The door creaked open a foot and Whitney Fordman peered out at them. At least, he looked like Whitney Fordman. He had the same blond crew cut and pale blue eyes, but his face was more thin and haggard. Clark blinked at him, mentally taken aback to see someone who was dead in his own world. “What do you…,” Whitney started to say, when he caught sight of Chloe and stopped himself. “Oh you have to be kidding me,” he said and started to slam the door in their face.
“Wait a minute,” Chloe yelled and threw her shoulder into the door. It stopped an inch short of closing and held there as Whitney pushed back. “We need your help, you dumb bastard! Let us in!”
“After what you did?” he snapped, through the open space. “Not a chance, psycho!” He pushed back hard and narrowed the opening to a thin sliver.
Chloe grunted and put her whole back into it. “C’mon, that was a while ago, and it wasn’t really my fault.” He shook his head and struggled to shut the door.
“Care to explain any of this?” Clark asked her quietly, staring at the back and forth war going on.
In between grunts, she gasped out, “You remember how I said somebody burned down his store? Well, I was sort of a spectator to it.”
He gaped at her. “Chloe!”
“Hey, it wasn’t like I helped,” she insisted.
“Help start it or help put it out?”
“Okay… neither, but there was a lot of people there and nobody else did anything either.”
“That’s right,” Whitney snapped, still trying to shut the door. “The Luthors don’t like how I run my store; speak out against them; so they pay off some guys to trash it. Cops don’t show up to stop them, no one answers the fire alarms, everyone’s all been paid off. They burned my store to the ground, my father’s store! And you stood there and watched! So why should I help you with anything?” he demanded.
“We don’t have time for this,” Clark muttered, glancing down the street as he did. Another car could come by any moment and spot them. He stepped forward and pushed the door easily open with one hand. Whitney fell back in surprise as he stepped through the doorway. Chloe huffed slightly and followed him, shutting the door behind them.
“I almost had it,” she sniffed.
“Of course,” Clark remarked, studying Whitney as he lay there on the floor. He was a lot slimmer and under-developed than he remembered the Whitney from his world as having been. His arms and legs seemed almost gangly as he lay there in a heap. He was wearing a baggy t-shirt over a pair of faded jeans, neither of which looked like they’d seen an iron before.
“I’m gonna call the cops if you don’t get out of here right now,” Whitney warned them.
Chloe rolled her eyes and kneeled down next to him. “You do that. I’m sure they’d love to have an excuse to check your house out.” He winced and glanced away quickly. “Like I thought,” she said with a grin. “Rumors are true about you.”
“Maybe they are,” he muttered. He climbed to his feet and dusted himself off. “Just do yourself a favor and get out of here. You’re just wasting your time.”
“Sorry, we need help and you’re going to give it to us,” she disagreed.
He snorted and gave her a look. “Or what?”
Chloe smiled. “Clark? Show him what happens when people disagree with us.” She folded her arms and waited, grinning wickedly. Now they were both staring at her. When nothing happened, she started to get flustered. “Well, come’ on! Melt his leg off!”
Clark rubbed his forehead briefly and turned to Whitney. “Sorry about that, it’s been a long night and she’s… a little on edge.”
“What are you doing?” she demanded. “Make with the eyebeams. Toast his leg; a foot, a toe; a toenail! Anything!”
“Is she on something?” Whitney asked him quietly.
“Excuse us a minute,” he told him quickly. He grabbed Chloe’s arm and pulled her back a few feet in the hallway. “I’m not going to do that, okay?” he told her in a loud whisper.
“What do you mean? You beat the crap out of those guys in the sewers.” She glanced over his shoulder at Whitney. “Just lean on him a little. It’d do him some good.”
He stared at her for a moment and then turned around, his breath whistling out between his teeth. He walked over to Whitney and took his shoulder, pulling him away from Chloe. “It’s been a very long night,” Clark apologized. “Look, I’m sorry to do this to you, but we’re really in a lot of trouble.”
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“Welcome to Smallville,” he laughed shortly.
“It’s with the Luthors.” Whitney looked at him quickly and he went on. “I’m… not from around here, and somehow I wound up number one on their hit list, and I don’t know why. I ran into Chloe earlier, she’s an… old friend, and now she’s in as much trouble as I am.”
“She was in a lot of trouble to start with.” He looked Clark up and down. “And don’t take this the wrong way, but you don’t really strike me as an old friend of hers.”
“It’s a very long story.”
“This would be so much simpler if you just burnt his foot off,” Chloe remarked.
Whitney frowned, glancing back at her, but Clark pulled him around again, trying to talk over her. “Well, anyway, she thought you could help us. Information, shelter, anything would be great. We just need a place to lie low and figure things out for a while.” Whitney frowned and shrugged off Clark’s hand. He took a step back and studied them for a moment, thinking.
“You say Luthorcorp is after you?” he asked finally.
“Gee, only a couple times already,” Chloe rolled her eyes.
Whitney ignored that. “Come with me,” he told them. He led them through the house, kicking piles of dirty clothes and pizza boxes out of the way. Clark wrinkled his nose up at the smell, but didn’t say anything.
“You know, it’s something when I’m the one grossed out by a place, Whitney,” Chloe remarked behind them. She lifted the lid of a pizza box with her foot and glanced inside. “Lovely. Cheese with what I sure hope is broccoli. You have anything that doesn’t come with a side of penicillin?”
“In the other room,” he shrugged. They came to a particularly heavy looking door in the back wall of the room. He produced a key and unlocked it. As they stepped through, both Clark and Chloe had to blink in shock. The room they’d just entered was as neat and ordered as the rest of the house was a sty. There were no windows, but a row of lights on the ceilings that lit the room brightly. There was a made bed and nightstand in the corner, with cabinets overflowing with books in another. Another corner had been made into a small kitchenette with a portable mini-grill, a microwave, and a refrigerator. There was even a table and chairs in the middle of the room.
“Well, I can see where you’ve been spending all your time,” Chloe remarked, glancing around. “Why live like this?”
“It’s a disguise,” Clark told her quietly. His eyes were drawn to the last corner of the room. “And I guess I see for what.” The last corner was devoted to an impressive looking hookup of monitors, hard-drives, modems, and other systems, connected by bundles of wires that snaked around and over the equipment. The machines hummed and whirred quietly, creating a steady background drone in the room.
“Where did you get all this stuff?” he asked in amazement. He didn’t know much about computers, but these looked to be top of the line machines.
“Here and there,” Whitney said cautiously.
“And I suppose it’s just a coincidence that they all say ‘Luthercorp’ on them,” Chloe pointed out.
“I have a deal with someone inside,” he told her testily. “I help him out with a few things, he makes sure a few of the latest items fall off the back of the truck, so to speak.”
“And people call me a criminal,” she sighed.
Whitney rounded on her fiercely. “I’m only a criminal to the big suits and money lenders.” He sneered. “The people who just sit around taking things without giving back. What about you? What have you done for anyone recently?” She bridled and started to reply but Clark broke in.
“I can tell you she helped me today,” he said. “I don’t know if I could have gotten through this without her.” Whitney sneered again and shook his head. “She brought me here because she thought you could help us. Luthorcorp wants us for some reason, and we need you to figure out why. You say you want to help people,” Clark told him, “well here’s your chance.”
Whitney studied him for a moment, frowning. Finally he looked over at Chloe. “Just how the hell do you know him, Sullivan?”
“Oh,” she said, pulling a chair over and turning it around to sit in, “we go way back.” She gave him a demure little smile and tilted her head a bit.
“So will you help us?” Clark asked him. Whitney looked back at him and didn’t say anything for a moment. Then he turned and walked over to the array of computers.
“I’ll give you a fair chance,” he told them evenly. He sat down in the patched and ratty chair in front of the monitors. “That’s more than I owe Sullivan, anyways.”
Chloe rolled her eyes. “You’re just a well of generosity, ain’t ya, ‘Fordman’?” she asked, stressing the name.
“You have no idea,” he said, bending down. “Here we are.” He sat back up with a shotgun in his hands. It looked freshly polished and coldly professional. Clark and Chloe stared at him in shock. He cocked it loudly and leveled it at them. “Nice to know everything didn’t burn up in the fire, eh Chloe?”
Clark stepped in front of Chloe deliberately and glared at him. “And what do you expect to do with that?”
“Like I said, I’m giving you a fair chance,” he promised them. “You just wait there and let me work. I can hack into some Luthorcorp systems, no problem with this,” he said, nodding towards the computer set-up. “Not to mention the police and local FBI mainframes. If you’re story checks out, and they do want you, then everything’s fine. If not, well…”
Chloe laughed and stood behind Clark, peeking over his shoulder. “I almost wish we were lying,” she told him. “Just so I could see the look on your face when you pull the trigger.”
“Chloe,” Clark warned her in a low voice.
“You might get that chance,” Whitney told her. He lay the gun down on the top of the nearest screen, keeping the barrel facing towards them. “Now lets see here,” he started, sitting down in front of a monitor. “Just make yourself comfortable,” he told them dryly.
Clark gritted his teeth in irritation and glanced at Chloe. She shrugged and laughed a little. “So is he a big ass where you’re from too?” Chloe asked him.
“He once hung me up in a cornfield in my boxers,” he admitted.
“Ooh, I like this story!” She laughed again and sat forward eagerly. “Tell me more!”
He coughed into his fist and looked back at Whitney. “So what’s the verdict?” he asked. Whitney glanced up at him briefly.
“I just started,” he remarked. “You’re going to have to give me a little more time.” He frowned and looked up at him. “A name would probably help too. I know Sullivan well enough, from her rap sheet as much as anything.” Chloe smiled at him and flipped him off.
“Right,” Clark realized. “Sorry about that. It’s Clark Kent.” Whitney frowned and looked up at him for a moment. “What? What is it?” he asked, seeing the look.
Whitney frowned, lost in thought. “I’ve heard that name before,” he muttered.
“I have parents here. The Kent’s, they have a farm outside of town?” Clark supplied.
Whitney did look up then, his eyes wide. “The Kent farm? About three miles out, past Sales road?” he asked.
Clark nodded quickly. “You know it?”
“Yeah,” he said slowly. “Luthorcorp owns it.” He looked for a moment like he was going to say more, but then he looked back down quickly. “They own a lot, though.” Clark stared at him and then glanced over at Chloe. She shrugged helplessly.
“Didn’t realize the Kent’s had a son though,” Whitney remarked, not looking up.
“You knew them?” Chloe asked.
“Yeah,” he said slowly. “Something like-“ he was cut off as his computer chimed once. “Here we are,” he said, leaning forwards. “Well what do you know,” he said, smiling. “Chloe Sullivan speaks the truth. They’ve got your mug shot up and everything.”
“Ass,” she muttered under her breath.
Clark stepped around the desk and looked over Whitney’s shoulder. “What does it say about me?”
“Mmm…” he scanned the page. “Basic description, no name. It’s red-flagged though. And I do mean red-flagged.” He stared at the screen. “I’ve never seen them put out this many warnings. It looks like they’ve put everyone who has anything to do with Luthorcorp on full alert.” He sat back, shaking his head. He almost sounded impressed with all of this attention. Clark and Chloe shared a quick, worried look.
“I don’t know what you did to them,” Whitney told them, “but they want you bad.”