Rating: G

Disclaimer: Not my characters.

Setting: During Jonathan's coma.

Author's note: To Smallvillian, my own personal slave driver, who forced me to abandon my cherished third-person ways and dig deeper. And thanks to Dawn as well for giving it that extra read.

Out of Darkness

I know this place.

It's too dark and foggy to see clearly, but I'm sure I know it. Looking around in bewilderment, trying to get my bearings, I catch sight of a large, vaguely familiar shape in front of me, but I can't quite make it out. I stare at it till my eyes adjust and I can spell out the word Kent on its face.

My parents' grave.

What is this? What am I doing here, alone, in the middle of the night?

As that question forms itself in my head, my breath catches and I find myself stumbling back a step or two. It's as if I'm willing myself to forget something. For a second I grasp for it, but it's gone. My mind's so sluggish I can't seem to form a coherent thought. It's like—like the feeling you have when you drag yourself out of bed in the morning after a sleepless night, a feeling I've known a lot lately.

Except this time it's worse. The darkness and silence press on me heavily, suffocatingly. I can feel my heart hammering and force myself to take deep breaths, try to calm down.

But I can't shake this weird feeling of being trapped here. Trapped. Something clicks in my mind. My hand goes to my throat, my fingers searching for some phantom noose and attempting to close around it.

A noose? What on earth made me think of—?

Oh, God, no. Please, no.

Now I fight to hold back the mental image, but it's too late. The memory rushes over me, bringing a wave of nausea with it—my son literally being pulled apart in front of my eyes, sucked through the wall of a cave by the same energy that kept me helpless to save him.

I crumple to the ground with both hands over my mouth, stifling the cries rising in my throat.

Oh, Clark . . . Clark . . .

"Jonathan."

I hear the word spoken behind me, but it makes no more sense right now than a word spoken in Chinese. I have no idea who said it and don't care. The only thing that has any meaning is that my son is gone. My fingers are pressed over my eyes now in a futile effort to shut out the memory that won't go away.

The voice repeats itself, insistently. This time, as the sound of my name slowly penetrates my mind, I realize I do know that voice. In my whole life, I've only known one voice that sounded like that.

But—no. No, that isn't possible.

Gradually, almost against my will, my head turns and I squint up through a blur of tears.

"Dad?"

The world spins around me and I clutch at the grass, as if to keep from falling off. My father is standing there, looking at me.

This isn't real. It can't be. I try to speak, but my mouth is too dry. I have to swallow a couple of times.

"Dad—how—? Am I—?" The last word won't come out at all.

"No, son," he says gently. "Not yet."

That is his voice—I know it is—but it can't—

"Then how—why are you here?" An explanation occurs to me. "Is this a dream?"

"Not exactly." He hesitates. Even in the darkness, I can see the odd look in his eyes—a look of—compassion? It's not a look I'm familiar with, not from him.

"I came because—you needed me," he finally says. "That's all you need to know right now."

A sudden hope flashes through my mind. With a desperate effort, I pull myself up from the ground and force myself, despite my fear, to take a step closer. "Do you know if Clark's all right?" I hear myself pleading.

He only shakes his head sadly. "I don't know, Jonathan. I'm sorry."

I turn away from him, staring sightlessly at the ground, sick with disappointment—and something else. My hands clench into fists. Then why would you say I need you? I want to retort. Why are you even here? Because I've made a mess of everything? Is that what you wanted to see?

Stop it, another voice in my head orders me. You know that's not fair. I bite my lip hard, fighting to keep from lashing out at him. Good Lord, it's like being a teenager again—except in those days I would have just lashed out without even trying to control myself.

And in those days I wouldn't have felt such overwhelming shame along with the anger.

I let out a long breath and my shoulders sag as the rage subsides, leaving only guilt and anguish. So what if he is here to criticize me? He'd have every right.

But when his voice comes through the darkness once more, it's quiet and full of sympathy. "Jonathan. You're being much too hard on yourself."

What is he doing—reading my mind? Or does he just know me better than I used to think he did? Either way, I can't let that one go by.

"I failed him. I failed Martha, too." I close my eyes as the shock and horror on my wife's face come back to me. "They trusted me—and I—I let them down."

I can hear him moving closer, and without meaning to I stiffen. I'm still creeped out, as my son would say, by this Twilight Zone episode I've walked into, still not sure I can trust it. He seems to sense the aversion I can't help, and stops. But he's still there. I can feel his eyes on me, boring into me.

"And you're saying they've never let you down before?" he presses me in that same quiet voice. "Not once? That's not possible, Jonathan, not for anyone. You're all only human—well, two of you are, anyway. But all of you make mistakes. That's just how people are, son."

"But it's different for me!" I cry out, whirling around to face him again. Why do I have to explain this to him? For heaven's sake, he of all people should understand. "I am Clark's father! I was supposed to keep him safe."

That last sentence chokes me. My next words are so soft I can barely hear them myself. "The stakes were too high for me to make a mistake."

"Jonathan," he says, his voice low but steely, as it always used to be when he meant business. "You are not God." Suddenly, unexpectedly, he gives me a whimsical little smile. "Trust me. I know."

"I never said—"

"Then stop acting like it. You took the risk because you had to. And you did everything you could to protect Clark—more even than most fathers would have." He speaks more slowly, emphasizing each word. "There was nothing else you could have done."

I'm shaking my head. "I could have been there when he needed me in the first place. I could have stopped him from running away." The things I said to Clark in this very place are pouring out of me, the pain still as fresh as the first time I said them. "You would never have driven him away like I did. You would've—"

"Son, don't put me on a pedestal," Dad interrupts. There's a hint of the old note of command in his voice, and automatically my spine straightens. But his next words are gentler, even a little sorrowful. "I made my share of mistakes with you—maybe more than my share. You know that better than anyone."

I grimace wryly. "I didn't exactly make it easy for you, Dad."

"Well, no," he concedes, also a little wryly. For just a second I think I glimpse the resemblance my mother used to say she saw between us. It was so faint most people couldn't see it at all, except for the color of our eyes. I sometimes thought she was making it up, trying anything she could think of to strengthen what little relationship we had.

"But still," he goes on, "you've had it harder than I ever did."

I stare at him, dumbfounded. He's got to be kidding. After some of the stunts I pulled, the things I used to say to him?

I open my mouth to protest, but he holds up a hand, cutting me off. "Jonathan, you've had to deal with things I never even could have dreamed of. You took in that little boy and you got him through times that would have made most of us throw up our hands and give up. You've given him everything you had in you—and then some."

I hardly hear him anymore. My eyes are on the ground again as the long-suppressed tears finally start to spill over. What does any of that matter now? What difference did it make? It didn't save my son.

Clark's despairing last words to me ring in my ears. Oh, Clark. Why couldn't you just let that—that thing kill me instead? It would have been worth it, if it had kept you safe.

"Jonathan," my father says again, urgently now. "Look at me."

I can't do it.

He lays a hand on my cheek, a gesture he sometimes used when I was little. I flinch slightly from the contact, but he doesn't pull back. He simply moves his hand under my chin and tilts it up so that I'm forced to look into his face again. All I can see there are love and tenderness.

"Son, I'm so proud of you," he says softly, his eyes shining. "I couldn't be any prouder."

As his words sink in, I feel myself going limp again, but this time he's there to catch me before I fall. I bury my face in his shoulder as violent sobs shake my whole body.

"Dad . . ." I gasp. "Oh, Dad, I'm so sorry—for everything. . . ."

"Shhh. I know." He tightens his grasp. "I know, son. It's all right."

A strange peace steals over me even as I continue to weep uncontrollably. With Dad's arms around me, just for a few minutes, I feel safe, protected—a way I can't remember feeling since I was a kid. Just for a few minutes, I want nothing more than to stay here with him, to rest and be comforted.

I remember Clark sobbing in my arms like this that night in Metropolis, after he'd destroyed the ring that had done so much damage. I remember hugging him close to me, overwhelmed with love and relief and gratitude. The memory makes me cry even harder, and I hold on tighter to my own father, grateful beyond words for his strong, solid presence. I still don't understand anything about how this happened, but I can't bring myself to care anymore.

At long last the painful sobs start to die away, but Dad still supports me as I struggle to get my breath, patting my back and murmuring encouragement. Slowly, as a momentary wave of dizziness recedes, I relax against him, my eyes closing again.

Dad, why was I so stupid and stubborn? Why did I always shut you out? Once I could have come up with dozens of reasons. Now, with my head resting on his shoulder, I can't think of any. His words of love and forgiveness have lifted an enormous weight from my shoulders, a weight I wasn't fully aware of carrying all these years. But there's still an ache of regret for all the time we lost.

And there's still the terrible fear for my own son.

I feel Dad start to draw away from me, and look up. Something in his face strikes a new fear into my heart. "Dad, don't leave me," I say hoarsely. "Please. I can't stay here alone—not knowing whether Clark is—"

He reaches out quickly and grips my shoulder, looking at me intently. It feels as if he's trying to pour some of his own strength into me. "Jonathan, I want you to remember something. You're not the only one who cares about Clark. There are others trying to help him, to free him."

There's steel in his voice again. "And if they do—when they do—he's gonna need his dad."

"But—" I begin.

"And, son," he breaks in. "You won't be alone. You never have been."

He smiles at me warmly, lovingly, one last time before letting go and turning away.

I try to take a step after him, but something holds me as securely as if my feet have been nailed to the ground. "Dad—" I whisper. But the mist and the darkness are deepening. I can't see him now—I can't see anything. I can't even feel the ground under my feet anymore.

Dad? Where are you? What's happening—

The next minute I'm sitting straight up in bed.

The End