Chapter Two - Desire

Once upon a time Clark Kent wanted Lana more than anything else in the world, but not anymore. Now the only person on his mind was some girl called Zee. For the last three days, on his visits to the Talon, he'd lectured Pete, Chloe and, when they started to avoid him, anyone else who would listen, about the wonders of this Zee who, from the sounds of it, was almost Lana-esque in her beauty.

While Lana could cope with Clark's heart's allegiance's shifting, what upset her more than anything was that Clark was now treating her as a stranger. Maybe it was her fault for constantly keeping him at a distance all this time, afraid to get close to him because it might put him in danger from Insect Queen's many enemies. The number of times she'd come close to sharing her secret with him but, no, she couldn't risk endangering their friendship. Now, it seemed, that friendship was gone.

Still, she had to admit, Zee made Clark happy. At the start of the week Clark had been distraught beyond the point of melodrama about his dead cow, telling Lana how he'd held Buttercup in his arms and how he'd wished he could have turned back time, like in that Warrior Angel movie that Lex had made him watch, to save her. Whereas today, when she'd accidentally set up the Talon's background music to play "Build Me Up Buttercup" followed by "No Milk Today", Clark's smile was unwavering.

As Lana stared at Clark, sitting at the counter alone, smiling, completely oblivious to her, she completely ignored the raven-haired girl who'd just walked in.

"Hey Clark," shouted the girl, "I managed to get Dad to move the auditions to here."

Clark's head whirled around faster than Lana would have thought possible. "Zee!" he exclaimed joyfully.

Lana looked at the girl unimpressed. So this was Zee? She hardly lived up to the publicity (then again, apart from herself, Lana expected nobody possibly could have).

"Hi, I'm Lana," she said, offering her hand to the approaching Zee. "I expect Clark's told you all about me."

"No," replied Zee, confused. "Oh wait ..." she added as Clark looked upon her adoringly, "you must be the rinky-dink Lana that Chloe told me about that night after the show. Pleased to meet you. I'm Zatanna."

"Hi, Zatanna, I've heard a lot about you," replied Lana smiling her forced smile.

"Hey, can I put some of these up here," the girl asked, pulling some posters for Zatara's magic show from one of the pockets of her trenchcoat.

Lana looked at the posters and a tear came to her eye. "I'm sorry, Zatanna, but, like I told Clark when he asked me to go to your Dad's show, magic really upsets me. I guess it's because I was waving a wand the day my parents got hit by a meteorite."

Zatanna looked sadly at Lana, nodded understandingly and, slowly, deliberately, began tearing the posters up into strips. When she'd finished she bundled the strips together in her hand and passed them to Lana.

Lana looked at the bundle of strips and saw that they'd reformed. Slowly she unfolded the paper in her hands to find herself staring at her younger face on the cover of an old issue of Time.

"Old news," said Zatanna.

"So, Zee, where's your Dad?" asked Clark, ignoring any reaction from this Lana girl who claimed to know him.

"Oh, he's seeing some old acquaintance - some guy called Luthor."

Zatara entered the darkened room. sthgil no he murmured and the room lit up.

"Very impressive, Mr. Zatara."

"Please, call me Zatara, Mr. Luthor."

"Thank you, Zatara. And you can call me Lex."

"Well, Lex, you've certainly changed from that red-haired little boy I entertained at those birthday parties years ago."

Lex looked at Zatara, dressed in top hat and tails, with his jet black hair and moustache. "You, on the other hand, haven't aged at all. It's hard to believe you've been around as long as you have. There was even a comic strip about you at the back of the first Warrior Angel comic."

"I still say I should have got top billing," interrupted Zatara, with a trace of mock resentment in his voice.

"So, Zatara, what's your secret," asked Lex, curious that this face from his childhood hadn't changed.

"My father was a fifth-dimensional imp," replied Zatara deadpan.

"Okay," laughed Lex, "I understand if you don't want to give away your secrets. It's a lot more fun trying to guess them myself anyway. Which, I guess, is how we met originally - my father decided to hire the world's greatest magician for my birthday party after the previous year when I'd spoiled the magician's tricks by guessing how they all were done and heckling him accordingly."

Zatara smiled. "So, Lex, why are we meeting again after all this time?"

Lex walked over to a water-damaged Porsche, with it's roof torn off. "I've had top engineers looking at this car since 2001 and, apart from a general consensus that it's unroadworthy, I still haven't had any answers that make sense."

"I'm sorry, Lex, I don't understand," replied Zatara confused.

"In October 2001 I was driving this car when I collided with a young man named Clark Kent on a bridge and ended up plunging into a river. When I next regained consciousness Clark Kent was standing over me unharmed and this Porsche was sitting underwater with a torn roof. Ever since I've been trying to piece together a rational explanation for what happened that day but ..."

"But you can't," added Zatara, completing Lex's sentence for him

"That's right," replied Lex, turning his gaze away from Zatara.

"So you want me to show you how this trick was done?"

"That's right. I'm bored with scratching my head. I figured if anyone can figure out the impossible you can."

"Very well, Lex. I've never met a mystery I cannot explain. But are you sure? Once you know how a trick's done the magic's lost forever."

"I'm sure."

"Well, if that's what you desire, I'll investigate. Soon you'll know how the magic was done and, more importantly, who was the magician."