Title: Displacement
Rating: T
Category: Romance/Suspence
Content: Chlex
Summary: Clark's abilities had always stood between them. Could hers bring them back together?
Spoilers: This takes place in season 5 starting with the episode Hypnotic. But, honestly, the whole series is fair game here.
Disclaimer: Smallville and all its characters are owned by people who are not me. No profit is made and no infringement is intended.
A/N #1 – This begins with Hypnotic, which I completely rewrite the way I want it to go and then from there I'm off on my own. I'm going to ignore and/or drastically minimize the stuff with Fine that's going on at this time in the show because this is going to be a much lighter story then my other fics and, frankly, as cute as James Marsters is there's only so much work I want to do.
A/N #2 – This is dedicated to Westwingwolf because it is her birthday and she remembered to remind me. lolol Happy birthday, www. I hope that this story will meet with your approval.
A/N #3 – This story was inspired by the Chloe Meteor Power Fic-a-thon hosted by http//tobywolf13. (remove space between : and / ). I started it but ended up writing something else. The master list for the fic-a-thon at this point is here - http//tobywolf13. The stories were good; you should go take a look.

Prologue

"Do it, Lionel. Kill your son."

As Chloe heard the words coming from up ahead, she wondered why Lex chose to remain in a town where watches could be accurately set according to the routine attempts on his life. But, more to the point, she wondered why she stayed when she kept getting caught up in them.

Of course, even though Smallville had far more than it's fair share of weirdness, she was willing to admit barging into the mansion to demand information about some psycho hypno chick, when said psycho was still on the loose and clearly involved with the Luthors, was probably more her fault than the town's.

Not that she had had much choice. When Lana had called her earlier in hysterics because Clark had dumped her for some "blonde bimbo slut", Chloe had rushed to the farm to see what new cosmic catastrophe had befallen her friend.

When she'd finally reached the Kent farm the woman in question was just leaving. Chloe smiled and played nice, but the minute she was gone the interrogation had started. From what she'd been able to gather from a still bemused Clark, all that Simone had done was come onto him, make him believe that they were beginning a relationship, and then had him break up Lana.

Honestly, by Smallville standards Chloe thought that he'd gotten off pretty easy. She hadn't even left him all tranced up, or made him believe he was a chicken. And, while Lana was reeling from the supposed betrayal and Clark would no doubt be serving penance with the brunette for weeks to come, the fact was that they were all very fortunate that whatever he and Simone had done hadn't exposed his powers. God only knew the kind of havoc that some amoral, mind controlling bitch could reek with a Kryptonian at her mercy.

And so, having ascertained that Clark was, with the exception of his perpetual Lana trauma, okay for the moment, Chloe left to see what she could dig up on this Simone and, more importantly, why a woman with this kind of power and no inkling of Clark's secret would waste her time breaking up a farm boy and a small town princess.

Sadly, the answer hadn't been even a little shocking. In Smallville all roads had only two destinations - the meteor rocks and the Luthors. And this time it definitely wasn't the meteor rocks.

From what Chloe had been able to gather, Simone's father had been a renowned hypnotist who was reputed to be able to cure his patients of things from addiction to cancer. And, from what she'd seen, on both Simone and in old news paper reports, it had something to do with the large blue stone hanging on his daughter's neck. Since the man had been killed in a robbery and the only thing taken was the stone, it was her belief that whatever power the man had held was now in Simone's hand.

The only thing she hadn't been able to figure out at this point was which Luthor was actually pulling the strings.

Lex certainly had the motive. It was no secret that he was trying to drive a wedge between Clark and Lana recently. Whether that was due to any genuine interest in the other girl, Chloe was unsure; but whatever Lex's reasons were, there wasn't even the slightest stretch of her imagination necessary for her to believe that he was capable of authoring such a plot.

And yet, Chloe couldn't rule out the elder Luthor as a viable suspect. But while she could easily see Lionel, once again, disrupting Clark's existence, she found it nearly impossible to believe that he'd do so for the sole purpose of ruining his love life. Besides, Clark had been doing a fine job of that for years. Lionel wasn't the type of man who would dirty his hands with a task already being accomplished so magnificently.

But her research had revealed that Lionel had the concrete connection to Simone's father that Lex had lacked. Which left her with the quandary of which held more weight – motive or opportunity?

There was simply no way of telling which one of the two was responsible for the mess that had apparently grown out of even their considerable control. And Chloe would have thought, rather snidely in fact, that it served them both right, if she wasn't about to be dragged into the middle of yet another Smallville deathmatch…or what she liked to call Wednesday.

Peeking around the half open door, Chloe merely planned to scope out the situation before she called for back up. And for once in her dealings with the bizarre that meant the police. After all, Clark was, for obvious reasons, clearly out; and Smallville's finest, while definitely susceptible to Simone's brand of persuasion, would hopefully be able to arrive in great enough numbers that she simply wouldn't be able to manipulate them all.

Despite her sense of resolve it was only her endless experiences with life and death situations that held back Chloe's gasp at the sight that met her eyes. Lex, who had clearly been unsuccessfully trying to reason with his father, was backed up against the nearest wall, his left hand pressed tightly to his right arm, staunching the flow of blood from what was obviously Lionel's previous effort to obey Simone's command.

As Lionel slowly moved forward, the colored light from the stained glass windows caught the edge of the heavy antique dagger clutched in his hand, arcing rainbows waves across the floor. The sight of such beauty from something so clearly designed to kill was incongruous and the contradiction held Chloe momentarily transfixed. But Simone's insistent orders snapped her back to reality. And just in time.

"Kill Lex now!"

Honestly, she felt cheated. For once she'd been planning to be common sense Chloe. She was going to be the girl who cried wolf instead of going out and hunting the damn thing herself. But the new and improved version of her wasn't worth someone's life. Even a Luthor's. And so she sighed and said goodbye to level headed, sensible plan Chloe as she shoved open the door and threw herself towards the two men.

As her feet practically flew across the short distance Chloe realized that she had no idea what she was going to do once she arrived at her destination. She'd really only had time to think of the one plan which mainly involved letting other people handle things. Certainly what she was doing at the moment couldn't be considered a plan. Stupidity, yes. A plan, not so much.

And, unfortunately, there really was no more time to think as she reached the men just in time to grasp Lionel's thrusting arm. A deceptively effective concept until she realized that she hadn't stopped the blades momentum; merely directed it towards herself.

Time seemed to slow and allowed Chloe an individual awareness of the myriad of events unfolding around her. She felt the knife slide past her skin and tear through the muscles of her abdomen in a fiery burst of agony. She felt strong arms go around her, halting what she was certain was a swift descent to the floor. And, oddly enough, she heard Lex's shout of denial before everything went black.

As quickly as the darkness had taken her the light pulled her back. But everything wasn't how she left it. It was all just…wrong. She didn't feel pain, but neither did she feel alright. The room was the same as it had always been, and yet everything looked vaguely off. Her body in Lex's arms was-

And suddenly she realized why things appeared out of whack. Because, while her body was resting against Lex's body, the rest of her wasn't.

Chloe tried to recall everything she'd ever read about out of body experiences. Unfortunately, most of the weirdness she had researched had to do with aliens and meteor rocks. Which was too bad, because she really wanted some clue as to how to get back into her body. She liked it. It fit well and she'd become accustomed to it over the years. Of course, the down side was that it was currently bleeding profusely, but Chloe was fairly certain that she had a better chance at addressing that situation if she were corporeal.

However, Chloe had always been a problem solver, and she knew that normally she could think the situation through to a logical conclusion. She just needed a moment to consider the options. Regrettably, her stabbing didn't appear to have shocked the room into a beneficial silence.

"Chloe? Chloe!"

Hearing the uncustomary fear in Lex's voice Chloe decided she could overlook the fact that his concern, while touching, wasn't actually helping her find a way out of the current mess.

However, Simone's screeching was just obnoxious, both for the sound of her whiny voice and her repetitive incitements to murder.

"Lionel, I order you to kill your son this instant."

Chloe wasn't sure how he was managing to withstand Simone's hypnotic pull, but she was grateful that the older Luthor was no longer scuttling to do her evil bidding. Both because she honestly didn't want to see Lex get hurt and, in a more realistic and self oriented way, she didn't want to see him attacked while he was clutching her defenseless body, trying to stop the rampant spilling of her blood.

Suddenly, to Chloe's great shock, Lex's eyes locked on her. Voice heavy with loathing and accusation he spit at her, "What have you done?"

He was blaming her? Chloe's mind reeled at the unfairness of that thought when she had gone charging in there in the first place to save his miserable, ungrateful life. And she was just about to tell him as much when she heard someone rushing up behind her.

Forgetting her predicament and acting on instinct alone, Chloe turned towards the sound, and pushed forward to ward of what she assumed was an attack. She saw her own shock revealed on Simone's face as the knife in Chloe's hand slammed into the stone she was wearing, breaking it, before sliding into the other woman's chest.

Simone's shock was easy to understand; she'd just been stabbed and was slowly sinking to the floor, dagger still embedded in her. Chloe's shock, however, came not from just killing a woman, although she was certain that trauma would set in momentarily, but because she had held the dagger…with a hand that wasn't hers.

But this was Smallville, so there could never be one mind bending ordeal at a time.

And then bad went to worse and worse traveled light years to unbearably horrific as she realized that the reason that she wasn't in her own body was because she was in Lionel Luthor's.

"Lex?"

Chloe could hear the quaver in the voice that spoke – Lionel's voice; and it must have sounded as strange to Lex as it did to her because his head jerked up in response and his eyes narrowed. But whatever problems he had with his father's uncharacteristic behavior he seemed to quickly shake of as Chloe saw his attention once again concentrate itself on her wounded body.

"Call an ambulance!"

That was a good plan. Chloe whole heartedly approved of that idea. And she knew that, under normal circumstances that would be her top priority. But normally she wasn't trapped in the mortal coil of Satan, so she figured she could be forgiven her hesitation.

"Lex," she tried once again. "That's not me. I mean - that is me, but I'm not in there."

She knew that she was mucking things up, but explaining to someone that she was inhabiting their father's body was apparently not her forte. Still, she was nothing if not persistent. And desperate to get out of Lionel's body. God only knew where it had been.

"It's me, Chloe."

She didn't know what it was that convinced him; something in her voice, her eyes, the general lack of an "I'm going to crush you and serve your children as an amuse buche" air that Lionel seemed to perpetually project. Whatever it was that tipped Lex off, Chloe was sure that it would horrify Lionel no end and that gave her some small measure of comfort.

Suddenly the hall rang with the sound of footsteps and the missing security flooded into the room.

She was glad when Lex barked at the men to call for help. At that point she wasn't sure that she could have managed such a complex task in her new body. In fact, she didn't even make it the three steps over to her own injured form without stumbling and was grateful to sink to her knees.

A terrible thought occurred to her and Lionel's trembling voice emerged once more.

"I'm not-"

Chloe couldn't even finish her question; wouldn't contemplate what manner of cruel fate would kill her body, leaving her body trapped in a living hell.

"No." Lex's fierce response was reassuring, but the growing spread of crimson that even his large hands could not contain belied his confident assertion. As she watched the precious liquid pool on the floor Chloe couldn't help but ponder which was worse - being stabbed or being Lionel.

With shaking, unfamiliar hands, Chloe removed the jacket of Lionel's suit. Knowing the smooth, expensive material might actually be worth more than her life didn't concern her in the least as she passed it to Lex who promptly pressed it against her wound.

She was so pale. Chloe wasn't sure if it was the loss of blood or the loss of her soul that had turned her skin to parchment, and she couldn't stop herself from reaching out to gently brush her ashen cheek.

The earlier darkness rose up and engulfed her once more, only to be replaced, near instantly, with blinding light and burning pain. As her eyes fluttered open, she was met with gray eyes, swirling with anxious concern.

"Chloe?"

About to answer Lex's hesitant inquiry, Chloe was distracted by a loud thud. Turning her head was an experiment in agony, but it was worth it for the concrete proof that she was back in her own body. For there, in an untidy pile on the floor, was the unconscious form of Lionel Luthor.

Glancing back at Lex's worried expression, Chloe did her best to fight past the pain and let Lex know that she was herself once more; although inside she again cursed the vagaries of their small town that made such ridiculous assurances necessary.

"Yeah. I'm me again."

Despite his serious demeanor, a small smirk tugged at the corner of his lips as he, too, appreciated the overwhelming strangeness that made up their lives.

Chloe watched as Lex's lips began moving again, but no sound reached her ears. She knew that she was losing consciousness and could only hope that she'd remain safely tucked into her body this time. Before her last hold on reality faded, once final thought spilled across her mind - of the two experiences, being stabbed was much better.

TBC