Joseph’s eye fell on Dr. Hamilton and a dreadful look of anticipation came over his face. “You,” he breathed out heavily. “Oh God, I’ve waited for this.” Hamilton moaned and pressed back against the wall. Joseph pulled his arm out of the remains of the computer console and started towards him.
Clark looked down at Hamilton dully and then back up at his brother. He felt like his brain was a skipping record; all he could do was remember that girl’s face before Joseph killed her. Over and over, he saw him pull her head up, his fingers wrapped around her hair, the flash of terror in her eyes, and then the sickening crunch as he smashed her head into the terminal.
He’d killed her right before his eyes, and he hadn’t been able to stop it. He hadn’t even tried. He killed her. Joseph was a few feet from him now, his attention fixed on Hamilton. He killed her, Clark thought. He could see the blood still on his brother’s hands. He killed her. Joseph reached out towards Hamilton, his fingers curling around like claws.
“NO!” Clark screamed, coming out of his trance. He rushed at Joseph and they touched briefly –
You have to be careful, son. Football might be alright for other boys but… he killed those men with bare hands and look what he did that door we can’t… I’ll be careful. What’s the harm in just having a little fun now and then
- as he shoved him away roughly. They both lost their footing and went tumbling across the floor of the lab for a moment Clark fought his way to his feet, trying to clear his head of the pain and disorientation that came from touching Joseph. He looked up and saw his brother was on his feet just as soon as he was.
“What the hell are you doing?” he screamed at him. Joseph glared right back at him.
“What are you talking about?” He seemed generally shocked and angry about the question.
“You… You killed those people! You killed them!”
Joseph blinked and looked back at the girl with her head in the computer. “So?” he asked roughly.
Clark hit him without even thinking about it. There was a flash of pain and dizziness, and then Joseph was striking back at him. He was too used to fighting to be taken down by one blow, and he knew how to hit back. They rolled on the floor, punching and kicking each other, and as bits and pieces of each other’s memories jumped back and forth between them.
God knows what he’d do if we hadn’t stopped him. As it is we lost seven. O’Rorke, Dollan – Clark shoved his head back into the ground and punched him across the mouth. He seemed to be stronger than his brother, maybe from being out in the sun more, but what Joseph lacked in strength, he more than made up for in viciousness and skill. He unexpectedly pulled Clark down and headbutted him. While he was stunned, Joseph latched onto his neck and rolled him over, pinning him to the ground. Clark tried to fight back, but his brother seemed to have him in a death grip. His eye was starting out of his head, almost like he wasn’t even seeing him. Gallen, Sullivan, Baxter, Quan, and Hu. Pete’s trying out why can’t… Clark couldn’t breathe, but what were more painful were the memories rushing through him. One of his eyes was boiling in its socket, he could feel the radiation from the meteor rocks washing over him again and again, and all over his body he could feel countless knives and needles piercing his skin, over and over again. Along with the other accident, that brings the total to 15. And he’s still getting stronger –
Suddenly, Joseph released him and Clark threw himself backwards. The memories and pain shut off as the link was broken. He collapsed in a heap on the floor, his chest heaving. For a moment, all he could was lay there. Every nerve in his body felt raw and sore. Groaning, he pushed himself to his knees and stared across at Joseph. His brother was on his side, almost curled up in a ball. One of his hands was pressed tightly against the metal patch on his face. The other eye stared back at him, bloodshot.
“Why did you…” he gasped out.
“You can’t kill people,” Clark rasped, his throat still feeling like there was a fist around it.
“Why not? Why shouldn’t I?”
“It’s not right,” he said weakly. “You just can’t-“
“Was this right?” his brother screamed at him, shaking the hand over the patch. “Was it? Is any of this right?” he waved his other hand around the demolished lab.
“No, it’s not,” Clark admitted. “But you can’t just kill people because of what they did. I won’t let you.”
Joseph stared at him, his mouth quivering. “You know what it was like,” he said quietly. “You could feel it in here,” he tapped his head. “How can you still say that?”
“I’ll still stop you,” he swore, not relenting. Joseph stared back at him just as resolute.
“Look,” Clark said, getting impatient. “You need my help to get out of here. I won’t take you anywhere though if you keep doing this.”
“You came to get me out!” Joseph protested.
“I didn’t know what you were like,” he shot back. Joseph’s face darkened even more and he snarled at Clark.
“Maybe I’d be better off on my own,” he said.
“I think we both know you wouldn’t be.” He climbed to his feet, trying to keep any sign of pain off his face. He didn’t need to show him weakness, especially not now. “But I can’t let you go either; I need your help.”
Joseph laughed, pushing himself up shakily. “Too much for you?” Clark was silent and just stared back at him. “So what is it? What do you need me for?”
“Our mother is here too. That’s what I need your help for.”
Joseph blinked and stared at him, at a lost. “You’re lying.”
“Why else do you think I need your help? We could be gone already. I could be gone.”
He frowned and thought his over. Finally he looked up and asked, “How long has she…”
“Almost as long as you,” Clark said, not wanting to go into too many details. There wasn’t the time and he wasn’t sure just how Joseph would take any of it. He wasn’t sure of anything any more. If he’s turned out like this, the thought rose up in his mind, what is Mom going to be like?
“We don’t have much time,” he said, squashing the thought down. “Help me get her back and we’ll all get out of here. If not, fine, I’ll just have to do it on my own. You can see how far you can get by yourself.”
Joseph darkened. “Maybe I’ll do alright,” he growled.
“Maybe you will. Maybe you’ll even manage to get outside. But then of course, where do you go from there? You don’t know anyone, you don’t know where to go; you didn’t even know you were in Kansas until today! What kind of chance do you think you’d have out there? You’d be back here in a day.” Joseph snarled and looked away, fuming. Careful, Clark told himself. You’re pushing him too hard. But there’s no other way and I’m running out of time. I need him with me, no matter what.
“I have friends; people who have helped set this up. They’re waiting for us, all of us. They can help you; you’ll never have to go in a cage again. I promise you.” Joseph didn’t say anything. “But you can’t kill, I mean that.”
“What happens if we get attacked again?” he asked. “And we are; this wasn’t the last of them,” he waved at the guards behind him.
“Then, I guess you’re going to have to learn to hold back a little,” Clark told him sternly, but inside, he was relieved. It wasn’t much, but it was a start. He just hoped he wasn’t going to regret this.
He turned around to find Hamilton again, but he was gone, vanished. The lab door hung open at the back of the lab, the sound of sirens going off farther in the lab echoed through them. “He must have slipped out while we were fighting,” he muttered.
“You need him?” Joseph asked, nodding towards the door. He pulled off the manacles on his wrist, one after the other. Then he bent down and snapped the two off his ankles with relish. Clark nodded.
“Alive, though. He’s going to help us find where they’re keeping her.”
“And if he doesn’t want to? What then?” his brother asked, glancing back at Clark.
“He doesn’t have a choice,” Clark told him, snapping off his manacles. He hurried off down the lab, with Joseph trailing behind him. He couldn’t see the dangerous grin on his brother’s face, but somehow, he knew it was there.
Tina raced to the control room doors and punched in the access codes as fast as she could. “Cmon, cmon,” she said impatiently. Finally the doors clicked open, just as a bullet ricocheted off the wall next to her. She flinched back, crying out and then pulled the door open. Bashing the keypad off the wall with one hand, she then ducked and threw herself inside the room. The door clicked shut behind her.
“You took your time getting here,” Lex said casually. She looked up, biting back a few choice words for him when she saw him. He was standing calmly with a gun pressed to the head of a technician, who was kneeling before him. A few other technicians and two guards were on the floor as well, all unconscious. Lex saw her looking around and shrugged. “Sorry, but I had to start without you.”
“I ran into a pair of guards I couldn’t shake. They still thought I was Lana. I couldn’t have them follow me here, so I tried to take care of them, but two more showed up before I could finish.”
“So you lead them right here, good idea,” Lex said, turning back to the cowering technician.
You might be reading a pirated copy. Look for the official release to support the author.
“I’m not bulletproof,” she snapped at him. “So, uh, what are you doing?” she asked finally.
“Allen, here, is not being cooperative. He has certain codes we need, but unfortunately, I can’t get him to tell me what they are.”
“I thought we had everything we needed?” Tina asked worried.
“Apparently my father changed the codes before he left. How very like him.”
“He changed them,” Allen stammered, Lex’s gun pressed against his forehead. “I don’t know them, I swear!”
“Nothing goes through the network without you knowing about it, Allen,” Lex smiled at him. “You either saw him change them or you changed them for him. Which was it? Don’t make me have to do something we’ll both regret later.”
“Do you really need them now or later?” Tina asked impatiently. She could hear the soldiers’ who’d followed her already pounding on the door behind her.
“Now would be preferable.”
“Then fine, let me handle it.” She shoved Lex aside and grabbed Allen, pinning him to the wall. Then she concentrated and formed the image in her mind. Immediately, her face contracted and flowed around until it was ready. It was a little hard to gauge his reaction, what with how much her eyes and ears were distorted, but she thought he was screaming. She held the form for a moment and then allowed her face to resume its usual shape. Allen was pale and quivering like a leaf, staring at her in absolute terror. “Do you know the codes?” she asked quickly.
His mouth worked frantically, but nothing would come out. She frowned at him and let her skin ripple a little on her face. Immediately, he was nodding feverishly, and croaked out, “Yes!”
Smiling, she handed him off to Lex, who was looking a little pale himself. “That was… particularly horrible,” he said after a moment.
“Blame Whitney,” she said. “He’s the one who made me watch all those Carpenter movies.” She followed him as he guided the still-shaking Allen to the main control room.
“We can control everything from in here,” Lex told her. “This is pretty much the nerve center of this entire lab.” It was a small room with a single, heavy door and thick security glass walls. Lex shoved Allen into a chair in front of a vast array of computers and nodded at him. “Enter the codes.” Allen glanced past him to Tina for a second and then he turned around quickly and started to type rapidly. Lex smirked and sat down beside him, watching him closely.
Tina stared around nervously. There were monitors hanging from the ceiling, showing images from around the lab. There were shots of the ‘Corps still held captive in their barracks, of empty and abandoned hallways, and –
“There’s fighting going on outside!” she said suddenly. On one of the monitors there was a firefight in progress at one of the side entrances. It was too far off though to make out any details though.
“That would be Pete and the rest,” Lex supplied. “I had to push up the schedule, remember? They’re having a little more trouble pinning down the guards outside than I anticipated, but it looks like they’ve got things in hand. He’ll be inside the base soon.”
She nodded, looking at the other monitors. “What about Clark?” she asked nervously.
“He’s doing better, or worse, than I thought,” Lex said. “He managed to free his brother, but he’s taking him along.”
“I thought that was good?”
“I honestly don’t know. He seems to have some control over him, but who knows? He’s an uncertain element in all of this. If he makes the wrong move, he could upset everything.” His mouth tightened noticeably. “It wouldn’t take a lot to bring this all down on top of our heads.”
A hand closed around Chloe’s shoulder and she almost jumped out of her skin. “Sorry, sorry,” Whitney apologized as she started up. “You must have nodded off for a little.”
“Yeah, well, awake now!” Chloe laughed, her heart in her throat. She heard Lana laugh in the cell behind him and she flipped her off over her shoulder. She’d been sitting all day watching Lana stare back at her in her makeshift cell. Despite Clark’s protests, they hadn’t untied her yet, and she was still under constant guard.
“You could have said something,” she snapped at the kid on guard duty with her. He had said his name was Jeremy, and that he was nineteen, but if he was a day over sixteen, Chloe would swear off guys. He laughed and leaned back against the wall.
“I tried to, but you were snoring too loud.”
Whitney waved at him and pulled up a chair beside Chloe. As he sat down, she was a little surprised to see a gun shoved into his waist band. “I’ve got this watch. You can both take a rest.” Jeremy started to leave, but Chloe stayed put.
“I’m fine, already had one.” Jeremy shrugged and headed down the hall, yawning. Pete had taken almost everyone he could with him to the labs, leaving only them and Sarah, who was puttering around somewhere.
“Has she done anything?” Whitney asked her idly. Chloe shrugged.
“Not much. Stared at the wall, stared at the floor, and then at me long enough to make me think we were going steady. Aside from that, not a hell of a lot else.”
“I guess that’s good.” He sighed and leaned back in his chair, looking off into space. Chloe watched him out of the corner of her eye.
“So I can guess why I got left behind,” she started. “Clark probably pulled one of you aside and asked for it, am I right?” He nodded slightly. “And it’s pretty easy for Jeremy or Sarah. He’s not old enough to shave yet and she’s… well, a bitch. But I’m trying to figure out why they left you behind, and I’m drawing a blank.”
“I’m not much of a shot,” he shrugged.
She glanced at the gun and gave him a quizzical look. “So what’s that for?”
“Our guest, if necessary.”
Chloe looked into the cell, but Lana hadn’t apparently heard him, or was pretending she hadn’t. “You can’t be that bad.”
“I suppose not.” He crossed his arms and looked down at his feet. “Maybe they think I’m distracted,” he said finally.
“Well, that’s not exactly the word I’d use,” Chloe smiled a little, “but it’s not too far off.”
He laughed a little. “Yours would probably fit better.” Then he was silent for a while. She rolled her eyes and stretched her arms out, starting to work out the kinks from sleeping in the chair. “I know I screwed up,” he said quietly.
“Again, not exactly the word I’d choose,” Chloe said pointedly, “but pretty close.”
“I know what I did,” he breathed out, looking down.
“Oh, so that makes it okay, huh? ‘You know what you did’. Do you know how crappy all of it was too?” she tore into him. “Something happens with her and you just stop talking, avoid her entirely. She was shot trying to help you and you can’t even say thank you? God!” she spun around in her chair and faced the other way, fuming. “I can’t even talk to you.”
“It wasn’t just something.”
“Okay, maybe she held some things back but…”
“’Some things,’, yeah, you could say that.”
“Okay, maybe some major things,” she snapped at him, feeling this close to hitting him, “but you have to admit, she had a reason.”
“I know that, but I’ve known her for four years, she could have…” he stopped suddenly.
“Well seeing how you reacted I can’t say I blame her,” she yelled at him. He went pale and seemed to shudder for a second. Chloe looked at him sharply and then asked in a much softer tone, “What did you think when you saw her?”
“I… I don’t want to talk about this,” he said quickly and started to get up.
“When are you going to talk about it?”
“Not right now and not with you, Sullivan!”
“Why not? Of all of us, I’m the only one who could get where you’re coming from.” She laughed at the confused look on his face. “Hello, I’m the girl in love with an alien. At least yours is human.”
“You’re in love with him?” he asked.
“Well, yeah, I think at least,” she said. “I don’t know, it’s confusing. I mean, I’ve liked guys before, but… well, Clark… He’s not like anyone else I’ve ever met.”
“When I first found out about him, I don’t know, I was a little creeped out,” she admitted. “He creeped me out to begin with, so that didn’t help. But you know, he stuck with me no matter what I said to him. No one had ever done that before. And then he saved my life, you know, he’s got all these powers, and let’s face it, he’s not that hard on the eyes either, so maybe I tried a pass at him, and he… well…”
“He turned you down,” Whitney finished. “He told me.”
“Well, geez, tell everybody, Clark,” she muttered under her breath. “Yeah, he turned me down,” she went on quickly.
“Never happened before?”
“Shut up, I’m trying to talk to you here. Anyway, I figured that was going to be it, but it wasn’t. He was still there… That hadn’t happened before either. I don’t have a lot of people who stick around in my life,” she admitted quietly.
Whitney was looking at her sadly. “Does he know?”
“I don’t know if it matters. If we win this, he goes home, right? And he’s already got a Chloe in his world, what am I going to do?” She shrugged helplessly and played with a hole in her jeans.
“You want to know what I felt when I saw her in the van, when she changed?” Whitney asked her sadly. She looked up and saw him struggling with it. “I was disgusted,” he finally choked out. “I hate myself for it, but that’s what I felt. Maybe it was just a natural reaction or a gut instinct, but it was there.” He shook his head and breathed out, his chest shaking a little. “How am I supposed to face her with that in me?”
Chloe hesitated, not knowing what to say. “Do you still feel that way?”
“I don’t know,” he said, conflicted. “I don’t want to.” He sighed and leaned back. “I love Tina, I do, but when I look at her, sometimes all I can see is her lying there in the van. How am I supposed to deal with that?”
“I can’t decide if this is entertaining or just part of the torture,” Lana said with loathing from her cell. Chloe snarled and got up, looking through the bars. Lana stared back at her, her face a little flushed and sweating.
“Well, looks like someone’s coming down from her meds,” she said mockingly, pressing her face against the bars. “I’ve never gone through withdrawal myself, but I’ve known people who have. Hope you’re having half as much fun.”
“Both of you are pathetic,” Lana rasped at her.
“Yeah well, at least we wouldn’t work for a fucker like your boss.”
“You shut up about him,” she snapped, rocking in her chair. Then suddenly, she turned her head and retched. Chloe watched her and smiled.
“Yeah, great guy your boss,” Whitney said. “Look at what he does for you.”
Lana glared at him and spit, clearing her mouth. “He takes care of me.”
“You know what makes me sick,” Chloe said quietly, “is thinking about you and Clark.” If Lana was mad before, she practically livid at that. “Oh yeah, can’t you tell?” Chloe asked, needling her. “I mean, the way he looks at you, you had to have noticed. You and he, well, your other self and he, they apparently have a bit of a history together.”
“Shut up!” she yelled, but Chloe went on.
“You know, he wants to save you from all this. He knows what you’ve done, and still, doesn’t change a thing,” she remarked, a little peevishly. “You’re still worth saving to him.”
“He’s an idiot.”
“Yeah, maybe he is,” she laughed. “But that’s not going to stop him.”
“You’re all idiots,” she snapped. “He’s a monster. He’s just like the other one.”
“What do you know,” Chloe dismissed her. She sat back down and put her feet on the wall. It was quiet for a moment and then Lana’s voice came drifting through the bars.
“It was a closed casket, wasn’t it?”
Chloe blinked, suddenly feeling like she’d been frozen on the inside. Whitney stared at her and then looked through the bars, frowning. “I think it’s about time you shut up again.”
“The funeral,” her voice came mockingly back. “Your father’s, Chloe. It was closed casket, it had to have been.”
It seemed to take Chloe no time at all to get to her feet and press her face into the bars. “Don’t you dare say another word about him!” she yelled.
Lana smiled back at her, her face red and sweating. Her eyes were a little unfocused, but her voice came through loud and clear. “You wanted to know what I know. Well, here it is. Gabriel Sullivan, employed on March 13th, 1974. Transferred to the main research branch of LuthorCorp Enterprises on February 21st, 1983. Appointed Team 3 Supervisor five months later. Bright man, Metropolis University educated, hard working, loyal to the company. He would’ve gone far.”
“Shut up,” Chloe said again, her heart pounding.
“January 14th, 2001,” Lana said quietly, no longer smiling. “He and six others die when a project escapes. We catch it, we put it back, and we invent a story: explosion in a lab, burned to death when a steam pipe ruptures over him. Tragic”
“You’re lying!”
“I saw his body; steam can’t burn a person like that. But we both know what can.”
“I said shut up!” she screamed. Whitney tried to pull her away, but she tugged herself out of his grasp. “Shut up!”
“You should be on my side, you should all be,” Lana swore at her. “Instead of trying to rescue the thing that killed your father!”
Chloe screamed at her, completely beside her self. She yanked on the door to the cell and pulled it open. Whitney yelled and tried to stop her again, but she was beyond caring. She couldn’t think, she couldn’t breathe, all that was there was a red flame of hate where her heart should have been. She clawed at him and forced him back, and then ran inside the cell. Lana was smiling at her, enraging her further. She threw herself at the girl in a tackle.
Lana didn’t try and resist, indeed, tied to the chair, there was no way she could have. What she did do, was help it along though. As Chloe hit her, she pushed herself backwards with her feet, propelling them both through the air. They came down in a heap, the impact smashing the old metal folding chair. It came apart in pieces as Lana rolled away, no longer tied to it. She was already fast at work, pulling at the knots on wrists with her teeth, trying to untie them. Chloe lay stunned, the wind knocked out of her.
“Chloe!” Whitney yelled, yanking the gun out of his waistband. Lana was quicker though. She flung a jagged leg of the chair at his head and he grunted as it hit him, knocking him off balance. Lana was on top of him before he knew what happened. Whitney easily outweighed her and she was still partially bound, but he never stood a chance.
Lana climbed to her feet with his gun in her hands, giving him a final kick in the ribs as she did. Whitney groaned and rolled over, holding his stomach. Blood from the cut on his forehead was already running down his face in streams. Chloe started to pick herself up, but Lana turned the gun on her and she froze.
“No, get up,” she snapped at her. Her face was now dangerously flushed and shiny, but the gun in her hands was steady enough. Chloe obeyed quietly, unable to take her eyes off it.
“You’re coming with me,” Lana said to her in a wavering voice. “I want to show you what you’re trying to save. You need to see. All of you do. I’ll make you see.”
“Hey, are you all right in there?” Jeremy’s voice was shockingly loud. Chloe gasped and stared outside the cell, hearing him coming down the hallway. Then she looked back at Lana and saw her turned around as well, waiting.
“Don’t,” she whispered to her, but Lana didn’t seem to hear. All of her attention was focused outside the cell.
“Hey, I said are you guys okay? Where are-“ Jeremy stepped into view and froze as he saw Lana standing there with the gun trained on him, an expression of stupid shock on his face.
Chloe saw her raise the gun a little, aiming it at him. He was still standing there, frozen in place. “Run!” the cry came ripping out of her. Lana’s head jerked back towards her for a second in surprise and Jeremy came alive again. He yelled and dived out of sight around the corner. In a second she could hear him running for safety. She would have sighed in relief, but then Lana grabbed her and shoved her towards the door.
“Thank you,” she said as she pushed her through it. “Would’ve wasted a bullet. Can’t have that yet.” She followed after her, aiming her towards the garage.
“Where are we going?” Chloe asked.
“Where do you think?” she wheezed back. Lana really seemed to be in bad shape now; she was breathing heavily and she looked like she’d be sick all over again. She waved the gun at her and motioned her towards the exit. “Get going, I don’t want-“
There was a sound like a gunshot behind them and then a real one followed an instant after. Chloe turned back and saw Whitney framed in the doorway to the cell. A piece of the broken metal chair fell out of his hands and hit the cement floor, making the same loud noise she’d heard before. Another piece of the chair lay beside it. Whitney stared at her for a long moment and then looked down at the dark red stain already spreading on his shirt. Then he slumped to the floor and lay there in the doorway, not moving.
Lana looked faintly surprised at what had happened, as if she wasn’t exactly sure what she’d done. But it was her hand, and it was the gun in her hand, pointed back at him. Even unfocused and sick to her stomach, her instincts had taken over when she’d heard the noise.
“No,” Chloe whispered. She stared at him. “NO!” The gun snapped around towards her and for a moment, she didn’t care, she would have honestly rushed into it.
“Move,” Lana told her simply.
“You stupid bitch!” Chloe swore at her.
“I don’t want to kill you, but I will if I have to. Move.”
There was something in Lana’s voice that made her believe her. Chloe turned back, the tears starting to come, and she let Lana push her towards the door. She had sounded dead inside; like no matter what happened, it didn’t mean anything to her. Somewhere deep inside herself, Chloe realized that she was more dangerous like this than she had ever been before.