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chapter 22




*



North of the sparkling downtown area was a darker corner of nighttime Metropolis.

 Some called it Hob's Bay, but those who lived within the ten city blocks called it Suicide Slums. But it wasn't the same "slums" that it was in the past. If you spoke outside of the recent monster attacks, Metropolis crime was on the down slope in the last decade. The trickle of prosperity even went as far as the north side; the side of town where our mysterious hero traveled through now.

Clark was no stranger to these parts. In the months after his more recent arrival to Earth, he'd been drawn to the neon lights; a pulsing bass beneath his feet. He'd patronized the clubs, the bars, and sat among the smokey atmospheres of the lounges that flourished in alleyways like an intoxication of neon, poppy flowers.

Here, his mortal senses were tested to their limits.

The overwhelming noise of music, laughter, anger, excitement... of people. The underground did no more to hide themselves, their nature, other than living in a shadow of The City of Tomorrow. There was only right now. Only now. Here, in Suicide Slums, the people were open to suggestion, to the darkness. His boots stepped over discarded pages of the most recent Daily Planet, the headlines reading:

UNSTOPPABLE FORCE.

The Monster, as they called it, continued to terrorize the tri-county area.

Powerless, Clark came here to disappear, if only for the night. He came here to be among the people he'd once neglected to understand. To become part of the soul and surroundings of the misfits. In his younger years, he patrolled these parts, an outsider to the world. The beats of the club music could be tuned on and off with a flick of his super hearing, but tonight, they blared. Forced to linger, to partake in the thick wafts of nightlife.  The smell of the alcohol, and smoke. There was no escaping the loss of control of his senses.

In front of him, a red neon glow called to him,

ACE O' CLUBS.

It might have been  tempting to wander inside, but considering where he had just wandered from, his mind was far from the scenery tonight.

Clark visited Tess Mercer earlier that evening. He had watched the sun pierce through her office's heavily tinted windows, several tens of stories up in the air.  Mercer was more than an aquaintance now, Clark having met her several times, and always of a sensitive subject of trust. He wouldn't call her a "friend" or even an informant. But the woman had came through in ways for Clark others hadn't in many years. It was precarious relationship, Clark's judgment of Tess growing in a sideways manner. Tess was upfront about her intentions, and she was open with her conclusions. Mostly about Lex Luthor, a man who had never been open about anything.

Tess knew about Chloe, that she was alive, and well. And Tess wanted her. Desperately.

She explained to  Clark, with much conviction,  that Chloe was a tremendous asset to the greater human kind. There was an unlocked potential, a curious power that Chloe possessed, one that Clark believed  Tess coveted. Hungrily pacing across her office, fingertips brushing absently across the scar on her neck.

Cadmus Labs needed a partnership with Chloe. Tess arguing that there  was a cure for all mankind so close to the horizon, that all of the tomorrows might be endless. The day was near when  a meteor infection might begin to be not a curse, not a godsend.

In a certain light, the proposal seemed almost,optimistic. In all his years, the suggestion that the public would embrace meteor infection never occurred to him. All the years of hiding and disdain, could they be lifted away like a stage curtain?

What she offered him was a chance to be something more than himself. Now that he was human, he had nothing else but that. It left him a little less than alone.

But Clark didn't trust Tess. Maybe it was him being paranoid about her previous employer, or the odd suspension of truth surrounding his past abilities. Or his non-human origins. Mostly, it was the angle Tess fished for Clark's confidence. Her preoccupation with Chloe echoed the same Lex Luthor once had for him in his teenage years. There was an  obsessive nature about her that rang too close to home...

Although it had been ten years since he'd had any  real loyalty to her, there was big  part of him that still wanted to  protect Chloe, no matter how untrusting she'd become. It was a subject he tried hard to not obsess on. But it was there, ever since he'd found out he'd been tricked, betrayed, captured and studied like a freak.

That's what he was truly doing in Suicide Slums, this night.

This was where he first encountered, her, or rather, one of her evasive personas. One or only one, Clark wasn't sure how many Chloe used, or had. He only knew he was her fish inside of a glass bowl. Clark couldn't settle with the idea that she'd wanted to toy with him, he had to believe that wished to observe him. Or rather, he wanted to believe. The aching in his chest, and his embarrassment said otherwise.

Embarrassed. Or even mortified. Clark strained to sift through all the encounters he'd had with the elusive Zatanna Zatara. The conversations, the confessions. Clark was broken by the time Zatanna found him inside Ace O'Clubs one night. Reliving the night moment to moment, Clark pictured it more of a seduction attempt, which had strangely worked its charms.

His pain, was the shame of a fool.

Clark leaned against a brick building just then, the sickness churning in his gut. How many times had he mentioned her name in front of her? And how could she continue to pretend? Continued to let him believe she was dead?

Help.

It was a small voice from behind him, a woman backing away from the shadows of two males in the shadows. It had been so long since Clark patrolled around here, he barely snapped to that she might have been in distress. Everything in the slums were languid within the street's haze. The woman's figure moved in sync with the strobing of a flickering neon sign above the alley Clark found her in. She had a hasty dash away from the two men, but one of them caught her by the waist, the other grabbing her hands.

The languid air clouded his eyes, but soon he preoccupations evaporated at the sound of her muffled screams, barely audible at all.

The pulse of nearby club shook his body as he moved towards them. His own pulse elevated, his fists forming primitively. It's all he had now, just good intentions and common strength. He was human after all. But even if he didn't believe it, or know it, Clark was still beyond average. He advanced towards them, shouting first. He couldn't even hear himself over the drumming of the , of his chest.

The vibrations shook him first through his boots as they ran across the concrete, the drum beat shaking up through his legs and into his chest.

When he reached the woman, she was on the ground, one of the men over her. Clark did nothing else besides placing  his hand on the man's shoulder to draw his attention before he  received the first hit, Clark's stomach crushed by the second male, and then smacked in the face by the other. He reeled backwards, catching the guy who lunged for him, both of them rolling to the ground. His senses flooded forward again, the taste and smell of blood filling his mouth.


Clark pushed one man off of him, and swung at another. He didn't get a single hit in, but when he looked at the corner of his eye, he saw the woman sneak away, passed the alley violence.

When he looked back towards them, he caught the moment before he got knocked to his knees. This was pain he could handle. It was clean, clear. He knew how it got there, and he knew it would eventually fade away.

Clark sucked the ground, gasping for air after the hit to his throat. The men taunted him, but Clark found his confidence soaring. It had been a long time since his enemies had been so clear to him. They were right in front of him. No need for endless searching and mind games. This, was a simple back alley fight. These men had no special powers. No super strength. If this was the type of criminal he fought, he'd be happy to do it. The dirty, and hard way. And as soon as he got a good lung of air back in him, he was ready to tear them up.

Clark got to his feet, wiped the blood from his lip, and smiled.

The two men looked at each other as Clark stepped closer.

Want some more, huh? one of the men said, barely audible over the thick atmosphere.

Clark got within inches before he lifted his arm to swing, but oddly the men turned and ran in the opposite direction. Clark paused,arm in mid air, in disbelief  that the fight was that easily won. A few seconds later, he heard a whooping noise of cop sirens behind him. Two patrolmen walking towards him.

Clark shuffled the same way the other men had, turned the corner to see them scrambling through the bar infested streets. Clark spotted a fire escape the opposite way, and made a jump for it.

Once climbed on top the rickety wrought iron stairs, he watched the two patrolmen chase after the two perpetrators, oblivious to Clark's quick escape. He smiled just then, sneaking away up a third flight as the city took care of itself. He felt a wave of nostalgia, a sense of wellness, of wholeness. Almost, wholeness.

He reached the top of the building, some six stories high, and settled in among the roof and behind the skeletons of glowing neon signs. The club's drumming deadened up there. From the roof he could almost hear the traffic from a few streets away. The sphere of the city opening up, the skyline more visible from a few feet higher.

Metropolis was before him.

Clark tasted the sharp, mineral bitterness again. He pulled the collar of his shirt toward his mouth, but saw the blood scattered through the fabric of his chest. Blotted, soaked. And in the shape of his massive scar.

"That was impressive."

Clark stiffened. He knew he could never be truly alone in this city, but the materializing voice, he knew it wasn't a stranger this time.  He held back his emotions, except for the bitterness that surfaced. He knew Oliver would never allow the real Chloe outside. This was some fake, some trick, a phony. "I'm not in the mood for magic  tricks."

Chloe, dressed in black, from her fingertips to her toes, stood silently. Her eyes lowered, the undertone had not escaped her.

After what he thought was a sign that she might leave, without another word,  Clark asked suddenly, "Why are you here?"

She looked back at him, "Why do you think?"

Clark spoke from his fat, swollen lip, " You've been following me."

"I didn't think that was a secret, anymore."

Clark turned back to the sparkling skyline, feeling her presence near him. He felt ashamed, that all he desired was the real girl. That, despite all that had happened, those feelings existed beyond his understanding. "What's impressive about getting your ass kicked?"

"Nothing," she said from behind him, her voice sounding closer than before, "unless you're fighting for others who can't fight for themselves. "

He resisted admiring how real she did look. Traces of her hair fluttered in front of her eyes with the rooftop breeze.  "So how does this work exactly? You just teleport your image through satellites? Cell phone towers?" he skeptically sifted his eyes through the sky.

"Not exactly."

Clark lifted his brows, his sour attitude soaking through his words, "So, you gonna tell me how it works, or is it just another secret kept from me..."

"I don't have time to have this argument with you," Chloe brushed back her golden hair, revealing no headset, no link to Oliver or the rest of their team, "I came here to share vital information that could save lives. Specifically about the same monster that almost killed you."

Clark stood up, turning towards her completely. Her eyes clung to the blotchy patterns of his chest, soaked through his shirt.

She wanted to say something, but instead she turned over one of her palms, gloved in black. Inside of it, was a metallic disc. A golden light illuminated from it, first as a halo, then in strands, like a sunburst. An image materialized from thin air. "Do you know what this is?"

Clark blinked from it, to her. At this point, the thought crossed that she might have been really there with him. Not a hologram. "Do you know?"

"Other than it's the  same shape carved in your chest... I know it belongs to a prominent Kryptonian family."

Clark nodded, "That's right. I guess you know just about everything there is to know, now."

Chloe shook her head, "I know most things, but not everything."

He crossed his arms, walking back and forth across the flat top roof. "Ok, then. So, what do you know?"

Chloe flexed her fingers over the disc in her palm, the hologram dematerializing, and then rematerializing again.  "I know you've been seeing a dangerous woman."

Clark stared straight through the image and across to Chloe, "Figures, since you've been surveilling me.Do you know what about?"

"I can only guess it has something to do with me."

Clark sneered, "Right, again."

Chloe took a step forward, hologram disappearing again, "If you want to know why I kept my presence from you, it's because of people like her. "

"Tess wants me to bring you to her."

"By force?" Chloe challenged.

"No," Clark shook his head, "she has the impression that we're good enough friends that I'd convince you to come with me.Willingly."

Chloe thought a moment, "I guess we're still friends, if you're volunteering this information."

Clark smiled sadly, "You and your friends did save my life. Despite lying and leading me around..." He took a deep breath and then added, "but beside all my reservations, I can't do anything to hurt you, Chloe. And I know that whatever humanitarian intentions Mercer has, the way she has gone about hunting you down, worries me. I don't blame you for hiding for so long. I only wish, you'd told me. At some point. Any time actually, all those times I visited Zatanna..."

Her eyes welled, "You wouldn't believe how badly I wanted to tell you who I was."

Clark nodded, "Actually, I think I do... y'know ten years ago, you and I might have been standing in different positions."

The moment she broke away their eyes, Clark realized that she'd come on her own. Perhaps risked the trust of her friends by seeing Clark alone. Maybe even done so in secrecy, and this wasn't the first time.

"I'm not like the other's," Clark pled to her, "The Krytonians you and Oliver encountered that night ten years ago. I tried to stop them from hurting you, and anyone else."

"And Lex Luthor?"

Clark paused a moment, remembering the violence like yesterday, "An alien program named the Brain Interactive Construct killed Lex inside the Kawatche caves."

Chloe frowned, "An A.I.?"

"Yes," he nodded, "Brainiac is... was, very dangerous. But, he's gone now. He was left to the Phantom Zone."

Chloe surmised that Clark had gone to the same place, asking, "Is that how you lost your powers?"

He nodded slowly, "I don't know what good use I am to you and Oliver on fighting this beast. I'm virtually useless, now."

"Stop it," Chloe stared back him, "I'm tired of watching you mope around, acting like you're flesh and bones. This isn't the Clark Kent I remembered from Smallville. If you really want me to believe that I can trust you, that you're the same man I trusted all that time ago, I need you to let go of this affliction you've been carrying around."

He didn't know where to start, her sudden candidness caught him off guard, ""I'm powerless, Chloe! I have no advantage, I have no clues. I've tried piecing together what I have left of my homeworld, only to learn that everyone else from Krypton is a murdering traitor.... What ever my father intended for me here on Earth, I have no idea what it was..."

"You're stuck in the past. Does it matter why your father really sent you here? All you should be thinking about is how to help protect us from the Kryptonians who followed you here."

"It's all I can think about," Clark replied, "without my powers, I'm useless. To you, to Tess, to anyone--"

"Do you think all your strengths are your abilities? The Clark I know would never give up! You're the best chance we have to defeat this thing.." Chloe yelled over the fainter drum beatings below them, "We need you, and your insight."

If she was trying to guilt him into giving in, he fought it as hard as he could. There couldn't possibly be anymore guilt left to place on his shoulders.

Chloe took a breath and shook her metallic device from her palm," I always believed in you, Clark. Even before I knew you had any powers at all, and even after. Even now. I know it's in your destiny to help us fight this. My only question is, do you believe it?"

Destiny.

He bowed his head, ruminating on her words.  He didn't believe her, not yet. And for whatever reason she did believe in him, he wasn't sure. There was always something to prove.

The metallic disc, a device she used to control her hologram technology left her hand, hovering just above the material of her dark gloves...

The gold light spilled from its origin, tumbling into array of showered pixels, and into a virtual Kawatche caves. The old cave drawings shone as if drawn only moments ago, sparkling in golden light.

"Where did you.."

"After you disappeared, I had Oliver help me preserve what we could. I've been collecting the pieces too, Clark. I never gave up on you. I've been trying so hard to understand, to go against all of my human nature.."

Chloe navigated the hologram effortlessly, a series of images scrolling past Clark.

One image, of a blonde, beautiful, slumbering woman hovered in place. On her wrist, was a silver bracelet, an emblem similar to one Clark knew so well. Another Kryptonian.

"Who is she?"

Chloe shook her head, "I don't know. She is wearing the identical Kryptonian shield, as you."

Clark turned around, "Where is she?"

"Somewhere safe. In a frozen stasis. She was found shortly after you disappeared, and in a bad state. She had been contaminated, or diseased somehow. We are still learning about the  biological makeup of Kryptonians... We are trying to gather what we can, and compare it to the evidence from the Monster sightings. We've found some similarities, but not enough to draw conclusions with what we're dealing with."

Clark questioned, "you haven't tried to cure her?"

"No." Chloe frowned, "of course not. She was found to be Kryptonian. And as far as we know, she's a danger to us. She's remained in stasis for a decade."

Clark thought on this, pacing to and fro on the roof top. The woman couldn't have been the phantom he'd been seeking all this time. She'd arrived on Earth ten years before. This was a Krptonian he'd never known about.

"I was hoping you'd have insight, Clark."

"I know you're on counting on me to have answers," Clark looked up, "but you have to understand, that most of my knowledge about my home world came through programmed transmissions from my birth father. And all of that is gone now."

Chloe stepped closer to him, her fingers handing him the metallic disc she held all night. Clark took it, the chroma of light shifting to somewhere  of blue. He held it in his palm, the cool metal flat against the callouses of his past. It was octagonal, he now realised. And just then, it struck him.

"It's not all gone, Clark." Chloe looked at him deeply, "The disc is Kryptonian technology. It took years to restore it to its operational state. To decipher its uses, and learn how to manipulate them. We're still in the rudimentary stages, but it's a start."

An involuntary smile crossed his face.

"Within it is  an archive of, well, of you. Anything I could find, buy, collect.." Chloe shrugged helplessly, "I guess I never grew out of my Wall of Weird--"

She gasped as Clark unexpectedly  kissed her.
 It was a tentative embrace, as his hands gently caught the length of her arms, and led her to him. He wasn't sure it would work, wasn't absolutely confident that she was the real thing. There was no real reason for her to be so exposed to him. There couldn't have been a logical reason, just instinct.
Like her, he didn't know it was happening until it was, happening. Sparked by the endearing ways of her, something he never lost hope for. . He supposed that she placed her decisions on pure instinct, like he just did.  And as he held her for a brief time after, his confidence dropped once he saw her shock, and not the same wanting expectation he felt. "Sorry, I... Chloe, I couldn't wait any longer."

He watched as she bowed her head, embarrassed, he thought. He wasn't sure. "I'm sorry," he said, backing away, "It wont happen again."

Embers of light drifted in a lazy whirl around them. He fingered the octagonal disc, finding some way to move past the ruined moment of joy. But he still felt it. Overjoyed. She hadn't ran away. She hadn't said no. Her lips didn't refuse his.

While standing in silence, he noticed that she remained standing near him, her concealed dress hiding everything but her face. In fact, all of her skin was covered, he thought. Even up to her neck, only the paleness beneath her chin revealed and her pretty face.

"I have to be careful," Chloe whispered, "with how I use physical contact."

Clark honed in on her voice, "Is it your meteor abilities?"

"Yes," she nodded, "The slightest touch, I can't control how my body reacts. Sometimes I go into overdrive, and I get overwhelmed. In the labs, when we extract from my cells for study, I can have small reactions."

"You're powers are still maturing."

She shook her head, "I don't know--"

"I do," Clark smiled at her, "I had abilities once. It took me years to adjust, to rein control."

 He went with instincts and for her hand, and held it. She seemed comfortable with this, the black material still a thin barrier. He looked at her, "My father used to tell me to always test my limits. That's the only way to learn."

"Clark," she looked up finally, and she was blushing, "it's more than that--"

"Just, listen. You've given me something so invaluable, so extraordinary, Chloe. You've given me hope," he smiled brilliantly, his other hand holding the disc. Blue pixels of light scattered between them like pixie dust in the night, "This disc, it could save me. It could save us all. Thank you."

She didn't say anything, he didn't know why. He'd never seen her speechless, or maybe it was that she was afraid. She looked as if she were bracing for another kiss, but he wouldn't dare. He didn't know if she'd felt pain, or pleasure like he had. He could only assume it was something unpleasant. He thought about what she had said, being in hiding all this time. Posing as someone else. It was all too familiar for him. Like looking into a mirror, watching all her fears like they were his own. "I promise I wont kiss you again, I... I wish you could experience the world, without the fear of being exploited. I want you to feel safe, around me at least."

But then she removed one of her gloves, very slowly from her hand. "I trust you, Clark. I just wasn't expecting it, was all." She looked up at him, and smiled sideways at the dried blood underneath his nose from the fight minutes ago. "Your lips are swollen.... it hurts, doesn't it?"

"No," he said, "not much."


Her bare fingers reached to his lips, and traced them carefully, the other hand blotting away the faint traces of redness. "Liar. I felt it when you kissed me." Her fingers left his lips, travelled down to his chin, then his neck. To his chest. They stopped there with a firmness, exactness. He knew she could feel it, just below the surface. He knew he could feel his heart beating faster for her.

She whispered something, but he couldn't answer, too captivated by the way her skin felt when he caressed her face, and brushed back her hair. She seemed to forget too, closing her eyes when he smoothed his fingers against her ear.

There was a voice, and a large city waiting for them in the back of both of their minds. There were anxieties, massive agendas to take on. Monsters to topple, and elusive truths to unveil.

 But in that moment, they chose to focus only on each other. Clark chose this truth. Unpeeling the collar of her jacket just so he could feel her.

His fingers traced her neckline, as hers did his. But with his, he was feeling for  her heart beat that was ingrained in his own. He found it just underneath her delicate skin waiting for him, her pulse so strong that it sparked an excitement so intoxicating that he couldn't help but be drawn closer.

The answer was yes. Clark did still believe in destiny. In what strange ways his path unravelled and lead, Clark, for the first time in many years, felt he had found his sense of bearing, his direction. His ground. And now, more than ever, he was terrified of losing it, slipping away. He had lost everything. His birthworld, his powers, and now possibly his home world if they never figured out how to stop what his ancestors had done.

 But Chloe had given him hope, something stronger than all the doubts he had. And as she stood silently beside him in the moonlight, she gave a little of her self, gave up a little more of her control. That she gave to him as he kissed her again, this time with her permission. And then again.

Among their bodies, the hologram reverted to the Kawatche Caves, the drawings floating as glowing strings of light. Clark closed his eyes, the both of them huddled on a nondescript rooftop among the largest city in the world. It could have been anywhere that he held her, any place would be perfect. But with Metropolis surrounding them, he knew this was it.

"I know you're her," he said with whispering conviction.

Ancient drawings illuminated over Metropolis.