Honesty 13
Missed yesterday, so H14 will be out tomorrow. In other news, I'm about half done with SV-Files 2.
Title: Honesty -- Chapter 13, The Invitation
Author: PepperjackCandy
Rating: PG-13
Pairing: Clark/Lex
Category: Established Relationship
Spoilers for: Nothing. I don't think.
Disclaimer: I own nothing Smallville-related, or related in any other way to Clark Kent, Superman or any of the various creations of the wonderful folks at DC Comics.
==========
Martha was in the kitchen, sorting through flowers for her afternoon delivery, when she heard a knock at the door. Quickly shedding her stem-snipping gloves, Martha walked to the door. "May I help you?" She asked the dark-haired, nicely-dressed stranger on her doorstep.
"Mrs. Kent?"
"Yes."
"Bruce Wayne. May I come in?"
"Certainly." Martha responded, surprised. The last thing she'd expected when she got up that morning was a visit from another wealthy young billionaire. The one she had visiting already was plenty.
She backed away from the door, admitting Bruce into the house.
"You have a lovely home, Mrs. Kent."
"Thank you. Would you like something to drink?"
"Just some water, thank you." Bruce gracefully lowered himself onto the sofa.
Martha went into the kitchen and returned a moment later with a glass of water.
Handing it to him, she asked, "What can we do for you, Mr. Wayne?"
"I'd like to speak with both you and Mr. Kent, if that's all right."
"All right." Martha started worrying.
"Don't worry, Mrs. Kent. It's nothing bad. You know that your son is seeing Lex Luthor, right?"
"Yes."
"And how well does that sit with you?"
"I'm all right with it. They certainly seem to be good for each other. But Jonathan, that's Clark's father, he's . . . a little dubious."
Bruce smiled a little, as if he knew just how much of an understatement that was. "Actually, I'd like to wait until your husband is available before I say any more. Could you please ask him if he could spare a moment?"
"Certainly." Martha nodded and went to the phone to call Jonathan in from the field.
***
"Have you heard?" Chloe asked as she glided in for a landing on the seat next to Clark.
Sensing some juicy gossip, the other three friends lean in. "What?" Clark asked for all of them.
"I was just down in Kwan's office, and McGuire just turned in her notice."
"She's quitting?" Clark asked.
"Who'll teach Freshman English?" Pete asked.
"Who'll coach the cheerleading squad?" Lana asked.
"She'll be here through the end of the year. She's quitting to have a baby. She's just into her second trimester, so the baby's due . . ." Chloe started counting on her fingers.
"Late October." Clark said. When all three looked at him surprised, he said, "What? Nine divided by three is three. Three times two is six. Six months left in her pregnancy. It's April now . . ."
Chloe raised her eyebrows and continued. "Sounds like Kwan's going to try to hire an English teacher who can also coach the cheerleading squad."
Lana heaved a sigh of relief. "Just as long as they don't have Lopez do it. How that woman ever got to be assistant coach is beyond me."
Chloe gave Lana a quirky grin. "Well, I'll keep my ear to the ground and if I hear anything . . ." She was interrupted by the ringing of her cell phone. She glanced down at the caller ID and an ear-to-ear grin broke out on her face.
She answered it. "Natasha! Hi!" Then, without a backwards glance, Chloe stood and made her way to an empty table halfway across the room.
Clark and Lana looked at Pete. "Isn't Natasha your cousin?" Lana asked.
"Yeah." Pete looked befuddled as he stared at Chloe, who was chatting amiably on the phone.
The trio sat in silence for a minute, then Clark spoke. "What did the two of you get for problem 39?"
***
Jonathan came in from the field, heading directly to the downstairs bathroom to wash his hands. Afterwards, he came into the living room. "Mr. Wayne." He greeted Bruce.
Bruce stood and extended a hand. "Mr. Kent."
Jonathan shied away from Bruce's hand. "I really shouldn't. I just came back from washing my hands, but still . . ."
"I'm not afraid to get my hands dirty, Mr. Kent." Bruce said in such a tone that Jonathan felt compelled to shake hands with him.
After the two men had taken their seats, Bruce began. "I suppose I should just start in with what I want to talk to you about. But I want you to promise me that you'll hear me out before you make any decisions."
Jonathan's mouth tightened into a thin white line, but he nodded. "Fair enough."
"I know that you are aware that your son, Clark, is in a relationship with Lex Luthor."
Jonathan bridled at this, but Martha's gentle hand on his shoulder calmed him down. "Yes." He responded shortly.
"Are you aware that Lex wanted to bring Clark to a party that I'm giving next weekend?"
Bruce and Martha could see Jonathan practically chewing on the inside of his mouth. "I have no intention . . ." Then he seemed to come to himself again.
"Yes."
"I'm here to invite the two of you," Bruce looked from Jonathan to Martha and back, "to attend the party as well."
The last thing he was expecting was for Bruce Wayne, billionaire philanthropist, to ask a midwestern farmer to a party at his mansion. The only argument he could give was, "I don't . . . I don't think we'd fit in in your kind of society, Mr. Wayne."
"First, please call me Bruce, and second, this will not be any kind of society function. It's simply a gathering of friends. And I'd be honored if you would attend."
Before he knew what he was saying, Jonathan said, "We'd be happy to attend."
Bruce smiled warmly, but with an air of assurance, as if he knew their answer before they gave it. "Wonderful."
"But we don't even know what night it is." Martha said.
"It's a whole-weekend function. We begin with an alfresco dinner on Friday night. Then Saturday during the day, my guests usually go in to Chicago, or out onto Lake Michigan. Then Saturday evening is the black-tie dinner, and on Sunday, most of my out-of-town guests go home."
Martha looked alarmed. "We don't have clothes for a black-tie dinner." She said worriedly.
"And someone needs to be here to keep an eye on the farm." Jonathan protested.
Bruce's mouth turned up in a small smile as he reached into his pocket. Pulling three cards out, he handed one to Jonathan and one to Martha. Martha gasped as she realized what she was holding.
"These credit cards draw on one of my personal accounts. Go into Metropolis and get whatever you need. Only, be careful not to go too overboard. Limit yourselves to only one sailboat, for example. And as for style, as I said before, it's a gathering of friends; CMA will go over just as well as GQ."
He handed the third card to Jonathan. It was a calling card that had the name Alfred Pennyworth written on it. "Alfred is my most trusted employee. He will contact you in a few days, once he's made arrangements for someone to cover the farm for you. And if you need anything, anything at all, call Alfred. He's empowered to do anything that needs doing, and if by some chance, you need something that he can't provide, he always knows where I am."
Nonplused, Jonathan could only say, "Thank you."
"Yes, thank you." Martha echoed.
"Thank you." Bruce said sincerely. "For raising the person who saved one of my best friends from himself."
Then Bruce stood and smoothly walked to the door. "It was very nice meeting you, Mr. Kent, Mrs. Kent."
"You, too." Jonathan and Martha replied simultaneously.
And then Bruce was gone, leaving a stunned Jonathan and Martha in his wake.
"Persuasive." Martha said as she glanced down at the Gold Card with her name embossed on it, Martha Clark Kent.
"I'm just glad Lex isn't that persuasive, or we'd be his in-laws by now."
***
Lex had left work early to examine Clark's blood more closely.
The night before, he had run a complete blood count on it, to find that everything in it -- red blood cells, white blood cells, hemoglobin, everything - was far above human normal.
Amazed, Lex had done another complete blood count to check his results. That time, the numbers had declined to just above the high end of human normal.
Lex took off his suitcoat and unfastened his tie as soon as he entered the lab. He folded the sleeves of his lavender dress shirt up to just above his elbows as he walked across to where he had stored Clark's blood.
Well, it's been nearly 24 hours. Let's see how this goes. Lex put a dot of blood on each of three slides.
He slipped two of the three slides into the refrigerator and fed the vial into the analyzer. As the machine ran, he pulled out his hematology books and took the slide to the microscope. He stained the sample and slid it onto the stage.
He peered through the eyepiece and saw, blood. It was slightly disappointing. He wasn't sure what he expected to see. Perhaps at the rate Clark's blood levels had dropped, he was expecting just enough red blood cells to color the sample and nothing else. He certainly didn't expect it to look pretty much like the illustration on the cover of one of the hematology books.
Red blood cells. White blood cells. Platelets. And . . . what are those things? There were dark, asymmetrical specks of . . . something in Clark's blood. I hope the sample's not contaminated with something.
Grateful that he hadn't stained the other slides yet, he went back to the refrigerator. On his way across the room, he could see that the analyzer had finished. He read the screen attached. This sample of Clark's blood was human normal, on the dot.
"That makes no sense at all." Lex whispered to himself.
"What makes no sense?"
Lex looked up, unable to resist smiling. "I was just running my third CBC." He indicated the screen.
Clark looked at it. "You're right. Absolute nonsense."
"And you said you want to be a doctor." Lex ribbed him.
"I also said that I'm a high school freshman, Lex. I'm not supposed to understand this stuff yet. So what is it?"
"All of your levels, red blood cells, white blood cells, platelets, hemoglobin, leukocytes, everything, are all human normal."
"But that makes no sense at all." Clark quoted his lover wryly.
"That's what I said." Lex grinned. "But that's the third time I've run a CBC. The numbers keep coming down."
"Why would they do that?"
Lex shrugged. "Apparently, they've bottomed out. Anyway, I was looking at some of your blood under the microscope, and, well," he went to the refrigerator and took out one of the two slides still inside, then led Clark to the microscope.
He opened one of the hematology books to a labeled photograph of blood cells. "This is human blood. Now look at yours."
Clark peered into the eyepiece. "There's some . . . flakes of something here."
"Yep."
"What is it?"
"I don't know. That's what this is for." He indicated the slide he'd just removed from the refrigerator.
Clark stepped away from the microscope, and Lex replaced the stained slide with the unstained one. He was silent for a long moment.
"Well?" Clark asked impatiently.
"It's in this one, too, and apparently those specks, whatever they are, are black." Lex let Clark have the microscope again.
"I've got black specks in my blood?"
"Apparently."
"Is that . . . Should I be worried?"
"Dunno. Depends on what the specks are."
"How do we find out?"
Lex sighed. "I'm going to try to separate it out, then we can have it analyzed."
"You can do that?"
"Well, not me personally." Lex grinned. "I'll use a flow cytometer."
"A what . . .?"
"A flow cytometer. It uses lasers to separate the particles in the blood."
"You have one?"
"I'll have to get access to one. . ." His voice faded as he wandered back to the desk. Ask Bill about flow cytometer, he wrote. He turned back around to find Clark paging through the introductory hematology book he'd bought.
"You want to borrow that?"
"Hm?" Clark looked up. "No. You can keep it."
Lex could hear the reluctance in his young lover's tone. "I'm done with it." He assured him.
"You sure?" Clark looked up hopefully.
"Yes. I'm sure." Lex walked over and kissed Clark thoroughly. "Now, don't you have chores, or dinner, or something waiting for you?"
"Yeah. You want to come over for dinner? Mom's discovered that she loves feeding you."
Lex smiled. "I'd be happy to. I need to talk to your mom about something anyhow."
***
Lex and Clark rode to the Kent farm in Lex's Jaguar. They arrived to find Jonathan and Martha sitting in the living room, obviously concerned about something.
"Hey. Is everything . . . all right?"
There was a long silence as Martha and Jonathan looked from Clark, to Lex, and back, and Clark noticed the credit cards his parents were holding.
"What? MetroBank send you credit cards in Devana's name again?"
"I'm surprised you remembered that." Martha said with a smile. "We sold Devana when you were five."
Clark shrugged. "I have a good memory, I guess. So? What's with the credit cards, then?"
Martha handed hers to Clark, who showed it to Lex.
"A gold card?" He spluttered. "How? Where?"
"Lex's friend Bruce Wayne came by to invite us to that party at his house. He gave us these cards to pay for clothes for the black-tie dinner." Jonathan said in an accusatory tone.
"He . . . came by?" Lex asked.
"You sound surprised." Jonathan arched a brow at him.
"Yes. Sort of. I did ask Bruce to extend an invitation to you. But I never dreamed that he'd come out here himself. I expected him to send you some kind of written invitation."
Jonathan looked dubious.
"But you are going? I mean, *we* are going?" Clark asked.
Jonathan sighed. "Yes."
Clark couldn't help himself, he grinned and bounced on the balls of his feet a couple of times. He stopped when he saw Lex grinning at him.
"So, you're staying for dinner?" Martha asked.
"Yes, ma'am. I'd also like to talk to you about something." Lex looked at Jonathan and Clark. "Actually, to ask your help with something."
"Then why don't we go into my office and we can discuss it?" Martha indicated the kitchen.
"Yes, please."
Jonathan and Clark exchanged confused looks as their partners moved into the kitchen.
Martha busied herself with dinner preparations. "What do you need my help with?"
Lex sat at the table. "I'm looking to start phasing out my Dad's employees and hiring some of my own for the castle."
"And . . .?"
"And, frankly, I'm not sure what to look for. I was hoping that, since you know about . . . stuff like that, you could help me sort through resumes and maybe even be there for the interviews?"
Martha smiled. "I think I can manage that. When do you need me?"
"Friday, before we leave for Bruce's?"
"I take it you have a candidate?"
Lex nodded, not elaborating further.
"What aren't you telling me?"
"He's Tim Turner."
Martha dropped the carrot she was cleaning into the sink. "Tim Turner? Lex, I don't think . . ."
"I know. He's in prison. But you should see his portfolio. He's been on work release before, and it worked out really well, so I said I'd like to interview him. I asked the agency to keep it confidential until the interview itself, so he's not going to be casing the castle or anything like that."
"I'd hope not. Why him, specifically?"
Lex shrugged. "I guess it's because I've been given my share of second chances and I thought I should pass it on. From what I can tell, he's been in the correctional system for something like 11 years. And he's only 23. That means that he was 12 when he went in. He sounds like he's due for a second chance."
"Or that he's a lost cause."
"True. But I'm willing to take that chance."
"You're either very brave or very foolish."
"But will you help me? If it's any consolation, his past is property crimes, not violent crime, so it's doubtful he'll mug us or anything."
Martha snorted. "I guess. If you can guarantee that I'll get out safely."
"I think that's pretty safe."
"Then I'll be happy to help."
---------------
Technobabble Summary:
For information on complete blood counts.
And on hematology analyzers
Yes, there's such a thing as a flow cytometer, and here's how it works.
Title: Honesty -- Chapter 13, The Invitation
Author: PepperjackCandy
Rating: PG-13
Pairing: Clark/Lex
Category: Established Relationship
Spoilers for: Nothing. I don't think.
Disclaimer: I own nothing Smallville-related, or related in any other way to Clark Kent, Superman or any of the various creations of the wonderful folks at DC Comics.
==========
Martha was in the kitchen, sorting through flowers for her afternoon delivery, when she heard a knock at the door. Quickly shedding her stem-snipping gloves, Martha walked to the door. "May I help you?" She asked the dark-haired, nicely-dressed stranger on her doorstep.
"Mrs. Kent?"
"Yes."
"Bruce Wayne. May I come in?"
"Certainly." Martha responded, surprised. The last thing she'd expected when she got up that morning was a visit from another wealthy young billionaire. The one she had visiting already was plenty.
She backed away from the door, admitting Bruce into the house.
"You have a lovely home, Mrs. Kent."
"Thank you. Would you like something to drink?"
"Just some water, thank you." Bruce gracefully lowered himself onto the sofa.
Martha went into the kitchen and returned a moment later with a glass of water.
Handing it to him, she asked, "What can we do for you, Mr. Wayne?"
"I'd like to speak with both you and Mr. Kent, if that's all right."
"All right." Martha started worrying.
"Don't worry, Mrs. Kent. It's nothing bad. You know that your son is seeing Lex Luthor, right?"
"Yes."
"And how well does that sit with you?"
"I'm all right with it. They certainly seem to be good for each other. But Jonathan, that's Clark's father, he's . . . a little dubious."
Bruce smiled a little, as if he knew just how much of an understatement that was. "Actually, I'd like to wait until your husband is available before I say any more. Could you please ask him if he could spare a moment?"
"Certainly." Martha nodded and went to the phone to call Jonathan in from the field.
***
"Have you heard?" Chloe asked as she glided in for a landing on the seat next to Clark.
Sensing some juicy gossip, the other three friends lean in. "What?" Clark asked for all of them.
"I was just down in Kwan's office, and McGuire just turned in her notice."
"She's quitting?" Clark asked.
"Who'll teach Freshman English?" Pete asked.
"Who'll coach the cheerleading squad?" Lana asked.
"She'll be here through the end of the year. She's quitting to have a baby. She's just into her second trimester, so the baby's due . . ." Chloe started counting on her fingers.
"Late October." Clark said. When all three looked at him surprised, he said, "What? Nine divided by three is three. Three times two is six. Six months left in her pregnancy. It's April now . . ."
Chloe raised her eyebrows and continued. "Sounds like Kwan's going to try to hire an English teacher who can also coach the cheerleading squad."
Lana heaved a sigh of relief. "Just as long as they don't have Lopez do it. How that woman ever got to be assistant coach is beyond me."
Chloe gave Lana a quirky grin. "Well, I'll keep my ear to the ground and if I hear anything . . ." She was interrupted by the ringing of her cell phone. She glanced down at the caller ID and an ear-to-ear grin broke out on her face.
She answered it. "Natasha! Hi!" Then, without a backwards glance, Chloe stood and made her way to an empty table halfway across the room.
Clark and Lana looked at Pete. "Isn't Natasha your cousin?" Lana asked.
"Yeah." Pete looked befuddled as he stared at Chloe, who was chatting amiably on the phone.
The trio sat in silence for a minute, then Clark spoke. "What did the two of you get for problem 39?"
***
Jonathan came in from the field, heading directly to the downstairs bathroom to wash his hands. Afterwards, he came into the living room. "Mr. Wayne." He greeted Bruce.
Bruce stood and extended a hand. "Mr. Kent."
Jonathan shied away from Bruce's hand. "I really shouldn't. I just came back from washing my hands, but still . . ."
"I'm not afraid to get my hands dirty, Mr. Kent." Bruce said in such a tone that Jonathan felt compelled to shake hands with him.
After the two men had taken their seats, Bruce began. "I suppose I should just start in with what I want to talk to you about. But I want you to promise me that you'll hear me out before you make any decisions."
Jonathan's mouth tightened into a thin white line, but he nodded. "Fair enough."
"I know that you are aware that your son, Clark, is in a relationship with Lex Luthor."
Jonathan bridled at this, but Martha's gentle hand on his shoulder calmed him down. "Yes." He responded shortly.
"Are you aware that Lex wanted to bring Clark to a party that I'm giving next weekend?"
Bruce and Martha could see Jonathan practically chewing on the inside of his mouth. "I have no intention . . ." Then he seemed to come to himself again.
"Yes."
"I'm here to invite the two of you," Bruce looked from Jonathan to Martha and back, "to attend the party as well."
The last thing he was expecting was for Bruce Wayne, billionaire philanthropist, to ask a midwestern farmer to a party at his mansion. The only argument he could give was, "I don't . . . I don't think we'd fit in in your kind of society, Mr. Wayne."
"First, please call me Bruce, and second, this will not be any kind of society function. It's simply a gathering of friends. And I'd be honored if you would attend."
Before he knew what he was saying, Jonathan said, "We'd be happy to attend."
Bruce smiled warmly, but with an air of assurance, as if he knew their answer before they gave it. "Wonderful."
"But we don't even know what night it is." Martha said.
"It's a whole-weekend function. We begin with an alfresco dinner on Friday night. Then Saturday during the day, my guests usually go in to Chicago, or out onto Lake Michigan. Then Saturday evening is the black-tie dinner, and on Sunday, most of my out-of-town guests go home."
Martha looked alarmed. "We don't have clothes for a black-tie dinner." She said worriedly.
"And someone needs to be here to keep an eye on the farm." Jonathan protested.
Bruce's mouth turned up in a small smile as he reached into his pocket. Pulling three cards out, he handed one to Jonathan and one to Martha. Martha gasped as she realized what she was holding.
"These credit cards draw on one of my personal accounts. Go into Metropolis and get whatever you need. Only, be careful not to go too overboard. Limit yourselves to only one sailboat, for example. And as for style, as I said before, it's a gathering of friends; CMA will go over just as well as GQ."
He handed the third card to Jonathan. It was a calling card that had the name Alfred Pennyworth written on it. "Alfred is my most trusted employee. He will contact you in a few days, once he's made arrangements for someone to cover the farm for you. And if you need anything, anything at all, call Alfred. He's empowered to do anything that needs doing, and if by some chance, you need something that he can't provide, he always knows where I am."
Nonplused, Jonathan could only say, "Thank you."
"Yes, thank you." Martha echoed.
"Thank you." Bruce said sincerely. "For raising the person who saved one of my best friends from himself."
Then Bruce stood and smoothly walked to the door. "It was very nice meeting you, Mr. Kent, Mrs. Kent."
"You, too." Jonathan and Martha replied simultaneously.
And then Bruce was gone, leaving a stunned Jonathan and Martha in his wake.
"Persuasive." Martha said as she glanced down at the Gold Card with her name embossed on it, Martha Clark Kent.
"I'm just glad Lex isn't that persuasive, or we'd be his in-laws by now."
***
Lex had left work early to examine Clark's blood more closely.
The night before, he had run a complete blood count on it, to find that everything in it -- red blood cells, white blood cells, hemoglobin, everything - was far above human normal.
Amazed, Lex had done another complete blood count to check his results. That time, the numbers had declined to just above the high end of human normal.
Lex took off his suitcoat and unfastened his tie as soon as he entered the lab. He folded the sleeves of his lavender dress shirt up to just above his elbows as he walked across to where he had stored Clark's blood.
Well, it's been nearly 24 hours. Let's see how this goes. Lex put a dot of blood on each of three slides.
He slipped two of the three slides into the refrigerator and fed the vial into the analyzer. As the machine ran, he pulled out his hematology books and took the slide to the microscope. He stained the sample and slid it onto the stage.
He peered through the eyepiece and saw, blood. It was slightly disappointing. He wasn't sure what he expected to see. Perhaps at the rate Clark's blood levels had dropped, he was expecting just enough red blood cells to color the sample and nothing else. He certainly didn't expect it to look pretty much like the illustration on the cover of one of the hematology books.
Red blood cells. White blood cells. Platelets. And . . . what are those things? There were dark, asymmetrical specks of . . . something in Clark's blood. I hope the sample's not contaminated with something.
Grateful that he hadn't stained the other slides yet, he went back to the refrigerator. On his way across the room, he could see that the analyzer had finished. He read the screen attached. This sample of Clark's blood was human normal, on the dot.
"That makes no sense at all." Lex whispered to himself.
"What makes no sense?"
Lex looked up, unable to resist smiling. "I was just running my third CBC." He indicated the screen.
Clark looked at it. "You're right. Absolute nonsense."
"And you said you want to be a doctor." Lex ribbed him.
"I also said that I'm a high school freshman, Lex. I'm not supposed to understand this stuff yet. So what is it?"
"All of your levels, red blood cells, white blood cells, platelets, hemoglobin, leukocytes, everything, are all human normal."
"But that makes no sense at all." Clark quoted his lover wryly.
"That's what I said." Lex grinned. "But that's the third time I've run a CBC. The numbers keep coming down."
"Why would they do that?"
Lex shrugged. "Apparently, they've bottomed out. Anyway, I was looking at some of your blood under the microscope, and, well," he went to the refrigerator and took out one of the two slides still inside, then led Clark to the microscope.
He opened one of the hematology books to a labeled photograph of blood cells. "This is human blood. Now look at yours."
Clark peered into the eyepiece. "There's some . . . flakes of something here."
"Yep."
"What is it?"
"I don't know. That's what this is for." He indicated the slide he'd just removed from the refrigerator.
Clark stepped away from the microscope, and Lex replaced the stained slide with the unstained one. He was silent for a long moment.
"Well?" Clark asked impatiently.
"It's in this one, too, and apparently those specks, whatever they are, are black." Lex let Clark have the microscope again.
"I've got black specks in my blood?"
"Apparently."
"Is that . . . Should I be worried?"
"Dunno. Depends on what the specks are."
"How do we find out?"
Lex sighed. "I'm going to try to separate it out, then we can have it analyzed."
"You can do that?"
"Well, not me personally." Lex grinned. "I'll use a flow cytometer."
"A what . . .?"
"A flow cytometer. It uses lasers to separate the particles in the blood."
"You have one?"
"I'll have to get access to one. . ." His voice faded as he wandered back to the desk. Ask Bill about flow cytometer, he wrote. He turned back around to find Clark paging through the introductory hematology book he'd bought.
"You want to borrow that?"
"Hm?" Clark looked up. "No. You can keep it."
Lex could hear the reluctance in his young lover's tone. "I'm done with it." He assured him.
"You sure?" Clark looked up hopefully.
"Yes. I'm sure." Lex walked over and kissed Clark thoroughly. "Now, don't you have chores, or dinner, or something waiting for you?"
"Yeah. You want to come over for dinner? Mom's discovered that she loves feeding you."
Lex smiled. "I'd be happy to. I need to talk to your mom about something anyhow."
***
Lex and Clark rode to the Kent farm in Lex's Jaguar. They arrived to find Jonathan and Martha sitting in the living room, obviously concerned about something.
"Hey. Is everything . . . all right?"
There was a long silence as Martha and Jonathan looked from Clark, to Lex, and back, and Clark noticed the credit cards his parents were holding.
"What? MetroBank send you credit cards in Devana's name again?"
"I'm surprised you remembered that." Martha said with a smile. "We sold Devana when you were five."
Clark shrugged. "I have a good memory, I guess. So? What's with the credit cards, then?"
Martha handed hers to Clark, who showed it to Lex.
"A gold card?" He spluttered. "How? Where?"
"Lex's friend Bruce Wayne came by to invite us to that party at his house. He gave us these cards to pay for clothes for the black-tie dinner." Jonathan said in an accusatory tone.
"He . . . came by?" Lex asked.
"You sound surprised." Jonathan arched a brow at him.
"Yes. Sort of. I did ask Bruce to extend an invitation to you. But I never dreamed that he'd come out here himself. I expected him to send you some kind of written invitation."
Jonathan looked dubious.
"But you are going? I mean, *we* are going?" Clark asked.
Jonathan sighed. "Yes."
Clark couldn't help himself, he grinned and bounced on the balls of his feet a couple of times. He stopped when he saw Lex grinning at him.
"So, you're staying for dinner?" Martha asked.
"Yes, ma'am. I'd also like to talk to you about something." Lex looked at Jonathan and Clark. "Actually, to ask your help with something."
"Then why don't we go into my office and we can discuss it?" Martha indicated the kitchen.
"Yes, please."
Jonathan and Clark exchanged confused looks as their partners moved into the kitchen.
Martha busied herself with dinner preparations. "What do you need my help with?"
Lex sat at the table. "I'm looking to start phasing out my Dad's employees and hiring some of my own for the castle."
"And . . .?"
"And, frankly, I'm not sure what to look for. I was hoping that, since you know about . . . stuff like that, you could help me sort through resumes and maybe even be there for the interviews?"
Martha smiled. "I think I can manage that. When do you need me?"
"Friday, before we leave for Bruce's?"
"I take it you have a candidate?"
Lex nodded, not elaborating further.
"What aren't you telling me?"
"He's Tim Turner."
Martha dropped the carrot she was cleaning into the sink. "Tim Turner? Lex, I don't think . . ."
"I know. He's in prison. But you should see his portfolio. He's been on work release before, and it worked out really well, so I said I'd like to interview him. I asked the agency to keep it confidential until the interview itself, so he's not going to be casing the castle or anything like that."
"I'd hope not. Why him, specifically?"
Lex shrugged. "I guess it's because I've been given my share of second chances and I thought I should pass it on. From what I can tell, he's been in the correctional system for something like 11 years. And he's only 23. That means that he was 12 when he went in. He sounds like he's due for a second chance."
"Or that he's a lost cause."
"True. But I'm willing to take that chance."
"You're either very brave or very foolish."
"But will you help me? If it's any consolation, his past is property crimes, not violent crime, so it's doubtful he'll mug us or anything."
Martha snorted. "I guess. If you can guarantee that I'll get out safely."
"I think that's pretty safe."
"Then I'll be happy to help."
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Technobabble Summary:
For information on complete blood counts.
And on hematology analyzers
Yes, there's such a thing as a flow cytometer, and here's how it works.