FIC: No One Noticed the Cat (2/7)
Title: No One Noticed the Cat
Pairing: Clex
Rating: PG13
Warning: Violence
Includes: temporary mpreg, temporary character deaths
Summary: Clark gets Lex a pet cat… that's not quite a cat.
Author’s Notes:
1. Continuity Post S3 finale.
2. This is a
help_haiti fic for
tallihensia, who has been awfully patient to get this.
3. The Bennu bird serves as the Egyptian correlation to the phoenix, and is pictured as a heron. This relates to reinforce the Greek --> Egyptian name shift.
Thanks to
cheerful_earl and
herohunter for the betas. :D
“Until one has loved an animal a part of one’s soul remains unawakened.”
Anatole France
Part Two
Clark adjusted his glasses and ducked his head on his way through the bullpen. There was no hiding that there was a link between him and Superman, at least one that made it possible for him to get quotes no one else could get. Lois had been convinced at one point that Clark was having a relationship with Superman.
After making it to his desk without being molested by his fellow reporters, Clark sat at his desk and hunched over his keyboard.
“Well, if it isn’t the perpetually late Mr. Kent,” Perry said coming up to his desk.
“Uh, sorry.” Clark looked up. “It was a late night.”
“Tell me you’ve got an idea what that great big hole above Metropolis was, son. All the papers are speculatin’ but you can’t do a front page article on sneaky suspicions.”
“Hole?” Clark frowned for a moment. The portal to the other dimension they’d gone to had looked a little like a giant purplish flower to him, but it might have seemed like a hole. “Yeah, um, that was part of something the JLA was doing. I don’t think they want the general public to know what it was about, though. You know, the Injustice League would know, too.”
“Hm. Hm. Yep, I can see the problem with that.” Perry clapped his hand on Clark’s shoulder. “See what you can get us, Kent.”
Clark nodded and sighed. He opened up a file on his computer and started typing quickly. He would have to give them something, and for that, he should probably contact Bruce and ask for his perspective. Being on the paper was always such a conflict of interest when it came to the League and Superman.
When he looked up, it was an hour later, and Chloe was taking a seat at her desk and talking in hushed tones on her cell.
“-just not that comfortable with cats having such prominence in your life. If you don’t feel the same way, then we should probably just go back to our original deal: No strings. Remember that? It’s fine. Play with the pussy all you want.”
At such an odd conversation, Clark turn his head and tried very hard not to listen to the other side of that.
“I’m not being passive-aggressive. I’m being serious. You’ve made no promises to me, nor I to you. We have no legal contracts or obligations, other than to not spill one another’s... Hang on. I have a listener.” Chloe turned her head. “Hi, Clark- Hm. He hung up. How’ve you been?”
“Fine. I need to talk to Bruce and Diana.” He swiveled around. “Perry wants me to do a write-up on the League’s activities yesterday.”
“Of course. Perry only has two reporters in his bullpen.” Chloe slipped her phone in her pocket. “J’onn told me everything went well. I’m having a hard time believing that the Key was that easy to find. And it really looks like a great big key?”
Clark shrugged. “Apparently so. You haven’t seen it yet?”
“I was a little busy last night. I’ll head up to see it later.” Chloe stood up. “Right now I have to go out and get a story, since I can’t sit around and let the stories fall onto my desk.”
Clark got up to go with her. “They might, if you decided to cover all the Gold Heron stories yourself.”
“Hm.” “You and Bruce are just alike. All these hard, arbitrary principles that you use to guide your life that just stress you out and make everything more difficult.” Clark knew this was true of him as well, but he had to tease her a little. It was practically part of his job.
Chloe turned to blow a raspberry at him.
***
There weren’t as many orphanages these days, not the way there used to be. Now there were group homes for kids who couldn’t be placed for one reason or the other, or the foster homes where most kids hoped to end up. In a foster home, there was a chance of being adopted, slim, but a chance. If they couldn’t be placed, or they had to many problems, then they’d find themselves in the institution just outside of Metropolis proper. The kids apparently called it Hell House. Clark lounged against the wall as Chloe chatted with the head of this group home on Bleaker Street, thinking that he’d been incredibly lucky to be found by the Kents.
“How’s Ms. Delany?” Clark asked when Chloe returned.
She held a finger up as she continued to speak into her mini-recorder. “Okay. They’re about to shut this place down. Lighthouse has been trying to keep the more ‘troubled’ kids out of Hill Memorial, from where they usually graduate to prison or Belle Reve, but due to lack of support, Delany may not be able to keep the home open for more than a month or two.”
“Poor kids.” Clark watched as a little girl with wide, nervous eyes pulled her hair around her fingers and darted past them. She looked back suspiciously once, then fled down another hallway.
“Yeah.” Chloe pocketed her recorder. “People always want babies. So any infant that doesn’t have problems will get snatched up, but the rest of them... Hopefully the story will get some rich, bored billionaire to write a check.”
“Babies are really cute,” Clark agreed. “But I wasn’t exactly a squalling infant, and my mom still wanted to adopt me.”
“Well, I think your mom is the exception. I don’t know that all couples are like that.” Chloe took out her phone and started to walk down the hallway. “I’ve been given permission to look around.”
“You mean snoop.”
“Hush, you. Anyway. Not all couples are like that. I think there are plenty who would be perfectly fine to adopt a little older, if they had the money to adopt, or it were legal.”
“You mean gay guys.”
“Like that hasn’t occurred to you. I see you getting all misty when you see kids in the park,” Chloe teased.
“I don’t know if Lex would want to have kids, though.”
Chloe took a picture of what looked like a game room. “I have a brilliant idea about that.”
“Yeah?”
“Ask him about it.” Chloe winked at him, then went over to talk to some of the kids.
Clark sighed and spotted a quiet little boy in the corner. He could ask Lex about kids. Maybe he’d be into it.
***
“Excellent,” Lex murmured, looking at the results of his last experiment. He’d been working all day on a potential neutralizing agent that would hopefully render all forms of Kryptonite radiation useless. Given all the trouble that stuff had caused over the years, it was high time that someone put their mind to it.
“I have the samples prepped over here, Lex,” Pritchard said. “Whenever you’re ready.”
“In a minute. I’m... almost done here-”
Lex blinked. He heard his name being called and he looked around to see the apartment instead of the lab.
“What the hell?”
“Lex? I’m home!”
Lex pushed himself up, realizing he was in the den and on the sofa. He felt groggy, and heavy.
“I’m... I’m losing my mind...” He muttered. “Clark?”
“On my way. Your little kitty demanded a pet as soon as I came in.” Clark chuckled and entered the room with Mau in his arms. “You really smartened this place up while I was gone. Are you tired?”
“Yes, a... a little.” Lex took in a deep breath, only to find his lungs feeling a bit constricted.
“You shouldn’t wear yourself out like that,” Clark chided. He dropped Mau on the sofa next to Lex, then knelt by him. “It’s not good for you.”
“It’s not?” Lex raised a brow as he looked down at Clark. Then his eyes widened and he blinked in disbelief.
His abdomen was grossly distended, and Clark was caressing it with one hand. He kissed the rise of it, then pressed his cheek to it with a beatific expression on his face. Lex felt for a moment as though he had been transplanted into another body.
“Clark, what’s happening?”
“What?” Clark looked up worriedly, then rose to put his arms around Lex. “Do you feel okay? Is something wrong with the baby? Should I call the doctor?”
“... with the baby?” Lex blinked again, then looked down at himself as the world started to make sense again. Part of his mind was questioning how this was possible and why he would ever consent to such a thing. Another part reminded him that he would give anything to Clark that he really wanted. He lifted his chin and touched the side of Clark’s face. “I’m fine. Just... I don’t know, maybe I was still asleep.”
“I’m putting you to bed early tonight.”
Clark slipped his arm around Lex’s back and helped him to his feet. Lex rested a hand on his belly, then looked back at Mau.
“I named the cat.”
“Oh yeah? What?”
“Mau.”
“Mao Zedong? You named our cat after a communist dictator?” Clark asked incredulously.
“He was a revolutionary. And no, Mau as in the Egyptian god.”
“I’m surprised you didn’t name her after a Greek god.” “I would have, if there were any Grecian gods specifically associated with cats that I were aware of.” Lex leaned into Clark wearily. “I’ve never been so tired in my whole life.”
“I’m sorry about that.” Clark kissed the top of Lex’s head. “You’ve been a champ so far.”
“Somehow I find that hard to believe.” Lex pressed his face into Clark’s chest. A moment later, he found himself lifted into Clark’s arms, being carried into the kitchen. “Thanks.”
“No problem. You didn’t try to make dinner, did you?”
“Hm. I did. I think it’s burning, though.”
Clark zipped into the kitchen and set Lex down on the counter. Then he opened up the oven and pulled out the pan with his bare hands.
“I’ll never get used to that,” Lex admitted.
“I enjoy always being super in your eyes.”
Lex leaned back on the counter and rubbed his hand up and down his belly. “You always will be,” he confided. “You always have been, even before I knew about your powers.”
Clark grinned widely and put the pan on the stove. “You made manicotti! It’s not burned too bad. Just around the edges.”
“I remembered how much you used to like that, when we went to that fancy restaurant. Do you remember? Your parents just wanted to stay home after your mother was taken hostage, and we took their reservations.” Lex looked at the rolls of pasta in the pan. “Probably doesn’t taste quite the same.”
“It’ll be even better,” Clark declared. “Let me make a salad, then I’ll dish us up.”
Lex reached forward, and they squeezed hands briefly before letting go.
Yes, he would do anything for Clark.
***
After a hot shower (with the help of a grab bar that had been installed in the shower and some duck-shaped anti-slip stickers on the bottom of the tub), Lex waddled into their bedroom with one hand supporting his belly. He’d pulled on a comfortable pair of pajama bottoms and an oversized shirt that was loose everywhere but his middle. The walls were painted red and had numerous photographs as decoration. There were some of Clark and Lex, but there were also pictures of the Kents and Clark’s friends.
“I should make some friends,” Lex murmured.
He drifted into the other room, which he was mentally sorting as both his office and the new nursery. Right now it looked more like the latter, with stuffed bunnies around the room and a large antique crib. It was obvious that he and Clark had compromised on the colors of this room; the walls were a light purple and the border was blue. Nicely ungendered, since Lex had begun transforming his office shortly after learning he was pregnant. He hadn’t been able to wait to find out the baby’s sex.
A fluttery motion over the side of his belly caused Lex to stand up straight. It shouldn’t still be such a surprise to feel their baby kicking him. Somehow it seemed like the first time. Lex let a long breath out, blinking in disbelief, then looking down.
“Hey,” Clark whispered, coming up behind him. “You need to get some sleep. Come to bed.”
“Okay,” Lex agreed. He knew that maybe in another life he would have argued, but he couldn’t do that now. You can be my friend, baby boy, he thought to himself.
He’d wanted a child for a long time. It was one of those irrational wants that he’d had to put aside, knowing that he did not have the resources to be a proper parent alone. Now that he wasn’t alone, he felt determined to do this with all of his ability. Clark would help him raise their son.
Lex let Clark lead him back to bed, help him into it, and then position pillows around him. He closed his eyes briefly as Clark kissed his forehead, then nose, cheeks, and lips. Clark slipped in behind him and put his arms around Lex, resting one hand on his belly, possessively.
“Clark?” Lex whispered.
“Sleep, Lex.”
“I will. It’s just...” Lex turned his head and looked at Clark for a moment.
“I love you,” Clark told him. He leaned forward to give Lex a firmer kiss. “And I’ll take you whatever way I can get you, y’know. Don’t feel like anything will ever make me love you less.”
“I try to have faith. That you’re here with me speaks volumes. Did you tell the League not to bother you tonight?”
“Felt like you needed me here. Maybe I can’t always do that, but when you need me, I do try to be.” Clark’s browns raised a bit.
Feeling his own heart thudding in his chest, pumping the blood away for himself and his child, Lex let his eyes fall closed, and he put his hand over Clark’s.
“Goodnight, Clark.”
***
Clark knew something was wrong the moment he opened his eyes, but he felt so disoriented that it was hard to put his finger on where exactly the world had gone askew. He sat up, looking around his bedroom, painted in purple with large pieces of art decorating the walls, and tuned his superhearing in tightly. Lex’s heartbeat was in the other room.
Checking the clock briefly (it was three am), Clark got up and walked into Lex’s office. He didn’t turn on the light right away. He didn’t need it to see the outline of Lex’s desk and bookshelves, and he certainly didn’t need it to be drawn to Lex’s heartbeat, where he was sitting on the floor with his legs curled up tightly to his chest.
“Hey,” Clark whispered, coming up to him slowly. He was a little afraid that Lex was crying, or worse, just hurt by something Clark had said. He could see his broken little Lex slinking away to lick his wounds in private. “Couldn’t sleep?”
“He’s gone,” Lex said in a hoarse voice. “I didn’t want him. I loved him, but I didn’t want him like that, and now he’s gone, and it’s all my fault.”
Clark blinked slowly. Twice. He knelt by Lex and looked over his too-slim boyfriend. Sometimes it was hard to make Lex properly care for himself. “Who’s gone?”
“The nursery isn’t even here anymore. I lost him.” Lex’s voice was so tight and strained that Clark imagined it for a moment like a wire pulled completely taut.
“I don’t understand,” Clark admitted. He put his arm around Lex’s shoulders and held him. When Lex didn’t even try to push him away, Clark only grew more worried.
“I don’t understand either.” Lex’s hand moved down and clutched the silky fabric of the front of his black pajamas. “I don’t understand anything. It all keeps changing. I think I’m losing my mind, Clark.”
He looked up and met Clark’s eye. Only then did Clark realize that Lex’s eyes were red and blotchy. Something had made Lex cry, and that was no easy matter.
“You aren’t losing your mind-” Clark began.
“It’s either that or I have a brain tumor. I can’t think of any other reason why I could possibly have a son who is utterly whisked out of existence when I wake up one morning!” Lex argued.
“A son?” Clark frowned. He cupped Lex’s cheek and pressed their foreheads together. “You dreamed we had a son?”
“We were going to have a son. It wasn’t a dream. It was real. God, it was so real, Clark.” Lex’s eyes closed, and he reached forward, as though to steady himself against Clark’s bulky muscles.
“I’m sorry.” Clark didn’t know what to say to that, but Lex was obviously hurting. “We’ll take you to the hospital in the morning. Do some tests. Everything will be okay.”
Lex shook his head, but Clark kept holding him. Out of the corner of his eye, Clark caught something flashing. He turned his head and saw Mau sitting under the desk, watching them with her eyes wide and her ears tilted forward slightly.
He wished she’d come over and purr on Lex. That often made Lex feel better.
***
Clark sat in the hospital room while he waited for the doctors to come back and tell him if there was a tumor inside Lex’s brain. He’d scanned Lex himself, of course, but he was no doctor. Everything seemed fine, but what if it wasn’t? What if it was something else, an abscess, a lesion, an infection...
He didn’t think he could survive it if Lex died on him.
It wasn’t until his mother’s hand was on his shoulder that Clark even realized that she was there. He stood and hugged her, putting his chin on her shoulder. Chloe petted his head and gave him a watery little smile.
At times like this, he wished his father were still alive. He could tell Clark what to do.
“How’s Lex feeling?” Martha asked as she pulled back.
“Physically he feels fine, but Mom, he never freaks out like this for no reason. Something’s going on. I just can’t stand to see him so unhappy.” Clark dipped his head and shoved his hands in his pockets.
“Well, once the doctors get done with him, we can...” Chloe tilted her head to the side and looking upward pointedly.
“I thought of that first, but you know his history with cancer. I thought it might be...”
Chloe sighed quietly and came forward to give him a hug as well.
“Whatever happens, we’ll all be here for you guys,” she promised. “Bruce has a... situation but he promised to come today.”
“I can imagine what kind of situation,” Clark muttered. Sitting down with his mother and Chloe, he let them try to distract him.
***
Laying still in the MRI machine was cold and lonely, and Lex found himself wishing he could just have stayed quiet about his delusion. If he hadn’t said anything, then he would be with Clark now, living their lives.
“I should just adopt a kid, or something,” Lex murmured.
“Make sure you hold still, Lex,” the doctor advised from the other room.
“Holding.” Lex sighed and stared at the ceiling. It was a good thing he wasn’t claustrophobic.
What was wrong with him? Why wasn’t he happy? How could he have Clark-- body, mind, soul, etc.-- and desire anything else?
As they were wheeling Lex back to his room, he pinched the bridge of his nose. From the way the doctors were looking at him, he didn’t have to hear what they’d found. These people thought he was crazy.
He looked up as they approached his room, and Clark jumped up to meet him.
“Hey,” Lex muttered. Clark’s body heat was almost oppressive, but Lex leaned into it anyway.
“How was it? How do you feel?”
“I feel fine. I never felt bad, really,” Lex replied quietly. Clark lifted him out of the chair and set him on the bed in the middle of the room. Lex frowned as he noticed Martha and Chloe by the wall. “I want to go home.”
“Well, the doctor will be back in a minute.” Clark crawled into the bed with him and put his arms around Lex.
“That’s what I’m worried about.” Lex laid his head on Clark’s shoulder.
Martha came up to the bed to give Lex’s back a gentle rub. “Whatever it is, we’ll face it together, alright, sweetheart? Like we do everything else.”
Lex let his eyes fall closed. “Here I am, and this is all I’ve ever wanted.”
Someone entered the room almost silently. Lex looked, then arched his brows high when he saw goddamn Bruce Wayne standing there. Chloe went up to him, put her arms around him, and kissed his cheek.
“Thanks for coming,” she whispered.
Bruce fixed his gaze directly on Clark. “If they aren’t able to find anything, I’m prepared to take him to the Watchtower immediately for a more detailed scan.”
Lex blinked. Hard. Batman was willing to allow him on the League’s space station, their home base?
“What is it, Lex?” Bruce asked. He drew closer to the hospital bed.
“I’m experiencing a great deal of cognitive dissonance. This world seems very hard to believe,” Lex explained. At once he remembered this man encouraging Superman to kill him, as well as remembered him as a dear friend whom he’d met in boarding school.
Clark kissed the side of Lex’s head again. “It’ll be okay. We’ll figure it out.”
“Can you explain it? This dissonance?” Bruce pulled up a chair and, as he laced his fingers together, looked at Lex with the deadly seriousness that he normally reserved for solving cases from his Rogues Gallery in Gotham.
“Everything... is true. It’s as though multiple, contradictory realities are all true in my mind. I remember Clark and I being enemies, but it was both a few days ago and a year ago and years ago. It’s also true that we were never enemies, just the best of friends since the day we met. I run LexCorp, and LuthorCorp, but at the same time I’m not a CEO but a scientist, and professor, and a stay at home mom, and a hooker.” Lex paused to check Clark’s expression, and sure enough, the man he loved was looking at him as though he was fragile, and vulnerable, as though his mind had cracked beyond repair.
“It’s okay, Lex,” Clark whispered. “And, the baby? That’s what you were talking about before? You remember us having a child?”
“That was yesterday. It was gone when I woke up, but I remember. I couldn’t forget him.” Lex pressed his lips together and looked down. “I wish I were crazy. That would make all of this easier.”
“I don’t think that you’re crazy,” Bruce said darkly. “I think...”
“What?” Clark asked.
“Nothing. You should take him home. There’s nothing physical going on here.” A deep, stern expression was etched into Bruce’s face. Chloe touched his shoulder and looked at Bruce curiously.
The look went unnoticed by Clark, whose attention was still strictly focused on Lex. “You wanna go?” He tilted his head to the side. “I think they’re gonna try to put you on anti-psychotics.”
“I’d take them if I thought it would help at this point,” Lex said honestly. “And I distinctly remember a reality in which I was prescribed antipsychotics and refused them because they might dull my creativity in stopping the incoming alien invasion.”
Clark narrowed his eyes and considered that for a moment. “Was there one?”
“I thought so. I don’t think anyone else did.” Lex shook his head, his eyes growing empty as he remembered. “That wasn’t what made me crazy in that reality, though. And I was. So very crazy. I was just afraid that if I stopped there would be no one to protect humanity.”
“Well, you have me. You have me, Lex. The League, too. We’re all here to protect humanity,” Clark urged.
“Not always. Here you might be. Other truths prove otherwise.”
“With infinite possibilities, I’m sure the League isn’t always good. With that much power?” Chloe pointed out. “Too easy to tip the other way.”
Lex appreciated her support, even if he wasn’t certain if she really believed him. He took Clark’s hand and then his lead out of the hospital. Even if they thought he was delusional, they couldn’t keep him here unless he proved to be a danger to himself or others.
***
“What made you decide to come visit us today?” Chloe asked. “I’m not used to you being so open.”
“We have a critical situation here.” Bruce stopped at his car and looked down at the small blond woman crossing her arms at him.
“We do?”
“You’re a sharp woman, Chloe. Could it have escaped your notice that less than a week ago we were hunting something that had the power to open and close different realities at will?”
“No, it didn’t escape my notice.” Chloe’s lips pinched together in a sour expression. “But the Key is in the Watchtower. You think that it’s affecting Lex from there?”
Bruce shook his head slowly. “You said yourself that you had a hard time believing what we brought back was the Key.”
“I do. And? If we didn’t bring back the Key, there’s no reason for this to happen.”
“That’s why I suspect...”
Chloe held her breath.
“That Luthor has been the Key all along.”
Chloe blinked. Then she sighed.
“We didn’t bring anything else back from that dimension,” Bruce told her sternly.
“I’m gonna throw something out there. If there’s a force that can open realities at will, then I think that’s pretty powerful. If this energy is sentient, then I think it’s possible it could also hide itself from our notice.”
Bruce rubbed his chin. “Then how do we find it?”
“Do you think it’s concentrating on Clark and Lex for some reason?”
“I still think that Lex is the Key.”
“And... I think you’ve been awake for five days. I’m taking you home.”
***
Lex stood at the door to his apartment unable to discern how long they had been living here, how long they had been together, or why they weren’t living in a penthouse. He liked his open living spaces. Why wouldn’t he insist on a place more suited to his own needs?
“I love you, Lex,” Clark’s voice whispered through his confusion.
“I know.”
A plaintive cry reached Lex’s ears, and he picked up Mau and scratched between her ears.
“I hear that petting a cat lowers your blood pressure. Good for stress,” Clark pointed out. There was a hopeful note in his voice that Lex could hardly ignore.
“Hm. Can you make this better, little kitty?” Lex asked the little ragdoll cat. She purred loudly in his arms.
“I’m gonna make you some tea, Lex.” Clark kissed Lex’s cheek and hugged his shoulders before heading to the kitchen.
Lex stood by the doorway, half wanting to follow Clark, half wanting to leave this insanity and be free. He buried his face in Mau’s coat. The vibrations of her purring were in fact pretty comforting.
“Hmm. Make it better, Mau.”
When Lex opened his eyes, he set the cat down, closed the door, and headed for the kitchen.
“Clark, I’m home,” he called into the small apartment.
There was the sound of small sneakers against the hardwood floors of their spacious apartment, and then a small boy with black hair appeared. With a laugh, Lex lifted him into his arms and continued toward the kitchen as he stroked his fingers adoringly through the boy’s hair.
“Hey!” Clark looked up from the sauce he was making, set the wooden spoon down, and came over to greet Lex with a hug. “How did it go today?”
“Busy in the lab, but not bad. You?”
“Nothing notable.” Clark shrugged. He ruffled the boy’s hair. “Whaddaya say, kiddo?”
“It’s spaghetti night!” the boy declared.
Lex laughed softly, and Clark reached his big arms around them both, enveloping them in a warm, loving embrace. He rocked them back and forth a little, and Lex was grateful to have his family together.
Behind him, padding into the kitchen softly to get her dinner, Mau looked up at them with flashing eyes.
“Mrrow?”
This entry was originally posted at Dreamwidth.
comments posted there. Please comment there using OpenID or your DW account.
Pairing: Clex
Rating: PG13
Warning: Violence
Includes: temporary mpreg, temporary character deaths
Summary: Clark gets Lex a pet cat… that's not quite a cat.
Author’s Notes:
1. Continuity Post S3 finale.
2. This is a
help_haiti fic for
tallihensia, who has been awfully patient to get this.
3. The Bennu bird serves as the Egyptian correlation to the phoenix, and is pictured as a heron. This relates to reinforce the Greek --> Egyptian name shift.
Thanks to
cheerful_earl and
herohunter for the betas. :D
“Until one has loved an animal a part of one’s soul remains unawakened.”
Anatole France
Part Two
Clark adjusted his glasses and ducked his head on his way through the bullpen. There was no hiding that there was a link between him and Superman, at least one that made it possible for him to get quotes no one else could get. Lois had been convinced at one point that Clark was having a relationship with Superman.
After making it to his desk without being molested by his fellow reporters, Clark sat at his desk and hunched over his keyboard.
“Well, if it isn’t the perpetually late Mr. Kent,” Perry said coming up to his desk.
“Uh, sorry.” Clark looked up. “It was a late night.”
“Tell me you’ve got an idea what that great big hole above Metropolis was, son. All the papers are speculatin’ but you can’t do a front page article on sneaky suspicions.”
“Hole?” Clark frowned for a moment. The portal to the other dimension they’d gone to had looked a little like a giant purplish flower to him, but it might have seemed like a hole. “Yeah, um, that was part of something the JLA was doing. I don’t think they want the general public to know what it was about, though. You know, the Injustice League would know, too.”
“Hm. Hm. Yep, I can see the problem with that.” Perry clapped his hand on Clark’s shoulder. “See what you can get us, Kent.”
Clark nodded and sighed. He opened up a file on his computer and started typing quickly. He would have to give them something, and for that, he should probably contact Bruce and ask for his perspective. Being on the paper was always such a conflict of interest when it came to the League and Superman.
When he looked up, it was an hour later, and Chloe was taking a seat at her desk and talking in hushed tones on her cell.
“-just not that comfortable with cats having such prominence in your life. If you don’t feel the same way, then we should probably just go back to our original deal: No strings. Remember that? It’s fine. Play with the pussy all you want.”
At such an odd conversation, Clark turn his head and tried very hard not to listen to the other side of that.
“I’m not being passive-aggressive. I’m being serious. You’ve made no promises to me, nor I to you. We have no legal contracts or obligations, other than to not spill one another’s... Hang on. I have a listener.” Chloe turned her head. “Hi, Clark- Hm. He hung up. How’ve you been?”
“Fine. I need to talk to Bruce and Diana.” He swiveled around. “Perry wants me to do a write-up on the League’s activities yesterday.”
“Of course. Perry only has two reporters in his bullpen.” Chloe slipped her phone in her pocket. “J’onn told me everything went well. I’m having a hard time believing that the Key was that easy to find. And it really looks like a great big key?”
Clark shrugged. “Apparently so. You haven’t seen it yet?”
“I was a little busy last night. I’ll head up to see it later.” Chloe stood up. “Right now I have to go out and get a story, since I can’t sit around and let the stories fall onto my desk.”
Clark got up to go with her. “They might, if you decided to cover all the Gold Heron stories yourself.”
“Hm.” “You and Bruce are just alike. All these hard, arbitrary principles that you use to guide your life that just stress you out and make everything more difficult.” Clark knew this was true of him as well, but he had to tease her a little. It was practically part of his job.
Chloe turned to blow a raspberry at him.
***
There weren’t as many orphanages these days, not the way there used to be. Now there were group homes for kids who couldn’t be placed for one reason or the other, or the foster homes where most kids hoped to end up. In a foster home, there was a chance of being adopted, slim, but a chance. If they couldn’t be placed, or they had to many problems, then they’d find themselves in the institution just outside of Metropolis proper. The kids apparently called it Hell House. Clark lounged against the wall as Chloe chatted with the head of this group home on Bleaker Street, thinking that he’d been incredibly lucky to be found by the Kents.
“How’s Ms. Delany?” Clark asked when Chloe returned.
She held a finger up as she continued to speak into her mini-recorder. “Okay. They’re about to shut this place down. Lighthouse has been trying to keep the more ‘troubled’ kids out of Hill Memorial, from where they usually graduate to prison or Belle Reve, but due to lack of support, Delany may not be able to keep the home open for more than a month or two.”
“Poor kids.” Clark watched as a little girl with wide, nervous eyes pulled her hair around her fingers and darted past them. She looked back suspiciously once, then fled down another hallway.
“Yeah.” Chloe pocketed her recorder. “People always want babies. So any infant that doesn’t have problems will get snatched up, but the rest of them... Hopefully the story will get some rich, bored billionaire to write a check.”
“Babies are really cute,” Clark agreed. “But I wasn’t exactly a squalling infant, and my mom still wanted to adopt me.”
“Well, I think your mom is the exception. I don’t know that all couples are like that.” Chloe took out her phone and started to walk down the hallway. “I’ve been given permission to look around.”
“You mean snoop.”
“Hush, you. Anyway. Not all couples are like that. I think there are plenty who would be perfectly fine to adopt a little older, if they had the money to adopt, or it were legal.”
“You mean gay guys.”
“Like that hasn’t occurred to you. I see you getting all misty when you see kids in the park,” Chloe teased.
“I don’t know if Lex would want to have kids, though.”
Chloe took a picture of what looked like a game room. “I have a brilliant idea about that.”
“Yeah?”
“Ask him about it.” Chloe winked at him, then went over to talk to some of the kids.
Clark sighed and spotted a quiet little boy in the corner. He could ask Lex about kids. Maybe he’d be into it.
***
“Excellent,” Lex murmured, looking at the results of his last experiment. He’d been working all day on a potential neutralizing agent that would hopefully render all forms of Kryptonite radiation useless. Given all the trouble that stuff had caused over the years, it was high time that someone put their mind to it.
“I have the samples prepped over here, Lex,” Pritchard said. “Whenever you’re ready.”
“In a minute. I’m... almost done here-”
Lex blinked. He heard his name being called and he looked around to see the apartment instead of the lab.
“What the hell?”
“Lex? I’m home!”
Lex pushed himself up, realizing he was in the den and on the sofa. He felt groggy, and heavy.
“I’m... I’m losing my mind...” He muttered. “Clark?”
“On my way. Your little kitty demanded a pet as soon as I came in.” Clark chuckled and entered the room with Mau in his arms. “You really smartened this place up while I was gone. Are you tired?”
“Yes, a... a little.” Lex took in a deep breath, only to find his lungs feeling a bit constricted.
“You shouldn’t wear yourself out like that,” Clark chided. He dropped Mau on the sofa next to Lex, then knelt by him. “It’s not good for you.”
“It’s not?” Lex raised a brow as he looked down at Clark. Then his eyes widened and he blinked in disbelief.
His abdomen was grossly distended, and Clark was caressing it with one hand. He kissed the rise of it, then pressed his cheek to it with a beatific expression on his face. Lex felt for a moment as though he had been transplanted into another body.
“Clark, what’s happening?”
“What?” Clark looked up worriedly, then rose to put his arms around Lex. “Do you feel okay? Is something wrong with the baby? Should I call the doctor?”
“... with the baby?” Lex blinked again, then looked down at himself as the world started to make sense again. Part of his mind was questioning how this was possible and why he would ever consent to such a thing. Another part reminded him that he would give anything to Clark that he really wanted. He lifted his chin and touched the side of Clark’s face. “I’m fine. Just... I don’t know, maybe I was still asleep.”
“I’m putting you to bed early tonight.”
Clark slipped his arm around Lex’s back and helped him to his feet. Lex rested a hand on his belly, then looked back at Mau.
“I named the cat.”
“Oh yeah? What?”
“Mau.”
“Mao Zedong? You named our cat after a communist dictator?” Clark asked incredulously.
“He was a revolutionary. And no, Mau as in the Egyptian god.”
“I’m surprised you didn’t name her after a Greek god.” “I would have, if there were any Grecian gods specifically associated with cats that I were aware of.” Lex leaned into Clark wearily. “I’ve never been so tired in my whole life.”
“I’m sorry about that.” Clark kissed the top of Lex’s head. “You’ve been a champ so far.”
“Somehow I find that hard to believe.” Lex pressed his face into Clark’s chest. A moment later, he found himself lifted into Clark’s arms, being carried into the kitchen. “Thanks.”
“No problem. You didn’t try to make dinner, did you?”
“Hm. I did. I think it’s burning, though.”
Clark zipped into the kitchen and set Lex down on the counter. Then he opened up the oven and pulled out the pan with his bare hands.
“I’ll never get used to that,” Lex admitted.
“I enjoy always being super in your eyes.”
Lex leaned back on the counter and rubbed his hand up and down his belly. “You always will be,” he confided. “You always have been, even before I knew about your powers.”
Clark grinned widely and put the pan on the stove. “You made manicotti! It’s not burned too bad. Just around the edges.”
“I remembered how much you used to like that, when we went to that fancy restaurant. Do you remember? Your parents just wanted to stay home after your mother was taken hostage, and we took their reservations.” Lex looked at the rolls of pasta in the pan. “Probably doesn’t taste quite the same.”
“It’ll be even better,” Clark declared. “Let me make a salad, then I’ll dish us up.”
Lex reached forward, and they squeezed hands briefly before letting go.
Yes, he would do anything for Clark.
***
After a hot shower (with the help of a grab bar that had been installed in the shower and some duck-shaped anti-slip stickers on the bottom of the tub), Lex waddled into their bedroom with one hand supporting his belly. He’d pulled on a comfortable pair of pajama bottoms and an oversized shirt that was loose everywhere but his middle. The walls were painted red and had numerous photographs as decoration. There were some of Clark and Lex, but there were also pictures of the Kents and Clark’s friends.
“I should make some friends,” Lex murmured.
He drifted into the other room, which he was mentally sorting as both his office and the new nursery. Right now it looked more like the latter, with stuffed bunnies around the room and a large antique crib. It was obvious that he and Clark had compromised on the colors of this room; the walls were a light purple and the border was blue. Nicely ungendered, since Lex had begun transforming his office shortly after learning he was pregnant. He hadn’t been able to wait to find out the baby’s sex.
A fluttery motion over the side of his belly caused Lex to stand up straight. It shouldn’t still be such a surprise to feel their baby kicking him. Somehow it seemed like the first time. Lex let a long breath out, blinking in disbelief, then looking down.
“Hey,” Clark whispered, coming up behind him. “You need to get some sleep. Come to bed.”
“Okay,” Lex agreed. He knew that maybe in another life he would have argued, but he couldn’t do that now. You can be my friend, baby boy, he thought to himself.
He’d wanted a child for a long time. It was one of those irrational wants that he’d had to put aside, knowing that he did not have the resources to be a proper parent alone. Now that he wasn’t alone, he felt determined to do this with all of his ability. Clark would help him raise their son.
Lex let Clark lead him back to bed, help him into it, and then position pillows around him. He closed his eyes briefly as Clark kissed his forehead, then nose, cheeks, and lips. Clark slipped in behind him and put his arms around Lex, resting one hand on his belly, possessively.
“Clark?” Lex whispered.
“Sleep, Lex.”
“I will. It’s just...” Lex turned his head and looked at Clark for a moment.
“I love you,” Clark told him. He leaned forward to give Lex a firmer kiss. “And I’ll take you whatever way I can get you, y’know. Don’t feel like anything will ever make me love you less.”
“I try to have faith. That you’re here with me speaks volumes. Did you tell the League not to bother you tonight?”
“Felt like you needed me here. Maybe I can’t always do that, but when you need me, I do try to be.” Clark’s browns raised a bit.
Feeling his own heart thudding in his chest, pumping the blood away for himself and his child, Lex let his eyes fall closed, and he put his hand over Clark’s.
“Goodnight, Clark.”
***
Clark knew something was wrong the moment he opened his eyes, but he felt so disoriented that it was hard to put his finger on where exactly the world had gone askew. He sat up, looking around his bedroom, painted in purple with large pieces of art decorating the walls, and tuned his superhearing in tightly. Lex’s heartbeat was in the other room.
Checking the clock briefly (it was three am), Clark got up and walked into Lex’s office. He didn’t turn on the light right away. He didn’t need it to see the outline of Lex’s desk and bookshelves, and he certainly didn’t need it to be drawn to Lex’s heartbeat, where he was sitting on the floor with his legs curled up tightly to his chest.
“Hey,” Clark whispered, coming up to him slowly. He was a little afraid that Lex was crying, or worse, just hurt by something Clark had said. He could see his broken little Lex slinking away to lick his wounds in private. “Couldn’t sleep?”
“He’s gone,” Lex said in a hoarse voice. “I didn’t want him. I loved him, but I didn’t want him like that, and now he’s gone, and it’s all my fault.”
Clark blinked slowly. Twice. He knelt by Lex and looked over his too-slim boyfriend. Sometimes it was hard to make Lex properly care for himself. “Who’s gone?”
“The nursery isn’t even here anymore. I lost him.” Lex’s voice was so tight and strained that Clark imagined it for a moment like a wire pulled completely taut.
“I don’t understand,” Clark admitted. He put his arm around Lex’s shoulders and held him. When Lex didn’t even try to push him away, Clark only grew more worried.
“I don’t understand either.” Lex’s hand moved down and clutched the silky fabric of the front of his black pajamas. “I don’t understand anything. It all keeps changing. I think I’m losing my mind, Clark.”
He looked up and met Clark’s eye. Only then did Clark realize that Lex’s eyes were red and blotchy. Something had made Lex cry, and that was no easy matter.
“You aren’t losing your mind-” Clark began.
“It’s either that or I have a brain tumor. I can’t think of any other reason why I could possibly have a son who is utterly whisked out of existence when I wake up one morning!” Lex argued.
“A son?” Clark frowned. He cupped Lex’s cheek and pressed their foreheads together. “You dreamed we had a son?”
“We were going to have a son. It wasn’t a dream. It was real. God, it was so real, Clark.” Lex’s eyes closed, and he reached forward, as though to steady himself against Clark’s bulky muscles.
“I’m sorry.” Clark didn’t know what to say to that, but Lex was obviously hurting. “We’ll take you to the hospital in the morning. Do some tests. Everything will be okay.”
Lex shook his head, but Clark kept holding him. Out of the corner of his eye, Clark caught something flashing. He turned his head and saw Mau sitting under the desk, watching them with her eyes wide and her ears tilted forward slightly.
He wished she’d come over and purr on Lex. That often made Lex feel better.
***
Clark sat in the hospital room while he waited for the doctors to come back and tell him if there was a tumor inside Lex’s brain. He’d scanned Lex himself, of course, but he was no doctor. Everything seemed fine, but what if it wasn’t? What if it was something else, an abscess, a lesion, an infection...
He didn’t think he could survive it if Lex died on him.
It wasn’t until his mother’s hand was on his shoulder that Clark even realized that she was there. He stood and hugged her, putting his chin on her shoulder. Chloe petted his head and gave him a watery little smile.
At times like this, he wished his father were still alive. He could tell Clark what to do.
“How’s Lex feeling?” Martha asked as she pulled back.
“Physically he feels fine, but Mom, he never freaks out like this for no reason. Something’s going on. I just can’t stand to see him so unhappy.” Clark dipped his head and shoved his hands in his pockets.
“Well, once the doctors get done with him, we can...” Chloe tilted her head to the side and looking upward pointedly.
“I thought of that first, but you know his history with cancer. I thought it might be...”
Chloe sighed quietly and came forward to give him a hug as well.
“Whatever happens, we’ll all be here for you guys,” she promised. “Bruce has a... situation but he promised to come today.”
“I can imagine what kind of situation,” Clark muttered. Sitting down with his mother and Chloe, he let them try to distract him.
***
Laying still in the MRI machine was cold and lonely, and Lex found himself wishing he could just have stayed quiet about his delusion. If he hadn’t said anything, then he would be with Clark now, living their lives.
“I should just adopt a kid, or something,” Lex murmured.
“Make sure you hold still, Lex,” the doctor advised from the other room.
“Holding.” Lex sighed and stared at the ceiling. It was a good thing he wasn’t claustrophobic.
What was wrong with him? Why wasn’t he happy? How could he have Clark-- body, mind, soul, etc.-- and desire anything else?
As they were wheeling Lex back to his room, he pinched the bridge of his nose. From the way the doctors were looking at him, he didn’t have to hear what they’d found. These people thought he was crazy.
He looked up as they approached his room, and Clark jumped up to meet him.
“Hey,” Lex muttered. Clark’s body heat was almost oppressive, but Lex leaned into it anyway.
“How was it? How do you feel?”
“I feel fine. I never felt bad, really,” Lex replied quietly. Clark lifted him out of the chair and set him on the bed in the middle of the room. Lex frowned as he noticed Martha and Chloe by the wall. “I want to go home.”
“Well, the doctor will be back in a minute.” Clark crawled into the bed with him and put his arms around Lex.
“That’s what I’m worried about.” Lex laid his head on Clark’s shoulder.
Martha came up to the bed to give Lex’s back a gentle rub. “Whatever it is, we’ll face it together, alright, sweetheart? Like we do everything else.”
Lex let his eyes fall closed. “Here I am, and this is all I’ve ever wanted.”
Someone entered the room almost silently. Lex looked, then arched his brows high when he saw goddamn Bruce Wayne standing there. Chloe went up to him, put her arms around him, and kissed his cheek.
“Thanks for coming,” she whispered.
Bruce fixed his gaze directly on Clark. “If they aren’t able to find anything, I’m prepared to take him to the Watchtower immediately for a more detailed scan.”
Lex blinked. Hard. Batman was willing to allow him on the League’s space station, their home base?
“What is it, Lex?” Bruce asked. He drew closer to the hospital bed.
“I’m experiencing a great deal of cognitive dissonance. This world seems very hard to believe,” Lex explained. At once he remembered this man encouraging Superman to kill him, as well as remembered him as a dear friend whom he’d met in boarding school.
Clark kissed the side of Lex’s head again. “It’ll be okay. We’ll figure it out.”
“Can you explain it? This dissonance?” Bruce pulled up a chair and, as he laced his fingers together, looked at Lex with the deadly seriousness that he normally reserved for solving cases from his Rogues Gallery in Gotham.
“Everything... is true. It’s as though multiple, contradictory realities are all true in my mind. I remember Clark and I being enemies, but it was both a few days ago and a year ago and years ago. It’s also true that we were never enemies, just the best of friends since the day we met. I run LexCorp, and LuthorCorp, but at the same time I’m not a CEO but a scientist, and professor, and a stay at home mom, and a hooker.” Lex paused to check Clark’s expression, and sure enough, the man he loved was looking at him as though he was fragile, and vulnerable, as though his mind had cracked beyond repair.
“It’s okay, Lex,” Clark whispered. “And, the baby? That’s what you were talking about before? You remember us having a child?”
“That was yesterday. It was gone when I woke up, but I remember. I couldn’t forget him.” Lex pressed his lips together and looked down. “I wish I were crazy. That would make all of this easier.”
“I don’t think that you’re crazy,” Bruce said darkly. “I think...”
“What?” Clark asked.
“Nothing. You should take him home. There’s nothing physical going on here.” A deep, stern expression was etched into Bruce’s face. Chloe touched his shoulder and looked at Bruce curiously.
The look went unnoticed by Clark, whose attention was still strictly focused on Lex. “You wanna go?” He tilted his head to the side. “I think they’re gonna try to put you on anti-psychotics.”
“I’d take them if I thought it would help at this point,” Lex said honestly. “And I distinctly remember a reality in which I was prescribed antipsychotics and refused them because they might dull my creativity in stopping the incoming alien invasion.”
Clark narrowed his eyes and considered that for a moment. “Was there one?”
“I thought so. I don’t think anyone else did.” Lex shook his head, his eyes growing empty as he remembered. “That wasn’t what made me crazy in that reality, though. And I was. So very crazy. I was just afraid that if I stopped there would be no one to protect humanity.”
“Well, you have me. You have me, Lex. The League, too. We’re all here to protect humanity,” Clark urged.
“Not always. Here you might be. Other truths prove otherwise.”
“With infinite possibilities, I’m sure the League isn’t always good. With that much power?” Chloe pointed out. “Too easy to tip the other way.”
Lex appreciated her support, even if he wasn’t certain if she really believed him. He took Clark’s hand and then his lead out of the hospital. Even if they thought he was delusional, they couldn’t keep him here unless he proved to be a danger to himself or others.
***
“What made you decide to come visit us today?” Chloe asked. “I’m not used to you being so open.”
“We have a critical situation here.” Bruce stopped at his car and looked down at the small blond woman crossing her arms at him.
“We do?”
“You’re a sharp woman, Chloe. Could it have escaped your notice that less than a week ago we were hunting something that had the power to open and close different realities at will?”
“No, it didn’t escape my notice.” Chloe’s lips pinched together in a sour expression. “But the Key is in the Watchtower. You think that it’s affecting Lex from there?”
Bruce shook his head slowly. “You said yourself that you had a hard time believing what we brought back was the Key.”
“I do. And? If we didn’t bring back the Key, there’s no reason for this to happen.”
“That’s why I suspect...”
Chloe held her breath.
“That Luthor has been the Key all along.”
Chloe blinked. Then she sighed.
“We didn’t bring anything else back from that dimension,” Bruce told her sternly.
“I’m gonna throw something out there. If there’s a force that can open realities at will, then I think that’s pretty powerful. If this energy is sentient, then I think it’s possible it could also hide itself from our notice.”
Bruce rubbed his chin. “Then how do we find it?”
“Do you think it’s concentrating on Clark and Lex for some reason?”
“I still think that Lex is the Key.”
“And... I think you’ve been awake for five days. I’m taking you home.”
***
Lex stood at the door to his apartment unable to discern how long they had been living here, how long they had been together, or why they weren’t living in a penthouse. He liked his open living spaces. Why wouldn’t he insist on a place more suited to his own needs?
“I love you, Lex,” Clark’s voice whispered through his confusion.
“I know.”
A plaintive cry reached Lex’s ears, and he picked up Mau and scratched between her ears.
“I hear that petting a cat lowers your blood pressure. Good for stress,” Clark pointed out. There was a hopeful note in his voice that Lex could hardly ignore.
“Hm. Can you make this better, little kitty?” Lex asked the little ragdoll cat. She purred loudly in his arms.
“I’m gonna make you some tea, Lex.” Clark kissed Lex’s cheek and hugged his shoulders before heading to the kitchen.
Lex stood by the doorway, half wanting to follow Clark, half wanting to leave this insanity and be free. He buried his face in Mau’s coat. The vibrations of her purring were in fact pretty comforting.
“Hmm. Make it better, Mau.”
When Lex opened his eyes, he set the cat down, closed the door, and headed for the kitchen.
“Clark, I’m home,” he called into the small apartment.
There was the sound of small sneakers against the hardwood floors of their spacious apartment, and then a small boy with black hair appeared. With a laugh, Lex lifted him into his arms and continued toward the kitchen as he stroked his fingers adoringly through the boy’s hair.
“Hey!” Clark looked up from the sauce he was making, set the wooden spoon down, and came over to greet Lex with a hug. “How did it go today?”
“Busy in the lab, but not bad. You?”
“Nothing notable.” Clark shrugged. He ruffled the boy’s hair. “Whaddaya say, kiddo?”
“It’s spaghetti night!” the boy declared.
Lex laughed softly, and Clark reached his big arms around them both, enveloping them in a warm, loving embrace. He rocked them back and forth a little, and Lex was grateful to have his family together.
Behind him, padding into the kitchen softly to get her dinner, Mau looked up at them with flashing eyes.
“Mrrow?”
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