incitethemuse Dandemis quote
Do not condemn the judgement of another because it differs from your own. You may both be wrong. -Dandemis
Metropolis is a shiny city, a new city. It's the city of tomorrow. Like most new, shiny things there is a flip side to all of Metropolis' prosperity and that flip side is called Suicide Slum.
Suicide Slum is a lousy place to live. It's not even a good place to visit.
However, it's an excellent place to get lost. A superb place to hide things because no one but the most determined will ever go looking down the rabbit hole. That's why she's there. It's why Chloe left the comfort of the Gotham townhouse and drove back to Metropolis without telling anyone where she was going in Gotham or letting any of her friends or family in Metropolis know that she'd be in town. She wasn't planning on staying and she did make one call.
Now she just had to see if he would show up.
The truck is parked down a back alley so narrow that she'd been worried she wouldn't be able to get the driver's side door open when she got out of the truck but it opened up directly in front of the storage unit. She'd tried waiting inside the truck but the drive had been long and boring and she needed a change of scenery. Even if the so called scenery was a dark alley strewn with litter in front of a storage unit. There was brick to the right of her, brick to the left, an old steel garage door in front of her and the cold bumper of the U-Haul under her butt which was slowly going numb.
"Have you been waiting long, Chloe?"
She jumps. Sometimes it amazes her that she can still be caught unaware even when she's expecting the unexpected. Years of having Clark pop up out of nowhere, things going bump in the night, all the usual suspects and she's still startled. It's both annoying and comforting to know that she's still got a sense of self-preservation. She may even start putting it to use one day.
"Not very long." Using the heel of her boot, Chloe pushed off the truck. "I wasn't all that sure you were coming tonight, J'onn."
"Neither was I." J'onn says in that same, quiet, calm way he has. "I almost didn't."
Standing in front of him, Chloe feels smaller than usual. It's not just the Martian's height, there is a bigger presence in the man they call J'onn J'onzz than the human form he assumes can fully contain. "For what it's worth, I'm sorry I had to call. I don't want to put you in the middle of this but I don't have a lot of choices. I trust you, and I think you and I want the same thing."
J'onn's arms fold over his chest and he looks down at her with his usual inscrutable expression. "What is that?"
"We both want Clark to work things out for the Kandorians. We both want him to lead them into making new lives on Earth and integrating into human society." She spins the keyring on her index finger like a tiny hula hoop, watching each rotation because it's easier than trying to look J'onzz in the eye. "And we want those things for Clark not just because it'll be better for the Kandorians, we want it so that Clark will have his people. He won't be Krypton's only son anymore." She chances a glance up at his face before watching the keys spin. "You know about that."
"Yes, I do."
Suddenly annoyed by the jingling of the keys, Chloe brings them to a stop and looks up. "That's what we want but we know that's not the only way that all this could play out and we both know that if it goes the other way? We are screwed on a monumental scale. Not just us, not just the League or just Metropolis, we're talking the entire planet. This could all go wrong so fast."
"Or, Kal-El could accomplish exactly what he set out to do."
"And if he does I won't be surprised and I will be the first person in line to congratulate him and admit I was wrong." She blows out a breath. "But if he's wrong? We're not going to have time for a moratorium."
"You don't think Kal-El deserves to know about your contingency plan? This affects him too. Perhaps most of all."
She can't argue that. The weapons she's had made would certainly affect Clark. "It's not a matter of deserving. It - Clark and I don't see eye to eye. He won't listen to me, and we both know I can't go through him." A single look from J'onn makes her sigh and add. "Maybe I'm not hearing him so great right now either. Things aren't as easy as they used to be. We talk in circles and nothing gets done. This had to get done. We can argue about it later."
"So you intend to inform Clark of these weapons of yours?"
There was a time when Chloe would have told Clark about them before she siphoned the money out of Queen Industries and had them made. Before that there'd been a time when she would never in a million years have considered having weapons forged from Kryptonite. Since learning Clark's secret Chloe had thrown away quarries full of the bright green rocks. Of course that was before the Kandorians.
"Actually, I'm hoping I never have to tell Clark about the weapons. I hope they sit in those lead boxes and rot. I want to be wrong. I want to be wrong more than I will ever be able to tell you. But not enough to just sit back and not have a Plan B. It's Zod and he's not leading a troop of Kandorian Girl Scouts. They're an army." An army of Kryptonians who, if they managed to come into the same powers as Clark, would be able to annihilate every major city on earth without so much as breaking a sweat. An army that would be unstoppable without something to level the playing field.
In her mind she's gone over the argument with Clark over and over again. She's being paranoid. She doesn't have enough faith in him. She isn't being reasonable. The Kandorians aren't a threat. They want peace.
She's wrong. She's wrong. She's wrong.
She's wrong and it's all for nothing.
Or she's not.
Metropolis is a shiny city, a new city. It's the city of tomorrow. Like most new, shiny things there is a flip side to all of Metropolis' prosperity and that flip side is called Suicide Slum.
Suicide Slum is a lousy place to live. It's not even a good place to visit.
However, it's an excellent place to get lost. A superb place to hide things because no one but the most determined will ever go looking down the rabbit hole. That's why she's there. It's why Chloe left the comfort of the Gotham townhouse and drove back to Metropolis without telling anyone where she was going in Gotham or letting any of her friends or family in Metropolis know that she'd be in town. She wasn't planning on staying and she did make one call.
Now she just had to see if he would show up.
The truck is parked down a back alley so narrow that she'd been worried she wouldn't be able to get the driver's side door open when she got out of the truck but it opened up directly in front of the storage unit. She'd tried waiting inside the truck but the drive had been long and boring and she needed a change of scenery. Even if the so called scenery was a dark alley strewn with litter in front of a storage unit. There was brick to the right of her, brick to the left, an old steel garage door in front of her and the cold bumper of the U-Haul under her butt which was slowly going numb.
"Have you been waiting long, Chloe?"
She jumps. Sometimes it amazes her that she can still be caught unaware even when she's expecting the unexpected. Years of having Clark pop up out of nowhere, things going bump in the night, all the usual suspects and she's still startled. It's both annoying and comforting to know that she's still got a sense of self-preservation. She may even start putting it to use one day.
"Not very long." Using the heel of her boot, Chloe pushed off the truck. "I wasn't all that sure you were coming tonight, J'onn."
"Neither was I." J'onn says in that same, quiet, calm way he has. "I almost didn't."
Standing in front of him, Chloe feels smaller than usual. It's not just the Martian's height, there is a bigger presence in the man they call J'onn J'onzz than the human form he assumes can fully contain. "For what it's worth, I'm sorry I had to call. I don't want to put you in the middle of this but I don't have a lot of choices. I trust you, and I think you and I want the same thing."
J'onn's arms fold over his chest and he looks down at her with his usual inscrutable expression. "What is that?"
"We both want Clark to work things out for the Kandorians. We both want him to lead them into making new lives on Earth and integrating into human society." She spins the keyring on her index finger like a tiny hula hoop, watching each rotation because it's easier than trying to look J'onzz in the eye. "And we want those things for Clark not just because it'll be better for the Kandorians, we want it so that Clark will have his people. He won't be Krypton's only son anymore." She chances a glance up at his face before watching the keys spin. "You know about that."
"Yes, I do."
Suddenly annoyed by the jingling of the keys, Chloe brings them to a stop and looks up. "That's what we want but we know that's not the only way that all this could play out and we both know that if it goes the other way? We are screwed on a monumental scale. Not just us, not just the League or just Metropolis, we're talking the entire planet. This could all go wrong so fast."
"Or, Kal-El could accomplish exactly what he set out to do."
"And if he does I won't be surprised and I will be the first person in line to congratulate him and admit I was wrong." She blows out a breath. "But if he's wrong? We're not going to have time for a moratorium."
"You don't think Kal-El deserves to know about your contingency plan? This affects him too. Perhaps most of all."
She can't argue that. The weapons she's had made would certainly affect Clark. "It's not a matter of deserving. It - Clark and I don't see eye to eye. He won't listen to me, and we both know I can't go through him." A single look from J'onn makes her sigh and add. "Maybe I'm not hearing him so great right now either. Things aren't as easy as they used to be. We talk in circles and nothing gets done. This had to get done. We can argue about it later."
"So you intend to inform Clark of these weapons of yours?"
There was a time when Chloe would have told Clark about them before she siphoned the money out of Queen Industries and had them made. Before that there'd been a time when she would never in a million years have considered having weapons forged from Kryptonite. Since learning Clark's secret Chloe had thrown away quarries full of the bright green rocks. Of course that was before the Kandorians.
"Actually, I'm hoping I never have to tell Clark about the weapons. I hope they sit in those lead boxes and rot. I want to be wrong. I want to be wrong more than I will ever be able to tell you. But not enough to just sit back and not have a Plan B. It's Zod and he's not leading a troop of Kandorian Girl Scouts. They're an army." An army of Kryptonians who, if they managed to come into the same powers as Clark, would be able to annihilate every major city on earth without so much as breaking a sweat. An army that would be unstoppable without something to level the playing field.
In her mind she's gone over the argument with Clark over and over again. She's being paranoid. She doesn't have enough faith in him. She isn't being reasonable. The Kandorians aren't a threat. They want peace.
She's wrong. She's wrong. She's wrong.
She's wrong and it's all for nothing.
Or she's not.