"Hey Clark!" someone screamed, the young Mr. Kent turned around in time to catch a baseball that went into the stands. He immediately noticed that he had just grabbed the ball hit into the middle of the stands. He dropped the ball and immediately began to fake being in pain. Chloe who was sitting not too far away from him looked up at her friend who was screaming. She walked over to him, "What happened?" she asked having been totally absorbed in her laptop earlier. "They wear gloves in baseball for a reason you know?" she said having quickly assessed the situation. Clark looked at her suppressing a smile, "I'll try to remember that." Clark said clutching his hand. One of the kids who had been playing ran up the steps. When he got up to where Clark was he looked at the hand. "Wow Clark, your tougher than I thought. That happened to me once and I started bleeding." Clark looked to him and straightened up. "Yeah, I guess I have toughened up a lot."

Lex was busy sparring again; he brought his sword up and blocked that of his instructor then slightly moved it off to the right and tried for a thrust. The instructor moved though and tried for a slash to the legs. Lex jumped bringing his knees up allowing the fencing blade to go under him and brought his own blade down on the back of his instructor. The tip hit the cloth of the suit of the other man. "Good job Mr. Luthor, there is almost nothing else that I can teach you." Lex had a devilish smile as he took off his helmet. "Well thank you Mr. Barnabus, it has been a pleasure working with you." They both shook hands and Mr. Barnabus began to pack up. Lex heard someone coming up to the room and turned to see one of the people that work for him. "Mr. Luthor, there is a mister Wayne here to see you." Lex nodded and began to get out of his training clothes. Wayne, he knew that name but he couldn't place it yet. This frustrated him but he would remember soon enough. The minute he was in his suit he realized it, there was a Wayne Enterprises that was runned out of Gotham City. He walked to the door to meet this Mr. Wayne.

"Zack? Zack are you here?" someone asked. The room was very dark and it had all the makings of the first murder of a horror film. The kid heard something moving quickly behind him and spun around only to catch the glimpse of some black fabric. "Zack, if this is a joke it isn't that funny." The boy heard another noise and turned to see something that chilled him to the bone. "Sorry Johnny boy but this is no joke." A voice said that was surrounded in shadows. The kid turned to run but the figure jumped from the shadows and grabbed the kid.

Clark walked down the halls of his school and saw the site he knew he could never get away from, it haunted him in his nightmares and even in the waking hours he couldn't escape it. There Lana stood with Whitney next to her, most likely talking about how much he loved her or what they would be doing on their date tonight. It made him feel worse than the meteor rocks ever could. "Clark, a bunch of the guys wanted to play football out back after school. I wanted to know if you were going to come?" Pete asked snapping Clark out of his depressing trance. Clark turned to look at his best friend who was tossing a football up in the air. "Yeah, sure, I'll be there. Might take me a bit longer though. There is something I got to do." Clark said and Pete just shook his head. "Clark, she's with Whitney. Man you had your chance but she just seemed to slip through your fingers. There are plenty of other girls here, why not just find someone else?" Clark smiled; he knew that at least no matter how wrong things went he would at least have his friends there to back him up. "Yeah I know. Your right, I'll see you after school. Where are you going to be?" Pete smiled; finally Clark seemed to be able to at least forget Lana a little. "In the field out back. I gotta go before I'm late for class." And with that Pete raced down the hall. Clark remembered that he too had a class and began making his way down the hall not looking up as Lana looked away from Whitney.

"So, what brings you to Smallville Mr. Wayne?" Lex asked having offered Bruce Wayne a seat in front of his desk, which Lex was already sitting at not bothering to stand up and shake hands. This Bruce was about Lex's age or a little older, the size difference could easily be seen though. Bruce had the makings of a football player, or something out of a comic book Lex thought to himself. "I decided that I should start taking a slight interest in my company. So I figured that I should acquaint myself with some of the people my company has done business with." Bruce said with a smile. Lex stared at the man he was hard to read. There seemed to be a hidden motive to his actions but he couldn't be sure. "Mr. Wayne, I'm a busy man. I don't have time to explain my ways to you." Bruce's smile dropped till his face was stoic. "I'm sorry to hear that Mr. Luthor, I had hoped we could have become friends before I discussed this with you. A good friend of my family's and chairman of Wayne Enterprises has told me that things your company has bought have not been put to the intended use." Bruce said his expression never changing. Lex was surprised but he wouldn't let this upstart find that out so he forced his expression not to change. "First of all I have no idea what you are talking about and secondly after we buy something, it is none of your business what we do with it." Lex said putting a fake smile onto his face. Bruce's eyes narrowed, "Mr. Luthor, if your company is involved with illegal weapons I will find out. Not only that I will have your company. Have a good day, I will be here all week." With that Bruce stood up and left. Lex's smile dropped the minute Bruce was out of site. "Big words Mr. Wayne, I hope you are able to back them up."

"I trust everything went well Master Bruce?" Alfred said as he opened the door to the limousine. "Not really Alfred, I couldn't find out anything." Bruce said now clearly pissed off. "Could it be that he isn't sure what is going on?" Alfred asked as Bruce sat down inside. "Possibly but not likely." Alfred shut the door and walked around and entered driver's seat. "Where to Master Bruce?" Bruce looked out at the front of the castle as he spoke, "I would like to stop by the hotel before I go to one of the factories."

Clark met everyone out at the field, once again he was late and everyone had started without him. Both teams were down and fixing to hike the ball when they noticed Clark was there. "We got Clark!" Pete shouted for his team. Clark smiled and dropped his pack where he was standing and ran to get with his team. Clark thought he heard a bush rustling over in the corner but forgot about it when the other team passed the ball to the quarterback and everyone started running at each other. That's when Clark saw it, a black blur raced across the field and leapt into the air and landed on one of the people who was running to the end zone. Everyone watched as some creature that resembled an albino with long black hair began slashing at the poor guy with four-inch claws. Clark ran toward it and tackled the creature but it proved to be stronger than he was. The creature lifted Clark up and began to inhale deeply. No one else could really see what was going on but Clark could. He saw a stream of energy coming out of him and into the thing's mouth. Clark punched the thing in the face but it didn't phase it, Clark kicked it in the chest but again the thing didn't even shake. Clark was fixing to pass out but before he did he heard the rumble of a motorcycle.

A figure with a mask on drove wildly toward the creature. He got the vehicle up to 75 miles an hour and jumped off sending the chopper straight at him. The motorcycle hit him and fell to the ground crunched. The man pulled out a bunch of shuriken and threw them as hard as he could. Two lodged in the creature's back and the third nicked his neck. It dropped Clark to the ground and howled in pain. "Drop to the ground now!" the masked man shouted. All of the kids had left already so the creature couldn't start to feed on anyone else. It whipped around and charged the man that attacked it. The man jumped off the ground and put both feet into the creature's face sending him back a few steps. The man landed expertly and went to grab something out of a pouch but the thing moved faster than any human. It jumped on top of Clark's savior knocking him to the ground and was fixing to inhale again. "Hope you enjoy your flight." The man said grimly and pulled both hands of the man over him and placed his foot on the thing's chest and rolled back and kicked throwing the thing into the woods. The man stood back up and walked over to Clark and checked his pulse. Clark began to regain consciousness and the man quickly checked to see if anything had been broken on him. "Who are you?" Clark asked, the man however didn't answer and helped Clark up to his feet. "Any idea what that thing was?" Clark asked groggily. "A weapon." Was the only reply the man gave. Clark was puzzled by this, "How did you stop it?" he asked and the man shook his head. "I got to leave." And with that the man ran off into the woods.

Clark walked up to his house to find his mother outside. She turned and looked at him bleeding from his shoulder. "Oh my god, what happened?" she asked running over to him. Jonathan heard his wife's concerned voice and came around the corner and was shocked to see his son bleeding. "Let's get him inside." He said and helped Clark inside the house. Clark went over to the couch and lay down while Martha ran to go get some peroxide and some bandages while Jonathan staid with him. Almost as quickly as she left she came back in. "What happened to you?" Jonathan asked as his wife went to work on Clark's shoulder. "I'm not sure, we were out playing football when this thing just shot out of the bushes and attacked someone, don't remember who. When I attacked it I think Pete and the others got him and went to get the police. Dad, I was helpless today. The thing was able to throw me around like a rag doll. I hit it as hard as I could and it didn't even take a step back." When Clark said this Jonathan and Martha were in shock. They had seen before how strong their son was, he lifted the tractor once when it was stuck and many other amazing feats of strength, yet something was able to stand up to that? "The thing started to suck energy out of me or something, it was weird, I could actually feel myself fixing to die. Then out of nowhere someone hit him with a motorcycle." Martha stopped wiping the blood off of his cuts for a moment, "You hitting him didn't hurt but a motorcycle did?" Clark shrugged. "I don't think so, the man threw something at him and that's what hurt him. Then it turned and attacked the guy but the guy was able to beat him." His mom put a bandage on his cuts and leaned back in her chair. "Clark, I want you to be more careful. God knows what this thing could do if it decided to come back." Jonathan said a perplexed and concerned look on his face.

The man that had saved Clark stood before a tall fence that was suppose to stop his entry into a Luthor Corp factory. Bruce Wayne smiled under his ninja mask that only showed his eyes. He also wore a black trench coat, a longed sleeve black shirt that hid a bulletproof vest and black jeans. He analyzed the fence quickly and was positive it wasn't electrical despite the sign that said the contrary. Another spoof that the company gave. He reached into his coat and drew a grappling hook. He spun the rope three times before he released it, sending it soaring up and catching on the barbed wire at the top of the 20-foot fence. He tugged twice to make sure it would hold and climbed quickly till he was at the top then jumped to the ground and landed expertly. It had been chance that he had seen the kid being attacked and had been lucky that he had stopped the thing when he did. He couldn't understand why when he hit the creature with his motorcycle it didn't hurt it but the shuriken did. Maybe it was the light coating of acid he had placed on it, or maybe it was the small silver content in the stars. He refused to believe the later. He got his hook back and wound it up and slipped it back into his coat. He moved stealthily through the building that seemed to be mostly abandoned. He quickly climbed up the ladder that led to the catwalk in order to be above any eyes that might see him. He heard someone coming and stopped walking and drew a throwing disk from his pouch. It was a security guard and of course he was armed. Bruce wondered why it always seemed to be the guards that played cops for places like Luthor Corp. that had to have weapons. The guard looked around him and began to turn to leave but just before he did he looked up and saw Bruce. The guard drew his gun and raised it at Bruce but the disk had already left Bruce's hand and connected hard just at the wrist causing the gun to drop. Bruce leapt from his place on the catwalk and came down with both feet right to the chest of the guard sending him out cold to the floor. Bruce picked his disk back up and began running. Other guards heard the noise and came running straight at him. Bruce started running faster and toward the man in the middle of the five guards, then jumped sending a kick to his face while he was in the air and then hit the ground in a crouched position and spun with his right leg out taking out the two on either side to him. The guard to the far right tried coming at him but Bruce rose to his feet quickly and sent a quick jab to the man's nose and then a punch to his stomach. The man at the far left came and grabbed Bruce from behind while the man Bruce had been pummeling came up and punched him hard in the ribs. Bruce used this to his advantage though and picked up both feet and kicked the guard in front of him hard sending him off into the wall and the push knocked the guard that was holding him to the floor. Bruce got to his feet and began running again; he had to find some incriminating evidence before there were too many guards. He ran past a window that seemed to be the only place where there were scientists. He tried breaking the glass with a kick but it staid firm. The scientists looked up and one ran to the door and made sure the door was locked. There was know way he could get in now, he hadn't brought any explosives with him. Then he looked over to the guards that were still lying on the ground. He hated the thought that crept into his head but knew it was the only way he could get in. He ran over to them and picked up one of the guards guns and ran back to the door. He pointed it at a hinge and fired, then another, and another and finally the lock. He dropped the gun to the floor then pushed against the door to knock it in. The scientists all ran out a side door as he came in. He looked around and went to what looked to be the main computer. He took a computer disk out of his belt and put it in and started to download everything.

Lex Luthor sat in his chair with a drink in his hand and watching the news. He could get the stock market information off his computer but he always enjoyed seeing what the public saw. However this time that wasn't what was on. A reporter stood outside one of his factories. "This afternoon a masked man broke into this Luthor Corp. factory apparently looking for something. What was taken has not been released by the manager. However we were given this video of the perpetrator." The lady reporter said and then the screen changed to a man walking across the catwalk and then taking down a guard. Lex was infuriated, why hadn't anyone informed him of this. He was about to pick up the phone to fire someone when it began to ring.

The next day Clark walked back in the school building. He had healed but the pain was still there. Chloe ran up to him followed by Pete, "Clark, how are you? I'm so sorry I left you there. We had to get William out of there and then I went and called the police and.and" Clark smiled, "Don't worry about it, after you got William out of there it left." Chloe smiled hearing this. "Then how did these get there?" she held up a bag and a clang was heard as the contents of the bag hit the ground. Clark looked down and saw the shuriken that the strange man had used to stop the thing. "That is the fourth bag those things have burned through." Clark looked up at the shorter blonde woman, "Burned through?" she bent down and picked them up. "Yeah they have some type of acid on them, if you hold them long enough they will start to burn your hand." Pete looked at them confused. "Why would anyone put acid on a ninja star? I mean wouldn't it burn through the metal or something?" Chloe shook her head, "Not these, they are a some type of aluminum, I'm guessing sort of like the type they use for planes. It takes this acid a couple of months to burn through it but it makes it easier for it to pierce skin. Whoever used this really knows what they are doing." Clark and Pete looked at her amazed, "How did you find out all that stuff?" Clark asked. No one noticed the tall man that walked up behind them, "Apparently she is quite the detective." the man said. They all turned to see a man in a nice black suit, he had a brown mustache and his hair was tangled basically saying he was not used to being dressed up. "I am Tony Marzone, reporter for the Daily Planet out of Metropolis. I was wondering if you could direct me to one Clark Kent?" Clark narrowed his eyes at the man, "I'm Clark." The man smiled. "Well Clark, I have already talked to your teachers and they said I can borrow you today for an interview. Of course that is only if you are up to it." Tony said keeping his silly grin on his face. "Yeah, I guess I could afford getting out of class for today." Clark said and they both walked out of the school. Pete turned to Chloe, "That was weird." "What was?" Lana asked coming up next to Chloe. "A reporter just asked to talk to Clark, he has been involved with the police before but he never got asked for an interview." Chloe told Lana.

Tony motioned for Clark to take a seat at a picnic table while he went around and sat on the seat facing him. "So, what can I help you with?" Clark asked not feeling very comfortable. "There have been many strange things happening here lately." It was an acknowledgment not a question. "I'm sure not as many as in Metropolis." Clark said wondering where the reporter was going with this. "What was the thing that attacked you?" Clark shrugged, "I don't know. I have never seen anything like it before." The man's smile faded, "Be careful Clark, you have been connected with some serious things. A girl that tried to eat another student here, a man that shook so much that he killed someone by touching him, a child that could change her shape." After the last one Clark knew he was in trouble. No one really knew about that one. "I'm not after you Clark but I do need your help. Clark looked around him and saw Lana walking down the sidewalk. It was too bad that Lana didn't see the blur rushing told her. Clark saw it though and went to run and move her out of the way but it was too late. The creature knocked her to the ground. Lana screamed in fear as the creature pinned her to the ground and began to inhale drawing the bio-energy out of her. Clark was clearly pissed off and no longer cared who saw him. He moved at a speed faster than the thing had previously and tackled the beast. When the thing was off of Lana he began to pummel the creature as hard as he could. Tony ran over to Lana and picked her up and took her over to the picnic table and laid her on it then ran over to where Clark and the beast were battling.

Clark sent a flurry of punches and kicks at the beast continually knocking it back. Clark wasn't himself anymore; instead he was in a blind rage. The beast though, while not able to attack back was not seriously injured either. Tony ran and saw what was going on, what he had figured before now was definitely true; Clark was another one of the people who had been changed. Clark grabbed the beast with both hands by the collar of the shirt it was wearing and then threw it over his head. The beast landed in a crouch and charged straight for Lana again. He needed more energy if he was going to survive. The beast saw the reporter duck behind the wall, he would feed off of him the minute he drained the life out of Lana. This thinking was done in less than a second and the minute Clark turned around the beast was already speeding toward her. He was fixing to try to catch up with it when he saw a blur hit the beast sending it to the floor. The leg came back down and Tony stepped out from behind the wall. The beast snarled and jumped to his feet in a ninja like fashion. "I was going to finish off the girl, but I guess I just have to get you first." It growled and leapt at Tony. The reporter tried to pull off a judo throw but the beast was moving too fast. Tony hit the ground hard with the beast pinning his arms to the floor with his knees. The beast began to inhale again, drawing the energy from Tony's body. Clark ran and punched him in the back but it was useless. The creature was gaining the energy he needed to protect him. Tony had his hands pointing but at what Clark couldn't understand. Then Clark got the idea and put his hand right in front of the beast's mouth cutting off the connection. It looked at Clark as he brought his left hand around in a left cross throwing the beast off of the reporter. The creature hit the ground then took off across the field again.

Lana used her left arm to prop herself up and held her head with the right trying to will the headache away. She looked over and saw Clark helping Tony to his feet. The two men headed back to the table. Clark helped Tony sit down and Lana looked into the face of her savior. "What the hell was that bizarro thing?" she asked still holding her head. "I believe it to be some kind of human weapon. I have been researching the story for a couple of months now. First time I have gotten real proof though." Tony said cradling his head in his hands. "A weapon? I thought stuff like that only happened in bad movies and comic books." Clark said looking at the reporter. "Well then maybe this is a comic book. I don't know but that thing has to be stopped and apparently Smallville doesn't have anything to do it with." Tony said giving Clark a look that told him that he knew Clark's secret now. Lana looked at the both of them wondering what was going on. She still wasn't completely over her fall. "What do the both of you mean? That thing that attacked us was created?" Clark looked at her as she asked her questions. He shrugged not really knowing what to say. Clark turned to see if Tony would answer but when he looked where Tony was, the reporter was gone.

The beast was back at the shack where he had fed off of that one child. "They think I'm bizarro, well wait till they see what I'll do next."