Chapter 2: Compromise
Clark, his parents, Pete, Chloe and Lana were all digging into the barbeque that Martha and Jonathan had made when Clark looked in the distance and saw that parade of the black vehicles. His heart began to beat faster and he broke out into a sweat. He remembered watching those movies about the FBI and other people like that coming to take somebody away in black cars.
Pete was the first to notice Clark's tenseness and he looked to where Clark was staring intensely. Pete couldn't see anything except a large dust cloud from the road that came up from somebody driving down the street, only this one looked wrong even to Pete. The dust was continuing to rise, indicating that there were several vehicles.
"Clark honey? What's the matter?" Martha asked worriedly when she looked over at her son and saw terror in his eyes.
But Clark couldn't answer. He found himself petrified. He didn't like the feeling; it was something alien to him. Martha looked around instead and saw the cars too. In that instant, all of the nightmares that she had had when Clark was younger seemed to be coming true. Jonathan saw the cars too. Pete knew why the Kent's were acting like this but Chloe and Lana were mystified.
"Clark? What's wrong?" Chloe asked.
Instead Jonathan got up and came around to his son and grabbed him somewhat roughly from the shoulders.
"Clark? Run ok. Run. We'll take care of anything." Jonathan said.
Clark shook his head, not taking his eyes away from the tirade of vehicles. He concentrated hard and saw that all the vehicles were lead lined which meant two things, they knew about his abilities and they knew about the meteor rocks.
Clark was finally able to move his tongue. "No." Clark said in a raspy voice. "But they got meteor rocks."
"How do you know Clark?" Pete asked.
"The vehicles are lead lined." Clark said.
Martha couldn't help but burst into tears. It was obvious that who ever these men were, they were here to take Clark away.
"What's going on?" Lana asked, seeing the fright in everybody's eyes except for her and Chloe. But the fright was starting to rub off on her.
"Clark. This is your last chance. Run away ok?" Jonathan said.
"But what about you guys?" Clark asked starting to slightly panic.
"We can take care of ourselves." Jonathan said.
"Come on Clark." Pete urged. "You have to go. I don't want to see you get hurt."
Clark got up but he didn't run. "I am not running away." Clark said bravely, which was the exact opposite of how he felt. He too had nightmares for a while after finding out about his origin. But after he thought that it would have happened before then if somebody knew.
The cars came in and parked. Men with what looked like modified guns spilled out of the vehicles, yelling orders to each other.
"Oh god." Clark whispered.
The men continued to come out of the vehicles and then finally everything just seemed to stop. The armed men staring at everyone on the Kent property and everyone on the Kent property staring at the armed men. Finally after what seemed like hours, the man who was obviously in charge stepped away from the men and boldly walked to where Martha and Jonathan were standing.
"Are you Martha and Jonathan Kent?" The man asked.
"Who wants to know?" Pete asked stepping up beside them.
"CIA." The man said pulling out a badge and showing it to the Kent's and Pete. "Do you know why we are here?"
Jonathan decided to stall. "Maybe we do and maybe we don't." Jonathan said.
"We are here to take ah Clark Kent into custody." The man said, saying Clark Kent in a cruel manner.
Clark ducked down to speak to the girls in a whisper. "You guys better go. I don't want to see you get hurt." Clark said.
"Why do the CIA want to put you in custody?" Chloe asked kicking into reporter mode.
"If I make it out of this, I promise to tell you everything. Everything." Clark said, emphasizing everything.
Lana realized what he meant by it but she shook her head. "We're not going anywhere." Lana said firmly.
"But I can't protect you." Clark said.
"What do you want with Clark?" Martha asked.
"We are here to take Clark to a facility to do tests on him." The man said honestly. "And you can't stop us."
The man turned back to the group of men and nodded his head. Ten of the men came out and stood beside the man, all of them had their guns up and ready to shoot.
"Please don't make this hard." The man said pleadingly.
"Over my dead body." Jonathan said taking a step forward. One of them men shot the gun right at Jonathan's head. Martha screamed and Pete jumped back. When everyone dared to look back, they saw Clark in front of his dad hand out blocking the bullet.
Clark fell to the ground though and Pete saw that it was a bullet coated with meteor rocks. Clark started break out in a violent sweat as his veins started to wither and stick out from his skin. Clark stared at his hand in amazement, blood trickling down his hand.
Pete dropped to his knees beside Clark and pulled a pocketknife from his pocket. He opened the blade and looked at Clark. Clark nodded at what Pete was going to do. Pete concentrated on using the blade to wedge the bullet out and he did it in a few seconds. Pete then stood up and threw the bullet back in the direction of them men's car.
Clark got unsteadily back up and stared at his healing hand. The men watched Clark do all this in amazement. A man from the group of people by the cars ran to the man and whispered something in his ear.
"Come on Clark. Come quietly and we won't hurt your friends." The man said.
"No I won't leave." Clark said. "This is my home."
"You don't have a home." The man said tauntingly. "You don't belong."
Clark looked off into the distance and saw another car coming. They pulled in farther than the other vehicles. They parked almost right next to the man.
Men jumped out from the vehicle and they went to the back of the vehicle where they opened the doors and pulled down a ramp. One of the men walked up the ramp and then wheeled someone down.
Clark could feel the effects of the meteor rocks immediately again. He saw that Swann was wearing the symbol friend of the kryptonian language made out of green meteor rocks.
"Dr. Swann?" Clark asked, disbelief lacing his voice.
"Don't be so surprise Kal'El." Swann said.
"How could you?" Clark demanded angrily. "I trusted you!"
"Well I think you should invest your trust more wisely." Swann said.
"Damn you." Pete said stepping in front of Swann.
"Ah you must know about Clark to act so protective of him." Swann said.
A man stepped out and shoved Pete down hard. "I am also protecting him." Swann said. "From himself."
Three men stepped out and picked up Clark. They started to drag him away. It was then that it hit Clark full force what they were doing. He started to kick out and struggle.
"No! No! NO!" Clark screamed out. "Don't take me away please. Don't take me away!"
Martha ran out and grabbed one of the men by the collar and shook them. "You get away from my son." Martha yelled angrily. Martha started to pound hard on the man's chest.
"He's not your son." The man said cruelly. "He's not even human."
The man ordered for them to continue but Swann spoke up. "Wait." Swann called out. "We may need him as leverage."
Men started to pour out and they grabbed everyone and forced them to their knees. Then they tied them all up in rope that had meteor rocks tied to them. The men, who had been carrying Clark, dropped him to the ground. One of them bent over and tied a meteor necklace around his neck. Clark tried to move but he was helpless.
"Sampson? Press Mr. Kent here." Swann said.
Another man walked up to Jonathan and punched him. Jonathan fell to the ground and clutched his bleeding nose.
"Where is the ship?" Sampson demanded.
"I don't know what you're talking about." Jonathan said.
"Wrong answer." Sampson said and he punched Jonathan in the eye. "Where's the ship?"
"I said I don't know what you're talking about." Jonathan said. "What ship?"
Sampson leered at Jonathan before kicking him in the gut. Jonathan doubled over clutching his gut.
"Stop it." Clark said weakly. "I'll tell you where it is."
"Clark, don't." Jonathan said weakly.
"I have to dad. I don't want to see you get hurt." Clark replied, forcing a weak smile.
"Oh a Kodak moment." Swann sneered.
Sampson walked over to Clark and took a meteor rock out of his pocket and pressed his against Clark's cheek. Clark squirmed in pain.
"So where is it?" Sampson asked.
"I'll tell you and come quietly as long as you promise to let them go." Clark said gesturing over to his friends and family.
Swann eyed him before agreeing. "Deal." Swann said. "Now where is the ship?"
"Storm cellar." Clark replied. "Under the tarp."
"Storm cellar? Interesting hiding spot." Swann said. "Kind of obvious though."
Two men ran down to the storm cellar and went down the steps. Finally after five minutes, one of them came back up.
"We can't open it." He called out. "But there is an octagonal recess."
"Kal'El? Is that a like a key hole?" Swann asked.
"My name is Clark Kent." Clark said.
"Is it?" Swann said ignoring Clark.
Clark refused to answer so Sampson walked over and grabbed a regular pistol out of his belt. He pointed it at Clark.
"You want me to shoot you Clark?" Sampson asked.
Clark reached up and showed his hand palm up. "Regular bullets won't hurt me." Clark said.
Sampson smirked. "They may not hurt you but they will kill them." Sampson said pointing the gun at Lana.
"No don't you dare!" Clark said. His eyes started to glow orange and he shot a heat beam at Sampson's arm. Sampson watched as his jacket was set on fire but he took the sleeve of his other jacket and simply slapped the fire out in one hit.
"Fire proof jacket." Sampson said with a smirk. "I know all of your abilities Clark, and your weaknesses."
"The key is in the tool box in the barn." Clark said.
While a man went to fetch the key, several man took chains down to the storm cellar and attached them to the ship while the other men tied the ends of the chains to the trucks. They dragged the ship out of the storm cellar.
Clark avoided Chloe and Lana's questioning eyes and instead concentrated on getting the meteor rock away from his neck but he was failing. Clark saw that it was futile so instead he crawled weakly over to where his mother was kneeling, crying.
"I love you mom." Clark said. Martha looked up and he kissed her on the fore head. "Thank you for finding me."
"But we didn't find you honey." Martha said. "You found us."
Clark smiled and he felt his eyes had started to tear up. "If I find a way out. I promise that I will come back. Nobody can keep me from my mom." Clark said adamantly.
"Son. Whatever happens, you know that we love you right?" Jonathan said.
"Yeah Dad I know." Clark said.
"And we never cared about where you came from. All we saw was our son." Jonathan said.
By then Swann was tired of the sentimentality. "Come on boys. Load him up."
Two men came and grabbed Clark by his armpits and started to drag him away. He kicked and screamed, looking more like the young boy that the Kent's had found. Clark started to cry freely and his pleas fell on deaf ears.
"Don't take me away please. Don't!" Clark screamed. "Mommy! Daddy! Don't take me away from them. Please don't! I don't want to go away! I don't want to be sent away again! Please don't! Please don't!"
Chloe and Lana both felt their hearts break at Clark screamed. Lana could feel the tears cascading down her cheeks. The man she secretly loved was being taken away from her.
Swann was wheeled away beaming while the men got into their vehicles. Even as the men drove away, they all could still hear Clark's cries.
Jonathan finally was able to work out of his bonds. He quickly untied Pete and then he untied Martha while Pete untied Chloe and Lana.
Jonathan helped Martha up and she collapsed into his arms sobbing. Jonathan held Martha tightly and rocked back and forth, tears falling from his own eyes.
"They took our son away." Martha sobbed. "They took him away like he was just a lab rat."
Jonathan didn't know what to say. There really wasn't anything he could say. It was true, his son was taken away to some place to be tested and prodded. It was inhuman what they did.
"There has to be something we can do." Pete said, finally speaking up. "The CIA just can't take Clark away."
"What can we do Pete?" Jonathan asked. "No one is going to believe us."
"But there has to be something." Pete persisted. "There just has to be."
"Pete we have been fearing this day since the day Clark pulled us out from our overturn truck." Jonathan said.
Martha just continued to cry into Jonathan's shirt thinking about all the horrible things that they might do to Clark.
TBC
Clark, his parents, Pete, Chloe and Lana were all digging into the barbeque that Martha and Jonathan had made when Clark looked in the distance and saw that parade of the black vehicles. His heart began to beat faster and he broke out into a sweat. He remembered watching those movies about the FBI and other people like that coming to take somebody away in black cars.
Pete was the first to notice Clark's tenseness and he looked to where Clark was staring intensely. Pete couldn't see anything except a large dust cloud from the road that came up from somebody driving down the street, only this one looked wrong even to Pete. The dust was continuing to rise, indicating that there were several vehicles.
"Clark honey? What's the matter?" Martha asked worriedly when she looked over at her son and saw terror in his eyes.
But Clark couldn't answer. He found himself petrified. He didn't like the feeling; it was something alien to him. Martha looked around instead and saw the cars too. In that instant, all of the nightmares that she had had when Clark was younger seemed to be coming true. Jonathan saw the cars too. Pete knew why the Kent's were acting like this but Chloe and Lana were mystified.
"Clark? What's wrong?" Chloe asked.
Instead Jonathan got up and came around to his son and grabbed him somewhat roughly from the shoulders.
"Clark? Run ok. Run. We'll take care of anything." Jonathan said.
Clark shook his head, not taking his eyes away from the tirade of vehicles. He concentrated hard and saw that all the vehicles were lead lined which meant two things, they knew about his abilities and they knew about the meteor rocks.
Clark was finally able to move his tongue. "No." Clark said in a raspy voice. "But they got meteor rocks."
"How do you know Clark?" Pete asked.
"The vehicles are lead lined." Clark said.
Martha couldn't help but burst into tears. It was obvious that who ever these men were, they were here to take Clark away.
"What's going on?" Lana asked, seeing the fright in everybody's eyes except for her and Chloe. But the fright was starting to rub off on her.
"Clark. This is your last chance. Run away ok?" Jonathan said.
"But what about you guys?" Clark asked starting to slightly panic.
"We can take care of ourselves." Jonathan said.
"Come on Clark." Pete urged. "You have to go. I don't want to see you get hurt."
Clark got up but he didn't run. "I am not running away." Clark said bravely, which was the exact opposite of how he felt. He too had nightmares for a while after finding out about his origin. But after he thought that it would have happened before then if somebody knew.
The cars came in and parked. Men with what looked like modified guns spilled out of the vehicles, yelling orders to each other.
"Oh god." Clark whispered.
The men continued to come out of the vehicles and then finally everything just seemed to stop. The armed men staring at everyone on the Kent property and everyone on the Kent property staring at the armed men. Finally after what seemed like hours, the man who was obviously in charge stepped away from the men and boldly walked to where Martha and Jonathan were standing.
"Are you Martha and Jonathan Kent?" The man asked.
"Who wants to know?" Pete asked stepping up beside them.
"CIA." The man said pulling out a badge and showing it to the Kent's and Pete. "Do you know why we are here?"
Jonathan decided to stall. "Maybe we do and maybe we don't." Jonathan said.
"We are here to take ah Clark Kent into custody." The man said, saying Clark Kent in a cruel manner.
Clark ducked down to speak to the girls in a whisper. "You guys better go. I don't want to see you get hurt." Clark said.
"Why do the CIA want to put you in custody?" Chloe asked kicking into reporter mode.
"If I make it out of this, I promise to tell you everything. Everything." Clark said, emphasizing everything.
Lana realized what he meant by it but she shook her head. "We're not going anywhere." Lana said firmly.
"But I can't protect you." Clark said.
"What do you want with Clark?" Martha asked.
"We are here to take Clark to a facility to do tests on him." The man said honestly. "And you can't stop us."
The man turned back to the group of men and nodded his head. Ten of the men came out and stood beside the man, all of them had their guns up and ready to shoot.
"Please don't make this hard." The man said pleadingly.
"Over my dead body." Jonathan said taking a step forward. One of them men shot the gun right at Jonathan's head. Martha screamed and Pete jumped back. When everyone dared to look back, they saw Clark in front of his dad hand out blocking the bullet.
Clark fell to the ground though and Pete saw that it was a bullet coated with meteor rocks. Clark started break out in a violent sweat as his veins started to wither and stick out from his skin. Clark stared at his hand in amazement, blood trickling down his hand.
Pete dropped to his knees beside Clark and pulled a pocketknife from his pocket. He opened the blade and looked at Clark. Clark nodded at what Pete was going to do. Pete concentrated on using the blade to wedge the bullet out and he did it in a few seconds. Pete then stood up and threw the bullet back in the direction of them men's car.
Clark got unsteadily back up and stared at his healing hand. The men watched Clark do all this in amazement. A man from the group of people by the cars ran to the man and whispered something in his ear.
"Come on Clark. Come quietly and we won't hurt your friends." The man said.
"No I won't leave." Clark said. "This is my home."
"You don't have a home." The man said tauntingly. "You don't belong."
Clark looked off into the distance and saw another car coming. They pulled in farther than the other vehicles. They parked almost right next to the man.
Men jumped out from the vehicle and they went to the back of the vehicle where they opened the doors and pulled down a ramp. One of the men walked up the ramp and then wheeled someone down.
Clark could feel the effects of the meteor rocks immediately again. He saw that Swann was wearing the symbol friend of the kryptonian language made out of green meteor rocks.
"Dr. Swann?" Clark asked, disbelief lacing his voice.
"Don't be so surprise Kal'El." Swann said.
"How could you?" Clark demanded angrily. "I trusted you!"
"Well I think you should invest your trust more wisely." Swann said.
"Damn you." Pete said stepping in front of Swann.
"Ah you must know about Clark to act so protective of him." Swann said.
A man stepped out and shoved Pete down hard. "I am also protecting him." Swann said. "From himself."
Three men stepped out and picked up Clark. They started to drag him away. It was then that it hit Clark full force what they were doing. He started to kick out and struggle.
"No! No! NO!" Clark screamed out. "Don't take me away please. Don't take me away!"
Martha ran out and grabbed one of the men by the collar and shook them. "You get away from my son." Martha yelled angrily. Martha started to pound hard on the man's chest.
"He's not your son." The man said cruelly. "He's not even human."
The man ordered for them to continue but Swann spoke up. "Wait." Swann called out. "We may need him as leverage."
Men started to pour out and they grabbed everyone and forced them to their knees. Then they tied them all up in rope that had meteor rocks tied to them. The men, who had been carrying Clark, dropped him to the ground. One of them bent over and tied a meteor necklace around his neck. Clark tried to move but he was helpless.
"Sampson? Press Mr. Kent here." Swann said.
Another man walked up to Jonathan and punched him. Jonathan fell to the ground and clutched his bleeding nose.
"Where is the ship?" Sampson demanded.
"I don't know what you're talking about." Jonathan said.
"Wrong answer." Sampson said and he punched Jonathan in the eye. "Where's the ship?"
"I said I don't know what you're talking about." Jonathan said. "What ship?"
Sampson leered at Jonathan before kicking him in the gut. Jonathan doubled over clutching his gut.
"Stop it." Clark said weakly. "I'll tell you where it is."
"Clark, don't." Jonathan said weakly.
"I have to dad. I don't want to see you get hurt." Clark replied, forcing a weak smile.
"Oh a Kodak moment." Swann sneered.
Sampson walked over to Clark and took a meteor rock out of his pocket and pressed his against Clark's cheek. Clark squirmed in pain.
"So where is it?" Sampson asked.
"I'll tell you and come quietly as long as you promise to let them go." Clark said gesturing over to his friends and family.
Swann eyed him before agreeing. "Deal." Swann said. "Now where is the ship?"
"Storm cellar." Clark replied. "Under the tarp."
"Storm cellar? Interesting hiding spot." Swann said. "Kind of obvious though."
Two men ran down to the storm cellar and went down the steps. Finally after five minutes, one of them came back up.
"We can't open it." He called out. "But there is an octagonal recess."
"Kal'El? Is that a like a key hole?" Swann asked.
"My name is Clark Kent." Clark said.
"Is it?" Swann said ignoring Clark.
Clark refused to answer so Sampson walked over and grabbed a regular pistol out of his belt. He pointed it at Clark.
"You want me to shoot you Clark?" Sampson asked.
Clark reached up and showed his hand palm up. "Regular bullets won't hurt me." Clark said.
Sampson smirked. "They may not hurt you but they will kill them." Sampson said pointing the gun at Lana.
"No don't you dare!" Clark said. His eyes started to glow orange and he shot a heat beam at Sampson's arm. Sampson watched as his jacket was set on fire but he took the sleeve of his other jacket and simply slapped the fire out in one hit.
"Fire proof jacket." Sampson said with a smirk. "I know all of your abilities Clark, and your weaknesses."
"The key is in the tool box in the barn." Clark said.
While a man went to fetch the key, several man took chains down to the storm cellar and attached them to the ship while the other men tied the ends of the chains to the trucks. They dragged the ship out of the storm cellar.
Clark avoided Chloe and Lana's questioning eyes and instead concentrated on getting the meteor rock away from his neck but he was failing. Clark saw that it was futile so instead he crawled weakly over to where his mother was kneeling, crying.
"I love you mom." Clark said. Martha looked up and he kissed her on the fore head. "Thank you for finding me."
"But we didn't find you honey." Martha said. "You found us."
Clark smiled and he felt his eyes had started to tear up. "If I find a way out. I promise that I will come back. Nobody can keep me from my mom." Clark said adamantly.
"Son. Whatever happens, you know that we love you right?" Jonathan said.
"Yeah Dad I know." Clark said.
"And we never cared about where you came from. All we saw was our son." Jonathan said.
By then Swann was tired of the sentimentality. "Come on boys. Load him up."
Two men came and grabbed Clark by his armpits and started to drag him away. He kicked and screamed, looking more like the young boy that the Kent's had found. Clark started to cry freely and his pleas fell on deaf ears.
"Don't take me away please. Don't!" Clark screamed. "Mommy! Daddy! Don't take me away from them. Please don't! I don't want to go away! I don't want to be sent away again! Please don't! Please don't!"
Chloe and Lana both felt their hearts break at Clark screamed. Lana could feel the tears cascading down her cheeks. The man she secretly loved was being taken away from her.
Swann was wheeled away beaming while the men got into their vehicles. Even as the men drove away, they all could still hear Clark's cries.
Jonathan finally was able to work out of his bonds. He quickly untied Pete and then he untied Martha while Pete untied Chloe and Lana.
Jonathan helped Martha up and she collapsed into his arms sobbing. Jonathan held Martha tightly and rocked back and forth, tears falling from his own eyes.
"They took our son away." Martha sobbed. "They took him away like he was just a lab rat."
Jonathan didn't know what to say. There really wasn't anything he could say. It was true, his son was taken away to some place to be tested and prodded. It was inhuman what they did.
"There has to be something we can do." Pete said, finally speaking up. "The CIA just can't take Clark away."
"What can we do Pete?" Jonathan asked. "No one is going to believe us."
"But there has to be something." Pete persisted. "There just has to be."
"Pete we have been fearing this day since the day Clark pulled us out from our overturn truck." Jonathan said.
Martha just continued to cry into Jonathan's shirt thinking about all the horrible things that they might do to Clark.
TBC