Fic: Girls Just Wanna Be Boys Again, Thanks (Parts 1 and 2) (5/6)
Title: Girls Just Wanna Be Boys Again, Thanks (Parts 1 and 2)
Author: josephina_x
Fandom: Smallville
Pairing: Clark, Lex
Rating: PG-13
Spoilers: major for Season 1, though it references some things up to Season 5 and beyond (Oliver, mainly); starts after Jitters (1x08) but goes AU before Rogue (1x09)
Word count: 23,700+ and 24,700+
Summary: Clark and Lex get genderswapped. Real life ensues.
Warnings: Only unofficially beta'd. Genderswap fic (a.k.a. female!Clark and female!Lex). Some weirdness and confusion involving sex and sexuality, as a matter of course. ...It belatedly occurs to me that I should also warn for PTSD and chemical torture.
Disclaimer: Not mine, not-for-profit.
Comments: Yes, please! :)
Author's Note: Written for the clexmas Spring Fling 2012 -- Changes, Prompt: Changes of gender.
For the full ongoing text (parts further than 2), updates will (eventually) be posted at AO3.
Previous post is here.
~*~*~*~*~*~
Pete caught up to the both of them in the alleyway behind the Beanery, next to Luthor's cherry red -- god, just kill him with green envy and temptation already! -- 2002 Ferrari 348 Spider. Pete had to remind himself not to drool, because he hated the guy. Who was also apparently insane. If he wanted to be charitable, some of that might be blamable on the being-a-girl-and-getting-Clark-turned-into-one-too thing, but Pete wasn't really feeling it, so there. I mean, the asshole had just spent the last ten minutes putting down reporters like they were going out of style, and Chloe was one, not to mention that Chloe had practically begged his to stay out of whatever and let her do the talking. And then there was that weird thing right before he ran away. So, yeah -- if there was something Pete was feeling right now, it sure as hell wasn't charitable.
...And Pete hot-tailed it over really quick, because maybe he couldn't hear exactly what they were saying from that far away as he rounded the corner, but he had eyes. As much as Chloe was trying to look calming, moving towards him with her palms out and talking in a lower tone of voice, she really looked more like she was trying to sneak up on an unruly cat and jump it. And Luthor looked like he was wanting to bolt, holding himself tensely, he was biting things out all staccatto and wary. Seriously, he'd never seen the guy look anything but cool as shit and sleek like he'd had custom detailing done for all the right streamlines, but if anything, right now his body language was screaming like he was two seconds away from losing his shit and lashing out again like--
...like...
...like some of the kids at school he'd seen bullied by some of the other jocks.
Like... literally beaten-into-the-ground bullied.
And that just made Pete twitch.
"Chlo, leave off him," Pete said, coming to a halt a few feet away from Luthor, before reaching forward, hooking a hand under her arm and tugging her back -- gently, because her wasn't about to manhandle her. (She'd kick him in the balls, if his mother didn't get to him for disrespecting a girl, first.)
"Pete!" Chloe complained, reaching back and slapping him in the arm, so he let go.
"Since when are you part of Lex's fanclub?" Chloe turned on him.
Fuck, that stung. "Since I don't want him going postal on you like a psycho lunatic!" Pete shot back in a sarcastic mimicry, getting between then again.
"Oh, please," Chloe scoffed at him. "If he was that kind of meteor freak, he'd've done something by now."
Pete's jaw dropped, and he heard a strangled sound from Luthor's direction.
"Babysitter," he thought he heard Luthor mumble with irritation.
"Babysitters get paid," Pete muttered back, out loud.
Luthor looked up at him and stared. Chloe said, "What?" all confused. Pete guessed she hadn't heard Luthor's comment.
"Please tell me that she does not run around aggravating meteor freaks on purpose just to see what will happen," he heard Lex say.
"Uh, no." Pete frowned at the guy.
Something like a 'thank god' got muttered in response as Luthor leaned heavily against his sweet, sweet driving machine.
Chloe frowned between the two of them and then focused on Luthor again. "You ok?" Chloe asked, tilting her head and looking at Luthor almost warily, or maybe that was really directed curiousity. Pete honest-to-god couldn't tell. It was like Chloe was upping her game several levels, messing around with Luthor. Pete didn't like it, not one bit.
Luthor nearly sat down on the door frame of the convertible. "I... just needed some air," he said a little shakily, not looking at either of them. He had his braced his hands against the door and he was sweating and swaying slightly from side to side again.
Liar, thought Pete. For some reason, the idea of Luthor having gotten a comeuppance that involved a physical beatdown wasn't leaving him feeling all that smug and glowy-warm inside, though.
"Who else grabbed you like that?" Chloe asked, and Lex's head whipped up before he winced at the movement, and then grimaced and rubbed at his forehead at the tell. Pete frowned, because from the way Chloe sounded, all concerned... Pete really couldn't wrap his brain around the idea of Luthor as a victim. Instigator, maybe; deserving it, definitely. But the way Lex was reacting... shouldn't Pete be enjoying it more? Why wasn't he?
"Fuck, why can't you people just leave me alone? Did it ever occur to you that I might only want some space to breathe?" Luthor complained.
"You could have just said something instead of running out like that," Chloe said reasonably.
"We aren't friends," Luthor grated out. "I owe you no explanation for my actions, and yet you still followed me out here. You're the one who said you're not after a story," Luthor replied darkly.
"Maybe we were worried," Chloe said argumentatively.
Lex made a scoffing sound. At least, that was what Pete guessed it was -- he'd never actually heard a person do that out loud before.
"Don't be ridiculous," Luthor added, like it was the least believable thing in the world that anyone would worry over him. Like Clark wasn't totally freaking out two days ago when you disappeared, or any of the other times that... Pete shook his head, because he didn't want to get angry at Clark right now -- he was angry enough at himself. It already felt a little like betrayal, that he wasn't feeling the way he thought he should about Luthor; he didn't want to think what Clark might say about it if he knew.
"What?" Chloe said, frowning a little. " Come on -- we're all friends with Clark."
Luthor looked like he was getting another headache. "The friend of my friend is not necessarily my friend."
"Why not?" Chloe pestered him. Pete rolled his eyes because, really, stupid question much? He sure didn't like Luthor, and he sure didn't have to just because Clark did. Kind of a no-brainer.
"Besides the obvious negating evidence, in that every soul on the entire planet would 'be friends' with each other if that was the case?" Luthor said sarcastically as he waved his hands around. "Clark has an entirely different set of compatibility and trust requirements for his relationships than I do, not to mention his actual expectations for people and their interactions with him, and such."
...Uh, what?
Pete glanced at Chloe, and she gave him a quick smug glance. Oh, god. What is she digging for now? Pete mentally complained. Hadn't she done enough already?
"So? What's so different about you two?" Chloe pestered him. Luthor just groaned.
Apparently not.
"Clark's parents have neither the inclination nor the wherewithal to buy off the people close to him to either stick around and spy on him, or to vanish from his life, or ruin their fiscal and personal reputation if they don't comply, for a start."
It took Pete a moment to get it.
"Christ, man, you're totally paranoid as hell," Pete said uneasily, because, god, nobody did that shit outside of the movies, let alone a parent to their son! What the hell was wrong with Luthor's head?
Lex just snarled back, "Fuck you, Ross -- it's happened before! Don't you dare presume to tell me what I do or don't know." He bent over slightly and started rubbing at his temples with his fingertips again. "Don't know when he's going to go after Clark; I've been trying to keep it low-key and him off dad's radar," he muttered. "Fucking idiot kidnapper blew that right out the window."
"Actually, I'd heard some rumors about that--" Chloe put out there as a start.
" 'Rumors'," Luthor muttered.
"--But if you're so worried about that happening, then why do you still hang out with him?" Chloe asked nonjudgementally, sounding nothing but curious. Pete frowned at her, and Luthor braced his hands against the car again and looked away, almost pained.
"Because I'm sick and tired of my dad pulling this shit on people I care about, and I don't think Clark'll go for it. I'm fairly sure that I can protect him now if he comes to me, and I can't see him as doing anything but getting seriously insulted and spending no time stomping over to the mansion and complaining to me about it if my dad's actually stupid enough to try that sort of idiocy on him." Luthor bit his lip, and Pete realized he was holding back a smile. "And if my dad ever tries threatening Mr. Kent... he'd probably end up punched in the face for his troubles." Or a laugh. It might be a laugh. Damn. Who gets happy about the thought of their dad getting beaten up by their friend's dad?
...Then again, we're talking about Lionel Luthor here, and that kind of messed with Pete's brain a little. Shouldn't his own son give a damn about him, or like him, or whatever? Sure, Lionel's a bastard, but isn't family family? ...Then again, Pete had had lots of times when he'd wished somebody would punch his own brothers out, and --ok, yeah, not going there, thinking of Luthor as an actual human being was kind of off the map for him, living somewhere in the realm of squick between gay porn and somebody telling him his mom was hot. Just... ugh.
"You know, it's kind of funny that you're worried about people thinking you're sick, but not worried that they'll think you're a paranoid freak," Pete put out there, crossing his arms.
"Pete!" Chloe hissed, but Luthor just looked amused.
"Oh no?" he replied. "If someone puts out a report saying that I was kidnapped and in poor health, the damage is already done, and no-one will believe otherwise -- they'll simply wonder what we're trying to hide if we deny it. But if someone puts out an odd report about my father paying off people to leave me alone -- well, that's just normal for the Metropolis elite. Someone you don't like suddenly knows a little too much? Silence them with monetary payoffs and threats." Luthor waved a hand. "If my father did something egregious, such as threatening someone who could actually prove it, and it garnered that much attention in the media, which I find doubtful, he could just spin it. After all, something like that could have been 'misconstrued' when it was merely a reasonable action to warn people off of me, to 'protect' me as family does," Luthor said the last in a mock-saintly voice, "and he comes out smelling like roses while the offending party is lambasted in turn, because blackmail is against the law, after all. By that time, my father surely would have taken care of whatever supposed 'evidence' the offender had compiled, and either the amateur would end up in jail and ruined, or would retract their accusations and try to save face. Hardly a ripple in the lake for either of us." Luthor had a wry smile on his face as he turned his head away.
Pete's jaw dropped. "You can't be serious. That's completely fucked up!" He'd heard about inner-city corruption being bad before, but that was just...
"That's life. Everybody does it -- or has it done to them," Luthor shrugged casually, like it didn't really matter. "The professionals know better, of course. The best ones are actually farily honest and upfront about it -- they show copies of whatever damaging material they've found, state their requests at a reasonable price, hand over or destroy the originals once payment is received, and disappear."
He sighed, and added, pinching the bridge of his nose again, "It's our business competitors who cause the worst problems, really, getting desperate and stupid. They'll usually make things up and attempt to frame the company for bad business practices by planting false evidence, or subvert a Luthorcorp employee or two into performing sabotage or corporate espionage for them, or otherwise try and make things difficult. It's common practice when someone wants to stall a takeover or merger, or try to upset the award of a government contract, or catch up in R&D work."
Oh my god, that can't actually be real, Pete thought in horror. That doesn't ever actually happen. He's just shitting me!
Then he looked up and frowned a little at Pete. "It's how the game is played," he added, as though he couldn't understand how Pete didn't already know this. He turned to Chloe with a question in his eyes. "Don't you have similar here on a smaller scale? Perhaps someone is friends with the sheriff, and their son does something a little less than legal, but they're a friend of the family, so they just give the kid a slap on the wrist and let them go, saying 'boys will be boys' with no charges filed?"
"That's not supposed to happen!" Pete said, feeling a little freaked out, because Chloe wasn't correcting him.
"But it does, doesn't it?" Luthor said, turning back to Pete searching his face. "With the senior members of the football team especially, yes? Surely, they have parties with alcohol, and no-one goes looking to find and arrest them, or the people who allowed them to acquire the liquor. They 'pull pranks', and someone has a 'talk' with the victims, and no charges are ever filed."
Pete felt a little sick. "It's not the same thing," he said stubbornly.
"If you say so," Luthor replied lightly.
"Pete, don't worry about it too much, ok?" Chloe said, touching his arm.
Pete grumbled, because that wasn't Chloe agreeing with him. Man, she was so getting the third-degree after this. What else didn't he know? Was this 'game' something he'd have to warn Clark about? He didn't want Clark getting caught up in this crap!
"Not everybody can be bought off," Pete retorted, because he didn't like the idea of what Luthor had been talking about. It had started out sounding like friends who weren't friends selling out, but the way Luthor had talked about it after that had sounded like he'd been talking about bribing reporters. "Some people have ethics, and standards and principles and... stuff." He thought of his mother the judge.
"Hardly." Luthor drawled, with a smirk. "Everyone has a price."
My mom doesn't! Pete thought proudly, but that wasn't an argument he wanted to get into with the jerk. So instead he said, "Clark doesn't!" and thought Ha! Take that! because even Luthor couldn't contest that one.
But Luthor's smirk just twitched a little higher at that, and he leaned back, settling against the car more comfortably. "Oh, but he does," he said, and the smirk edged towards an outright grin. "It may not be in the usual coin of the realm, but he most certainly does."
"Like hell!" Pete shot back.
"Such as?" Chloe prodded.
"Chlo!"
Luthor settled on a crazy sort of closed-mouth smile. "For Clark? Stop me if this sounds familiar: a gladness to spend time with him, a willingness to listen to him and consider his words, an arrangement where one does not ask after or otherwise immediately drops what he considers to be personal subjects, a propensity to always share with him the truth, the doling out of favors for others more than himself at his request, an agreement to always try to do what he considers to be the right thing... and I believe that is more than enough to get across my point?"
"Yeah, that sounds about right," Chloe said, sounding a little sour. At this point, Pete honestly didn't know what to think. How the hell can you buy somebody off by listening to what they have to say, when you're just shooting the shit drinking coffee at the Beanery? Let alone the rest of it. It didn't make any sense to him.
"His expectations are both a glory and a curse," Luthor murmured, sounding like he was agreeing with Chloe. "He wants me to be a better person, for me." Luthor shook his head. "While the prospect that I can accomplish such a mad feat is more than a little daunting on its own, I find the sheer fact of even the existence of such an expectation from him in the first place... well, stunning."
"You don't think you can be a better person?" Chloe asked, and Pete didn't recognize her tone of voice.
But Luthor didn't seem to have that problem -- he just laughed, though he didn't exactly sound happy doing it. "Oh, I have no illusions about that, Miss Sullivan," he half-grinned, half grimaced. "I am not a 'nice' person, or a 'good' one. I've warned Clark to that effect repeatedly." He twisted his lips up in a weird expression. "For some reason he doesn't believe me, god only knows why."
"Maybe he sees something in you that you don't?" Chloe offered, even though it was obvious that she didn't agree with the idea. (If anybody asked, neither did Pete. Nobody asked.)
"Maybe he sees something in me that he wants to see that isn't actually there," Luthor retorted, before sighing. "I can't believe that you of all people haven't entirely disabused him of the notion, yet," he added, rubbing at the bridge of his nose again.
"Clark has always kind of refused to read any articles about you, or listen to me give him the rundown on them," Chloe offered.
"That would do it," Luthor agreed softly, leaning back and staring up at the sky.
"You don't think you're good enough for him?" Pete blurted out, right as the thought occurred to him.
Luthor tilted his head back down and gave Pete a curious look. "I suppose that depends on your definition of 'good'," he replied easily.
Ok, and that really hurt his brain, because Luthor was a stuck up little bastard, not... this, whatever this was.
"If it's any consolation, I believe the feeling is mutual?" Luthor added with a smirk.
"Clark is way better than you," Pete declared.
"Are you expecting me to argue with you?" Luthor said, and his smile didn't change at all. He just slid his hands into his pockets.
"I'm pretty sure a lot of people feel that way around Clark when he's being all... him," Chloe said with a quirky smile of her own, glancing at Pete.
Pete glowered.
Luthor pulled his hands out of his pockets, carefully pushed off the side of the car, and stood up, swaying slightly. He had a keyring in one hand.
"What, leaving so soon?" Chloe said, tilting her head at him. Oh god, seriously, is she teasing him? Pete thought angrily.
"I can't think of what else I might like to do on a Friday night, other than getting snarked at by teenagers, besides driving myself home before I collapse again," Luthor smoothly snarked right back.
Pete reached forward and grabbed the keys right out of his hand.
Luthor's fingers twitched twice, and then he turned to look at Pete.
He frowned and reached out to grab them back, then aborted the motion when Pete held them out at arm's length.
Luthor's eyes narrowed and he didn't move as Chloe said, "Pete, what the hell?" and then Pete had to pull them in to his chest so she didn't grab them away from him.
"C'mon, are you both crazy? You can't drive like this!" he told Luthor. When the guy looked about to protest, he said, "Are you seriously gonna risk wrapping your sweet ride around a tree just because you were an idiot and got dizzy and passed out while trying to drive?"
Luthor blew out his breath in a sort of derisive way, and said, "Well, I'm not about to leave her out on the street overnight, so how, pray tell, would you suggest that I find my way home?"
"I could drive you," Pete said, before his brain started kicking his ass, because he was totally better than this, and not Luthor's choeffeur or any of that shit, because he wasn't doing Luthor any favors, damnit, because he didn't like the guy and he didn't care that he was Clark's friend and Clark would probably freak if he got hurt when Pete could've helped him, and it definitely shouldn't matter that this was a chance to drive a sweet ride, and oh god he was actually talking himself into this wasn't he? Shit, shit, and shit.
Luthor made that scoffing sound again. "You most certainly could not. This is a fine piece of machinery. If I want my 'sweet ride' wrapped around a tree, I'll do it myself," he ended, leaning against the car door again and holding out a hand for the keys.
Ok, and now he'd had his driving skill impugned. (Impugned: SAT word of the week.) This meant war. "I damn well do know how do handle a beautiful woman like this one, and I am not giving you your keys back."
"Oh my god, Pete," Chloe groaned, rolling her eyes. "Just because you're trying to put together that stupid old junker in your garage--"
"It's not a junker! It's a classic racing-- ugh, why am I even telling you this? You totally don't get it!"
"Far be it from me to disrespect your manly attraction for fast cars and women," Chloe snarked, and then she glanced to her right and said, "...Lex?"
"--should be fine. Thank you," Luthor ended as he hung up his cellphone, and then turned to look up at the two of them from his vantage point in the shotgun seat. "Problem?" he asked.
"Uh... who were you talking to?" Pete asked. And when the hell did he get over there?
"The guard at the mansion gate. I was informing him not to panic if and when I arrived unconscious in the passenger's side of my car later this evening." He slid the phone back into an inside pocket of his suit jacket. "Are you still amenable to an attempt to properly navigate my conveyance homeward bound without instigating any major and sadly wholly forseen incidents, up to and including an idiotic blunder that utterly destroys my transmission system not five seconds into said soon-to-be-ignominous attempt?"
Pete blinked at him.
"Oh, I'm sorry. Perhaps I should rephrase," Luthor said, and then he cleared his throat and enunciated very clearly, "So, are we doing this thing, or are you chickening out, bitch?"
Pete gritted his teeth. He got it that time. "Fuck you very much -- it's on, asshole." He tossed the keys in the empty seat, slapped his hands down on the car door, and levered himself up and over, sliding down into the seat, while fluidly snatching the keys out of the way and thrusting them into the ignition.
He thought he saw Luthor smirk out of the corner of his eye, but when he turned to glare at him, his expression gave away nothing and he raised his eyebrows at Pete in a Yeah, so? look.
Pete grumbled at him and was about to turn the key when he heard scrabbling at the side, and he yelped, "Fuck, Chloe, no room!"
"Oh, c'mon, there's plenty in the center!" she griped, pushing her way across the back.
"Ohmygodwhatareyoudoing--NOSHOESINTHECAR!" Pete yelled, grabbing her by the ankles.
Chloe rolled her eyes and laughed, and it looked like Luthor was thinking about doing the same, but by the time Pete got the engine started, Chloe was sitting at the back of the center console, and her shoes were in the passenger side seat footwell. Close enough.
"Last chance, Miss Sullivan," Luthor said, leaning back in his seat.
"Last chance?"
Luthor nodded seriously. "You see, I have a red-blooded American male installed in the driver's seat of my fine motor vehicle. It's going to be hours before we stop again, as we will undoubtedly be taking the 'long way' home."
Pete's mouth dropped. Chloe looked between the two of them, and she giggled slightly. Pete rolled his eyes, because if that was Luthor's try at a pious look, somebody someplace needed to be shot.
"Well, it's not like I had anything better to do tonight," Chloe said, sighing dramatically.
"Neither did I," Luthor said, sounding horribly sad. They both kept it up for all of five seconds until they glanced at each other and broke out in almost matching grins.
"Oh, fuck you guys, Metropolis isn't that great on a Friday night," Pete griped, putting it into gear.
"Yes it is," they both chimed back, and Chloe laughed her ass off, while Luthor glanced over at her in amusement.
"Oh, and how would you know?" Luthor asked, the damn tease, and that left Chloe blushing bright red.
Pete hit the gas, and Luthor stuck out an arm to grasp the side of Pete's seat, admonishing, "Your friend does not have a seatbelt, so I highly recommend that you keep that in mind on the quick decelerations and sharp turns, lest you send her through the windshield, which I doubt she would find a pleasant experience."
Pete gritted his teeth and glanced over at Chloe in shame, who was hanging on to Luthor's forearm like a lifevest where it bridged the gap. She just looked a little embarrassed as she let go, and then Lex did in turn.
"Why are you talking like that, anyway?" Pete asked, as he slowed to a stop and backed up in the three-point turn a lot more slowly than the first time. Was Luthor messing with him?
"Hm?" Luthor said, glancing over at him, then pausing for a moment. "Ah." He resettled himself in his seat and said with a smirk, "I'm tired, irritated, college-educated, and have an extensive vocabulary. Has it ever occurred to you that perhaps I'm simply not inclined to dumb myself down for a pair of high school freshmen at the moment?"
"Uh huh," Pete said, focusing on maneuvering the car properly.
"...It's gratifying to see that you haven't crashed my car yet, Ross," Luthor sniped at him as they turned off of Main Street. "Or left my transmission several yards back."
"Oh shut it, just admit that I know what I'm doing," Pete complained.
"Never," Luthor grinned. "But in the interest of fairness, I should warn you," he added, patting the dashboard fondly, "She likes me best."
Chloe giggled again, and Pete rolled his eyes. "Whatever. So, what tunes does this thing have?" he asked, trying not to let himself get too carried away with the idea of driving this lovely lovely thing for hours.
But by the time they'd settled on a radio station they could all live with, and Pete had really started to open her up on Route 8, he realized that Luthor had -- holy crap -- actually fallen asleep.
Pete damn near let out a gleeful yell and pumped his fists in the air, except that that might have woken up the bald owner of the car sleeping next to him, so he didn't because he was gonna get as much mileage out of this puppy as he could. No Luthor awake to tell him to head to the mansion meant no set time limit on driving this lovely lady around the county and showing her the sights, and Pete meant to make her feel at home.
~*~*~*~*~*~
When they were about an hour into the drive, Chloe finally realized that Lex hadn't been kidding about Pete, and Pete wasn't going to stop driving unless someone made him or they ran out of fuel, so she pestered him into finally turning around and driving them back to the mansion. It took another thirty minutes, all told.
Lex was still asleep when they turned off the radio and pulled up to a slow stop in front of the mansion's high black iron-wrought gates.
The gate guard in the small 'tower' on the outside of the gate peered out the window at them, then opened it and leaned forward, looking between Chloe, and Pete, and Lex.
He looked a little worried.
Chloe pushed herself into a kneeling position and said, not horribly loud, "Uh, hi. We're, uh," she glanced back at Pete, who was looking nervous, drumming his fingertips on the steering wheel, "We're here to give you back your... not-so-bald-anymore billionaire?" Chloe winced, because she hadn't meant to make that sound like a question.
The guy glanced between them, then stared down at Lex.
"Uh, we could wake him up, if you--" Chloe proceeded to stick out a finger to poke her in the arm...
"NO!" the guard whispered at the top of his lungs, waving his arms back and forth in a 'no go' gesture. "Don't wake him! --I mean, he's a light sleeper, Mrs. Palmer says so, and she would know; he should sleep," he stammered out lowly, somehow being more quiet than a loud whisper.
Chloe froze, her finger an inch away from his shoulder. She slowly drew it back.
The guard let out a sigh of relief.
"Uh, are you gonna let us in, or what?" Pete asked him.
The guy wrung his hands -- literally wrung his hands together in front of them -- and glanced nervously up the drive, and then back down the roadway. "Do you think that, maybe... you could go away and come back later?" he asked hopefully.
Chloe and Pete exchanged a glance.
"Why?" Chloe asked carefully.
The guy looked nervous -- no, spooked almost, and glanced around again, almost like he was expecting someone to jump out at him or something. Then he swallowed, seemed to steel himself, then leaned forward half out of the window and said, "Mr. Luthor's here."
Chloe knew she got a confused look, but she couldn't help it. "Okay..." she said.
"Uh, yeah, we kinda drove him up here," Pete said, pointing at Lex.
The man stared at them for a moment, then shook his head. "No, I mean -- the elder Mr. Luthor is here."
"Lionel?" Chloe asked.
Then man nodded.
"And we shouldn't bring... Lex... inside, why?" Pete asked, looking a little irritated as he eyed the closed gates.
"He... won't get any rest," the guard said. Then in a rush, he added, desperately, "Please, we'd really all be very grateful. --You wouldn't have to feed him; I can send someone with food from Cook if you'd like?" He reached back into the gate 'tower' and scribbled on a piece of paper, then handed it over to Chloe. "If you call in an hour or two, we'll send it to wherever you are. --With enough for all three of you, I mean," he added quickly.
"Ok..." Chloe said, glancing at Pete, who didn't look too happy about things, but gave her an 'I don't care' shrug. "What do we tell Lex when--" she stopped when the guy looked really nervous all of a sudden.
"Ah, do you have to?"
Chloe paused, considering.
"Is there a reason not to?" At the guy's pause, she added. "What would Lex do if we woke him up right now?"
The man's shoulders sagged a bit in defeat. "He'd want to go inside and confront the elder Mr. Luthor."
"And he wouldn't get any rest," Chloe finished. The man nodded miserably.
"Why are you asking us?" Pete asked in a half-grumble.
The man looked downcast. "I thought you might be friends of his."
Chloe and Pete shared another look.
"Aren't you worried about what'll happen if Lionel finds out?" Chloe asked slowly.
But the man straightened abruptly, eyes flashing. "I work for Lex Luthor, not his father," he said, with an almost fierce pride that left Chloe wide-eyed and blinking in shock. Because sure, her dad talked about Lex a little sometimes with some weird happiness at how well Lex seemed to be getting on at work and how quickly he was picking things up, but her dad was usually no more than mildly sympathetic for the guy, for whatever reason he had to feel that way in the first place. But however her dad felt about the redhead sleeping in the bucket seat next to her, it was a soft echo of what this guy was obviously feeling, and she was pretty sure that that was a highly possessive "He's our Luthor, damnit, and the best one, too! Get your own!"
Chloe started to puzzle through that one as she resettled back down behind the center console again.
She watched the guy go from backbone to worried all over again when he glanced at the monitors in the booth. "If you're going to go, you need to go now!" he hissed back out the window. "He'll be coming down the drive soon!"
"So, we should come back in a couple minutes once he's gone?" Pete asked, frowning as he shifted into reverse.
"No!" the man whispered frantically. "He won't be going anywhere just yet, not really. He'll be looking. Just-- find someplace out of the way!"
Chloe and Pete exchanged one more look, and Pete looked away first, sighing.
Choe stifled a grin.
"We won't say anything about what you or anybody said," Chloe promised the man as Pete backed the car down the driveway, and she noted the relieved look she got from the guard at hearing that.
They drove in silence for awhile, Pete heading for the backroads again.
"So what the hell was that?" Pete asked her.
"Not sure, but it smells kind of like a staff revolt," Chloe mused. "I always thought there was a reason why they made the house staff sign such hard core non-disclosure agreements, but..."
"What?" Pete said, glancing over at her. "You think... something's going on at the mansion? Why didn't you interview the guy?" and interrogate him like you usually do? was implied.
"Pete, what little that guy at the gate said was already pushing it, and what he did and didn't say was more than enough."
"You want to break that down for the rest of us dumb hicks, Metropolis girl?" Pete asked, rolling his eyes.
Chloe sighed. "Pete--"
"I know, I know."
Chloe looked away, then down at Lex for a moment. "House staff... usually don't take sides in upper class families. They just stay out of the way. That guy... was definitely taking sides, and it sounds like most of them were --that they were siding with Lex."
"So?"
"So, everybody knows what Lionel Luthor can do to you if you cross him; you know he's not a nice guy. Getting blackballed is the least of it," Chloe said, worrying her bottom lip. God, Lex had better be asleep right now, I don't think he'd be ready to hear this, if... Chloe really didn't want to think about that right now. "But they're doing it anyway. They work for Lex, and they think Lex will... stick up for them if they back him up and not Lionel -- that Lex won't fire them, even though they're doing something he might not agree with." Because if Lex would have forced the confrontation, and the staff didn't want him to... but they went around his back and tried to prevent it anyway... "That's... a really big deal."
"Ok, whatever, but why would they pick Lex? 'Cause they think he's the lesser of two evils?"
"Maybe." Chloe frowned. "I don't know; I don't think so. The guy sounded worried about him. That's more than just a paycheck talking there." Chloe was silent for awhile.
"What are you thinking?" Pete asked finally.
"I'm thinking that maybe his family's a lot more dysfunctional than anybody ever thought to hint at in any of the tabloids," Chloe said grimly. "Way worse. Light-years."
"And we care why?"
Chloe glanced over at Pete. "Because if Clark ever finds out -- and he probably will eventually -- he's gonna be really upset over whatever it is, and want to fix things, and maybe try to do something about it?"
"...And do something stupid," Pete sighed.
"...And do something stupid," Chloe agreed.
They drove in silence, down roads with overarching trees. Chloe didn't enjoy the ride nearly as much as she had earlier, her mind focused on other, more weighty things.
~*~*~*~*~*~
Lex woke from his slumber and glanced around. The car was stopped at the side of the road, in the middle of one of the more forested areas. The keys were in the ignition. It was dark out.
He rubbed his forehead and shifted himself a little further upright, slowly turning his head and glancing about. There was light coming from his right.
He looked over his car door and down, and finally spotted Chloe and Pete sitting in the dirt-gravel with their backs against his side of the car.
Chloe glanced up. "Hey," she said. "Want a sandwich?"
Lex blinked at her.
He undid his seatbelt, levered himself up over the door and dropped down next to her in a crouch, before gingerly settling into a cross-legged seated position.
As Chloe turned away, reached forward, and started rifling through a rather large picnic basket sitting on the grassy slope, Lex surreptitiously checked his watch. Eight-thirty-two. Hm.
"Turkey, ham, or mystery sandwich?" Chloe asked, looking over her shoulder at him.
"Which do you recommend?" Lex asked.
Chloe handed over a pastrami on rye. With mustard. Hm. Lex lowered the bread slice and eyed the two teenagers.
"How exactly did you get my Cook to make us a picnic dinner to go?" he asked casually, taking a bite. He sighed softly, closed his eyes, and let his head thunk back against the car door as he savored the bite, because, god this tasted good. Cook needed a raise.
He absently noted that the impact was decidedly softer than usual, before remembering about The Red Hair, now firmly tamed in a convenient, if rather long, braid. Oh, the much difference a few hours make! he laughed quietly to himself.
"What do you mean?" Chloe returned.
" 'Mystery meat', Chloe?" It was obvious that neither she nor Ross had had any part in the making of the meal. That begged the question, however, of why he was eating with them, rather than their being at home, and he in his...
"They thought we were friends of yours and asked us if we wanted to eat dinner out with you. Pete just can't get enough of the driving, you know. You might never get rid of him now."
Pete, on the other side of Chloe, made a noise of protest around a mouthful of sandwich.
"That doesn't explain why we aren't indoors at the mansion," Lex pointed out. "Isn't it a little cold out for a picnic in wintertime?" And a little dark? but the soft white light from the flashlight-lantern was illuminating everything just fine, really. There wasn't any snow on the ground, but still...
"We have thermoses of soup and hot chocolate," Chloe put out there. "Why, are you cold?"
Lex pulled his long winter jacket closer about him but... "No, I'm fine." He could do with a little less heat, right now, anyway. He shivered slightly, having a quick flashback to the radiation chamber. He shook it off quickly, then glanced over at Chloe, a question in his eyes.
"Oh, we're fine," Chloe laughed. "I think I might talk Pete into putting up the top and turning on the heat when we get back in, though.
"Don't either of you have a curfew?" Lex asked mildly, wondering if their parents knew where they were, and who with.
"On a Friday night?" Pete sounded offended.
"We're not Clark," Chloe snickered, shaking her head.
"My mistake," Lex murmured, sitting back and getting to finishing off his sandwich, before reaching forward and retrieving another for himself.
Lex ate mostly in silence as Pete and Chloe chatted amicably. It wasn't until he caught the both of them staring at him that he swallowed his current mouthful and asked, "What?"
"Did you finish off the rest of the basket all by yourself?" Chloe asked.
Lex glanced at the open picnic basket and felt no small trepidation at its mostly-empty interior.
"Man, I thought they'd packed too much," Pete said, eyes wide.
Lex felt his cheeks heat. "I don't normally..." he started.
"Oh. Oh, hey, c'mon--" Chloe cut in. "You said you guys were eating a lot, right? It's fine. It's helping and stuff, right?" then she paused and grinned, saying with no small amusement, "--You're totally still hungry and gonna finish off the soup now, aren't you?"
Lex's whole face felt like it was aflame. Damnit.
Lex finished off his sandwich, but he took the large thermos and spoon from Chloe when she offered it. He wasn't proud. Much. "I really don't usually have this much of an appetite..." he tried again.
"It's fine, really," Chloe said. "We ate plenty before you woke up." And Lex heard Pete make a sort of acquiescent grumble from the opposite side.
"Just leave me some hot chocolate for the drive, 'kay?" Lex heard.
"Of course," he responded.
After awhile, they packed everything up -- except one thermos of hot chocolate for Pete -- and stuffed it all in the trunk... and Lex was subject to grumbling from the youngest Ross boy about the set of golf clubs in his trunk.
"Well, where else would I put them? I'm not about to dirty my house with the damn things," Lex grumbled, which got a laugh from Chloe and an offended look from Ross.
"So you dirty your car with them instead?"
"They're in the trunk!"
"Whatever." Lex heard more than saw the eyeroll.
"It's not too late for me to ask Chloe if she'd like to drive, you know. --Miss Sullivan, would you care to drive?" That garnered him a laugh from Chloe and a gurgling dying sound from Ross.
"Sorry, I think Pete's better at the whole not-leaving-the-transmission-in-the-middle-of-the-road thing," Chloe said. "Plus, I don't know how to drive a stick shift."
"And you're not learning on this car," Pete said decisively, at which Lex couldn't help but laugh.
Once they were situated in the car again -- with the top up and the heat going -- and Pete had started them moving down the road again, Lex caught Chloe's hand mid-motion as it darted forward to turn on the radio. "You never did explain why we're still out here, all three."
Chloe sighed and glanced away. Then she looked back at him. "How long did you think we were going to be out driving you?" she asked.
"I don't see how that's relevant," Lex responded.
"Isn't it?" Chloe reflected.
Lex frowned. "What aren't you telling me?" What is going on that I don't know about?
But Chloe redirected again. "If you had a choice between being back at the mansion, in bed, asleep, and falling asleep in the car while somebody else is driving, which would you pick?"
"I suppose that would depend on who's driving," Lex said before he thought the wiser of it.
"Pete? Or Clark?"
Lex winced. He couldn't help it.
"That isn't a fair question," Lex said quietly, because he'd take spending time with Clark over time alone, any day. At the mansion -- at home, he reminded himself, because Smallville was his home now, not Metropolis -- at home, he would be subject to all sorts of interruptions, unable to sleep in as long as he would like, and all manner of minor problems might arise that would require his attention, despite the fact that they wuold otherwise keep. But, just driving along with Clark... pretending like it could go on forever. He felt safe with Clark. (Despite what had happened in the radiation chamber.) He felt safer with Clark than anyone else. (But he'd fallen asleep right in front of these two, hadn't he? Twice.)
"I'm not asking what's fair, Lex. I'm asking what you want."
That just threw him for a loop. He turned in his seat and stared at her. "Why would you care what I want?" Why would anyone? ...Besides Clark, maybe?
"Just answer the question," Chloe asked stubbornly, crossing her arms.
Lex gritted his teeth, then turned forward in his seat again, rubbing his forehead. "Fine. You want to know the truth? I don't care how long it takes to get back to the mansion, or how many stops we take along the way. Happy?"
At the grin Chloe had across her face when he glanced over at her, Lex thought that he might've just gotten himself into some odd sort of trouble, though he couldn't imagine what.
"Good to know," was all Chloe had to say further on the matter, and the feeling deepened.
Lex realized that he was giving himself a tension headache, and forced himself to relax his shoulders, as a start.
They drove in silence for awhile and, also oddly, it didn't exactly feel like an uncomfortable one.
Lex had just started to dose off again when Chloe asked, "So, what actually happened with you and Clark and the late Dr. Smithe?"
Lex blinked his eyes open and stared out the front windshield. "Clark didn't tell you?"
"No."
That was... abnormal, Lex was fairly sure. "Your reporting skills have failed you, so now you're going direct-to-second-source?"
"Clark was still in the whole aggressive-bad-mood dealy when we were talking to him, and his mom yanked him from school before we could have a second shot at him."
"Lovely," Lex murmured, having ill thoughts about what "a second shot" might have meant.
"And Li-- your dad ganked literally everything from the warehouse you'd been held in, down to the bare walls. He probably did the same thing to the place where they caught up to the doctor."
"You don't know where they picked him up?"
"Do you?"
Lex glanced over at her. "Why wouldn't I?" he said neutrally.
"You said something earlier about getting the originals from Lionel if you had to. That kind of makes it sound like you don't have all the information you need or want right now."
Goddamnit, but I am off my game today, Lex muttered to himself mentally as he massaged his temples. "I just haven't asked for it yet."
"You made it sound like he might not give it to you."
"That's ludicrous. Of course he would."
"Are you sure?"
Lex stared at her aghast. "Why on earth wouldn't he?"
Chloe shrugged. "You tell me. You're the one who said it."
"I did not--"
"Fine, implied it. Whatever. If you're sure, you're sure... right?"
"What, exactly, are you implying, Sullivan?" Lex gritted out, looking at her sideways and loosely crossing his arms across his waist.
"How much do you trust him?" Chloe said. As Lex stared at her and tried to formulate a coherent thought, she added, "Look, you don't have to tell me, I'm just saying that you might want to be careful."
Lex sat there in his car, being driven about by a pair of teenagers, friends of his first and only best friend, and remembered something his father had once told him, about how outsiders might try to divide his loyalties, and cause a rift in their family. But Lex could not for the life of him think of a reason why Chloe Sullivan of all people might find it to her advantage to attempt such a thing.
"What are you..." Lex had to stop and rethink how to put this. "Is there something in particular that you are trying to warn me about?"
Chloe bit her lip. "Will you listen?"
Lex felt more than a little disquieted at her tone. Will you hear me? Will you promise to take me seriously, or just dismiss me out of hand? It struck more deeply than she'd probably ever know. (He certainly wasn't about to tell her.)
He'd never liked being ignored, either.
"Tell me."
Chloe took a deep breath, then started. "You came to me about the meteor rocks before what happened with Earl Jenkins at the plant. And after what happened at the plant with him, I talked with Clark. He said that Level 3 was real..."
There was silence for awhile after she trailed off. Finally, Lex said, "There is no evidence that Level 3 ever existed."
"But you and Clark were there!"
Lex closed his eyes and didn't say anything.
He knew when she got it when he heard the slight gasping intake of breath.
"What happened?" she asked quietly.
"By the next day, that portion of the factory was filled in with concrete."
"The entire thing?"
"I believe so, yes." He opened his eyes and looked out the side window. "I'm not even sure when or how they did it. Neither is your father."
"The work permits didn't go by my father's desk?"
"Not unless he's lying and hid the documentation," Lex said, concentrating on the trees, not wanting to turn around and see the expression on her face.
"You've looked," she said flatly.
"Yes."
There was a pause.
"Dad said you were going to be going over the books for the entire plant with him starting next week."
"That was the plan, yes."
"Are you still going to?"
"No. I changed my mind." Before she could protest, he added, "I was planning on starting early and beginning to familiarize myself with the paperwork this weekend." He shifted in his seat and glanced down at his feet, at her shoes on the floor next to the wheelwell. "From what I understand so far about day-to-day operations at the plant, it looks as though some parts of the plant were never truly under his supervisory control, or that of the previous official management."
"Did they have separate books?"
"Some of the records were kept separate, yes." And I'm going to be finding out exactly how far my company clearance level stretches very soon, I imagine. "The general expenses fell squarely under the main plant operations budget, and the more isolated sectors did not always contribute to the upkeep."
"Is there still an unaccounted for drain on the budget for it?"
Lex glanced back at her. "Whatever alternate project or projects there may have been, were shut down years ago."
"Yes, but..."
"You think there might be?" He stopped and thought for a moment. "You think that someone is embezzling funds, and that is why the factory is always running in the red."
"I think something weird is up. My dad's not stupid; he does a good job."
"Ah." Lex smiled. "And if there are budgetary concerns which he is not allowed to touch or meddle in..."
Chloe nodded. "If you go looking..."
"Aren't you worried about what I might find?"
Chloe looked startled. "My dad isn't--"
Lex shrugged. "Perhaps, perhaps not. He seems to be a good man, though most men do," he put a hand up, forestalling the expected outburst. "Personally, I think that Occam's Razor is a better explanation." He glanced over at Chloe again. "He may do a good job, but there are things that I can get away with as Lionel's son that he can't as a 'mere' general manager. Reorganizing the entire plant and restructuring the day-to-day operations over the course of several weeks or months is one of them." He looked ahead out the window again, watching the white dashes fly by mesmerisingly along the roadway. "He would have to try and justify untried procedures to several levels of management. I am all but expected to shake things up a bit." He smiled.
"So how many people are you planning on firing in your 'restructuring'?" Pete asked acidly, joining in on the conversation.
"None, if I can help it... assuming that everyone is willing to put in an appropriate level of work effort as should be expected of them, and not just coast by on little to no effort," Lex added, glancing over at Pete.
"Yeah, because you know what it's like to work for a living," Pete snorted.
Lex's eyes narrowed. "Have you ever held down a real job?" he asked coldly, knowing the answer was 'no'. "Because I have -- and not just my employment at the plant, which I will be the first to admit was given to me when I didn't deserve it." More like thrust upon me when I didn't want it. I would have been happy to get my advanced degrees, and then, maybe... "Everyone knows full well that I don't have the experience to have earned my current position, most of all myself. But I did work while receiving my undergraduate degree in college, and I earned my way into grad school. I may not have earned my place here yet, but I damn well will before I'm done."
Pete eyeballed him sideways. "Yeah, well, do us all a favor and don't get the plant closed down and everybody fired trying, ok?" He gritted his teeth and added, 'We've had enough of that shit already."
"You think I don't know that?" Lex shot back. "You think I'm trying to turn this place into some ghost town, to ruin it?"
"Lionel did," Pete said angrily.
"I am not my father!"
Lex only realized that he'd yelled that -- and how badly he was shaking -- until after he'd demanded that Ross stop the car, and he'd gotten out and started walking down the bank towards the treeline.
He wrapped his arms around himself in a self-given half-hug, and tried to stop fucking shaking so badly. He hadn't even gotten three steps past the first tree when Chloe caught up with him.
"Where are you going?" she asked, hovering at his elbow.
Someplace I can scream for awhile without anyone asking what is wrong or looking at me like I'm out of my mind,can't you tell? "Go away," he said instead, not stopping, even though he could barely see the forest floor in front of him.
"It's your car; shouldn't you be kicking us out of it?"
Damnit, she wasn't going away, and her logic was not helping his mood at the moment. Especially the part where he knew he ought to be saying something reasonable like how leaving teenaged children at the side of a highway was decidedly not the sort of behavior that would find approval with one Emily Post. "What part of 'go away' is somehow unclea--"
"What happened to you at that warehouse?"
Lex stopped where he was. He stood there, squeezing his eyes shut, in the middle of a dark wood, and dug his fingers into his arms so tightly that he knew there would be bruises later, if not bloody welts. He was finding it that hard to keep himself from grabbing her, tossing her against the nearest tree trunk, and beating her to death with his bare fists. He clenched his teeth and tried his damndest to keep the flashes of memory -- if one could call one long stretch of total and completely overwhelming pain characterized by an utter lack of rational thought a 'memory' -- at bay. He dearly needed to lash out, and he still had enough of a grip on sanity at the moment to care that hitting someone was antisocial behavior best avoided.
It only became slightly less difficult to resist the urge when he saw his surroundings lighten from behind his eyelids, and heard crunching footsteps approach from behind them. Ross must have grabbed the electric flashlight from the trunk before pursuing them; an audience to a murder would make things more difficult, he told himself.
Chloe was conspiring not to make things any easier on him though, when she said, "Every time I've asked you about the warehouse, you redirect. Clark didn't want to talk about it, either."
"There's a reason for that," Lex said without inflection.
"What happened?"
"Chlo, he doesn't want to talk about it," he heard Pete say uneasily.
"Which just means that he probably really needs to!" she shot back at him, before turning back to Lex. "--Lex, for god's sake, if you won't talk about you, at least tell us what happened to Clark so we can help him!"
"It was the same damn thing," Lex said, his voice shaking like his body. I can't do this, I can't -- I should have gone home. I shouldn't have let them-- I'm weak, I was useless, I am useless, I hadn't been able to-- Clark got hurt because of me. He's still hurting, because of me. He's going to wake up one day soon and hate me for it, and I-- I won't be able to-- It might be dark now, but it was bright white then, and he could almost smell the antiseptic on concrete floor, like a sour bitter tang in the back of his throat.
"Lex."
Lex eyes snapped open and he flinched back a step from Chloe, who was in front of him now, pulling away from her,who had put her hands on his arms.
He glanced away from her quickly, not wanting to see the expression on her face. Stupid boy. So weak. Too emotional. Not even worth anyone's pity. Not that he wanted it. He'd have to hurt her if she did.
You'll never get anywhere with your eyes closed.
He shouldn't have closed his eyes. Not even in the dark.
No, especially not in the dark.
"You're shaking," she said quietly.
"I'm fine," he insisted.
"No. No, you're not," she said just as quietly, not moving away. "Lex," she pulled in her lips, moistened them slightly. Tentatively, she began with, "Clark said... Clark said that it hurt..."
~*~*~*~*~*~
Next post is here.
Author: josephina_x
Fandom: Smallville
Pairing: Clark, Lex
Rating: PG-13
Spoilers: major for Season 1, though it references some things up to Season 5 and beyond (Oliver, mainly); starts after Jitters (1x08) but goes AU before Rogue (1x09)
Word count: 23,700+ and 24,700+
Summary: Clark and Lex get genderswapped. Real life ensues.
Warnings: Only unofficially beta'd. Genderswap fic (a.k.a. female!Clark and female!Lex). Some weirdness and confusion involving sex and sexuality, as a matter of course. ...It belatedly occurs to me that I should also warn for PTSD and chemical torture.
Disclaimer: Not mine, not-for-profit.
Comments: Yes, please! :)
Author's Note: Written for the clexmas Spring Fling 2012 -- Changes, Prompt: Changes of gender.
For the full ongoing text (parts further than 2), updates will (eventually) be posted at AO3.
Previous post is here.
~*~*~*~*~*~
Pete caught up to the both of them in the alleyway behind the Beanery, next to Luthor's cherry red -- god, just kill him with green envy and temptation already! -- 2002 Ferrari 348 Spider. Pete had to remind himself not to drool, because he hated the guy. Who was also apparently insane. If he wanted to be charitable, some of that might be blamable on the being-a-girl-and-getting-Clark-turned-into-one-too thing, but Pete wasn't really feeling it, so there. I mean, the asshole had just spent the last ten minutes putting down reporters like they were going out of style, and Chloe was one, not to mention that Chloe had practically begged his to stay out of whatever and let her do the talking. And then there was that weird thing right before he ran away. So, yeah -- if there was something Pete was feeling right now, it sure as hell wasn't charitable.
...And Pete hot-tailed it over really quick, because maybe he couldn't hear exactly what they were saying from that far away as he rounded the corner, but he had eyes. As much as Chloe was trying to look calming, moving towards him with her palms out and talking in a lower tone of voice, she really looked more like she was trying to sneak up on an unruly cat and jump it. And Luthor looked like he was wanting to bolt, holding himself tensely, he was biting things out all staccatto and wary. Seriously, he'd never seen the guy look anything but cool as shit and sleek like he'd had custom detailing done for all the right streamlines, but if anything, right now his body language was screaming like he was two seconds away from losing his shit and lashing out again like--
...like...
...like some of the kids at school he'd seen bullied by some of the other jocks.
Like... literally beaten-into-the-ground bullied.
And that just made Pete twitch.
"Chlo, leave off him," Pete said, coming to a halt a few feet away from Luthor, before reaching forward, hooking a hand under her arm and tugging her back -- gently, because her wasn't about to manhandle her. (She'd kick him in the balls, if his mother didn't get to him for disrespecting a girl, first.)
"Pete!" Chloe complained, reaching back and slapping him in the arm, so he let go.
"Since when are you part of Lex's fanclub?" Chloe turned on him.
Fuck, that stung. "Since I don't want him going postal on you like a psycho lunatic!" Pete shot back in a sarcastic mimicry, getting between then again.
"Oh, please," Chloe scoffed at him. "If he was that kind of meteor freak, he'd've done something by now."
Pete's jaw dropped, and he heard a strangled sound from Luthor's direction.
"Babysitter," he thought he heard Luthor mumble with irritation.
"Babysitters get paid," Pete muttered back, out loud.
Luthor looked up at him and stared. Chloe said, "What?" all confused. Pete guessed she hadn't heard Luthor's comment.
"Please tell me that she does not run around aggravating meteor freaks on purpose just to see what will happen," he heard Lex say.
"Uh, no." Pete frowned at the guy.
Something like a 'thank god' got muttered in response as Luthor leaned heavily against his sweet, sweet driving machine.
Chloe frowned between the two of them and then focused on Luthor again. "You ok?" Chloe asked, tilting her head and looking at Luthor almost warily, or maybe that was really directed curiousity. Pete honest-to-god couldn't tell. It was like Chloe was upping her game several levels, messing around with Luthor. Pete didn't like it, not one bit.
Luthor nearly sat down on the door frame of the convertible. "I... just needed some air," he said a little shakily, not looking at either of them. He had his braced his hands against the door and he was sweating and swaying slightly from side to side again.
Liar, thought Pete. For some reason, the idea of Luthor having gotten a comeuppance that involved a physical beatdown wasn't leaving him feeling all that smug and glowy-warm inside, though.
"Who else grabbed you like that?" Chloe asked, and Lex's head whipped up before he winced at the movement, and then grimaced and rubbed at his forehead at the tell. Pete frowned, because from the way Chloe sounded, all concerned... Pete really couldn't wrap his brain around the idea of Luthor as a victim. Instigator, maybe; deserving it, definitely. But the way Lex was reacting... shouldn't Pete be enjoying it more? Why wasn't he?
"Fuck, why can't you people just leave me alone? Did it ever occur to you that I might only want some space to breathe?" Luthor complained.
"You could have just said something instead of running out like that," Chloe said reasonably.
"We aren't friends," Luthor grated out. "I owe you no explanation for my actions, and yet you still followed me out here. You're the one who said you're not after a story," Luthor replied darkly.
"Maybe we were worried," Chloe said argumentatively.
Lex made a scoffing sound. At least, that was what Pete guessed it was -- he'd never actually heard a person do that out loud before.
"Don't be ridiculous," Luthor added, like it was the least believable thing in the world that anyone would worry over him. Like Clark wasn't totally freaking out two days ago when you disappeared, or any of the other times that... Pete shook his head, because he didn't want to get angry at Clark right now -- he was angry enough at himself. It already felt a little like betrayal, that he wasn't feeling the way he thought he should about Luthor; he didn't want to think what Clark might say about it if he knew.
"What?" Chloe said, frowning a little. " Come on -- we're all friends with Clark."
Luthor looked like he was getting another headache. "The friend of my friend is not necessarily my friend."
"Why not?" Chloe pestered him. Pete rolled his eyes because, really, stupid question much? He sure didn't like Luthor, and he sure didn't have to just because Clark did. Kind of a no-brainer.
"Besides the obvious negating evidence, in that every soul on the entire planet would 'be friends' with each other if that was the case?" Luthor said sarcastically as he waved his hands around. "Clark has an entirely different set of compatibility and trust requirements for his relationships than I do, not to mention his actual expectations for people and their interactions with him, and such."
...Uh, what?
Pete glanced at Chloe, and she gave him a quick smug glance. Oh, god. What is she digging for now? Pete mentally complained. Hadn't she done enough already?
"So? What's so different about you two?" Chloe pestered him. Luthor just groaned.
Apparently not.
"Clark's parents have neither the inclination nor the wherewithal to buy off the people close to him to either stick around and spy on him, or to vanish from his life, or ruin their fiscal and personal reputation if they don't comply, for a start."
It took Pete a moment to get it.
"Christ, man, you're totally paranoid as hell," Pete said uneasily, because, god, nobody did that shit outside of the movies, let alone a parent to their son! What the hell was wrong with Luthor's head?
Lex just snarled back, "Fuck you, Ross -- it's happened before! Don't you dare presume to tell me what I do or don't know." He bent over slightly and started rubbing at his temples with his fingertips again. "Don't know when he's going to go after Clark; I've been trying to keep it low-key and him off dad's radar," he muttered. "Fucking idiot kidnapper blew that right out the window."
"Actually, I'd heard some rumors about that--" Chloe put out there as a start.
" 'Rumors'," Luthor muttered.
"--But if you're so worried about that happening, then why do you still hang out with him?" Chloe asked nonjudgementally, sounding nothing but curious. Pete frowned at her, and Luthor braced his hands against the car again and looked away, almost pained.
"Because I'm sick and tired of my dad pulling this shit on people I care about, and I don't think Clark'll go for it. I'm fairly sure that I can protect him now if he comes to me, and I can't see him as doing anything but getting seriously insulted and spending no time stomping over to the mansion and complaining to me about it if my dad's actually stupid enough to try that sort of idiocy on him." Luthor bit his lip, and Pete realized he was holding back a smile. "And if my dad ever tries threatening Mr. Kent... he'd probably end up punched in the face for his troubles." Or a laugh. It might be a laugh. Damn. Who gets happy about the thought of their dad getting beaten up by their friend's dad?
...Then again, we're talking about Lionel Luthor here, and that kind of messed with Pete's brain a little. Shouldn't his own son give a damn about him, or like him, or whatever? Sure, Lionel's a bastard, but isn't family family? ...Then again, Pete had had lots of times when he'd wished somebody would punch his own brothers out, and --ok, yeah, not going there, thinking of Luthor as an actual human being was kind of off the map for him, living somewhere in the realm of squick between gay porn and somebody telling him his mom was hot. Just... ugh.
"You know, it's kind of funny that you're worried about people thinking you're sick, but not worried that they'll think you're a paranoid freak," Pete put out there, crossing his arms.
"Pete!" Chloe hissed, but Luthor just looked amused.
"Oh no?" he replied. "If someone puts out a report saying that I was kidnapped and in poor health, the damage is already done, and no-one will believe otherwise -- they'll simply wonder what we're trying to hide if we deny it. But if someone puts out an odd report about my father paying off people to leave me alone -- well, that's just normal for the Metropolis elite. Someone you don't like suddenly knows a little too much? Silence them with monetary payoffs and threats." Luthor waved a hand. "If my father did something egregious, such as threatening someone who could actually prove it, and it garnered that much attention in the media, which I find doubtful, he could just spin it. After all, something like that could have been 'misconstrued' when it was merely a reasonable action to warn people off of me, to 'protect' me as family does," Luthor said the last in a mock-saintly voice, "and he comes out smelling like roses while the offending party is lambasted in turn, because blackmail is against the law, after all. By that time, my father surely would have taken care of whatever supposed 'evidence' the offender had compiled, and either the amateur would end up in jail and ruined, or would retract their accusations and try to save face. Hardly a ripple in the lake for either of us." Luthor had a wry smile on his face as he turned his head away.
Pete's jaw dropped. "You can't be serious. That's completely fucked up!" He'd heard about inner-city corruption being bad before, but that was just...
"That's life. Everybody does it -- or has it done to them," Luthor shrugged casually, like it didn't really matter. "The professionals know better, of course. The best ones are actually farily honest and upfront about it -- they show copies of whatever damaging material they've found, state their requests at a reasonable price, hand over or destroy the originals once payment is received, and disappear."
He sighed, and added, pinching the bridge of his nose again, "It's our business competitors who cause the worst problems, really, getting desperate and stupid. They'll usually make things up and attempt to frame the company for bad business practices by planting false evidence, or subvert a Luthorcorp employee or two into performing sabotage or corporate espionage for them, or otherwise try and make things difficult. It's common practice when someone wants to stall a takeover or merger, or try to upset the award of a government contract, or catch up in R&D work."
Oh my god, that can't actually be real, Pete thought in horror. That doesn't ever actually happen. He's just shitting me!
Then he looked up and frowned a little at Pete. "It's how the game is played," he added, as though he couldn't understand how Pete didn't already know this. He turned to Chloe with a question in his eyes. "Don't you have similar here on a smaller scale? Perhaps someone is friends with the sheriff, and their son does something a little less than legal, but they're a friend of the family, so they just give the kid a slap on the wrist and let them go, saying 'boys will be boys' with no charges filed?"
"That's not supposed to happen!" Pete said, feeling a little freaked out, because Chloe wasn't correcting him.
"But it does, doesn't it?" Luthor said, turning back to Pete searching his face. "With the senior members of the football team especially, yes? Surely, they have parties with alcohol, and no-one goes looking to find and arrest them, or the people who allowed them to acquire the liquor. They 'pull pranks', and someone has a 'talk' with the victims, and no charges are ever filed."
Pete felt a little sick. "It's not the same thing," he said stubbornly.
"If you say so," Luthor replied lightly.
"Pete, don't worry about it too much, ok?" Chloe said, touching his arm.
Pete grumbled, because that wasn't Chloe agreeing with him. Man, she was so getting the third-degree after this. What else didn't he know? Was this 'game' something he'd have to warn Clark about? He didn't want Clark getting caught up in this crap!
"Not everybody can be bought off," Pete retorted, because he didn't like the idea of what Luthor had been talking about. It had started out sounding like friends who weren't friends selling out, but the way Luthor had talked about it after that had sounded like he'd been talking about bribing reporters. "Some people have ethics, and standards and principles and... stuff." He thought of his mother the judge.
"Hardly." Luthor drawled, with a smirk. "Everyone has a price."
My mom doesn't! Pete thought proudly, but that wasn't an argument he wanted to get into with the jerk. So instead he said, "Clark doesn't!" and thought Ha! Take that! because even Luthor couldn't contest that one.
But Luthor's smirk just twitched a little higher at that, and he leaned back, settling against the car more comfortably. "Oh, but he does," he said, and the smirk edged towards an outright grin. "It may not be in the usual coin of the realm, but he most certainly does."
"Like hell!" Pete shot back.
"Such as?" Chloe prodded.
"Chlo!"
Luthor settled on a crazy sort of closed-mouth smile. "For Clark? Stop me if this sounds familiar: a gladness to spend time with him, a willingness to listen to him and consider his words, an arrangement where one does not ask after or otherwise immediately drops what he considers to be personal subjects, a propensity to always share with him the truth, the doling out of favors for others more than himself at his request, an agreement to always try to do what he considers to be the right thing... and I believe that is more than enough to get across my point?"
"Yeah, that sounds about right," Chloe said, sounding a little sour. At this point, Pete honestly didn't know what to think. How the hell can you buy somebody off by listening to what they have to say, when you're just shooting the shit drinking coffee at the Beanery? Let alone the rest of it. It didn't make any sense to him.
"His expectations are both a glory and a curse," Luthor murmured, sounding like he was agreeing with Chloe. "He wants me to be a better person, for me." Luthor shook his head. "While the prospect that I can accomplish such a mad feat is more than a little daunting on its own, I find the sheer fact of even the existence of such an expectation from him in the first place... well, stunning."
"You don't think you can be a better person?" Chloe asked, and Pete didn't recognize her tone of voice.
But Luthor didn't seem to have that problem -- he just laughed, though he didn't exactly sound happy doing it. "Oh, I have no illusions about that, Miss Sullivan," he half-grinned, half grimaced. "I am not a 'nice' person, or a 'good' one. I've warned Clark to that effect repeatedly." He twisted his lips up in a weird expression. "For some reason he doesn't believe me, god only knows why."
"Maybe he sees something in you that you don't?" Chloe offered, even though it was obvious that she didn't agree with the idea. (If anybody asked, neither did Pete. Nobody asked.)
"Maybe he sees something in me that he wants to see that isn't actually there," Luthor retorted, before sighing. "I can't believe that you of all people haven't entirely disabused him of the notion, yet," he added, rubbing at the bridge of his nose again.
"Clark has always kind of refused to read any articles about you, or listen to me give him the rundown on them," Chloe offered.
"That would do it," Luthor agreed softly, leaning back and staring up at the sky.
"You don't think you're good enough for him?" Pete blurted out, right as the thought occurred to him.
Luthor tilted his head back down and gave Pete a curious look. "I suppose that depends on your definition of 'good'," he replied easily.
Ok, and that really hurt his brain, because Luthor was a stuck up little bastard, not... this, whatever this was.
"If it's any consolation, I believe the feeling is mutual?" Luthor added with a smirk.
"Clark is way better than you," Pete declared.
"Are you expecting me to argue with you?" Luthor said, and his smile didn't change at all. He just slid his hands into his pockets.
"I'm pretty sure a lot of people feel that way around Clark when he's being all... him," Chloe said with a quirky smile of her own, glancing at Pete.
Pete glowered.
Luthor pulled his hands out of his pockets, carefully pushed off the side of the car, and stood up, swaying slightly. He had a keyring in one hand.
"What, leaving so soon?" Chloe said, tilting her head at him. Oh god, seriously, is she teasing him? Pete thought angrily.
"I can't think of what else I might like to do on a Friday night, other than getting snarked at by teenagers, besides driving myself home before I collapse again," Luthor smoothly snarked right back.
Pete reached forward and grabbed the keys right out of his hand.
Luthor's fingers twitched twice, and then he turned to look at Pete.
He frowned and reached out to grab them back, then aborted the motion when Pete held them out at arm's length.
Luthor's eyes narrowed and he didn't move as Chloe said, "Pete, what the hell?" and then Pete had to pull them in to his chest so she didn't grab them away from him.
"C'mon, are you both crazy? You can't drive like this!" he told Luthor. When the guy looked about to protest, he said, "Are you seriously gonna risk wrapping your sweet ride around a tree just because you were an idiot and got dizzy and passed out while trying to drive?"
Luthor blew out his breath in a sort of derisive way, and said, "Well, I'm not about to leave her out on the street overnight, so how, pray tell, would you suggest that I find my way home?"
"I could drive you," Pete said, before his brain started kicking his ass, because he was totally better than this, and not Luthor's choeffeur or any of that shit, because he wasn't doing Luthor any favors, damnit, because he didn't like the guy and he didn't care that he was Clark's friend and Clark would probably freak if he got hurt when Pete could've helped him, and it definitely shouldn't matter that this was a chance to drive a sweet ride, and oh god he was actually talking himself into this wasn't he? Shit, shit, and shit.
Luthor made that scoffing sound again. "You most certainly could not. This is a fine piece of machinery. If I want my 'sweet ride' wrapped around a tree, I'll do it myself," he ended, leaning against the car door again and holding out a hand for the keys.
Ok, and now he'd had his driving skill impugned. (Impugned: SAT word of the week.) This meant war. "I damn well do know how do handle a beautiful woman like this one, and I am not giving you your keys back."
"Oh my god, Pete," Chloe groaned, rolling her eyes. "Just because you're trying to put together that stupid old junker in your garage--"
"It's not a junker! It's a classic racing-- ugh, why am I even telling you this? You totally don't get it!"
"Far be it from me to disrespect your manly attraction for fast cars and women," Chloe snarked, and then she glanced to her right and said, "...Lex?"
"--should be fine. Thank you," Luthor ended as he hung up his cellphone, and then turned to look up at the two of them from his vantage point in the shotgun seat. "Problem?" he asked.
"Uh... who were you talking to?" Pete asked. And when the hell did he get over there?
"The guard at the mansion gate. I was informing him not to panic if and when I arrived unconscious in the passenger's side of my car later this evening." He slid the phone back into an inside pocket of his suit jacket. "Are you still amenable to an attempt to properly navigate my conveyance homeward bound without instigating any major and sadly wholly forseen incidents, up to and including an idiotic blunder that utterly destroys my transmission system not five seconds into said soon-to-be-ignominous attempt?"
Pete blinked at him.
"Oh, I'm sorry. Perhaps I should rephrase," Luthor said, and then he cleared his throat and enunciated very clearly, "So, are we doing this thing, or are you chickening out, bitch?"
Pete gritted his teeth. He got it that time. "Fuck you very much -- it's on, asshole." He tossed the keys in the empty seat, slapped his hands down on the car door, and levered himself up and over, sliding down into the seat, while fluidly snatching the keys out of the way and thrusting them into the ignition.
He thought he saw Luthor smirk out of the corner of his eye, but when he turned to glare at him, his expression gave away nothing and he raised his eyebrows at Pete in a Yeah, so? look.
Pete grumbled at him and was about to turn the key when he heard scrabbling at the side, and he yelped, "Fuck, Chloe, no room!"
"Oh, c'mon, there's plenty in the center!" she griped, pushing her way across the back.
"Ohmygodwhatareyoudoing--NOSHOESINTHECAR!" Pete yelled, grabbing her by the ankles.
Chloe rolled her eyes and laughed, and it looked like Luthor was thinking about doing the same, but by the time Pete got the engine started, Chloe was sitting at the back of the center console, and her shoes were in the passenger side seat footwell. Close enough.
"Last chance, Miss Sullivan," Luthor said, leaning back in his seat.
"Last chance?"
Luthor nodded seriously. "You see, I have a red-blooded American male installed in the driver's seat of my fine motor vehicle. It's going to be hours before we stop again, as we will undoubtedly be taking the 'long way' home."
Pete's mouth dropped. Chloe looked between the two of them, and she giggled slightly. Pete rolled his eyes, because if that was Luthor's try at a pious look, somebody someplace needed to be shot.
"Well, it's not like I had anything better to do tonight," Chloe said, sighing dramatically.
"Neither did I," Luthor said, sounding horribly sad. They both kept it up for all of five seconds until they glanced at each other and broke out in almost matching grins.
"Oh, fuck you guys, Metropolis isn't that great on a Friday night," Pete griped, putting it into gear.
"Yes it is," they both chimed back, and Chloe laughed her ass off, while Luthor glanced over at her in amusement.
"Oh, and how would you know?" Luthor asked, the damn tease, and that left Chloe blushing bright red.
Pete hit the gas, and Luthor stuck out an arm to grasp the side of Pete's seat, admonishing, "Your friend does not have a seatbelt, so I highly recommend that you keep that in mind on the quick decelerations and sharp turns, lest you send her through the windshield, which I doubt she would find a pleasant experience."
Pete gritted his teeth and glanced over at Chloe in shame, who was hanging on to Luthor's forearm like a lifevest where it bridged the gap. She just looked a little embarrassed as she let go, and then Lex did in turn.
"Why are you talking like that, anyway?" Pete asked, as he slowed to a stop and backed up in the three-point turn a lot more slowly than the first time. Was Luthor messing with him?
"Hm?" Luthor said, glancing over at him, then pausing for a moment. "Ah." He resettled himself in his seat and said with a smirk, "I'm tired, irritated, college-educated, and have an extensive vocabulary. Has it ever occurred to you that perhaps I'm simply not inclined to dumb myself down for a pair of high school freshmen at the moment?"
"Uh huh," Pete said, focusing on maneuvering the car properly.
"...It's gratifying to see that you haven't crashed my car yet, Ross," Luthor sniped at him as they turned off of Main Street. "Or left my transmission several yards back."
"Oh shut it, just admit that I know what I'm doing," Pete complained.
"Never," Luthor grinned. "But in the interest of fairness, I should warn you," he added, patting the dashboard fondly, "She likes me best."
Chloe giggled again, and Pete rolled his eyes. "Whatever. So, what tunes does this thing have?" he asked, trying not to let himself get too carried away with the idea of driving this lovely lovely thing for hours.
But by the time they'd settled on a radio station they could all live with, and Pete had really started to open her up on Route 8, he realized that Luthor had -- holy crap -- actually fallen asleep.
Pete damn near let out a gleeful yell and pumped his fists in the air, except that that might have woken up the bald owner of the car sleeping next to him, so he didn't because he was gonna get as much mileage out of this puppy as he could. No Luthor awake to tell him to head to the mansion meant no set time limit on driving this lovely lady around the county and showing her the sights, and Pete meant to make her feel at home.
~*~*~*~*~*~
When they were about an hour into the drive, Chloe finally realized that Lex hadn't been kidding about Pete, and Pete wasn't going to stop driving unless someone made him or they ran out of fuel, so she pestered him into finally turning around and driving them back to the mansion. It took another thirty minutes, all told.
Lex was still asleep when they turned off the radio and pulled up to a slow stop in front of the mansion's high black iron-wrought gates.
The gate guard in the small 'tower' on the outside of the gate peered out the window at them, then opened it and leaned forward, looking between Chloe, and Pete, and Lex.
He looked a little worried.
Chloe pushed herself into a kneeling position and said, not horribly loud, "Uh, hi. We're, uh," she glanced back at Pete, who was looking nervous, drumming his fingertips on the steering wheel, "We're here to give you back your... not-so-bald-anymore billionaire?" Chloe winced, because she hadn't meant to make that sound like a question.
The guy glanced between them, then stared down at Lex.
"Uh, we could wake him up, if you--" Chloe proceeded to stick out a finger to poke her in the arm...
"NO!" the guard whispered at the top of his lungs, waving his arms back and forth in a 'no go' gesture. "Don't wake him! --I mean, he's a light sleeper, Mrs. Palmer says so, and she would know; he should sleep," he stammered out lowly, somehow being more quiet than a loud whisper.
Chloe froze, her finger an inch away from his shoulder. She slowly drew it back.
The guard let out a sigh of relief.
"Uh, are you gonna let us in, or what?" Pete asked him.
The guy wrung his hands -- literally wrung his hands together in front of them -- and glanced nervously up the drive, and then back down the roadway. "Do you think that, maybe... you could go away and come back later?" he asked hopefully.
Chloe and Pete exchanged a glance.
"Why?" Chloe asked carefully.
The guy looked nervous -- no, spooked almost, and glanced around again, almost like he was expecting someone to jump out at him or something. Then he swallowed, seemed to steel himself, then leaned forward half out of the window and said, "Mr. Luthor's here."
Chloe knew she got a confused look, but she couldn't help it. "Okay..." she said.
"Uh, yeah, we kinda drove him up here," Pete said, pointing at Lex.
The man stared at them for a moment, then shook his head. "No, I mean -- the elder Mr. Luthor is here."
"Lionel?" Chloe asked.
Then man nodded.
"And we shouldn't bring... Lex... inside, why?" Pete asked, looking a little irritated as he eyed the closed gates.
"He... won't get any rest," the guard said. Then in a rush, he added, desperately, "Please, we'd really all be very grateful. --You wouldn't have to feed him; I can send someone with food from Cook if you'd like?" He reached back into the gate 'tower' and scribbled on a piece of paper, then handed it over to Chloe. "If you call in an hour or two, we'll send it to wherever you are. --With enough for all three of you, I mean," he added quickly.
"Ok..." Chloe said, glancing at Pete, who didn't look too happy about things, but gave her an 'I don't care' shrug. "What do we tell Lex when--" she stopped when the guy looked really nervous all of a sudden.
"Ah, do you have to?"
Chloe paused, considering.
"Is there a reason not to?" At the guy's pause, she added. "What would Lex do if we woke him up right now?"
The man's shoulders sagged a bit in defeat. "He'd want to go inside and confront the elder Mr. Luthor."
"And he wouldn't get any rest," Chloe finished. The man nodded miserably.
"Why are you asking us?" Pete asked in a half-grumble.
The man looked downcast. "I thought you might be friends of his."
Chloe and Pete shared another look.
"Aren't you worried about what'll happen if Lionel finds out?" Chloe asked slowly.
But the man straightened abruptly, eyes flashing. "I work for Lex Luthor, not his father," he said, with an almost fierce pride that left Chloe wide-eyed and blinking in shock. Because sure, her dad talked about Lex a little sometimes with some weird happiness at how well Lex seemed to be getting on at work and how quickly he was picking things up, but her dad was usually no more than mildly sympathetic for the guy, for whatever reason he had to feel that way in the first place. But however her dad felt about the redhead sleeping in the bucket seat next to her, it was a soft echo of what this guy was obviously feeling, and she was pretty sure that that was a highly possessive "He's our Luthor, damnit, and the best one, too! Get your own!"
Chloe started to puzzle through that one as she resettled back down behind the center console again.
She watched the guy go from backbone to worried all over again when he glanced at the monitors in the booth. "If you're going to go, you need to go now!" he hissed back out the window. "He'll be coming down the drive soon!"
"So, we should come back in a couple minutes once he's gone?" Pete asked, frowning as he shifted into reverse.
"No!" the man whispered frantically. "He won't be going anywhere just yet, not really. He'll be looking. Just-- find someplace out of the way!"
Chloe and Pete exchanged one more look, and Pete looked away first, sighing.
Choe stifled a grin.
"We won't say anything about what you or anybody said," Chloe promised the man as Pete backed the car down the driveway, and she noted the relieved look she got from the guard at hearing that.
They drove in silence for awhile, Pete heading for the backroads again.
"So what the hell was that?" Pete asked her.
"Not sure, but it smells kind of like a staff revolt," Chloe mused. "I always thought there was a reason why they made the house staff sign such hard core non-disclosure agreements, but..."
"What?" Pete said, glancing over at her. "You think... something's going on at the mansion? Why didn't you interview the guy?" and interrogate him like you usually do? was implied.
"Pete, what little that guy at the gate said was already pushing it, and what he did and didn't say was more than enough."
"You want to break that down for the rest of us dumb hicks, Metropolis girl?" Pete asked, rolling his eyes.
Chloe sighed. "Pete--"
"I know, I know."
Chloe looked away, then down at Lex for a moment. "House staff... usually don't take sides in upper class families. They just stay out of the way. That guy... was definitely taking sides, and it sounds like most of them were --that they were siding with Lex."
"So?"
"So, everybody knows what Lionel Luthor can do to you if you cross him; you know he's not a nice guy. Getting blackballed is the least of it," Chloe said, worrying her bottom lip. God, Lex had better be asleep right now, I don't think he'd be ready to hear this, if... Chloe really didn't want to think about that right now. "But they're doing it anyway. They work for Lex, and they think Lex will... stick up for them if they back him up and not Lionel -- that Lex won't fire them, even though they're doing something he might not agree with." Because if Lex would have forced the confrontation, and the staff didn't want him to... but they went around his back and tried to prevent it anyway... "That's... a really big deal."
"Ok, whatever, but why would they pick Lex? 'Cause they think he's the lesser of two evils?"
"Maybe." Chloe frowned. "I don't know; I don't think so. The guy sounded worried about him. That's more than just a paycheck talking there." Chloe was silent for awhile.
"What are you thinking?" Pete asked finally.
"I'm thinking that maybe his family's a lot more dysfunctional than anybody ever thought to hint at in any of the tabloids," Chloe said grimly. "Way worse. Light-years."
"And we care why?"
Chloe glanced over at Pete. "Because if Clark ever finds out -- and he probably will eventually -- he's gonna be really upset over whatever it is, and want to fix things, and maybe try to do something about it?"
"...And do something stupid," Pete sighed.
"...And do something stupid," Chloe agreed.
They drove in silence, down roads with overarching trees. Chloe didn't enjoy the ride nearly as much as she had earlier, her mind focused on other, more weighty things.
~*~*~*~*~*~
Lex woke from his slumber and glanced around. The car was stopped at the side of the road, in the middle of one of the more forested areas. The keys were in the ignition. It was dark out.
He rubbed his forehead and shifted himself a little further upright, slowly turning his head and glancing about. There was light coming from his right.
He looked over his car door and down, and finally spotted Chloe and Pete sitting in the dirt-gravel with their backs against his side of the car.
Chloe glanced up. "Hey," she said. "Want a sandwich?"
Lex blinked at her.
He undid his seatbelt, levered himself up over the door and dropped down next to her in a crouch, before gingerly settling into a cross-legged seated position.
As Chloe turned away, reached forward, and started rifling through a rather large picnic basket sitting on the grassy slope, Lex surreptitiously checked his watch. Eight-thirty-two. Hm.
"Turkey, ham, or mystery sandwich?" Chloe asked, looking over her shoulder at him.
"Which do you recommend?" Lex asked.
Chloe handed over a pastrami on rye. With mustard. Hm. Lex lowered the bread slice and eyed the two teenagers.
"How exactly did you get my Cook to make us a picnic dinner to go?" he asked casually, taking a bite. He sighed softly, closed his eyes, and let his head thunk back against the car door as he savored the bite, because, god this tasted good. Cook needed a raise.
He absently noted that the impact was decidedly softer than usual, before remembering about The Red Hair, now firmly tamed in a convenient, if rather long, braid. Oh, the much difference a few hours make! he laughed quietly to himself.
"What do you mean?" Chloe returned.
" 'Mystery meat', Chloe?" It was obvious that neither she nor Ross had had any part in the making of the meal. That begged the question, however, of why he was eating with them, rather than their being at home, and he in his...
"They thought we were friends of yours and asked us if we wanted to eat dinner out with you. Pete just can't get enough of the driving, you know. You might never get rid of him now."
Pete, on the other side of Chloe, made a noise of protest around a mouthful of sandwich.
"That doesn't explain why we aren't indoors at the mansion," Lex pointed out. "Isn't it a little cold out for a picnic in wintertime?" And a little dark? but the soft white light from the flashlight-lantern was illuminating everything just fine, really. There wasn't any snow on the ground, but still...
"We have thermoses of soup and hot chocolate," Chloe put out there. "Why, are you cold?"
Lex pulled his long winter jacket closer about him but... "No, I'm fine." He could do with a little less heat, right now, anyway. He shivered slightly, having a quick flashback to the radiation chamber. He shook it off quickly, then glanced over at Chloe, a question in his eyes.
"Oh, we're fine," Chloe laughed. "I think I might talk Pete into putting up the top and turning on the heat when we get back in, though.
"Don't either of you have a curfew?" Lex asked mildly, wondering if their parents knew where they were, and who with.
"On a Friday night?" Pete sounded offended.
"We're not Clark," Chloe snickered, shaking her head.
"My mistake," Lex murmured, sitting back and getting to finishing off his sandwich, before reaching forward and retrieving another for himself.
Lex ate mostly in silence as Pete and Chloe chatted amicably. It wasn't until he caught the both of them staring at him that he swallowed his current mouthful and asked, "What?"
"Did you finish off the rest of the basket all by yourself?" Chloe asked.
Lex glanced at the open picnic basket and felt no small trepidation at its mostly-empty interior.
"Man, I thought they'd packed too much," Pete said, eyes wide.
Lex felt his cheeks heat. "I don't normally..." he started.
"Oh. Oh, hey, c'mon--" Chloe cut in. "You said you guys were eating a lot, right? It's fine. It's helping and stuff, right?" then she paused and grinned, saying with no small amusement, "--You're totally still hungry and gonna finish off the soup now, aren't you?"
Lex's whole face felt like it was aflame. Damnit.
Lex finished off his sandwich, but he took the large thermos and spoon from Chloe when she offered it. He wasn't proud. Much. "I really don't usually have this much of an appetite..." he tried again.
"It's fine, really," Chloe said. "We ate plenty before you woke up." And Lex heard Pete make a sort of acquiescent grumble from the opposite side.
"Just leave me some hot chocolate for the drive, 'kay?" Lex heard.
"Of course," he responded.
After awhile, they packed everything up -- except one thermos of hot chocolate for Pete -- and stuffed it all in the trunk... and Lex was subject to grumbling from the youngest Ross boy about the set of golf clubs in his trunk.
"Well, where else would I put them? I'm not about to dirty my house with the damn things," Lex grumbled, which got a laugh from Chloe and an offended look from Ross.
"So you dirty your car with them instead?"
"They're in the trunk!"
"Whatever." Lex heard more than saw the eyeroll.
"It's not too late for me to ask Chloe if she'd like to drive, you know. --Miss Sullivan, would you care to drive?" That garnered him a laugh from Chloe and a gurgling dying sound from Ross.
"Sorry, I think Pete's better at the whole not-leaving-the-transmission-in-the-middle-of-the-road thing," Chloe said. "Plus, I don't know how to drive a stick shift."
"And you're not learning on this car," Pete said decisively, at which Lex couldn't help but laugh.
Once they were situated in the car again -- with the top up and the heat going -- and Pete had started them moving down the road again, Lex caught Chloe's hand mid-motion as it darted forward to turn on the radio. "You never did explain why we're still out here, all three."
Chloe sighed and glanced away. Then she looked back at him. "How long did you think we were going to be out driving you?" she asked.
"I don't see how that's relevant," Lex responded.
"Isn't it?" Chloe reflected.
Lex frowned. "What aren't you telling me?" What is going on that I don't know about?
But Chloe redirected again. "If you had a choice between being back at the mansion, in bed, asleep, and falling asleep in the car while somebody else is driving, which would you pick?"
"I suppose that would depend on who's driving," Lex said before he thought the wiser of it.
"Pete? Or Clark?"
Lex winced. He couldn't help it.
"That isn't a fair question," Lex said quietly, because he'd take spending time with Clark over time alone, any day. At the mansion -- at home, he reminded himself, because Smallville was his home now, not Metropolis -- at home, he would be subject to all sorts of interruptions, unable to sleep in as long as he would like, and all manner of minor problems might arise that would require his attention, despite the fact that they wuold otherwise keep. But, just driving along with Clark... pretending like it could go on forever. He felt safe with Clark. (Despite what had happened in the radiation chamber.) He felt safer with Clark than anyone else. (But he'd fallen asleep right in front of these two, hadn't he? Twice.)
"I'm not asking what's fair, Lex. I'm asking what you want."
That just threw him for a loop. He turned in his seat and stared at her. "Why would you care what I want?" Why would anyone? ...Besides Clark, maybe?
"Just answer the question," Chloe asked stubbornly, crossing her arms.
Lex gritted his teeth, then turned forward in his seat again, rubbing his forehead. "Fine. You want to know the truth? I don't care how long it takes to get back to the mansion, or how many stops we take along the way. Happy?"
At the grin Chloe had across her face when he glanced over at her, Lex thought that he might've just gotten himself into some odd sort of trouble, though he couldn't imagine what.
"Good to know," was all Chloe had to say further on the matter, and the feeling deepened.
Lex realized that he was giving himself a tension headache, and forced himself to relax his shoulders, as a start.
They drove in silence for awhile and, also oddly, it didn't exactly feel like an uncomfortable one.
Lex had just started to dose off again when Chloe asked, "So, what actually happened with you and Clark and the late Dr. Smithe?"
Lex blinked his eyes open and stared out the front windshield. "Clark didn't tell you?"
"No."
That was... abnormal, Lex was fairly sure. "Your reporting skills have failed you, so now you're going direct-to-second-source?"
"Clark was still in the whole aggressive-bad-mood dealy when we were talking to him, and his mom yanked him from school before we could have a second shot at him."
"Lovely," Lex murmured, having ill thoughts about what "a second shot" might have meant.
"And Li-- your dad ganked literally everything from the warehouse you'd been held in, down to the bare walls. He probably did the same thing to the place where they caught up to the doctor."
"You don't know where they picked him up?"
"Do you?"
Lex glanced over at her. "Why wouldn't I?" he said neutrally.
"You said something earlier about getting the originals from Lionel if you had to. That kind of makes it sound like you don't have all the information you need or want right now."
Goddamnit, but I am off my game today, Lex muttered to himself mentally as he massaged his temples. "I just haven't asked for it yet."
"You made it sound like he might not give it to you."
"That's ludicrous. Of course he would."
"Are you sure?"
Lex stared at her aghast. "Why on earth wouldn't he?"
Chloe shrugged. "You tell me. You're the one who said it."
"I did not--"
"Fine, implied it. Whatever. If you're sure, you're sure... right?"
"What, exactly, are you implying, Sullivan?" Lex gritted out, looking at her sideways and loosely crossing his arms across his waist.
"How much do you trust him?" Chloe said. As Lex stared at her and tried to formulate a coherent thought, she added, "Look, you don't have to tell me, I'm just saying that you might want to be careful."
Lex sat there in his car, being driven about by a pair of teenagers, friends of his first and only best friend, and remembered something his father had once told him, about how outsiders might try to divide his loyalties, and cause a rift in their family. But Lex could not for the life of him think of a reason why Chloe Sullivan of all people might find it to her advantage to attempt such a thing.
"What are you..." Lex had to stop and rethink how to put this. "Is there something in particular that you are trying to warn me about?"
Chloe bit her lip. "Will you listen?"
Lex felt more than a little disquieted at her tone. Will you hear me? Will you promise to take me seriously, or just dismiss me out of hand? It struck more deeply than she'd probably ever know. (He certainly wasn't about to tell her.)
He'd never liked being ignored, either.
"Tell me."
Chloe took a deep breath, then started. "You came to me about the meteor rocks before what happened with Earl Jenkins at the plant. And after what happened at the plant with him, I talked with Clark. He said that Level 3 was real..."
There was silence for awhile after she trailed off. Finally, Lex said, "There is no evidence that Level 3 ever existed."
"But you and Clark were there!"
Lex closed his eyes and didn't say anything.
He knew when she got it when he heard the slight gasping intake of breath.
"What happened?" she asked quietly.
"By the next day, that portion of the factory was filled in with concrete."
"The entire thing?"
"I believe so, yes." He opened his eyes and looked out the side window. "I'm not even sure when or how they did it. Neither is your father."
"The work permits didn't go by my father's desk?"
"Not unless he's lying and hid the documentation," Lex said, concentrating on the trees, not wanting to turn around and see the expression on her face.
"You've looked," she said flatly.
"Yes."
There was a pause.
"Dad said you were going to be going over the books for the entire plant with him starting next week."
"That was the plan, yes."
"Are you still going to?"
"No. I changed my mind." Before she could protest, he added, "I was planning on starting early and beginning to familiarize myself with the paperwork this weekend." He shifted in his seat and glanced down at his feet, at her shoes on the floor next to the wheelwell. "From what I understand so far about day-to-day operations at the plant, it looks as though some parts of the plant were never truly under his supervisory control, or that of the previous official management."
"Did they have separate books?"
"Some of the records were kept separate, yes." And I'm going to be finding out exactly how far my company clearance level stretches very soon, I imagine. "The general expenses fell squarely under the main plant operations budget, and the more isolated sectors did not always contribute to the upkeep."
"Is there still an unaccounted for drain on the budget for it?"
Lex glanced back at her. "Whatever alternate project or projects there may have been, were shut down years ago."
"Yes, but..."
"You think there might be?" He stopped and thought for a moment. "You think that someone is embezzling funds, and that is why the factory is always running in the red."
"I think something weird is up. My dad's not stupid; he does a good job."
"Ah." Lex smiled. "And if there are budgetary concerns which he is not allowed to touch or meddle in..."
Chloe nodded. "If you go looking..."
"Aren't you worried about what I might find?"
Chloe looked startled. "My dad isn't--"
Lex shrugged. "Perhaps, perhaps not. He seems to be a good man, though most men do," he put a hand up, forestalling the expected outburst. "Personally, I think that Occam's Razor is a better explanation." He glanced over at Chloe again. "He may do a good job, but there are things that I can get away with as Lionel's son that he can't as a 'mere' general manager. Reorganizing the entire plant and restructuring the day-to-day operations over the course of several weeks or months is one of them." He looked ahead out the window again, watching the white dashes fly by mesmerisingly along the roadway. "He would have to try and justify untried procedures to several levels of management. I am all but expected to shake things up a bit." He smiled.
"So how many people are you planning on firing in your 'restructuring'?" Pete asked acidly, joining in on the conversation.
"None, if I can help it... assuming that everyone is willing to put in an appropriate level of work effort as should be expected of them, and not just coast by on little to no effort," Lex added, glancing over at Pete.
"Yeah, because you know what it's like to work for a living," Pete snorted.
Lex's eyes narrowed. "Have you ever held down a real job?" he asked coldly, knowing the answer was 'no'. "Because I have -- and not just my employment at the plant, which I will be the first to admit was given to me when I didn't deserve it." More like thrust upon me when I didn't want it. I would have been happy to get my advanced degrees, and then, maybe... "Everyone knows full well that I don't have the experience to have earned my current position, most of all myself. But I did work while receiving my undergraduate degree in college, and I earned my way into grad school. I may not have earned my place here yet, but I damn well will before I'm done."
Pete eyeballed him sideways. "Yeah, well, do us all a favor and don't get the plant closed down and everybody fired trying, ok?" He gritted his teeth and added, 'We've had enough of that shit already."
"You think I don't know that?" Lex shot back. "You think I'm trying to turn this place into some ghost town, to ruin it?"
"Lionel did," Pete said angrily.
"I am not my father!"
Lex only realized that he'd yelled that -- and how badly he was shaking -- until after he'd demanded that Ross stop the car, and he'd gotten out and started walking down the bank towards the treeline.
He wrapped his arms around himself in a self-given half-hug, and tried to stop fucking shaking so badly. He hadn't even gotten three steps past the first tree when Chloe caught up with him.
"Where are you going?" she asked, hovering at his elbow.
Someplace I can scream for awhile without anyone asking what is wrong or looking at me like I'm out of my mind,can't you tell? "Go away," he said instead, not stopping, even though he could barely see the forest floor in front of him.
"It's your car; shouldn't you be kicking us out of it?"
Damnit, she wasn't going away, and her logic was not helping his mood at the moment. Especially the part where he knew he ought to be saying something reasonable like how leaving teenaged children at the side of a highway was decidedly not the sort of behavior that would find approval with one Emily Post. "What part of 'go away' is somehow unclea--"
"What happened to you at that warehouse?"
Lex stopped where he was. He stood there, squeezing his eyes shut, in the middle of a dark wood, and dug his fingers into his arms so tightly that he knew there would be bruises later, if not bloody welts. He was finding it that hard to keep himself from grabbing her, tossing her against the nearest tree trunk, and beating her to death with his bare fists. He clenched his teeth and tried his damndest to keep the flashes of memory -- if one could call one long stretch of total and completely overwhelming pain characterized by an utter lack of rational thought a 'memory' -- at bay. He dearly needed to lash out, and he still had enough of a grip on sanity at the moment to care that hitting someone was antisocial behavior best avoided.
It only became slightly less difficult to resist the urge when he saw his surroundings lighten from behind his eyelids, and heard crunching footsteps approach from behind them. Ross must have grabbed the electric flashlight from the trunk before pursuing them; an audience to a murder would make things more difficult, he told himself.
Chloe was conspiring not to make things any easier on him though, when she said, "Every time I've asked you about the warehouse, you redirect. Clark didn't want to talk about it, either."
"There's a reason for that," Lex said without inflection.
"What happened?"
"Chlo, he doesn't want to talk about it," he heard Pete say uneasily.
"Which just means that he probably really needs to!" she shot back at him, before turning back to Lex. "--Lex, for god's sake, if you won't talk about you, at least tell us what happened to Clark so we can help him!"
"It was the same damn thing," Lex said, his voice shaking like his body. I can't do this, I can't -- I should have gone home. I shouldn't have let them-- I'm weak, I was useless, I am useless, I hadn't been able to-- Clark got hurt because of me. He's still hurting, because of me. He's going to wake up one day soon and hate me for it, and I-- I won't be able to-- It might be dark now, but it was bright white then, and he could almost smell the antiseptic on concrete floor, like a sour bitter tang in the back of his throat.
"Lex."
Lex eyes snapped open and he flinched back a step from Chloe, who was in front of him now, pulling away from her,who had put her hands on his arms.
He glanced away from her quickly, not wanting to see the expression on her face. Stupid boy. So weak. Too emotional. Not even worth anyone's pity. Not that he wanted it. He'd have to hurt her if she did.
You'll never get anywhere with your eyes closed.
He shouldn't have closed his eyes. Not even in the dark.
No, especially not in the dark.
"You're shaking," she said quietly.
"I'm fine," he insisted.
"No. No, you're not," she said just as quietly, not moving away. "Lex," she pulled in her lips, moistened them slightly. Tentatively, she began with, "Clark said... Clark said that it hurt..."
~*~*~*~*~*~
Next post is here.