Title: Lessons in Conspiracy
Author: Lori
Series : Yes, guess so. Number #3 in the Lessons #1. Lessons in Compassion
#2. Lessons in Cruelty
Archive : It needs a home, take care of it. Spoilers: Up to and including X-Ray
Rating: R, Clark/Lex
Author's notes: Couldn't have written it without input and discussion from this list, and from some very perceptive people like Makolane, Fade the Cat, and Reesa. Beta thanks go to the most wonderful Fade the Cat (without a doubt the best grammar nazi ever), Karen Nicholas, and Makolane. Yeah, well, X-Ray jumped too much for my liking, so here's a lot of blanks filled (hopefully with good explanations). Takes place before, during, and after that episode.

Please read this as if you've never seen the rest of the series. It only involves what has been revealed in X-Ray.

Disclaimer: My evil deeds were not condoned by anyone official involved with Smallville.

Comments to: Stanleysgirl21@yahoo.com

Summary: "You asked me to enter, but then you made me crawl."

Speed. He pressed his foot down on the accelerator, trying to outrun what he couldn't face. Exile in the middle of nowhere. He was going from a set of people who read the Wall Street Journal cover-to-cover to a set of people who loved the Andy Griffith Show.

Lex glanced over to his passenger seat, and cursed. He'd forgotten his day planner at the factory in his rush to leave the damned place. His stomach was growling, reminding him that coffee was not a substitute for nutrition. If he turned around now, it would be long dark by the time he reached home.

As he considered slowing down, his cell phone rang from his jacket pocket.

He almost smiled; it was probably Rose calling to tell him that he'd forgotten the day planner, and that she had it. He reached down to grab the phone, dropping his eyes from the road for a moment.

Then time slowed down.

He saw the log. What? What log? There were no trees on the roadside, just corn. Reflexively he tightened his grip on the wheel, feeling the seams of leather press against his skin. He jerked the wheel to the side to avoid it. Too fast. Too close. He gripped even tighter, as if holding onto the wheel was going to stop the inevitable.

Tires blew under him, sending the Porsche on an skewed trip to the right.

Bridge. Blue eyes. Dark hair. An angel to guide him to heaven, he wondered foolishly, before his mind clicked a name to the face. Oh god. Clark. The sickening impact of machine and flesh, before the splintering of wood as the barricade gave way. He was going to die, and like the selfish bastard he was, he was going to take someone with him.

Lex stilled, his breath coming in uneven rasps. For a moment he thought he was having an asthma attack. His hand reached clumsily for the inhaler he still kept close, and knocked his clock to the ground. Relax, he told himself. It was just a dream.

He took two puffs, something he rarely needed after he'd entered Princeton. The night terrors and panic attacks had abated once he left London. He thought he was cured. The steroids hit his system with a well-timed punch. Already the almost pleasant light-headed curtain was dropping over his senses.

Nothing like feeling of water pressing down on his chest to bring a lapsed phobia back with a vengeance. Just a dream he reminded himself. Or was it? Had he really struck Clark?

He sat up, rubbing his temples. His memory of the accident was patchy at best. He'd only remembered the number on the cell call a few days ago. His father's number, not Rose, like he thought.

The roll of wire in the road, and then his tires blowing, that much he was sure of; everything else was darkness or too jumbled to make sense. He had his doubts about whether even time would restore the memory.

Memory, despite its importance in court, was really the most unreliable way of recreating events. The mind often changed details in order to protect from further trauma. He knew that, from his attempts to recall the meteor shower. When he was ten, he was convinced his father had caused the accident. It made sense to his young mind; Lionel was the most powerful person in his life; he controlled the rewards or more often, the punishments. As an adult, Lex knew that as powerful as his father wanted Lex to believe he was, Lionel could not make rocks rain down from the heavens.

Lex had convinced himself he couldn't have hit Clark. Had he done so, they'd both be dead. No one could survive being hit by a car at 60 mph, and then be aware enough to pull a body from a submerged car, let alone perform life-saving CPR. It was impossible.

Instincts were modern man's last link to his primitive beginnings. Instincts were the only thing that stood in the way of extinction and survival. Lex had learned to trust his implicitly; instinct made the difference between a good business man and a great business man. Right now, his instincts were telling him that perhaps there was more to his muddled memories than what he remembered.

There was only one way for his science-trained mind to accept the facts and that was to look over the evidence again. He reached down for the fallen clock; four in the morning wasn't too early to call Mike Holkins.

"You better be on fire."

Lex leaned back against his headboard. "Mikey, you sound like this is a bad time."

"It's four in the morning, Luthor, that's never a good time to be awake," the engineer grumbled into the phone, sounding more awake with each syllable.

"Well, I know I'm not keeping you from a woman, so let's pretend I actually did interrupt something important, and move on. How soon can you be here?" Lex listened to the rustling in the background coupled with a few swear words as engineer fumbled for a reply.

Mike coughed. "Twenty minutes."

"Then I guess I'll see you in ten."

Mike Holkins pushed his glasses further onto his nose, and cautiously touched the edge of the Porsche's windshield. The overhead lights of the garage hid nothing of the damage from eyesight. He squatted down, and focused in on the tires. "Four blow outs, that's no accident, even with Firestones."

Lex watched him closely. "You tell me what happened to this car, just on the evidence alone, and then I'll tell you what I remember."

The engineer looked up from the ground where he was inspecting the undercarriage of the car. "has this car been processed by a lab yet?"

"Depends. Does the county sheriff's office count?"

Mike snorted, and pushed himself up off the garage floor. "I'm sure they are adequate for most fender-benders and small time crime that goes on in Smallville, but if you want a real investigation, you should have sent the car to the Metropolis Crime Lab." He stopped at the bench where his carrying case rested.

"I would have, if I wanted someone to be charged for the accident. As it was, I believe it was a case of the wrong place, wrong time. No one could have known I was going to pass that stretch of road at that time to set up something. I don't suspect anyone of trying to kill me."

"Then why am I here?" Mike asked bewildered.

"Satisfy my curiosity, and collect some overtime." Lex gestured to the car under the lights. "Spend an hour and tell me what you see. If it were an unknown chemical, or pathogen, I could do it myself. This is your area."

"You're not going to tell me, are you?" Mike sighed, and pulled on a pair of latex gloves. "I'd forgotten how much you Luthors love the mystery act until now."

"You read the paper, you know what happened. Prove it happened that way, to me."

"Right." Mike inspected the garage for a way to lift the car without stressing the metal any more. He rounded the car, and stopped in surprise at slightly raised metal supports resting under what was left of the tires. "There's a hydraulic lift in the garage?"

"Sending the cars out for repair is too time consuming. I have a man who comes in, and does the work here." Lex moved to a panel of switches. "How high do you want the car?"

Mike connected the restraints around each axle, and double checked the harness that would hold the Porsche. "Twenty centimeters." A chain clanked from above, before engine hummed with power, lifting the car from the floor. "Ah... perfect. This beats rolling under the car, or a jack any day."

Lex pulled on his own latex gloves, and started laying out collection bags, brushes, tweezers, and other various forensic tools. "Anything collected we can have the lab here run, give them a pleasant change from the crap."

Mike grunted in response, and then started picking at the deflated tires, wrinkling his nose at the combined smell of rubber and pond water. "Shreds of wire, still caught in the rubber of the tires. That fits with the cause of the accident, the roll of baling wire." He accepted the offered plastic bag, and sealed the bits of metal for the lab.

"Now these marks on the rear axle, and wheel well, that's from the lift they used to recover the car from the river," Lex explained, shifting a tool shelf aside, and lifting out a camera for documentation.

Mike kneeled under the car, and flashed a strong beamed penlight at the undercarriage. "Smells like a dead trout in here."

"No one's been in to try and restore the car. Or clean it." Lex shrugged. "At the time I didn't know the damage; I thought the parts might be salvageable. I held onto it, in case my mechanic wanted to cannibalize it."

"Hmmm..." Mike slipped the small light between his teeth, and reached out toward Lex, "Cut me a strip of tape, I think I got something here..."

"What's it look like?"

Mike frowned again, and gently pressed the sticky side of the tape against the grill of the car. "Looks like fibers, not shiny enough to be polyester, or nylon, cotton maybe, or flannel-cotton blend."

Lex pursed his lips in thought. "From a shirt?"

"Maybe. Could be a shirt, could be from some rescue worker's jacket getting caught. Hard to tell, the way they do things out here in the country. Best bet is to check it against county issue uniforms, and see if it matches." He worked at the tiny grooves with a pick, running his tongue against his teeth in thought. "Looks like wood splinters; from the barricade?"

Lex nodded. "The bridge was old enough to have wood, instead of steel barricades."

"How quaint." A shadow under the uneven place of the hood release caught Mike's eye, as he moved the light further along the undercarriage. "Hello there..." He maneuvered the needle-nosed pliers from the case to pry at the anomaly. "Okay, this definitely didn't come from a rescue worker. Too deep into the metal frame for something like a casual brush."

"Is that...blue thread?"

Mike nodded, pulling the bits of blue into the light. "Looks like denim, maybe from a pair of jeans." He squinted, pushing his glasses further up his nose. "Did you hit someone, Lex?"

Lex lifted his brow in inquiry. "You tell me."

"Well, considering the speed you were traveling, if you hit someone, that might wedge these fibers into a crevasse like that. The paint chips from the barricade, along with the wooden splinters..." The engineer paused in thought. "They come from the same area of the car, leading me to believe they were collected at the same instant."

"Then I have a question for you." Lex narrowed his gaze at the devastation from the car. "Did I strike someone with enough force to kill them?"

"Theoretically? I mean, I'm no expert at vehicular homicide, but I'd say that was more than enough force to kill, depending on age, height, general health. You'd have to be made from steel to survive a hit at nearly ninety degrees, and even steel would bend." He backed away from the undercarriage of the Porsche and stored the samples collected. "Habeas corpus."

"Exactly." Lex returned to the hydraulic switches, and started lowering the car to the ground. "Where's the body?"

"Still in the river?"

Lex laughed, and looked at his watch. "Actually, no, he's probably getting ready for school."

"Could there have been two people on the bridge? One who was hit, and one who wasn't?" Mike hazarded, surveying the car again.

"I'm starting to think there's two sides to Clark," Lex muttered to himself, thinking of the story he'd heard over vodka and orange juice about Greg Arkin. "What about the roof of the car? How'd that happen?"

"You're sure it wasn't the guys who lifted the car? Maybe they tied the chains around the top of the car, hoping to lift it that way, and it caused the stress, peeled it like a banana..." Mike rubbed his forehead, and picked up the camera. He pointed the camera at the strange marks at the driver's side window frame, at the point where the windshield melded with the roof of the car. "The glass, that was broken from the outside, could have been the impact from the bridge."

"Could have been," Lex agreed quietly.

"Though... what was the barricade at? The height? Here?" Mike pressed his hand to his knee level, and then raised it slowly, "or higher?"

Lex pulled out a measuring tape, and estimated to the best of his memory, "A meter, maybe less."

"Well, look at the windshield," Mike used a pen, and indicated the middle of the glass. "Here's a solid hit, and then a secondary hit, like something bounced off the hood." He tilted his head in thought. "I would think the wood would break away, explode outward, not be propelled back against the windshield. The pressure of the water perhaps, or the impact on the bottom..."

"Or hitting someone."

Mike nodded. "Or that. The roof though, that's what's really puzzling. The water...it would have pressed inward, crumpling the metal like a can under someone's foot, and even then, the type of pressure you're talking about only exists in the Pacific ocean trenches. Or on say, Jupiter, where the force of gravity is so much greater than it is on Earth.

"Hard to imagine what would make the roof curl outward like that," the engineer finished, almost to himself.

Lex studied the neat press of the metal. Water pressure would have worked against him if he'd been conscious in the water, resisting any attempts to open the door until the air pressure was equalized. He'd been out of options as the car sank, unconsciousness kept him from rolling the windows down to equalize that pressure enough for the door release to work. "What do those marks look like to you?" he asked, indicating the stress marks on the roof.

"Well... that could be the impression of some sort of set of pliers, whatever gripped the metal hard enough to peel it back. I can take some pictures, see if anything matches in the database. Something made that tread."

"Something, someone..." Lex mused distractedly. He couldn't, no, he could not be looking at finger marks on the roof of the Porsche. "Let me know what the lab comes back with, in regards to the fibers."

"You're the boss."

Chloe tried really hard not to stare at the enormous pool table in the office. "'The Color of Money' meets 'Wall Street'," she said to herself, as she waited for Lex Luthor to return from the plant. She glanced at the desk, cursing her luck that it was clean of papers. Not that she would snoop. Okay, so she would snoop in the Luthor Manse given the chance.

It was human nature to be curious.

The sound of raised voices headed her way kept her from opening any drawers out of that same damning curious human nature.

"Rose, there has got to be a way to get out of that crap convention," a male voice said, with tones of very real annoyance.

Maybe this wasn't the best time to come about the Torch, she thought. The digital camera, the computer, the layout boards, and the rest of the newspaper resources could wait another day, her less brave side argued. She grew up in Metropolis. She knew that the last thing anyone wanted was to be faced with a Luthor in a bad mood.

Come on, chicken. It's just Lex Luthor. You sat next to him at a football game. He owes you a favor anyway, no backing out, she scolded herself.

"The 'crap convention' was your father's idea; since he has business in Zurich, you are the de facto host," a female voice, presumably Rose, replied with a reasonable tone.

"Bully for me." Lex rounded the corner in exasperation, and came face to face with Chloe. "Ah... this must be my three-thirty." He cast a look back at his secretary in dismissal, and then switched gears seamlessly into charming host.

"I'm Chloe Sullivan, we met before..." She held out her hand, slipping into her own coat of confidence.

"I know, you're friends with Clark." Lex smiled, shaking her hand, and slid behind his desk. "What can I do for you, Chloe?"

"Luthor Corp is the main sponsor for newspaper that I edit. The Smallville Torch."

"I'm aware of that."

She fought the urge to fidget under his calm gaze. Chloe was raised to believe in a lot of different ideas about society and how things should be; she was never raised to hold out her hand for something. Not that she had any choice in the matter. "Were you also aware that the nearly all of the materials for the Torch were destroyed in a fire on school property?"

Lex nodded thoughtfully. "Was this the same fire that claimed the life of Coach Walter Arnold?"

Chloe paused. "That depends on who you ask. Technically the fires are a day apart. Principal Kwan believes it was a separate incident, caused by carelessness. He said someone was smoking on school property, and caused the fire during the pep rally."

"Was anyone?"

"No!" Chloe snapped, losing control of her temper for a moment. It had been enraging to watch the Principal ignore the very evidence in his face, and blame the fire on students. "No one on the staff smokes, especially not on school grounds. I was there when the fire started; believe me, I would have picked up on cigarette smoke. The problem is, with all the damage to the gym from the second fire the school board is faced with, the bills are high enough. If they can get around replacing the materials the Torch lost, they will."

Lex steepled his fingers together. "The Torch isn't high priority for a high school that is headed for a football state championship."

"So you see my problem." Chloe sighed. "Even with our new principal, the money is still going to athletics over academics. I have a responsibility as a journalist to report on what is going on at Smallville High, and I can't do that with a pad of paper and a throw-away camera."

"How much are we talking?" He pulled a sheet of paper, and scribbled a few numbers down, with zeros attached. "Would this replace everything at the paper?"

Chloe blinked at the number. "This could replace the offices of the Ledger, let alone the Torch."

"Then this is beneficial for both of us; I need to write off this amount for taxes as it is, and I don't see why a charitable donation to a non-profit school newspaper shouldn't get it." Lex reached out and pulled the sheet of paper back. "What room at the school? So I know where to direct the supplies."

She swallowed, a little surprised at how easy this was going. "It's room 312-B." She watched as Lex wrote that down as well. Something wasn't right, since when did the wealthy hand out money without a fuss? Not even her parents, who spoiled her in the only child way, caved this easily to her plans.

"You look like you want to ask me a question," Lex said with amusement.

"I do." She thought for a moment, wording her question in the least inflammatory way. "What are you getting out of this? Besides tax purposes, there's got to be an angle."

"There's always an angle, is that what you're saying?" He laughed at her nod. "Well, you're very perceptive. There is an angle, at least for me. Believe it or not, I've read most of your articles in the Torch. I even saw the work you did at your summer internship with the Daily Planet."

"That's impressive." She lifted her eyebrow in interest. "I didn't think Yale picked up a paper from Kansas." Sometimes it paid to show off her own homework, the way he had just revealed his.

Lex's smile widened. "You've got the makings of a fine reporter. You have that...curiosity for answers; you keep asking questions even when someone does give you an answer. Always digging."

"Experience has taught me that what people believe and what the truth is are two separate things, especially in Smallville. I've never seen such a wide-spread case of ostrichitis until I moved here."

"Ostrichitis?"

"They stick their heads in the sand, even when the truth is jumping up and down in front of them." Chloe leaned forward with intensity. "The truth is stranger than fiction here."

"You said you were there when the fire started at the Torch," Lex began, his eyes narrowing in on her. "How did you escape without any burns?"

"Clark was there." She paused for a moment, remembering how the flames had surged toward her, and then dissipated after Clark had come through the door. She felt that the Coach was behind the fire, but she didn't mention this just yet to Luthor. If the coach had caused the blaze, both at the Torch, and then with the principal, both instances where Clark had been present in some faculty or another, how much of a leap of logic was it to believe that Clark had been present at the third and final fire?

"He's very good at that, showing up at the right moment," Lex mused.

"Yeah," Chloe replied slowly, the wheels still turning. If Clark had been present, maybe he'd consent to do an interview, provide proof that the beloved coach was a pyrokinitic. He had to have seen more than he'd told her, unless he was suffering from the same malaise the rest of town had, the 'I didn't see nothing at no time' flu. "Whatever accelerant that was used in the fire was short acting, and by the time Clark got up there, the flames were gone. Does that sound like a fire set by a cigarette?"

"Not to me, but you think an accelerant was used in the other fire?"

"Other fires; you forget the car that caught fire with Principal Kwan inside. Fires aren't started by will. At least I didn't think so, until I moved here. Stranger things have happened in Smallville."

"What other sort of strange things have you seen?"

She looked toward the clock. "Do you have a couple of hours? This could take a while."

Lex kept smiling throughout her explanation of the weird in Smallville, from the meteor shower effects, to the chemicals used at the Luthor Plant Three. Some of her points were interesting, and definitely merited more investigation. No matter how many sheets of data he showed her, she refused to see reason in his explanations about chemicals.

He ended up laughing, probably insulting her in the process, but she really sounded like a conspiracy theorist. As if Luthor Corp employed the type of scientists it would take to have severed fingers re-grown, or two headed animals birthed. The lab had its hands full trying to shorten the growth cycle of corn, let alone regenerating human flesh.

Chloe was an odd one, with all her questions about events, and she hadn't uttered one suspicion about her dear friend Clark. It was either out of loyalty, or out of ignorance; Lex hadn't decided which yet.

"Mike Holkins is on line one, Lex," Rose called through the open door between her desk and his office.

He picked up the phone eagerly, without comment to Rose and her war against the intercom system. "What do you have for me?"

Mike laughed on the other end. "What? No how are you, Mike? How are the kids?"

"How are you, Mike? How are your kids going to eat if I fire you?"

"If you fired me, you won't find out the results from the lab."

It was a hollow threat, and Mike knew it; engineers with his experience and brilliance didn't fall off of trees. One learned to play along, if one was ever going to learn anything from them. "So you're going to balance my curiosity against my impatience?"

"First, the report on the two fibers taken from the car. I ran it against the Rescue crew's issued uniform, and it doesn't belong to them, unless someone was out of regs. Cotton, like I thought, judging from the type of dyes and chemicals used to process the thread, it was most probably manufactured in the United States. Southeast Asian manufacture cotton has a distinct composition, so we're looking at something from Fruit of the Loom, and not Kathy Lee Gifford."

"I get the picture. What else?"

"The second was denim, from a pair of Levis, probably 501s according to the amount of stone-washing. So yes, indeed, you struck someone with your car. I'd canvas the river for a body though, and forget the idea that your rescuer was the one you hit." Mike cleared his throat. "However, if you can get his prints, it would give me more to go on."

Lex frowned slightly. "I told you he pulled me from the car, of course his prints would be on it."

"On the car, yes, that is if the water and subsequent handling by Sheriff's Office didn't completely obliterate them. I found a partial print in the car. In the metal, where the roof was pulled away. It could be just the way the metal and fiberglass were stressed, but the whorls and lines seem to indicate it came from someone's hand, or fingers." He continued with a slight hesitation, "Someone strong enough to pull the roof off the car; well, he was strong enough to leave an impression in the roof."

"Impossible."

"Hey, I'm just saying what the evidence is telling me I don't know how else to explain it, but someone tore the roof off that car, now either it was done by hand, or it was done while they lifted it from the water, and metal was so stressed it picked up an impression. Heat could have done it; of course, your unknown person would have a burned hand as well, unless they were invulnerable to fire."

Lex inhaled sharply, his conversation with Chloe coming back to him. "Are you free tomorrow afternoon? I'm having some remodeling done, and before everything is cleaned up, I need to prove or disprove arson for insurance purposes."

"Remodeling? Where?"

"Smallville High School, Room 312-B, then venture down to the sauna room. I want samples from both places."

"Lex... um, hi." Clark greeted him with a bright smile, before looking over his shoulder at the passing students in the halls. "What are you doing here?"

"What's wrong, Clark? Not happy to see me?" Lex teased softly, keeping his hands in his pockets, out of self-preservation. If he unleashed his hands, he might do something very un-Luthor like, and grab Clark. In a hallway filled with teenagers, it was not the way to keep a low profile.

"Surprised to see you, that's all." Clark again looked over his shoulder, before stepping out of the busy hallway to a quieter corridor. "I thought I was going to see you tonight."

"You are. I'm actually here on business; I've got an appointment with your Principal Kwan about private funding."

Clark grinned. "Trying to get another building named after you?"

"You're hilarious." He couldn't help but smile back at Clark, charmed as always by his infectious nature. "Actually, I'm here about the Torch. One of my father's better ideas was sponsoring the paper; with the office burned, Luther Corp is going to foot the bill." Lex stopped, and let his gaze linger on Clark's no-nonsense jeans and oversized sweater as Clark slouched against a wall.

Clark met his gaze, and again looked over his shoulder, blushing at the scrutiny in which Lex was using. He shifted, and returned to the subject dutifully. "Chloe told me the administration was balking at replacing her equipment."

"Do you blame them? The coach that this school district worshiped was just found dead, after a cheating scandal implicates him, and I believe her last article was a little less than scathing over the handling of situation." Lex smirked. "If I were the school, I'd make sure she and a wide-range reading public never interacted."

"Lex, I'm shocked." Clark shook his head in mock admonishment. "What about freedom of speech?"

"When they are making speeches against you, it's just good business to curtail the freedom. Draconian, I know, but it's a fact that no one has the freedom to write anything about someone. There's such a thing as libel." Lex pushed back the sleeve of his jacket, and glanced at his Rolex. "I should go, and make a bid to ensure free speech in Smallville High School with Principal Kwan."

Clark reached out to grab his arm in question before Lex could turn away. "If you don't believe in it, why are you helping?"

"I didn't say I don't believe in the freedom of speech, I just know its power. What if someone printed that you cheated on your literary test? It's not true, but that doesn't keep a teacher from watching extra carefully the next time you take a test, does it?" Lex covered Clark's hand with his own, smiling wanly. "Reputation falls in the gutter a lot faster than it climbs out. Take it from a Luthor."

"What can I do for you, Mr. Luthor?" Principal Kwan asked, as he took his seat behind the desk.

Lex looked around for a moment, taking in the school pennants, the strong desk, the certificates of achievement and recognition. He'd never sat in the principal's office before, not because he'd never been in trouble, but because not many headmasters dared to lose their funding by punishing a Luthor. "I've read about your work in Metropolis; the scores on the Standards of Learning tests improved dramatically after you implemented remedial after-school programs."

"Thank you." Kwan swelled with pride at the compliment, in just the way that Lex intended him to. "It wasn't easy, requiring the after-school sports programs to schedule around the study groups."

"Ah yes, well, some schools have strange priorities." He smiled expansively at the man. "I understand there was a cheating scandal here, involving a coach and players. It's shocking, someone placing academic integrity over a game like football."

Principal Kwan shifted in his seat uncomfortably, his fingers picking at a bandage on his left hand. "Yes, well, as tragic as Mr. Arnold's death was, I'm afraid it overshadowed the more important issue of honesty in the classroom."

Lex doubted the principal was mourning the coach's death the way the rest of the school was. "It raised concerns, I can imagine. If there was cheating over something as unimportant as football, I wonder what was going on when it came to life-altering decisions like college acceptances. Students getting grades they didn't earn because teachers thought they would have a better chance at getting college with a padded B, versus the deserved C."

A muscle tightened in the principal's jaw.

"I'm sure--"

"I know your commitment to education won't let that happen here," Lex replied, over-riding the defensive posturing. "Well, that does bring me to my reason for visiting. Luthor Corp sponsors the Smallville High Torch, and I'd like to remodel the offices and replace the equipment that was destroyed in the fire." He leaned back in the poorly patched chair accorded to visitors. "I hope you don't have any objection to an academic extra-curricular activity returning to the campus."

Kwan looked as if he had an objection, just based on the source of the suggestion. "Well... the funding for schools isn't what it should be, and with the destruction to the locker room; I'm sure there will be no problem in having Luthor Corp repair the newspaper."

"Thank you. My people will be here shortly to start work. I think one missing issue of the Torch is one too many." Lex stood, and offered his hand to the principal, who awkwardly shook Lex's hand with his uninjured right. "That's a nasty burn on your hand."

"Faulty wiring, caused my car to catch fire."

"Really? I hope the car was under warranty. You're lucky you weren't trapped."

Principal Kwan shifted again. "I was lucky; someone, I think, was able to pull me from the car, before the flames consumed it. I don't really remember, though."

"Passing good Samaritan?" Lex mused, mostly to himself. There were a lot of lucky people in Smallville walking around when fate dictated otherwise. Lucky, not counting the dead bodies.

A bright speck of light haloed by clouds filled Clark's vision. In his astronomy books there were hints of purple and sage around the nebula, but as he gently adjusted the lens, he knew all he was going to see was a clearer speck of light surrounded by haze. Briefly he wished for the type of money that could by a telescope with greater range, before he discarded that thought. This telescope was his grandfather's; it had familial meaning behind it, even if it was several decades outclassed by the newest motorized telescopes.

He'd found the perfect scope, equipped with a USB port and a hard drive, that stored coordinates of star systems. At the touch of a key the scope would select a star, scan the heavens for the star, and then magnify to a point that would have any astronomer drooling at the mouth. When he'd mentioned the telescope to his father, Jonathan's only reply was that manual focus taught the position of the stars in a way that had been passed down for generations; no fancy electronic toy could replace human experience.

Clark knew better than to argue. He turned the viewfinder toward the back pasture where Lex was probably parking his car out of sight. His mother and father were peacefully asleep, slaves to the farmer regimen of awake at dawn, asleep by dusk.

That suited Clark just fine.

Once the lights were out, once the chores were finished, he didn't have to ponder the questions of the day any longer. Concerns about whether he was going to pass French, questions about whether he should pursue the red-blooded American dream of a cheerleader, doubts about if he was ever going to feel comfortable lying to everyone at some point everyday. Once it was dark, he dropped the pretense of well-adjusted teenager, and just embraced what was becoming more and more natural to him.

It was Lex-time. The requirements of the evening were filled with simply showing up, no expectation of anything more. He could simply be Clark Kent, Regular Guy, and talk about the stars, talk about living with his parents, and joke over the trials of being a high school student. Lex in turned talked about everything but business, everything but who his father was, everything but what an outsider would expect from a young billionaire.

Normal guy bonding. Normal guy bonding that sometimes ended with Clark kissing Lex goodbye with more fever each night. Okay, so he was going to have to give up on the idea that life was ever going to be normal after dark. A touch on the back of Clark's neck, brought a slow smile to his lips. "Hey."

"Clark..." Lex leaned in to brush his lips with a kiss. "Sorry I'm late. I had a teleconference with Tokyo, their morning is our evening."

"That's okay, Dad just started up with his snoring about ten minutes ago. The world could end, and he wouldn't notice."

"What about your Mom?"

"She wears ear plugs." Clark settled onto the cot, and leaned against the barn wall comfortably. "I wish I had them in my ears when Chloe discovered the new laptop and camera."

Lex winced in sympathy. "High-pitched girly scream?"

"Dogs howled in Metropolis, Lex." He shook his head at the memory of the remodeled office. "You work fast. I thought you were just in to see Kwan this morning."

"I had a remodeling crew at the plant this week for renovation anyway. It seemed prudent to not waste time or resources." He sat cross-legged on the floor of Clark's Fortress of Solitude, and sighed softly. "I have to go to Metropolis for an inane convention, and I wanted it done before then."

"And when Lex Luthor wants something done, it's done," Clark teased, as he absently began to rub Lex's shoulders. "You never leave anything half-finished, do you?"

"If you want...oh god," Lex sighed in pleasure as Clark's fingers found a tense area. "Christ, I forgot what I was going to say."

Clark chuckled, digging his thumbs into Lex's back. "Better mark the calendar, Lex Luthor is speechless. I guess I have you at my mercy." Clark paused, thinking for a moment. "I bet you'd tell me anything to keep me from stopping, eh?"

"What do you want to know?" Lex asked muffled, his face pressed against his knees.

Clark bit his lower lip, not wanting to jump immediately to conclusions, but some questions still nagged at him. While he could ignore questions about how he felt about Lex after dark, he wasn't able to ignore questions about Lex. God, he had to stop listening to his father and his suspicions.

"Clark?" Lex lifted his head. "You stopped... uh oh, I'm guessing this is a big question."

"Well..." He twisted his mouth into an apologetic look. "I ... not that I'm doubting your motivations, but, um... that stuff for the Torch, that wasn't your way of buying Chloe, was it? So she'd like you?"

"That sounded like your father." Lex turned around to face Clark, "You think that's why I did what I did?" He stopped, and looked a little sad at the thought. "You really are learning from me, aren't you? I didn't try and buy Chloe's approval. You give me too much credit, and her too little. She's not really the type who accepts bribes, don't you think?"

Clark flushed in shame. "You're right. She's not someone who can be bought." This was really what he deserved for listening a little too long to the Jonathan Kent's patented rant about how Luthors engineered more than just crops in Smallville. "I'm sorry."

He leaned closer to Clark, resting his chin on Clark's knee. "Now Pete on the other hand, I could buy. A private box for the Metropolis Sharks, and he'd be putty." Lex paused, waiting for Clark to lighten in mood. "Hey, smile, I'm kidding."

"I thought you said you never joked," Clark began with mock-suspicion, watching the amusement grow in Lex's soft gray eyes.

"That was before you brought me back from the dead; I find myself doing a lot of things I didn't do before." Lex crawled closer to Clark, narrowing in on his lush mouth. "Like this..." he whispered softly, leaving a soft bite Clark's throat.

What little blood that hadn't already pooled below his belt, rushed there at those words. Cold fingers of desire started to curl around Clark's spine, sparking all different sorts of electric reaction in his body. "Yeah?" he replied brilliantly.

"Yeah."

"Lex...?" he whimpered under Lex's masterful assault on his throat.

Lex lifted a brow inquiry, reluctantly leaving Clark's collarbone unmarked. "Something wrong?"

"Not wrong, but I ... I mean, uh..." Clark fumbled, blushing hotly. He frantically wished one of his powers was telepathy. God, how to say it out loud without sounding like the painfully shy virgin that he was? "That is to say, I ... you know, um..."

"I don't know what the hell I'm doing either, Clark." Lex smiled ruefully. "Okay, I know how to do that, but ... this going slow thing we're doing, this is new." He tilted his face away from Clark, his voice mirroring Clark's uncertainty. "I like it. I like it a lot. Don't you?"

Maybe he was telepathic. Clark smiled warmly, letting out a breath in relief. "That's what I was going to say. I like it too."

"Hey, I don't want you to make a mistake, okay?" Clark was interrupted from replying by Lex's cell phone ringing. Lex pulled out the small phone, mouthing an apology to Clark, before answering with notable irritation, "You better be on fire."

"Interesting choice of words, Luthor. You said call if I found anything out. I'm calling," Mike Hoskins replied in a slightly hurt tone.

Lex sighed, and moved away from Clark with reluctance. "Talk."

"Oh, did I interrupt something? You and a woman, Lex?" Mike started to laugh on the other end, blissfully unaware of the building tension in Lex's body.

"I'm hanging up, and you're fired."

Clark raised his eyebrow at Lex's tone, and started to giggle.

"Okay, okay, the samples from the school? Turned up bupkiss. If there was a case for spontaneous combustion, that would be it, at least at that newspaper. Down at the locker room and sauna, much more interesting story."

"You're losing my interest," Lex threatened, as he watched Clark openly laugh at him.

"Traces of an element of unknown origin. As in, not of this world. Probably the meteorite that's salted all over this town. I'm telling you, if you break that down, Lex, you could get your name on the periodic table. Luthorium, or something." Mike continued, with excitement, "You won't believe this, but the coach was taking meteorite saunas. Now we've noticed that plant cells start to mutate around the meteorite, and to a much greater extent, animal cells; you have to wonder what it was doing to Coach Hardass. Open pores, big ole lungfuls of the stuff, probably not healthy."

"You interrupted my evening for this? You're still fired." He covered the cell phone, and tried to look stern at Clark. "You think I'm kidding, this guy is fired." Against his will, he started to smile with Clark. He turned back to the conversation. "Five words, what does this mean?"

"Kent is not what he seems."

Lex stopped smiling. "That was six words."

"The prints I lifted from the sauna match the prints from the car. There are signs of a struggle where the dearly departed coach died. A dented fire extinguisher, which I might add, was completely full. As in, no one tried to save this guy. Mysterious circumstances, Clark Kent's prints on the scene, again. Ask him, since I'm guessing you're with him right now, ask him where he was when the coach died."

"Leave a report with Rose, good work on that. I'll present that at the convention in Metropolis."

"Yeah, I get you, no can talk. I know I'm just an underling and all, but be careful, Luthor. I'd hate to have to go back to work for the old man."

Lex disconnected the phone, troubled. He noticed Clark had grown quiet and was now watching him with concern in his so-open so-innocent eyes. "Hey, I'm sorry about that. I needed that report before I leave tomorrow..."

Clark forced a smile. "It's okay, I know your work never really ends."

He thought about the smell of smoke in Clark's hair the night of the fire. He thought about the shaking hands and too-fast-words that night in the kitchen about Greg Arkin. He thought about the shell-shocked expression on Clark's face when the darkness finally faded from his eyes, and he'd looked up from the river bank surprised to be alive. "I have to go..."

"I should get some sleep too." Clark stood, and offered his hand to Lex. "I fell asleep in one of my classes today."

"Hmm..." Lex replied distractedly, pulling himself up with Clark's help. Smoky hair. Clark showed up, and the fire was gone from the office of the Torch. The top of the Porsche peeled like an onion. Clark asking if he had done the right thing in not trying to pull Greg out of the way. Would you save them all, Lex? Principal Kwan pulled to safety from his car. If you can't save everyone, would you save anyone? He shook off the disturbing thoughts. "I'll see you when I get back from Metropolis."

It wasn't until Lex was back at his car did he notice that he had forgotten to kiss Clark goodnight.

"Fertilizer run-offs are blamed for over seventy percent of the algae waste that is choking America's rivers. There are ten environmental groups in Washington at this very moment, lobbying for legislature that will leave each and everyone of us responsible for the die-off of America's fishing industry. Now we can pay for it now and start developing more environmentally-safe products, or we can pay for it later when our grandchildren turn to us one day, and ask us about the taste of trout, or the shape of salmon." Lex gathered his notes, and stared out into the audience of fertilizer companies. "Thank you."

The applause was polite, out of respect for his name, and not a sign of approval of his message. It was going to take federal legislature with the promise of hefty fines for any reform to be made in the business world. Lex knew this, and so did every man seated before him.

So the message of change now, instead of later, was not popular. If Lionel Luthor wanted a popular speech to be given, then he should have given it himself, instead of assigning it to his son.

Lex shook hands, and hid his boredom and disgust of the people surrounding him. If he heard one more lying two-faced businessman promise to 'look into more environmentally friendly ways of manufacturing', he might be moved to violence. Mother Earth really wasn't his concern; it was good business to change with the times.

He was halfway to freedom from the hotel, when four uniformed officers and two plainclothes detectives moved out of the shadows of the various fake vegetation of the lobby in an intercept route.

"Mr. Lex Luthor?"

He felt a strange sense of deja vu from the last time he'd been arrested. At least this time he was wearing more clothing, and wasn't carrying anything pharmaceutically illegal. "Yes? Can I help you gentlemen?"

"Mr. Luthor, would you like to come with us to answer a few questions?" a man in a suit asked, flashing a badge. It was phrased like a question, but the tone meant there was no option of refusing.

"Of course. May I ask what about?"

"Armed robbery, sir."

Lex started to laugh. "Did someone break into the Castle Luthor?"

"No, sir." The detective put a very strong grip on Lex's shoulder, guiding him out of the hotel, into the flashbulbs of the press to a police car.

"Hey! What is going on?" Lex barely managed to duck as the car door was opened, he was not-so-gently shuffled into the back seat. "What's this about?"

"Sir, perhaps you'd like to wait for your lawyer."

"Lawyer? What have I done?"

The driver of the patrol car snorted. "We have eyewitnesses putting you in Smallville this morning, robbing the Smallville Savings & Loan."

"Impossible." He was going to have to stop saying that.

Livia Wharton Luthor. The Angels Hold Her Now That I Cannot.

A blanket of orange and red covered the cemetery, as the trees shed their autumn foliage. Silently Lex bent to brush away the foliage from his mother's grave marker, his fingers lingering on the ornate script. He never thought of his father being poetic, until he learned that Lionel had written the words himself.

Carefully he settled the bouquet of lilies he'd brought by another smaller clutch of flowers.

"He still comes, whenever he's in town."

Lex straightened, and turned to face Rose's solemn face. She had come as soon as the news of the robbery had become public. "I talked to the caretaker; my father has only been here twice." He smiled bitterly, and walked back to the waiting limo. "But thank you for trying to defend him."

"I'm sure he has his reasons." Rose fell in step behind him, and put a hand on his shoulder in comfort. "Lionel and I don't see eye to eye, but I do know he loved her very much."

"Too bad I can't remember it." Lex sighed, and slipped into the car wearily. "So where are we on finding out what happened at the bank today?"

Rose accepted the subject change, and brought up her briefcase from her feet. "I'm still working on getting a copy of the surveillance tape, but from what witnesses say, the suspect was identical to you, except for the fact he had no ID and his signature didn't match the one you have on file at the bank. The lab is running your fingerprints against the ones lifted from the register at the bank, preliminary results indicate there is no match. We won't know for sure, for a day or so."

"I know I don't have a twin walking around. Can't imagine anyone wanting to clone me either." Lex tapped on the glass, indicating the driver to go on. "I guess that is somewhat of a relief. What did the other Lex say?"

"Oh it seems he wanted to cash out all of your accounts at the bank; it looks to me like a very amateur job. A professional that could look like you would have at least practiced your signature and obtained copies of your license." Rose flipped through a few statements, photocopied on the sly from the local police department, and handed them to Lex, along with the reports taken from outside investigators from the plant. "We feel it was a spur-of-the-moment venture, by a look-a-like. Once it became clear that the cash wasn't going to be handed over, the suspect pulled a gun, a long silver barrel pistol, perhaps an antique or a collector's gun, and demanded the cash by force."

"Hmmm..." Lex paused in his perusal of the files. "Clark Kent was on the scene?"

Rose shifted. "It appears that once the suspect left the bank he ran into Mr. Kent on the street, and then pushed him into a store window, shattering it."

"Is he okay? I don't see any report of injuries." He really didn't like the feeling that was circling his thoughts, that Clark had once again been present at a mysterious circumstance in Smallville.

"I could check, but I don't believe there were any injuries." Rose paused, before continuing with care, "Mr. Kent, he has an affinity for finding excitement. He also has an uncanny ability to escape circumstances without even a scratch on him."

Lex looked up, frowning slightly at the expression on Rose's face. "What? You're not telling me something."

"Michael Hoskins called just before I left for Metropolis. It appears Mr. Kent has never been sick, never been injured. There are no medical records on him, outside of the vaccinations that public schools require." She pressed her lips together, as if to try to physically keep back the words welling in her throat. "I ... it seems odd, doesn't it? A young boy growing up on a farm, and he's never been to the hospital? How much do you know about him?"

"Who else has Mike talked to? Anyone from the company?"

"No, just me. Why?"

Lex regarded the countryside that was passing them by as the limo journeyed back to Smallville. "This is what I know about Clark Kent, okay? Number one, I owe him my life. Number two, he's my friend. Number three, I owe him my life."

"You said that twice."

"It bears repeating." He smiled without a trace of humor. "I want you to find out everything you can on Clark Kent; his adoption, his parents, everything. Second, I need you to contact someone out of New York, regarding birth records. I want you to work with Mike on this, but you talk to no one but me about it, okay?"

"Lex... do you know who he is?"

"He saved my life, Rose," Lex replied, as if that answered the question. Maybe it did.

"I'm sorry you got thrown through that window." Not a scratch on Clark, though. "I promise I'm not a criminal mastermind." The question that was circling his brain though, was whether Clark was.

"Yeah, I know." Clark replied calmly. "A criminal mastermind would have worn a mask." He snuck a look, a smile spreading across his face.

Martha studied the looks that were exchanged between Lex and Clark curiously. "Well, Clark, you've missed the bus. Again."

Lex lifted his eyebrow. "I can give you ride if you want, Clark."

"Sounds great." Clark slipped his backpack over his shoulder, and walked over to kiss his mother goodbye. "I'll see you later, Mom."

"Oh and Lex?" she began, before they could head out the door. "Drive carefully."

Lex turned to Clark, as they approached his Jaguar. "Your mother is very funny."

"Yeah... so, how was business in Metropolis?" Clark asked, sending another sidelong glace to Lex, watching him pull on his driving gloves. "When I saw you or what I thought was you, on the street, I thought you made up the fertilizer convention."

"I don't think we're at the point where I have to lie and sneak off to the city behind your back."

"You let me know when we get to that point, okay? I think Lana is warming up to me."

Lex glanced out of the corner of his eye, as he drove. "I never know when you're kidding."

"Guess you have to trust me." Clark grinned, before turning to the scenery with a slight frown.

Lex watched as Clark began to rub his temples. "Headache?"

"Eye strain, from studying." Clark shrugged, and watched as the Smallville High School came into view. "Hey, let me out here, okay?"

Lex slowed down outside of the school, and pulled over for Clark. "Sure. Listen, I'm going to be busy with the fallout from this robbery nonsense. My father is going to have an stroke when he gets the paper."

"Guess I'll see you when I see you."

"Just make sure it's actually me."

Mike shifted on his stool, and focused the microscope on the slide. He looked up as the dim lights in the lab were brightened suddenly. "Hey, I needed it dark for a reason!"

"Sorry." Lex walked over to Mike, not sounding sorry at all. "Anything new?"

"Before I say anything to you, how do I know it's really you?" Mike questioned with a teasing suspicion. "On Star Trek, they required blood tests to make sure someone isn't a shape shifter."

"You stick me, and I will make sure pieces of you are used to grow corn in Iowa." He gestured to the clipboard and notes on the counter top. "So I take it you saw the tape from the robbery?"

"Yes indeed. As far as I can tell, it's you on that tape. Spooky." Mike walked over to the light panel, and turned off the overheads. "But not as spooky as this." As the room darkened, he gestured for Lex to approach the high powered electron microscope. "Take a look at that."

Lex frowned, scooting over to the eye piece. "What? I don't see anything."

"Yeah, now, wait until I fry it with X-rays." Mike flipped a switch. "Lights up like a Christmas tree, don't it?"

"Fascinating." Lex stared at the glowing bits of green under the lens. "Radiation, nothing we didn't know before."

"Ah, but did you know these bits of meteor are only emit radiation in pulses? I can't put a rhyme or reason to the pattern. Sometimes it makes the machines go crazy, and sometimes it's like a piece of gravel, basically watching paint dry." Mike rubbed his eyes. "I have no idea what it means."

"Hmmm..." Lex pushed away from the counter, and sighed. "Where did this sample come from? I've never seen samples of the meteorite this small. What did you do, grind in a pedestal?"

Mike shifted nervously. "It wasn't exactly legal." He continued with trepidation under Lex's intrigued gaze. "It came from Coach Arnold's lungs. He died in the shower area of the locker room, and it was really quite fascinating the way the tiles acted like a convection oven and baked him from the inside out."

"I don't even want to know how you got this out of the coroner's office. Just make sure it doesn't ever get back to me. I have had enough trouble with law enforcement, without this adding to it."

"Make an interesting addition to your rap sheet though."

Club Zero was a name he hadn't heard in a years.

He could have gone years without hearing it again.

"How?" Rose asked, after Lex filled her about Roger Nixon's proposition. She had worn him down after he had returned from town in a rage. Apparently he couldn't break a pool cue against a wall without being interrogated by his staff.

"That's why I employ you; find out how." Lex paced, his mind trying to block out the imagines from his "misspent" youth. A raid at the Club, even after he had paid for the ability to know when the police were going to arrive. Screaming women separating quickly, men rushing to pull their clothes on, Lex running for the back exit missing freedom by only a stride when a gun was leveled at his head in the alley.

"Well it couldn't have been from the judge, he's been dead for years. The record has been sealed, your father had everyone paid off, everyone down to the janitor at the Club."

Lex closed his eyes, fighting the back fever of emotion. The Kennedys could afford the embarrassment of drug and sex scandal, they had plenty of relatives to groom to replace a disgraced member. The effect of Catholic birth control, there were many branches to chose from. The Luthor name had narrowed down to exactly one when it came to heir apparent for the company, and it was far too late in the game for Lionel to groom another.

Lex knew that when he started frequenting Club Zero. He knew that when he began dealing. After the accident, his father had avoided looking at him, given the chance; in the midst of teenage rebellion, he'd decided to give his father a real reason to be ashamed of him. It hadn't worked that way, he reflected as he poured himself a brandy.

"I suppose we have to look at the damage this could do." Rose gently took away the glass from Lex's hand. "Retreating into that won't help."

"Would you rather I had a spoon and a lighter in my hands and a straw in my nose?"

"Stop being ridiculous, you were never like that."

Lex lifted his eyebrow, and spat out bitterly, "the papers won't see that distinction. The papers won't care that I was probably more in control than the vice cop who arrested me. They are just going to see I was picked up with enough to be judged carrying with intent to sell. Like I needed to make money that way." He poured a second glass of brandy, surrendering his first glass to Rose. "It will never make it to the papers."

"How much does this Roger Nixon want?"

"One hundred grand. Peanuts." Lex swallowed the dark liquor with a half-smile. "You and I both know it's not about the money." It was never about the money. Very little in his life was motivated by wealth, something he shared in common with his father. It always boils down to the power. "I'm not about to let this cockroach rule my life."

"True, nor should you." She sipped her glass slowly. "You have to cut off the head of this snake, grabbing it by the tail will just put off the next shakedown. You just have to put the fear of God into this man, so he'll never be tempted to try this again."

"I could just have him killed."

"Well there is that," Rose conceded. "Journalists, even ones who write for that rag, are hard to kill though; it raises lots of questions. It's not like killing a competitor, where a heart attack, or car accidents are easier to arrange. A reporter dies, and the next assumption is that someone was trying to keep them quiet.

"If he wasn't a reporter, this would be so much more simpler." She continued with a sigh, and removed her Palm Pilot to scroll through the electronic rolodex. "A phone call, and that would really be that."

"I never realized you had such a bloodthirsty side to you, Rose." Lex poured a second glass for himself, reluctantly recanting the brandy. He pulled a cue from the wall, and walked over to the pool table thoughtfully. The cue smacked the center of the arranged triad with a satisfactory clack, spreading the stripes and solids wide and far across the table.

The key to billiards was the ability to see a cause and effect relationship between target and goal. Following the geometry of the table, lining up the angles and applying the proper force with the cue sent the sighted ball into the correct pocket. Avoid the obstacles, keep the eight ball on the table, and know when to caress the cue ball versus smacking it; they were simple rules that Lex applied on and off the table. Roger Nixon needed something subtle, regardless of how badly Lex wanted to smack him down.

"'Everyone is a moon, Lex. They have a dark side they don't show anyone.'" Rose picked up a manila file folder she had discarded on Lex's desk after hearing the details of the blackmail scheme. "Including your friend, Clark Kent."

Her words upset the careful concentration Lex was giving the game, resulting in the premature end of the game. The eight ball rolled innocuously into the side pocket. He replaced the cue stick a little too forcefully, before turning back to Rose. "What did you find out?"

"The first sign of public record is approximately 12 years ago, just after the meteor shower. Jonathan and Martha Kent formally adopted their foundling child. The State of Kansas believes Clark Kent was born at home somewhere near Topeka with no record of a father. The birth mother is first name, Jane, last name, Doe who had the child for two to three years, before abandoning the boy outside of the Kent farm. No relatives stepped forward at the time of the adoption, so baby Doe, became Clark Kent in the eyes of the law."

"Christ." Lex had lost his mother, but at least he had known her. At least he had pictures of her, a place to go in order to mourn, and people who had stories about her. "He was abandoned?"

"That's what public record says." Rose flipped through the thin file folder. "Of course, that's about all the public record says. Clark received his shots and immunizations at a family clinic in Metropolis, there's only a copy of the records that the school has, after a fire claimed the originals. Other than that, nothing remarkable. Average grades, average activities, Sundays in church, boy scouts, and curiously no sports until high school."

"I fail to see how that is a dark side."

"Then you're refusing to see, or you've become trusting since moving to Smallville. I've seen people with Witness Protection with more of a background than Kent."

"Explain something to me."

Mike looked up from his electron microscope, and tipped his glasses back onto his nose. "Explain what to you, Lex? The meaning of life? The popularity behind the Olsen twins?"

Lex walked further into the lab, and held up his cellular phone. "Explain to me why this is as suddenly about as useful as a paperweight. I can't get a signal to save my life."

Mike opened his mouth, and then closed it with a guilty snap. "Damn, I forgot to tell you, I guess. I'm working on something here, involving the meteorite. Did you know that electrons, when excited, give off a particular wave? I'm trying to see if I can get a spectrograph reading from the meteorite, after bombarding the particles with various wavelengths ..." He trailed off. "To make a long, but fascinating story short, the waves the machine is giving off, is disrupting the signal, probably for the whole house. Sorry."

"Sorry. You're sorry." Lex rubbed his eyes, pausing in thought. "I've seen the meteor glow around Clark, do you think he's giving off any particular waves himself? Something that's concentrated to his vicinity?"

"I don't know about that yet, but I do know he gives off a 'trouble vibe'." Mike lifted a file from under a stack of EMF readings. "I got this from the police station. Again, don't ask how."

Lex took the file, and flipped it open to reveal a police report. "Who's this?"

"Excellent question, Lex, who indeed. Who is she, who can she be?" Mike shrugged, and then tapped his pen against the name on the top of the file. "The birth certificate says Tina Greer. They found the money from the bank robbery in her locker today."

"She robbed the bank?" Lex studied the school picture of Tina Greer. She had long brown hair, a sullen expression and a blouse on from the Gap. In short, she looked like an unremarkable teenager, forgettable in every way, except perhaps her eyes. Her eyes looked vaguely familiar to him, in a way he couldn't put his finger on. "What does this have to do with Clark?"

"There was an anonymously phoned in tip to the police this afternoon, telling them they might find something interesting if they searched the lockers at the high school, starting with Tina Greer. I happened to listen to the taped phone call, and recognize Clark Kent's voice." Mike stuffed his hands into his pockets, and leaned against the counter top. "I had every police report with his name pulled. So far, I've connected him to two bodies: our Coach Combustible, and a Mrs. Arkin. His name also appears in one missing persons report. I like to call him the Angel of Death."

"He didn't kill Mrs. Arkin, her son did," Lex corrected.

"Maybe Greg did, but he's not around to say yes or no to that. Last person to see him, oh yes, that would be Clark Kent. Wasn't he the last person to see Coach Arnold alive?"

Lex shrugged, dismissing Mike's comment. Coincidences didn't make proof, and they both knew it. "Tina Greer robbed the bank. How do we know that?"

"Other than the monopoly money in her locker? Her fingerprints. Of course, fingerprints aren't an exact science, not they way Perry Mason movies make them out to be. The pressure you use to make the print, the possible overlap of prints, they all change how a print looks. Matching prints isn't like blowing up a print on a transparency, and then seeing if it lines up against the print on record. The lab takes at least six points of a print, and compares the curves and whorls to find a match. That's probably why Tina's prints from the money in her locker, from the prints on her locker, and the bank manager's log were only a 70 percent match between them. I still can't explain how she walked into the bank looking like you, but I think this is a reason as to why." Mike tapped his finger against a ledger sheet, before sheepishly slipping his hands into his pockets.

Lex almost smiled, hearing Mike's almost-admissal of defeat, before scanning the list of numbers. "Her mother's shop wasn't doing well, not well enough to pay off debts like these. She robbed the bank for the money."

"Apparently Tina had some hefty medical bills when she was a baby. Some sort of soft tissue bone disorder. The bank was going to foreclose on the house, probably in a matter of weeks." Mike pursued his lips together in thought. "Her recovery was something of a miracle. Coincidently, it happened around the time of the meteor shower. Now, don't laugh, but remember how I told you the meteorite affects plant and animal cells under certain circumstances? I think in Tina's case, it made her easier to mold, and not like bacteria, mold as in Jell-O."

"You've said some pretty fantastical things, any proof?"

"Not yet. But you know, yet it moves. Of course, if she change her shape, she's limited by the fact she can't change her fingerprints."

"So if I were Tina, I'd wear gloves," Lex offered softly.

Mike's grin widened. "Yeah but you have this kinky glove fetish Lex, that I really don't understand."

"You never know when you might have to commit a crime." Lex paused, reminded suddenly of his blackmailer. The smile died from his lips, as he turned to the engineer with seriousness. "Mike, I need you to make the cell phones useless for a while longer."

"That's only thing my ex-wife will tell you I do well. I can make something consistently not work."

"Explain this."

Lex looked up from his paper to Mike Hoskins, and raised his brow. The engineer was holding a picture of Roger Nixon in his hand, and was looking none too pleased. "I meant to tell you about that."

"Listen, I know how to play well with others, but Roger Nixon? Why the hell is he looking into the car accident? He writes science fiction for the Metropolis Inquisitor." Mike slapped the picture down on Lex's desk with a pound. "Why him? Why now? And do you really think that journalistic wanna-be is going to find the answers quicker than I will?"

"You found out about Roger awfully fast." Lex observed smugly. "I only put him on the trail last night."

"Well that's the thing, Lex. I'm observant. When I found out he pulled the same accident report as I did, I started getting nervous. I thought, gee, the last thing Lex Luthor needs is a tabloid reporter printing stories about him. I didn't even dream you were the one to point him that direction."

"You're right, the last thing I need is Roger Nixon nosing around my life. That's why after he tried to blackmail me, I set him on Clark's life." A fact that seemed like a good idea at the time, but Lex was starting to feel a guilty over. It was one thing to have Mike and Rose snoop on Clark, they were two people he could quasi-trust, but Roger Nixon was a new variable.

Lex was just going to have to weigh Roger's self-protective instinct against anything he found that would be printable in the Inquisitor.

"He tried to blackmail you?" Mike started to laugh, softly at first, but then with increasing amount of volume. "I can't believe he still has his balls. Hell, I can't believe you want an incompetent like, Nixon working for you."

Lex leaned back in his chair, and opened his desk drawer. "You're right about his incompetence. He had this in his possession." He lifted the thick folder containing his sealed juvenile records.

"May I see that?"

"There's nothing in there you don't know about."

Mike smirked. "Yes, but I'm curious to know if all the stuff I do know about made it in there."

"If you're referring to the soliciting charge, yes, that's in there. Of course, those charges were dropped." Lex cleared his throat, before continuing, "Roger had what he thought was a fool proof plan. What he didn't count on was Rose and her power of finding out anything on anyone. She connected the file to Roger's brother who works in the Juvenile Court Records, and it was quite simple to see that Roger had his brother pass him the information. Illegally of course."

"So he's keeping quiet because he doesn't want you to turn his brother in?"

"He's also afraid I'm going to erase him from every computer and from every registry. He believes I can make him disappear as a journalist, and reappear as a drug dealer or even a murderer."

Mike lifted his eyebrow, impressed. "How did he come to that conclusion?"

"I have no idea." Lex smiled as innocently as he could.

"Well, I came up here for two reasons, one was to ask you if you were out of your mind, and the other was to let you know that our undertaker strikes again." Mike reached into his coat, and produced a preliminary police report and coroner's notes. "I found these very interesting reading."

"Tina Greer has been a busy little bee," Lex commented, scanning the reports.

"The Sheriff Wade would tell you that they are seeking her for questioning. They found the money from the heist, and the gun used in her locker. I was right, it was an antique, registered to her mother. Her late mother, as of this afternoon." Mike almost vibrated with energy as he began his explanation. "They found her body in a trunk in shop she owned, and her daughter has an APB out on her."

Lex shifted impatiently. "What's Clark's connection to this?"

"The cops paid her mother a visit at the shop, and questioned her about Tina the day the money was found. Twenty four hours later, our Angel of Death, Clark Kent walks by the antique store, spots something suspicious, breaks in, and discovers Tina Greer's mother's body in a trunk. Kent, and his friend Ross, dial the police, and the questions to Tina now include why did she put her dead mother in a trunk." Mike grabbed a pen from his shirt pocket, and circled on the police report, before handing it back to Lex. "Now that is the question I want to ask, Tina."

"You circled the temperature of the liver in the body," Lex said slowly, working out in his mind what Mike was getting at. "Wait a second, what time did the police interview Mrs. Greer?"

"One day before the body was discovered." Mike started to grin, "How can her liver temperature be so low, if she was alive only the day before the body was discovered? You can estimate the time of death, based on that temperature. Just looking at that, not even taking into account the entomological time line of the body..."

Lex hid a smile at Mike's sense of drama. "The bugs on the body, the insects. So what you're trying to say, is Mrs. Greer died approximately three to four days before the police interviewed her about Tina's whereabouts."

"Let me be the first to say it. Impossible," Mike proclaimed. "It's impossible for the woman that the police interviewed to be Tina Greer's mother. Not unless we're talking zombies, and as dumb as Sheriff Wink and his dutiful deputies are around here, I think even they would recognize the stench of a three day old corpse."

"So where is Tina now?" Lex asked, bringing Mike's focus back to the real concern, before he could start lecturing on the incompetence of small town law enforcement.

"The police are checking bus stations, airports, the border, thinking she's fled the jurisdiction. If I was her, I'd stay put." Mike shrugged philosophically. "If my guess is correct, and they usually are, Tina Greer can be whoever she wants. She can look like you, and rob a bank. She can look like her mother and talk to the police. Can you imagine the power?"

Lex having spent most of his life as a very noticeable, very public figure despite his desires for privacy, tried to imagine what it would be like to be Tina. The freedom of taking whatever gender he pleased, of looking as noticeable as he wished in a crowded nightclub without worrying about the Roger Nixons of the world waiting for scandal.

The possibility of abuse of that power was incomprehensible. What good would a police sketch artist be in an investigation? He could wear the face of Dominic walk right up to his father, and slip a knife between Lionel's ribs. Less murdersome uses would be the ability to find out what anyone really thought of Lex Luthor. He could walk over to Clark, looking like Lana, and test his loyalty. He could take the face of Jonathan Kent and lecture to the entire town about Lex's inherent trustworthiness and honest character.

Imagine the power.

Imagine the freedom.

Clark watched as one more rescue worker walked over to Lana and asked her how she was feeling. The walls of the farm house caught the various flashes of red and blue from the rescue vehicles. With the crisis over most of the crowd was leaving, oddly enough Clark hadn't had to explain very much to the police officers.

Apparently Sheriff Waid was content having recovered the money from the bank robbery, and then too willingly had Tina Greer escorted to a state hospital for psych evaluations.

"How's Tina?" Clark asked, thinking of the girl he saw strapped down, struggling to get free from the restraints. Mercifully they medicated her before loading her into an EMS wagon. He shivered at the visual reminder of why he had to keep his secrets to himself, lest he be led away in a similar manner.

Martha tucked her hands under her arms protectively, her eyes worried for the same reason. "She won't be able to hurt anyone else."

"I still don't understand why a girl would do all of that," Jonathan added, seemingly unaware of the tension surrounding him.

"I do." Clark looked down for a moment, and then up to his father. "You go through life with a gift that you have to keep a secret. You see everyone around you being normal, you get jealous. You just want to be someone else."

Whitney Fordman ran past them, and wrapped his arms around Lana.

Clark watched with a tinge of envy. From his gifts to his association with Lex, he was becoming resigned to live life vicariously through Whitney. The life of a football player, popular guy and devoted boyfriend to Lana; Clark sometimes wanted those things more than he could express. Could he run to Lex, kiss him in public, and walk into the house together without more than just raised eyebrows?

"You really like her, don't you?"

Clark didn't reply to his mother, and continued watching the couple behind the door. Lana looked tired and worn from her encounter, though Whitney seemed more than able to provide a shoulder and more to her in comfort. He envied their easy acceptance. Finally he tore his eyes away from the doorway, and turned back to his mother. "Mom if you can see anything, what would you do?"

She glanced from the farmhouse and back to Clark. "Learn to close my eyes."

He swallowed the jealousy, and got into the truck next to her. Don't watch what you can't have, he thought.

Lex parked his Jaguar under a tree, and quietly walked through the gates of the cemetery. The moonlight managed to hide most of the damage until he was nearly at the grave stones. Mike had left him a message, about the capture of Tina Greer and the rescue of Lana Lang.

He lifted his camera, and began to silently document the desecration to the various graves and crypts on film. Granite had been crushed like cardboard. There wasn't a monument under five hundred pounds present. He vaguely remembered a winch lifting his mother's massive headstone from the flat bed of a truck, encased in canvas for protection.

Franklin Peters. 1840-1864. Lex wondered if there were any family left to pay for the replacement of the marker. He made a mental note to ask Rose to allocate funds to the repair of the cemetery. Gone and dust, there was still respect for the dead. Death made saints out of sinners, what happened afterward no earthly person had control over. Only the cosmetic trappings could be arranged by the living, such as a service or flowers.

He dug into his pocket and produced a small plastic bag. Mike wanted a few samples to analyze in order to get an idea of Tina Greer's strength. He dropped a few chips into each bag. Mike wanted blood and hair from Clark, along with a set of fingerprints for archival use.

Mike was going to have to learn to live with disappointment. Regardless of how damning it looked that Clark had been on the scene when the police had apprehended Tina Greer, who had no memory of how she'd been knocked unconscious, he was not going to pluck or bleed Clark for Mike's curiosity.

Everyone was entitled to their secrets, and he was going to respect that.

He was stronger than his suspicions.

There was a difference he felt in actively invading someone's privacy by obtaining DNA on the sly, and following up on the sort of strange trouble that followed Clark. Mike would say he was splitting hairs, if Lex had any to split.

He had often enough wanted the same respect from others, he could do no less by Clark.

"I thought all your skeletons were in a closet, and not a plot."

Lex jerked his head up in surprise. "Clark." A pair of stone angel wings flanked Clark's silhouette in the dark. He tried to stop the shiver, thinking of Mike's description of Smallville's Angel of Death.

Clark shoved his hands into his pockets, and causally stepped closer to the shattered tombstone that Lex was kneeling by. "I guess you heard about Tina."

Lex pushed the sample bags into his pockets, and stood up, brushing the dirt from his knees. "I heard that she was found here subdued, and that 911 EMS officials checked out Lana Lang while the police escorted Tina away." He fingered a broken bit of granite, his eyes distant. "The reports say that Tina tried to kill Lana, and went on a rampage through the cemetery. The girl had a lot of rage, didn't she?"

"I guess in the heat of the moment, we're all capable of abnormal strength."

It was an innocent enough statement, but it made alarms go off in Lex's head. "You were here, weren't you?" Mike had confirmed it for him, but he wanted to hear it from Clark. He wanted to hear how Clark had handled this situation, if it was similar to the Greg Arkin confrontation, or the mysterious end of Coach Arnold.

"Pete saw that Tina was practicing Lana's signature at the shop, he went to get the police, while I tried to find Lana. I know she likes to come here at night to ta- to be closer to her parents, and I guess Tina knew that as well." Clark's voice was steady throughout the explanation. "When I got here . . . it looked like Lana had put up a fight, or Tina really lost it. I just got a lucky shot in."

Lex smiled sadly, not surprised at Clark's version of events. Without an eyewitness, there was only the evidence in front of him to discount Clark's statement. "I have heard some fantastical things around this town, Clark; things like you can't change the land, that the land changes you, especially after 1989." He paused, watching the exchange of interest, fear, and knowledge in Clark's eyes.

"Have you been talking to Chloe more?" Clark asked, trying for humor.

"I heard that Tina could change her appearance, and not cosmetically. I'm going to go out on a limb and say she was like your friend Greg. Not the typical teenager."

"Lex..."

"Before you laugh, and say I've been smoking the local grass, let me tell you what I found out about Tina Greer." Lex hated the look of wariness that was now radiating from Clark's poorly disguised feelings. It was time to lay a few cards on the table. "My face, Clark," he halted briefly, and reached out to place Clark's hand on his cheekbone, staring intently into the blue eyes. "My reputation was all over the papers, and let me tell you, it wasn't good for business, and it wasn't good for me. Innocent until proven guilty applies to everyone in Smallville but a Luthor, and I know, it's not like my father hasn't done anything to fight that image. If I'm going to get bad press, I want to know I've earned it. I protect what's mine; so I did a little checking. I followed a few leads.

"Tina could change her appearance, Clark. She made her face look like mine for the bank cameras. I don't know how exactly, but she did. The one thing she couldn't do was make evidence disappear. She couldn't change her fingerprints." Lex smirked slightly, and finished, "If she had made the evidence disappear, then I might have believed she was a Luthor."

"I know," Clark quietly admitted. "I wouldn't have believed it but she changed right before my eyes. One moment she was Lana, and the next she was herself." Clark gently moved his thumb against Lex's smooth skin, illicting a shiver before dropping his hand. "What you said about the land changing people here, and about Greg, you're right. Tina had a bone disorder as a baby. She changed after 1989."

There was a quiet thrill of victory, winning the truth instead of dissembled accounts from Clark. Lex nodded slowly. "So she grew up in this town, and no one guessed the truth. Must have been hard for her, having to lie all the time." He could almost feel Clark flinch at his words, even though outwardly there wasn't a ripple of unease. Words he hadn't thought of until then came to his lips, knowing somehow it was the right thing to say to Clark. The right words."She had a lot to hide for a fifteen year old. She would have had to hide everything that was different about herself, and that, that's something that would make anyone angry."

"She just wanted to be normal. She thought the money from the bank would help her and her mother make a clean start." Clark stopped for a moment, shifting his weight under Lex's stare. "Her mother dying, I guess that wasn't in her plan."

"Money doesn't make you normal." Lex smiled with a trace of bitterness. "Money makes you different. Money makes you a target for those who want it, and those who want to exploit you because you have it."

"You sound like you're speaking from experience," Clark observed softly.

"We all have secrets, Clark. When you have money, you just have to work twice as hard to keep them." Lex paused, letting his hand find Clark's. He squeezed Clark's hand gently, relishing the warmth that seemed pour from Clark in every way, from his touch to his smile. "I know you have secrets, Clark."

"Lex..."

"It's okay." Lex drew his free hand up to Clark's face, and stroked the strong cheekbones with a whisper of a touch. He didn't need an admission now, he knew the truth from the conflict in Clark's eyes. The land had changed Clark Kent, in the same type of unseen ways it had Greg Arkin, the coach, and Tina. That had to be the reason why there were so many secrets between them. "Just tell me you have a good reason for keeping them. Tell me and I'll ... trust you."

"I watched them take Tina away. She fought them, Lex, and she's strong, stronger than the four men from the hospital. They had to shoot her up with drugs, and then tie her down in a strait-jacket." Clark swallowed, and pulled his face back out of Lex's reach. "I don't think anyone wants to help Tina. I think they want to study her, pick her apart and see what makes her tick."

"That's never going to happen to you, Clark." Only if Lex was dead, and his resources were tapped, would anything like that ever be allowed to happen.

"You don't know that, and neither do I."

Lex was silent, unable to argue against that. Clark was special, in ways Lex could only guess at. There were more than a few people in the world who would love to have someone like Clark, someone with his strength and his imperviousness to harm. His father was on that list.

Lionel Luthor had made his reputation in business circles, but it was the laboratory that his father truly loved. To take apart a mystery and then try to piece it back together; nothing would make Lionel happier. Getting back into his father's good graces could be accomplished with a simple gift of one Clark Kent and a red bow.

As long as Lex was the only one who guessed at this, Clark was safe.

"Don't trust anyone, Clark. Don't tell anyone. Don't let anyone guess." Lex laughed humorlessly, realizing just how dangerous it was for Clark in a town populated with Luthor Corp employees. They'd both been lucky, but luck never lasted forever. "Remember what I said about Tina? She wasn't careful. Her fingerprints, her sloppy hiding of the body, of the money. She drew attention to herself in ways even the densest of cops would notice."

"You're not telling me anything that my parents haven't already." Clark hesitated for a moment, his eyes conflicted with indecision. "I want to tell you, Lex."

Lex placed his finger over Clark's lips. "Don't. Don't tell me, Clark. I don't want to take that chance, not with the way my father operates."

Relief swept over Clark's face, and Lex had a hard time swallowing the annoying pain that radiated from his chest. Once again, he was getting used to Clark lying to him. Of course Clark didn't want to tell Lex; it was an empty gesture on Clark's part, and Lex knew it.

It didn't make it hurt any less.

"What you said earlier, about my skeletons being in a closet?" Lex took a deep breath and continued. "My father tried to bury them, but he was less than successful. I just... I just want to know, if anyone tells you something about me, that you ... that you will give me the benefit of doubt."

"I know I shouldn't ask this, but wouldn't be better for me to hear it from you first?"

"I made a deal that I wouldn't talk about it." Lex fought the urge to turn away from Clark's eyes. He silently damned himself for saying as much as he had to Clark. A gaze, a smile, and he too often forgot to hide, to lie around Clark. He started to walk back to his car, surrendering before he forgot himself again. "It's getting late."

"Lana kissed me. Or it was Tina who kissed me." Clark followed him, his hands in his pocket.

Lex stopped by his car, amused instead of jealous. "So how was it?"

An expression of disgust spoke volumes. "It was awkward. I don't think Tina has kissed a lot of guys." Clark blinked as Lex started to laugh softly. "You're not mad?"

"Mad? No, I'm not mad. Why would I be mad? You can kiss whoever you want, Clark." Lex grinned, thinking of the trouble he had gotten into at Clark's age. Kissing another girl was the least of it. "You do whatever makes you comfortable, if it's kissing Lana or Tina, then so be it."

"But why? Why aren't you mad? I mean, you and I..."

Lex held up his hand. "You and I are whatever you want. I'm not being understanding for nothing, I know how you feel, I was there, remember? The quickest way to push you away is to put limits on what you can and can't do." He slid his arms around Clark, pulling him closer. "I don't want to you to go anywhere." He was going to do his best to insure that Clark wasn't going anywhere at that, not away from him, not in some hospital to be studied, not one mile further than he already was from Lex.

The question was how could he do that and still stay true to his word to Clark? With more lies, of course.