going on that... that you said happened, but..." Clark grimaced and looked away. "You said something had happened at two different places, but when we went back, there wasn't really any proof. At first, I thought you were right, but you started acting more and more crazy, and then Chloe said this stuff about how you'd also acted weird right after Julian... and then Lana got hurt and Lionel was just, everybody was just..." Clark rubbed his arms and shivered slightly like he was cold. "I wasn't really sure what to believe anymore, not after you ran off after threatening your... your psychologist?... with a gun and I had your medication checked, and it really was just a sedative. But Chloe brought up that that didn't mean that you werenn't being drugged, and I know how everybody brings you your food and drink at the mansion, so I thought... well... After I started pressuring people to talk, I found about the drugs in your scotch, and started tracing Darius' orders back to the source, and I finally caught up with you and Edge..."
"But Edge was dead. He died..." Lex said, putting his head in his hands.
Clark shook his head, squatting down in front of Lex. "We all thought that, but apparently he survived the explosion at the docks. He had plastic surgery, and a new name, and Lionel was setting him up someplace else. Nobody knew about it except you. Chloe's still not sure how you found out."
"What the hell was I doing with Edge?"
"Trying to get him to turn on Lionel, go state's evidence on your grandparent's death. But things went... bad. He tried to run you over with a car... you ended up shooting him dead."
I tried to turn a dangerous criminal like Edge state's evidence? A man with zero respect for the law? The man who started Intergang? I must have been out of my mind. But...
"You're leaving something out," Lex said roughly. There's something important here, that you're not saying... He raised his head to look at Clark. "How do you even know all this?"
Clark lowered his eyes. "I was there. Edge nearly killed me. You... you made him stop." Clark's eyes shifted sideways. "He tried to get away. And after he tried to run you over..." Clark swallowed and he turned his head away from Lex. "I got scared. And I ran."
And there's still something you're not saying, Lex thought, eyes narrowing. "What aren't you telling me?"
"I didn't get you out."
"I know that, Clark. But I also you know tried to."
Clark looked pained. "But I knew better and... I should've done it right away. I shouldn't have..." Clark stared down at his hands, wringing them together.
"Clark, you would have been arrested for kidnapping and locked away when they caught up to you. I was still pumped full of drugs. Neither of us would have been safe." Clark might be an alien conqueror, but he was a young alien conqueror, and he didn't seem very good at the whole 'doing whatever he wanted' thing. If the authorities had caught up with them, Clark's alienness would have been exposed, and if they hadn't... Lionel could have put pressure on Clark by threatening his other friends and his family, the Kents. He could have forced Clark to turn himself in, with that sort of leverage.
"That's what mom and dad said," Clark said darkly.
"They were right." Without family support, Clark would have had even less resources to draw on, if any. Lana was out. Pete was gone. Chloe would have been jittery about the whole thing. Hell, Clark himself had only been sixteen at the time. He couldn't have worked within the system to beat Lionel, and outside of that would've involved starting more-or-less a war between himself and Lionel, with gods-knew-who getting stuck in the middle, and the government, police, and military all on the wrong side. Lionel's side. Fuck.
"No, they weren't. It wasn't right. I should have gotten you out." And Clark was looking down angrily.
"So, what would you have done, Clark? After?" Because Lex had a feeling that Clark really hadn't ever really thought it through.
"What?" Clark said, looking up at him.
"You-- Come up here," Lex sighed, pulling Clark up to the couch next to him. "After you got me out, what would you have done?" Lex leaned back a little, studying Clark. "If you knew then what you know now, what would you have done differently? Could you have gotten me out? Where would we go? What would you do? How would we have lived?"
Clark looked down again. "Run. Hid. Waited. Taken care of you until you were better. Until the drugs were out of your system."
"That's all well and good, Clark, but I mean specifically -- how exactly would you have done it?"
"I almost got you out when I tried to break you out," Clark said looking up at him belligerently. "If they hadn't rescheduled the electroshock for right that afternoon, and I'd had just a little more time..."
"You... you tried to break me out?" And failed?
"I got you untied from your cot-bed-thing, but then we got jumped by some of the meteor freaks," Clark grimaced, looking away. "They grabbed me and... I didn't get back upstairs in time to stop the procedure."
"Van and Ian," Lex said slowly. He remembered from the reports that they'd died the same day under suspicious circumstances, but he had never put it together that that might have been connected somehow to his electroshock 'treatment'.
Clark looked at him oddly. "Ian and Eric. ...Why do you think Van had something to do with it? He wasn't there."
"Van was killed earlier that morning, if I remember correctly. The videos put Ian down as the culprit."
"Ian killed...?" Clark frowned. "Oh."
"Oh?"
"It's... nothing. I think maybe they all turned on each other, then. Eric killed Ian later. I barely managed to stop Eric, after."
Eric had intermittent alien-level powers... and when he'd been out, prior to his incarceration in Belle Reeve, he'd had those powers right around a time that Clark didn't seem to have them. And then he'd lost them, and Clark had suddenly seemed in much better shape thereafter. Had that been some sort of accidental transfer, not on purpose? Was there a trick to doing it, that such a temporary empowering of a human by an alien could be forced? That... could be useful, if it could be done without an alien's consent or help. If it could be done without some form of psychosis as a result -- Eric had been a troubled kid even before the incident (each incident?) but it was entirely possible that the procedure of transference wasn't safe for the human side of the equation.
"What are you thinking?" Clark asked.
Lex shook it off. "Fine, let's say that you could have gotten me out, then. What next?"
"I would've grabbed you, gotten you off the grounds--"
"How?"
"I don't know, borrowed one of their vans and a uniform and hid you in the back, and driven out the front, maybe? Or taken the service tunnels below the building; we would've walked out through the sewer system pipes and exited a mile or two away. It would've depended on who was watching what."
Lex stared at him. "And then what?"
"Well..." Clark frowned and rubbed the back of his neck. "I guess I would've hidden you someplace for the afternoon and gone back in to town, cleaned out my bank account, and then come back and we would've run."
"Hidden me where? And run on foot?" Lex pressed.
"Well, there are a lot of abandoned hunting cabins in pretty remote sections of the woods; Van wasn't the only person with one of those. Though if we'd had the van, I would've parked it someplace out in the woods and gone back myself. I guess... that probably wouldn't have worked so well, to keep driving it. I..." he paused for a bit, then said "I guess I could have paid a hundred or so for a lemon from the junkyard, drove that off, and then swapped it for another car at another junkyard in another town. Kept the car in gas, pay for things in cash, and head for the border. It's not that hard to get into Mexico, right?" Clark shrugged.
"Mexico," Lex repeated dully. Do you even know any spanish?
"Well, I don't think Lionel has much influence there, and they don't cooperate down there with the US as much as the Canadians would. The Mexican police wouldn't want to look for us, and they wouldn't just let the US authorities run around doing whatever they wanted."
"But the Mexican government is fairly corrupt, and most of the area is run by the drug cartels. Lionel could just buy people in power down there."
"So? We just wouldn't stay in the towns, we'd keep moving south. Get out of the desert, and into the rainforest. Nobody'd find us there."
"...And we would survive on what exactly, rainwater and air?"
Clark shrugged. "I could find stuff, forage for food, and I know how to hunt."
Well, of course he'd be unconcerned about food, he could probably run to a grocery store and back hundreds of miles away. He'd easily put people off our trail and all without arousing suspicions as to where we really were. Then Lex had to stop and think about that, because that actually really was a good way to disappear. If Clark ran down to a tropical region, he probably wouldn't even need to head back to civilization if he didn't want to -- he could quite possibly live off of whatever wild vegetation and animals were living in the area, literally live off of the land. And if he ate too much of the local fauna and flora to sustain him further, or someone seemed to be getting close to finding him? He could just run to a new area hundreds or thousands of miles away, and start right up again there. He could even trade food for clothing or supplies, if he made a stopover in on of the more second- or third- world countries along the way. He wouldn't even have to steal to get by.
Hell. A lot of alien-conquerers-to-be could live off the land like that, waiting for the signal to start. Who would know?
...And that was assuming that they didn't feel like blending in like Clark was, and just excelling in human society as a sleeper agent instead. Or a double agent. A government or two would kill for someone like that, able to go in and kill targets at will. Navy Seals, CIA agents, military sharpshooters... Or corporate espionage. Criminal activities. Breaking into banks, robbing the wealthy blind... hell, raiding a governmental gold repository or two. Assassinations. Bombings. Delivery of drugs, guns, money, anything at high speed across country borders without the possibility of getting caught. God, the possibilities were endless.
"How do you even know Edge?" Lex said absently, thinking it was a good thing that Clark had been taken in by the Kents, and never run afoul of the criminal element.
"I, uh..." Clark looked uneasy at the question.
Lex brought his full attention back to Clark, about to correct himself -- he'd meant to say 'know about', because Chloe had generally kept to Smallvillian stories back in the day -- but then he realized: "When did you first meet him?"
"Not sure I'd call it a meeting, exactly," Clark said, bringing his knees up to his chest, defensively, while looking back at Lex.
"Clark! --How the hell did you get involved with Edge?!?" Lex asked, shocked. He watched Clark flinch.
"I didn't say I was!" the alien protested.
Lex gave him a 'don't fuck with me' glare and waited.
Clark fidgeted in place for awhile, looking more and more nervous. Lex closed his eyes and almost said something, then reopened them when he realized he couldn't think of something to say that wouldn't be scathing. As he was contemplating how the hell to respond, Clark suddenly blurted out, "Look, we had a deal --you don't talk about the island, and I don't talk about that summer in Metropolis! And I wasn't working for him! Not really! Dad came and got me, and I ended up telling Edge 'no'!"
Lex sat there silently staring at Clark for awhile.
Finally, Lex said, as lightly as he could, "You know, I don't ever remember 'making a deal' with you about that. And I certainly hadn't realized exactly how... colorful... your 'wild summer in Metropolis' must have been."
"The pact of silence was implied," Clark muttered, glaring at Lex and curling his legs in closer. He looked even more defensive than before.
"Do you want to talk about it?"
"No!" came the immediate response.
"What if I want to talk about the island?" Lex said cooly. Clark looked a little alarmed.
"I... don't..." Clark shifted from side to side. "...Do you ...want to?" he said, clearly hoping that Lex would say 'no'.
Lex smiled slowly.
"That's not fair," Clark muttered. "You can't just do that."
"Why not?"
"Because I don't want to talk about it," Clark repeated, glaring at him again.
I really shouldn't be pushing him, Lex reminded himself. Alien overlord-to-be, right here. No meteor rock within reach. I should be worried and trying to calm him down, not rileing him up.
But for whatever reason, he didn't feel afraid of Clark at all right now.
"You're not ever sending me back to Belle Reeve, are you?" Lex asked, reasonably sure that he already knew the answer to that.
"You practically own the place now, anyway. You'd probably just tell them to let you out with no drugs or psychotherapy or anything and they'd do it. If you actually needed help, that'd be the last place I send you, though. It's horrible there." Clark shuddered.
...Why am I still not feeling so afraid of him anymore? Lex thought. He just admitted that he might have me committed, if he thought...
Then Lex took in a slow breath as he realized what it was.
Clark shared something with me. Something true.
Clark had explained, shared, told Lex something that Lex hadn't even known he was missing, that he had really needed to know and hear. And Clark certainly hadn't needed to do it. But he'd shared it anyway, and he'd done it because he was worried about Lex's mental well-being. Even knowing the risk of Lex prying further into possibly alien-ability-related details, from the sound of things, and even feeling that he didn't come off in a good light from his inaction and then late ineffectual action, he'd shared the information anyway.
It wasn't the whole truth, but... It was enough.
And that was exactly why he'd given Clark the POA in the first place.
Clark is looking out for me. It was unbelievable, yet also true.
Hell, Clark even had a plan -- an actually workable plan -- to pull him out of the country if things ever went so far south that they might need to literally disappear, and it hadn't even taken much prodding to get Clark to think of it on the spot.
I really need to stop underestimating him. Lex hadn't used to do that. When had he started?
...When Clark started baldly lying to my face. He'd thought that somehow if Clark couldn't lie to him properly, that equated to some sort of stupidity, either in an inability to cover his truth properly with falsehood, or in believing that there would be no consequences for lying to Lex like that. And, for whatever reason, Clark had never tried to disabuse him of the notion. ...Or he hadn't realized that Lex no longer saw him the same way, or just didn't know how to fix it. --Or knew he couldn't fix it, because a key part of that would have involved telling the truth to make up for the lie.
Hell, I let him do it though, for years. There were so many times I could have called him on it, but let it go.
We stopped socializing, and started fighting, and he never seemed to win. He always seemed to give up in the end, and I thought that meant that he was either weak-willed, or too stupid to change my mind or otherwise battle himself a victory. Lex should have known better, because that line of thought came straight from Lionel's book of wisdom. Lex did know better, because Clark did things that put the lie to either of those traits every damn day.
He's not weak-willed, he bends for the people he cares about, and those he doesn't want to hurt. He stands tall against anyone he sees trying to hurt someone he cares about. Which was every damn meteor freak out there, for a start, and once Clark was on the trail after one of those, he didn't stop untli there was a resolution, one way or another. No-one 'weak-willed' did something like that.
He's not stupid, either.
"If you talk about the island? I am still so not talking about that summer in Metropolis," Clark said warningly, still glaring, and hunched over so far that his eyes were barely peeking over his knees.
Lex leaned back, then realized he'd been having a rather long discussion with Clark so far, and glanced down at his watch.
"Look, why don't we put this discussion on hold until we've gotten some lunch?" Lex offered.
Clark groaned at the 'on hold' part, then brightened. "Lunch?" he said, then started to droop again. "Wait -- real lunch, or one of those corporate things?"
Lex nearly laughed. "Real lunch. Where do you want to go?"
Clark shrugged. "They've got that really good hot dog vendor over by Centennial Park..."
"Hotdogs? Really, Clark?"
Clark nodded hopefully.
Lex sighed, and Clark grinned.
"We don't have to go to just that one vendor, you know," Clark offered, as he stretched his legs out from the side of the couch and stood up. "There's plenty of other places along the way we can stop by if you don't want hotdogs for lunch," he said reasonably.
Lex stood slowly and covertly stretched. "Two different places?" That was new. Adult, but new. "What if I want to just stop off at a restaurant to dine in instead?" Lex tested.
Clark paused, blinking. "Uh, well, then I guess you can do that? I'm planning on finding a bench at the park to eat," he said as he quickly checked his wallet.
Willing to eat together, but not willing to compromise on location, including planning on funding his own meal if he has to? Lex, as a rule, usually paid for full meals if they went out someplace together. "Is there a reason you want to eat outside so badly, Clark?
"Huh?" Clark said, sounding startled and looking up as he put his wallet away.
"You don't seem willing to compromise on a food establishment or a location."
"If it's something on the way that looks good, that's fine. It doesn't have to be hotdogs," Clark said, frowning a little.
"Then it's just the location?"
"What's wrong with the park?"
"Nothing, but you usually tend to be more... polite about working out a common meal."
Clark's frown deepened slightly.
Lex pressed a lttle further. "Is there any particular reason you need to be at the park?"
"I... that's not..." Clark looked down and frowned. "I don't need to be at the park, I just..."
Lex walked over to him. "Clark...?" he asked. For some reason, the way Clark was acting, this didn't seem like just a simple thing.
"I... don't know," Clark said finally, looking at Lex with a confused frown. "I just... I haven't been outside all day. It's... green there." He seemed to be having a hard time trying to describe the why of it.
"Ok, Clark. I was just curious. You usually aren't that direct or abrupt about what you want," Lex said, tilting his head and walking for his office doors.
"I'm not?" Clark asked, looking surprised.
"Not so much," Lex said, holding the door for him. "Not with me, anyway."
"Oh," Clark said, looking a little thoughtful. "...Really?"
Lex nodded.
"Huh," said Clark. "Is that... bad?"
"It's easier if you're more open. I'd rather not have to guess," Lex laughed.
Clark gave him an odd look as he followed, then fell into step beside Lex as they headed for the elevator.
It was a short ride down, but neither of them said a word.
Lex only realized belatedly as they walked out of the building that Clark couldn't have taken care of him straight out of Belle Reeve the way he'd suggested without using his powers -- not once they were out of the state, and certainly not once they were out of the country. The wrong state license plates would be a big red flag for the police, for a start. Not to mention that trying to drive around in a vehicle south of the border would be too conspicuous, there weren't enough gas stations, and there was no way that Clark could hide how easily he could 'hunt and forage' for food and water enough for the both of them, either on route or in the deep jungle.
Did he say that because he looked at the pictures in the packet, and knows that I know? Was this a way that Clark was trying to acknowledge the truth without talking about it outright?
...But Clark's never really been that subtle before, Lex thought. Though I don't know what else it could be...
He thought over it a bit, and wondered if it was just that Clark hadn't thought it through completely. After all, he'd only been thinking things through as far as Lex had prodded him for more details.
He started out by extrapolating from the day when he tried to break me out, though, he mused. But the driving part sounded almost... tacked on... Lex realized. What was he going to do instead, pick me up and carry me, and run halfway across Kansas, and all of Oklahoma and Texas, straight across the Mexican border?
Then he blinked and glanced at Clark out of the corner of his eye as they walked across the street, headed towards the park.
He couldn't do that if I didn't know. He'd have broken his cover and had to explain. And if one thing was a constant with Clark, it was that he did not talk about alien stuff with Lex. Ever. No abilities, no nothing. Not a thing that could be tied to him not being normal -- forget the thought of even thinking of using the possibility of being a meteor freak as an excuse or a cover. Lex would bet that Clark never did anything around the non-meteor freaks or the uninitiated that could even suggest that he might be an alien. No, the only way Clark could have done that, using his powers openly, would be if...
If...
HELL, NO!
Lex hauled off and punched Clark in the arm as hard as he could, right in the middle of the street.
"Ow! What the hell was that for?!"
~*~*~*~*~*~
Clark was glaring at him all the way to the park.
Clark glanced away for a moment and rubbed his arm again.
Lex punched his arm again in the same spot when Clark got distracted.
Clark didn't say anything, just winced away and glared some more. He didn't say anything, because he'd learned from the last dozen or so times that Lex had hit him and he'd complained that Lex wasn't going to respond with anything other than silence.
They found a bench in a remote section of the park and sat down.
Lex soundlessly started in on his sandwich.
Clark set down his armful of hotdogs (which he'd paid for himself, with nary a look in Lex's direction as he did so). Then he crossed his arms and glared down at Lex some more.
"Are you finally going to tell me why you keep hitting me?!" Clark asked darkly.
Lex met Clark's glare with a glare of his own. He took his time, finished his mouthful, swallowed.
Then deliberately took another bite.
"You hit me again and I'm going to hit you back," Clark warned him, sounding like he meant it.
Lex finished his bite. He eyed Clark.
"I asked you if you wanted to tell me something, Clark," Lex said coldly. Two years. Two fucking years.
"What?" Then Clark seemed to get it. "And I said 'no.' It wasn't important."
"It wasn't important," Lex slowly repeated in a monotone.
...You fucking goddamn alien liar. Two fucking years I could have known!
Lex hit him again -- or tried to, except Clark slid sideways slightly and grabbed his wrist.
"Stop it!"
"You want me to stop hitting you?" Lex said, wrenching away his wrist as Clark let go.
Clark nodded.
"FIne. You tell me why you ran." You weren't just trying to get me out because you thought I wasn't crazy. You were trying to get me out because you felt guilty that you ran away and left me there.
Clark winced and looked away. "I told you, I was scared."
"Of what, Clark?"
No response.
"Of what."
"You," Clark said, looking back at him. "I was scared of you. Of what you were going to say or do."
"Bullshit."
"I'm not lying," Clark said stubbornly, setting his jaw.
"Why would you be afraid of me, huh? Why would you be afraid of what I'd do?" If you'd ever tell me the fucking truth-- I'd go a lot easier on you than I will when I finish finding it all out myself...
"Because you were out of your mind, ok!? You were acting scary."
"I was drugged Clark, you knew that. Did I only suddenly start getting scary then?" Lex all-but-sneered.
Clark clenched his teeth, then turned on him. "No, I think you were a hell of a lot scarier when you nearly shot me dead after Edge finished beating me into the floor."
Lex went cold and his gut churned. Not possible. "I did not."
But it felt true.
"Only because you didn't shoot Edge badly enough to keep him from getting away, and got distracted from me going after him because you wanted to finish him off first."
Lex wished he hadn't eaten any of his sandwich. At this rate, it was going to come back up.
"I would not. Ever. Shoot you." Not that it would fucking matter, because you're bulletproof away from meteor rock, aren't you!
"I think we both know by now that that isn't true," Clark said, looking him straight in the eye.
The emphasis wasn't lost on Lex.
He tallied up the number of times he had blank spots in his memory, and how many of those times he had had known violent behavior during those episodes.
One of those times had involved mind control by someone who had wanted Clark dead, and had ended with a torched car riddled with bullet holes from a automatic weapon.
Another had involved a black meteor rock explosion and a 'dark side' of his escaping from the boundaries of his mind in its own copy of his body and running amuck.
Both times Clark had seemed very relieved that Lex couldn't remember anything afterwards.
And now, this.
Three times I knew?
Hindsight was 20-20. Always.
"I shot Edge once and he didn't die."
"You told me you were going to kill me."
"I was drugged."
"Not that drugged."
"Why would I want to kill you? Was I hallucinating?" Lex ground out.
"You were lucid enough."
"Then. Why. If I was 'lucid enough' then I must have had a reason."
"You thought I'd been conspiring with Edge on everything because we knew each other."
"Were you?" Lex asked, with narrowed eyes.
"No!" Clark denied.
"But you knew him from your Metropolis summer. You'd worked with him before."
"No! God! I just--" Clark crossed his arms and looked like he wanted to hit something. "I didn't want anything to do with him."
"Clark--"
"I was trying to help you!"
That's it. "Clark, if you ever want me to trust you again, you had better damn well explain to me how you knew Edge, because I don't believe you."
And Lex knew after he'd finished saying it that he'd overstepped his bounds. This was all tied up with memories of Jonathan, for a start, not to mention that Clark had said not ten minutes earlier that he didn't want to talk about that summer. And giving Clark an ultimatum like that was a bad idea, especially now. It wasn't as though Lex had anything Clark wanted, that would make him pause and reconsider the consequences of not answering.
But right now, Lex was too angry to care.
He waited for Clark to get up and walk away.
Except he didn't.
Clark just continued to sit there and looked pained, not meeting his eyes.
"I told you I don't want to talk about that summer," Clark said finally.
"Not good enough."
"What the hell do you want from me?!?" Clark exploded, looking like he was half-losing his mind.
"The truth."
Clark clenched his fists on his knees, looked down, and made a noise between a groan and a snarl.
"Is that too hard for you?" Lex asked, his mind spinning through possibilities of why Clark hadn't left yet, and discarding them just as quickly, one after another.
"I could ask you the same thing!"
"Don't you try and turn this around on me, Clark -- I've been as honest as possible with you lately!"
"Which just means that you're not being completely honest, either!"
"So you admit it!" Lex stabbed a finger at his chest.
"What?"
"You admit that you're not completely honest with me!"
"Neither are you!"
"But you admit it!" He hadn't ever before!
Clark looked at him in complete and total frustration. "What the hell, Lex?"
"Just say it!"
"What?"
"Say you admit it!"
"I admit it."
"HAH!"
"Are you an idiot?" Clark asked him.
Lex froze.
"--Or do you think I am?" Clark said, just as coldly. "Because I'm pretty aware that I don't usually lie very well to you, and that you pretty much always notice when I am."
Lex got a bad feeling.
"Or is this just another one of those things that I thought we never talked about, only this one is one of those ones where you actually thought I'd never bring it up, except that I never promised that."
Oh, you son of a--
"It's hardly my fault you can't lie worth a damn."
Clark gave him a cold, even look.
Then he closed his eyes, took a deep breath, and...
...suddenly smiled, and looked like he normally did.
Used to. Before Jonathan died.
Happy.
Clark smiled sunnily, and his whole countenance... changed.
He relaxed into the bench, throwing an elbow over the back, and said, "Hey, Lex, it's a great day, isn't it? Green skies, no clouds," he said casually, glancing up.
Lex automatically followed his gaze and glanced up at the pale blue sky with patches of grey cloud cover.
It took a moment for that to sink in.
Lex's eyes went wide, and his head whipped back to Clark, but before he could say anything...
"You know, I'm looking forward to hanging out at the Talon tomorrow afternoon. Chloe's little sister is really fun to babysit. She really likes playing with Legos. It's a good thing Lois has a ton of them around the apartment."
Lex nearly choked on air, because for a second there he found himself trying to recall the name of a sibling of Chloe's when Chloe was an only child and he knew this.
Then he remembered that Lois wasn't one for educational toys.
And Lex felt like reality was slowly unwinding as Clark picked up a hotdog and ate his lunch as he chattered away about friends he hung out with -- who he might-or-might-not have actually spent time with, Lex wasn't sure, because he hadn't kept up on Clark's associations at college -- and what was on TV last night, and reminded Lex about an old movie they'd watched together that was one of his favorites, and started quoting from it...
...except that TV show wasn't on last night, and Lex had never seen that movie. If fact, he was pretty sure it didn't exist, because the series Clark had brought up was a three-parter, and Lex had seen all of them alone, and none of them with Clark...
And Lex realized with a flash that this must be what doublethink felt like, because he would listen to Clark and get pulled in and follow along... until something tripped up in his head and he knew Clark was lying, because he couldn't remember something Clark was referring to or he knew that something was wrong... except that he somehow lost track of it not too long after... and he found himself relaxing almost against his will to the oh-so-normal cadence of Clark's voice as it was when he was generally feeling happy and unstressed...
Lex started to relax enough that his hands drifted towards his sandwich. At one point he asked a question about something, and Clark changed topics and rambled on about that. Lex felt like he was losing track of reality -- and was there something wrong with him? was he just misremembering? -- but it didn't seem to really matter, somehow. And then Clark said:
"...and I think that's enough to prove my point, right?"
And then Clark sat back and the whole pretense just dropped off of his face like it was never there.
Cold and angry Clark. He took another bite of a hotdog and chewed it aggressively.
Lex sat there for a moment.
And then he fell out of it all-at-once.
Because oh god what was that?!? And his mind went WRONG WRONG WRONG WRONG and all he could do was stammer, "No-- you-- that's-- you can't--"
"I damn well can lie," Clark said, without a trace of guilt.
Lex stared at him.
And then he demanded, "WHY?!?!"
Because why did he? --Why didn't he before? Why now? Why not then?
"Because you ask, and I lie, and then we don't talk about it." Clark took another bite of his hotdog, then glared at him. "Except then you go and research me and stuff behind my back, and that's not--"
"--Because you lied! Badly!" If you didn't want me to know enough to look, then why didn't you lie well?!
Clark glowered. "And you were supposed to stop asking!"
"I wanted to know why you were lying!" I wanted to know the truth. If you didn't want me to know, then, goddamnit, why would you let me know even that much? Why wouldn't you make sure that I never even had a chance of finding out?
"Do you think I lie to you because I enjoy it? Do you think I think it's fun?" Clark demanded. "You couldn't figure this out?"
"You never trusted me with your secret!" I knew, I knew before, and then I didn't, and you wouldn't tell me again. I can't have known sometimes and then only ever wanted to kill you afterwards, or I'd feel that way now! I wasn't myself before. Why wouldn't you trust me?
"Trust isn't the issue here, Lex!" Clark said, sounding mad as hell. "It doesn't have to do with trust, it has to do with boundaries! Nobody should have to tell somebody everything, and everybody has things they don't want to talk about, secret or not."
"If you'd just told me, I wouldn't have to ask!" Why didn't you tell me after I got out of Belle Reeve? I must have kept your secret, or Lionel would have found out, and if he'd known from back then, he never would have left you alone for so long--
"Whether I wanted to tell you or not has nothing to do with it, either!" Clark spat back. "And if you didn't ask, I wouldn't have to lie!"
"I--" This doesn't make sense. None of this makes any sense!
And then Clark got up and walked away.
Lex, feeling more than a little frantic, quickly got up to follow him.
And then Lex nearly ran into him from behind when Clark stopped at a garbage bin and threw his trash away.
"What?" Clark asked, sounding angry and aggrieved.
Lex stared up at Clark. He told himself to remember to breathe.
Lex found himself hugging Clark as hard as he could, and he was pretty sure that he hadn't been thinking anything like that.
Clark was stock-still and motionless.
And then Clark said, sounding equal parts annoyed and worried, "Damnit, Lex," and wrapped his arms around him.
Oh god, Lex thought. I don't know what to do anymore. Because he didn't want to kill him, and he didn't even really want to hurt him, and Clark had power over him and he wasn't even sure he wanted that to change, because maybe it almost helped even out the whole being-deathly-allergic-to-rocks thing, when Clark didn't seem willing to use his powers around him.
I want to know what's going on, I want to feel safe, and I want to be happy. And that was really all he ever wanted.
But what he mumbled into Clark's shoulder was: "Why couldn't you just tell me, Clark? Why couldn't you just tell me?"
And it was only after he felt Clark stiffen slightly that he realized what he'd just admitted.
Then he felt Clark slowly relax -- force himself to relax -- and Clark's arms wrapped around him a little more fully, one hand traveling up his back.
Lex waited for Clark to snap his neck. He closed his eyes and prayed it was quick.
And then Clark said, low and right by his ear, "Because my parents told me not to, and Lionel would find out."
Lex shivered.
And then he grasped Clark more tightly, almost spasmodically.
"What-- what are you going to do?" Lex asked, barely above a whisper.
"Hope Lionel doesn't find out."
Oh god.
Lex nearly burst into tears.
It wasn't what he said. It was what he didn't say.
~*~*~*~*~*~
AN2: ...Ok, so not a cliffy, and we're all cool, right? Right? *crosses fingers*
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 section here.
~*~*~*~*~*~
Lex didn't want to be angry with Clark, but he didn't know why.
...Actually, that was a lie -- he did know why: it was because it hurt. Badly.
Clark didn't want Lionel as a father, and he didn't want Lionel's approval.
Lex, on the other hand, would damn near kill for it, what Clark was being offered -- no, straight-up given -- free and clear.
Am I just not good enough? ...But Lionel didn't want Lex good, Lionel had only ever wanted Lex to behave, to do as he said, as he wanted... whenever he didn't want Lex to fight him and be a challenge. I can't be better than him and willing to follow him around like a good little dog. They're mutually exclusive. Because to be better at business than Lionel was to be willing to serve no-one; Lex had had that drilled into him from damn near birth.
It's not fair. Lex couldn't be whatever Lionel wanted him to be. He wasn't even sure what thatwas, anymore.
He knew better by now than to want it, to want Lionel's approval and his love (what love a Luthor could feel for another person, anyway), but he still ached for it so badly that it hurt, too. ...It hurt worse to be angry at Clark about it, but not by much.
Why does he want the 'perfect son' in Clark, anyway? He's just some farm boy.
...Except he really isn't, now is he?
But no -- Lionel couldn't know that Clark was Kalel. He couldn't. He'd have done something about it, used the green meteor rock on Kalel that he knew was a weakness of the aliens. Lionel would have immediately tried to gain control of Clark and subvert him by force, locked him up and...
Lex shuddered from behind his desk. He looked up and over at Clark, who was lying on the couch in his office, curled up, facing the room but fitfully tense in his sleep.
Lionel couldn't have already done it, at least. Clark hasn't been out of anyone's sight for any significant period of time since the aliens landed ...in the second meteor shower. Chloe would've noticed if something was wrong, too, more than likely. Martha, too. And Clark outright hates him. And that scared Lex a little, because he saw what had happened to Clark when he felt that shaky hatred, how it was poisoning him, even now. He could just look up at him and see it, plain as day.
Clark shouldn't hate. There was something really wrong with even the idea of it.
God help him, he didn't want Clark to ever kill anyone, and it wasn't even because he was worried that it would break Clark afterwards and shake his core beliefs, instilled in him by Jonathan as they had been over the years. ...No, Lex was deathly afraid of something else entirely. Now he was afraid that Clark might actually enjoy it. The power. The feeling of control. Because Lex had felt it; he'd felt it all. ...And yes, he'd gotten sick well afterwards, but not during it all. And with the way Clark seemed to be twisting in the wind right now, and with Lionel's death the easy solution, the quick way out, and what a relief it would be for Clark to not have to worry about him any more, Clark could easily become addicted to the feeling. Clark might become a killer, and decide he enjoyed it.
...Really? Is that what I'm most afraid of?
No. No, it wasn't. Because if he were honest with himself...
...Clark wasn't the one Lex was worried about 'going to the dark side', as it were.
He was projecting.
Because it would be so easy. And Lionel wouldn't be a problem anymore.
He was family. He could do it himself. It had a rightness to it, almost. Keep it in the family. Luthors deal with their own.
...Clark would never forgive him if he ever found out. And he would find out.
Wouldn't he?
Or would he?
Clark wasn't all that inquisitive on his own. And Clark wanted Lionel dead, too. Maybe he'd be happy Lionel died. Maybe he'd be grateful.
Maybe he'd thank Lex for doing it. For helping make him safe.
But even if Clark didn't find out, someone would. Chloe would probably suspect and tell him. And even if Clark agreed with Lex to start with, for doing what needed to be done, he'd either end up getting turned against Lex by Chloe later, or have to do something about Chloe having found out what Lex had done, and Lex wouldn't want Clark put in either position. Because Chloe knew Clark's secret, and Lex doubted very much that Chloe would be comfortable serving under an alien master that was ok with murder. If Lex killed Lionel and Clark was ok with it, then he'd be risking the very real chance that Chloe would, in her fear and anger at Clark's inaction, then go off and blow Clark's cover, turning him over to those less-inclined to be reasonable about the existence of aliens on Earth so long as they didn't threaten the status quo. And since keeping Clark safe from just that sort of outcome -- himself and his abilities a secret from those who would misuse them -- that meant that Lex would have to kill Chloe, too. Unfortunately, if Lex killed Chloe, there was no way Clark would be ok with it. Which would lead to exactly the same problem as if Clark hadn't been ok with Lex killing Lionel in the first place -- in direct opposition to Lex. Which would mean that Lex would either have to become the subjugating oppressor himself, or let Clark take him out of the picture, thus leaving the Earth wide open and vulnerable to attack without someone in power to put forth any real opposition to an invasion. Which meant that Lex killing Lionel was a very bad idea, that had a near-zero chance of a good outcome.
Lex brushed a hand through Clark's soft hair, then started slightly as he realized what he was doing. He'd hardly remembered walking over to the couch and crouching down in front of it.
But, now that he was here...
And already had a hand in Clark's hair...
And Clark's eyes were open.
SHIT!
Lex froze where he was.
Clark's eyes were focused on Lex. He blinked at him.
"What are you doing?" he said, in a voice still a little low and rough from too much crying.
"I'm not sure," said Lex, because it was true. "I think I may hate you a little," he said. Which was also true.
Clark's eyes widened. He pulled away and sat up abruptly. Lex remained crouched at Clark's knees.
"You hate me?" Clark looked a little scared. More than a little scared. Very scared.
"Maybe. Just a little." Lex stood up slowly, until he was the one towering over Clark. "I'm very angry with you right now."
"Why?" Clark said, sounding desperately sorry. "I... I... am I, was I being too loud? Lois said I snore, but..."
lex felt a severe mental disconnect for a moment. He sat down on the couch next to Clark. "You don't snore."
"Oh." Clark looked a little relieved, then a little annoyed, probably all with Lois. "But..." Then Clark looked confused and worried. "What did I do? Should I have... not been in here?"
"Clark, you've hardly disrupted my work when you've camped out in the library at the mansion awake; what makes you think you were disrupting my work here while asleep?"
"I don't know, you said you were angry with me!" Clark said, rubbing at his eyes tiredly. "And you weren't this morning..." Then he frowned a little, started slightly in realization, and said, in a lowering tone, "I shouldn't have said anything this morning. You didn't want me to say anything; you were really trying to tell me to stop and I didn't..." he ended on a note of horror and shame.
"No, Clark. That's not it."
Clark looked up at him and went blank for a moment. "I... I don't understand. You did want me to tell you?" He frowned again. "Oh. Just you, not everybody."
"No, Clark. You did very well, saying what you did. It was damn near perfect timing, in fact."
"...I don't get it."
"You saved the day."
"...Huh?"
"If you hadn't said what you did, Lionel would have walked right into that boardroom and started the hostile takeover, right then and there."
"But you would've stopped him!"
"No, Clark. I couldn't."
"But you did! You just did! You told everyone no!"
"I couldn't have done that with any authority if you hadn't said what you had."
"But they wouldn't have listened to just me! You did that!"
"And if you hadn't been there--"
"--Then you would've just read about it in the Planet later tonight and called it all off then!"
"It's your damn article, Clark!"
"It... It's not really mine, it's Chloe's; she wrote it," Clark said, looking affronted. "Why are you so mad that I helped? If you really couldn't stop him yourself, why wouldn't you be happy that I could help you so you could stop him?" he asked, sounding confused.
Pride. Vanity. This is why they're sins. It still hurt, though, and Lex was still angry. "Doesn't Chloe ever get angry after you've helped her out?"
"Yeah, but not with paper-stuff."
"Oh? What's the difference?" Lex asked with dry sarcasm.
...which apparently Clark hadn't yet been exposed to enough to pick up on. "With the paper-stuff, like the Planet articles, and the Torch and Wall of Weird stuff, I ask Chloe how I can help out, and she tells me what's going on and how I can help, so I know what to do. Then she only gets mad if I don't manage to do whatever-it-is, and that makes sense, because I'd told her I would and just screwed it up somehow. It's everything else that she gets all weird about. I mean, I get the personal stuff -- she doesn't like being wrong about people, so she especially doesn't want to hear it when the boyfriend she's dating is actually homicidal and a total liar and cheating on her, because it means she was really really wrong about somebody, but when that happens she's just gonna be angry in general about everything afterwards, not just me -- so I get that now."
And the last bit implied that Clark hadn't gotten it at the time, but was 'older and wiser' now, and Lex had to choke down a laugh, because he knew which meteor freak situation Clark was referring to -- he'd learned about Ian second-hand from the deceased-patient Belle Reeve files that had been transferred to the Level 3 docket -- ...and it really wasn't all that funny, honestly. Clark either didn't notice his reaction, or he'd successfully suppressed it, because Clark kept going.
"But I don't get it when something goes wrong and maybe she doesn't know about it, so I go and try to fix it on my own because she can't do anything about it, and maybe I'm the only one who can... because I'm there --and then she gets mad because I did that..." Clark trailed off, and seemed to be expending a lot of brain power in pulling parallels between Chloe and Lex, though Lex had thought it all quite obvious just listening to him talk.
Though if Clark was pulling parallels between Chloe and Ian and him and Desiree... -- well, he hadn't gone off on Clark once he was no longer under the influence; he'd thanked him for trying. Though it would have helped if Clark had outright told me that Desiree was a meteor freak, instead of the mess afterwards, with her nearly escaping jail and-- Lex shook his head to clear it. Clark had probably thought it obvious at the time... or thought Lex had known when he'd said what he had about 'passion' and being more careful, since he had nearly fought off her control more than once on his own during their short... 'courtship'...
"Is it because I didn't ask first? Because that doesn't seem very fair..." Clark said after awhile, pulling a face. "I shouldn't have to worry about whether you guys are going to be mad at me later, just because I went ahead and did something you probably weren't expecting because you didn't know about something that was going on, and I don't see why either of you would think I need to get permission from you just to do what I think is right."
"Clark, that's not--" god, that's totally unreasonable, he can't actually think that we--
"--And even if I did feel like doing that, I don't usually have time to ask anyway, if I'm in the middle of stuff with a meteor freak, or your dad, or whatever. I mean, I can't just ask whoever to stop what they're doing for awhile because I need to call Chloe and Lex now, so I can get their approval on what I want to do and maybe have them tell me to do something totally different and argue it out with them first, and expect whoever to be all like 'Oh, ok. I'll just stop trying to kill you and your friends and sit over here while you figure things out, no rush.' "
Jesus.
"Clark..."
"I mean, I get that your dad wasn't trying to kill you this morning? But he was trying to ruin a bunch of people's lives, so..."
Context is really not for the weak. Is this how Clark usually thinks about things? Lex thought, rubbing a hand across his face. "Clark, I don't expect that from you" -- though I wouldn't mind at the very least being extended the common courtesy of being told the truth about things after the fact! -- "and that's really not the point."
"Ok, then what is the point?" Clark said in exasperation.
"The point is that people" -- human beings -- "have emotions, and emotions are not rational, and sometimes I am going to be angry" -- I'll get over it, you can't do anything about it, but I can't help feeling it -- "when you do things that I can't do!"
"But you could have done it!" Clark said hotly. "You do research into companies all the time, and I know you know how to dig up dirt on people. You could have done it!"
--And that fucking hurt. Lex jumped up and shouted down at Clark. "No, I couldn't -- I didn't know!" And god, I should have, Lex berated himself I should have looked into the company Lionel was using to force the buyout, but it didn't even fucking occur to me, when it should have been the very first thing I did. Anyone willing to do business with Lionel would be-- because of course they would have to be--
Clark got to his feet and yelled right back, fists clenched: "I know you didn't know -- that's why I told you!!!"
Silence.
"Why the hell is it so wrong for me to help?!" Clark demanded, pacing away and making fists in his hair, before rounding on Lex again. "You didn't used to get angry when I helped! Chloe's always been like that, but you never used to be!"
...No, he hadn't. "But that was years ago." ...What changed?
"Then why aren't you 'rational' about it now??" Clark asked, throwing his arms out to the side and stopping in front of him.
Lex realized then that he'd said that out loud. And his thought process derailed a little bit, from vague snippets of you've lied to me so many times since then, and I know now that you don't trust me, and I didn't know back then that I probably couldn't do anything to earn your trust, and you may never decide to trust me, and at best I may only be able to demand compliance and force noninterference, and you're an alien, and you keep acting like we might be friends even though you said we're not anymore, and I might be having trouble reconciling that with the whole your-race-is-trying-to-subjugate-mine thing, and I'm not sure I can trust you anymore, and damnit, I'm allowed to feel whatever I want in the privacy of my own damn brain! I'm not acting on it, I'm just warning you about it, to...
Why am I not as rational about things now as I used to be?
No, a better question was: when had that first changed? And... I think I know that... he realized morosely.
"...You may remember that I had an extended stay at Belle Reeve at one point, Lex drew out, softly and very slowly, tucking his chin down against his chest and closing his eyes.
"Yeah, I remember that," Clark grated out, hunching his shoulders a little. "I--" Then Clark looked a little scared, then angry. "Lex, you're fine now, you-- you're better now. You got over it. You recovered, and got over it."
"Clark, people generally don't 'get over' a psychotic break like nothing ever happened," he said quietly, opening his eyes to stare at the floor. And that hurt to admit, but if he couldn't even be honest with himself... If nothing else, he had to be able to do that, or he really would be too far gone to...
Clark stared at him for a long time, and Lex kept his gaze lowered and was a littel afraid that he might have made a tactical error there. He was trying to be more honest and open with Clark, to help inspire the possibility of a more open working relationship with him, and a more balanced exchange of information in the future, because there were some things that he really needed to know about -- alien things chief among them. But. Admitting that he might not be completely sane was not the best way to inspire trust, and...
Clark had power of attorney over him for medical decisions. If Clark thought he wasn't well, Clark could send him right back to Belle Reeve, and Lex wouldn't be able to do a damn thing about it.
...No, Clark could send him back to Belle Reeve any time he felt like it. For any reason. Like if he got too close to Clark's secrets. Clark was living at the mansion now, he saw him all the time, he could say he'd seen Lex acting oddly; Clark could just lie about the why of it, and--
Oh, fuck. What have I done?!? Lex realized, going very cold. Oh god, I gave a young alien complete power over me, within my own culture's governmental legal power base. I-- Lex started to panic. If I withdraw the power of attorney, he'll know something's up and want to know why, and when he figures it out... But if I don't, I remain in constant danger, subject to his whims and suspicions. And who else could he appoint in Clark's stead? He couldn't give that power back over to Lionel, the traitor; Lionel wouldn't hesitate to use it against him, Lex knew that now -- Lionel wanted him and Clark separated, post-haste. I am well and truly fucked--
"You're not crazy."
Lex's head snapped up.
"Lex, you-- you're not crazy. You never were."
What?
"You-- you think... you really thought...? --Didn't Chloe tell you?" Clark said, lookng a little panicky.
What?!?
"I-- You two were together that whole summer before Lionel's trial, weren't you? I mean, you checked up on her a lot while she was in protective custody, you talked... I thought you both were getting along. I... I thought... --She really didn't tell you?!"
"Clark." Lex licked his dry lips and continued slowly. He felt like he was standing on a knife's edge, and didn't know why. "Clark, I had a psychotic break..."
"You were drugged."
"...Yes, Clark. They usually do that in mental--"
"--No, I mean before."
Lex paused, then said quietly, "...I know that they needed to subdue me with tranquilizers, but--" Clark was shaking his head.
"Lex, not that. It was in your scotch. And it wasn't tranquilizers in there."
Lex was having trouble breathing, because, somehow, this felt... true. He couldn't remember, but some part of him... did. He sat back down on the couch, hard.
"Lionel and Morgan Edge were working together to drive you crazy. They paid Darius to drug your scotch, and there was a bunch of other crazy stuff going on that... that you said happened, but..." Clark grimaced and looked away. "You said something had happened at two different places, but when we went back, there wasn't really any proof. At first, I thought you were right, but you started acting more and more crazy, and then Chloe said this stuff about how you'd also acted weird right after Julian... and then Lana got hurt and Lionel was just, everybody was just..." Clark rubbed his arms and shivered slightly like he was cold. "I wasn't really sure what to believe anymore, not after you ran off after threatening your... your psychologist?... with a gun and I had your medication checked, and it really was just a sedative. But Chloe brought up that that didn't mean that you werenn't being drugged, and I know how everybody brings you your food and drink at the mansion, so I thought... well... After I started pressuring people to talk, I found about the drugs in your scotch, and started tracing Darius' orders back to the source, and I finally caught up with you and Edge..."
"But Edge was dead. He died..." Lex said, putting his head in his hands.
Clark shook his head, squatting down in front of Lex. "We all thought that, but apparently he survived the explosion at the docks. He had plastic surgery, and a new name, and Lionel was setting him up someplace else. Nobody knew about it except you. Chloe's still not sure how you found out."
"What the hell was I doing with Edge?"
"Trying to get him to turn on Lionel, go state's evidence on your grandparent's death. But things went... bad. He tried to run you over with a car... you ended up shooting him dead."
I tried to turn a dangerous criminal like Edge state's evidence? A man with zero respect for the law? The man who started Intergang? I must have been out of my mind. But...
"You're leaving something out," Lex said roughly. There's something important here, that you're not saying... He raised his head to look at Clark. "How do you even know all this?"
Clark lowered his eyes. "I was there. Edge nearly killed me. You... you made him stop." Clark's eyes shifted sideways. "He tried to get away. And after he tried to run you over..." Clark swallowed and he turned his head away from Lex. "I got scared. And I ran."
And there's still something you're not saying, Lex thought, eyes narrowing. "What aren't you telling me?"
"I didn't get you out."
"I know that, Clark. But I also you know tried to."
Clark looked pained. "But I knew better and... I should've done it right away. I shouldn't have..." Clark stared down at his hands, wringing them together.
"Clark, you would have been arrested for kidnapping and locked away when they caught up to you. I was still pumped full of drugs. Neither of us would have been safe." Clark might be an alien conqueror, but he was a young alien conqueror, and he didn't seem very good at the whole 'doing whatever he wanted' thing. If the authorities had caught up with them, Clark's alienness would have been exposed, and if they hadn't... Lionel could have put pressure on Clark by threatening his other friends and his family, the Kents. He could have forced Clark to turn himself in, with that sort of leverage.
"That's what mom and dad said," Clark said darkly.
"They were right." Without family support, Clark would have had even less resources to draw on, if any. Lana was out. Pete was gone. Chloe would have been jittery about the whole thing. Hell, Clark himself had only been sixteen at the time. He couldn't have worked within the system to beat Lionel, and outside of that would've involved starting more-or-less a war between himself and Lionel, with gods-knew-who getting stuck in the middle, and the government, police, and military all on the wrong side. Lionel's side. Fuck.
"No, they weren't. It wasn't right. I should have gotten you out." And Clark was looking down angrily.
"So, what would you have done, Clark? After?" Because Lex had a feeling that Clark really hadn't ever really thought it through.
"What?" Clark said, looking up at him.
"You-- Come up here," Lex sighed, pulling Clark up to the couch next to him. "After you got me out, what would you have done?" Lex leaned back a little, studying Clark. "If you knew then what you know now, what would you have done differently? Could you have gotten me out? Where would we go? What would you do? How would we have lived?"
Clark looked down again. "Run. Hid. Waited. Taken care of you until you were better. Until the drugs were out of your system."
"That's all well and good, Clark, but I mean specifically -- how exactly would you have done it?"
"I almost got you out when I tried to break you out," Clark said looking up at him belligerently. "If they hadn't rescheduled the electroshock for right that afternoon, and I'd had just a little more time..."
"You... you tried to break me out?" And failed?
"I got you untied from your cot-bed-thing, but then we got jumped by some of the meteor freaks," Clark grimaced, looking away. "They grabbed me and... I didn't get back upstairs in time to stop the procedure."
"Van and Ian," Lex said slowly. He remembered from the reports that they'd died the same day under suspicious circumstances, but he had never put it together that that might have been connected somehow to his electroshock 'treatment'.
Clark looked at him oddly. "Ian and Eric. ...Why do you think Van had something to do with it? He wasn't there."
"Van was killed earlier that morning, if I remember correctly. The videos put Ian down as the culprit."
"Ian killed...?" Clark frowned. "Oh."
"Oh?"
"It's... nothing. I think maybe they all turned on each other, then. Eric killed Ian later. I barely managed to stop Eric, after."
Eric had intermittent alien-level powers... and when he'd been out, prior to his incarceration in Belle Reeve, he'd had those powers right around a time that Clark didn't seem to have them. And then he'd lost them, and Clark had suddenly seemed in much better shape thereafter. Had that been some sort of accidental transfer, not on purpose? Was there a trick to doing it, that such a temporary empowering of a human by an alien could be forced? That... could be useful, if it could be done without an alien's consent or help. If it could be done without some form of psychosis as a result -- Eric had been a troubled kid even before the incident (each incident?) but it was entirely possible that the procedure of transference wasn't safe for the human side of the equation.
"What are you thinking?" Clark asked.
Lex shook it off. "Fine, let's say that you could have gotten me out, then. What next?"
"I would've grabbed you, gotten you off the grounds--"
"How?"
"I don't know, borrowed one of their vans and a uniform and hid you in the back, and driven out the front, maybe? Or taken the service tunnels below the building; we would've walked out through the sewer system pipes and exited a mile or two away. It would've depended on who was watching what."
Lex stared at him. "And then what?"
"Well..." Clark frowned and rubbed the back of his neck. "I guess I would've hidden you someplace for the afternoon and gone back in to town, cleaned out my bank account, and then come back and we would've run."
"Hidden me where? And run on foot?" Lex pressed.
"Well, there are a lot of abandoned hunting cabins in pretty remote sections of the woods; Van wasn't the only person with one of those. Though if we'd had the van, I would've parked it someplace out in the woods and gone back myself. I guess... that probably wouldn't have worked so well, to keep driving it. I..." he paused for a bit, then said "I guess I could have paid a hundred or so for a lemon from the junkyard, drove that off, and then swapped it for another car at another junkyard in another town. Kept the car in gas, pay for things in cash, and head for the border. It's not that hard to get into Mexico, right?" Clark shrugged.
"Mexico," Lex repeated dully. Do you even know any spanish?
"Well, I don't think Lionel has much influence there, and they don't cooperate down there with the US as much as the Canadians would. The Mexican police wouldn't want to look for us, and they wouldn't just let the US authorities run around doing whatever they wanted."
"But the Mexican government is fairly corrupt, and most of the area is run by the drug cartels. Lionel could just buy people in power down there."
"So? We just wouldn't stay in the towns, we'd keep moving south. Get out of the desert, and into the rainforest. Nobody'd find us there."
"...And we would survive on what exactly, rainwater and air?"
Clark shrugged. "I could find stuff, forage for food, and I know how to hunt."
Well, of course he'd be unconcerned about food, he could probably run to a grocery store and back hundreds of miles away. He'd easily put people off our trail and all without arousing suspicions as to where we really were. Then Lex had to stop and think about that, because that actually really was a good way to disappear. If Clark ran down to a tropical region, he probably wouldn't even need to head back to civilization if he didn't want to -- he could quite possibly live off of whatever wild vegetation and animals were living in the area, literally live off of the land. And if he ate too much of the local fauna and flora to sustain him further, or someone seemed to be getting close to finding him? He could just run to a new area hundreds or thousands of miles away, and start right up again there. He could even trade food for clothing or supplies, if he made a stopover in on of the more second- or third- world countries along the way. He wouldn't even have to steal to get by.
Hell. A lot of alien-conquerers-to-be could live off the land like that, waiting for the signal to start. Who would know?
...And that was assuming that they didn't feel like blending in like Clark was, and just excelling in human society as a sleeper agent instead. Or a double agent. A government or two would kill for someone like that, able to go in and kill targets at will. Navy Seals, CIA agents, military sharpshooters... Or corporate espionage. Criminal activities. Breaking into banks, robbing the wealthy blind... hell, raiding a governmental gold repository or two. Assassinations. Bombings. Delivery of drugs, guns, money, anything at high speed across country borders without the possibility of getting caught. God, the possibilities were endless.
"How do you even know Edge?" Lex said absently, thinking it was a good thing that Clark had been taken in by the Kents, and never run afoul of the criminal element.
"I, uh..." Clark looked uneasy at the question.
Lex brought his full attention back to Clark, about to correct himself -- he'd meant to say 'know about', because Chloe had generally kept to Smallvillian stories back in the day -- but then he realized: "When did you first meet him?"
"Not sure I'd call it a meeting, exactly," Clark said, bringing his knees up to his chest, defensively, while looking back at Lex.
"Clark! --How the hell did you get involved with Edge?!?" Lex asked, shocked. He watched Clark flinch.
"I didn't say I was!" the alien protested.
Lex gave him a 'don't fuck with me' glare and waited.
Clark fidgeted in place for awhile, looking more and more nervous. Lex closed his eyes and almost said something, then reopened them when he realized he couldn't think of something to say that wouldn't be scathing. As he was contemplating how the hell to respond, Clark suddenly blurted out, "Look, we had a deal --you don't talk about the island, and I don't talk about that summer in Metropolis! And I wasn't working for him! Not really! Dad came and got me, and I ended up telling Edge 'no'!"
Lex sat there silently staring at Clark for awhile.
Finally, Lex said, as lightly as he could, "You know, I don't ever remember 'making a deal' with you about that. And I certainly hadn't realized exactly how... colorful... your 'wild summer in Metropolis' must have been."
"The pact of silence was implied," Clark muttered, glaring at Lex and curling his legs in closer. He looked even more defensive than before.
"Do you want to talk about it?"
"No!" came the immediate response.
"What if I want to talk about the island?" Lex said cooly. Clark looked a little alarmed.
"I... don't..." Clark shifted from side to side. "...Do you ...want to?" he said, clearly hoping that Lex would say 'no'.
Lex smiled slowly.
"That's not fair," Clark muttered. "You can't just do that."
"Why not?"
"Because I don't want to talk about it," Clark repeated, glaring at him again.
I really shouldn't be pushing him, Lex reminded himself. Alien overlord-to-be, right here. No meteor rock within reach. I should be worried and trying to calm him down, not rileing him up.
But for whatever reason, he didn't feel afraid of Clark at all right now.
"You're not ever sending me back to Belle Reeve, are you?" Lex asked, reasonably sure that he already knew the answer to that.
"You practically own the place now, anyway. You'd probably just tell them to let you out with no drugs or psychotherapy or anything and they'd do it. If you actually needed help, that'd be the last place I send you, though. It's horrible there." Clark shuddered.
...Why am I still not feeling so afraid of him anymore? Lex thought. He just admitted that he might have me committed, if he thought...
Then Lex took in a slow breath as he realized what it was.
Clark shared something with me. Something true.
Clark had explained, shared, told Lex something that Lex hadn't even known he was missing, that he had really needed to know and hear. And Clark certainly hadn't needed to do it. But he'd shared it anyway, and he'd done it because he was worried about Lex's mental well-being. Even knowing the risk of Lex prying further into possibly alien-ability-related details, from the sound of things, and even feeling that he didn't come off in a good light from his inaction and then late ineffectual action, he'd shared the information anyway.
It wasn't the whole truth, but... It was enough.
And that was exactly why he'd given Clark the POA in the first place.
Clark is looking out for me. It was unbelievable, yet also true.
Hell, Clark even had a plan -- an actually workable plan -- to pull him out of the country if things ever went so far south that they might need to literally disappear, and it hadn't even taken much prodding to get Clark to think of it on the spot.
I really need to stop underestimating him. Lex hadn't used to do that. When had he started?
...When Clark started baldly lying to my face. He'd thought that somehow if Clark couldn't lie to him properly, that equated to some sort of stupidity, either in an inability to cover his truth properly with falsehood, or in believing that there would be no consequences for lying to Lex like that. And, for whatever reason, Clark had never tried to disabuse him of the notion. ...Or he hadn't realized that Lex no longer saw him the same way, or just didn't know how to fix it. --Or knew he couldn't fix it, because a key part of that would have involved telling the truth to make up for the lie.
Hell, I let him do it though, for years. There were so many times I could have called him on it, but let it go.
We stopped socializing, and started fighting, and he never seemed to win. He always seemed to give up in the end, and I thought that meant that he was either weak-willed, or too stupid to change my mind or otherwise battle himself a victory. Lex should have known better, because that line of thought came straight from Lionel's book of wisdom. Lex did know better, because Clark did things that put the lie to either of those traits every damn day.
He's not weak-willed, he bends for the people he cares about, and those he doesn't want to hurt. He stands tall against anyone he sees trying to hurt someone he cares about. Which was every damn meteor freak out there, for a start, and once Clark was on the trail after one of those, he didn't stop untli there was a resolution, one way or another. No-one 'weak-willed' did something like that.
He's not stupid, either.
"If you talk about the island? I am still so not talking about that summer in Metropolis," Clark said warningly, still glaring, and hunched over so far that his eyes were barely peeking over his knees.
Lex leaned back, then realized he'd been having a rather long discussion with Clark so far, and glanced down at his watch.
"Look, why don't we put this discussion on hold until we've gotten some lunch?" Lex offered.
Clark groaned at the 'on hold' part, then brightened. "Lunch?" he said, then started to droop again. "Wait -- real lunch, or one of those corporate things?"
Lex nearly laughed. "Real lunch. Where do you want to go?"
Clark shrugged. "They've got that really good hot dog vendor over by Centennial Park..."
"Hotdogs? Really, Clark?"
Clark nodded hopefully.
Lex sighed, and Clark grinned.
"We don't have to go to just that one vendor, you know," Clark offered, as he stretched his legs out from the side of the couch and stood up. "There's plenty of other places along the way we can stop by if you don't want hotdogs for lunch," he said reasonably.
Lex stood slowly and covertly stretched. "Two different places?" That was new. Adult, but new. "What if I want to just stop off at a restaurant to dine in instead?" Lex tested.
Clark paused, blinking. "Uh, well, then I guess you can do that? I'm planning on finding a bench at the park to eat," he said as he quickly checked his wallet.
Willing to eat together, but not willing to compromise on location, including planning on funding his own meal if he has to? Lex, as a rule, usually paid for full meals if they went out someplace together. "Is there a reason you want to eat outside so badly, Clark?
"Huh?" Clark said, sounding startled and looking up as he put his wallet away.
"You don't seem willing to compromise on a food establishment or a location."
"If it's something on the way that looks good, that's fine. It doesn't have to be hotdogs," Clark said, frowning a little.
"Then it's just the location?"
"What's wrong with the park?"
"Nothing, but you usually tend to be more... polite about working out a common meal."
Clark's frown deepened slightly.
Lex pressed a lttle further. "Is there any particular reason you need to be at the park?"
"I... that's not..." Clark looked down and frowned. "I don't need to be at the park, I just..."
Lex walked over to him. "Clark...?" he asked. For some reason, the way Clark was acting, this didn't seem like just a simple thing.
"I... don't know," Clark said finally, looking at Lex with a confused frown. "I just... I haven't been outside all day. It's... green there." He seemed to be having a hard time trying to describe the why of it.
"Ok, Clark. I was just curious. You usually aren't that direct or abrupt about what you want," Lex said, tilting his head and walking for his office doors.
"I'm not?" Clark asked, looking surprised.
"Not so much," Lex said, holding the door for him. "Not with me, anyway."
"Oh," Clark said, looking a little thoughtful. "...Really?"
Lex nodded.
"Huh," said Clark. "Is that... bad?"
"It's easier if you're more open. I'd rather not have to guess," Lex laughed.
Clark gave him an odd look as he followed, then fell into step beside Lex as they headed for the elevator.
It was a short ride down, but neither of them said a word.
Lex only realized belatedly as they walked out of the building that Clark couldn't have taken care of him straight out of Belle Reeve the way he'd suggested without using his powers -- not once they were out of the state, and certainly not once they were out of the country. The wrong state license plates would be a big red flag for the police, for a start. Not to mention that trying to drive around in a vehicle south of the border would be too conspicuous, there weren't enough gas stations, and there was no way that Clark could hide how easily he could 'hunt and forage' for food and water enough for the both of them, either on route or in the deep jungle.
Did he say that because he looked at the pictures in the packet, and knows that I know? Was this a way that Clark was trying to acknowledge the truth without talking about it outright?
...But Clark's never really been that subtle before, Lex thought. Though I don't know what else it could be...
He thought over it a bit, and wondered if it was just that Clark hadn't thought it through completely. After all, he'd only been thinking things through as far as Lex had prodded him for more details.
He started out by extrapolating from the day when he tried to break me out, though, he mused. But the driving part sounded almost... tacked on... Lex realized. What was he going to do instead, pick me up and carry me, and run halfway across Kansas, and all of Oklahoma and Texas, straight across the Mexican border?
Then he blinked and glanced at Clark out of the corner of his eye as they walked across the street, headed towards the park.
He couldn't do that if I didn't know. He'd have broken his cover and had to explain. And if one thing was a constant with Clark, it was that he did not talk about alien stuff with Lex. Ever. No abilities, no nothing. Not a thing that could be tied to him not being normal -- forget the thought of even thinking of using the possibility of being a meteor freak as an excuse or a cover. Lex would bet that Clark never did anything around the non-meteor freaks or the uninitiated that could even suggest that he might be an alien. No, the only way Clark could have done that, using his powers openly, would be if...
If...
HELL, NO!
Lex hauled off and punched Clark in the arm as hard as he could, right in the middle of the street.
"Ow! What the hell was that for?!"
~*~*~*~*~*~
Clark was glaring at him all the way to the park.
Clark glanced away for a moment and rubbed his arm again.
Lex punched his arm again in the same spot when Clark got distracted.
Clark didn't say anything, just winced away and glared some more. He didn't say anything, because he'd learned from the last dozen or so times that Lex had hit him and he'd complained that Lex wasn't going to respond with anything other than silence.
They found a bench in a remote section of the park and sat down.
Lex soundlessly started in on his sandwich.
Clark set down his armful of hotdogs (which he'd paid for himself, with nary a look in Lex's direction as he did so). Then he crossed his arms and glared down at Lex some more.
"Are you finally going to tell me why you keep hitting me?!" Clark asked darkly.
Lex met Clark's glare with a glare of his own. He took his time, finished his mouthful, swallowed.
Then deliberately took another bite.
"You hit me again and I'm going to hit you back," Clark warned him, sounding like he meant it.
Lex finished his bite. He eyed Clark.
"I asked you if you wanted to tell me something, Clark," Lex said coldly. Two years. Two fucking years.
"What?" Then Clark seemed to get it. "And I said 'no.' It wasn't important."
"It wasn't important," Lex slowly repeated in a monotone.
...You fucking goddamn alien liar. Two fucking years I could have known!
Lex hit him again -- or tried to, except Clark slid sideways slightly and grabbed his wrist.
"Stop it!"
"You want me to stop hitting you?" Lex said, wrenching away his wrist as Clark let go.
Clark nodded.
"FIne. You tell me why you ran." You weren't just trying to get me out because you thought I wasn't crazy. You were trying to get me out because you felt guilty that you ran away and left me there.
Clark winced and looked away. "I told you, I was scared."
"Of what, Clark?"
No response.
"Of what."
"You," Clark said, looking back at him. "I was scared of you. Of what you were going to say or do."
"Bullshit."
"I'm not lying," Clark said stubbornly, setting his jaw.
"Why would you be afraid of me, huh? Why would you be afraid of what I'd do?" If you'd ever tell me the fucking truth-- I'd go a lot easier on you than I will when I finish finding it all out myself...
"Because you were out of your mind, ok!? You were acting scary."
"I was drugged Clark, you knew that. Did I only suddenly start getting scary then?" Lex all-but-sneered.
Clark clenched his teeth, then turned on him. "No, I think you were a hell of a lot scarier when you nearly shot me dead after Edge finished beating me into the floor."
Lex went cold and his gut churned. Not possible. "I did not."
But it felt true.
"Only because you didn't shoot Edge badly enough to keep him from getting away, and got distracted from me going after him because you wanted to finish him off first."
Lex wished he hadn't eaten any of his sandwich. At this rate, it was going to come back up.
"I would not. Ever. Shoot you." Not that it would fucking matter, because you're bulletproof away from meteor rock, aren't you!
"I think we both know by now that that isn't true," Clark said, looking him straight in the eye.
The emphasis wasn't lost on Lex.
He tallied up the number of times he had blank spots in his memory, and how many of those times he had had known violent behavior during those episodes.
One of those times had involved mind control by someone who had wanted Clark dead, and had ended with a torched car riddled with bullet holes from a automatic weapon.
Another had involved a black meteor rock explosion and a 'dark side' of his escaping from the boundaries of his mind in its own copy of his body and running amuck.
Both times Clark had seemed very relieved that Lex couldn't remember anything afterwards.
And now, this.
Three times I knew?
Hindsight was 20-20. Always.
"I shot Edge once and he didn't die."
"You told me you were going to kill me."
"I was drugged."
"Not that drugged."
"Why would I want to kill you? Was I hallucinating?" Lex ground out.
"You were lucid enough."
"Then. Why. If I was 'lucid enough' then I must have had a reason."
"You thought I'd been conspiring with Edge on everything because we knew each other."
"Were you?" Lex asked, with narrowed eyes.
"No!" Clark denied.
"But you knew him from your Metropolis summer. You'd worked with him before."
"No! God! I just--" Clark crossed his arms and looked like he wanted to hit something. "I didn't want anything to do with him."
"Clark--"
"I was trying to help you!"
That's it. "Clark, if you ever want me to trust you again, you had better damn well explain to me how you knew Edge, because I don't believe you."
And Lex knew after he'd finished saying it that he'd overstepped his bounds. This was all tied up with memories of Jonathan, for a start, not to mention that Clark had said not ten minutes earlier that he didn't want to talk about that summer. And giving Clark an ultimatum like that was a bad idea, especially now. It wasn't as though Lex had anything Clark wanted, that would make him pause and reconsider the consequences of not answering.
But right now, Lex was too angry to care.
He waited for Clark to get up and walk away.
Except he didn't.
Clark just continued to sit there and looked pained, not meeting his eyes.
"I told you I don't want to talk about that summer," Clark said finally.
"Not good enough."
"What the hell do you want from me?!?" Clark exploded, looking like he was half-losing his mind.
"The truth."
Clark clenched his fists on his knees, looked down, and made a noise between a groan and a snarl.
"Is that too hard for you?" Lex asked, his mind spinning through possibilities of why Clark hadn't left yet, and discarding them just as quickly, one after another.
"I could ask you the same thing!"
"Don't you try and turn this around on me, Clark -- I've been as honest as possible with you lately!"
"Which just means that you're not being completely honest, either!"
"So you admit it!" Lex stabbed a finger at his chest.
"What?"
"You admit that you're not completely honest with me!"
"Neither are you!"
"But you admit it!" He hadn't ever before!
Clark looked at him in complete and total frustration. "What the hell, Lex?"
"Just say it!"
"What?"
"Say you admit it!"
"I admit it."
"HAH!"
"Are you an idiot?" Clark asked him.
Lex froze.
"--Or do you think I am?" Clark said, just as coldly. "Because I'm pretty aware that I don't usually lie very well to you, and that you pretty much always notice when I am."
Lex got a bad feeling.
"Or is this just another one of those things that I thought we never talked about, only this one is one of those ones where you actually thought I'd never bring it up, except that I never promised that."
Oh, you son of a--
"It's hardly my fault you can't lie worth a damn."
Clark gave him a cold, even look.
Then he closed his eyes, took a deep breath, and...
...suddenly smiled, and looked like he normally did.
Used to. Before Jonathan died.
Happy.
Clark smiled sunnily, and his whole countenance... changed.
He relaxed into the bench, throwing an elbow over the back, and said, "Hey, Lex, it's a great day, isn't it? Green skies, no clouds," he said casually, glancing up.
Lex automatically followed his gaze and glanced up at the pale blue sky with patches of grey cloud cover.
It took a moment for that to sink in.
Lex's eyes went wide, and his head whipped back to Clark, but before he could say anything...
"You know, I'm looking forward to hanging out at the Talon tomorrow afternoon. Chloe's little sister is really fun to babysit. She really likes playing with Legos. It's a good thing Lois has a ton of them around the apartment."
Lex nearly choked on air, because for a second there he found himself trying to recall the name of a sibling of Chloe's when Chloe was an only child and he knew this.
Then he remembered that Lois wasn't one for educational toys.
And Lex felt like reality was slowly unwinding as Clark picked up a hotdog and ate his lunch as he chattered away about friends he hung out with -- who he might-or-might-not have actually spent time with, Lex wasn't sure, because he hadn't kept up on Clark's associations at college -- and what was on TV last night, and reminded Lex about an old movie they'd watched together that was one of his favorites, and started quoting from it...
...except that TV show wasn't on last night, and Lex had never seen that movie. If fact, he was pretty sure it didn't exist, because the series Clark had brought up was a three-parter, and Lex had seen all of them alone, and none of them with Clark...
And Lex realized with a flash that this must be what doublethink felt like, because he would listen to Clark and get pulled in and follow along... until something tripped up in his head and he knew Clark was lying, because he couldn't remember something Clark was referring to or he knew that something was wrong... except that he somehow lost track of it not too long after... and he found himself relaxing almost against his will to the oh-so-normal cadence of Clark's voice as it was when he was generally feeling happy and unstressed...
Lex started to relax enough that his hands drifted towards his sandwich. At one point he asked a question about something, and Clark changed topics and rambled on about that. Lex felt like he was losing track of reality -- and was there something wrong with him? was he just misremembering? -- but it didn't seem to really matter, somehow. And then Clark said:
"...and I think that's enough to prove my point, right?"
And then Clark sat back and the whole pretense just dropped off of his face like it was never there.
Cold and angry Clark. He took another bite of a hotdog and chewed it aggressively.
Lex sat there for a moment.
And then he fell out of it all-at-once.
Because oh god what was that?!? And his mind went WRONG WRONG WRONG WRONG and all he could do was stammer, "No-- you-- that's-- you can't--"
"I damn well can lie," Clark said, without a trace of guilt.
Lex stared at him.
And then he demanded, "WHY?!?!"
Because why did he? --Why didn't he before? Why now? Why not then?
"Because you ask, and I lie, and then we don't talk about it." Clark took another bite of his hotdog, then glared at him. "Except then you go and research me and stuff behind my back, and that's not--"
"--Because you lied! Badly!" If you didn't want me to know enough to look, then why didn't you lie well?!
Clark glowered. "And you were supposed to stop asking!"
"I wanted to know why you were lying!" I wanted to know the truth. If you didn't want me to know, then, goddamnit, why would you let me know even that much? Why wouldn't you make sure that I never even had a chance of finding out?
"Do you think I lie to you because I enjoy it? Do you think I think it's fun?" Clark demanded. "You couldn't figure this out?"
"You never trusted me with your secret!" I knew, I knew before, and then I didn't, and you wouldn't tell me again. I can't have known sometimes and then only ever wanted to kill you afterwards, or I'd feel that way now! I wasn't myself before. Why wouldn't you trust me?
"Trust isn't the issue here, Lex!" Clark said, sounding mad as hell. "It doesn't have to do with trust, it has to do with boundaries! Nobody should have to tell somebody everything, and everybody has things they don't want to talk about, secret or not."
"If you'd just told me, I wouldn't have to ask!" Why didn't you tell me after I got out of Belle Reeve? I must have kept your secret, or Lionel would have found out, and if he'd known from back then, he never would have left you alone for so long--
"Whether I wanted to tell you or not has nothing to do with it, either!" Clark spat back. "And if you didn't ask, I wouldn't have to lie!"
"I--" This doesn't make sense. None of this makes any sense!
And then Clark got up and walked away.
Lex, feeling more than a little frantic, quickly got up to follow him.
And then Lex nearly ran into him from behind when Clark stopped at a garbage bin and threw his trash away.
"What?" Clark asked, sounding angry and aggrieved.
Lex stared up at Clark. He told himself to remember to breathe.
Lex found himself hugging Clark as hard as he could, and he was pretty sure that he hadn't been thinking anything like that.
Clark was stock-still and motionless.
And then Clark said, sounding equal parts annoyed and worried, "Damnit, Lex," and wrapped his arms around him.
Oh god, Lex thought. I don't know what to do anymore. Because he didn't want to kill him, and he didn't even really want to hurt him, and Clark had power over him and he wasn't even sure he wanted that to change, because maybe it almost helped even out the whole being-deathly-allergic-to-rocks thing, when Clark didn't seem willing to use his powers around him.
I want to know what's going on, I want to feel safe, and I want to be happy. And that was really all he ever wanted.
But what he mumbled into Clark's shoulder was: "Why couldn't you just tell me, Clark? Why couldn't you just tell me?"
And it was only after he felt Clark stiffen slightly that he realized what he'd just admitted.
Then he felt Clark slowly relax -- force himself to relax -- and Clark's arms wrapped around him a little more fully, one hand traveling up his back.
Lex waited for Clark to snap his neck. He closed his eyes and prayed it was quick.
And then Clark said, low and right by his ear, "Because my parents told me not to, and Lionel would find out."
Lex shivered.
And then he grasped Clark more tightly, almost spasmodically.
"What-- what are you going to do?" Lex asked, barely above a whisper.
"Hope Lionel doesn't find out."
Oh god.
Lex nearly burst into tears.
It wasn't what he said. It was what he didn't say.
~*~*~*~*~*~
AN2: ...Ok, so not a cliffy, and we're all cool, right? Right? *crosses fingers*