[B]REFLECTIONS[/B]
[I]by hanemg[/I]
[I]Disclaimer: I neither own nor claim any formalized attachment with Smallville or its characters. This work of fan fiction is purely for enjoyment purposes only and no profit is gained with its use. Smallville and all its characters are the property of Warner Bros., DC Comics, Miller/Gough, Tolin-Robbins, et al.[/I]
The windblown rain pelted the upper floor office windows and ran down their panes like tears. Lionel sat with his back to the door in his darkened office staring out at the city he had once ruled. The weight of the past several years and most especially the past year showed heavily on him. He had lost the motivation to color his hair some weeks before and the natural gray now marked him with all of the years he possessed. His face had grown gaunt and was lined with wrinkles that made him look even older.
"Lex makes his final move tomorrow."
Lionel started at the voice jerking around to confront an apparition standing in the shadowy corner of his office. He had no idea how this intruder had entered his office let alone the building at this time of night without alerting him or his security force. Wrapped in darkness the man's features were obscured, but his voice, while soft, carried itself easily and eerily to Lionel's ears causing a chill of recognition to prick at Lionel's consciousness.
Lionel turned back to the window studying his own reflection.
"Are you here to gloat? Or are you just going to put me out of my misery?"
"I think justice seems to be finding you without my help, Lionel. Lex has been chipping away at you for sometime. Tomorrow he takes the head off the snake. Tomorrow he leaves you with nothing, but the clothes on your back and the satisfaction that you have a son that has finally lived up to his father's intentions if not expectations."
"So, you've chosen to gloat then."
"No, Lionel. Not to gloat, but to make a decision. Lex is taking all that you have and all that you are. I need to decide if that's enough. Enough to balance against all of the crimes you have committed during your life. I need to decide if tomorrow is the epitaph for a life misspent or merely the precursor for a larger accounting."
"So the choice is emasculation or worse," Lionel said still facing the window. " I must confess though that I have difficulty imagining what you could conceive of as worse."
"Justice comes to all in time. The form it takes is often dictated by the individual himself."
"Will your sense of 'justice' send you after him next?"
"Lex has problems of his own."
"Ah, yes. Our new 'savior,' come to fight for 'truth and justice'. Clark Kent wrote a wonderful article for the Daily Planet. Very insightful, for a fledgling reporter don't you think?"
The intruder did not answer and in truth Lionel had not really expected one. Silence filled the room before he spoke again.
"I don't hate him you know. You're right in that he turned out to be every bit the man I envisioned him to be."
"You must be proud."
"In many ways I am. He was sickly as a child and I always feared that he would be a victim."
Lionel was quite for a moment before continuing, speaking more to himself than the intruder, "There is nothing worse than being a victim."
He straightened, stood up still facing the window and continued more forcefully.
"Victims are always at the mercy of others and whatever abuses their whims dictated. My son deserved better than that."
Lionel suddenly gave a short laugh.
"That's ironic you know. My father used to say that to me all of the time. 'Luthors' deserve better'. I had to be smarter and faster and better than everyone else because he was determined that I would have it better than he did. He had lots of little pearls of wisdom like that. He would say, 'You're a Luthor. No one pushes a Luthor around.' Of course he usually said that right before he would push me around. Calling me to task for some infraction of his personal code. He wanted me to be better, but he hated it when better turned out to be better than him."
"He didn't like to be shown up by his son," the intruder commented.
"Yes, he hated it whenever anyone showed him up, but especially not me. I remember getting a job selling the Daily Planet over on the corner of Seigel and Shuster. He had just gotten laid off at the factory he worked at and he woke me up in the middle of the night to berate me. He had came in drunk, which really wasn't unusual for him even when he was working and he preceded to slap me around asking me if I thought I was better than him now that I was the one bringing the money into the house. He wanted me to know that I would always need him. He told me that we were family and that family was important. But, he was the head of the family and I shouldn't disrespect him."
"What about your mother?"
"The woman who gave birth to me was hardly a 'mother'. She was the first person to show me the fate of a victim. She stayed drunk most of the time just so she would be numb to my father's beatings and criticisms."
"She never came to your defense nor you to hers?"
"That was the first rule in our house, 'you are responsible for your own actions.' Interference only meant that the punishment would be twice as bad and include both parties. My father thought it would make us 'stronger' if we had to account for ourselves."
"So you both stayed silent."
"Not always. She spoke up once. Tried to tell my father that he was being too unreasonable. She learned her lesson soon enough though."
"Lesson?"
"Yes, my father didn't like to be corrected or contradicted. The first time she stood in his way he beat her until she was unconscious. After that she stayed quiet when he started in on me or sometimes sided with him because it made it easier on her to deflect his attention from her. She sold out her own child for her own safety. That's the way of victims."
"You must have felt very alone."
"I learned that alone was not a bad thing when together meant being with them. I became a stronger person despite their best intentions."
"A lesson that you've tried to pass down to your son."
"I've tried. Don't get me wrong, Lex will never be a victim, but I don't think he's as strong as me. He simply does what he does to best me. Not from a position of survival of the fittest, but simply to flaunt himself. Once I'm gone whose authority will he challenge?"
"Whose indeed."
"Lex didn't grow up like I did. He has no idea about true adversity. He never had to survive my father."
"He didn't understand the sacrifices you had to make."
"No, he grew up with wealth and never understood the character it took to come from nothing to something. To have to fight for that something because those closest to you were holding you back even as they claimed to be pushing you forward."
"Which is why you killed them."
Lionel was quiet for a moment and dropped his head to stare at the floor for a moment.
"Everyday with them was an exercise in survival. Is today the day that I say the wrong thing and this time I don't get up from the beating? It wasn't murder, it was self defense."
"Why didn't you just leave?"
"I tried, the police just brought me back. I was an upstart kid. No one believed my tale of woe. I was just an ungrateful child who didn't appreciate having parents when many didn't."
"You would never be free until you cut off the head of the snake."
"Yes, no matter how it had to be done."
The two were quiet for a moment until finally the intruder spoke again.
"Then perhaps the justice of your own making is the best."
"Perhaps," Lionel said, "for you as well."
Lionel pulled a gun from inside his jacket and spun to confront the intruder.
A bolt of lightning lit the room revealing a large man dressed as a bat his cape spreading open around him like wings. Lionel gasped and stepped backwards almost losing his grip on the gun as the room was once more plunged into darkness.
"Goodbye, Lionel."
Lightning once more illuminated the room for just a moment, but this time Lionel found himself alone.
He stood there for several minutes still holding the gun up with a trembling hand. He finally lowed it and turned back to the window. Staring at his reflection he finally recognized the startling resemblance to his father and for the first time since he was a child Lionel wept openly.
~The End~
[I]by hanemg[/I]
[I]Disclaimer: I neither own nor claim any formalized attachment with Smallville or its characters. This work of fan fiction is purely for enjoyment purposes only and no profit is gained with its use. Smallville and all its characters are the property of Warner Bros., DC Comics, Miller/Gough, Tolin-Robbins, et al.[/I]
The windblown rain pelted the upper floor office windows and ran down their panes like tears. Lionel sat with his back to the door in his darkened office staring out at the city he had once ruled. The weight of the past several years and most especially the past year showed heavily on him. He had lost the motivation to color his hair some weeks before and the natural gray now marked him with all of the years he possessed. His face had grown gaunt and was lined with wrinkles that made him look even older.
"Lex makes his final move tomorrow."
Lionel started at the voice jerking around to confront an apparition standing in the shadowy corner of his office. He had no idea how this intruder had entered his office let alone the building at this time of night without alerting him or his security force. Wrapped in darkness the man's features were obscured, but his voice, while soft, carried itself easily and eerily to Lionel's ears causing a chill of recognition to prick at Lionel's consciousness.
Lionel turned back to the window studying his own reflection.
"Are you here to gloat? Or are you just going to put me out of my misery?"
"I think justice seems to be finding you without my help, Lionel. Lex has been chipping away at you for sometime. Tomorrow he takes the head off the snake. Tomorrow he leaves you with nothing, but the clothes on your back and the satisfaction that you have a son that has finally lived up to his father's intentions if not expectations."
"So, you've chosen to gloat then."
"No, Lionel. Not to gloat, but to make a decision. Lex is taking all that you have and all that you are. I need to decide if that's enough. Enough to balance against all of the crimes you have committed during your life. I need to decide if tomorrow is the epitaph for a life misspent or merely the precursor for a larger accounting."
"So the choice is emasculation or worse," Lionel said still facing the window. " I must confess though that I have difficulty imagining what you could conceive of as worse."
"Justice comes to all in time. The form it takes is often dictated by the individual himself."
"Will your sense of 'justice' send you after him next?"
"Lex has problems of his own."
"Ah, yes. Our new 'savior,' come to fight for 'truth and justice'. Clark Kent wrote a wonderful article for the Daily Planet. Very insightful, for a fledgling reporter don't you think?"
The intruder did not answer and in truth Lionel had not really expected one. Silence filled the room before he spoke again.
"I don't hate him you know. You're right in that he turned out to be every bit the man I envisioned him to be."
"You must be proud."
"In many ways I am. He was sickly as a child and I always feared that he would be a victim."
Lionel was quite for a moment before continuing, speaking more to himself than the intruder, "There is nothing worse than being a victim."
He straightened, stood up still facing the window and continued more forcefully.
"Victims are always at the mercy of others and whatever abuses their whims dictated. My son deserved better than that."
Lionel suddenly gave a short laugh.
"That's ironic you know. My father used to say that to me all of the time. 'Luthors' deserve better'. I had to be smarter and faster and better than everyone else because he was determined that I would have it better than he did. He had lots of little pearls of wisdom like that. He would say, 'You're a Luthor. No one pushes a Luthor around.' Of course he usually said that right before he would push me around. Calling me to task for some infraction of his personal code. He wanted me to be better, but he hated it when better turned out to be better than him."
"He didn't like to be shown up by his son," the intruder commented.
"Yes, he hated it whenever anyone showed him up, but especially not me. I remember getting a job selling the Daily Planet over on the corner of Seigel and Shuster. He had just gotten laid off at the factory he worked at and he woke me up in the middle of the night to berate me. He had came in drunk, which really wasn't unusual for him even when he was working and he preceded to slap me around asking me if I thought I was better than him now that I was the one bringing the money into the house. He wanted me to know that I would always need him. He told me that we were family and that family was important. But, he was the head of the family and I shouldn't disrespect him."
"What about your mother?"
"The woman who gave birth to me was hardly a 'mother'. She was the first person to show me the fate of a victim. She stayed drunk most of the time just so she would be numb to my father's beatings and criticisms."
"She never came to your defense nor you to hers?"
"That was the first rule in our house, 'you are responsible for your own actions.' Interference only meant that the punishment would be twice as bad and include both parties. My father thought it would make us 'stronger' if we had to account for ourselves."
"So you both stayed silent."
"Not always. She spoke up once. Tried to tell my father that he was being too unreasonable. She learned her lesson soon enough though."
"Lesson?"
"Yes, my father didn't like to be corrected or contradicted. The first time she stood in his way he beat her until she was unconscious. After that she stayed quiet when he started in on me or sometimes sided with him because it made it easier on her to deflect his attention from her. She sold out her own child for her own safety. That's the way of victims."
"You must have felt very alone."
"I learned that alone was not a bad thing when together meant being with them. I became a stronger person despite their best intentions."
"A lesson that you've tried to pass down to your son."
"I've tried. Don't get me wrong, Lex will never be a victim, but I don't think he's as strong as me. He simply does what he does to best me. Not from a position of survival of the fittest, but simply to flaunt himself. Once I'm gone whose authority will he challenge?"
"Whose indeed."
"Lex didn't grow up like I did. He has no idea about true adversity. He never had to survive my father."
"He didn't understand the sacrifices you had to make."
"No, he grew up with wealth and never understood the character it took to come from nothing to something. To have to fight for that something because those closest to you were holding you back even as they claimed to be pushing you forward."
"Which is why you killed them."
Lionel was quiet for a moment and dropped his head to stare at the floor for a moment.
"Everyday with them was an exercise in survival. Is today the day that I say the wrong thing and this time I don't get up from the beating? It wasn't murder, it was self defense."
"Why didn't you just leave?"
"I tried, the police just brought me back. I was an upstart kid. No one believed my tale of woe. I was just an ungrateful child who didn't appreciate having parents when many didn't."
"You would never be free until you cut off the head of the snake."
"Yes, no matter how it had to be done."
The two were quiet for a moment until finally the intruder spoke again.
"Then perhaps the justice of your own making is the best."
"Perhaps," Lionel said, "for you as well."
Lionel pulled a gun from inside his jacket and spun to confront the intruder.
A bolt of lightning lit the room revealing a large man dressed as a bat his cape spreading open around him like wings. Lionel gasped and stepped backwards almost losing his grip on the gun as the room was once more plunged into darkness.
"Goodbye, Lionel."
Lightning once more illuminated the room for just a moment, but this time Lionel found himself alone.
He stood there for several minutes still holding the gun up with a trembling hand. He finally lowed it and turned back to the window. Staring at his reflection he finally recognized the startling resemblance to his father and for the first time since he was a child Lionel wept openly.
~The End~