Fic: Five time Clark realizes what he lost by letting Lex go (PG, 1980 words)
ladydey gave me the prompt: "5 Times Clark Realizes what he lost by letting Lex go - and One time he actually did something about it." It turned out mostly futurefic and has my usual mix of 'verses. The pieces are mostly in chronological order, although as you'll notice #2 and #3 extend over a long time.
1.
Clark realizes it every time there's the sound of a car coming up the drive to the farm, every time soft steps approach the loft. Every time he enters the Talon lost in thought, and for one little moment, when he opens the door and the scent of coffee and the music trigger an unconscious expectation in him. Every time he sees a bald man ahead of him in a crowd, every time an expensive sports car passes by.
Every time he dreams about Lex, because the Lex in his dreams is someone Clark knows. Whether he is good or evil, or merely Lex, strange and unreadable, he's always Lex. He's always the friend Clark loved and lost.
When he wakes, though, uncertainty reigns again. He doesn't know Lex. Maybe he never did. Maybe nothing was ever true about this friendship that still is ingrained in Clark like an instinct, like a natural reflex.
Maybe all Clark lost was a dream. A little piece of hope and faith that nothing will ever replace, nothing will ever rebuild.
In its place grows doubt, every hour, every day.
When Clark let Lex go, he lost the chance to ever truly know.
2.
Clark realizes it when the first League breaks up.
They were really just kids then, barely older than the Teen Titans, except Ollie. But Ollie isn't to blame for the mistakes they made. Ollie is the cause, yes, he's the one who lead them into fray, but they followed. Clark doesn't really regret the bad things they did. For the most part he treats it as a learning experience.
He learned a lot about methods, about ends and means, and about how easily wanting the right thing can make you think you're doing the right thing. He learned a lot about working in a team, the kind of compromises you have to make and how much trust it takes.
He learned a lot about breaking up, too.
They argued. They yelled at each other. A.C. broke three fingers of his right hand when he punched Clark, and Victor got himself a black eye for trying to pull them apart.
But afterwards, when Clark sat in the loft and brooded, he heard the silent motor of an expensive car, the sound of steps on the wooden stairs. Clark thought he knew what to expect. Apologies. Pleas for a second chance. This time it'll be different, Clark.
Instead, Ollie sauntered into the loft, with a split lip and a wry grin, and a bottle of good wine. He plopped down on a bale of hay, heedless of the dirt, and said, "It's a shame about the team. But no hard feelings, right?"
"So are you going to stop blowing up buildings?" Clark demanded.
Ollie gave him a long look, the smirk gone for a moment, all serious. "Is that what it takes to be friends with you?"
Clark looked away, because he didn't want to lose another friend, but he saw no alternatives.
"I don't believe that the personal should be political," Ollie said, and the light tone was back, but a little tentative. "Although if the two come into conflict, then the political wins. I believe in what I do. It's okay if you can't be friends with Green Arrow. But I think you're a great guy, Clark, no matter what you do with your powers. I'd like to still be able to hang out with you from time to time."
Clark had never thought of anything they did as political. It had never even occurred to him to separate his morals from his feelings. He didn't think he could.
"I can't just pretend I don't know what you're doing."
Ollie put the bottle of wine down on the rickety table between his bale of hay and Clark's couch. "There's nothing like a good, long argument over a bottle of wine, Clark. Try to convince me you're right."
Clark never convinced him. But from time to time they meet, in Metropolis or in Star City, and argue over a bottle of wine. Clark gets better at it as he grows older. He reads up on political philosophy and ethics. He learns to base his arguments on more than feelings, even though he will never be able to keep the two entirely apart. For the most part, their arguments go nowhere. They're too different, and the best they can do is agree to disagree.
When Clark let Lex go, he lost the chance to ever have an argument like that with Lex. He lost the chance to listen to Lex explain himself, and he lost the chance to have Lex listen to him.
Sometimes he thinks a bottle of wine and some neutral ground would do them good.
3.
Clark realizes it when he becomes friends with Bruce.
The start of their friendship is pretty much the opposite of how it started with Lex. They dislike and mistrust each other right from the start. They first conversation is an argument on a rooftop in Gotham, and Batman is wary of him because he knows Clark is an alien, and he knows about his powers. Clark floats in front of him, arms crossed, trying and failing to stare him down. Bruce tries to push him away, as hard as he can, tries to get Clark out of his city. They're honest with each other, and it's not pretty.
He threatens to kill an innocent if Clark doesn't leave.
When Clark realizes that the innocent is Batman himself, something in him stills. He looks at Batman, the bomb strapped to his chest, and suddenly sees Lex, walking into a hostage situation, taking off his bullet proof vest. Reckless, arrogant, self-sacrificing.
Their friendship is hard work. They move slowly as snails, each show of trust an immeasurable gift. They make each other earn their respect, and Bruce never makes it easy for Clark.
But the better Clark gets to know him, the more he sees how much Bruce is like Lex. He feels like stepping into the past the first time Alfred opens the door to let him into Wayne Manor. He knows it when he sits next to Bruce in the batmobile, knows it when he walks through the dark cave and sees the trophies Bruce is hoarding, the memorabilia of enemies and friends gathered there like in a shrine.
When they find out that Bruce has been investigating every member of the League, when they learn of his contingency plans, of the spy satellite, of the kryptonite Bruce keeps locked in the cave, Clark isn't surprised.
Things have changed. Clark's perspective has changed. And he can forgive Bruce, because he can accept that Bruce, for all that Batman often seems infallible, is human, and a little bit broken. He can live with Bruce's paranoia. He can work around the cracks and the dark spaces, around the obsession and the secrecy, and still be friends with Bruce, still be partners.
Maybe, in hindsight, it wasn't fair that Clark used such high standards for Lex.
4.
Of course Clark realizes what he lost every time he and Lex work together.
They always do, when there's a common enemy and no better alternative. Lex does it because he would do just about everything to get his way, and Clark does it because he can't put personal feelings above saving the world.
They both do it because they trust each other to keep a cease-fire, even if they don't trust each other in the long run.
And they're good at working together, for the same reasons that they balance each other as enemies. They complement each other so well that sometimes Clark is almost glad that they're not permanent allies.
Each time there's a new common enemy, a new reason to forge a temporary alliance, it gets a little easier. They don't have to negotiate anymore. They know the deal. Soon peace is as much of a habit as war.
But still it hurts, because every time they win and their cease-fire ends, there's a moment when Clark knows that there person he's turning away from is not only an enemy, but also a friend.
5.
Clark realizes it when he dies and comes back from the dead.
When he comes back, others have tried to taken his place. Good and bad people, some of them only pretending to protect the city. One of them is a kid with Clark's uniform, a boy who's half Clark and half not.
It's long before Clark learns of Superboy's origin. But what he sees when he comes back, is that people have tried to take his place and his symbols, but no one has taken care of his enemies.
Lex was left free to reign, without a Superman to watch him. Even Lois hasn't paid him attention, so much of her poise gone with the double loss of her partner and her hero.
In the year that Clark was gone, Lex has rebuilt the parts of Metropolis that were destroyed in the fight with Doomsday. The city is a little cleaner now, a lot more environment friendly. LexCorp has registered new patents, made profits, swallowed a few companies. Clark thinks he has finally found something sinister when he learns that Toyman and the Weather Wizard are working in LexCorp labs, but there's really nothing terribly sinister about employing Weather Wizard for terra-forming research or producing Toyman's line of naughty nurse robots. There's nothing altruistic about it either, Lex profits from these things.
The truth of the matter is, Lex has done nothing evil with his sudden freedom and power. He's neither trying to conquer the world nor destroy it.
Clark realizes that maybe this is how Lex might have been if he had never met Clark. Maybe this is what Clark has taken from him, by giving him a greater challenge.
Lex doesn't look terribly happy that Clark is back. Not all that surprised, either, to find him hovering outside the penthouse. He gives him a long, dark look, then opens the door to the balcony and steps outside.
"And there I was hoping you were another fake," he drawls.
"No, it's me." Despite being blue and having weird new powers.
"Is there anything in particular that you wanted or did you just miss me?"
Clark's new blue and white uniform doesn't have a belt or a cape, so he's carrying a bag slung over his shoulder. He reaches inside, hesitates for a moment, then hovers closer and extends his hand. Lex hesitates, too. But then he reaches up and takes the little octagonal disk from Clark, always too curious to refuse.
Lex studies it, then glances up at Clark with piercing blue eyes. "Not a souvenir from the afterlife, I assume."
"It's a key. To the caves. You know the room. If I ever die, it'll be there again. Insert the key into the slot in the table. It'll take you to the Fortress." He adds warningly, "It'll only work if I'm dead."
"You know," Lex says conversationally, "there's this guy I've met in the Secret Society. His name's Solomon Grundy. I've heard he gets more stupid every time he comes back from the dead."
Clark glowers at him, which causes his strange new electric blue aura to spark threateningly. "The AI in my Fortress will know if you're involved in my death."
Not that Clark thinks Lex will ever kill him while he's in his right mind. They're past that.
Lex turns the key, watches the sunlight play over the Kryptonian symbols. He can probably read them by now. "So this is your last will?"
Clark shakes his head. "This is my legacy." Then he reaches into his bag and pulls out the other gift he has brought.
Lex raises his brows at the bottle of wine.
1.
Clark realizes it every time there's the sound of a car coming up the drive to the farm, every time soft steps approach the loft. Every time he enters the Talon lost in thought, and for one little moment, when he opens the door and the scent of coffee and the music trigger an unconscious expectation in him. Every time he sees a bald man ahead of him in a crowd, every time an expensive sports car passes by.
Every time he dreams about Lex, because the Lex in his dreams is someone Clark knows. Whether he is good or evil, or merely Lex, strange and unreadable, he's always Lex. He's always the friend Clark loved and lost.
When he wakes, though, uncertainty reigns again. He doesn't know Lex. Maybe he never did. Maybe nothing was ever true about this friendship that still is ingrained in Clark like an instinct, like a natural reflex.
Maybe all Clark lost was a dream. A little piece of hope and faith that nothing will ever replace, nothing will ever rebuild.
In its place grows doubt, every hour, every day.
When Clark let Lex go, he lost the chance to ever truly know.
2.
Clark realizes it when the first League breaks up.
They were really just kids then, barely older than the Teen Titans, except Ollie. But Ollie isn't to blame for the mistakes they made. Ollie is the cause, yes, he's the one who lead them into fray, but they followed. Clark doesn't really regret the bad things they did. For the most part he treats it as a learning experience.
He learned a lot about methods, about ends and means, and about how easily wanting the right thing can make you think you're doing the right thing. He learned a lot about working in a team, the kind of compromises you have to make and how much trust it takes.
He learned a lot about breaking up, too.
They argued. They yelled at each other. A.C. broke three fingers of his right hand when he punched Clark, and Victor got himself a black eye for trying to pull them apart.
But afterwards, when Clark sat in the loft and brooded, he heard the silent motor of an expensive car, the sound of steps on the wooden stairs. Clark thought he knew what to expect. Apologies. Pleas for a second chance. This time it'll be different, Clark.
Instead, Ollie sauntered into the loft, with a split lip and a wry grin, and a bottle of good wine. He plopped down on a bale of hay, heedless of the dirt, and said, "It's a shame about the team. But no hard feelings, right?"
"So are you going to stop blowing up buildings?" Clark demanded.
Ollie gave him a long look, the smirk gone for a moment, all serious. "Is that what it takes to be friends with you?"
Clark looked away, because he didn't want to lose another friend, but he saw no alternatives.
"I don't believe that the personal should be political," Ollie said, and the light tone was back, but a little tentative. "Although if the two come into conflict, then the political wins. I believe in what I do. It's okay if you can't be friends with Green Arrow. But I think you're a great guy, Clark, no matter what you do with your powers. I'd like to still be able to hang out with you from time to time."
Clark had never thought of anything they did as political. It had never even occurred to him to separate his morals from his feelings. He didn't think he could.
"I can't just pretend I don't know what you're doing."
Ollie put the bottle of wine down on the rickety table between his bale of hay and Clark's couch. "There's nothing like a good, long argument over a bottle of wine, Clark. Try to convince me you're right."
Clark never convinced him. But from time to time they meet, in Metropolis or in Star City, and argue over a bottle of wine. Clark gets better at it as he grows older. He reads up on political philosophy and ethics. He learns to base his arguments on more than feelings, even though he will never be able to keep the two entirely apart. For the most part, their arguments go nowhere. They're too different, and the best they can do is agree to disagree.
When Clark let Lex go, he lost the chance to ever have an argument like that with Lex. He lost the chance to listen to Lex explain himself, and he lost the chance to have Lex listen to him.
Sometimes he thinks a bottle of wine and some neutral ground would do them good.
3.
Clark realizes it when he becomes friends with Bruce.
The start of their friendship is pretty much the opposite of how it started with Lex. They dislike and mistrust each other right from the start. They first conversation is an argument on a rooftop in Gotham, and Batman is wary of him because he knows Clark is an alien, and he knows about his powers. Clark floats in front of him, arms crossed, trying and failing to stare him down. Bruce tries to push him away, as hard as he can, tries to get Clark out of his city. They're honest with each other, and it's not pretty.
He threatens to kill an innocent if Clark doesn't leave.
When Clark realizes that the innocent is Batman himself, something in him stills. He looks at Batman, the bomb strapped to his chest, and suddenly sees Lex, walking into a hostage situation, taking off his bullet proof vest. Reckless, arrogant, self-sacrificing.
Their friendship is hard work. They move slowly as snails, each show of trust an immeasurable gift. They make each other earn their respect, and Bruce never makes it easy for Clark.
But the better Clark gets to know him, the more he sees how much Bruce is like Lex. He feels like stepping into the past the first time Alfred opens the door to let him into Wayne Manor. He knows it when he sits next to Bruce in the batmobile, knows it when he walks through the dark cave and sees the trophies Bruce is hoarding, the memorabilia of enemies and friends gathered there like in a shrine.
When they find out that Bruce has been investigating every member of the League, when they learn of his contingency plans, of the spy satellite, of the kryptonite Bruce keeps locked in the cave, Clark isn't surprised.
Things have changed. Clark's perspective has changed. And he can forgive Bruce, because he can accept that Bruce, for all that Batman often seems infallible, is human, and a little bit broken. He can live with Bruce's paranoia. He can work around the cracks and the dark spaces, around the obsession and the secrecy, and still be friends with Bruce, still be partners.
Maybe, in hindsight, it wasn't fair that Clark used such high standards for Lex.
4.
Of course Clark realizes what he lost every time he and Lex work together.
They always do, when there's a common enemy and no better alternative. Lex does it because he would do just about everything to get his way, and Clark does it because he can't put personal feelings above saving the world.
They both do it because they trust each other to keep a cease-fire, even if they don't trust each other in the long run.
And they're good at working together, for the same reasons that they balance each other as enemies. They complement each other so well that sometimes Clark is almost glad that they're not permanent allies.
Each time there's a new common enemy, a new reason to forge a temporary alliance, it gets a little easier. They don't have to negotiate anymore. They know the deal. Soon peace is as much of a habit as war.
But still it hurts, because every time they win and their cease-fire ends, there's a moment when Clark knows that there person he's turning away from is not only an enemy, but also a friend.
5.
Clark realizes it when he dies and comes back from the dead.
When he comes back, others have tried to taken his place. Good and bad people, some of them only pretending to protect the city. One of them is a kid with Clark's uniform, a boy who's half Clark and half not.
It's long before Clark learns of Superboy's origin. But what he sees when he comes back, is that people have tried to take his place and his symbols, but no one has taken care of his enemies.
Lex was left free to reign, without a Superman to watch him. Even Lois hasn't paid him attention, so much of her poise gone with the double loss of her partner and her hero.
In the year that Clark was gone, Lex has rebuilt the parts of Metropolis that were destroyed in the fight with Doomsday. The city is a little cleaner now, a lot more environment friendly. LexCorp has registered new patents, made profits, swallowed a few companies. Clark thinks he has finally found something sinister when he learns that Toyman and the Weather Wizard are working in LexCorp labs, but there's really nothing terribly sinister about employing Weather Wizard for terra-forming research or producing Toyman's line of naughty nurse robots. There's nothing altruistic about it either, Lex profits from these things.
The truth of the matter is, Lex has done nothing evil with his sudden freedom and power. He's neither trying to conquer the world nor destroy it.
Clark realizes that maybe this is how Lex might have been if he had never met Clark. Maybe this is what Clark has taken from him, by giving him a greater challenge.
Lex doesn't look terribly happy that Clark is back. Not all that surprised, either, to find him hovering outside the penthouse. He gives him a long, dark look, then opens the door to the balcony and steps outside.
"And there I was hoping you were another fake," he drawls.
"No, it's me." Despite being blue and having weird new powers.
"Is there anything in particular that you wanted or did you just miss me?"
Clark's new blue and white uniform doesn't have a belt or a cape, so he's carrying a bag slung over his shoulder. He reaches inside, hesitates for a moment, then hovers closer and extends his hand. Lex hesitates, too. But then he reaches up and takes the little octagonal disk from Clark, always too curious to refuse.
Lex studies it, then glances up at Clark with piercing blue eyes. "Not a souvenir from the afterlife, I assume."
"It's a key. To the caves. You know the room. If I ever die, it'll be there again. Insert the key into the slot in the table. It'll take you to the Fortress." He adds warningly, "It'll only work if I'm dead."
"You know," Lex says conversationally, "there's this guy I've met in the Secret Society. His name's Solomon Grundy. I've heard he gets more stupid every time he comes back from the dead."
Clark glowers at him, which causes his strange new electric blue aura to spark threateningly. "The AI in my Fortress will know if you're involved in my death."
Not that Clark thinks Lex will ever kill him while he's in his right mind. They're past that.
Lex turns the key, watches the sunlight play over the Kryptonian symbols. He can probably read them by now. "So this is your last will?"
Clark shakes his head. "This is my legacy." Then he reaches into his bag and pulls out the other gift he has brought.
Lex raises his brows at the bottle of wine.