Disclaimer: I do not own Smallville, its characters, or anything associated.
A/N: Just another piece with Clark and Lex. This was written so I could play with point of view and description. Thanks for reading, and please let me know what you think.
Watch Us Shatter
It was twilight; the evening time where the sky began its descent to inky darkness while the stars awoke from their beds of clouds to twinkle in the sky. The milky white moon yawned in its glittering sanctuary, not yet prepared to awaken from a blissful sleep.
Beneath the sky with its entire serene splendor was the world; the world that struggled and battle with every second it spun. Beneath was a place of green grasses that betrayed nothing of the blood spilt there ages before, those fickle gravestones devoured by animals and the dumb beasts that knew no better. Peppered in that land were tiny homes, seemingly randomly placed without care or consideration of the long miles betwixt and in-between.
But far away from those delicate wooden houses, forged of the thin sticks that would collapse at any rush of breath, faraway there lay a different shadow against the horizon. It cut a proud shape in the blackening sky; a scent of pretentiousness lingering to the high towers, for it saw no reason to be modest. The bricks, crumbling to perfection, had stood ground for powerful centuries. The stain glass windows, defying the moon's countenance, captured the remaining rays of the sun. They sliced the throats of the burning captives, spilling the hot blood on the polished floors.
The castle had been spectator to many a battle, as small as a friendly spat and as grand as legions of warriors versus hordes of screaming soldiers, choking on their own bloodthirsty cries of war. Still, the sounds echoing, bellowing enough to rattle the glass, through the castle shook even it to its foundation. The storm brewing within was pernicious in its deadly rage, thundering and booming with crashes and indulging bitterness.
Once again she would bear witness, observe and document in her stonewalls the story for the future to behold. So the castle did not sink into the mortar, flee from the banging and clanging of blade upon blade, rapier against broadsword, modernized for the night's confrontation. She opened her hidden ears, unveiled her timeless eyes and let the legendary scene unfold.
"Why can't you just let it go?"
There was anger, agitation mixed with fear, a masked current flowing invisible upon the spectrum. A figure followed the exclamation, large hands dangerously close to gouging into the cold stonewalls. His hair was abused and wild, eyes a wide, uncontrolled green, like the grass outside that grew to conceal so many things. This familiar intruder stomped around until he faced another man, he who ruled the castle with an unprecedented fairness, if not benevolence.
"Let what go, Clark? The impossible speed, the display of incredible, inhuman strength? Forgive me, but it's becoming difficult to keep track."
The master's tone was bitterly cold, freezing with frost that the castle could feel shivering upon her walls. His eyes were similar, two twisting pools of blue, churning and foolishly unchecked whirlpools.
"That's not fair. I didn't-"
"Didn't what?"
A deceptively smooth flurry of movement, leading to a pale hand with equally pale fingers clasped around a clear glass, filled to the brim with enticing liquid gold.
"Didn't reduce my fifth car to pieces in your amateur rescue attempt?"
A long sip, a cruel twitch of the lips barely concealing waves of chilling, unstable rage.
Teeth gleam in a parody of a sickening smile, reflecting the truest intelligence in madness.
"Have I hit my head too many times, Clark? One Smallville concussion too many? They have conveniently been practically gift wrapped on my step."
The atmosphere bristled with righteous indignation, heated in unbearable degrees with an oppressive intensity. Broad hands, a warrior's hands, fisted themselves in the checked pattern of knaves, or the rare romantic hero. Shoulders so often stooped and brought low, transformed into something else with a strength otherworldly, carved from marble, or like the castle, stone.
"I've told you the truth, Lex. You're just so convinced something is there that you won't believe it. There isn't anything there, just me. It's just Clark Kent."
Piano hands clenching tighter, glass howling in unheard pain. Drink covering its ears at the tortured sounds, slipping side by side in futile efforts at the promise of freedom.
"You're right. Whatever it is you're hiding, it is Clark Kent."
Steps moving close when expensive shoes reverberate their march across the floor. Bodies that should be separated in their fury shift close, magnetism, opposite, backwards, and unavoidable.
Lips curling up, wound vipers ready to strike venom seeping through, deadly and pink.
"You can't hide from the truth, no matter how much you try. As for who you are, that can't be hidden, not from me. I'm not willing to play the fool, Clark, nor am I blind."
"I don't want you to be-"
The glass went flying, soaring like a bird freed from a lifelong cage, finally stretching its forgotten wings. A crash, and the glass rained, cried its failure in sparkling, fragmented, pitiful tears. Its blood seeped forth, staining the floor, branding it with inerasable memory.
"What the heck, Lex?"
"What?"
Honestly curious, but honestly mocking, a sweet word mixed and blended into darker colors. Strong blue met viridian bewilderment, a silent clash of titans, too grand for so small a stage.
"Why did you do that?"
"Why did I do what, Clark?"
Deceptively smooth.
"Throw the glass, Lex!"
"I'm afraid I have no idea what you're referring to, Clark."
The dawning of the joke, a revolting contrast to the midnight backdrop that breathed upon the castle walls. Wide eyes shrinking, narrowing, hardening, liquid cooling to a dangerous gemstone.
"I saw you."
"Nothing was thrown, Clark."
"Stop playing games, Lex!"
"This is a game?"
A change of tone, no longer slick and bemused, patronizing lilt abandoned for something vicious.
"I told you nothing happened. Don't you trust me, Clark, don't you believe me? I thought we were friends."
Words that didn't belong in that mouth, childish and mocked. Fury was born in the other's depths, a fire alight from the bizarre turn the path had taken.
"This isn't the same!"
Eyes flash.
"Isn't it?"
And the metamorphosis continues, for the quiet spell has been banished to the populated sidelines. Snarls take its place, biting, guttural words, hissed and spat with animalistic shouts.
"Why should it matter if you saw it with your own two eyes? I'm your friend, and as your friend I have the unspoken right to tell you what's real, what's the truth."
Finger lifted, pointing, accusing. A wall between them, immovable. Neither tries.
"That's the way friendship works, isn't it Clark?"
Silence, thick, heavy, laden with diamond-incrusted secrets, ground from concealing lumps of black coal. Heavy breathing on one side, panic and uncertainty buzzing from the other. An impasse.
Crossable?
Maybe.
Willing?
Debatable.
"I'm sorry, Lex. I'm sorry if I've…made you think that's what friendship means."
The possibility of peace was crushed them, shattered, splintered like the glass dirtying the ruined floor. An ounce of pity, devastating and infuriating. Remorse, also present, raising a meek head in a crowd of thousands. Change was absent, and such the blow was crushing.
"Goodnight, Clark."
No more, no less, a dismissal, curt, disgustingly polite, and that was all.
As previously conducted so many a time, a brittle draw, ever so breakable, stretched across them.
One heart left.
One heart stayed.
Two hearts ached.
And the castle watched life continue on.