Tina was halfway to the front of the factory before Pete caught up to her. “Wait,” he called after her, but she kept going. She was walking fast with her head down, ignoring him. “Tina, wait a minute, come’on!” He grabbed her arm to try and pull her back, but she spun around and slammed him painfully into the side of Lex’s car. He grunted as the breath rushed out of him. He nearly dropped to his knees before she caught him. She lifted him up with one hand and shoved him back against the car none too gently.
“I can’t do this,” she said, her voice strained. She looked to be holding back tears as she said it. Lex came up behind them, but stopped as Tina stared at him. “None of you can make me. I can’t,” she repeated.
“We need… your help,” Pete gasped out. She shook her head forcefully.
“You’ll find another way, you have to!” she yelled. “There has to be.”
“There isn’t,” Lex told her. Clark came running up behind him and started towards Pete, but Lex thrust out his hand and stopped him. He glanced at Pete quickly and then eyed Tina warily. “I know you’re upset right now,” he said in a calming tone, “but believe me when I say I wouldn’t put you in that sort of danger if there was another way.”
“Believe you!” She sounded near hysteria. “You come up with this crazy plan and tell us all we follow that or it’s nothing. No! I’m not going to do it. Figure out something else.”
“Listen to him, Tina,” Clark said. “Please, we all have to do this.”
“Tina, this is the best way, I’ve thought this out,” Lex insisted. “I know there’s a risk, but there’s always going to be risk. This is my father’s lab; we can’t just expect to walk in.”
“Your father’s lab…” she repeated.
“Yes, my father’s…” Lex said.
She swallowed and said nervously, “Is that why you’re doing this? Why Clark has to go in chains? So you can just hand us over to him?”
“I wouldn’t do that!” Lex yelled at her.
“It’s easy for you if we get caught,” she yelled back, holding Pete higher. “You just go back to your father. You can walk away from this.”
Lex flushed, almost matching the color of his hair. “Do you really have that little faith in me?” he asked quietly. He locked eyes with Tina. “I’ve gone too far for that now. Do you think my father would let me live if he knew about this?” he gestured around them. “Mercy isn’t in my father; it’s not in his blood. Believe me, I know.” Tina looked uncertain. “I’m in this as much as the rest of you. I know what’s at stake.”
Her arm holding Pete drooped and finally she let him fall. He slumped to his knees, gasping for air. She stepped away from him, staring at Lex. “What happens to me if I get caught?” She asked, her voice cracking. “What’s at stake for me? They wouldn’t kill me, no. They’d do tests. More tests, everyday, just like Clark’s brother. Wouldn’t they!” she demanded.
“Yes, probably,” Lex said with a sigh.
She nodded, looking away. “I’d rather you’d let me bleed to death,” she said in a detached voice.
“What about…” Pete coughed and went on, “what about if we win? You’re forgetting about that, Tina.” He pushed himself off the car and stood shakily. “If we win this, you get your freedom back.”
“What?” she asked, confused.
Behind them, unnoticed, Whitney stepped closer. He hadn’t disappeared when Tina had arrived at the meeting, only stayed out of sight. Even then, he’d stayed close enough to hear what was going on, just as he was doing now.
“If we actually pull this off, if we win. Have you thought about that?” Pete asked her hoarsely. “How long do you think Lionel can last without his alien or his pet psychic? It’ll be like a house of cards, all coming tumbling down.” He grinned. “We get our town back then, just like it used to be. No Luthorcorp, no factories, no more breathing in crap every time you try and take a deep breath. It’ll all be back to normal.”
Tina stared at him blankly and then she rushed towards him and picked him off his feet. She slammed him back against the car and screamed at him, “Do you think I get to go back to normal?” Clark took a panicked step forwards and then stopped, staring. The skin on her face twitched and writhed around for a moment before settling into a look of desperation. “I can’t go back. I’ll be like this forever!” She was sobbing fiercely now, her entire body shaking with every word.
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Lex came out of his shock and shouted, “Tina, let him go!” Clark leapt past him and grabbed onto Tina’s arm, trying to pry her off of him. Even though Clark was stronger than her, he couldn’t risk trying to overpower her. She was holding Pete by the throat, choking him. It wouldn’t take much force from either of them to wind up crippling him by accident. Still, Clark couldn’t just stand by and do nothing. Pete was gasping for air, frantically trying to pry her hands off him.
“Tina, let go!” Lex said again. Pete was starting to go blue and his efforts were weakening. “There might be a cure for you,” he said desperately, trying to distract her, “we just have to find it!”
Tina dropped Pete just as suddenly as she’d grabbed him. He collapsed against the side of the car as Clark stumbled backwards, surprised. Tina stood there silently for a moment, then sank to her knees and buried her face in her hands. Lex went to check on Pete quickly, but Pete pushed him away, gasping for air. He crawled over to Tina and grabbed her shoulder. She looked up slowly and all Lex and Pete could do was stare. The face of a six year old girl stared back at them. Then, before their eyes, Tina’s entire body seemed to shrink in on itself, until it matched her face. Clark backed up in surprise. She actually seemed to be growing younger, the years falling off right in front of them. When it was over, her clothes hung off her loosely, like a kid playing dress-up. Even her bandages had come undone and were falling slowly off her shoulder.
“Tina?” Lex asked, staring.
“This is Tina Greer,” she said, her voice high and child-like. “What she used to look like at least.”
She held up her arm, rounded and smooth, and studied it. “Ever since I was born, I was always sick, weak. There was something wrong with my bones; the doctors said I would never be able to walk. All I could do was lie in bed all day. But that was before the meteor shower.”
“You were exposed,” Lex said quietly. Clark nodded slowly, staring at her.
“I was,” she smiled sadly. “A small piece crashed near our house, and my bedroom window was open. The dust came in and coated everything, me included. A few days later, it happened, I could move a little. A few weeks later I was up and running.”
She smiled, her child’s face brightening up a little. “None of the doctors could explain it; my mom just thought it was a miracle, so did I. I could be a normal girl, just like everyone else. I could go to school, play with friends, and do everything I’d always wanted to.” For a moment she seemed to be lost in those memories. Pete started to reach towards her, but then she shivered suddenly and looked up at them. What they saw in her eyes was enough to freeze all of them.
“Then a year later half my face slid down the front of my body,” she said hollowly.
“Do you have any idea what that feels like?” she asked them, her mouth trembling. “To feel your face suddenly turn into soup and slid right off you? It’s not painful at all, but you can’t help screaming, can’t stop screaming, even if you don’t have a mouth anymore. All you can do is just go on doing it up here,” she tapped her head slowly. “In some ways, I’ve never stopped screaming up here. I can still hear it sometimes,” she faded off slowly, staring into space.
She came back slowly and looked at them. “First it was my face, then my arms, the bones in them disappearing; my legs twisting together like pretzels,” she went on. She tilted her head to the side and let out a crazy sort of laugh. “You should have seen the look on my mom’s face when she found me. Would you like to see it?” She laughed again and then ducked her head down, hiding it.
Lex stared at her blankly, clearly speechless. She looked up and smiled at him, an off-center, somewhat unfocused grin. “But if we win, you can cure me right? Put me back to normal? But what if I told you I’ve forgotten what normal is?”
“What do you mean?” he asked quietly, a little pale.
“Could any of you put yourself back to together after that?” Tina asked them all slowly. “It took me more than two years to learn how to hold a shape again. But when I did, I couldn’t go back to the way I used to look. I didn’t… remember… what I looked like. All I had were pictures that were two years old. And even then, I can’t look like that forever. I had to guess what I’d look like.” As she talked, her body slowly started to change back, growing up as it were. When it was done, Tina stared back at them sadly.
“Tina Greer, the real girl, disappeared along time ago,” she told them. “I forgot her. So you see, I don’t have anything to go back to, not even my own body.” She looked at Lex. “What are you going to cure? How can you cure it? How can any of you promise anything to me?”
Clark and Lex looked at her and then glanced at each other, at a loss for words. Tina stared at them hopelessly and then shook her head. “I knew it,” she said quietly.
“You want a promise,” Pete spoke up. They all glanced at him quickly, surprised. “I’ll give you one: fear.”
“What?” Tina said.
“You’re terrified of walking into that base. Why? Because you’re afraid of being caught, of being found out.” Pete climbed to his feet slowly, wincing slightly. “You’re afraid of that most of all,” he rasped out, his voice raw sounding. “Why else would you hide your secret from us all this time?” Tina stared back at him, her eyes wild.
“We’re your friends, Tina. We’d be weirded out, sure, but we’d have accepted you. But that’s not enough is it? You’re still afraid.”
“Shut up,” she said quietly, staring at him. Clark took a step towards her, but Lex stopped him again, watching both of them carefully.
“The thing is, that fear’s always going to be with you,” Pete said heedless of the look in her eyes. He started to walk towards her, still talking. “If you run, if you leave us, that fear’s going to follow you wherever you go, whoever you look like. But if you stay, if you help us, maybe we can help you face it. You won’t have to feel alone.”
He stopped in front of her. Tina’s hands were clenching and unclenching rhythmically as she trembled. “Even if you run now you’re going to have to face it someday. Wouldn’t you rather it be with us?” She stood, almost shaking with emotion, staring wildly at him. Pete waited silently, his face more calm than Clark had ever seen it.
“Well, you going to slug me or what?” he asked after a moment. “I’m going to pass out if you make me stand here any longer.”
Slowly, her shoulders slumped and she bowed her head. “I’m sorry,” she said quietly.
Pete grunted softly. He touched her shoulder tenderly. A bit of her shirt was stained red. “You’re bleeding again,” he told her gently. “We’ll get Sarah to bandage you up, alright?” She nodded quietly. “And while we’re at it, she can take a look at me too,” Pete said, wincing again as he rubbed his neck. Tina reached out almost nervously and supported him.
Clark watched her lead Pete away quietly. “Do you think she’ll be okay?” he asked.
“Pete’s good with people,” Lex answered. “Much better at it than I am. She’ll come around.”
“She could die doing this.”
“We could all die doing this, Clark. Every last one of us.”
He started to walk off, but Clark called him back. “Promise me this is going to work.”
Lex sighed and looked back at him. “I don’t think I can,” he said reluctantly. “I wish I could.” He laughed. “I’m not very good with pep talks, am I? Pete could promise you, he’d believe it too. I’m not that lucky. I know my father.” He looked troubled for a minute and then looked up at Clark, puzzled.
“Why do you trust me? We barely know each other and you just agreed to whatever I said. You know what will happen to you in there, don’t you?”
“I’ve got a pretty good guess,” Clark admitted.
“Then how can you…”
“I trust you,” Clark told him simply. He had to grin as he saw Lex look back at him, dumbfounded. “I’ve seen you beat your father before. You can do it.”
Lex blinked and then smiled slightly. He shook his head, a mingled look of disbelief and envy on his face. “Really?” he asked quietly. Clark nodded. Lex laughed again and grinned. “Tell me about it.”