Prolog: Tragedy in the Tower
Summary: Picks up in season eight's Doomsday right after Jimmy and Chloe kiss.
"Jimmy no, wait. This isn't right. I can't do this again." Chloe turned her head, evading the familiar kiss and pushed against Jimmy's chest. Instead of releasing her, he tightened his grip on her arms and attempted to mash his mouth harder against her lips. "Jimmy!" She cried in surprise and irritation. "Stop it. I said no." She began struggling more vigorously as she felt his fingers dig painfully into her flesh. "You're hurting me." Suddenly he was pulled back and spun away.
"She said no."
Jimmy raised his hand and pointed his finger at Davis. "Stay out of this. This is none of your business. You've already messed things up enough as it is."
"You're the one that's messed up. Your pupils are dilated, your hands shaking. Are you on something or coming off something?" Davis stayed between Jimmy and Chloe.
"Great," Jimmy savagely grinned, "judgment from the Cornfield Killer. I ought to turn you over to the police myself." He pushed Davis and tried to twist around him, but Davis grabbed him around the middle and held him back.
"Jimmy!" Chloe's outrage penetrated whatever fog was settling over his reason and he stopped struggling. "Davis, it's ok."
Davis scowled, clearly not happy, but trusting Chloe, he let go and backed off a few paces. Jimmy sent Davis a dirty look and eagerly reached for Chloe.
"No stop." Chloe held up her palm to ward him off. He listened this time and halted a couple feet in front of her. Davis watched warily from the sides, shifting side-to-side, ready to intervene if needed.
"I don't get it Chlo." Jimmy blinked in confusion. "Everything can go back to the way it should be." A whine crept into his tone. "You said that you never wanted to leave me, that you missed me."
"I did, I do miss you. I hated how things ended between us, hated seeing you walk out of my life, but I can't go back." Chloe bit her lip in misery. "I'm sorry I gave you the wrong idea. I shouldn't have kissed you. This place is amazing and for a moment everything felt so familiar, so simple, but it's not enough, I can't let it be, things have changed."
A snarl curled his lip. "What's changed? Him?" His disgust was palatable.
"No, no, this has nothing to do with Davis."
Jimmy's hands fisted at his sides and something ugly flashed in his eyes as he shook his head. The muscles on his jaw clenched tightly against it, but a mirthless laugh escaped anyway. "Clark? Is this still about Clark?" Abruptly his voice turned pleading. "But everything is different now. I know now. I understand and I can forgive you." He held out his hand and took a step toward her. "We can start a brand new life right here."
Chloe warily took a step back. Like a hundred times before, Jimmy was saying what her head told her were the right words, but this time Chloe was listening to her gut. As often as he tried to say or do the right thing, he would never be right for her. "Jimmy, I'm so sorry, but I can't do that."
With her words, he reverted to the snarling stranger. "You married me!" Jimmy spit out the fact like an accusation.
Chloe heard the echo of their humiliating break up in the hospital hallways and felt the sting anew. Her spine stiffened and some of her sympathy ebbed away. "And you divorced me," she answered coolly. She took a breath and tried to continue more calmly. She had loved him as best she could. She didn't want their relationship to end in bitterness again. "I would have tried to make our marriage work," she tried to explain, "but you were right. I can't give you what you need and I can no longer pretend otherwise"
Jimmy closed his eyes and shook his head in denial. His trembling increased and the sweaty sheen to his skin was more pronounced than before. "No." He said softly, still shaking his head. "No." He said again, becoming louder and more agitated. "You can't do this to me." He shouted with his eyes still screwed tightly shut.
"Jimmy, you're obviously not yourself right now." Chloe closed the gap between them and tried to lay a sympathetic hand on his shoulder, but he reacted to her touch as if he had been burned.
"Get the hell away from me," he roared, shoving her arm away with enough force to cause her to stumble. "Don't touch me."
Davis rushed forward to steady her before she could fall. He looked over his shoulder at Jimmy. "You need to back off."
Jimmy laughed, a choked, bitter sound. "What? You think you are any better off? You're a fool. A monster pretending to be a man. She doesn't love you," he sneered. "Weren't you listening? She did it all for Clark."
Pain raced over Davis's face, but he fought for control of his emotions. "She never lied to me," he forced past the tightness in his throat. "I hoped, maybe in time..." He looked down at Chloe, still clutching her shoulders, the yearning in his eyes a palatable force.
"Davis I do care for you, but…," Chloe was interrupted by a keening sound of rage.
"Damn it, look at ME!" Jimmy grabbed a metal pipe leaning against the wall and used it to smash a section of the stained glass behind him. Colored shards flew back and hit the concrete floors, sounding like a wind chime in a hurricane.
"Jimmy!" Chloe cried out, pushing Davis away. "You need to calm down."
He spun around, fury glinting in his eyes. "Don't you talk to me! You don't know what I need."
"I know what you need," Davis told Jimmy, stepping around Chloe and putting himself between her and her ex-husband. "I've seen it a hundred times. You're crashing and jonesing so badly you can't think straight." He took a tentative step toward him and then another. "Just put the pipe down and we can get you help."
Jimmy squinted and blinked, like he was trying to focus on what Davis was saying. He wiped at his perspiring brow with that back of his shaky hand and for a moment, seemed to be considering the offer. He shut his eyes and gave his head a hard shake. When he reopened his eyes, in their depths madness swirled and found new focus.
Jimmy pointed his finger at Davis. "Monster!" He raised the iron pole like a baseball bat and took a step in his direction.
"Jimmy no!" Chloe cried.
"Olsen! You don't want to do this." Dave slowly drew back toward the winding stairs.
"Yes, I do." Jimmy ground out. He swung at Davis's head, missing by inches, the metal bar reverberating off a corner of the stairs instead. "This is all your fault."
Davis backed into an abandoned stepladder, grabbed it and tossed it into Jimmy's path. He batted it away easily, sending it crashing off to the side. He took another swing at Davis, forcing him to leap back and leaving him corralled in the corner. Jimmy flexed his fingers around the pole resting against his shoulder and calmly announced, "You destroyed my life, now I'm going to destroy yours."
"Jimmy, stop it!" Chloe screamed helplessly as he swung at Davis a third time. On the down swing, Davis grabbed a hold of the rod and wrenched it out of Jimmy's hands, the force spinning Jimmy around. Jimmy let the momentum fling him back and Chloe gasped in horror as three metal pipes snaking up out of the floor cleanly impaled him through the middle.
Blood, black, thick, and viscous oozed out of the corner of his mouth and his body twitched violently. In the seconds before his eyes went lifeless, he grinned like the devil, the scarlet of his blood staining his teeth and gagging him as he choked out one final word. "Mons..ter."
Frozen, Chloe felt her breath hitch, unable to believe Jimmy was dead. Davis swayed in front of Jimmy's body, still gripping the jagged ended metal rod he'd yanked from Jimmy's hands.
"What have I done?" He whispered. Horror and revulsion left him pale and unsteady, tears welling in his eyes. "No, no," he moaned in anguish. "I won't go back. I won't be the monster. No, no, not now."
The despair in Davis's voice broke through Chloe's shock to trigger new panic. "Davis, it was an accident." She took a step toward him, alarmed to see the corrosive sorrow contorting his features.
"Stay away from me Chloe," he shouted hoarsely. "I'm dangerous. You were right not to love me."
"No," she firmly disagreed and came closer until they were only an arms length apart. "Davis, you know I care for you."
A parody of a smile wryly twisted his lips. "But you don't love me. Something in you must know." His gaze returned to Jimmy's fallen form.
"How I feel isn't your fault. Jimmy isn't your fault." She insisted, desperate for him to understand.
Davis stared transfixed at Jimmy's body, not hearing her. "It's what they created for me to be," he said in disgust. "I'm just a weapon, a destroyer, a murderer, an abomination, a...a monster," his voice broke on the final word, and wetness spilled down his cheeks.
"No, that's not true." His hopelessness clawed at her insides. She could hear it in his voice; he was giving up. She felt hot tears well up in her eyes. She tried reasoning with him. "You've been separated from Doomsday." She choked back a sob. "Please!" She begged him to listen. "You can do anything you want. You're free now, free to make your own choices."
He jerked his head to look at her, then at the sharp pole in his hand, and again at Chloe's desperate, pleading green eyes. His furrowed brow smoothed out, and he exhaled on a long steady breath. "I'm so glad I met you Chloe. It doesn't matter how you feel about me, because loving you gives me the strength to make my own choices." He reached out with his hand and brushed back a strand of her silky hair that had fallen over her forehead. Hope appeared in her eyes.
"I will not be what they want me to be," he vowed. Taking a step back from Chloe, he nodded and said, "I choose death," and rammed the spike through his cardio pulmonary system.
"No!!!!!" Chloe cried, dropping to his side as his knees buckled and he collapsed to the floor. Her hands fluttered helplessly around his wound, the iron pipe sticking out from his body cavity at a grotesque angle. She knew she couldn't remove it without inflicting even more harm. "Oh Davis, why, why?"
"It's ok," he crooned and moved his hand to brush against hers.
She grabbed it up tightly in both of her hands. "No, no, it's not ok."
"Yes," he insisted, fighting against the pain, "this is good." He groaned. "This is mine."
Her tears fell hot and heavy. "I tried, I tried to save you," she sobbed while rocking and holding his hand to her face.
"You…did." He gasped and coughed, leaving flecks of foamy blood clinging to his lower lip. "You did… save me." A beautiful smile curved his mouth and lit his soft chocolate eyes. "I'll never again…be a… mons..ter." A shudder went through his body and his head slumped to the side.
"Davis, Davis." She called his name in denial, but his hand was slack in hers and his chest did not move.
Chloe looked from Davis to where Jimmy lay impaled and then out through the shattered window. From her vantage high on the hill, she could see fires dotting the city, burning brighter than the dawning morning sun. Hours had passed since Clark went after Doomsday.
Was Clark somewhere out there in Metropolis, still battling an unconquerable creature born for destruction?
Or, had Clark also lost his fight?
Unable to hold her agony inside any longer, Chloe tipped back her head and let her wild wails of grief echo down over her city.
Author's note: While I have no right to start another story when I have Another World as my first priority, this came bursting out of me after the epic fail that was season eight's finale. The story of Davis Bloome was meant to end in tragedy, not a psychotic rage, while at the same time, Jimmy was supposed to be spiraling out of control from his drug addiction. Clearly something went afoul in the writers room. This prolog is my Jimmy/Davis fix. I'll take care of the rest of Doomsday's big mistakes (and missed chances) in following chapters.