A/N: Sorry this update took so long! I started university a month ago and I've been really busy with homework and the overall experience. Moreover, I've been extremely busy with my original story (Light Dusk, Dark Dawn- Link is on my profile, please R+R!). This chapter is un-beta'd and hot off the press, so go easy on me!


Alienated Villain, Isolated Hero.

I'm going to die, he thought as the oncoming bullet raced towards his skull. It was his own fault anyway; Lex hired this man to kill him.

The hired gun didn't know that his mark was his employer, so he couldn't even talk him out of shooting. Lex had to accept his death and defeat, Clark wasn't coming. The only thing the camera he had set up would catch was his accidental death. He closed his eyes, readying himself for the impact, but opened them again after feeling a distinct breeze against his skin.

He was in a cornfield.

Not just any cornfield, but the Kent's. After gathering his wits for a second, Lex stood up and walked towards the Kent's house to try and hitch a lift back to the mansion. After all, he had a tape to watch back.

He decided against knocking on the front door and went round the back towards the barn in search of his Saviour himself. Upon walking into the barn Lex noticed a shirtless Clark attempting to fix the wood chipper, unaware of the audience he now held. His shirt was hanging on the bannister leading up to his room. The first thing Lex noticed about the red-checked shirt was the hole in it located on the left pocket. It was almost undoubtedly a bullet hole. His eyes then drifted back to the boy himself. Could this man be capable of saving my life along with others on countless occasions? He mused.

As much as he enjoyed the view, he knew that getting back to the mansion to watch the tapes was his main priority. He cleared his throat loudly.

The younger man looked up and flushed as he realised he had company.

"Hi Lex, what brings you here?" Clark asked with a friendly smile. His eyes followed Lex's gaze down to his bare torso. "Sorry about the…" he signalled towards his upper body.

"No need to feel embarrassed Clark. We're all human after all, right?"

"Yeah, sure." Clark replied as he beamed another one of his winning smiles towards Lex.

"I'm here because, well I sort of need a lift. It's kind of embarrassing, but I think I might be suffering from a major hangover or something because I ended up on your farm, when I distinctively remember being at the Luthor mansion."

Clark's eyes darkened with weariness for a moment before replying. If Clark had been talking to anyone else, they wouldn't have been able to see the saviour's apprehension. But this was Lex Luthor, he wasn't just anyone.

"Must've been some night then. Okay, give me a sec to get another shirt, my other one got stuck in the wood chipper."

He dashed off before Lex could reply, leaving the man waiting impatiently on the ground floor. He was positively itching with excitement over the fact that he may now possess physical evidence of Clark in action! All of his theories from before will finally be confirmed.

"Okay, let's go." Clark said as he rushed down the stairs with his father's keys in hand.

The ride had been uneventful; nothing extraordinary took place, just the usual idle chit-chat that usually took place among friends. Lex however, found himself listening intently to every word that slipped out of Clark's mouth, even when he went on about something as petty as his distress over Jonathan not allowing him to play football. Lex's eyes then went to the curve of his mouth and back up to the glint in his eye. Now he understood why people went beyond the fanatical worshipping of their heroes. If they all looked and acted like Clark, then he could see why one would be so passionate.

The car pulled to an abrupt stop before Lex even registered the fact that they were already at the mansion. He thanked Clark for the ride and asked him to return to his home later that day under the pretence of a party he was supposedly throwing.

He threw his coat on the back of his chair and opened his laptop to review the footage his cameras picked up. When he eventually got to the part when his shooter fired at him, he slowed down the footage at a reasonable speed to process the events.

Lex couldn't help but flinch when he saw how close the bullet was to his head, but then he abruptly froze in shock.

A blur had interrupted the bullet's course towards his head, resulting in it rebounding off of the mysterious figure straight towards the bookshelves. He paused the footage and walked over to the bookshelf the bullet had impacted on, finding the crushed pellet lodged in the wood.

It was crushed before it hit the case…so the blur must have been the cause of the bullet's state.

He returned to his seat and rewound the footage, deciding to play it back at an even slower pace than before. This way he had more of a chance of getting a face, or at least his saviour's outfit…even if he already knew what he was wearing. Minutes passed of tedious waiting before he found what he was looking for.

"Bingo."

It was a male with dark hair and a red checked shirt with Kickers. It was Clark Kent.