Stalemate Chapter 4, a smallville fanfic

Chapter Four

Smallville, Kansas, 2001

Clark

Canonically Clark had done all of this before, had ten years of experience precariously tucked away in his proverbial utility belt; devoid of batarangs, smoke pellets or thermite grenades — to name a few of the Dark Knight's paraphernalia. Bruce would effortlessly continue the mission, coaxed the crowd with a faux smile and glazed playboy blue eyes tease a crowd of cheerleaders; but, yet, as soon as Clark came into contact with bodies who Frisco danced down the hallways: he froze.

Standing in the confines of the dumping ground of hormones, latent metahuman abilities and uncensored gossip: his tragic eyes sifted through the pick 'n' mix crowd of high schoolers. What was Jeremy Creek compared to these vaguely familiar figures flickering in the corners of his eyes, or brushing past him, adamant in their day to day rituals of companionship. In many ways, he realised this week had been about re-living the past … especially for Jeremy … and now more so for Clark.

Experiencing this shift in the timeline was so different than moving in 'Clark Time' — a corny name for a brilliant concept Bart had dubbed Clark's ability to move so fast in time, that it appeared everyone else had frozen. Bart shared the ability to and had appropriately named his own "time freezing" ability: 'Flash Time'— so much cooler. He realised for all intent and purposes he was the acting facsimile of Doctor Fate, dependent on a red cape and boots: he had so much influence on these people radiating with the glow of abandon of the future. It would always be a fleeting thought: thinking about the long term, and though high school constantly brought the question of what to do next nearly every waking moment, careers day and the fact he knew someone could die in the next week held a lot more weight against Clark's psyche.

Nabu, he supposed, must've been working beyond the need of a host, maybe he'd foreseen Jor-El take this drastic action beforehand, and approved of his arrival in the past. The helmet was a sentient being after all. Perhaps, he was unequivocally relying on the Man of Steel to guide husks like Principle Kwan: who stopped in the intersection of the corridor surveying the crowd, on a better journey. Kwan ghosted away, back towards his office, the mix of pensiveness and excitement juxtaposed his shifting eyes.

Wow Clark, wait-ago and epitomise that whole farm boy thing you had going on — Lois's voice sounded in his mind, if he squinted hard enough he could erect a watery image of her standing in front of him, throwing her signature "God Smallville" smirk back at him— nice to know the big city hasn't sapped all that naked dorkiness that made me crash all those years ago… or was that just the Lightning? The voice tickled the edges of his mind, an evanescent tremor of her melodic husk — an artifice of headstrong Mad Dog Lane, who dived head first and thought later. But even still, he wished she were here, it'd be so easy to return her understanding smile — a smile that eased those around her (constructed only for Clark) — and brush his lips against her cheek, the murmur of: "I love you Miss Lane' left on the apple and assure a shudder run down her back.

Two different pairs of hands rested on his arm: first, a "hard" slap — for Pete's hand felt more like a pat on his back, caught his attention on his right. And a smaller softer one rubbed his shoulder down to his forearm with concern.

Blue eyes crashed with playful Viridian. It wasn't love. Her eyes — he meant … when she looked at him. It was a wonder to see what it'd be like to be on the receiving end, aware and wholly conscious of the fourteen-year-olds feelings, but it wasn't love on her open face. Though she bloomed under his gaze. Perhaps, caused by the poor yellow lighting, there was a bizarro tinge to her gaze that paled the one Oliver the true keeper of her ephemeral love received. If her love for Oliver were placed on a Richter scale, then they both became something gorgeous when they looked on another.

'Are you alright there, Clark? You look like you've seen your life flash before your eyes, did Lana finally drop the jock strap and open the flood gates of your long-suffering chance at love, I haven't seen you this dazed since she finally learnt to pronounce "unconformity"? '

In Clark's defence, the way she'd stumbled over the word in preschool with her cheeks alighting and her eyes quivering with indecision had made her especially beautiful to him at the time— hey he'd only been five himself and struggling with a slight lisp.

But of course, that had been then, and now… He couldn't help but smirk at the mixture of sarcasm and jealousy tucked in each corner of her mouth — a grotesque kiss of what J.M. Barrie was all too fond of referring to. And if he could, he'd wipe it away and assure her that Lana remained just Lana in his mind, nothing more nothing less than a pretty cheerleader. No inflection of awe, or a Doberman like love could ever be associated with her name again. If she had been Lois, (he'd remind her, like he had after Chloe and Jimmy's wedding and their school reunion— that Lana was his past and he was experiencing his evolution with her.) But instead with her cousin he lightly punched her shoulder and his eyes crinkled.

A brief look of horror fluttered across both his friend's faces, and he couldn't help but leave them behind in his wake as he moved to find his 'new' locker. It was interesting to see the polarising dichotomies that his dismissive behaviour towards Lana conjured in the two. He didn't mean to tease Chloe, but as she staggered back more from the shock of his admission to "giving up" or "losing interest" in his great love, she somewhat struggled to find her breath, and grasped for air.

Pete on the other hand, (rubbing soothing circles on her back, knowing somewhat that they might be overreacting), looked like he'd been whacked around the head by one of Bruce's crystal vases polished to perfection by Alfred, stared owlishly at the back of Clark's head like he'd lost his god damn mind (This was Lana they were talking about, the girl he'd had a crush on forever …), Clark practically heard Pete yell at him through his thoughts.

Clark redshifted the arm of his rucksack, while with the other arm worked on twisting the code for his locker. He couldn't wait to get his x-ray vision in a few months, he especially missed the convenience of that ability, in his youth, his lack of control had resulted in him taking the initial liberty of seeing Lana in the locker room, but now he wondered if that scene would even play out.

'Chloe, wave your hand in front of his face and make sure that's Clark. Make sure, that this guy who looks like our six foot something friend who still hasn't signed up for football, often can't speak and function in front of Lana Lang hasn't been swapped out with a character from the Twilight Zone?'

Another chuckle slipped pass Clark's lips, as he pulled open his locker and deposited the books he held against his chest. His head ducked and sheathed within the confines of his familiar locker, he missed the excited pitter patter of light footsteps figure skate between the growing hush she elicited from the crowd. It was the faint brush of her chocolate brown hair tucked behind her ear, that signalled the newcomer.

He slowly removed his head from the safety net of his locker, half surprised he hadn't heard either Chloe or Pete's snicker at the fact he'd caught Lana's attention, despite his very blatant rebuttal of his long-suffering crush on the girl— though, he wondered vaguely—where her constant shadow was, surely Whitney wouldn't take the dumping as absolute.

His glacial eyes fell on a pair that were indecisive: the colours at were like two waring titans in conflict with each other, green and blue clashed in their continuous dance as her eyes smiled at him. This wasn't Lana. Obviously.

Obviously, this girl, maybe two inches taller than Chloe and shorter than Pete, turned her brilliant eyes on the two and knew them. She fixed the strap of her satchel in a similar fashion as Clark, exhibiting an excitement a lightyear away from his faux clumsiness.

Clark raked her from head to toe, it was an unfamiliar expression experienced by his younger best-friends, foreign and jarring to say the least — he could feel Chloe's flicker of brief jealousy before she seemed to realise: his look was a look of haunted introspection. He looked so much older than his fourteen years for a moment. Chloe reasoned this must be why he attracted so many girls at times — he was the epitome of an oxymoron: a controlled bumbling teenage - man - child. Clark felt her questioning eyes ask him: "What's wrong?"

The new girl was moving her lips, a smile matching her rich voice full of a vitality, difficult to imitate … unless you had the unfortunate mishap of being raised alongside a blonde, billionaire who had a scary affinity towards bows and arrows. It was more than that, she like Oliver and Bruce had a discrete way of dressing in jeans (and a tank top and sneakers in her case) that smelled to Clark: of money, despite appearances.

He couldn't be sure of her identity yet but everything screamed at him. So, he fell back onto Lois' rules of reporting (he'd need to reframe another one in the near future): 3) always make a good impression and 4) check your facts three times. Well he'd check his gut feeling one more time.

Clark appeared to blossom in front of her, as he put forth a brilliant smile, that brought an almost, almost, ugly flush to the apples of her cheeks. Dwarfing her dainty hand in his larger one he shook it as his smooth baritone sounded in her ears: 'Hi, you must be new here? And you've already found Pete and Chloe, good choice,' he said, ignoring the way her eyes lit up with eerie interest the way Cat Grant's did when he passed by her desk at the Planet, 'Chloe's like a walking encyclopaedia of knowledge and witty comebacks, so you'll never be bored.'

'Then again,' he deadpanned, 'if you hang out with me and Pete long enough you'd be associating yourself with this year's prime candidates for the potential scarecrow, I'd pick my choice wisely. Seriously, run now.'

Pete blanched, before exclaiming and waving his permission slip like a shield wide enough in breadth to cover his chest from any Jock's watchful eye. Clark smirked at him before correcting himself: 'Excuse me, guess you should just avoid me then.'

She smiled — a handsome facsimile of the green archer's. But he was so close, all he needed was for her to confirm it, to just say it, or murmur it, because the resemblance between the two was like obnoxious bout of laughter from the universe, mocking his cautiousness.

She cut her eyes from Chloe and Pete, easily looping an arm through Chloe's in a sisterly way, very similar to the way Lois' would in the coming future. An invisible smile tugged the corner of his lips, at least fate seemed to approve of Chloe and Oliver's future union.

'Chloe was right about you, charming, cute and a killer smile, are you sure about this Scarecrow business Clark, you don't look like you're in need of a fixing for a new heart?' The siblings seemed to have a habit of rolling his name of their tongues in the same way, univocal buoyance and assuredness in his person.

'Is that right?'

She shrugged: 'Calling them as I see em', Boy Scout,' she teased back.

Another sharp wash of déjà vu prompted him to stare at her again, picking pieces of his Cousin in law from her face.

'I'm surprised you haven't guessed already, but then again, as Pete said you're a true gentleman through and through, and unlike some of these people,' she said with a faint hiss, cutting a brief sneer at the growing crowd of obvious eavesdroppers, 'I'm Thea, Thea Queen. And can we be friends now? Hanging out with you would probably sober up Oliver. I mean I love him to bits now, don't get me wrong, because he's so much funnier now, but his manners are still a bit shaky dear, if you know what I mean?'

Clark snorted with laughter and nodded back at her accepting her offer — damn Oliver, his old and soon to be future friend had used that poorly timed "shaky dear" barb to taunt Lobo — the Czarnian had howled with laughter and proceeded to beat the shit out of him. Once back at Watchtower and reciting his exertion to his lady dearest, had rolled her eyes despite tears of laughter falling down her cheeks.

Oliver

Smallville, Kansas, 2001

His precarious mood teetered on the scale between bemusement and disgust. He was already ten minutes late picking Thea up from the Torch. A smile of adoration ghosted over his face: the image of too green eyes and blonde hair streaked randomly with red shone back at him. She'd always been young his little watchtower, with seven years between them the difference of age had always been glaringly obvious. But meeting the love of your life at fourteen over the age of twenty-one had varying effects on his erratic heart.

He couldn't even tell, if he was lying to himself or not, that when he and Thea had left the best Smallville had to offer (a cosy and cramped bed and breakfast) that he hadn't hoped to run into her. Or catch a glimpse of her in the distance as he drove his rented Aston Martin (until his actual one was shipped down to cornfield city.)

He prayed, he and Clark became acquainted real soon. Struggling through Mrs Lawson's generous but abysmal cooking was making especially homesick for Martha Kent's cooking, even though he had his own mother and was oblivious to her culinary skills it seemed.

He was pissed because he was in 2001 and the blessing that was Bluetooth had not been integrated into cars yet. It's not that he couldn't text and drive in response to the plethora of – okay let's just call it what was— downright abuse pinged back at him from his supposed "Best friends" in the world for scarpering Starling City quick and sweet wasn't enough. This mounding well of guilt drenching him every so other second attacked him and made him feel bipolar in thought.

Laurel Dinah Lance and Tommy Merlyn, two people he personally had no idea where from Adam, but this timelines Oliver had spent most of his formative years with— while still attending boarding school and having enough time to torment Lex — had every right to be ticked off at him. But the body snatcher with a death movement, ghosted his fingers over the keyboard and replied to Laurel's question of: "when are you coming back?" with three empty cold words: "I don't know."

He was pathetic, or this Oliver was … because he was alive while Laurel's baby sister was gone. He was breathing and Laurel needed to probably hold onto something tangible, and her's, something that she cared for who was alive, and he had run off to of all places, Hicksville.

Her name had been Sara … Sara Lance and apparently, he had been in love with her, and whatever machinations Tess had been involved with while on the island seemed obsolete. Because, he wasn't even sure that a Tess Mercer existed in this timeline.

'… they were careless people…' he murmured to himself, reciting one of Clark's favourite novels, The Great Gatsby, initially an odd choice for the Farm Boy he'd thought, until he read the book and understood the Farm Boy's liking so much. It understood what made people in the twenties and still now, eighty years later.

He was like this unyielding god, like Darkseid he supposed, maybe not as evil and reckless, but Sara was dead (maybe not on his watch) but he'd done worse, he'd swapped out Sara for Tess in a way. Both were dead. But even worse, he'd claimed to be in love with Sara while all the while being 'in love with Laurel' (Sara's sister) and then gotten her killed. There was no way around it. It'd been a long time since he'd looked back at his face and heard the whisper of: "I heard he'd killed a man once" mock him.

With the help of Chloe, Lois, Clark and Bruce drawing him out of his darkness, he'd been in a sense clean from the drug that was the darkness that pervaded his scent. But apparently when being teleported back in the past, you have to re-face those demons again, bigger and badder.

He placed his phone back in the cubby hole, his mind tracing over the thought that this time around he was labelled: a cheater. He had cheated on a girl, that his heart and his memories told him continuously that he cared for deeply, this Oliver had attempted to convince himself time and time again: Laurel was the one, told her and himself again, only to fall on his own deaf ears, because he'd been screwing her sister.

It was fucking bullshit, he was bullshit… because he'd never cheated on someone before, until this timeline. He'd already managed to break four hearts in this timeline without even trying: Laurel's, Sara's, his father's (who'd shot himself on the lifeboat) and the his own— (with the disgust of the whole damn thing). And did it make him even worse a person, for not ever being able to be fully in love with either of Detective Lance's dead and breathing daughters? When his mind travelled to the inquisitive, witty freelance Star City reporter who happened to be his wife in the future. His feelings for her pounded like a constant beat against the waves; was he an even worse person now than before?

Hadn't he had to do enough self-assessing in his former lifetime? — it was like being blessed with a mother and a sister resulted in more magnanimous consequences… but he loved having them… even if he talked to his mom sparingly. He still wasn't sure about her.

His car raced onto Loeb Bridge.

And then there was Tommy, perhaps a more persistent thought than Laurel. Oliver had picked up his voicemail and now ran the words — a veiled echo of the man's voice pressed play on a preverbal recorder in his mind: I'd say you were a piece of shit, but this is the second scare you've given me in my young life. Believing you were dead and falling in a coma within weeks of each other were almost easy to work my head around. But you up and leaving … I don't know man, I don't really want to guilt you and I know you must feel awful about what happened … you living and then gone. But Queen, me and Laurel are here, even before you do come back, at least drop me a call or pick up. I don't bite remember — well except when we were five and you stole my Action man, Asshole … just you know…

Just you know … each word had dripped with brotherly concern that almost choked the archer up. He had brothers of course in his last lifetime: Clark and Bruce. The unlikeliest pair of weirdoes placed on the scales of personalities. But the Dark Knight, dark and brooding and the Man of Steel, light and otherworldly seemed to humble him as much as he did them. And now there was this new player in the game, who'd apparently known him since they were toddlers, was worried. And who wouldn't? His behaviour was half erratic and it was a wonder his mother had allowed him to whisk Thea away to Smallville. More probably, she'd only allowed her to enrol in Smallville High school so to watch over him.

The semi past by him fluidly. Half caught up in his reverie and consumed with impending guilt, he just about missed the long steel cylinder roll towards him. His eyes widened as he swerved away veering towards the metal railing his mind moving in hyper-speed.

Hadn't this story gone a whole lot differently the last time, hadn't an unassuming teenage boy been standing at the bridge when Lex Luthor's Lexus careened into his steel body at sixty miles per hour, hadn't this been the birth of an unlikely friendship between the intergalactic traveller and megalomaniac. It was all wrong, or he was too early, or Nabu was playing his little trick with time the same way Zantana played with magic because there was no Clark Kent waiting on the bridge to save him.

But he'd be damned if he'd go out like this: and twisting his impending fate around his finger, he yelled: 'Clark Kent, get your Boy Scout ass here and save me!' He counted on his friend to save him the same way any citizen of Metropolis placed their faith in Superman, every day.

His breathing probably picked up and his heart probably pounded frantically against his chest, but he refused to close his eyes.

His car was about to make contact with the barriers and either crush his ribcage first or deploy his airbag, when a figure and a flash of wide glacial blue eyes slammed into his vision.

Author Notes:

Sorry this took so long, but I started a new job and I wanted to get a handle of things before I returned back to writing.

I don't know how everyone will feel about this twist in this new timeline, I thought it would be interesting to subvert Oliver's expectation because even though he and Clark have a lot of foreknowledge of what's about to happen, time can be a tricky thing.

Jeremy hasn't been forgotten and don't worry Lex is still a major player in this story much is the scene where Chloe and Oliver meet.

And Lol, the main subject of this story hasn't been forgotten either: Kent Nelson will become apparent but soon I want may basis established as much as Clark and Oliver will in the next chapter.

The shaky dear comment is in reference to Trixie Mattle from RuPaul Drag Race and a lot of allusions are influenced by the Great Gatsby, I just finished re-reading it and was influence by his writing style for a bit.

Anyway, I hope you all enjoyed this chapter.

Please, Review, Fave and Follow

Greekgeekable.

p.s: I'm already starting on the next chapter and I have new idea for a Charmed/Vampire Diaries crossover if anyone is interested.