I. Sneeze
Clark was sulking a little bit. He figured he was allowed to, after the crappy three days he'd had. He'd been helping Dr. Crosby with some research in the lab, and she'd had a few bits of dust or residue or something from Swann's old research. It wasn't like the actual meteor rocks, just some almost intangible remains. Still, what was left had been enough to set off the mother of all colds. At least it hadn't done worse. After all, the green kind boiled his blood and, after an accident with heat vision, had left him blind over a year ago.
While that had been a horrendous experience and had taken months to adjust too, such as he could. This cold wasn't that much better. How was he supposed to know that his lung capacity was as suped up as his sense of smell or his strength? He'd been sitting at home, trying to get better with chicken soup and tea when he'd sneezed and blown the window out. According to Davis, he'd actually sent the pane flying about seven miles to the edge of their property. At least they had the space for no one to notice. It was a necessity so Davis's Beast could hunt wild game at night to keep it satiated. It just was a bonus that it concealed Clark's newest problem.
Since his cold was working its course, he'd been spending most of his time in a clearing in their estate's land where he could sniffle in peace.
Or he would have been able to sniffle in peace if he didn't have two nosy girls in his life. Quirking his head, Clark opened up his hearing and sighed. Then the tree tops around him rustled, and he felt even more awkward for doing that. Some days, being an alien wasn't the worst thing he could be. He liked patrolling with Davis, and he had a great family who cared about him a lot. Besides, and as horrible a thought as this was, he had the better end of the deal. He hadn't always thought he did. When he'd been younger, he'd been convinced and his mom and brother with him that he was the shapeshifter. He wasn't. Better to be the human-like alien (so far) who didn't need to hunt than suffer the way Davis did. All that aside, there were days when being so different struck him harshly. The cold and weird sneezes were just the type of things to needle at never-healed wounds.
"Chloe, Maddie, what are you doing here?"
Soft hands were patting his shoulder and his keen nose picked up the hint of lavender to his left. Turning his head, he accepted his girlfriend's kiss. "Placating me, Maddie, isn't going to make me let you hang out."
She kissed him again and chuckled. "I bet it is. Besides, Davis says you've been sitting out here for a day."
"I came in to sleep!"
He heard a snort off to his right. Right, Chloe was here too. He could tell by the thick boots she still preferred to wear when not in business suits at the Planet. Stealth was still not her specialty. "Right, sleeping indoors for about six hours a night. That's definitely not isolating yourself."
"I'm sick," he said slowly, as if explaining it to small children. "I mean, mom says my fever seems better, but I still sound like I have a nose plug on. Ugh, my head feels so heavy."
"It's the congestion," Maddie added helpfully. "Really, you never had a cold before?"
"That goes along with being invulnerable or, well, supposed to be invulnerable," he paused then and reached up to wipe his nose with the plethora of Kleenex he'd brought with him. "Davis used to get sick back before college. I never realized how much this sucks. I should have been nicer when he was eight and got chicken pox."
"How bad were you?" Chloe asked and he could smell her now on his right, a mix of vanilla skin cream and the sting of generic shampoo.
"Well, the oatmeal bath mix tasted good and I might have hogged it a bit."
"Right, an Alf thing," Chloe replied.
"Oh thanks, Chlo."
"Anyway," Maddie continued. "What Chloe is trying but failing to get across is that you, mister, are moping."
"I sneezed my window seven miles. I'm better than your average hurricane! I really don't think you girls should be around me right now."
"Puh-leaze," Maddie chirped and, sometimes, he had to worry about his girlfriend's sanity. "I'm a mutant, and I've had way worse leveled at me from my dad, no less."
"Wind can hurt too," he said.
"And I have your brother's spikier half bring me venison once in a while in person. Clark, I don't think either of us are as freaked out as you are. I mean, you got control of the strength and speed."
"But I suck at doing more than floating randomly, and, well-" he shrugged and rubbed at his sunglasses, careful not to move them too much because, even though both girls had seen the mess of scars left behing from his heat vision, he didn't like for them to be subjected to it. "The heat vision didn't pan out so well."
"That," Chloe said. "Was a one in a million shot. That's not the same thing at all. You just need to get some focus."
"What, like I'm going to go fly a kite?"
Beside him, Maddie stood up and he missed the comfort of her body curled next to his. "Actually, that's pretty much what Chloe and I had in mind."
"Huh," Davis said and Clark didn't need to see to feel his brother's scrutiny.
"Huh what?" Clark asked, breathing out carefully and smirking as the girls cheered. He'd learned to harness the breath with them and that idiot kite over the last few days. Now that his cold was done with, he could actually enjoy everything. His control was increasing; today he'd even been able with Maddie's direction to blow away the rain clouds that had threatened their day on a very private beach. "I think this is neat."
Davis laughed and clapped his shoulder. "So are you going to teach me how to do it?"
"You only have the strength, speed and ridiculous invulnerability," he replied.
"Well, one day I might fly better than you."
"Anyone could fly better than me. I suck."
"Exactly so one day I might get the breath thing." His brother dropped his hand and laughed again. "It doesn't look so hard."
Clark stopped blowing long enough for the kite to sink to the ground. Without him, the wind was perfectly still. "Hey Chlo?"
"Yeah," she chirped, sidling up next to him. He could tell from the lavender in the air that Maddie wasn't far behind.
"You still have lemonade right?"
He could hear the grin in her voice. "Oh definitely, Mads?"
Clark waited less than patiently as his girlfriend handed him the full cup. It wasn't hard to know where to aim. The scent of the drink was enough to direct him to where it was in front of him. Taking a small, measured breath and concentrating, he blew on the drink. "Davis, want some?"
His brother grunted and Clark bet he was frowning. "Is this frozen?"
"Yup. I told you my powers were better."
Maddie slid her arm through the crook of his and giggled. "Chloe, we might have created a monster."
II. Labyrinth
"Hey, uh, Davis said he wanted some alone time after everything that happened," Chloe said, sitting down next to him on his bed. Clark counted down the seconds in his head and reached five before the mattress dipped a second time and Maddie had her arm wrapped around his shoulders. The height difference made it awkward but they managed.
"I'm not feeling the best either. Whatever that was, wherever it came from..."
"I think we may have to face the idea that you and Swann's supply of artifacts aren't mixy things," Chloe corrected. "Last time it was space dust. This time it was some crystal thing that let God knows out. You're desperate to get your hands on the other colors of meteor rock. What if the next thing you get your hands on actually does kill you?"
"I have to agree," Maddie said. "I get that you want to know what you are and where you come from. I get that it sucks having powers and not knowing why. I mean, I didn't even meet my dad until a brief parole when I was nine. It wasn't like mom knew what I could do. I was embarrassed and once I figured my triggers out, I just hid it."
Her voice was fragile, hesitant, and Clark hugged her tight. He and Davis weren't the only ones who suffered with their oddities and he had to struggle to remember that.
"I know, Mads, and I get that. It's just that you at least have a name. I want that too, and I want...you know what I want," he said, his voice barely a whisper. Even then he wouldn't say the words because his brother would hear him. They all knew the real reason Clark had chosen Dr. Crosby's lab for undergrad work was the desperate bid to find a cure for his brother. "I need answers."
"What good are answers if you're dead?" Chloe asked.
"Don't you dare do the 'it doesn't matter if Davis is okay' mantra either," Maddie said. "We all love Davis and you. He'd be the most pissed of all if you got killed screwing around with Swann's stuff."
"I won't."
"That ghost or phantom or alien, whatever, got to both of you and played with your minds," Chloe said, and he could hear the anger in her voice. She was shaking beside him trying to contain it. "Davis said that it made you both think you were in an asylum, that it almost conned both of you into 'memory' treatments."
"So? I heard Shelby, figured it out, and that weird police detective fixed it. We're fine."
Maddie pulled away, and he hated that. Sometimes there were risks worth running. With Davis changing at least weekly, Clark knew they were running out of time. "You were incredibly lucky. I...why would you guys even think of choosing a life like that."
Clark chewed on the inside of his cheek, trying to keep his mouth shut. He couldn't let them know what Davis and he had seen in their shared delusion, that both Chloe and Maddie-fellow inmates there-had been shot dead protecting them. A world without the both of them wasn't one worth living in.
So, instead, he settled for a small truth, something he could offer them.
"It promised us a chance to have a better life. I...mom was there and she and Jonathan Kent were like a real family with the farm and everything. Grandfather was still alive, and he was so sad with me and Davis quote-unquote sick." He sighed, careful not to blow a tornado, and quirked his head toward Maddie. He couldn't aim directly to her face, her eyes, but at least he could tell where she was by smell and by the sound of her voice. "I could see."
She hugged him then and he was grateful she'd thawed a bit. "But it wasn't true, Clark. You need to think before messing with stuff you don't understand, alright? Chloe and me...Hell, your mom too...we can't live without you!"
He leaned into her touch and stuck out his right hand, palm up, and relaxed more when Chloe squeezed it. "I'll think things over better. I wouldn't want you guys to be upset, promise."
Clark found his brother sitting at the kitchen table. He must have been fidgeting with a banana because the smell was overpowering. Carefully, using his cane as a hint, Clark pulled out a chair and started to speak.
"The girls really bowl you over, don't they?"
"Sometimes the power team up isn't appreciated," his brother replied, his voice hollow as if it were coming from far away.
"So how's sleeping coming?"
"If you could...well Chloe commented before she left for school this morning that I look like Hell."
"I was gonna bet on that."
Davis sighed and set the fruit down; Clark noted the thunk on the table."Did you tell them? I know they pressed, but you're not that dumb, are you?"
"I'm not dumb at all."
"I'm not so foolish that I don't know what you're doing, that you have an astrophysics lab as your undergrad work. What were you screwing with?"
"Doesn't matter now. I promised I'd do better. Just, totally agreed, never tell them what we saw. The wraith or whatever it was, it wasn't wrong. Without them, we'd crumble pretty damn hard."
"They make a good B-squad for pulling our asses out of the fire."
Clark paused and smiled a little back at his brother. "They keep us human."
Davis didn't have an answer for that.
III. Justice
"Excuse me?" Maddie asked, and, even if he were invulnerable and sometimes a ravening beast, she scared him right then. The fact the windows in Oliver Queen's pretentious clocktower set up were rattling all over was gratifying. "You want Clark and Davis's help now?"
Oliver at least had the decency to look away. He didn't blush brightly, that was more his brother's specialty, but the billionaire did have shame enough to turn his head. Well, like Davis was thinking: Maddie was scary. Considering Oliver was only human and easily slice-able, then he really should watch it.
"Okay so, uh, we got off on the wrong foot-"
"That's a way to say it," Chloe said, and Davis had to wrap his arms around her in order to keep his girlfriend from launching at Ollie. That was cute. Chloe was one-twenty soaking wet. There was no way a desk-jockey like her could take the archer, but it was flattering she'd try.
Clark, being Clark, was the voice of reason here. His brother held up his hand and sighed a bit, causing both Chloe and Maddie's hair to blow in the breeze he kicked up.
Oliver whistled. "So that's a new one."
Davis was not amused, and it took a few seconds to blink the red back from his vision. He didn't always trust his Beast, even around his family. If it came out, Oliver and his team were dead, but he was scared the Beast might not stop at that.
Coughing, thankful his vision was normal again, Davis said, "You're wearing our patience thin. I don't like you. You took my brother and tested him. There's only the grace of God and Chloe's calming presence that kept you in one piece. I really wouldn't press me on that."
"I don't see that you can do anything that Clark can't."
Davis felt his jaw shift both in frustration and anger and stepped back, taking Chloe's hand and concentrating on staying calm. Being ambushed like this had a bad effect on his inner Zen. Clark quirked his head at him and Davis groaned; his brother could probably hear bones rearranging from where he stood.
How keen.
Clark shook his head and held up his hands in a placating gesture. It might have been more calming if he wasn't decked out in a duster and with a Zorro type mask over his eyes. Huh, maybe they did need better costumes.
"Look, Mr. Queen."
"Oliver, please."
"No, I prefer Mr. Queen. I don't consider people who abduct me friends."
"And I was trying to see if you were as strong as I thought. I just needed to see if you were someone Justice could use."
"Bullshit," Maddie hissed and this time the glass behind Oliver shattered in huge chunks and shattered to the ground. "You wanted to play with him. Now you give us cryptic notes, and want Clark and Davis to what? Play for your team? Dream the fuck on."
Clark took her arm and at least the glass stopped rattling. "I'll hear you out."
"Clark, let's just go," Chloe said and she was still struggling in Davis's grip. Sometimes the girls had more bravado than brains.
"No, tell me what you want. You have one minute," Clark said, his voice calm but low and deliberate. It was as close to threatening as his brother could get. Clark was too much of a boy scout for his own good.
"Winslow Schott. I don't know if you've heard of him. Calls himself the Toyman. He's been doing some work for Intergang on retainer, and he's been collecting bombs. We know the warehouse and it needs to be dealt with before he hurts Metropolis. He tends to booby trap but that's not a problem for you two the way it would be for my team."
"If we can even trust you," Maddie said. "You have a shit track record, Robin Hood."
Davis smirked at that, finally having his Beast under control. "If the city's really in danger, then we'll go. We've done as much for Smallville and sometimes here. We can't just leave people hanging because we hate you."
"Thanks, that's so charitable."
"You're lucky we're letting them help at all," Chloe said.
"'Let?'" Ollie asked and he looked at Davis and made the universal sign for whipped.
Davis laughed as he eyed first his brother and then both girls. "Oh you have that right. Look, you've seen what Clark and I can both do, and, frankly, you haven't seen half of it with me. The only thing we're scared of on Earth are these women."
Chloe and Maddie beamed at that then turned with twin stances, hands on hips, to send death glares at Oliver.
Chloe said it best. "Bring them back in one piece or I'll ruin you with The Planet, spill your whole operation."
Maddie shrugged. "I'll do hell on your skyscraper within reason."
Oliver frowned and then looked from him to Clark. "I can see what you mean."
"Well," Clark replied. "It could be worse."
"How?"
"You could meet our mother," Davis said, laughing a little.
Oliver topped that with his insufferable smirk. "So is that a Freud thing?"
IV. Freak
"I really should talk to her," Clark said. "I never should have been so stupid as to get us involved with Oliver's thugs. I mean, great that we stopped the Toyman-worst name ever, by the way-but I didn't expect him to use Tobias Rice to take her. It was bad enough with me, not that it hurt. Besides, maybe Tobias's radar is busted. It's not like she has a power!"
"Yet," Maddie reminded, looking back at Davis. "Clark, honey, don't take this the wrong way, but you might not be the best person to do this. It's not personal, it's just that you were born this way and Chloe's having a big shock."
Her boyfriend frowned, which, to be honest was an adorable look for him since he tended to pout big time when he did that. "I'm her friend."
"You are."
"And you were born with your abilities too."
"True, but sometimes, okay...let me be honest. There needs to be a delicate touch."
"I can be delicate!"
Davis chuckled despite the shocks they'd suffered all day recovering Chloe. "Squirt, you're a nice guy, but 'subtle' is not your thing. I think Maddie should have a shot at this."
"Thanks for your overwhelming vote of confidence," she drawled.
Maddie had distinctly not suggested that Davis talk to Chloe first. He'd made his opinions of Maddie more than clear over the last two years, and from what she'd gathered, had felt similarly about Alicia and Kyla Willowbrook. Davis didn't trust any meteor freaks, and it had taken a long time of her own dedication and steadfast support of Clark before he'd accepted that she wasn't a murderer waiting for her chance. Chloe had had a front seat to all of this, and now that she was infected...it was hard to see Davis, despite his differences, not being suspicious of her.
Maddie did understand. A lot of meteor mutants went crazy; God knows her father had, and her mother had paid dearly for that. For right now, though, Chloe was still Chloe and she had to be freaking out that Davis was going to hate her from now on.
"I can help, you know," Davis offered.
She shook her head. "I know you've never really trusted me."
Clark, bless him, tried to ease the tension. "Mads Davis likes you now."
"The Beast has never threatened me. Let's just consider that a sign of mostly good will," she quipped. "Sometimes things are just between us girls," she finished heading into Chloe's bedroom at her apartment.
The other girl was curled up tightly in her comforter, and Maddie winced at the wound in her shoulder. Davis had had to cut it open to remove the tracking chip. It was lucky for all of them he had EMT training and could suture it shut. Until the boys made their opinions of Oliver's interference more than clear to him, then it wouldn't have been smart to take Chloe to a hospital where she was easily traced. Hell, maybe her bloodwork was different and it wouldn't be good at all for that to be in a hospital database. Still, Maddie didn't like the way she was shaking-not when it wasn't cold-or the blank look on her face as Chloe stared at the clock.
"Chloe?"
She turned and tried to smile, although she was far from successful. The corners of her mouth barely lifted at all. "Hey, I heard everyone arguing over me. You drew the short straw?"
"I insisted. The boys mean well but they're, well, boys."
"They wouldn't be good at it, right?"
"Clark would try, but-"
Chloe laughed a little, and it was genuine. "He's not that good at delicate situations."
"Not really," she said, pulling up Chloe's desk chair and straddling it. "Look, I know Davis wanted to be in here first."
"I noticed you out-voted him."
"He wanted to be here, Chloe. He's worried."
"Does he hate me now?" her voice was stark but Maddie was impressed it didn't break. Chloe was a tough girl, and Maddie didn't even remember ever seeing her cry. "He's made his opinions of meteor freaks pretty clear."
Maddie shrugged and drummed her fingers on the back of the chair. Maybe all of them would stop using that word now that "freak" applied to Chloe. It would matter more to Davis now to quit that. It reminded her that as much as she loved Clark, and as glad as she was that she'd been taken into his family, that she still was the late comer and would never fit as well as Chloe did, had not weathered nearly as much with the boys as her friend had.
"He loves you, you know. I mean, it's not the best situation because of The Beast and what he does."
Spikey and red-eyed hasn't bothered me in years."
"I know that and Clark knows that. Some days I still think Davis doesn't get that."
"But now I can add my whole bucket of weird to the table. Who knows what I can even do. Maybe I'll be inhuman too."
"I'm not. I mean, I can do stuff with glass but I'm not a wolf-girl or a bug-guy or a shadow-creature."
"Yeah, Clark and Davis have met a lot of interesting meteor fr...people patrolling and otherwise. I could sweep this and be something even worse. I mean, if you keep the Beast here with enough food to hunt, so far, it stays mostly harmless."
"It wasn't harmless when it killed Jonathan Kent or Kyla, even if she was a wolf then. Don't kid yourself that there's not blood on Davis's hands and it doesn't eat him up. If you did something...and I'm not saying you will, but if you did, he'd understand."
"You want me to think that."
"He does love you, but I think he'll have to adjust to the fact you're, uh, kind of like me now. I think it'll be harder to fight off fears that you'll eventually end up like my dad."
"You mean crazy?"
"Basically. I can't sugar coat that. You might very well end out badly, and that's what's scaring him-that he'll lose you all over again. Don't mistake that for hating you because I'm still newer to all of this, but I know what I see when I see it."
"You think?"
Maddie reached over and hugged Chloe, something she rarely did. She wasn't a touchy-feely sort of girl, not the way the blonde was. "I know. Give me a minute and I'll be right back." She hopped up and made quick work of getting into the all, making sure to shut the door. She glared back at Davis, and, even though it was an empty threat against someone like him or Clark, caused the glass left on the coffee table to levitate.
"Is she mad?"
"She's scared to death of rejection. So, you go in and you make your apology for all the things you've ever said about meteor mutants count. I...you don't know how much time you'll have with her so I'd make it good, Davis."
He looked at Clark and gulped loudly, and her boyfriend just shrugged.
Huh, she'd made The Ultimate scared. That was kind of cool.
V. Supergirl
"Huh," Chloe said, staring open-mouthed at the girl before her.
While Clark had been able to find out a lot about Krypton, finally, from Dr. Swann's records, not that all the news was good. Still, when he'd uncovered an octagonal disc from it and the ringing had set off, leading him to Reeves Dam, well, she never expected to find another ship.
Or a person who'd been trapped in stasis there.
The tall blonde eyed both her and then Maddie. She quirked her head at both of them, clearly confused. "You're not Kal-El."
"Everyone loves that name," she snarked, thinking back to the Beast's fondness for it and limited vocabulary. "Who are you?"
"I'm looking for Kal-El."
"Clark," Maddie corrected. "He goes by 'Clark' here. He and his brother Davis are out helping clean up after the dam broke. Your ship opened, and I guess we're the welcoming committee."
"You know Kal-El."
Maddie blushed and Chloe had to chuckle at that. "Um, yeah."
"Oh you can say we know the boys in the Biblical sense," Chloe added.
The girl frowned. Huh, her brow wrinkled just like Clark when she did it. Weird. "I don't know what that means, but I'm looking for Kal-El. I'm his cousin Kara, and I have to take care of him." She paused then, really processing it seemed what Maddie had said. "Kal-El can't save anything. He's a baby."
Chloe laughed, thinking of something that odd. "No, he's about twenty, best as we can tell."
"No, we left Krypton and when we got here out of stasis, I'd be nineteen and he'd be closer to three."
"You got buried in the river for a long time," Maddie added. "You're actually younger now, but by just a bit."
"And this Davis?"
"Yeah, we sort of figured that he and Clark aren't biologically related. The fact they, uh, developed differently sort of tipped us off," Chloe hedged. She wasn't sure she trusted Kara at all. The last thing they needed was to tip Kara off that Davis had a beast part to his nature. The other girl might not understand.
"There was no one else sent. Just the two of us."
"But Davis can do a lot of what Clark can, and he came out of the ship too," Maddie objected. "He's fast, strong, and invulnerable. The, uh, heat vision and X-ray stuff just started this summer."
"That's just not...no other families were going to send anyone."
"Yeah, well, these Zod and Faora people did. I assumed that Clark, uh, 'Kal-El' was Zod's too," Maddie said.
"He most certainly is not," Kara spat.
Chloe eyed Maddie and both frowned. Yeah, telling Kara anything about Davis's parentage had been a huge mistake already.
"Hey," Chloe said, holding up her hands. She wished for a white flag or a napkin, anything to indicate her surrender. "Look, let's just talk about this. Maybe we should all go to the river bank and find Clark and Davis together."
Kara's eyes went red and Chloe leapt behind Maddie. Not that Maddie's powers would do any damn good against a Kryptonian. Of course, Chloe didn't even know what hers were yet so that was depressing. "You left my cousin with Zod's spawn?"
"You say that like it's a bad thing," Maddie said. "Look, Davis is super nice. Okay, we had a few issues at first, but he's really super great."
Chloe nodded like a bobble head behind the other girl. She didn't dare whisper to remind Maddie that the less said about the Beast, the better. She'd have to trust the other girl's common sense. Whispering in front of someone with Clark or Davis's hearing was suicide.
"Zod never had children."
Chloe blinked, confused. "No, he did. Davis's memories on that are very clear. It's the only thing he does remember from before."
"No, you misunderstand me. Zod was a scientist and a general. He was in trouble for a lot of things, including starting a war that ruined Krypton, but he did a lot of illicit genetic engineering too. Davis...he's his experiment." With that the girl was gone, and Chloe was running off with Maddie, racing for the river bank and the guys before Kara found them first.
"Maddie?"
"Yeah?" the other girl huffed.
Being mutants didn't make them any more athletic than they'd always been, after all. They really needed to train more if they were going to junior partner with The Blur and The Ultimate.
"I think we made things a lot worse."
"Maybe? Maybe we don't always come up with the best ideas, pal."
"Buddy," Chloe said, wheezing herself as they rounded a corner. "We might have topped ourselves in the idiocy Olympics today, definitely."
