When The Past Comes Back to Haunt You

Chapter One

~~~~2010~~~~~

Chloe slowly woke up, everything in her screamed with pain. She opened her mouth, but couldn't muster the strength to call out. In a flash, Clark's face appeared before her.

"Hold on, Chlo', I'm going to get Dr. Hamilton," he told her, gently squeezing her shoulder. A minute later, the kind face of Emil appeared before her eyes. Again she tried to speak, but her throat was dry and ached immensely.

"Don't try to speak yet, Chloe, you have a tube in your throat to help you breath, I'm going to take it out. When I tell you to, I need you to cough, hard, okay?"

She just nodded.

"Okay, here we go… cough."

Chloe coughed, hard and retched as the burning sensation ripped through her throat, then relief. She coughed once more before attempting to use her voice. It worked this time, but was rather scratchy.

"Where's Oliver?"

"J'onn is with him, trying to break the hold Darkseid has on him," Clark told her quietly. Chloe felt her eyes well up with tears but she quickly blinked them away.

"Chloe, you took a pretty bad beating… you're bleeding pretty badly… I'm sorry, but I'm pretty sure you are miscarrying… there's just too much damage and the baby's heartbeat is weak," Emil told her as gently as he could. The tears she had held back fell freely now.

"I need Oliver," she whispered, brokenly.

"As soon as we get him back to himself, you'll be the first one to see him, I promise," Clark told her, holding her hand tightly.

~~~~Present Day~~~~~

Bruce, Chloe, Helena and Clark stood on the large front steps of the Queen Mansion. An elderly woman eased the elegant wood front door open.

"This way, please," she told them, leading the entourage into a grand sitting room.

"Nice place," Helena whispered, "it's so… bright. Why is the Manor so dark again?"

"It suits your dad's personality," Clark told her, never missing an opportunity to rub Bruce.

"Boys, are we really starting this now?" Chloe asked, shaking her head at their need to verbally spar whenever they were within shouting distance of each other.

"We're not boys," Bruce muttered under his breath.

"Then why are you acting like children?"

"Mr. and Mrs. Queen will be out shortly," the maid told them before leaving them alone in the large domed room.

Chloe took a deep breath; her hands clutched her purse hard enough to turn her knuckles white. Bruce noticed her nervousness and gently placed a hand on her lower back.

"You don't have to do this," he whispered so a distracted Helena wouldn't hear.

"Yes, I do… Jake asked for this. I owe him this much," she whispered back.

"Bruce Wayne, it's been too long," Oliver called jovially as he entered the sitting room followed by Dinah who was carrying their daughter. Two boys followed quietly behind.

"Oliver Queen, too long, indeed," Bruce replied with a tight smile, never removing his hand from Chloe's back while he shook hands with the blond man.

"Clark, Chloe, it's been awhile," Oliver said shaking hands with Clark and nodding to Chloe.

"You should come out to Smallville once in awhile, Ollie," Clark told his old friend, an easy smile on his face.

"How's your mom?"

"Retired, but good."

"Good, good, and… who's this?" he asked, indicating the quiet girl standing slightly behind Chloe and Bruce.

"My daughter, Helena. Say hello," he told the young girl.

"Hello, Mr. Queen. It's nice to meet you," she said quietly, her eyes straying to the older boy standing next to Dinah.

"It's nice to meet you to, Miss Wayne. This is my wife, Dinah, and our daughter, Sin," he indicated the brunette woman, "my sons, Connor," he laid one hand on the older boys shoulder, "and Robert," he laid his other hand on the younger boys shoulder.

"Hi," Helena whispered, blushing profusely when Connor smiled at her.

Chloe rolled her eyes.

"He's definitely your son," she muttered to Oliver.

"Hey, you say that like it's a bad thing," Connor said with a frown.

"Okay, anyway, you had something you wanted to talk about?" Oliver asked, starting to feel the tension in the room.

"Umm…" Chloe hesitated, her eyes straying to Helena, trying to silently indicate her desire not to speak in front of the young teen.

Oliver seemed to get the message.

"Helena, do you like video games?" he asked.

"Duh!" came the enthusiastic reply.

"Boys, why don't you show Helena to the game room? You can take your pick of the games," he offered.

"Sweet! Do you have the new Call of Duty? I need to practice. Jake and I have a bet going! He doesn't think I can catch up to him; I have to prove him wrong! I've got a hundred bucks riding on it!"

"Excuse me?" Chloe asked in a shocked tone.

Helena turned guiltily towards the blond woman.

"Oopps…"

"And just where did you get a hundred dollars?"

"I won it off Dick playing poker."

"You what!"

Bruce gently pulled Chloe back as she started to step towards the teenager, a rant on the tip of her tongue.

"We'll talk about this when we get home," he told both women, finality in his words.

Chloe turned on him.

"What are those boys teaching her?"

"We'll ask them when we get home," he told her sternly, willing her with his eyes to drop it.

She just huffed before turning back towards their hosts.

"I'm sorry. Is there somewhere we can sit to discuss this?" she asked calmly, hiding the irritation in her words.

Oliver led them over to the couches that lined the sitting room; sitting down next to his wife he indicated the opposite couch. Chloe sat in the middle with Clark and Bruce on either side of her. She glanced towards Bruce and watched as he pulled out a small device and allowed it to scan the area before nodding, indicating the lack of listening or recording devices.

"Mr. Queen, we know you made it very clear you had no desire to associate with our little… club any longer and we respect that decision. We wouldn't come to you if the situation weren't dire," she started to explain. Oliver tensed at the formal way she addressed him.

"The satellite you commissioned for Watchtower years ago has been compromised as have the many satellites we have sent up since. President Luthor has a new program, one even Cyborg can't break, that he has used to take control of all orbiting satellites. He is using his reformed Patriot Act as a shield so he can play Big Brother and find all of us. We know Queen Industries is on the leading edge when it comes to this technology and we know you are sending up a new satellite this weekend, we want to know if you would allow us access to it until we can find away around Luthor's program, or get our own satellite up and running. Until we have something up there, we're sitting ducks, there's no safe way to communicate across the distances, no way to peak inside our destinations before we deploy… we're vulnerable, Oliver, and I don't like it," she told him earnestly.

Oliver leaned back against the couch and stared into Chloe's eyes for a moment.

"You want me to give you the access codes to the satellite stream?"

"Well, that would help immensely, but… we were actually hoping you might come to Gotham and share your secret with our Tech crew," she told him hesitantly. "We know that Luthor will continue to create programs to break through any firewall we can come up with, somehow your people have figured a way around that, and we'd like to be able to do that as well."

"You want me to come to Gotham? That's all the way across the country… I just got back from a business trip and was hoping to spend some time with my family."

"By all means, bring your family, they can stay at the Manor," Bruce offered.

"I…" Oliver glanced over at his wife. Dinah just shrugged, as if to say it's your decision. "Alright, sure, we can come for a few days and give your techies a crash course."

Chloe slumped in relief.

"Thank you, Oliver," she told him whole-heartedly.

"If there's nothing else, I'll have my family start packing and we can leave tomorrow morning," he said standing up.

"Actually, there was one more thing… do… do you think I could talk to you alone?" she asked, her voice wavering slightly.

Oliver paused, shocked at the request, before turning to Dinah.

"Why don't you show Bruce and Clark where the kids are?" he asked his wife, ignoring the glare she sent his way.

"Fine," she bit out, stalking away through the open French doors that lead out of the sitting room. Clark and Bruce made to follow her but Bruce paused to squeeze Chloe's hand before exiting the room.

"Alright, Chloe, what's up?" he asked, resuming his seat.

"There's something I need to tell you, but first… I… I need to say I am so, so sorry. There is no excuse for what I am about to tell you and I just… I just hope someday you will forgive me," she told him, her lip trembling with the effort not to cry.

Oliver's brow furrowed, an uneasy feeling settling in his stomach.

"Chloe, what's going on?"

"Oliver… Emil was wrong," she told him.

He just looked at her in confusion.

"Emil was wrong… I… I didn't lose the baby," she whispered. "You… you have a son, his name's Jacob."

A/N: Thank you so much for the wonderful reviews! They are the only thing that pushes me to write anything anymore… I thrive on feedback, lol. I know this is short… not sure why I made the chapters so short… oh well, I'll try and be quick about getting them up.