Fic: Badlands (5/8)
Fic: Badlands (5/8)
By: Pen37
Beta:
clarksmuse
Banner:
cheryljluv
Rating: PG-13
Fandoms: Smallville/Supernatural
Characters: Chloe, Sam, Dean, Bobby, Oliver Queen
Pairing: Chloe/Dean,
Disclaimer: Not Mine, Fun only.
Dust Jacket: http://i165.photobucket.com/albums/u51/pen37_album/badlands.jpg
Summary: The group heads to South Dakota to recover. But recovery isn't as relaxing as it should be with Evil Scientists, ghostly Native Americans, and Chloe and Dean fighting the whole way.
Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4, Part 5, Part 6, Part 7, Part 8
This is part of the Special Projects series. The rest of the fics can be found here.
Written for the Crossovers100 challenge. Prompt #82 Cave. The table is here.
Chloe squinted through the night-vision goggles that Ollie had provided. “No response. Try another arrow.”
They'd come in as closely as they could on dirt bikes. The first barrier they came to, an electrified fence, was no real barrier. Chloe's healing ability allowed her to shake off the jolt that she'd gotten while helping Ollie over. As they eased closer to the actual mining town, Ollie suspected that they would encounter motion sensors.
The basic plan was to trip them early and slip past the soldiers who came out to investigate. To this end, Ollie had been launching arrows into the ground to set off the sensors.
“Hey, wouldn't it be ironic if we never find a sensor?” Chloe said. “Then we have to walk the whole way?”
“I would be very disappointed in Lex, if that were the case,”
“I wouldn't be surprised,” Chloe shook her head. “Given the number of times that Clark was able to just wander at will around that castle in Smallville. Even after he and Lex weren't speaking.”
“Let's not forget the quality of his staff,” Oliver joked. “How many of them ended up being psychotic?”
“We are talking Smallville here,” Chloe said. “Psychotic is all relative.”
Ollie launched another arrow. “Come on, come on.”
“Impatient much?”
“I would hate to walk the whole way to the evil mad scientist's secret lair. That's what? Three miles?”
“James Bond makes it look easy,” Chloe said. “You know, we could've totally had someone fly us in.”
“And totally loose the element of surprise. The point was to get in and out with minimal detection.”
“They're going to know someone was here.”
“Could be corporate espionage.”
“Technically? It is.”
Chloe stopped him from firing again with a hand to his wrist. “I see lights.”
In the distance a pair of headlights pulled into view. They ducked down into the brush as an army-issue jeep pulled up and stopped in front of them.
“I get so sick of chasing animals all night long,” one of the soldiers said conversationally.
“Could be worse,” the other said. “We could be in the building guarding those poor schmucks.”
Chloe pointed to the underside of the jeep. With a nod, Ollie slipped out onto the road and slithered underneath. She quickly followed. The undercarriage didn't have that many places to hold onto, but Oliver unclipped a couple of magnetic hooks from his belt, and with them, created instant hand-holds.
“Would you look at this? An arrow!”
“I'll be glad when hunting season is over.”
“You know, all you do is complain.”
“What else is there to do?”
Chloe rolled her eyes as the sentries groused at length about drawing perimeter duty. Eventually, they climbed back into the jeep and started off again. Out of the corner of her eye, Chloe watched Ollie try to maintain a precarious balance between too close to the engine and too close to the road. She flattened herself a little closer and payed attention with the careless ease of an accelerated healer.
The jeep continued its circuit for a few hours more. Eventually, Ollie resorted to hooking his belt to the undercarriage to take the strain off his muscles. Any residual anger she might have felt for him evaporated when they drove through the scrub, and he took a couple of thorny bushes to the back.
As daylight cracked the horizon, the jeep pulled into a motor pool, and the complaining soldiers got out. Chloe and Ollie abandoned their hiding place in favor of a supply closet off the garage area.
“Well that went well,” Oliver said as Chloe tended to his scratches with antiseptic and liquid stitches.
“At least we're in,” She said mildly. “Next order of business?”
“Let's find a terminal and get the layout of the lab,” Oliver said. “We can plan our next course of action from there.”
***
They parked the Impala on the side of the road, and spread a map on the hood to look it over.
“The mutilations occurred here, here and here,” Bobby pointed out. “All within a few miles of this ravine. But we're going to have to go in from here.” He pointed to an opening five miles to the south of the widest section.
“It's going to be a long friggin' hike,” Dean groused.
“If you insist on this hunt,” Sam said. “Then a five-mile hike is better than us having to have you air-lifted because you tore all your stitches loose.”
“Man,” Dean shook his head. “I hate nature.”
They loaded up packs with provisions, water, rock salt, kerosene and firearms. Then they set an easy pace through the opening of the ravine. As the day wore on, they all ignored Dean as his breathing picked up, and he stumbled more than once. Finally, Bobby called a halt.
“We're resting here.”
“Why?” Dean asked belligerently.
“Because we need rest.”
“I don't.”
Sam rolled his eyes. Dean was all but falling over. The only thing really holding him upright was sheer Winchester stubbornness.
“Well I do,” Bobby said. “I'm old, fat, and not cut out for this. The ghosts will still be there, whether we take an hour or two to rest or not. So suck it up.”
“Fine.” Dean sat down and pulled his pack off. He lay back and put his head on it. “I'm going to have a nap.”
Once he shut his eyes, Sam threw Bobby an appreciative look. The older hunter nodded in acknowledgment and understanding.
***
“I've always kind of wondered,” Ollie said as they crouched in the darkened motor pool offices. “As often as you've hacked into Luthorcorp, how is it that you're able to keep on hacking them so easily?”
Chloe glanced up from the computer terminal and raised an eyebrow.
“I mean, it's like you've got the hack into Lex's files key right in between F7 and F8.”
“Lionel Luthor,” Chloe said as she turned back to the screen.
“The magnificent bastard himself?” Ollie let out a low whistle. “How did that go down?”
“The Luthors are like the Sith,” Chloe said. She easily slipped into Yoda-speak. “Always, are there two. A master and an apprentice.”
“And I thought I had a twisted family life.” Ollie shook his head. “Lex's family dynamic made mine seem like The Brady Bunch.”
“Back when I was young and stupid, I let myself get used in Lex and Lionel's power struggles on more than one occasion. I think they both had a sick fascination with me because I was sixteen and bold enough to try and go toe-to-toe with them.”
“Maybe it was just the Luthor version of respect,” Ollie said.
“And maybe Jeffry Dahmer had a few unpleasant eating habits.”
“Touche.”
“Anyway, patricide is practically a Luthor tradition. So Lionel hedged his bets, just in case Lex came out on top and Lionel turned out six feet under.”
Ollie let out a low whistle. “He planned revenge in advance of the slight?”
“That's a Luthor for you. Some people play chess. They play celebrity death chess.”
“And where do you come in?”
“While Lionel still had control of Luthorcorp, he had hundreds of back doors built into his computer systems. Additionally, he has employees who stayed loyal to him to this day. Like corporate sleeper cells. If Lex ever goes down, those employees stand to profit enormously. Their primary job is to keep Lex from finding all of Lionel's secrets.”
“And Lionel entrusted those back doors to you?”
“A few of them. Some of them are like windows. They don't stay open for very long, so that Lex's minions can't find them. Every once in a while, I get an anonymous tip from one of Lionel's loyal toadies with a window.”
“That's handy.”
“It's saved lives a time or two,” Chloe nodded. “The trick is knowing how to use it judiciously. . . here we go.”
Oliver looked over her shoulder at the blueprint that she pulled up. “Looks like the mainframe with the records are in the heart of the primary mine shaft, past the holding cells. Through three different security checkpoints.
“Any weaknesses?”
Chloe pointed to the screen. “We can bypass the first security checkpoint by rappelling down a tertiary shaft. It has laser sensors and a locked door, but we can easily re-route the sensors, and bypass the lock.
“What about the next two?”
“We'll walk right through them.”
“How?”
“Those checkpoints operate on fingerprint and voice recognition. Remember the windows into Luthorcorp? I'm going to use one of them to place my identification information into the security mainframe. The checkpoints are automated, so we'll just pass through.”
***
Sam woke with the muzzle of a military-issue assault rifle pointed right between his eyes. He looked up the barrel, and saw a man in military fatigues holding it and glaring at him.
“You're in a restricted area. Who are you?”
Sam put his hands up and tried to look non-threatening. “We're hikers. We were taking a nice, easy day hike up the ravine.” He glanced over to Dean and Bobby, who were both awake and being held at gunpoint by a second soldier.
“Where are your permits?”
“Um?” He looked at Bobby. The older hunter shrugged at him.
Meanwhile, a third soldier was going through their things. He pulled out a pistol and held it up for the others to see. “Are these registered?”
“Um?” Sam looked at Dean. His brother was wearing a scowl - which was the closest he came to looking worried.
“Looks like we got some poachers here,” the first guy said. “I think you'd better come with us.” The three of them were herded into a line and made to march up the ravine.
“Was this part of a military base?” Sam asked Bobby.
“No any one that I've ever heard of,” Bobby said.
“Dude, what's going on?” Dean asked.
“Guess we'll find out,” Sam shrugged.
They were forced to walk another mile over increasingly rough terrain. Within fifteen minutes, Dean was holding his side. Within thirty, he was batting away Sam's offered help. Eventually, they came within sight of a gouge in the side of the ravine.
“That's not on the map,” Sam whispered as they were led to the opening. Up close, they could see that the rock surrounding the opening was clean - as if recently blasted open. Conversely, the surrounding rock was darkened and weathered with exposure.
“I think it might be new,” Bobby whispered.
They were herded inside, through a dizzying maze of corridors, tunnels and checkpoints, and into some kind of cluster of holding cells. Around them they could hear cries of misery that turned Sam's stomach. Then, they were pushed into one of the cells. The door shut behind them with an electric hum.
“Where are we?” Sam asked quietly.
Dean eased into a low cot, and looked at the door. “I think we may have found the evil scientists that Chloe was looking for.”
“What makes you say that?”
“Dude? This is South Dakota. You think there's an evil lab on every street corner?”
“Great,” Sam sat on the bed next to Dean, and frowned at the floor.
Dean sighed. “We are so screwed.”