Welcome Back, Cyrus

by The Die Hard

After a summer of reruns, Cyrus rescues Clark. Well, sort of. Much angst. And Lex throws a pitcher of water on Lionel. And Lana grows up! A little.

1. What a Difference a Year Makes

Welcome Back, Cyrus (Even to get a single-word title, I refuse to resort to "Homecoming")

Disclaimer: I don't own none of 'em, more's the pity, 'cause they're missing a bunch of bets.

Timeline and Spoilers: after Exodus, but before WB screws it all up with their Pink Princess Power Ranger (gah). And if you ain't read "Lessons" (self-promoting here, and yeah, I know the darn thing is practically a novel, but tormenting Clark is SOO much fun), then you won't know where Cyrus is coming from, but short form is, he's recovered, and been trained.

Archive: as far as I'm concerned, once it's posted, electrons are public property.

Explanation for stupid reposting: people pointed out to me that the durn thing ought to be in chapters so they didn't have to reread it all to get to the new stuff. SOOORRYY! Actually I thought it was finished when I first posted it, but Lex just wouldn't shut up.

Moral: there's no such thing as happily ever after, but sometimes it's worth trying. A little.

Opening scene: no, Cyrus is not wearing a hat. Or a hood. Or plaid. El yucko.

The bus pulled up to the Smallville station, its hydrogen-clean engine almost soundless, but its air-brake CHWHUFF! as loud as the oldest truck on the road. Technology was still bound by the laws of physics. Compressed air would always be noisy.

Clark winced at the sound. Cyrus, beside him, gave him a sympathetic look. "Still having trouble with the hearing thing?"

Clark sighed. "Actually, I think it's mostly nerves." He looked away. "I could have just run back," he muttered. "It would have been faster. And quieter."

Cyrus laughed. "You contradict yourself more than even the Baron does, and he has way more practice. You're nervous about coming back, but you wanted to get back faster. Have you always been so dichotomous, or just since the business with the voice from space?"

"Always, I guess," Clark mumbled. They got off the bus and went around to the luggage compartment -- Clark, lagging behind, was carrying barely an overnight bag, but Cyrus had packed enough to practically move back to Smallville. "At least, ever since ... I...." He stumbled, and sagged against the side of the bus, breath going out of him in a ragged gasp.

Cyrus caught him automatically, his usual healer / empath aversion to physical touch be damned. This was *Clark*. The reflexes of the past year's training kicked in, and his protective power flared to full strength as he fought back instinctively on the psi level against the waves of pain and sickness engulfing his friend. "Christ, you're burning up. What...?"

He picked up the direction from the worst of the effect on Clark, and looked around to where some entrepreneur had set up a welcome-to-Smallville souvenir table, complete with meteorites. "Oh, hells. Come on, let's get you away from here. Lean on me."

Clark would have protested when Cyrus took his weight across the shoulder -- he knew full well that physical contact put the empath through whatever the other person was feeling -- but he was too short of breath to argue, and too dizzy to stand by himself. He started to shake his head, and decided that would be a bad idea. Cyrus probably wouldn't appreciate being thrown up on, on top of everything else. "Shouldn't," was all he managed.

"Oh, can it, Kal." Cyrus gritted his teeth, less from Clark's heaviness than the effort of countering the cursed radiation poisoning's effects on Clark and trying to shield himself enough to stay functional. "After what you and your friends did for me, there's not a hell of a lot left that I can't do in repayment. Except save the world, maybe. Or Lionel Luthor's soul."

He slid Clark down onto a bench on the other side of the terminal from the souvenir vendor, but kept hold of Clark's hand, concentrating on the flow of healing energy. He was getting pretty good at this. Blast the years he'd wasted hiding his talent! -- instead of learning to use it, learning the nuances of biology and bodies that would have made him so much more effective. He wondered if Clark ever felt like that. Probably. Clark had admitted that he never sought the limits of his powers, and was always more concerned with concealing them.

Clark fell back against the seat, panting, but recovering, faster than even the healer could have accounted for. "Shouldn't ... have hit me ... that hard," he said apologetically. "And I didn't even think to check. Sorry. And thanks. If you hadn't been there...."

Cyrus snorted. "I knew there was a reason I needed to come back with you. Hey, maybe I'm developing a precog talent too. Let's go bet on the horses or something."

"You have definitely changed in the past year." Clark worked up a smile. "I guess hanging out with the wrong crowd of crazy people will do that to you."

"That 'wrong crowd' saved my sanity. And my life. If I act a little crazy sometimes anyway, hey, so what? At least I don't go around saying I'm from another planet any more."

"Neither do I," Clark said quietly.

The empath put his hand firmly on the back of Clark's. "You never did, Kal. And I understand why. But someday, you may want to rethink that decision." When Clark started to make his ingrained objection, Cyrus shook his head. "Not now, Clark. Don't even think about it right now. You're exhausted, and you're scared, and you've got a lot on your plate to deal with in the next few days, and your body is reacting to stress the same way anyone else's does, which is why that crap put you so out on your feet like that. Didn't you get it beaten into your head yet that you're human too?"

Clark looked away. "Only in a ... figurative sense."

"It was only beaten into your head in a figurative sense? Okay, let's fix that." Cyrus smacked him across the side of the head, hard. Clark was still weakened enough that he even felt it, a little. "Lesson one. You have emotions, just like anyone else." Cyrus went to slap him upside the head again, and Clark ducked, chuckling. "You trying to break your hand?"

"I'm trying to get your attention. You're talking to the expert on who is and isn't human in the head, remember? I'll break my hand if that's what it takes to get it through that steel skull. Lesson two. Your mind, your sanity, is not indestructible. And you're way too careless with that most vulnerable part of you." Cyrus made as if to swat him again, but a shout interrupted them before he could actually prove his willingness to smash finger bones on Clark's head. "Clark! Man! There you are! I was afraid you hadn't come after all!"

Clark looked up, and Cyrus turned, to see Pete bearing down on them. Clark stood to meet his friend, cautiously, tentatively. His eyes blurred, and he felt a little sick. He tried to put it down to residual radiation effects, but he knew that would have been a lie.

Then he and Pete were hugging each other, Pete with all his strength, Clark hard enough to make Pete catch his breath. The blur in his vision went away when he squeezed his eyes shut, and ran down his cheeks. "Pete, I'm sorry, I missed you, I'm so glad you're here...."

Cyrus put a hand on his shoulder before the babbling got out of control. "Hey. Watch it, Ka-- Kent, you'll get lectured for public displays and so forth. Hey, Pete, how's it been hangin' back in the old town?"

Pete let go of Clark and dashed his sleeve across his eyes with what he hoped was an unobtrusive sniffle. "Hey, it's been okay, good to see you again ... CYRUS?" His eyes opened wide, just now registering who Clark's companion was.

Cyrus grinned. "I mostly go by Bill these days, but whatever." He held out his hand to shake, and Pete took it automatically, not realizing what a significant gesture that was (though Clark did, and his eyes widened even more than Pete's) for an empath.

Cyrus winced at the contact. "Great, Clark, you cracked one of his ribs. Never mind, I can fix that up in a minute. And Pete -- " Now it was Cyrus' turn for his eyes to go wide. "Oh. I didn't realize that you knew. You been backin' Kal all this time? Good on you, man. Wow, you really *were* worried about Clark. Not one date in all these months? Jeez!"

Pete's mouth dropped open, and his arm went limp, though his hand stayed in Cyrus' grip. "How did you ... What are you....?"

Cyrus looked immensely pleased with himself. "You want to tell him, or shall I?"

Clark ran a hand through his hair. "I'm sorry, Pete. About everything. About running. About what I said to you. About -- " He glanced at x-ray over Pete's ribs, and flinched. "About hurting you." His voice dropped. "About everyone I hurt."

Cyrus let go of Pete's hand and slapped Clark across the face, fast and unexpected. "Ow. Dammit, Kal-El, if you don't stop that, I'm going to keep hitting you until I break every bone in both hands. You ran, same as I did. You were hurting, and I know all and exactly about that. You're coming back to us. It's not going to be easy. It wasn't easy for me. But you can do it, and you're going to do it, and I'm going to slap you every time you forget that."

"All right," Clark agreed, subdued. "You're right. And I did promise." He took a deep breath. "Pete, you knew Cyrus -- Bill -- had a talent, right?" Pete was still looking between them suspiciously, the phrase "not another meteor freak!" written all over his face. "What's that got to do with him slapping you around?" Pete demanded, low and hostile.

Clark shook his head. "It's not like that, really. He's trying to help. He's naturally empathic, and his healing talent is, well, he can do things even I wouldn't have believed. The meteors just enhanced his abilities. And he got me away from," a nod to the other side of the terminal, "that. If he hadn't been here with me, I would have been in real trouble. Probably passed out, and wouldn't THAT have been a great homecoming to read about in the papers."

Pete was shaking his head with the effort of absorbing the new information, along with Clark's return and Cyrus' presence, but his eyes automatically followed Clark's nod to the souvenir stand, and his dark skin darkened further with anger. "Why, that son of a -- "

"Pete! It's not like the guy would know, after all."

Pete snorted. "It's not like everyone in town doesn't know the damn things turn people into dangerous freaks? Present company excepted. But he's been warned about putting those things out here. Excuse me while I go beat some sense into someone myself."

Cyrus laughed. "Let me fix up that broken rib first. Only take a few minutes."

Pete stared at him, then shook his head. "I got used to my best friend being -- what he is, I guess I can get used to this too. No, I want to keep a mad on for a few minutes. You might have something else to fix up after I finish," he flexed his hand into a fist, eyes narrowing, "explaining things." He looked at Clark, who smiled tiredly. Pete, at least, hadn't changed. "Why don't you go wait in the car, man? I can help Cyrus, uh, Bill, with the bags."

Clark nodded in acquiescence. Cyrus looked delighted. This was going better than he had hoped. "Can I watch? I've picked up a few pointers myself in the past year."

Pete looked at him curiously. "In fighting? Thought Clark said you're empathic."

"Physical training is part of mental discipline," Cyrus intoned solemnly. Clark nearly giggled at the obvious imitation. "Besides, Clark needs some time alone with -- oops."

"Oops?" Pete's and Clark's suspicion was simultaneous, but for opposite reasons. Pete looked confused and then sheepish, Clark just looked confused. "Wow, man, you picked that up too? So you read minds?"

"Telepathy is a whole other kettle of fish of a different color, and not something I'd wish on anyone. But yeah, it was pretty easy to figure out, from your emotional spectrum."

Clark scowled. "What on this planet are you two talking about?"

"Um." Pete all but toed the ground. "Your parents are at your house, getting things ready for you, but Lana and Chloe are waiting in the car."

Clark felt dizzy and faint again. Damn those green rocks, anyway. Cyrus took his hand between his own, soothing him with that moonlight-intangible calm that was emotional healing, and tried to keep the sadness out of his own smile. "Go talk to them, Clark. You knew you would have to, sooner or later. One step at a time."

"Yeah. Thanks," Clark whispered. It was all he could do not to close his eyes against the pain. I can pick up a tractor, he told himself. I'm bulletproof. How hard can it be to just go talk to a couple of old friends that I just haven't seen for a few months?

A couple of old friends that I hurt. Because I couldn't tell them the truth. Because I was scared. Because I was a coward. Because I ran. Give me a tractor to pick up any day.

Cyrus gave him a light shove. "Am I going to have to slap you again? Go on. I'm looking forward to critiquing Pete's methods of 'explaining things'." He rubbed his hands and grinned, as if in real anticipation. "And obviously you can't be the one to step in and finish any fights in this arena. Get used to not trying to save the world on your own, cow-boy."

Clark grimaced at the awful joke. It was enough to get him moving, anyway.

Behind him, he heard Pete and Cyrus falling into conversation like old friends.

Pete had acquired a different car in the past few months (did he wreck the last one? again? Clark snickered automatically, then sobered -- maybe Pete had been hurt, or maybe he had taken up some hard work to earn the money for the silver and dark green convertible, but either way, Clark hadn't been there to share it with him). He knew it was Pete's only because Lana and Chloe were standing beside it, talking in low intimate tones.

Clark slowed, watching them. They looked -- different. (Surprise, surprise.) Lana was as beautiful as ever, but her face, the way she stood, was ... it was as if something had been beaten out of her. She had always struck him as being able to rise above all the adversity in her life, sooner or later, letting herself cry it out, and then finally jerking her chin up and going on. Now, the way she stood as she looked down and nodded vaguely at whatever Chloe was saying, was ... defeated. Empty. All her resources and inner strength gone.

Chloe, on the other hand, looked, well, angry. Not just angry at something right now, not just mad, but angry to the depths of her soul, at everything, everyone, all the time. As if her trust in the whole world had been ripped away, and she would never open her heart or mind to anyone or anything ever again. As if everything she had ever believed had been betrayed. It was an obvious effort for her, being gentle with Lana. She looked as if she wanted to throw all the cars in the parking lot through the wall.

My fault, Clark thought. For hurting them. For abandoning them

Then he realized that he was being egotistical about that. He had no idea what had happened in their lives for the past several months. Why should they care one way or the other about his opinions or actions? They had probably moved on, made other friends, found new interests. Hell, for all he knew, they could both be married by now.

Clark swallowed hard and sought to hold onto the only-recently-learned idea that not everything was his fault, or his responsibility. He hoped Cyrus wasn't tuned in on him. Even the empath would probably buy a souvenir meteor rock to hit him with just to shut him up.

The two girls sensed his presence at the same time, catching his tall form in their peripheral vision. Both froze, for a second that seemed like ten years to Clark. Both turned together to face him, silent, expressions as blank as if he were a total stranger.

Clark fought the urge to run away. He had done that already, and it hadn't helped.

I've just been away for awhile, he told himself. How hard could it be to just go over and say, Hey, how've you been? Smile his practiced smile? Play the normalcy card?

The thought made him want to throw up. Damn those green rocks anyway.

"Hi," he said tentatively. "Um, thanks for coming."

Lana held herself back for one second, her frozen expression melting like an ice statue abandoned in the sun. Then she sobbed and threw herself into his arms, babbling words that mostly consisted of his name, and apologies that made no sense. He held her carefully, delicately, dizzy again, but knowing it was purely from confusion. "It's okay, it's all right," he murmured over and over again, babbling in his own way, as her tears soaked his shirt. "I'm sorry, I didn't mean to hurt you, I won't leave again, it was just ... you know, all too much...."

Lana's sobs subsided, as they always did, when she believed she had gotten her proper amount of attention. Clark lifted his head from where it was pressed against her hair and met Chloe's eyes. The anger in those sparking sapphires scared him as much as any green rock ever had. Deep, deadly, barely contained anger, that would never be banked again. Clark was pretty sure that right now she could have hit him hard enough to hurt him.

"Welcome back, Clark," she said with a chill calm like tempered edged steel.

"Chloe." The knot in his throat and his gut would have killed anyone less invulnerable "I'm -- how many times can I say I'm sorry? I had to get you away from there. I, I knew the explosion was coming. I just couldn't tell you." And it made him sick all over again, how easily the half-truths came to him.... "I can't ask you to forgive me. I was ... I wasn't thinking straight. I was stupid. I didn't mean to push you away. I was scared, and I wanted to talk to you, but that was exactly the wrong time, and...." He ran down, mercifully.

Chloe's sharp, glittering eyes raked him over once. "I'll accept that, Clark," she said softly, like the sliding sound of a sword being drawn. "On one condition."

Clark gulped. Cyrus, hurry up and get out here with that kryptonite, so I can pass out in peace. "Name it. I, whatever I can. You deserve it."

Lana, still curled in his arms, frowned up at him. This was obviously not something she had figured on for their great wonderful reunion. Without thinking, Clark released her and stood straight, facing Chloe as if she were a gladiator opponent.

Clark was suddenly reminded of Lex. Amazing how much Chloe and Lex were alike in some ways. "I think you already know what I want."

Oh, I can just guess. Hurry, Cyrus. "No, Chloe, I'm sorry, I really don't."

Her eyes narrowed. If she'd had heat vision, he would have been flash-fried on the spot. "That doesn't cut it, Clark. Don't ever lie to me again."

Clark lowered his head and closed his eyes, accepting the price. Whatever it took, he had to come back to himself. To the people who accepted him, even if they had to learn that he wasn't one of them. To find an anchor, a reason to care again. Pushing his friends away, running away, had nearly cost him his soul. "Okay. What do you want to know?"

Whatever it was that altered her voice, it wasn't triumph. It was something -- gentle. "Nothing, Clark. Your private life is none of my business. Just don't ever lie to me again."

Startled, Clark looked up at her. Okay, he really HADN'T expected that. He'd been underestimating Chloe. Maybe.... He nodded. "I promise." He could live with that.

He'd have to. If he ever wanted to be treated as a person again, to have a home.

Lana moved close to him again, reclaiming the conversation. "Where's Pete?"

Uh-oh. "He's getting the bags. An old friend came back with me -- you remember Cyrus? -- and he brought quite a bit of baggage." In more ways than one.

"And you didn't feel like helping? Hardly the Clark Kent I used to know."

Lana shot Chloe a warning look at that. Clark tried to remember what it had been like, back when words didn't cut him apart and make him want to hide. Back when he hadn't had any trouble breathing. Of course Lana would have shared his last words to her.

You wouldn't like what you see. The Clark Kent you know is a lie.

"Pete thought I might want some time alone with you two." Oh, gods, so easy to leave it at that, half-truths, excuses, evasions. But the laser glitter was back in Chloe's eyes. There were too many obvious contradictions and comebacks to that.

He turned away, leaning over, hands braced on the trunk of Pete's car. Breaking a life-long habit was hard. He sympathized with people who had brainwashed and had to be deprogrammed. Giving up a secret of vulnerability was way harder. No wonder addicts fought against being cured. "Also, there was a souvenir stand by the bus, selling meteorites. I had to get away from there. I ... sort of have a problem, being around the meteorites."

Whatever he had expected in reaction, it was not Lana's gentle hand on his shoulder, and Chloe's understanding nod. "You mean like my old necklace?" Lana asked softly.

Clark managed a bare smile, hoping Chloe wouldn't call him on that particular lie. "Well. Yeah. I had to let you think I was avoiding you because of Whitney."

"Because if every jock and nerd and unpopular geek in school knew they could clock you with a meteorite," Chloe finished analytically, "the Luthors would have cornered the market on the damn things and be selling them by the gram."

This time, Clark's short laugh was nearly genuine. "Lex wouldn't do that."

"Don't bet on it." Chloe's eyes darkened, sapphire rage. "Lionel certainly would." Clark wondered what had happened to make Chloe even more furious with the Luthors than Pete was. "Actually, Clark, I had pretty much figured that out. The only times you fall on your butt or don't save the day is when the meteors are involved. But you could have saved yourself a lot of trouble along the way if you had just told us. Running interference is what friends are for, you think? Or are we just not good enough friends for you to trust?"

"C-Chloe." Where had all the air gone? Maybe Chloe was a meteor mutant. She could certainly hurt him like one. "Haven't you ever had something that you just didn't want to talk about? That you mostly didn't even want to think about?" That was unfair, because Clark knew she did have at least one such vulnerability, the mother who had abandoned her. He didn't bring it up, though. Let her make the connection for herself.

Chloe's expression softened again. Forgiveness. It was like sunlight to Clark. "Yeah, I guess worshiping the toilet isn't something you go advertising, even to friends."

Clark blinked. How had she known about THAT particular effect of kryptonite? Or was she talking about something else, something she herself.... No. He didn't want to know. "Yeah. Like that." The smile was shaky, but not a lie this time.

Lana hugged him, trying to distract him from a conversation that was a little over her head, and he held her, taking welcome comfort in her warmth and familiarity. After a second, he held out his hand to Chloe as well, offering. Not asking, not demanding, not of this angry woman who had changed far more than even he had in the past few months, but offering.

Chloe's anger finally took second place to their years of friendship and caring, and she moved into his arms as well. Clark resolved that, promise or no, it would be a long time before he told her that his hearing was sensitive enough to pick up her suppressed sobs.

Pete and Cyrus (timing no doubt clued by the empath's talent, and Clark was simply not even going to think about how much Bill had been "peeking" in on) chose that moment to yell at them from across the parking lot. "Yo! Big man! Care to lend a hand with the bags here? Cyrus brought enough with him to take up half of Luthor's mansion!"

"Oh, come on, Pete," Cyrus drawled, also at full volume, "If I were going to move in with Lex, I'd have made him buy me all this stuff instead of schlepping it myself!"

And that provoked a round of snickers and giggles entirely out of proportion to the comment. Clark wondered if everyone there knew something he didn't. Granted there was a lot he needed to catch up on, but still.... Maybe he should ask Lex about it later.

Or maybe not. He kissed both girls on the forehead, let them go with reluctance, and jogged over to grab four of the bags Pete and Cyrus were staggering under. "Show-off," Pete muttered. Cyrus just grinned. "And just exactly how much did you tell them?"

"What, you weren't listening in?" Clark needled. Cyrus frowned, and Clark was instantly contrite. "Sorry. Yes, I know you read emotions, not words. That was just a dumb Clark comment. I told them I had to get away from the kryptonite. That's a start, isn't it?"

"It's a good enough start," Cyrus allowed. "You're going to have to tell them everything sooner or later, if you want to keep them as friends. But slow and easy is as good a way as any." Hoisting two of the remaining bags, he took the lead of the parade over to Pete's car and the two girls, his jaunty saunter so at odds with the reclusive self-proclaimed alien of a year earlier that neither Lana nor Chloe recognized him at first.

Clark tried to maintain the amused facade, though it was getting tiring. He kept Pete physically in between himself and the empath. "Ladies, may I present our old schoolmate, William, the boy from outer space. Or inner space, as the case may be. He's decided that Smallville isn't such a hole after all. At least, that's what we're trying to convince each other." His voice failed him at that one. Cyrus wasn't the one who had run away of his own choice.

"William," Chloe said neutrally, holding out a hand in distancing welcome.

Cyrus took her hand without hesitation, making Clark gulp. "Just Bill, Chloe," he said, smiling. "Thanks for all your research. It was good to know about my biological heritage. Turns out my bio-dad's family runs to high blood pressure, so I'm keeping a watch on that. Wouldn't have known about it except for you." He kissed her hand with an exaggerated bow. Pete choked. "You're an amazing person. And trust me, I know amazing."

Clark grumblingly considered a touch of heat vision to the seat of Bill's pants for that bit of overplayed flirtation. Bill caught it, and gave him a sharp raised-eyebrow smile, as if to say, try it. I can dish it out too, alien farmboy.

Cyrus turned to Lana, and took her hand too. By now, Pete had remembered that this was serious work for an empath. "Lovely Lana. How's the Talon doing? I could sell all my worldly possessions for a decent java right now. Buses leave a little to be desired in the comfort department. And Morose Man here could make anyone pass out from boredom."

Clark glared. Pete laughed in relief. The girls smiled uncertainly, but the discomfort level was dissolving, everything calming down towards ordinariness, maybe even acceptance.

Only Clark would ever know how hard Cyrus had worked to learn that control, that yeah-hey-everything's-okay projection with the power of his terribly sensitive touch.

"I'd," Clark started, and had to clear his throat. He was invulnerable to everything except the exploded remnants of his own planet, wasn't he? Trying to finish a sentence shouldn't hurt so much. He fought his conflicting feelings back down, moving away from Bill's automatic attempt to reach for and comfort him. "I think I'd like to, um, go...."

"Home," Cyrus finished firmly. "Yes, you do that. Me, I think I'd like to stop by the Talon and catch up with everybody. Can I bum a ride, Pete? Or is there even room in your trunk for all this crap?"

"Huh? Oh, sure. Sounds like a plan. Clark, you want me to drop you off...?"

"...No. I'd rather ... I need some time to ... think."

"Whatever, man," Pete said neutrally, and Cyrus gave him a sympathetic nod.

"You're going to WALK home?" Lana said in disbelief. "Clark, it's miles and miles!" Chloe said nothing, but that laser rage was back in her eyes again as she waited for his answer.

"No," he said firmly, "I'm going to run. I'm good at running." In more ways than one. "Just another one of those little differences. Like the meteorites." He braced himself.

Lana thought about that for a second that cost Clark centuries of terror and pain. Then she nodded, hugged him, and gave him a quick kiss. It wasn't the passion or closeness they had shared, but he could hardly expect that after having left her, much less letting on to the fact that he was some kind of freak. She smiled at him, a little sadly. Maybe she thought he was "just another meteor mutant," like a dozen others who had terrorized the town.

Though once she had a chance to think about it, she might realize that none of the others had "had a problem" being around the meteorites. Except for being turned into freaks in the first place, of course. Then again, he hadn't specified what his "problem" was.

Chloe, on the other hand, had picked it up all too quickly, to judge from her narrowed eyes. She started to say something, and then, surprisingly, stopped and shook her head. "No one's blaming you for things you can't control, Clark." She glared up at him from hooded eyes, and Clark realized abruptly -- maybe it was Cyrus' presence -- that a good deal of her anger was directed at herself. "But you need to work on those things that you can."

And what, exactly, did she mean by that? "I know."

Cyrus grinned, another deliberate diversion. "You got an 'I know' out of Clueless here! That's quite a talent, Chloe. You sure you're not a meteor freak yourself?"

Clark flinched, but Chloe didn't. "Well, I wasn't here for the rock fall from space, but you never know." In fact, she looked thoughtful. "Too bad I burned my Wall of Weird. I could have been up on it myself. Have to check and see if any others were latecomers."

"You burned your Wall of Weird?" Clark blurted.

The anger in her eyes, expression, stance, shifted, just for a second, to a self-loathing that Clark thought only he had been capable of. "It's a long story, Clark. I'm not going to lie to you either, any more. But this isn't the time for that confession. Maybe tomorrow."

Lana looked at her in confusion, Pete in a mix of fear and pity. Cyrus blinked at her, then his face crumpled. "Oh, Chloe, no. You didn't."

That scared Clark as badly as the thought of facing his adoptive parents again. Her "confession" obviously had nothing to do with destroying her Wall of Weird.

Chloe glared at Cyrus. "You don't have to tell me it was stupid. I figured that out all by myself, thank you. I was mad. But I didn't think I would do any damage." She looked away, and bit her lip. Hard. "I didn't tell him everything. Will that salvage my soul?"

Clark was pretty sure at this point that she wasn't talking about her burning of the Wall of Weird, but he couldn't imagine what she WAS talking about. "Chloe...?"

She shook her head. "Later, Clark. After you talk to Lex."

Cyrus looked troubled. "That might not be such a good idea."

"No 'might' about it, but since when has that ever stopped Clark? Or me." The self-hatred in her voice was plain even to Clark. "On second thought, Pete, I think I'll walk, too. More room for the baggage, anyway. I'll see you guys at the Talon later." She started to suit actions to words and turn away, but Cyrus caught her hand and held it up between his palms.

Chloe froze, and with obvious terrible reluctance, turned back to meet his eyes.

"You're only seventeen," he said gently, almost hypnotically. Clark knew exactly what she was feeling -- as if moonlight were flowing through her, peaceful, intangible, unmistakable. "You're smart. You're proud. You're ambitious. The world is yours to take on, and you want it all. At seventeen, he would have been no match for you. But he's got the power of age and treachery behind him, Chloe. Your only fault is inexperience. And you'll remedy that, too, in time. But for now, you're only seventeen. Forgive yourself for that."

"I'm going to kill him," Chloe choked, anger overflowing and strangling her.

"Do better than that. Taunt him. Scare him. Use him. Ruin him."

Chloe's fury broke like a tidal wave, leaving her clinging to Cyrus, shaking with the sobs she refused to let out, unable to breathe. Even Pete and Lana heard one of the empath's teeth crack as he ground his jaws together in the effort to hold onto his own control. Clark wondered if there were any chores he could do for Doctor Morrell to pay the dental bill.

"I'm ... sorry," Chloe whispered, and pushed him away. Cyrus swallowed and took an uneven breath. Clark figured it was something like having a meteor rock taken away from his heart. He wasn't sure he even wanted to know what had just happened. "Thanks ... Bill."

"You're welcome. Buy me a java at the Talon later?"

"You're on. In spades. And if you want, front page on the Torch. 'The Prodigal Son Returns.' A glowing report on your adventures. Make up whatever you want it to say."

"Hah! Ahead of Clark's homecoming? And what happened to journalistic integrity?"

"I don't think I'll ever be able to use that phrase again," she said bitterly. "And Clark...." Her eyes turned to him, darkening under an uneasy frown. "Clark probably doesn't want people to know he was ever really gone."

"Really" gone? Well, that was a little too true for comfort. The "don't say it" look Chloe and Lana exchanged wasn't very reassuring, either.

"Way cool. So long as you promise to run a photo of my best side." Cyrus struck a deliberately silly pose, chin up and tongue out, causing the girls to laugh a little and Pete to pound on his car. "You are bad, man!"

"I try. Good to know I have the approval of a master. Now are we gonna stand out here like a bunch of teenagers hanging out at a bus station, or am I gonna get some coffee?"

Lana smiled and opened the car door for him. "First round's on the house."

Pete did a doughnut in the parking lot, honking and spraying loose bits of gravel. Chloe walked away, head down, but looking more thoughtful than depressed. Clark ran.

From the jog he did in the parking lot, to the stretching run down the road, to the flat-out acceleration that made tornadoes feel slow once he hit the fields, Clark was trying his damnedest not to think. He didn't want to think. He didn't want to feel. He had spent the whole bus trip with Cyrus doing his absolute best not to think.

The empath had been a life-ring during the trip. Cyrus had challenged him to crossword contest, read bad jokes from a cheap magazine in a loud voice, and told very embarrassing stories about the not-suitable-for-children magazines he'd discovered over the past year, in a dirty whisper that made Clark turn the color of the red star-fall stones.

Cyrus had kept him from worrying. From brooding. From thinking. (Of course, Clark's more unpleasant nature said nastily, that might have just been to keep from being put through the pain of feeling all the bad things himself.)

Clark told what was left of the Kal-El that was Jor-El's slave to just shut the hell up. Cyrus hadn't had to be there at all. Cyrus had volunteered to come back with him.

William had been working hard to make him feel human again. As human as he could ever be again.

With a human mother and father, who were all he had and nothing like him.

Mom. And dad.

Clark came over the rise and went from just short of the speed of sound to a dead stop at the sight of his (his? would it ever be "his" again?) house, sliding onto his knees, digging his fingers into the dirt, a sudden sob cutting off his breath. He spared a second to wish that Jonathan (dad, dad) hadn't cleared the fields of all those shards from the meteor strike. Physical pain and nausea and helplessness would have felt a hell of a lot better right now than the thought of walking in his own front door.

Coward, he told himself. Stupid. Useless. Coward. Cyrus will hit you upside the head again. Probably with one of those rocks. (Pete and Cyrus, he found out later, had thrown the entire collection into the dumpster after Pete's "explanation." Clark's inadvertent x-ray vision had shown him the still-healing break in Pete's knuckles. Nobody else would ever know why Pete and Cyrus had thrown piles of scrap metal on top of it, and covered that with really nasty garbage. Friends, he told himself. Friends I don't deserve.)

Come on. You can pick up a tractor. With one hand. You can walk through the front door. You can talk with a meteorite around your throat. You can say "Hi, mom."

"Son?" The tentative voice made him want to dig into a very deep hole. "Clark?"

Raising his head was the hardest thing he had ever done. Tears washed away the dirt, not that dirt could bother his eyes. But he still couldn't see. "Dad...?"

"I thought I heard ... oh, god ... Clark...."

Heavy, hard, warm hands were on his shoulders, pulling him close. Clark wanted to pass out. The familiar scent, farm dirt and hard work. Sun and sweat and animals and all the living things. Everything he had grown up with. Clark doubled over, choking, clutching the dirt to keep from breaking anything. Anyone. "Dad ... I'm sorry, I'm so sorry...."

"It's not your fault," Jonathan said in a fierce whisper. "Someone ought to beat hell out of me for what I did to you. I'll never forgive myself. I don't expect you to ever forgive me. But thank god, whatever gods there are, that you're back. And you're safe."

"Dad," Clark managed, lifting one hand to reach out and touch, and then did what he had wanted to do pretty much all day, and fainted.

The ceiling that came back into slow fuzzy focus was wonderfully familiar. For one half of a second, the past year didn't exist. Clark smiled from his warm comfortable normal place on the couch. He felt okay, he must have just fallen asleep....

Memory crashed back like being hit by a space shuttle. No. Oh, no.

He made it to his feet before the second was up and almost fell down again. Dizzy. Almost sick. Drained. There was none of the physical gut-twisting burn of the meteorites (though he doubted if the agony in his mind could be any worse), so no cause for such weakness that he could think of immediately. What the hell had he done?

Aside from nearly destroying everything he had and everyone he cared about....

("Haven't you had it beaten into yet that you're human?" The voice, many voices, echoed. Cyrus' was only the most recent. "That you're vulnerable *inside* your head?")

Jonathan must have carried him in from where he found him. Like a little kid, and wasn't THAT a great first impression to make. No wonder he felt sick. Invulnerability was apparently no defense against embarrassment and turmoil and self-disgust.

"Clark?" The soft voice that he'd always associated with sunrise and comfort, home and hearth and belonging. Clark closed his eyes for a second and braced himself before turning to face the woman who had raised him, who he had repaid with so much pain.

"Mom." The word nearly choked him.

She approached slowly, unsure. Afraid of him? Probably. She raised a hand carefully to touch him, butterfly-light, as if she weren't certain he was actually there.

Then she was holding onto him as if he were the only thing in the world, a grip that would have broken bones in a normal person, breathing in sobbing gasps. Clark, mindful of what he had done to Pete, kept his touch as gentle as he possibly could. Her tears were thin and weak, as if she had already cried most of them out. Clark didn't have any left himself.

"Clark.... Oh god, you came back, you're home, I'm sorry, I'm so sorry...."

Clark swallowed what felt like every meteor rock in Smallville. "You're sorry? You're ... after what I did to you.... How could you be...."

"Clark, my baby...." He stiffened at the reminder, and she felt him start to pull away, and understood. She shook her head violently, sunset-and-gray hair flying. "No. NO. Clark, YOU are my baby. My first baby. My son. The love of my life. The only person in the world more precious to me than even Jonathan." If possible, she clutched him even tighter. Clark wasn't sure he could have moved away if he'd wanted to. "We failed you. I failed you. I've hated myself every single day since you left. But you came back. Oh, Clark.... If you have to leave again...." She pushed him back the very tiny distance necessary to look up at him, heedless of her tears. "If you have to leave again, please at least tell me good-bye."

Clark decided to faint again. Damn his stupid invulnerable body for not cooperating.

"I'm not leaving," he said, if mouthing the words could be called "saying" something. "I'm never leaving again."

But even as he pressed that breath into his mother's hair (his mother, the only one he had ever known), he realized it was a lie. He would have to leave, someday. Probably soon. Childhood was ending. There was a huge and awful world out there, and he had only gotten a first taste of what his uniqueness -- his gifts -- would demand that he do with his life.

Not rule them with strength. Lead them with strength. Not as a dictator, but as an inspiration. Anything less would be a betrayal of all that he was and could do and be.

"But when the time comes that I do have to leave," he managed, in something a little closer to a voice this time, "I won't be running away. I'll always come back."

Jonathan came back into the room again then, hesitantly, expression uncertain. Apparently, Clark thought, you didn't have to be an empath to know when to put in an appearance, and when to hang back. "Son? Are you okay?"

Clark held out one hand, not letting go of his mother with the other, asking, as he had with Chloe and Lana. He had no right to demand, ever again. But asking.

Jonathan moved into the circle slowly, as if he were wading into cold and unfamiliar depths. It took a long time before his arms closed around Clark and Martha. But once he did, it was with a solid unyielding firmness that made Clark catch his breath at the support.

"I'm ... I'm not sure, dad. I'm not sure anything will ever be okay again. I'm going to try to make it up to you. I don't know how, but I promise, I'm going to try."

"Just promise," Jonathan said, in that too-low and too-steady voice that meant he was fighting tears himself, "to always be our son."

And Clark thought he had exhausted his own supply of tears. "Always, dad. Mom. Always. I'll never be anything less than what you've given me. Or anything more."

His room was the same as he had left it, except cleaner, with all his "junk" carefully arranged and clothes neatly put away. He welcomed the time and space alone to shower and change. Too many thoughts, too much still unresolved, but the simple re-establishing of a long-familiar routine was as healing as any of Cyrus' power. For now, Clark was just going to let it try to sort itself out around him, and not to try to analyze or plan or hope too much.

Dinner was being put on the table when he came down. Clark gulped. What were they supposed to talk about over the family ritual? School? (Clark had actually been to school, of a sorts, over the past months, a hard and demanding one, but he didn't think his parents were ready to hear about that, if they ever would be.) What had been going on with his friends? (What had gone so wrong with Lana and Chloe?) How was the farm doing? Jonathan had been dependent on Clark to make ends meet. He couldn't afford hired help.

The phone rang just as they were sitting down to eat. Martha glanced at the caller ID and rolled her eyes. "Pete. I knew it. His timing is impeccable."

Clark managed a small chuckle at that. Pete had been known to call right at dinnertime ever since they first met. "I'll get back to him."

"Honey, Pete's been calling here every single day since.... I think you should go ahead and talk to him. He's, well, done a lot for us. For you. If it's important enough that he needs to call you again, after seeing you just a few hours ago...."

Well, that was a point. Maybe there was another meteor mutant on the loose. Clark sighed and went to the phone. A reprieve, in a way, but it was just putting off the inevitable. "What's up, Pete?" Actually, punching out a meteor mutant right now would be a relief.

The burst of noise from the other end of the phone made him flinch and yank it away from his ear. The newly-acquired oversensitive hearing picked the worst damn times to kick in. "We just wanted to see how it was going, bro'!"

Good lord, Pete's entire family (plus Cyrus) was singing "Welcome back!" on the other end of their speaker-phone. It hadn't been any unusual hearing ability on his part after all. Weather central was probably reporting an earthquake with the epicenter at the Ross house. "Um, actually, we were just about to have dinner."

"GREAT! Save us some leftovers! Mom's put dad on a diet, and there isn't any food left worth eating in the whole house. We'll be over in half an hour or so!"

"Oh, um...." Clark was cut off by the final verse of "Welcome back!" from the entire household, and when his hearing did flicker to hypersensitivity, he dropped the phone with a gasp. His parents both immediately abandoned dinner and ran to his side in concern just short of panic. (Justifiable panic, he thought dizzily, distantly, given the terrifying voice in his head, and his actions over the past few months....) "What is it, son? What's wrong?"

The simplest explanation, this time, was fortunately the actual truth, and only mildly alarming. "That was ... Pete's whole family. On the speaker-phone. Singing."

Jonathan and Martha traded a look of absolute disbelief, and then fell into helpless laughter. Jonathan threw back his head. "Leave it to the Rosses to be the only normal people in Smallville!" Martha just held on to him, giggling, more in relief than anything else.

"Uh ... Pete sort of invited himself over, too. Says his dad's on a diet, and he has intentions on our refrigerator. I hope he's not bringing his brothers too."

Jonathan roared, in sheer gratitude at the release of tension, at being able to feel SOMEthing normal. "Let 'em all come! Can't be any worse than locusts in the fields, can it?" At Martha's new wave of hilarity, he grabbed both of them in a hug that a bear would have studied with interest. "Well, can it?" he demanded.

"Well, Pete and Jack are still teenagers...." Martha collapsed into giggles again.

"Uh, I dunno about Jack, but probably Pete will be bringing Cyrus over." His parents sobered quickly at the name, puzzled and wary again -- not letting go of him, but once more uncertain of what to say, how to react. Clark went through his litany again. I can throw a tractor. I can stand a meteorite, for a little while. I can tell my parents the truth.

"You remember, the guy who thought he was from Krypton? Turns out he's an empath, a really good one. He was picking up on me, what I was feeling, the day I came down. That's why he had memories of the ship, of the meteors -- he got it from me. I was, I don't remember exactly, just coming out of some sort of suspended animation, and I don't think there were any windows, or that I saw anything, but the fall was.... Anyway, he was close enough to where I hit to feel just about everything I was feeling. I had already been in range of Earth's sun long enough to be pretty tough, but he almost died in the strike." Clark trailed off and looked away. Just another victim of the Kryptonian who fell to Earth.

God. Jonathan and Martha looked at each other again. To a baby, even a controlled atmospheric entry, the gravity and fire and falling, would be terrifying. And the meteor swarm would have damaged Clark's ship -- he'd already proved that the ship's control was vulnerable to the meteorites -- enough that it was hardly making a controlled entry.

"Son, how many times are we going to have to tell you that it wasn't your fault? You certainly didn't choose to bring the meteors with you. I doubt the people who sent you here did it on purpose, either. If a bunch of powerful aliens were going to invade the planet," Jonathan tried to sound offhandedly witty, though in fact this was something he had thought long and carefully about during the many years alone out in the fields, "They would hardly have brought along rocks that could kill them. And I sure don't see alien invaders sending one baby just to cause one meteor storm in one small town."

"And maybe that -- memory of falling -- is why you're afraid of heights?" Martha offered gently, dragging the subject away from the lone baby, the last of his kind.

"Well, that, and Greg's treehouse. Every time I got near the treehouse, I was near the kryptonite in that abandoned building next to it," Clark said wryly, allowing himself to be diverted. "I don't think I fell down and threw up and got a bloody nose every time I tried to climb the ladder to the treehouse just because it was fifteen feet above the ground."

The Kents absorbed that in something like shock. They had known the old factory had been destroyed in the meteor storm. And yet they had encouraged Clark to go there and play with his friends, to "get over" a fear that a nearly-invulnerable kid should not have had.

Not even wondering, for years, if there were something he had genuine reason to fear. Clark had stopped complaining about the dizziness and cramping pain and helpless gasping for breath that he couldn't seem to make himself "get over," blaming his own inadequacy, after they had ever-so-gently explained what psychosomatic symptoms were.

Clark cleared his throat. "Old history," he offered, apologetically. "I should have known better myself. You couldn't be expected to tell what it...."

Jonathan went and sat down, heavily. Dinner was cold. He stared at it, wondering if he could bring himself to eat it, if forcing himself to appreciate Martha's efforts was more important than berating himself for the terrible things he had done to Clark in his ignorance.

All the sacrifices they had made in trying to bring up a superhuman child ... their own difficulties were nothing, compared to what they had actually put Clark through, demanding human constraints, and requiring human responses, of a child who could never be that.

"Dad...?" Clark's voice was unsteady. Jonathan was getting a whole new perspective on why Clark had run away. And Clark was still trying to blame himself.

"I'm sorry, son," he said, low. "We've been -- we did try, the best way we knew how. We didn't -- we just -- there aren't any guide books for things like this. All the times we hurt you -- all the things we did wrong -- I'm sorry. We never ... we never meant to hurt you."

Jonathan buried his face in his hands, and Martha moved to stand behind him, her hands on his shoulders, her own head bowed. "We love you. We were scared for you. We wanted ... everything right for you. I hope you can believe that. We just ... didn't know."

Clark moved, that eye-blink speed they would never get used to -- no one would, not even his superhuman friends decades down the line (except for the ones who could do it themselves) -- and had both of them in his arms again. "Don't you dare," he said fiercely. "Don't you dare even think I don't understand that. I owe you everything I could ever have, ever be. Without you.... What if I had been raised by, oh, for starters, Lionel Luthor? And there are worse than him. Way worse. I've met some."

In fact, the Baron had far more scruples than Lionel, but he was also far more dangerous. Clark shuddered to himself to think of being raised, not just as a weapon, but as someone with no particular concern for individual members of the human race at all.

His parents misinterpreted his shudder. Which was fine with him. He wanted his adopted home back. He wanted the support of the people who had raised him. His sanity depended on it, on this very simple and basic contact with the world and people around him. Because without it, he didn't, couldn't, belong to this world at all. He would rather die.

Jonathan pulled himself together. "You have a point there, son." He stood, facing the boy, still astonished on a subliminal level at how tall Clark had grown. No longer a boy. But always his son. Not that damn ship's, not some dead planet's. His.

"You'll always be our son. And whatever we've screwed up, we'll work out. Together. Can you trust us enough to try that? And not to think you have to lie to us again?"

Not to have to lie. Clark closed his eyes, resting his head on his mother's hair, his hand on his father's arm. Not to ever have to lie to the people he loved again. Not to Chloe, not to Pete, maybe not to Lana. Maybe not even to Lex, someday, although that was another meeting he was not looking forward to. But most of all, not to the people against whom he had always measured his moral compass, even when the red rock was poisoning his mind.

Not to have to lie to the people who had saved him. Not to be living a lie, all alone.

"That's," his voice came out in a choked whisper, and he steadied it, to keep from worrying them, to keep them from thinking he was lying again. Forcing his emotions under control was not a lie. It was part of growing up. "That's everything I could ask for."

Martha wiped her eyes. "It's -- we know you have your own life now. We don't expect ... everything. But when you have a problem, when you need help, just, please, remember one thing. Promise me."

That I'd be dead by now if it weren't for you? Or worse? Don't remind me. "I promise." Without even knowing what you demand, mom, I promise. I have to. To live.

"Remember," and Martha's eyes suddenly glinted with mischief rather than tears, "that we're older than you, and there's very little -- well, except for the strength and speed and vision and invulnerability part -- that you can do that we haven't already done, and done worse. Or better. Depends on your definition."

Well, those exceptions kind of define the rule, don't they? "You mean," Clark tried to keep his tone light, though he really wanted nothing more than to sit down and cry and hopefully pass out again, "You once ran away?"

"Once? Hon, between your father and I, we've done more running away than there are milk cartons to put pictures on." She hugged Jonathan, who actually chuckled, telling Clark more than he really needed to know about the truthfulness of that. "But we always came back." She included Clark in the hug. "And so did you. That's all that counts."

Jonathan slapped Clark on the back, hard enough for Clark to feel it, a little. "Son, I doubt you get all your stubbornness from your biological side."

Clark managed a smile. "I think I already knew that."

The sound of Pete's car horn saved him going into any morbid introspection. "Oh, no," he groaned. "I thought he said half an hour. He's been taking driving lessons from Lex."

"Well, yes, actually," Martha said, bemused. "Pete and Lex have actually kind of hit it off since Lex was rescued. It started out as a shouting match as soon as Lex was released from the hospital -- you were one of the subjects, but not the only one -- turned into family threats -- I think the only reason his brothers kept Pete from decking Lex was the threat of jail -- and trading horror stories, and.... Well, Pete shaking hands with Lex was on the front page of the Ledger. Since then, they've spent a lot of time working together on, mm...."

"Finding me?"

"Protecting you." Martha's eyes hooded. "Pete had to ... tell him some things."

Oh, no. And his dad's eyes were distant and blank, as if in accusation. Clark could read the disappointment there as if he were a telepath himself. It's your fault for telling Pete in the first place. It's your fault for letting him see you put on the ring. It's your fault for putting on the ring at all. Your fault. No kidding, dad. "Um, what did he tell him, do you know?"

"Turns out," Jonathan said flatly, "that Lex already knew the meteorites make you sick. And that Lionel knew. The red rock's effects was news to him, but not by much, and nothing any more dangerous to you than they already had. So you can't blame Pete."

No, just blame me. Clark bit the inside of his lip, wondering if he could cut his own skin that way. "Lex is my friend. And if he already knew, he hasn't used it to hurt me."

"Lionel isn't. And he may just be waiting for the right time."

"Clark...." Martha's face was a study in misery, and both Clark and Jonathan flinched from it. "After all the times we've told you to be careful.... I'm the one who failed you there. When you came to rescue me in Lionel's office -- with that vault of the meteorite bars...."

Clark swallowed a gag at the memory. Even being tied up for hours with Lana's necklace tearing him apart hadn't hurt as badly as those things. "What about it, mom?"

Martha squared her jaw. "Can you think of anything more stupid than me calling out your name in front of everyone, when you came in? Even if Lionel was really even still blind at that point, which I'm not sure about. But there's no way he couldn't have heard everything. When you fell, and were so sick. When I went to you instead of making sure that kidnapper wasn't still a threat." Martha looked away. "I couldn't have told Lionel more clearly that what he had in the vault was dangerous to you if I had painted a sign on the door. It's my fault."

"You were just trying to protect our son," Jonathan said gently.

"Yes. And I panicked. And now the Luthors know how to hurt Clark."

Clark had to force his hands to stay feather-light on his parents. He wanted to hate himself, just for being what he was. He couldn't bring himself to hate his mom and dad. "If," he said carefully, "If I had been a normal person, then they could have hurt me -- us -- any way they wanted, and not cared. It's not your fault that I'm -- something they want to exploit."

Jonathan pulled away and stared at him. "If you ever say that again," he replied evenly, "I will hit you, son. And I still have a pretty good right cross. I will find out exactly which is harder, my fist or your jaw, if that's what it takes to get your attention."

Clark tried hard to make a smile. "Funny. Cyrus said pretty much the same thing."

By now Pete was beating on the door, crying claims of starvation and threatening to expire in a hideous sack of skin and bones. Jonathan chuckled a little and went to let him in. "May as well feed Pete the dinner, hon. I'm sorry, but I've kind of lost my appetite."

"I could warm it up," Clark offered halfheartedly. Heat vision seemed kind of a violation of what he was trying to do, the normalcy he was trying to achieve right now.

"We have a microwave, Clark." And that put an end to that.

Pete gave them all an effusive hug. "Wow, you can't imagine what it was like at our house tonight. Here I bring home company," he gestured at Cyrus, behind him, "And mom tried to feed us celery soup. CELERY SOUP! Jan threw it out the door. There was a fight like you, uh," well, the Kents would have had their own share of fights, "Like would have scared away Klingons. You know Cyrus, right?" Pete waved a hand in introduction. " I told him, if we want some decent food, we have to go hit on Clark to get the sympathy vote."

"Mrs. Kent." Cyrus' smile was as open and warm as Clark's had been, once. It twisted her heart. He took her offered hand between his and held it gently, firmly. Clark gulped. His mother had no idea what that offer of contact meant, or what it cost the empath.

"Cyrus. It's ... good to see you again. You're looking ... a lot better."

Cyrus threw back his head and laughed in honest appreciation, though he didn't let go of Martha's hand, and Clark easily caught the loss of blood from his skin from what looked an awful lot like pain. "A lot better than being in catatonic shock? Yeah, I'd imagine so. I came through the other side, Mrs. Kent. You can too. Hang onto that idea, will you? For me?"

Martha managed a smile back at him. "Yes. I'll keep that in mind."

Cyrus turned to Jonathan, and offered a man-to-man handshake. Jonathan returned it with the trademark Kent smile. He was not, however, entirely unobservant. "You okay, son? You kind of went pale. Can we get you something?"

"I'm fine." Cyrus released Jonathan's hand and wiped sweat from his forehead. Clark cringed at the unintentional mimicry of the excuse he'd always made when caught too close to the green rocks. Unintentional? "I wouldn't object to something cold, though."

"Oh, I think we can manage that. Any preferences?"

"Juice, if you have it. I've pretty much gone vegetarian since I...." He trailed off, and ran a hand through his hair. Most of what he'd been through, he wasn't at liberty to reveal.

"Since you what, son?" Jonathan said gently, as Martha came back with a glass of juice for both boys. "We understand if you don't want to talk about it, but if you do...."

"I smell food!" Pete declared, as the microwave dinged.

"Dig in, Pete. And you can take the casserole back for your brothers, if they want. Don't want my volunteer farm help starving to death. Celery soup! Martha, don't you ever."

Clark winced. So the Ross family had been filling in for him on the farm. He wondered how much Pete had told his brothers.

"Then I couldn't ask for better confidantes, could I?" Cyrus grinned, redirecting the conversation as he found a seat and saluted the Kent family with his glass. "I wonder how it would have been if I'd had parents as understanding as you. Who didn't call me crazy and have me locked up when I did things kids weren't supposed to be able to do. How old was Clark when you first found out about his strength and invulnerability? I hope he could at least understand Anglic by then. Good thing the x-ray and heat vision didn't kick in until later."

Jonathan and Martha both went absolutely still. "What ... are you...."

"Oh, for --" Cyrus glared, actually glared, at Clark. "You didn't tell them?"

"Um." Clark tried to make himself small. "Things have been ... kind of crazy. We haven't even really managed to, you know, talk, ourselves. There's a lot we just haven't, well, gotten around to." Clark's attention dithered between Pete and Cyrus, looking for the most effective distraction. He finally settled for a tentative seat beside Cyrus while Pete ate.

"Crap." Cyrus stood up. "I'm sorry. I should leave." Then he flopped back down on the couch. "No, I shouldn't." He slapped Clark across the head, hard, and took a primordial satisfaction in the Kent parents' gasp of concern for HIM. "Ow. You DOOFUS. What have you been using to try to communicate, coloring books? I mean, granted Anglic doesn't have the precision of Kryptonian, but have you tried, maybe, finishing a sentence?"

"I told them I was sorry." Clark's voice couldn't even be called a whisper.

"Sorry?" Cyrus looked as if he were going to bounce to his feet again, but settled for sitting up straight and narrowing his eyes, ignoring the gaping parents. "What, precisely, for? Being a runaway? Like none of you guys have seen any after-school specials?"

"When ... when I blew up ... the ship...." Clark pulled as far away from the empath as he could get without having to make the effort to stand. "The explosion ... they were caught in it. The wreck -- mom -- lost her baby." The wash of never-to-be-atoned-for sorrow made Cyrus clench his fists on the couch. "Their baby. Their -- human -- baby."

"Oh." Cyrus' face cleared suddenly, as if a painkiller had just kicked in. "About that. This isn't the best time. And Kal, this is going to hurt. I wish I could spare you. But you need to know. Mrs. Kent -- Martha -- that baby wasn't yours. It wasn't human. It would have killed you trying to bear it. Clark saved your life when he blew up that damn ship."

Jonathan was looming over him, suddenly, his fingers twitching as if wishing for a shotgun trigger to pull. "What the hell did you just say?"

Cyrus looked up at him with the calm that comes only from superior power, the power of being able to kill with a touch, and Jonathan recognized it, if only subconsciously, from having seen it in Clark. "The ship impregnated your wife. More precisely, made her a host for an experiment. The child was meant to be Clark's -- Kal-El's -- mate. The artificers of Krypton, and his biological father was the leader of the bunch, didn't give a damn whether your people lived or died. Their only interest was in preserving the heritage of their planet and the lineage of their race. And they were a cold-blooded bunch of bastards, believe me."

Jonathan collapsed back into his seat. Martha sat as if frozen solid. "What in the HELL are you talking about? Clark ... our baby ... you're not making sense."

Cyrus made a rude gesture. "Mr. Kent, you may be a cow-hand, but you're not a damn idiot. Kal-El? Krypton? Spaceship? Green rocks? Hello? Do I look like Lex Luthor in his chem lab with some kind of new meteorite-laced LSD? The boy you raised -- " he slapped Clark across the head again on general principals, eliciting an indignant but slightly tension-relieving "hmmph!" -- "Was, is, the last survivor of a planet that had space-travel since before homo sapiens drew pictures on cave walls. You think that planet's most famous scientist, who by the way fortunately didn't pass on the family tendency to create planet-cracking bombs to his brat here -- " Cyrus aimed another head shot, and Clark dodged, fast.

Cyrus chuckled, but his demeanor changed, and he leaned forward, deadly serious.

"You think that damned spaceship computer was protecting YOU? It was out to, I guess the closest Earth parallel is, breed a master race. And you, beautiful and loving and unsuspecting Mrs. Kent, were only its first and most convenient experiment in creating a proper mate for the last male survivor of the species. And when you died from the strain, it would have gained enough information to try again. It had millions of others to choose from, and play around with, and experiment with genetics on. Starting, I would guess, with his other unsuspecting and nearby and convenient female friends, like Lana and Chloe."

Cyrus took a deep breath and sipped at his juice, working to keep his voice cool and controlled while telling a real-life horror story. "The local kryptonite mutations just made it a little easier for the computer's super-bugs, but it was programmed to produce a mate for Kal-El, and keep Krypton's culture going, if it had to kill everything on this planet trying."

The dead silence was broken only by the sound of the suddenly-gone Clark cracking the toilet seat down the hall between his fingers as he held onto it, vomiting.

Jonathan's eyes were the color of glaciers. Cyrus shivered. There was only one person on the planet that he was truly and deeply afraid of, and she had eyes like that. "What, exactly," he said in a tone so low and dangerous that the shotgun would have been a relief, "Makes you think something like that?"

Cyrus straightened his backbone. He had not gone through hell and back to be cowed by even Jonathan Kent. "I accessed the spaceship's download myself," he said evenly. "So did most of my friends with mental talents. We talked about it. Compared notes. A lot."

Cyrus leaned back, considering going into lecture mode. "That stupid linguist went crazy because he was already a nutcase, not to mention an arrogant jerk, and didn't have a clue how to process direct mental input. Clark couldn't have gotten the whole thing because it was such a shock to his system, even as tough as he is. He's not even remotely psychic, and he doesn't have any mental defenses. Plus it was aimed straight at him, on the genetic level. The rest of us didn't get just an ancestor's voice screaming in our minds to take over the world and visions of a planet blowing all to hell. We managed to read everything behind it."

"Mental," Martha said dazedly, coming back from far away, "talents?"

"Damn that kid of yours for not knowing when NOT to keep a secret." Pete snorted agreement at Clark's nearly psychotic habit of hiding even things that could have helped him. Cyrus rose and moved to kneel in front of Martha, taking her hand between his again. "Mrs. Kent. Martha. Look at me." When she did, he took a deep breath and summoned everything he had, pouring it over her like light and air. "I have the power to heal," he said softly. "But only if you let me. And I have the power to feel what you do. But only if you let me."

Both statements were a lie, but only technically. An empath couldn't heal without feeling pain, and a healer couldn't share pain he couldn't help but feel without needing to heal.

"You -- you're a meteor mutant? Something like that?"

Cyrus forced a chuckle. "The meteorites enhanced my natural abilities, yes. But I was born an empath healer. It's not as uncommon as you might think. Most people who have it hide it. Touching people when you feel everything they do isn't always a lot of fun, and Clark doesn't go around telling the world about the kryptonite, does he? I'm, well, mentally what he is physically. I'm awfully strong, way more than most. But almost as easy to hurt. That's why it took me so long to come back." He squeezed her hand, and let go, reluctantly.

Underneath the pain, Martha tasted of sunlight and growing things and determination. Protection. He could learn to like the feel of that.

Jonathan's hand dropped onto his shoulder, and Cyrus jumped. God, hadn't the man understood a word he'd just said about feeling everything when you touched? Then his head came up in wonder. There was nothing in the contact except pure solid support, stability, the feel of the land and the wind and the sky. Cyrus blinked. Either Jonathan Kent had more mental control than any non-psi in the history of the planet, or he was an empath himself.

Oh. Wow. Well, that would explain a lot about their ability to deal with Clark.

"Clark said he thought you two were fellow aliens," Jonathan said softly, ruefully.

"Well, yeah. In a way. Once I found out about him -- learned what to do when I touched -- I remembered being caught in the meteor fall. And picking up on Clark. Kal. He was so scared, poor kid. So was I. We connected so hard when his ship crashed that I would have run over and held onto him if I could have moved at all. I had nightmares about that whole thing for decades. I was burned half to death and had broken bones everywhere."

"That's what Chloe says, too," Pete added through a mouthful of food. "Cyrus' real name is William, and his parents were, like, you know," an evasive gesture, "in the meteor storm." And at least he didn't go around whining about it like Lana.

"That's probably when the healing talent kicked in." Cyrus shook his head. "The people who found me were afraid of being accused of child abuse from how bad I was hurt, and then terrified of what they'd seen when I was fine a week later. It didn't occur to you to wonder why Clark wasn't burned or even bruised in the middle of a meteor strike?"

"I don't question miracles," Martha said. She stood up. "May I...?"

Cyrus braced himself. "I would be honored."

Martha hugged him, hard and quickly, and released him. The emotions pouring through her made him dizzy. She didn't have anywhere near Jonathan's control.

But she understood. And to Cyrus, she felt like sunlight and life. And love.

"Would you like some dinner?" And that, Cyrus though with amusement, was all Smallville. Your world came down around you, and you wiped your eyes and set the table for dinner. "I'd love to, Mrs. Kent. But like I said, I have a problem eating animals. It's part of the whole empathic thing."

"I didn't leave him much, anyway," Pete interjected gleefully.

"I made an apple cobbler. It was Clark's," her voice faltered, "Favorite. Back, you know, when."

Cyrus took her hand. "Now that's an offer I can't refuse. I could eat my own weight in apple cobbler. Especially yours." He looked down the hall, and schooled his face to calm impassivity. "I had better go see about Clark. That was a ton of rocks to drop on him."

"No." Jonathan's voice was as firm and commanding as any Cyrus had ever heard, and he'd heard people who would make Lionel Luthor quake in his socks. "Clark is my son. I hurt him. It's my responsibility." His pain is my fault, he did not say aloud, but for Cyrus, he may as well have written it on the wall in permanent marker. "Let me go talk to him. You," he tapped Cyrus lightly, teasingly, "Go help Martha find the ice cream to go with the cobbler."

Cyrus shivered at the contact. There was NOTHING THERE. Except land and wind and sky. Jonathan Kent, the rough gruff farmhand who took a shotgun to bankers and yelled at his adopted son and his friends for doing stupid things and was well-known for both temper and tenderness, had a psi-level control that no normal person would ever be able to manage.

Only an empath, or a telepath, could block emotions like that. Cyrus caught his hand automatically, then let him go immediately, embarrassed at the violation of privacy.

Jonathan Kent had a trace, long buried, but inborn, of the full spectrum of psi talent. He could feel it. Holy hells. Not to a hundredth of Cyrus' power, but still. Holy hells.

"Mr. Kent," Cyrus said carefully, "Before you go, um, talk to Clark, do you, well, know? About the touching thing? The...?" He tapped his head. Just in case Martha didn't know, though that was unlikely, after half a lifetime together.

In the look that Jonathan turned on him, he saw the eyes change color. Human eyes do not change color, regardless of what novels say. Jonathan Kent wasn't a normal human.

"Yeah," the grizzled, graying farmhand said. "I've always known." He took his wife's hand, and love flowed through the room like honey when their eyes met. "We both have. That's how I was sure that this beautiful woman was the one I was meant to be with."

"You ... how...."

"Cows don't have many emotions. And corn doesn't have any at all." Jonathan extended his other hand to the boy again, a deliberate offer. Cyrus took it, opening himself completely this time, dizzy and ecstatic at the feeling. A fully-under-control, complete-spectrum psi, that so-very-rare talent, and he was Clark's, Kal-El's, adoptive father? Oh, he was going to hit Kal SO many times for not even questioning how he could have grown up even more-or-less human without understanding how extraordinary his parents were.

And for not having such parents himself. Damn. He'd better not touch Kal until he got his own jealousy under control.

"I can .. teach you," Cyrus breathed, through the sun / wind / rain / growing things that was all Jonathan let him feel.

"Thanks, son. But I don't need it any more." Of course not. Jonathan had been dealing with the unconscious power to feel everything, to hurt and be hurt, since before Cyrus had been born. Had he deliberately let himself become deadened? Hardly surprising.

Cyrus gulped at another memory dredged from the contact. Touching Lionel Luthor. Blanking hells, DEALING with Lionel Luthor. Forcing himself to stay in contact with the bitter hate-filled old man. Just to protect Clark. Jonathan could have slammed the vicious old manipulator's own emotions back on him, returned pain for pain. If he hadn't barricaded himself so completely. It must have been a terrible temptation. "All I need is my boy back."

"He's your son, sir." Cyrus stepped back and made a formal bow. "But when stuff goes so wrong ... if you need a hand...."

Jonathan faced him, and the unyielding gaze was more powerful and dangerous than Clark's heat vision. Cyrus blocked the contact, hard, against the temptation to follow and become lost in it. "You're a good boy, son. Thanks for all you've done for Clark. More than we could have done, as sad a thing as that is to say. But there are some things...."

"That only parents can do." Cyrus nodded. "Believe me, sir, I understand."

Pete, who was no kind of psi talent at all, picked up on the discomfort level in the room. "Um, wow, look at the time. I got some things I promised to get. Thanks for the eats, Mr. Kent, Mrs. Kent. Come on, Bill, we better get going."

"Absolutely not," Martha said in her take-charge voice. "Cyrus -- Bill -- hasn't gotten his cobbler yet. Run your errands, Pete, and I'll have some more things ready for your brothers when you come to pick him up."

"Mrs. Kent, you are one awesome lady. My mom says so every day." Pete gave her a quick kiss on the cheek, a nod to Jonathan, and headed out the door. Singing.

Cyrus rolled his eyes. "Remind me NEVER to encourage the Ross family to sing."

Clark came back from the bathroom with his father after a long and quiet session, as pale as if he'd been tied to a green meteorite, but he managed to eat two bites of the cobbler. Cyrus pretty much finished off the rest. (He had offered his hand to Clark in an attempt to try to help, but all three Kents shook their heads at him. Dammit, they weren't going to make this easy. Well, what did you expect of Kents?)

Martha sent Clark to bed so firmly that Cyrus thought about checking her for traces of psi talent, too. Even the most powerful psis he knew couldn't COMMAND like that. Or maybe that was totally a mom thing. Jonathan, predictably, offered him a bed for the night. Cyrus didn't even think about telling him how much the idea of staying under this roof for another hour made him ill from the tension, and hoped his highly trained and powerful control was good enough to keep Jonathan from picking it up when they shook hands good-night.

"Actually, sir, I promised Pete to go embarrass all his brothers by hinting at all their secrets about striking out with the girls. Plus he has all my luggage. Though if Judge Ross finds out what I can do, there will be a not-fun time in the criminal justice system. I personally would rather not be stuck to a chair for ten hours a day listening to legal arguments about which case takes precedent over what and who's telling just how much of the truth."

Jonathan chuckled. "I can well imagine. Give me mucking out a stall over a court room any day. Can I offer you a ride, then?"

"Oh, thanks, but no. I need some time alone, you know? Just to walk, and think, and let stuff sort itself out."

"I understand." Duh. Of course he did. Something damn few people could say with such honesty. "Come over any time, Cyrus. William. And welcome back."

In fact, Cyrus did not go to Pete's house, but met him halfway, flagging him down on the road. Pete was all but bouncing in his seat. "I got everything! Including a camera. You think we should wait a few hours to sneak in?"

"Maybe one or two. Clark's gone to bed, but his mom and dad will be up for awhile, I bet. Let's go grab some caffeine and look over the stuff. It's gonna be a long night."

Two hours later, Cyrus and Pete were working hard to sneak several armloads of materials up into Clark's loft. "You sure Clark won't wake up and catch us at this?" Pete whispered. "His hearing is, you know, pretty good."

"Better than you or I can imagine, though he doesn't have it under control yet," Cyrus answered in a normal voice, quiet only in deference to the after-midnight hour. "But don't worry. He's dead to the world from emotional exhaustion. And if necessary, I can keep him that way."

"Oh, damnit, man. That's not a power I even want to think about."

"Being a healer is dangerous, partner Pete. You should read Elfquest sometime. Winnowill would run screaming from what I can do. I've never actually killed anybody, but I could, with a touch, and by accident. Though come to think of it, so could Clark. Or you."

"Me?" Only Pete's deepening voice kept him from squeaking. "No way."

"You're stronger than I am. You're stronger than anyone in this town, except your brother Stan. And maybe Jonathan Kent."

"And Clark, duh."

"Let's not go there. You wouldn't even have to hit him to kill him. It must be hell, to know that one second you can be the strongest thing on the planet, and the next you can barely move." Cyrus paused in their assembly work, looking away, unhappy. "Chloe is dangerous, too. In a fair fight, I'd bet on you over her, but she doesn't play by Queensbury rules."

"No kidding. What are we gonna do about her and Lionel?"

"Help her. Support her. Discreetly. She catches us backing her, she'll kill us too."

"Ain't that the truth. Hey, you missed a connection there."

"Where? Oh. Thanks. I kind of neglected my mechanical skills for the past year. You're gonna practically have to teach me how to change the oil in my car all over again."

"Yeah, I been meaning to ask. What HAVE you been up to for the past year?"

"Long story, and not a pleasant one. Bottom line, I met another empath, who taught me to keep the mad down to a dull roar. And got some serious science and psychology lessons. Some of them at the receiving end of a shouting-at. Trust me, Pete, college is not going to be all keg parties. There were days when I was too tired to cry."

"Freshman year is harder than anything short of live combat," said Pete, in a tone that couldn't be mistaken for anything except a sarcastic quote.

"True, if I know anything to go by. Where'd you learn that?"

"Mrs. Harris, the guidance counselor. I guess she'd know. She doesn't talk about it, but she was in Iraq."

"Ouch. Remind me not to shake her hand."

"Yeah." The boys busied themselves with their mechanism for another minute in silence. "That should do it," Pete proclaimed.

"You sure? Should we test it?"

"And waste a dart? Oh, why not. You keep Clark asleep," Pete's tone was deliberately casual at that, but he wasn't fooling the empath, "and I'll go buy some more."

"At one in the morning?"

"Mrs. Fordman doesn't sleep much these days. If I tell her what it's for, she'll wake up half of Metropolis ordering a store full. And probably ask to watch."

"Hah!" Cyrus made a mental note to go see Mrs. Fordman. "No, she can't watch. Clark would see her. Heat-sensitive vision works both ways."

"She can be invited to come see Mrs. Kent for breakfast."

"Pete, you are an evil genius."

The automatic-fire rig to shoot suction-darts, tracking Clark's body heat, had taken them barely three hours to install in Clark's loft. Cyrus had not, actually, been skimping on his mechanics lessons, and Pete was a natural inventor. The only thing they hadn't been able to figure out yet was how to watch the reaction when Clark got whapped by some two hundred, maybe another thousand if Pete got the supply in before dawn, stick-on darts.

"One second delay on the trigger, or none at all?"

"Clark's pretty fast. And don't forget the x-ray vision. He'll find it."

"No delay then. Constant fire.... How fast is that digital camera?"

"State of the art. LexCorp."

"That's a ten-thousand-dollar piece of equipment!"

"It was free."

"You TOLD him?"

"Well, sort of. He wants it back, though. It has a recorder built in."

"Oh, hell. If he sees..."

"My sentiments exactly. But look at it this way -- once we explain it to Clark, we can do it ALL OVER AGAIN, and make him relive it at normal speed for the camera."

"BWAHAHAHAHA!"