TITLE: Turn of The Hour
AUTHOR: shipperchick, shipperchick_42@yahoo.com
CATEGORY: futurefic, vignette, Chloe/Lex friendship
DISCLAIMER: The characters and situations of 'Smallville' are the property of Warner Bros. and DC Comics. No profit is being made from this endeavor.
RATING: G AUTHORS NOTES: I am currently seeking a Chlex/Chlark friendly beta reader to review my stories for canon, flow, characterization, and distillation of concepts. If you like what you're reading and think you could help, please drop me a line at shipperchick_42@yahoo.com.
Regarding the story: I say 'bah!' to the idea of Lex's "unavoidable" evil destiny, and essentially ignore it. If you have a problem with that lack of explanation, then perhaps this story is not for you. Though, if you're not into canonical stories, what are you doing reading Chlex?
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Ten 'til ten in the morning, and the streets of New York City were teeming.
Here, a girl with blue hair skating past, sipping on coffee. There, a harassed nanny pushing a pair of squalling children to the park. A businesswoman, a street vendor, a flock of Catholic schoolgirls... they all slid over and through the pale gaze of a still, pale man.
It was the turn of the hour, and everyone had somewhere to be - everyone but Lex Luthor.
He'd called for and slid into the limo on a whim. There were, of course, places he *could* be... Business and charity brunches, greasing the right palms. Health clubs and spas, a private jet waiting to whisk him to any isolated corner of the world. But... but. .but there was nowhere he needed to be. In the greatest irony of his life, Lex Luthor had schemed and maneuvered himself into obsolescence.
Winning over the LuthorCorp board, having his father ousted and 'promoted' into a useless advisory position, moving to New York to build up LexCorp - a faster, hungrier corporation in the new breed of corporations, that had been Lex's dream... his destiny. Unfortunately, in creating a new vision of the corporate world, building not on the backs of underlings but with the hands of eager and capable colleagues, he'd delegated himself out of necessity. LexCorp was chock full of greyhound-lean talent and running on smoothly oiled wheels... it left Lex depressingly little to scheme about.
Which was why Lex Luthor, one of the most powerful, influential, and wealthy men in the western world, found himself - in a metaphoric sense only, of course, -- twiddling his thumbs.
Perhaps it was fate; that he decided to step out of the car and join the hurtling masses, strolling to their scurry, ever so slightly apart. Very much apart, if one took in his obscenely sybaritic clothes and the limo that kept silently apace. If not fate, then a very happy accident (and Lex had never been one to believe in those) that caused a pink-cashmere wrapped shoulder to bump roughly against his, and a fortuitous coincidence (didn't believe in those either) that caused the bag gripped in the hand attached to the shoulder to go tumbling down, scattering tightly rolled posters and a host of papers across the sidewalk.
A fluent string of curses emerged from the owner of the bag and shoulder, and Lex watched, somewhat amused but mostly irritated, as a blond head bobbed up and down as she (for it was most definitely a she) stooped along the sidewalk to gather her belongings. The head turned and Lex's irritation quickly turned to shock and surprise, in that order.
"Well? Are you going to... Lex?"
The bag, hand, head, and shoulder all belonged to a somewhat familiar face, and Lex smiled, a well practiced social expression that could mean nothing. or everything. Bending and hitching up his trouser legs, he reached for a wayward poster and handed it to the blonde struck momentarily dumb.
"Hello, Chloe."
"Lex? Lex Luthor?"
He had the urge to laugh, and despite the iron will he normally kept upon his emotive urges, a short bark emerged from him. It was answered almost unconsciously by a tip-tilted pink-lipsticked smile on the girl across from him.
"Exactly how many entirely bald men do you know, Ms. Sullivan, that you have trouble recognizing me?"
They stood, and Chloe shouldered the colorful hobo bag that had begun to drift towards her elbow.
"Not too many, but I also don't know many billionaires out walking the streets of Manhattan on a weekday morning. What brings you to my little corner of the world, Lex? Need directions back to the schwank areas?"
A tilt of the aforementioned bald head, and he ran his eyes up and down her person. She couldn't even feel insulted, because there was nothing prurient or untoward in the gaze, just calculation and assessment. same as ever, for the Luthors.
She'd changed a little, and a lot. The perky short hair of high school was gone, replaced by hair that was longer, feathered at the ends. Still offbeat, still individual, but suiting the cooler gaze that was directed his way. Her face had thinned, the chin sharper, emphasizing the eyes currently lasering into his. He was surprised, given her chosen profession, to see her decked out casually in jeans and a linen blouse, along with the pink sweater that had felt so soft against his arm. But perhaps it was her day off.
A muffled cough from the girl in question, and he realized there'd been a question directed his way. His thoughts gave him another idea, and again on a whim, he blurted (though Luthors never blurted) out the words that would change the direction of his day entirely.
"I was under the impression that the Upper East Side counted itself as one of the 'schwank' areas. actually, Ms. Sullivan, I was just going to grab myself some brunch. Would you care to join me? Unless there's somewhere you have to be."
An instinctive glance down at her watch, and he felt for the rest of his days that she must have seen something of the slight desolation in his gaze, for after the instant it would take to process such information, her head came up and shook away whatever engagement she'd obviously had planned. The knowledge didn't erase the pleased smile from his lips upon hearing her reply, though.
"Mr. Luthor, that is a great idea! I'm starving, and poor enough that I never turn down the offer of free food. Where do you want to go?"
Sweeping one hand towards the limo that had stopped beside them; he placed the other under her arm and guided her towards the door that was opened for them. Taking gentle possession of her bags and handing them over to one of the retainers that always seemed to surround him these days, he pushed her softly into the low car and joined her.
"Wherever you'd like to go, Ms. Sullivan. The world, or at least New York, is your oyster."
"How do you feel about dumplings, Mr. Luthor?"
AUTHOR: shipperchick, shipperchick_42@yahoo.com
CATEGORY: futurefic, vignette, Chloe/Lex friendship
DISCLAIMER: The characters and situations of 'Smallville' are the property of Warner Bros. and DC Comics. No profit is being made from this endeavor.
RATING: G AUTHORS NOTES: I am currently seeking a Chlex/Chlark friendly beta reader to review my stories for canon, flow, characterization, and distillation of concepts. If you like what you're reading and think you could help, please drop me a line at shipperchick_42@yahoo.com.
Regarding the story: I say 'bah!' to the idea of Lex's "unavoidable" evil destiny, and essentially ignore it. If you have a problem with that lack of explanation, then perhaps this story is not for you. Though, if you're not into canonical stories, what are you doing reading Chlex?
---------------------------------------------------------------------------- ----
Ten 'til ten in the morning, and the streets of New York City were teeming.
Here, a girl with blue hair skating past, sipping on coffee. There, a harassed nanny pushing a pair of squalling children to the park. A businesswoman, a street vendor, a flock of Catholic schoolgirls... they all slid over and through the pale gaze of a still, pale man.
It was the turn of the hour, and everyone had somewhere to be - everyone but Lex Luthor.
He'd called for and slid into the limo on a whim. There were, of course, places he *could* be... Business and charity brunches, greasing the right palms. Health clubs and spas, a private jet waiting to whisk him to any isolated corner of the world. But... but. .but there was nowhere he needed to be. In the greatest irony of his life, Lex Luthor had schemed and maneuvered himself into obsolescence.
Winning over the LuthorCorp board, having his father ousted and 'promoted' into a useless advisory position, moving to New York to build up LexCorp - a faster, hungrier corporation in the new breed of corporations, that had been Lex's dream... his destiny. Unfortunately, in creating a new vision of the corporate world, building not on the backs of underlings but with the hands of eager and capable colleagues, he'd delegated himself out of necessity. LexCorp was chock full of greyhound-lean talent and running on smoothly oiled wheels... it left Lex depressingly little to scheme about.
Which was why Lex Luthor, one of the most powerful, influential, and wealthy men in the western world, found himself - in a metaphoric sense only, of course, -- twiddling his thumbs.
Perhaps it was fate; that he decided to step out of the car and join the hurtling masses, strolling to their scurry, ever so slightly apart. Very much apart, if one took in his obscenely sybaritic clothes and the limo that kept silently apace. If not fate, then a very happy accident (and Lex had never been one to believe in those) that caused a pink-cashmere wrapped shoulder to bump roughly against his, and a fortuitous coincidence (didn't believe in those either) that caused the bag gripped in the hand attached to the shoulder to go tumbling down, scattering tightly rolled posters and a host of papers across the sidewalk.
A fluent string of curses emerged from the owner of the bag and shoulder, and Lex watched, somewhat amused but mostly irritated, as a blond head bobbed up and down as she (for it was most definitely a she) stooped along the sidewalk to gather her belongings. The head turned and Lex's irritation quickly turned to shock and surprise, in that order.
"Well? Are you going to... Lex?"
The bag, hand, head, and shoulder all belonged to a somewhat familiar face, and Lex smiled, a well practiced social expression that could mean nothing. or everything. Bending and hitching up his trouser legs, he reached for a wayward poster and handed it to the blonde struck momentarily dumb.
"Hello, Chloe."
"Lex? Lex Luthor?"
He had the urge to laugh, and despite the iron will he normally kept upon his emotive urges, a short bark emerged from him. It was answered almost unconsciously by a tip-tilted pink-lipsticked smile on the girl across from him.
"Exactly how many entirely bald men do you know, Ms. Sullivan, that you have trouble recognizing me?"
They stood, and Chloe shouldered the colorful hobo bag that had begun to drift towards her elbow.
"Not too many, but I also don't know many billionaires out walking the streets of Manhattan on a weekday morning. What brings you to my little corner of the world, Lex? Need directions back to the schwank areas?"
A tilt of the aforementioned bald head, and he ran his eyes up and down her person. She couldn't even feel insulted, because there was nothing prurient or untoward in the gaze, just calculation and assessment. same as ever, for the Luthors.
She'd changed a little, and a lot. The perky short hair of high school was gone, replaced by hair that was longer, feathered at the ends. Still offbeat, still individual, but suiting the cooler gaze that was directed his way. Her face had thinned, the chin sharper, emphasizing the eyes currently lasering into his. He was surprised, given her chosen profession, to see her decked out casually in jeans and a linen blouse, along with the pink sweater that had felt so soft against his arm. But perhaps it was her day off.
A muffled cough from the girl in question, and he realized there'd been a question directed his way. His thoughts gave him another idea, and again on a whim, he blurted (though Luthors never blurted) out the words that would change the direction of his day entirely.
"I was under the impression that the Upper East Side counted itself as one of the 'schwank' areas. actually, Ms. Sullivan, I was just going to grab myself some brunch. Would you care to join me? Unless there's somewhere you have to be."
An instinctive glance down at her watch, and he felt for the rest of his days that she must have seen something of the slight desolation in his gaze, for after the instant it would take to process such information, her head came up and shook away whatever engagement she'd obviously had planned. The knowledge didn't erase the pleased smile from his lips upon hearing her reply, though.
"Mr. Luthor, that is a great idea! I'm starving, and poor enough that I never turn down the offer of free food. Where do you want to go?"
Sweeping one hand towards the limo that had stopped beside them; he placed the other under her arm and guided her towards the door that was opened for them. Taking gentle possession of her bags and handing them over to one of the retainers that always seemed to surround him these days, he pushed her softly into the low car and joined her.
"Wherever you'd like to go, Ms. Sullivan. The world, or at least New York, is your oyster."
"How do you feel about dumplings, Mr. Luthor?"