Hello everyone, it has been a long time since I posted. I have to confess I have been having an inner struggle with my doubtful side. I cannot begin to express how encouraged I am at the responses to this story. I continue to post because of those of you who are enjoying this fanfic. However, I as a writer, as me, I am extremely critical of what I write, as well as, extremely hesitant to share my stories for they are physical expressions of my soul. I posted each chapter with the fiercest of anxiety and trepidation. I posted them feeling like I am now exposed, vulnerable, wide open, defenseless, and all the ways one can feel when they're sharing a part of themselves which they had always kept private.
After two negative comments about my bad grammar being so offensive that it was distracting to read my fanfic, I was left feeling extremely dejected. I am a full believer in honestly and these two people were being honest, and one even offered to beta for me. I seriously considered it and after several days of honest soul searching, I realized that I needed to focus on why I posted this story in the first place. I will go back to how I have been doing things, I will continue to post and I will continue to wait patiently for your reactions to each chapter and that is how I will be doing things until I feel strong enough to let someone else handle my work.
Please understand, I want to hear how you honestly feel about the story, how you feel about my portrayals of the characters and where you feel I went wrong or right about the story, I love reviews like that, they keep me writing, in this case they keep me posting. As far as my grammar, trust me I know it is not perfect, I will take classes to help me along with that. I apologize to anyone that I have tortured with my bad grammar. Thank you to the two people who were honest with letting me know of my offenses, please, if you like the story I urge you to continue to read, it is a great story. I was amazed when I finally finished it, it has some amazing surprises to come, funny moments, as well as some hard to read ones.
All right, you have waited long enough, happy reading everyone!
Disclaimer: I own nothing but my thoughts and the stories I create.
In Medias Res
"Into the middle of things"
"Out of suffering have emerged the strongest souls; the most massive characters are seared with scars." Kahlil Gibran
Chapter 26
Foiled Plans.
Lois looked down at the letter with a deep frown on her face. She didn't need anyone to tell her who it was from or what sort of trouble such a letter could bring to her family. She looked around once more, making sure Clark was not around. He had left to meet with Chloe and the apprehension on his face reminded her of JJ on his first day of Group.
"Do you want me to come with, I can hold your hand?" she had asked Clark teasingly. As a response, he had glared at her not the least bit amused and left promptly without saying a word. She didn't mean to make light of his feelings but it was all too funny. After she had laughed to her hearts content, she had noticed the letter.
She slipped her nail in the corner edge of the envelope and ripped it open. She paused to steel herself for what was to be confirmation of who had sent this letter to Clark. She removed the folded paper and as she lifted the first folded part with the Luthor letterhead, she felt her heart sink. She knew it,
"Damn it Lex!" she growled.
She didn't need to read it; she needed to stop this once and for all. She quickly folded the letter back up and grabbed her coat and purse.
Lex stood a safe distance to the side of the control room, facing the giant screen with all the lite up geographical regions he aimed to target. The lab techs rushed around the room busying themselves with monitoring the devices individual systems. Each of the techs were hunched over a computer consol with strings of numbers that made little sense to him except that it told of how well each of the device's systems were reacting to its new programming.
Dr. Fletcher walked over to Lex,
"Mr. Luthor, I do believe this demonstration is much too early. The device has been unstable and…"
Lex held up his hand impatiently.
"Enough with the disclaimers Doctor, I want to see what my money has produced so far."
Mercer came and stood next to Lex, she was smirking at Fletcher openly gloating at the fact that she was not the one in Lex's cross hairs.
"Come on Fletcher, let's see what you got!"
She coxed with a sly smile. Fletcher glared at her and turned to his team.
"All right everyone, here we go!"
Lex and Mercer exchanged a quick glance and turned their attention back to the action.
"Target Mr. Luthor!"
"China!"
Lex answered, Fletcher nodded.
"China it is."
Mercer raised an eyebrow; she knew that Lex recently had a business deal that suddenly went sour with China.
"Interesting choice!"
Lex looked over at her and smiled sinisterly.
"Beijing to be exact Dr. Fletcher!"
He added looking back at the doctor. Mercer looked over at him shaking her head, she should expect nothing less from Lex and yet she was still surprised at how far his need to strike back would take him.
Dr. Fletcher gave one last look over at Lex and the witch and then silently praying everything would workout as planned, he pressed the reactor's activator button. The device activated in a blinding light, the numbers on the consoles were going crazy and Fletcher kept his eyes fixed on the device behind the protective glass.
He needed this to work; he had been working long hours for weeks just for this one moment. From the corner of the room Lex smiled, this is definitely a good sign they had not been able to get the reactor to engage in the last demonstration two months ago.
Fletcher stood there unmoving; his eyes glowed on the device waiting. 'come on, come on.' He silently repeated. Suddenly the room, the floor the building started shaking. Everyone thrashed about staggering back and forth and sideways.
Lex fell back against the large screen bracing himself on the counter next to him. Mercer fell against him as she lost her grip on the file cabinet she was clinging to for support. As soon as the tremor came, it was gone and so was the reactor in the device as it died out. The consoles grew quite and some sparked as they crashed.
Fletcher smiled as he rose to his feet, he had not expected this reaction but it was a gamble when he had decided to temper with the device's reactor core.
Lex straightened himself and Mercer unhappily patted down her pinstriped pencil skirt.
"What the hell was that Fletcher?"
She asked annoyed. Lex smooth down his tie, his anger flashing in his eyes.
"I said China, this is Metropolis, do I need to give you a geography lesson too you incompetent baboon!"
Lex yelled. Fletcher straightened his shoulders and faced the extremely angry billionaire as his assistants cowered away.
"I warned you Mr. Luthor that the core was unstable."
He pointed out; Lex narrowed his eyes on the man.
"You have had three years to get it right Fletcher."
Lex reminded him through clenched teeth. The doctor nodded,
"I have been redesigning a device that I created to do the opposite of what you want it to do now. It's not going to be as…"
"Enough!"
Lex yelled. He was done with excuses and he was done with Fletcher.
"You have a week, if you can't make the damn thing work by then, I'll dispose of you and your team and find someone else who will."
With that, Lex stormed passed him and out of the lab.
Fletcher looked over at the smiling witch, Mercer was definitely enjoying this. As she followed Lex out she stopped and looked back at the doctor.
"I'll start looking for your replacement now Doctor."