Smallville - "Strong and Forgiving"
Co-Writers: AssassinForHire (Lana Lang), D. Barnes (Clark Kent)
We've decided to do away with all continuity so we could set our chapters to whatever timeline we wanted. To start you off, here's our take on Whitney's disappearance. It's different from canon. Enjoy!
Few ever caught Lana Lang with anything less than a pleasant smile for company, but this particular morning, despite the sunshine and dreamy clouds forever dotting the town of Smallville, the young woman wore an immovable expression - one of solemnity and unamusement. It had been no less than twenty-four hours since she heard news from Whitney's mother that the boy was missing in action, and little made sense in her head at the moment. Her tiny figure sat atop her favorite rock, overlooking the cliff that was fenced outside of her barn. Her white palamino was gently tied to a post a few feet behind her, but otherwise, she was alone. At least...so the wind would have her believe, when she picked up the faint sound of footsteps crunching down on the low blades of grass. Lana kept her attention forward, eyeing the crevice gaping before her and the trees up ahead. She knew who was coming before Clark even uttered a greeting.
It wasn't hard to pick up on a Kent footstep. They were deliberate, powerful, yet with no intentions of waking anyone near or disturbing even the slightest being. Slipping his hands into his pockets, he prepared for a long silence. Lana was not much to talk about things once she was aware of them. It took her hours, days, weeks, to even confront Clark with the feelings she kept caged.
"I... just heard about Whitney..."
He would not say he was sorry; he knew she was the type to easily get sick of people apologizing for things they did not take part in.
"You can't expect the worst, Lana. If you do, you'll go crazy by sundown."
There was discreet movement - Lana wiping old tears that formed above her right cheek. There was that embarrassed chuckle of hers, the one that knew all too well when she had been caught in a purely unladylike moment. But this was no stranger come to disturb her contemplation. Just the guy she had known since kindergarten.
"Yeah well, that's difficult when a girl doesn't even know what to believe in anymore, isn't it?"
She was vaguely smiling, but with lips that were taut and hiding back her anger. Her words were a clear attack on Clark, for hiding things from her all week - hell, all her life - but she just wanted one more reason to be angry at the world right now with shameless abandon. She was only really blaming Clark because he was the nearest target.
Lana moved naught, fixed in her stony posture, but there remained an empty seat on the rock next to her for him to share anyway.
"How'd you find me?" she straightened suddenly, trying for a more casual composure. Lana Lang. Ever adept at appearing cool and aloof despite his presence.
Eyeing the empty spot, Clark took his respectable seat beside her. His large form overtook hers, making her look more of like a huddling form. He knew she was still confused about him and Kyla. Well, maybe not confused. No matter how much she tried to downplay her feelings, he knew she was somewhat hurt by it. And, by all means, those were not his intentions. He would never intentionally hurt Lana. But now, even though a tinge of blame tainted her every word, he pushed it aside to try and find what she was really feeling; which was a feat.
"I've seen you back here a couple of times. I guess I was too intimidated to say anything. You looked so content and in your own world that I didn't want to interrupt you. But now... I guess it's best for you to have someone around. Because the more time you spend without loved ones, the more time your mind begins to drift. And our minds do terrible things to us."
Dr. Clark Kent, if you presume. Hmm. Someone knew -too well- how to make her feel better. Despite this, Lana tried her very best to fend him off. She was in no mood to be reminded of her own confusion right now, but then again... when were things -never- confusing around this boy?
"I remember the last thing Whitney said to me before he left," Lana continued, finally giving Clark a brief but meaningful glance before she turned her gaze back to the trees across the other side of the cliff. "I don't know. I guess I just believed him when he promised me he would return."
She leaned forward and peeled off the annoying black bangs that the wind blew across her light gray eyes. Her emotions usually dictated her attire and it showed this morning. For now, she took in the summer breeze in a simple white baby tee, black shorts, and black thong sandals.
It was hard for Clark to look Lana in her tear-trodden eyes. Lana was always such a strength for him, whether she knew it or not. That always seemed to make it hard when the tables were turned, but he stood his ground even when Lana attempted to lay all the world's blame on his shoulders. It was her own defense mechanism. Blame the closest person near you; and 9 out of 10 times it was Clark. After all, if it made her feel better, he would carry the weight just for her.
But then again, that was Clark Kent; save the world first, then worry about yourself.
"Lana, you're telling me this as if you know exactly what's happened to him. But you don't. And I know you don't want anyone telling you this, but you have to look on the other side of things."
His pretty audience huffed in the middle of his monologue and stood, just to be away from him. Her version of conceding defeat. It took Lana a few moments to suppress the growing frustration that was indignantly welling up inside her again before she could form a fair response.
Her raven hair was gathered in clumps - a girl's standard reaction to heartache, stress, and nosy boys. She let her arms fall to her side. She knew she must've come across as the most selfish person in town at the moment, but God help her. She was scared. Scared of never seeing Whitney again. Scared that she had ended that relationship without having properly made atones with the boy.
"Shot. Wounded. Missing is missing. His body was never accounted for. Tell me some of the possibilities that I haven't triple-checked all morning, Clark."
Harsh. Too harsh. Lana bit her tongue and ceased her childish bickering for just a moment, to turn around and regard the tall figure behind her carefully. He was holding up a helluvalot better than she clearly was.
"Are -you- okay?"
She wasn't about to pretend that Kyla hadn't meant anything to him.
Lana was scared. It wasn't too hard to pick up on; or maybe he just knew her too well. 'Captured, lost, tortured, disoriented, passed out'...he wasn't about to fill Lana's mind with those possibilities. He'd like to have at least one friend left with an ounce of sanity. Next question.
Turning towards the edge of the cliff he looks out at it, running a hand through his tousled locks. Turn it around on him. Does it always come down to this, anyway? It was inevitable.
"I've been better, but I've also been worse."
Play it off. Get on a new subject, for chrissakes. And don't crack, either. Damn she's good.
And suddenly, it was Lana's turn to stare. She took it quite seriously when he turned his back on her, and used this moment to finally return back down to earth where she belonged. If she couldn't brood, he couldn't either. Such was the dynamic between them - an ever shifting emotional struggle. It would be terrible thing to say that Clark's suffering somehow negated her own, but there it was. They were, in a manner of speaking, even.
"It hurts, doesn't it?" Lana added quietly. "The part where you don't know what's gonna next for them."
She translated Clark's silence as him concurring, before dropping the subject altogether. She had been aware of the tension between Whitney and Clark last year, how the two consistently showed their unspoken machismo around her, how they would have silent pissing contests for her attention. Oh yes, and she paid attention. For God's sake, was that all she had been good for between the two of them? A prize trophy?
"She was pretty." That much Lana could offer. She waited for Clark to turn around before plastering a half-hearted attempt of a smile on her face. An apology.
"I'm gonna take your advice."
There it was. Lana returning to her optimism. She would hope for the best.
So now this all turned into another life lesson given by Lana Lang? Biting his tongue, Clark swore he tasted blood.
"Too bad you never really got to meet her."
Kyla was beautiful in and out, even if it was contrary to Lana's wanted belief. However, this wasn't the time to get huffy about something that was in the past. He turned his head to her, his light eyes staring into her brooding orbs.
"I guess my rambling does help once in a while," Clark went on. "Well, of course, once you push away all the B.S. and get the gist of it."
A smile. Maybe it was a smile that tended to come through your hardest protests, but it was a lightened visage nonetheless.
Lana shifted her attention off to the side, recalling Kyla's prettiness with little difficulty. What could she say? Clark had good taste in women. Lana returned his smile, placatingly. She knew he meant every good in that statement, knew how important Kyla was to him. Last week, she was almost ready to accept the fact that Clark was going to marry the girl, hook, line, and sinker.
"Yeah..."
Another smile, this time disastrous. She looked ready to lose it again, remembering how slighted she had felt when she had stumbled upon Clark's impromptu makeout session with the newcomer in the Kent's barn. But blunt confessions really weren't their kind of thing, were they?
Lana kept her opinions on Kyla to herself. She liked the girl plainly enough. But then tragedy struck, and she was no longer in the position to say anything slanderous against the dead, no matter if her opinions had been in the negative. And they weren't.
"Can you keep up with Bast?" Lana quipped lightly, nodding over her shoulder at the gentle mare patiently waiting for her by the fence. The hour was growing late, the sullen mood between them growing even longer. She needed to be heading back to the barn by now. Any reason to pull away from this conversation.
Peering past Lana at the mare awaiting her, Clark smiled. More genuine this time and less polished.
"Nobody said I couldn't try."
Arising from his seated position, he politely brushed off the seat of his pants and sauntered towards her. Large, awkward hands found refuge in his jean pockets while the boy hunched forward shyly.
"Glad to know I was of some help to you today. At least...I think."
Still relieved to have gotten off the Kyla subject. Even if he hadn't openly talked about her with anyone, this was not the time to start. Clark felt indifferent about the whole situation. He came here to comfort Lana, yet the tables turned and his own problems surfaced new wounds. But Lana got something out of it, so he fell silent knowing he had accomplished what he came here to do.
The girl, meanwhile, ducked her diminutive figure in between the old, rickety log fence to cross to the other side, but not before making a crack at something curious that she suddenly noticed.
"What are you, Clark, able to leap tall buildings?"
She couldn't help herself. The fence was as tall as him and none of the space between the logs could have ever fit the boy's obviously muscular's frame through. Dismissively, Lana chuckled the joke away.
Bast's rein was untied and collected, then held onto as the young woman fluidly slipped into the saddle. Even then, she was only about a foot or two above Clark at his full height. She paused, holding back the sentiment of the moment that threatened to make her tear up again, and smiled down at him that purely polite, Lana Lang way.
"I haven't had much time to deal with this or share it with anyone, so. Thank you."
Despite the losses they had each shared between them - and there had been many - Lana felt a smile tugging at the corners of her lips from the sheer realization that Clark would always be that someone who would sneak up from behind, unbidden, mysteriously though he might approach, to check up on her. The ride back to the barn was slow, unhurried. They talked about everything and nothing, of school and their unfortunate homework assignments both, and somewhere in the middle of the conversation... Lana let it be known that she'd always be there for him in case Clark needed some sneaking up on of his own.
