Fic: All the Difference, part 5
Mar. 17th, 2007 12:14 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
xparrotSV 6x16, "Promise" - no spoilers, but Oh Em Gee, I love Lionel, puppet master extraordinaire. Dance on his strings, boys and girls. Hah. (This is why I like villains. Everyone is miserable - and making me miserable watching them - except Lionel, who's snug as a spider in its web...)
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gnine's been ill, but felt well enough to beta tonight (thanks hon!), so here you go. Don't know about you but after that ep, I need the pick-me-up. Man, I want me some 6th season reconciliation!Clex...
Smallville: All the Difference, 5/? {3,631 words}
PG-13, Clark/Lex, futurefic, AU (in a manner of speaking)
Lex Luthor wakes up in his own bed in his own penthouse, infinitely far from all he knows. Meanwhile, Lex Luthor wakes up in his own bed in his own penthouse, just as far from home...
All the Difference (5/?)
Lex needed a drink. The more he thought about it, the more ridiculous it became, that he was somehow trapped in a world--simulation--timeline--where he was Superman's booty call. Lex Luthor, whore to the Man of Steel. Unless he was the one paying. There was something appealing about buying a hero, paying dirty money for those cocksucker lips and sculpted ass, one of the few perversions he hadn't yet gotten around to.
But that wasn't what he had here. He would have been more careful, if he were playing that game; there would have been kryptonite somewhere, secreted in the walls or in the window compartment. A safety net; but there was nothing, when he studied the LexCorp Towers floor plans in his database, not a single fragment of meteorite. Instead there was Clark Kent's photo on his desk, and emails from Clark Kent's Daily Planet address on his computer, and the Kent farmhouse on his office phone's memory, before the mayor's number.
That wasn't a game; that was a lover. Ridiculous.
The liquor stocked in his office cabinet was invariably inferior to his personal collection, but Lex had no desire to go back to the penthouse. He hadn't gotten a close look this morning and didn't want to see what changes had been wrought there. A home couldn't escape a lover's mark, and Clark Kent, as far as he had determined from city directories, didn't have his own place in Metropolis.
Impossible. He knew Superman; he knew himself. 'Opposites attract' was a rule for polarized charges and trash harlequin novels. The alien would no more risk himself to Lex's mercy than Lex would trade the power he had for base desire. This Twilight Zone universe was absolutely untenable, could only be delusion. The question was whose, but if he let himself think about that too much, he would go insane.
In the liquor cabinet he was astonished to find an unopened Chateau Laubade Armagnac, '35. His favorite year, but he had bought and finished the last bottle in the world some five years before. It was no hoax, however, when he opened the brandy, rich and aged to perfection, the heady scent curling up as he poured a generous level into the snifter.
Mercy returned from her busy work just as Lex was starting on his second glass, at his computer again looking over past LexCorp press releases. She made no comment, only tersely recounted the day's inspections and then stood before his desk awaiting orders. Watching him. That wouldn't do; his own Mercy had Protocol 86 authorization, and it stood to reason that his bodyguard here would as well. Lex debated, at last decided, "You can go back to the penthouse, take care of whatever you need to."
"Got it," Mercy said. "You mind if I go out this evening? There's a new kung fu flick at the 8th Street theater."
"Ah. Certainly, go ahead," Lex said, with luck not entirely failing to conceal his surprise. Mercy never asked for personal time. He had to order her to doctor's appointments on the rare occasions when she fell ill, and she'd argue her case, pointing out through hacking coughs that Lex was immune to contagions anyway, so there was no risk involved.
"Thanks, boss," she said now, with a small but un-Mercy-like grin and a bizarre bounce to her prowling steps as she headed out.
"Mercy," he called after her. "One more thing. Refresh my memory, when was the last time I met Superman?"
"Superman, not Clark Kent?" Mercy asked.
He had never shared that particular secret with anyone. It had always been his to hold, a weapon for his hands only, whenever he decided to pull the trigger. Lex had never spoken it aloud, not even to Superman, for all they both knew the truth. Not since the first time he had met Clark Kent, Daily Planet reporter, and seen for himself that the strapping Smallville farm boy had been traded in for a new mask.
To hear Mercy say it so casually now--he kept the shock from his face. For all he knew no hero's identity was secret here. "Superman."
"Three weeks ago," she said immediately. "That's in person, not counting the thing up in Canada since that was over the phone. He joined you and the mayor for the ribbon cutting of the science center."
"Ah, yes, of course."
Mercy hesitated at the door. "Lex, it's none of my beeswax, but...you and Clark, you're doing okay?"
"It isn't, but yes, Mercy, we are," Lex said smoothly. "I assume any other burning personal questions can wait until we're off the clock?"
"Understood," Mercy said, not quite hastily enough to be scared, and saw herself out.
Once the office door had firmly closed, Lex raised his glass, polished off the brandy and got up to bring the bottle back to his desk.
Ribbon-cutting at a science center? Ridiculous.
A keyword search for his name and Superman in the Daily Planet's online archives retrieved an unsettling number of hits, ranging from front page headlines to human interest stories. He scrolled down through gallery grand openings and charity events, stories about LexCorp's disaster relief efforts and the Justice League's public statement for environmental reform, which quoted him with other business moguls issuing their public support. Could Superman have a corporate sponsor? It would be a different sort of whoring, but no less effective; no less a perversion. Man of Steel, hero of the people, the ultimate brand-name recognition.
Except he could find no public link between the superhero and LexCorp. Oh, a few quotes from Superman, vague optimistic mentions of certain companies' responsible resource management; he had cited LexCorp among others. A few talking points from Lex himself, expressing an even more cautious neutrality about the superhero phenomenon. And as two of Metropolis's most famous citizens, there were more than a few photos of them together, posed shaking hands or standing side-by-side at media circuses, but never enough to mean anything, their smiles always plastic, with a formal distance between them.
It was a curious game they were playing, Lex thought, considering this morning. The superhero's naked body over his had been anything but formal. On a whim he looked up Clark Kent and Lex Luthor, to far fewer results. No bylines from Kent, none of his indirect, amusingly constrained ranting about LexCorp practices. Naturally not; it would be a professional conflict of interest. There were a few titillating mentions in the Planet's gossip columns, probably far more in the Inquisitor's, of Lex Luthor's alleged relationship with a certain junior reporter, but those articles were all years old.
Either he had successfully hushed the rumors, or their relationship was such old news as to no longer be of any interest. Either way, the commitment implied was absurd, but it presented intriguing possibilities. Lex logged offline and returned to his private database. There he ran a full scan search for Kryptonian.
He got hits. Many hits, flashing on the screen in an expanding ripple of text: pages of files and folders, gigabytes of material. They included linguistic analyses, scientific treatises, video simulations, physiological tests, countless more fields of research. Most of the data was marked in orange, restricted to this logon, his-eyes-only. Data gathered from years of investigation, evidence of an obsession even more intense than his own.
Lex had started his own database his first year in Smallville. It was substantial, an ever-growing collection of every fragment of information that could be wrung from Superman's appearances, from his rare interviews or the even rarer times he thought to offer up a crumb of his people's vast knowledge for the sake of human progress. But it wasn't this; was nothing to this. It would take him days to go through it all, weeks.
It was the next best thing to hacking the Fortress of Solitude itself. And it was on his personal computer.
Fortunately he had made sure the cameras in his office were deactivated, per his usual procedure when alone, else there would have been a minute solid of footage of Lex Luthor laughing like the Joker's latest victim.
It was the key to everything he had always sought. If this were real--if any of this were real; if he weren't merely insane after all. Wish fulfillment. Egomaniacal fantasies.
Useless knowledge anyway, genuine or not, if he could find no way to return to his own reality and the resources of his LexCorp to apply it.
That was when he stopped laughing.
He had finished the brandy and started on the scotch when Superman blew into his office, three hours after Mercy departed. Not enough to really be tipsy or even numb; Lex's tolerance hadn't been that low in years, and his poison resistance was high enough now that getting drunk was more an idle wish than a feasible proposition. But enough to take the edge off the crystalline fragments of theory, the razor-sharp certainties that kept cutting through every conceivable chain of logic. If this were a delusion--if this were a remade history--if his memory was the delusion, and this had been the reality all along...
Enough to close down the computer and convincingly feign relaxation when Superman entered, out of costume and through the door for once instead of the window. If not enough to actually be comfortable with the superhero in his office. This was the alien, not Clark Kent: jeans and blue cotton instead of the reporter's suit and tie, no glasses, and he pushed his hair out of his eyes with a practiced gesture as he entered.
"Lex," he said, "sorry I'm so late, something's come up with the League and we didn't quite work it out. Are you almost done for the day? I did promise..." He stopped, took in the scotch and the empty brandy bottle in the trash. "Uh, something came up here, too, I take it?"
"Would you like some?" Lex asked, a courtesy that was really more of a joke since Superman invariably refused, his hero's mouth twisting in a disapproving frown, as if alcohol were as great a sin as any of Lex's others.
"Sure," Superman said, collected a glass from the bar and brought it over, seating himself quite casually on the edge of Lex's desk while Lex poured the scotch. He splashed in a generous amount after Superman made a little hiccup indicating three drops was enough, to see what would happen. But the alien didn't say anything, simply accepted the glass, took an infinitesimal sip and made a sour face before putting it down on the desk.
"What happened with the League?" Lex inquired, to see how Superman would evade the question.
"Trouble in the Oiyrt Nebula," Superman readily answered. "The dominant species on Fralqud II just achieved interstellar spaceflight, but they're a bit xenophobic, in a possibly genocidal way. The Green Lanterns are trying to work out a treaty, and they asked if some of the League would be willing to make an appearance at the negotiations, since Earth is at a similar technological level but has successfully integrated alien races. If that doesn't work their fleet might have to be destroyed--and yeah, I know," he raised one hand as if to forestall Lex's nonexistent objections, "but it's the Lanterns' call. The League wouldn't be there for that; our presence would be strictly ceremonial. Unless we end up having to sort out the mess afterwards," and he sighed.
"Ah," Lex said, and took a long swallow of scotch. He wondered how best to request an invitation to the Fortress of Solitude. Perhaps if he just asked politely. In the alien's peculiarly expansive mood, it might be granted.
"Have you had dinner yet?" Superman asked, watching him. "There was pizza--Wally's turn to order takeout--but I'm still hungry--"
"I already ate," Lex said. His secretary had brought him a veritable buffet of Thai and Indonesian before she had left for the night, and seemed surprised by his surprise, as if this were a regular event. As he recognized the cuisine as one of his favorite restaurant's, he had concluded that it might be.
"Any leftovers?" Superman asked, going over to a blank black partition where there was usually, to Lex's knowledge, a particle beam weapon and a lead-shielded kryptonite chip. The refrigerator and microwave had been news to him, though Superman seemed familiar enough with them, going through the shelves and coming back with a carton of pad thai and two pairs of chopsticks.
"Here," he said, handing one pair to Lex as he stared at the carton for a second, his eyes briefly flaring red as he fired a burst of heat vision to reheat the noodles.
Lex took the chopsticks dumbly and set down his glass. Perhaps alcohol hadn't been the best of ideas. This was--so far beyond any reasonable expectation of behavior that it was utterly impossible to make further predictions. He wasn't in control of this situation. He wasn't sure there was control to be had in this situation.
Just Thai food, and Superman in jeans, sitting on his desk close enough that Lex's knee was brushing his calf. Grinning at him as he held the steaming carton towards Lex. "Yeah, I know the chopsticks are inauthentic for Thai. Go ahead, break the rules."
He should have made more of an effort to find the kryptonite's location in that vast store of data. There had to be some; Superman presumably had come to Earth in a similar manner as in his own world, meteor shower included. He had no more hair here than there, after all. His gaze fell to his hand, his living fingers. He missed the feeling of the ring, the reassurance of its power. Even given the radiation's deleterious side effects, the danger was worth the security against this far greater threat.
Perhaps all the kryptonite here had been destroyed, and there was nothing now, no protection left against the alien, no way for frail mortal humans to resist. He had given in because he had no choice.
No, there was still a chance. Superman drew his strength from the yellow sun. Red sunlight wasn't nearly as effective against him, not lethal like the kryptonite; but at least it could level the field. A fighting chance. It shouldn't be too hard to arrange a light source, though finding a way to expose him long enough...
"Lex," Superman said, bumping his leg gently against Lex's. "What are you thinking about?"
"Nothing in particular," Lex lied, but Superman's frown was unconvinced.
The chances a long-term lover would have been granted Protocol 86 privileges were high. And this alien could kill him with a flick of one finger. Lex had to be careful. More careful than this. "Nothing you can help me with," he temporized. "LexCorp business."
"Bruce mentioned you seemed pretty busy when he met with you today," Superman said. "Either he was annoyed you weren't paying attention or he was concerned about you, I couldn't tell. But he said you weren't yourself."
The alcohol had definitely not been a good idea. Lex barely choked back his laugh, coughed instead. He took a sip of scotch to steady himself, leaned back in his chair and tried to ignore the warm pressure of Superman's leg against his own. "I was merely a little...stressed."
"Then we should un-stress you," Superman said. He put down the pad thai, got up and circled around behind Lex's chair to put his hands on Lex's shoulders.
It took every ounce of self-control Lex Luthor possessed not to stiffen at that contact, not to try to recoil as those big fingers closed around him--they could tear through muscle and tendon like tissue paper, could snap his spine like a toothpick. Instead they dug in, firmly for a human, gentle as a breeze for the alien, dexterously homing in on the knots of tension tightening his muscles and kneading and pounding that soreness away.
Trained professionals didn't have a tenth this talent. Then again, most professionals didn't have x-ray vision, or heat vision, as Lex tentatively identified the penetrating warmth, more than the heat of Clark's palms. He had no choice but to submit, leaning forward to allow him access to his lower back, fighting not to flinch at every touch of those big hands.
He'd had full-body massages and invasive medical examinations. And he'd had lovers enough, though not for several months. Imogen Carrefour had been his last, and she'd had the sense to disappear before the tabloids had started posting clipart wedding bells or he had bored of her. He always did appreciate intelligent women. After sex they would lie in bed, apart, watching one another's faces as they talked.
This touch was more intimate than any of that. This morning had been sex, pure and animal, one more seduction. Now--now Lex could not move, almost could not breathe. Like those rare instances he had felt his father's hand--no, Lionel was dead, had been dead a decade, even in this universe he surely couldn't still survive.
And this was entirely different, like nothing he knew or wanted. Bringing him back fifteen years, to Smallville, innocent embraces with his only friend...but that boy was gone, might as well be as dead as his father; and everything Lex himself had been then was a lie; and this meant nothing. Massage was Foreplay 101, staple of any freshman prowling his floor for co-eds.
He didn't move, made no sound, and yet Clark's hands stopped. Instead Clark reached around to wrap his arms across Lex's chest, and leaned over the chair back to rest his chin on Lex's shoulder. Warm and close, steadfast a prison as a straitjacket. "Lex," he murmured, tickling Lex's earlobe with his breath, "what's wrong? Please, just tell me."
"It's nothing." He had to relax. He was too tense and Clark would recognize that; this could give too much away. Everything.
"Is it the dreams?"
"No. No dreams. It's not about that."
"Then what?"
"It doesn't have anything to do with you, either," Lex said, carefully. He had had wives before, and experience enough with paranoia. "So don't worry about that."
"I'm not worried about that," Clark said. "But you--what am I going to have to do to get the truth out of you, Luthor?"
And that was Superman's voice, the booming, chastising command. Lex felt himself stiffen. If he had seen the computer screen through the wall, and this had all been a trap...did the superhero suspect how closely his lover observed him? Had he ever seen any of those countless files? It was all Lex could do not to try to jerk away--uselessly, given the strength of the being grasping him; instead he kept himself still, and showed no fear. But Superman's arms withdrew anyway, releasing him.
"Lex," he said, "Lex, I'm sorry." His chair was spun around, and Superman's hands clamped on the armrests on either side, caging him in as the hero peered into his face, a vivisecting stare, slicing deep to expose whatever might be inside him.
Lex had faced that glower hundreds of times, met it now with all his will, unshakeable and impenetrable, even forcing a slight smile at the corners of his mouth.
"Damn it, it is the dreams, isn't it," Superman said. "You know they're crazy, Lex. They're fucking silly," and the swear sounded as out of place in his mouth as blue jeans in a Metropolis penthouse office. "I'd never fight you--you're never going to do anything I'll have to fight you for, you should know that by now. All our arguments are never going to come to that." He cupped his hand around Lex's cheek. "You have to know that. You have to know by now what kind of man you are. You know I wouldn't love a man who was anything less."
"I know that," Lex said, because he did. His heart pounded in his chest as he contemplated how he had ever managed this, how he might possibly have deceived Superman of all men. This was greater even than the database. What incredible schemes must he be running, what avenues must have opened, with this accomplished.
Perhaps the kryptonite was unnecessary after all.
He thought they would kiss, leaned forward for it. But Superman's arms came around him instead, dragged him off the chair into a hug, rough and close. The alien's heart beat against his own chest through silk and cotton. "The League wants me to go to Fralqud," Superman said. "For the best show of good alien-Earth relations. We'd leave tomorrow morning--it'd be two or three days. The ceremony will probably only take a day or two, but it's a three-wormhole trip, thirteen hours either way. But I didn't promise them I'd go."
Two or three days. Two days he would be able to work unobserved, would be able to research this problem of realities without question and go through the database to his content; forty-eight hours without any of this interference, and more than enough time to make a crude red-sunlight emitter. His chance. "No," Lex said, and made it almost a sigh, but a determined one. "Go."
"Are you sure?"
"I have my business; you have yours. You're still a hero, aren't you?"
"Always," Superman said. Lex couldn't see his face, tipped against his, but he sounded like he was smiling.
"Then go, Superman," Lex told him. "By the time you get back, I should have taken care of...certain problems."
"We are going to talk, Lex," Superman answered, warningly. "But...it can wait."
The kiss now Lex was expecting, and he smiled into it, triumphant.
tbc...
gnine's been ill, but felt well enough to beta tonight (thanks hon!), so here you go. Don't know about you but after that ep, I need the pick-me-up. Man, I want me some 6th season reconciliation!Clex...Smallville: All the Difference, 5/? {3,631 words}
PG-13, Clark/Lex, futurefic, AU (in a manner of speaking)
Lex Luthor wakes up in his own bed in his own penthouse, infinitely far from all he knows. Meanwhile, Lex Luthor wakes up in his own bed in his own penthouse, just as far from home...
All the Difference (5/?)
Lex needed a drink. The more he thought about it, the more ridiculous it became, that he was somehow trapped in a world--simulation--timeline--where he was Superman's booty call. Lex Luthor, whore to the Man of Steel. Unless he was the one paying. There was something appealing about buying a hero, paying dirty money for those cocksucker lips and sculpted ass, one of the few perversions he hadn't yet gotten around to.
But that wasn't what he had here. He would have been more careful, if he were playing that game; there would have been kryptonite somewhere, secreted in the walls or in the window compartment. A safety net; but there was nothing, when he studied the LexCorp Towers floor plans in his database, not a single fragment of meteorite. Instead there was Clark Kent's photo on his desk, and emails from Clark Kent's Daily Planet address on his computer, and the Kent farmhouse on his office phone's memory, before the mayor's number.
That wasn't a game; that was a lover. Ridiculous.
The liquor stocked in his office cabinet was invariably inferior to his personal collection, but Lex had no desire to go back to the penthouse. He hadn't gotten a close look this morning and didn't want to see what changes had been wrought there. A home couldn't escape a lover's mark, and Clark Kent, as far as he had determined from city directories, didn't have his own place in Metropolis.
Impossible. He knew Superman; he knew himself. 'Opposites attract' was a rule for polarized charges and trash harlequin novels. The alien would no more risk himself to Lex's mercy than Lex would trade the power he had for base desire. This Twilight Zone universe was absolutely untenable, could only be delusion. The question was whose, but if he let himself think about that too much, he would go insane.
In the liquor cabinet he was astonished to find an unopened Chateau Laubade Armagnac, '35. His favorite year, but he had bought and finished the last bottle in the world some five years before. It was no hoax, however, when he opened the brandy, rich and aged to perfection, the heady scent curling up as he poured a generous level into the snifter.
Mercy returned from her busy work just as Lex was starting on his second glass, at his computer again looking over past LexCorp press releases. She made no comment, only tersely recounted the day's inspections and then stood before his desk awaiting orders. Watching him. That wouldn't do; his own Mercy had Protocol 86 authorization, and it stood to reason that his bodyguard here would as well. Lex debated, at last decided, "You can go back to the penthouse, take care of whatever you need to."
"Got it," Mercy said. "You mind if I go out this evening? There's a new kung fu flick at the 8th Street theater."
"Ah. Certainly, go ahead," Lex said, with luck not entirely failing to conceal his surprise. Mercy never asked for personal time. He had to order her to doctor's appointments on the rare occasions when she fell ill, and she'd argue her case, pointing out through hacking coughs that Lex was immune to contagions anyway, so there was no risk involved.
"Thanks, boss," she said now, with a small but un-Mercy-like grin and a bizarre bounce to her prowling steps as she headed out.
"Mercy," he called after her. "One more thing. Refresh my memory, when was the last time I met Superman?"
"Superman, not Clark Kent?" Mercy asked.
He had never shared that particular secret with anyone. It had always been his to hold, a weapon for his hands only, whenever he decided to pull the trigger. Lex had never spoken it aloud, not even to Superman, for all they both knew the truth. Not since the first time he had met Clark Kent, Daily Planet reporter, and seen for himself that the strapping Smallville farm boy had been traded in for a new mask.
To hear Mercy say it so casually now--he kept the shock from his face. For all he knew no hero's identity was secret here. "Superman."
"Three weeks ago," she said immediately. "That's in person, not counting the thing up in Canada since that was over the phone. He joined you and the mayor for the ribbon cutting of the science center."
"Ah, yes, of course."
Mercy hesitated at the door. "Lex, it's none of my beeswax, but...you and Clark, you're doing okay?"
"It isn't, but yes, Mercy, we are," Lex said smoothly. "I assume any other burning personal questions can wait until we're off the clock?"
"Understood," Mercy said, not quite hastily enough to be scared, and saw herself out.
Once the office door had firmly closed, Lex raised his glass, polished off the brandy and got up to bring the bottle back to his desk.
Ribbon-cutting at a science center? Ridiculous.
A keyword search for his name and Superman in the Daily Planet's online archives retrieved an unsettling number of hits, ranging from front page headlines to human interest stories. He scrolled down through gallery grand openings and charity events, stories about LexCorp's disaster relief efforts and the Justice League's public statement for environmental reform, which quoted him with other business moguls issuing their public support. Could Superman have a corporate sponsor? It would be a different sort of whoring, but no less effective; no less a perversion. Man of Steel, hero of the people, the ultimate brand-name recognition.
Except he could find no public link between the superhero and LexCorp. Oh, a few quotes from Superman, vague optimistic mentions of certain companies' responsible resource management; he had cited LexCorp among others. A few talking points from Lex himself, expressing an even more cautious neutrality about the superhero phenomenon. And as two of Metropolis's most famous citizens, there were more than a few photos of them together, posed shaking hands or standing side-by-side at media circuses, but never enough to mean anything, their smiles always plastic, with a formal distance between them.
It was a curious game they were playing, Lex thought, considering this morning. The superhero's naked body over his had been anything but formal. On a whim he looked up Clark Kent and Lex Luthor, to far fewer results. No bylines from Kent, none of his indirect, amusingly constrained ranting about LexCorp practices. Naturally not; it would be a professional conflict of interest. There were a few titillating mentions in the Planet's gossip columns, probably far more in the Inquisitor's, of Lex Luthor's alleged relationship with a certain junior reporter, but those articles were all years old.
Either he had successfully hushed the rumors, or their relationship was such old news as to no longer be of any interest. Either way, the commitment implied was absurd, but it presented intriguing possibilities. Lex logged offline and returned to his private database. There he ran a full scan search for Kryptonian.
He got hits. Many hits, flashing on the screen in an expanding ripple of text: pages of files and folders, gigabytes of material. They included linguistic analyses, scientific treatises, video simulations, physiological tests, countless more fields of research. Most of the data was marked in orange, restricted to this logon, his-eyes-only. Data gathered from years of investigation, evidence of an obsession even more intense than his own.
Lex had started his own database his first year in Smallville. It was substantial, an ever-growing collection of every fragment of information that could be wrung from Superman's appearances, from his rare interviews or the even rarer times he thought to offer up a crumb of his people's vast knowledge for the sake of human progress. But it wasn't this; was nothing to this. It would take him days to go through it all, weeks.
It was the next best thing to hacking the Fortress of Solitude itself. And it was on his personal computer.
Fortunately he had made sure the cameras in his office were deactivated, per his usual procedure when alone, else there would have been a minute solid of footage of Lex Luthor laughing like the Joker's latest victim.
It was the key to everything he had always sought. If this were real--if any of this were real; if he weren't merely insane after all. Wish fulfillment. Egomaniacal fantasies.
Useless knowledge anyway, genuine or not, if he could find no way to return to his own reality and the resources of his LexCorp to apply it.
That was when he stopped laughing.
He had finished the brandy and started on the scotch when Superman blew into his office, three hours after Mercy departed. Not enough to really be tipsy or even numb; Lex's tolerance hadn't been that low in years, and his poison resistance was high enough now that getting drunk was more an idle wish than a feasible proposition. But enough to take the edge off the crystalline fragments of theory, the razor-sharp certainties that kept cutting through every conceivable chain of logic. If this were a delusion--if this were a remade history--if his memory was the delusion, and this had been the reality all along...
Enough to close down the computer and convincingly feign relaxation when Superman entered, out of costume and through the door for once instead of the window. If not enough to actually be comfortable with the superhero in his office. This was the alien, not Clark Kent: jeans and blue cotton instead of the reporter's suit and tie, no glasses, and he pushed his hair out of his eyes with a practiced gesture as he entered.
"Lex," he said, "sorry I'm so late, something's come up with the League and we didn't quite work it out. Are you almost done for the day? I did promise..." He stopped, took in the scotch and the empty brandy bottle in the trash. "Uh, something came up here, too, I take it?"
"Would you like some?" Lex asked, a courtesy that was really more of a joke since Superman invariably refused, his hero's mouth twisting in a disapproving frown, as if alcohol were as great a sin as any of Lex's others.
"Sure," Superman said, collected a glass from the bar and brought it over, seating himself quite casually on the edge of Lex's desk while Lex poured the scotch. He splashed in a generous amount after Superman made a little hiccup indicating three drops was enough, to see what would happen. But the alien didn't say anything, simply accepted the glass, took an infinitesimal sip and made a sour face before putting it down on the desk.
"What happened with the League?" Lex inquired, to see how Superman would evade the question.
"Trouble in the Oiyrt Nebula," Superman readily answered. "The dominant species on Fralqud II just achieved interstellar spaceflight, but they're a bit xenophobic, in a possibly genocidal way. The Green Lanterns are trying to work out a treaty, and they asked if some of the League would be willing to make an appearance at the negotiations, since Earth is at a similar technological level but has successfully integrated alien races. If that doesn't work their fleet might have to be destroyed--and yeah, I know," he raised one hand as if to forestall Lex's nonexistent objections, "but it's the Lanterns' call. The League wouldn't be there for that; our presence would be strictly ceremonial. Unless we end up having to sort out the mess afterwards," and he sighed.
"Ah," Lex said, and took a long swallow of scotch. He wondered how best to request an invitation to the Fortress of Solitude. Perhaps if he just asked politely. In the alien's peculiarly expansive mood, it might be granted.
"Have you had dinner yet?" Superman asked, watching him. "There was pizza--Wally's turn to order takeout--but I'm still hungry--"
"I already ate," Lex said. His secretary had brought him a veritable buffet of Thai and Indonesian before she had left for the night, and seemed surprised by his surprise, as if this were a regular event. As he recognized the cuisine as one of his favorite restaurant's, he had concluded that it might be.
"Any leftovers?" Superman asked, going over to a blank black partition where there was usually, to Lex's knowledge, a particle beam weapon and a lead-shielded kryptonite chip. The refrigerator and microwave had been news to him, though Superman seemed familiar enough with them, going through the shelves and coming back with a carton of pad thai and two pairs of chopsticks.
"Here," he said, handing one pair to Lex as he stared at the carton for a second, his eyes briefly flaring red as he fired a burst of heat vision to reheat the noodles.
Lex took the chopsticks dumbly and set down his glass. Perhaps alcohol hadn't been the best of ideas. This was--so far beyond any reasonable expectation of behavior that it was utterly impossible to make further predictions. He wasn't in control of this situation. He wasn't sure there was control to be had in this situation.
Just Thai food, and Superman in jeans, sitting on his desk close enough that Lex's knee was brushing his calf. Grinning at him as he held the steaming carton towards Lex. "Yeah, I know the chopsticks are inauthentic for Thai. Go ahead, break the rules."
He should have made more of an effort to find the kryptonite's location in that vast store of data. There had to be some; Superman presumably had come to Earth in a similar manner as in his own world, meteor shower included. He had no more hair here than there, after all. His gaze fell to his hand, his living fingers. He missed the feeling of the ring, the reassurance of its power. Even given the radiation's deleterious side effects, the danger was worth the security against this far greater threat.
Perhaps all the kryptonite here had been destroyed, and there was nothing now, no protection left against the alien, no way for frail mortal humans to resist. He had given in because he had no choice.
No, there was still a chance. Superman drew his strength from the yellow sun. Red sunlight wasn't nearly as effective against him, not lethal like the kryptonite; but at least it could level the field. A fighting chance. It shouldn't be too hard to arrange a light source, though finding a way to expose him long enough...
"Lex," Superman said, bumping his leg gently against Lex's. "What are you thinking about?"
"Nothing in particular," Lex lied, but Superman's frown was unconvinced.
The chances a long-term lover would have been granted Protocol 86 privileges were high. And this alien could kill him with a flick of one finger. Lex had to be careful. More careful than this. "Nothing you can help me with," he temporized. "LexCorp business."
"Bruce mentioned you seemed pretty busy when he met with you today," Superman said. "Either he was annoyed you weren't paying attention or he was concerned about you, I couldn't tell. But he said you weren't yourself."
The alcohol had definitely not been a good idea. Lex barely choked back his laugh, coughed instead. He took a sip of scotch to steady himself, leaned back in his chair and tried to ignore the warm pressure of Superman's leg against his own. "I was merely a little...stressed."
"Then we should un-stress you," Superman said. He put down the pad thai, got up and circled around behind Lex's chair to put his hands on Lex's shoulders.
It took every ounce of self-control Lex Luthor possessed not to stiffen at that contact, not to try to recoil as those big fingers closed around him--they could tear through muscle and tendon like tissue paper, could snap his spine like a toothpick. Instead they dug in, firmly for a human, gentle as a breeze for the alien, dexterously homing in on the knots of tension tightening his muscles and kneading and pounding that soreness away.
Trained professionals didn't have a tenth this talent. Then again, most professionals didn't have x-ray vision, or heat vision, as Lex tentatively identified the penetrating warmth, more than the heat of Clark's palms. He had no choice but to submit, leaning forward to allow him access to his lower back, fighting not to flinch at every touch of those big hands.
He'd had full-body massages and invasive medical examinations. And he'd had lovers enough, though not for several months. Imogen Carrefour had been his last, and she'd had the sense to disappear before the tabloids had started posting clipart wedding bells or he had bored of her. He always did appreciate intelligent women. After sex they would lie in bed, apart, watching one another's faces as they talked.
This touch was more intimate than any of that. This morning had been sex, pure and animal, one more seduction. Now--now Lex could not move, almost could not breathe. Like those rare instances he had felt his father's hand--no, Lionel was dead, had been dead a decade, even in this universe he surely couldn't still survive.
And this was entirely different, like nothing he knew or wanted. Bringing him back fifteen years, to Smallville, innocent embraces with his only friend...but that boy was gone, might as well be as dead as his father; and everything Lex himself had been then was a lie; and this meant nothing. Massage was Foreplay 101, staple of any freshman prowling his floor for co-eds.
He didn't move, made no sound, and yet Clark's hands stopped. Instead Clark reached around to wrap his arms across Lex's chest, and leaned over the chair back to rest his chin on Lex's shoulder. Warm and close, steadfast a prison as a straitjacket. "Lex," he murmured, tickling Lex's earlobe with his breath, "what's wrong? Please, just tell me."
"It's nothing." He had to relax. He was too tense and Clark would recognize that; this could give too much away. Everything.
"Is it the dreams?"
"No. No dreams. It's not about that."
"Then what?"
"It doesn't have anything to do with you, either," Lex said, carefully. He had had wives before, and experience enough with paranoia. "So don't worry about that."
"I'm not worried about that," Clark said. "But you--what am I going to have to do to get the truth out of you, Luthor?"
And that was Superman's voice, the booming, chastising command. Lex felt himself stiffen. If he had seen the computer screen through the wall, and this had all been a trap...did the superhero suspect how closely his lover observed him? Had he ever seen any of those countless files? It was all Lex could do not to try to jerk away--uselessly, given the strength of the being grasping him; instead he kept himself still, and showed no fear. But Superman's arms withdrew anyway, releasing him.
"Lex," he said, "Lex, I'm sorry." His chair was spun around, and Superman's hands clamped on the armrests on either side, caging him in as the hero peered into his face, a vivisecting stare, slicing deep to expose whatever might be inside him.
Lex had faced that glower hundreds of times, met it now with all his will, unshakeable and impenetrable, even forcing a slight smile at the corners of his mouth.
"Damn it, it is the dreams, isn't it," Superman said. "You know they're crazy, Lex. They're fucking silly," and the swear sounded as out of place in his mouth as blue jeans in a Metropolis penthouse office. "I'd never fight you--you're never going to do anything I'll have to fight you for, you should know that by now. All our arguments are never going to come to that." He cupped his hand around Lex's cheek. "You have to know that. You have to know by now what kind of man you are. You know I wouldn't love a man who was anything less."
"I know that," Lex said, because he did. His heart pounded in his chest as he contemplated how he had ever managed this, how he might possibly have deceived Superman of all men. This was greater even than the database. What incredible schemes must he be running, what avenues must have opened, with this accomplished.
Perhaps the kryptonite was unnecessary after all.
He thought they would kiss, leaned forward for it. But Superman's arms came around him instead, dragged him off the chair into a hug, rough and close. The alien's heart beat against his own chest through silk and cotton. "The League wants me to go to Fralqud," Superman said. "For the best show of good alien-Earth relations. We'd leave tomorrow morning--it'd be two or three days. The ceremony will probably only take a day or two, but it's a three-wormhole trip, thirteen hours either way. But I didn't promise them I'd go."
Two or three days. Two days he would be able to work unobserved, would be able to research this problem of realities without question and go through the database to his content; forty-eight hours without any of this interference, and more than enough time to make a crude red-sunlight emitter. His chance. "No," Lex said, and made it almost a sigh, but a determined one. "Go."
"Are you sure?"
"I have my business; you have yours. You're still a hero, aren't you?"
"Always," Superman said. Lex couldn't see his face, tipped against his, but he sounded like he was smiling.
"Then go, Superman," Lex told him. "By the time you get back, I should have taken care of...certain problems."
"We are going to talk, Lex," Superman answered, warningly. "But...it can wait."
The kiss now Lex was expecting, and he smiled into it, triumphant.
tbc...
