the remainder p2

part 2








I was looking at him.

Looking, but not quite believing.

Looking at the unresponsive, bare body. All of the pretty, gift wrapped boxes and desserts were scattered across the floor, and yet there he was, sprawled on the dining table. Him, the birthday boy. His chest open, pried wide open; a black, tendril thing blossoming from him.

Clark.

I looked at Clark.

His eyes were eerily placid, and equally horrifying. I had never known Clark besides a pair bright eyes. Never known, nor prepared to see him like that. His skin, no longer the healthy tan of a midwest farmer. He was pale, and cool to the touch. My hands rested on is forehead many times. The subtle rise of his chest confirmed he was breathing, but was he awake?

Lois clutched at Clark's hands and screamed. She screamed for what seemed like hours until Oliver grabbed and tried in vain to settle her down.

Bruce was the first to take command and ordered Dick, Tim, and all of his boys to start the search for the culprit who had done this to Clark. Courtney Whitmore and a few others of the JL had gone with them, leaving a small band of us behind.

I watched as Bruce and Victor tried, and failed to remove the black thing from Clark's chest, but every attempt seemed to strengthen the plant's hold on Clark, more tendrils spurring out, and wrapping themselves tighter.

I offered another solution, and asked Oliver to call in a favor at his labs. A few minutes later, a customized Magnetic Resonating Imager arrived at the loft, Oliver and Bruce wheeled it into the large party room.

For some reason, I remember that it took five people to move Clark to the MRI table. That's how dense his body was. I suppose I always forgot that Clark was not from here. That his bones were denser than steel. He was always so humble about it, so good at concealing it. His face was always so innocent, and pure. So, handsome. For some reason, I remember looking down at him on that table, and and wanting a second chance.

"Chloe," Victor said from the controls, "Everything is secured and ready."

Everyone looked to me as if I were the one in charge. Nonetheless, I put in my two cents and told them that the Imaging of Clark's brain would determine if he were awake. You see, I had learned a thing or two while under my own dosage of mind altering infections. Brainiac had caused me so much scarring in my life, so many blank voids like swiss cheese. But like all bad things in life, there were some good laced inbetween. My stint as a supercomputer had left some residual superintellect with it. I remembered a few things, and kept a trick or two up my sleeves.

"There," I said, pointing to the shifting image of Clark's brain. I read the neural oscillations as if I were reading a phone book, although, the other half of me, the swiss on the sandwich had trouble forming it into layman's terms. "This portion, these are delta waves."

"What does it mean, Chloe?" Bruce asked impatiently.

"It means," Victor thoughtfuly supplied, "that Clark is, dreaming."

"Dreaming?" Lois gasped, "You mean he is asleep? With that, thing wrapped around him?"

"It may have sedated him somehow." I offered as a conclusion.

"I've already sent a biopsy to my staff," Oliver said beside me, "Emil should have results soon. Maybe tell us what we're dealing with before we do anything else."

"It might be contagious," I added again, partially holding up a red flag in my mind. But I didn't back away, nor did I really worry about myself. If there were anyone in that room that was the safest, it was me. I hadn't come across a single organism or plague that had affected me since my abilities had manifested. I was a walking Z-pack.

"Maybe," I said, touching Clark's forehead again, "maybe it can be cured?"

"Chloe, no." This I heard from Bruce. "We will wait for Oliver's results."

"But he's getting worse!" Lois sobbed behind us. "Please, do something!"

Part of me was glad that it was Lois who had lost all control of her fear. I needed someone, anyone but myself to lose control. Her cries relieved the urge of my own. Inside, my chest shook with every second that passed without knowing what to do.

A subtle fog had permanently rested over Clark's eyes, like bloated cataracts. All of his blood drained from his face with only the dark, ashen red of his lips left behind. Out of all the murmurs and speculation of the room, it was only Lois who had said what was on everyone's mind.

Do, something.

"I have to do something," I said again, this time moving my hand across Clark's chest. In my career as a investigator, if I had ever needed to find the answer, I had to first understand the problem. I moved my fingers over the tips of the black tendrils, watched it move in anticipation of my own flesh. It wanted me, wanted me to touch it, and yet I knew I shouldn't have. It's long, dark arms continued to strangle the life out of my oldest friend and yet I allowed myself to stand beside it.  I watched Clark slip away. I decided then that this, out of anything else in the world, would be the best gift I could ever give.

The dark tendrils seized as I touched it, seized and then clutched at my own hand.

Bruce pulled me away from the table, snapping me backwards, "Are you insane?"

I heard his screaming very clearly, but I wasn't sure how to answer. I held a cluster of black growth in my palm, watching it as it desperately rooted itself into my skin over and over, and then withered away.

My brief victory was thrarted when I observed the larger growth expand where I had ripped it away, and then grow over like a black, ugly scab.

"It just got bigger!" Lois screamed.

"It's called morphallaxis," I said, and then walked over to one of the large windows, searching for an answer, "we can't remove the it. It's probably manifested so deep into his tissue, it will be impossible to extract it without it reproducing more of itself in it's place."

Bruce walked over, and clutched my own hand, reminded me, "It didn't infect you."

No, I thought to myself, and then shook my head. Nothing affected me it seemed. To this, I wasn't surprised. My mind trailed off as I stared at the amber lights outside...

Metropolis hummed with life, the lights flickering like reachable stars. In the glass, I saw myself again. Within myself, I searched inside every inch and strength I had. Out of all the crises we had experienced together, the worst were always of the mind.

"Project Intercept..." I felt the vague recollection spill from my lips.

"What?"

I turned to Bruce, and then looked at him with conviction. "Project Intercept. It was a brief stint used by Lex Luthor to gain access to a person's mind, his thoughts."

"You think Clark's mind is the access point to this thing?"

"I think that the way it's controlling his brain waves proves that it's manipulating his mind somehow. Using his own subconscious, dream state to keep his body unaware of what's happening to him. It might even be feeding off it. You see how it's growing."

Bruce stared at me like he always did, completely devoid of any emotion at all. It didn't take much longer to convince him I was right.

*

An hour later, and there was still no positve word from Oliver's lab, or Emil Hamilton. Neither did Bruce's boys or any JL had find any clues.

Fifteen minutes after that, I found myself strapped to a neighboring table that was pushed against Clark's. My clothes had been replaced with one of Lois' bath robes, its collar parted open enough for Victor to tape electrodes to my chest and and arms. It was after he had taped the ones to my forehead when I really started to process what I was tasked to do.

Somehow I had convinced everyone, except myself, that using decade old technology stolen from Lex Luthor would be a good idea. With Victor's help, we had concocted a strange machine that Tesla could admire.

"Are you sure?" Victor stood over me, his hand over mine.

"Sure, I'm sure." I said, smiling like I had practiced before I got here. I had survived worse, and died a lot more times than that. I was semi confident that this would be no different. I was the best candidate afterall, both with the immunity to the black infestation, and because of my prior Brainiac possession. If we all had to submit a resume for the job, I was fairly confident I had all the relative experience.

And any doubt I had was suppressed with one turn of my head. I looked at Clark beside me and knew, I was sure.

"Let's do this." I said, and remember as being the last words I said before Victor put me under. I felt Victor's hand over mine, and how it felt lighter and lighter. Slowly, my eye lids fell lower until all I could see were the hands of the people who I had always trusted my life. I trusted them now. And they trusted me.

I could hear Lois' voice very faintly, but my breathing took the lead role. I concentrated on my breaths until I heard nothing else. Not even the EKG. I remember smiling very faintly when I finally found the words I was looking for the entire evening. I leaned my head in the direction of the room and said,

"Save us some cake, will ya?"


I thought I heard laughter, but I wasn't sure.
Soon, I wasn't even sure if I could even hear, me.

I counted in darkness,

one...

two...