fic: Contingencies, 4/?

[xparrot]

Will be continuing with "All the Difference" as soon as this is done. Which ought to be soon, there should be maybe 3 parts to go after this. So almost in time...is anyone else dreading the final SV eps, and what havoc they could potentially wreak on canon and chars, even as you look forward to them? What an odd fandom this is, for me, anyway...

Smallville: Contingencies, 4/? {4,405 words}
PG-13; Clark/Lex; 6th season; angst, drama, h/c
Lex, forced to his last resort, comes to the Kent home, and Clark must rise to the occasion, as he finds himself questioning his assumptions about his dying enemy.

Read it on AO3

Comments

[hils.livejournal.com]

Oh, god, my hearting is breaking here :(

[aerynvala.livejournal.com]

omg *sniffles* yay for Clark (and Chloe) realizing that they really don't want Lex dead. And yay for Clark going to Jor-El to try to find a cure/stop gap. man...you're just breaking my heart here. :)

[jakrar.livejournal.com]

So beautiful, and so heartwrenching! I still want to smack Clark and Chloe for not realizing what Lex has been trying to do with 33.1 and the rest, but Lex hasn't yet had a chance to make it painfully clear, and neither Clark nor Chloe is exactly open-minded where Lex is concerned. *whimpers and hugs Lex* Am waiting breathlessly for more!

And, yes, I am very much afraid of the remaining SV episodes. My hopes do tend to rise a little at the thought of the CLex-in-a-cave one, but I try not to get too excited; knowing the SV writers, I'm fairly sure that what could have been a fantastic episode will be terrible instead. *deep sigh* This is not a fandom for the emotionally fragile.

[earthkitty.livejournal.com]

You are making this so very real. I love that you aren't taking any emotional shortcuts, not scripting any unbelievable epiphanies or ignoring all that has passed between them. Clark has seen Lex dying on his couch for hours, and is only just managing to admit to himself that he even cares, yet the connection between them is completely palpable.

I think this is the best Season 6 fic I've seen, and definitely one of the best post-rift ones overall.

No, I'm not dreading the final eps...

[(Anonymous)]

... since I don't watch the show, and haven't since the second season. I just follow some of the discussion here and there, and read the fan fiction, and I have my own version of Lex and Clark, where they live happily ever after. It's all fantasy, anyway. Not Real Life. :-)))

Sorry, that anonymous person just above was me...

[greenlady2.livejournal.com]

... not some evil spammer. I forgot to log in. :-)))

[dogwoodblossom.livejournal.com]

Aww! I'm all teary here. Lex is my baby. You wouldn't kill my baby would you? This story will have a happy, everybody's alive, dancing, skipping, tra la ending right? Right?!

[bagheera-san.livejournal.com]

This chapter was awesome.

You almost had me crying. That very rarely happens. Also, I think I have an idea how this will end, and... heh. If the solution is going to be what I think it's going to be, that'd be... very cool.

He's still a guy we used to know. Thanks! I wish the show would play that angle more. I want them to be angry at Lex not only because of what he does, but because it's personal! Lex is not Lionel, not just some evil guy come from the big city, he's *someone they used to be friends with*.

For a long time now Clark had felt as if he were moving toward something--as if he were falling and getting closer to the ground, as if he were a bullet or a cannonball hurtling through the air and the target was approaching. His destiny, the truth about not what he was, but what he was going to be; for a long time it had terrified him, but when he touched the smooth blue-hued facets, when he looked at the crest shining in the sunlight and thought of everything it represented, the future felt possible, and not so terrible after all.
Great paragraph :) Oh show, if only you forgot about the stupid teen romance...

[annakas.livejournal.com]

Ohhh Clark is finally starting to realise how important Lex to him still is.

Awww poor woobie Lex breaks my heart.

annakas

[lapetite-kiki.livejournal.com]

Oh, that was so poignant!

[bonehed.livejournal.com]

Excellent chapter. You've got me holding my breath and sitting on the very edge of my seat. I'm also considering not going to work today - just in case you post another chapter...

[lukita.livejournal.com]

My heart is going to be all bruised and doing an impression of a three legged horse by the time this fic is through. Mmmm~ I love how both Chloe and Clark doesn't want Lex to die because he was their friend. Eee! Only a few hours left to go, I shouldn't be this excited about a fic, but well, I am. ♥

[danceswithgary]

You're absolutely breaking me here with dying Lex and helpless distraught Clark. Nothing could hurt him; he was invulnerable. Even the Brainiac contamination probably wouldn't kill him, that was how strong his body was, but he wasn't strong enough to stop shuddering. "I don't want him to die. I don't want Lex to die, Mom." *sniffle*

Have I told you how glad I am you decided to write CLex again? If not, please consider this my heartfelt thanks that you're back. :-D

[morganlilah.livejournal.com]

See this? *points to fingers bloodied from clinging too long to the seat edge* Can you pleasepleaseplease put Lex & Clark (and me) out of our collective misery?

I need to go lie down and comfort myself with the Subterfuge fics.

[ladydreamer.livejournal.com]

I'm glad that you had Chloe state that Lex is a person because I honestly cannot fathom her suggesting that they should let him die from her behavior on the show. She's continued to try to save him even after she made it clear that he's the "devil" or "has scales" or whatever the hell she believes, even when Clark rolls his eyes and goes to Washington to get his ass kicked instead of helping Lex.

You're pretty on with the miscommunication between her and Clark, though. Clark gets upset, it's all over him and he's unable to hide it, usually. Chloe does, and she jokes and says blunt callous things to make it not real so she can go on with her investigation without crying like a baby. I think she's got Lex's departmentalization thing going on, only not to the same degree for lack of soulcrushing trauma.

It's nice to see Martha being a compassionate person for them. It's so poignant when Lex mistakes her for his mother for a moment. Poor Lexie. Fighting evol all alone. Someone hug him! *looks at Clark* :(

I'm laying in the preparations to go into FULL DENIAL MODE on several fronts with the final eps of S6. I slide further and further into AU.

[attaccabottoni.livejournal.com]

You know, I'd rather it would have been a trick. I could take the cruelty of deception, but not the reality of the seemingly inevitable loss. Lex's pain-filled delirium reminded me of a recent personal event so much I had to stop reading for a few hours.

I really don't know what else to say, because I could hardly hear myself think with all the wailing for Lex in my head. Well, other than I have been loving the exploration of Clark's feelings towards Lex so far (because that has always been a painful lack of that in SV canon except for a handful of episodes, and hardly any since S6 due to their antagonistic relationship), and your description of Clark's pain makes me forget my own for a while.

[yma2.livejournal.com]

Oh, that's so very sad. The I loved the way you described Clark's emotions here, and Lex's illness and yeah... beautiful. I especially liked the part where Lex called Martha mom, so sad....
Really loverly fic this, really loverly.

[norwich36.livejournal.com]

This chapter really hurt. I love your depiction of Clark, though, how mixed and confused his feelings about Lex are, and I really love how torn he is between searching for a cure and being with Lex. And this paragraph just about broke me:

Clark felt like he couldn't breathe, standing in the warm yellow kitchen with his arms around his mother, the air stuck in his lungs like glue so he had to fight to force it out. "I don't want to see him die." He was shuddering just from the effort of breathing, like he was in pain though nothing was hurting him. Nothing could hurt him; he was invulnerable. Even the Brainiac contamination probably wouldn't kill him, that was how strong his body was, but he wasn't strong enough to stop shuddering. "I don't want him to die. I don't want Lex to die, Mom."

[brandil.livejournal.com]

you are *killing* me

[frelling-tralk.livejournal.com]

Excellent update!

[myownghost.livejournal.com]

oh, poignant. clark's disconnected, it seems to me, from what he really feels. it makes me very sad that lex just wanted to see clark again. so painful.

[tasabian.livejournal.com]

Oh, my poor babies! Confused Lex thinking Martha is his Mom just slays me.

Love how sad and urgent this chapter is, with Clark, Martha and Chloe all re-examining their feelings about Lex.

[itsaslashything.livejournal.com]

Excellent. Truly excellent. You're making me feel the hurt that Clark is feeling...even when he doesn't realize why he's hurting...

[ladydey.livejournal.com]

I wish it didn't take a catastrophic event - Lex dying and possibly releasing Brainiac on the planet - to get Lex and Clark to talk about what's going on. Lex isn't wrong to want to protect the planet - I wish that TPTB let something like this be Lex's motivation and not just EVOL for evol sake - he just has incomplete information from an unreliable narrator. If Clark had told Lex any of what's going on maybe, just maybe, it wouldn't have gotten to this point.


I have never understood how Clark ever expected people with IQs higher then cheese to just accept that everything is alright - Lex isn't stupid and has seen and experienced too much for him to just accept on faith that someone outside of himself will stop bad things from happening. Heck, it Lex just waited for Clark to look outside himself and his immediate family/friends any number of things would not be protected; besides Lex isn't the only person out there striving for innovation, who's to say that they didn't find bits of Brainiac and unwittingly unleash it - it's not like the Fortress cares about humanity...

All this is to say that it is so sad that Lex is dying and really his dying wish is to be surrounded by people he still cares about - Martha and Clark - who have never held him in/at the same level of esteem and can even still question his sincerity (Now I know that this is partially Clark repressing and denying that Lex could be dying, could be leaving him - but still poor Lex.)


I like that Clark at least tried to get the Fortress to help. It seems that he is finally thinking outside the box, exhausting all sources to try and save Lex. Moreover, he seems to be letting go of some of his fear of those things that the Fortress will demand of him and his future.. I also like that Chloe admitted that she too can't believe that something could fell LEX LUTHOR, so it has to be a trick. Because before he was Luthor, he was theirs and the idea that the hope is gone that they could get him back is awful.



I really hope that this can be ended without Lex dying....

[bradygirl_12]

This was a great chapter! *wipes eyes*

I, too, am afraid of what Smallville has in store for the final S6 eps, and you're right: I'm not expecting too much from the Clex-in-a-cave episode. They'll find some way to screw it up!