Sam didn't drive far before he pulled over to the side of the road. He waited until they were out of the city, so that there wouldn't be prying eyes watching them, but they had been on the road for less than a half an hour when he couldn't hold in his anger any longer.

Clark haven't said a word up to this point, and Sam couldn't really see his face—it was still pretty dark out—but when Sam pulled off to the side, Clark asked softly, "Where are we?"

"Nowhere. We just need to talk."

"OK. Yeah."

Sam didn't even know how to respond to that. He felt like he was going to overflow. "Clark, what were you thinking? You know you have a little sister, right?"

"I killed my brother. Even my dad basically admitted that much."

"It was an accident!"

"I still did it."

"So you left your family? I get being afraid to face up to your mistakes, I really do, but… drugging yourself with red kryptonite? Robbing banks? Who are you, Clark?"

Clark didn't respond.

"Who do you think you are? You know your mom has been crying every day? And your dad is having to pick up the slack on the farm, they can barely hold it together, and they're trying to take care of the baby at the same time, and you… you're off partying on stolen money and trying to bang demon chicks."

Clark still didn't answer, and finally Sam turned on the lights in the car. He looked over to find Clark's eyes filling with tears.

Sam hung his head. He didn't feel like Clark's remorse excused him for several weeks of making Aunt Martha cry, But he also didn't have the heart to keep laying on the guilt. He wondered what Uncle John would do in the situation, but maybe it didn't matter. Sam wasn't Clark's dad; it wasn't his job to tell Clark any of this. "Look, man—"

"I couldn't stand the guilt. It was just eating at me, every time I looked at my parents, I killed their real kid, and I would always be the one who killed their real kid. The red kryptonite, it just made me feel normal again, like I wasn't drowning in shame every second of every day."

"Clark…" Sam took a deep breath. "Did you even try to talk to your parents about this, after everyone had cooled down?"

Clark looked away.

"Because… I haven't heard them talk about how they blame you for anything. They talk about how much they miss you, and they're angry that you ran, but there were more worried than angry." Sam knew that he never could've said the same thing about his own father. Clark was so lucky, so spoiled, and he wasn't even grateful for any of it.

Clark wiped it has eyes. "Do me a favor, Sam. Don't bring me back to them tonight."

"Oh, I'm bringing you back to them. I'm not letting you worry them for another day."

"It's not that." Clark turn to look at Sam. "Those monsters. What were they?"

"Demons. Infected by kryptonite, I would guess."

"Do they have a kryptonite weakness?"

"No, that was kryptonite dissolved in holy water." Sam almost wanted to ask whether it was still hurting Clark's skin—he was pretty sure the meteors wouldn't evaporate like the water would—but there was nothing they could do about it even if he was in pain.

"How did you know I was being attacked by demons?"

"I had no idea. I just found the water at the mansion. I brought it to make sure I could get you to come back with me this time."

Clark's cheeks turned a bit pink. "Why was there kryptonite dissolved in holy water at the mansion?"

You could be reading stolen content. Head to the original site for the genuine story.

"Someone there must have been fighting kryptonite demons." Maybe this whole encounter hadn't been as big a coincidence as he thought. If there were demons after Clark, they might have gone to Smallville first, and the mansion was a good place for information. Besides which, Lex had a tendency to collect information about different meteor mutants; he and Sam had exchanged a lot of letters about their findings.

Of course, Lex wasn't actually at the mansion right now. Helen was there, and Dean had been staying for a little while…

"I think we should go find out what happened."

Clark nodded. "OK."

"Scratch that. I'm going to find out what happened. You're going home to your parents."

"No, that's my point. I shouldn't go home until we know what's going on. What if I put them in danger? I can't do that, not again."

"Clark…"

"I'll call them. I'll tell them I'm coming home."

"No. That's worse. They've been waiting for weeks already, it's better if…" Sam sighed. It went against every instinct he had to even say this. "You win. Just go home when we figure this out. Don't get their hopes up."

Clark looked down at his hands. "What does my sister look like?"

Sam breathed in to tell him she was beautiful. She looked a little like Martha and a lot like Jonathan, she had big bright intelligent eyes, and she could grip on to your little finger and hold on so tight you could swear she grabbed your heart instead.

But he stopped himself. "You're just gonna have to find out when you meet her," he said, and he started the car.

----------------------------------------

The morning had dawned by the time they reached the mansion. Clark dozed off in the passenger seat. Sam wasn't sure whether he would've been able to sleep under the same circumstances, but he suspected Clark hadn't been doing a lot of sleeping over the past few weeks.

Over the course of the drive, Sam started to worry about his own issues. What if Dean had returned? What if the demons had? He had a little bit of the holy water with kryptonite left, but not much. Not enough to protect them if there was another large group of demons and they decided to go after Sam and Clark this time.

But there was nothing. No attacks, no demons, not even so much as a sulfuric smell.

Sam looked into local motels to try to find Dean, but no one had seen him. He wasn't sure where to go; finally he tried the mansion. If nothing else, maybe it would be a place for Clark to stay, since it seemed to be abandoned at the moment. Sam knew that Clark didn't technically need to sleep, but he still seemed exhausted. Sam suspected that the month with the red kryptonite ring on had taken more of a toll on him than he knew what to do with.

A few security people had returned. Sam knew the passwords, and the security personnel knew Sam.

He had expected to walk into an empty house. Instead, both Lex and Dean were there in the study.

Lex was alive.

"Lex! You're okay!" Sam rushed forward and threw his arms around his older friend. Lex hugged back and smiled as he let go, then he took a couple of steps toward Clark.

Who was glaring at him.

"Clark," he said carefully, "it's good to see you."

Clark just stared at him.

Sam wanted to slap some sense into him. For all intents and purposes, Lex had practically risen from the dead. And whatever Lex had done, Clark didn't have the right to be upset about it after what he had done to his own family; it didn't compare.

But Sam couldn't worry about Clark and Lex. He had Dean to face.

Sam wasn't about to apologize. And he didn't exactly expect an apology from Dean. But he wasn't sure what to say. They stood before each other awkwardly for a moment, while Sam scrambled for words.

"Kryptonite holy water," Sam said finally.

"Right," Dean said, rubbing the back of his neck.

Lex took a step closer to them. "Helen was a demon. She was also infected with meteor rocks."

"Do you mean she was possessed?"

"No, Helen was the demon's name," Dean said. "She had possessed a girl named Madison."

"Before I ever knew her," Lex added softly.

Sam grimaced. They had seemed so happy together. He couldn't even imagine how painful it must've been to find out it was all fake. "Lex, I'm so sorry. I know you loved her."

Lex shrugged. "Where do we go from here? That's all I care about."

Sam glanced around the room at the men that he had long considered to be his brothers. He and Sam could still barely get a sentence out, unless it had to do with hunting. Clark could barely look at Lex; Lex's eyes begged every time they looked at Clark. Sam himself was still so upset with Clark, he didn't know what to say.

But they were all together again. And that felt right.

"Lex has been stuck on an island for a month," Dean said. "He needs to rest up."

Lex scoffed. "Not a chance. If I can help with this fight…"

"You know what, Clark had a long night, two," Sam said. "I think we could all do with a little rest. Then we can regroup and figure out what's next."

"OK, but before we do," Dean said, "we need to check to make sure we are all still ourselves." He went over to the table to pick up the last container of kryptonite infused holy water. "This stuff burns demons." He splashed a little of it onto his own arms.

Lex took the container and poured a little onto his hand, and Sam did the same. He watched as Clark hesitated a little before he did it also, but he knew that Dean was watching for billowing smoke and blistering skin; he wouldn't notice that Clark's muscles clenched and his jaw stiffened.

"OK. Your guest rooms are ready for you, as always," Lex said.

"Great." Dean glanced around at the group. "It's about ten now. Let's meet back here in six hours?"

"I'll be OK in four," Lex said.

Sam glanced from Lex to Clark. "Make it eight," he said, and he left before anyone could argue.