nw7

no ordinary world

7

*

The Daily Star went about its usual day, Clark noted as he leaned back in his office chair. He counted the key strokes and telephone lines as they individually lit up, ticking off the strange patterns as they took shape in his head. Was it him, or did Betty, the receptionist, always answer the phone after three rings? Did Gary, the mailboy, always make his rounds from counterclock wise until he reached Clark's desk?

Had the water deliveries follow just after the paper deliveries? And did the bus always stop outside Clark's window at exactly 8:57 every morning?

This was not the first time Clark noticed these patterns. Today was simply the first time Clark had taken context with everything else. There was a correlation between the office workings and the city of Smallville. Everything was always so neat, and so put in order. There was hardly any disorganization, or dischord. Which is why the night of the fire and everything that proceeded after it raised Clark's suspicious.

Clark turned to his left where his wife sat at her desk. Lois was busy preening herself for her city council briefing, dressed to the T with a navy blue pant suit, silk scarf and all. She'd made several attempts to start small conversation with Clark all morning but with no luck. He would listen for a few minutes until her warbling voice become a droning hum in the back of his mind.

Clark was preoccupied, concerned, alarmed. He'd been skeptical lately, after looking into the none existent fire marshal reports, and the lack of follow up by the police department. He'd wondered how the city officials could let a huge loss like the school fire go without a second thought.

But they did. The entire town seemed more than happy to move on.

Just like Lois.

He turned to her, studying the way she piled yet another layer of make up over her face. Clark never mentioned how much this bothered him. Any attractive woman looked cheap in heavy mascara.

She looked up from her compact mirror, "You like?"

Clark paused a moment, and then pasted on a smile, "You look good."

"Thanks." Lois powdered again and then did her lipstick. "The mayor is annoucing the new plans to rebuild the highschool today."

"Great." Clark turned towards his desk and fumbled for some papers. The city was rebuilding over a crime scene that wasn't even a week old. Clark patted his pen against his keyboard, beating to a cadence of his own. He'd been battling a the unrest in his stomach all afternoon, and the only consolation he could find was knowing he wasn't giving up on his end of the investigation yet.

"KENT!"

Lois and Clark both stood up.

The sounds of George Taylor yelling from his office was definitely not part of a usual work day. Infact, Clark couldn't remember a time Taylor ever raised his voice.

A frosted pane door opened with a steaming editor staring out from it. "No, not you Lois. The other Kent."

Clark exchanged glances, and then walked into Taylor's office, the door shutting behind him.

"Clark, have a seat."

Clark obeyed, filling up a leather desk chair opposite from the editor.

"Clark, I read your opposition report this morning." Taylor said, rubbing his temples. He'd been cooped up in his office all day, answering one phone call or another. Busier than usual. "You know, the one that pinpoints the entire mayor's office and sherif office in a conspiracy to cover up the school burning?" This he said condescendingly.

"I have substanial proof on my allegations." Clark said, shifting his muscular frame inside the small chair. "There were fire acellerants found at the scene, and were traced all the way back to the county lines. It is my belief that the arsonist--"

"I've read both the fire report and the sherif report, and there were no mentions of any--"

"My point exactly. The departments never made an investigative effort of the incident."

"Then who did. You?

Clark straightened up, confident. "Well, yes. I've been at the fire department for ten years now. I think that qualifies me--"

"You are not an investigator, Clark. You are a reporter."

"I may be a reporter for a local paper, but it is an investigative field by nature. My job is to investigate incidents in my community down to the root of the truth and report it to my readers."

"And that's fine." Taylor sat back in his chair, "The only problem is, I just got off the phone with Sherif Adams."

Clark blinked, "They have a new lead?"

"No." Taylor replied, "They caught the guy. Your arsonist."

Clark blinked again. "Really?"

'Yes." Taylor leaned forward and smiled partly, "So, I wanted to give you this opportunity to retract your previous article, and get a head start on tomorrow's cover story."

Clark shook his head, "I don't understand. I made several attempts to reach the sheriff office--"

"Well," Taylor shrugged, "maybe you don't have the same connections I have. Listen, no one else read the copy you gave me, so no harm done right? The point is, don't lose faith in your friends so easily, Clark. The sheriff's been on top of this case since day one, and the city will be a lot safer now that Perry White is in custody."

"Perry White?" Clark leaned forward, "Perry White is the arsonist?"

"Yeah," Taylor reached for a donut on his desk, "you know how he is. The guy's been bound for crazy ever since..." Taylor paused, taking a bite and then took his time chewing.

"Excuse me," Clark pushed in his chair and made for the door, " but I need to see the Sheriff right away."

Taylor barely choked on his fried pastry before asking on Clark's way out, "So you'll do the story?"

Outside, the office simultaneously started chirping again with phone calls and conversation. Clark paddled through the perpetuatal rounds of the mail cart and grabbed his coat.

"Clark?" Lois collapsed her make up case and went after him. "Something wrong?"

*

"Sheriff, I need to speak to Mr. White."

The Smallville Sheriff's Office consisted of one secretary, two deputies and one sage, gray haired woman named Sheriff Nancy Adams. She'd been the reigning law official in town since Clark could remember. Nancy Adams was still the woman who his mother invited over to dinner every Thursday and who had taught a younger Clark the finer roles of the justice system through after school programs.

Nancy Adams was also known as the best judge of character in town. Therefore it was difficult for Clark to believes that Nancy Adam acutally believed that someone like Perry White could have risked hurting so many people.

"I'm sorry Mr. Kent," Adams put on her brown fleece jacket, "but in accordance of the law, Perry White is the prime suspect in a felony crime. I can't have you tampering any testimony."

"Sheriff, when I contacted you before, you told me all investigations of the fire had been concluded as accidental," Clark continued his questioning as he followed her outside to her patrol car, "How can it be that you only now have evidence that connect White to the crime?"

"Well," Adams paused and leaned in, "between you and me, I read the supplemental article you wrote and gave to your editor. It was very eye opening and informative enough that we reopened the case and started from scratch."

"You used my unpublished report to connect White?"

"Well, your report convinced us to reopen the case." Adams put on a reassuring face and patted him on the back. "So, good work Kent. You know, if you ever want to come to the PD side, we could use an investigative mind like yours."

Clark stood there confused. "I'm sorry Sheriff. It's just that none of this makes any sense. My editor said that no one read that report except for him."

Adams looked thoughtful for a moment and then shrugged, "It was passed to me under the table, Clark. Listen,the important thing is that the perpetrator is caught and is no longer a threat to the public."

"No where in my report did I connect White to the fire, Sheriff. Just what evidence do you have to charge him with?"

"Witness accounts." Adams replied, "Witness accounts along with the many gallons of gasoline found at the air field where White resides. The same gasoline used to start the fire."

Clark shook his head, "I think you're over stepping yourself there. No where did I find traces of gasoline at that fire. It was diesel fuel, not gasoline. The same used in large generators. And besides that, the traces I found of accelerant led back to the north side of town, not the southwest where the airfields are located. Something doesn't add up"

"Clark, i understand this is all confusing and difficult to recreate, but the fact is..." Adams shifted her weight, and apparently grown annoyed by Clark's questioning, " Perry White just signed a confession admitting to the crime. Case closed." Adams patted Clark one more time before jumping into her car and closing the door.

"I don't understand." Clark shook his head again, and leaned inside her window. He remembered the odd encounter with White the night of the fire. "You and I both know Perry. He would never do this. What could possibly be his motive?"

*

"Are all parties accounted for?"

"Yes, we're all present."

"Good." Emil Hamilton set aside his eye glasses and redirected his attention to the end of a very long, very shiny black marble table.

At the end sat Lex Luthor. Contemplating.

"I'm listening." Lex said, after a long silence. The entire table was filled with various scientists involved in the Smallville Project. Scientists and advisors, and a few representatives of the US military.

"Mr. Luthor, it is only recently that the members of the board wish to review your direction of the experiment. That is to say, we are concerned about recent events inside the project. Events orchestrated by you.

Within a short period of time, we have watched the experiment stray from its original guidlines, the directive that Lionel Luthor created when the project was founded." Hamilton glanced down at his clip board and then continued, "These new directives from your office have caused sudden program losses, and drastic environmental hazards, not to mention expensive set changes incured by the large fire that you inacted. There are several people in this room who have spent their entire careers on this project, and they deserve to know where exactly you are leading us in this new direction?"

"The directive has stayed the same, Dr. Hamilton." Lex said effortlessly. "We are here to examine, and study the specimen in our lab. It is as simple as any other experiement in any other scientific laboratory. We are only larger, and have more expensive tools and fortunately, a rare, more advanced specimen in our microscopes."

Hamilton and other scientists exchanged looks.

"I appreciate your concern,"Lex turned his attention to all in the room "and I appreciate the everyone's enthusiasm in this room. What I don't understand is how a scientist studies a foreign specimen; how it operates, how it thinks, and reacts, and yet the experiment never introduces new instances and challenges to it?"

"You're idea of a challeng is more than dangerous--"

"The experiment is stagnating, Dr. Hamilton!" Lex stood from his chair and circled the room, "For the past several months I've learned nothing else except for how bored Clark Kent is! To be honest, I'm rather bored myself reading about it."

"So you admit it." Emil countered, "Your recent tampering with the experiment has been out of personal appeal and not of the projects?"

"No." Lex replied cooly, walking to the display of bottled water near the middle of the board room. "My recent reprogramming has been to the benefit of the project. Tell me Doctor, how much more data have you collected on Clark now that he has actually shone a genuine interest in something in the last seven years?"

Hamilton remained silent, but the mousy researcher to the left of him didn't.

"Actually," she said, glasses sliding from her nose, "Mr. Luthor's right. We have four interns working on the data right now. It could take weeks to catalog everything that's happened in just the past two days."

Lex turned to Hamilton defiantly. "See? Progress." He smiled, and cracked open the aluminum bottle top, and sipped from blue glass. "Any other issues?"

The board members whispered between them.

Lex directed his attention to Hamilton, the lead, and longest running scientist on the project to date. "Well?"

"There is the issue concerning the reintroduction of certain variables that were already extracted from the experiment." Hamilton took a breath and then underlined the name,

"Chloe Sullivan."

*