AN: Thanks for the great support for the fic. I'm glad you're interested.

I was thinking of including Michael actually. Didn't put him in the list at first because his role was smaller than the others'.

Guardian of the Future

Part 2

Lex was about to have a coronary. The damned ambulance siren grated on him. He could think of nothing but speeding since he saw the ambulance turn left. Clark had opted to stay behind, and Lex wondered if Clark did it because he was afraid of what a possibly injured girl would say when she learned that Clark had tattled on her.

The very idea concerned Lex. Sure, Clark, and most of Smallville, knew how he had harbored Chloe during her and her father's months of hiding. Still, for Clark to come to him with this information... Lex was thankful he knew at once, true. But did that also mean that Clark suspected that there was more to his relationship with Chloe than a simple act of protection?

Wait a minute. Lex asked himself, Was there more to his relationship with Chloe than simple protection?

If he was very true to himself, Lex would have to say that every gesture and look, every touch, spoke of just that. That last night was proof enough.

"Aren't you cold out here?" he had inquired, his voice soft like the goose feather pillow he had fluffed in his hands before handing them to Chloe when she first slept under his roof.

Chloe had turned to him, and she was silhouetted by the thousands of lights that scattered behind her. She stood on the balcony of his penthouse apartment that starlit night, and Lex had the passing thought that she looked very much in place there.

He noticed the glimmer on her cheeks that almost vied with the shine of her eyes. "Are you crying?"

She had turned her face away and swallowed deeply, because crying was beautiful on girls like Lana--dainty girls who made agony look lovely. Crying was not for girls like her, who got red and blotchy in parts of her face that made her seem like a clown.

"I know you're scared," he had begun. His voice was low. Lex moved towards her and was mere inches from pressing against her back. "I'd be scared too if I were you. I know you miss your home."

"My dad is my home. I'm fine," she had insisted.

"Chloe," he had said, urging her to look at him.

Chloe had taken deep, steadying breaths because it was a shame to bawl in front of Lex.

When she did not turn, Lex slipped a hand on her cheek and gently turned her to face him. Chloe felt the smooth rich texture of his handkerchief slide over her cheeks to dry her tears. And then it had slid to her neck. "You don't have to be afraid. I'm here." Chloe nodded. "You won't have to be lonely." Lex had held her gaze then, because the months of subtle touches and tense regard have coalesced into an uncontrollable burst in his heart. "I'm here," he had promised.

Chloe's trembling lips had parted. She had traced the planes and lines of his face with her fingertips. He had leaned down, and her eyelids had fluttered closed.

His phone had rung in his pocket. Lex pulled away. Chloe's eyes snapped open and she watched the way his gentle regard morph into disbelief and relief. She had never been so insulted. Then suddenly the expression was gone and she wondered if she had only imagined it.

Lex's gaze focused on the lights of the ambulance as he maneuvered to the exact spot of the fields she was in. He stopped his car a little way off. He felt it the moment she saw him. His heart slowed pounding when he saw one stretcher and heard the paramedic call out, "Male. Caucasian. Anywhere from seventeen to twenty two."

Lex frowned when he saw Chloe gripping the victim's hand in hers. He jogged towards the scene. Chloe looked up at him without rising from the ground.

"Are you okay?" Lex demanded from behind the paramedics.

Chloe nodded. "Nothing broken."

The paramedics looked at Chris' wound. When he hissed in pain, Chloe squeezed his hand, an action not lost on Lex.

"Chloe, let's go," Lex suggested. "The paramedics will take care of it."

She craned her neck over he paramedics replied, "I'm going with them to the hospital."

Lex let out a low rumble. "Don't start, Chloe."

Chris, even if he was used to squeezing his eyes shut in pain, suddenly tried to sit up because it was too good to miss. He had known Chloe for less than two hours but that was definitely not the right thing to say to her. The paramedics tried to push him back down, but Chris shushed them.

"What did you say?" came the deceptively quiet response of Chloe.

"You endangered yourself, Chloe. That's not acceptable," Lex answered, his voice with the same smooth control.

Chloe's lips curved without humor. "You would never understand me if you think your little warnings can keep me from pursuing a hot lead."

"That's not what I meant, Chloe."

"Look. Some guy is hurt," Chloe reminded him. "I'm going with the ambulance. See you," she bid curtly.

"They can take of him, or do you have more first aid learning than they do?"

"I found him!" Chloe argued, storming towards Lex. "I have a responsibility to him to see this through."

"You really don't," Chris tried to interject, but his voice was drowned by Chloe's.

Since Chloe was close, and her breath made his shirt flutter in the proximity, Lex whispered, "And you don't think you found me?"

Chloe's eyes widened. He was not going to do this. Not now. He could not just hide away somewhere and decided to talk about it when he wanted. "You can be so childish at times!"

She stalked towards the ambulance, where the paramedics were strapping Chris in. Chloe climbed into the back. The other paramedics got in aftr Chloe and slammed the door shut.

As the ambulance sped away, Lex shook his head and muttered, "And I'm hurt too."

Inside the ambulance, Chloe peered into Chris' face. "Told you you're gonna be fine."

"Always has to be right. That's the kind of girl you are," Chris said faintly. He remembered that guy. He was so familiar. Still, Chris doubted he had ever met him before. Was it possible that this niggling feeling was merely clues coming from his new role? Where had he seen him before?

"Come on!'' the man on the motorcycle demanded. ''The way these people are looking at me gives me the creeps.''

Isabel screwed her lips. ''What did you expect when you ride into a town called Smallville wearing tight black pants, a black leather jacket and a shiny black helmet?" She maneuvered herself behind him on the seat and looped her arms around his waist. "She wasn't there, Michael," she said in a tight voice. "But," she added, "there was a man who abruptly disappeared when he saw me. Bald."

"What did he look like?" Michael inquired, thinking deeply and recalling the bad men he had had run ins with.

"Would it matter?" retorted Isabel. "Our enemies can shapeshift into whatever they want."

"Just tell me!" he snapped. Short tolerance. Thin thread of patience. Both characteristics he promised Maria he would work on.

"Looked like a boy trying to be mean," Isabel replied.

"Young?" Michael clarified.

"No. Just. Early twenties. He looked like he was forced to mature early, I guess."

"Drugs," he concluded.

"It's not that. He just looked different, I guess."

"Not a surprise. There's a lot of strange folk here." Michael started the bike.

Isabel frowned. "There's nothing out of the ordinary.''

When they were about to roll, a jeep blocked their way. ''You were saying?" Michael mocked.

A woman with blue hair and a man with striking bleached white hair skipped off the vehicle. "City people," Isabel offered. Surely there was no blue dye in a place like Smallville.

The bike roared like thunder away from the jeep. As they passed the white-haired guy, he glared at the man. He took another turn when he thought he saw the guy's sharp bone structure transform into a mottled face with fangs peeking out from under his lips.

As soon as the shaggy boy and the voluptuous statue zoomed away on their bike, Spike allowed his face to return to normal. Illyria had seen him that way before, but Spike felt the disgust she tried to hide. He did not really believe it mattered what the old one thought. He just didn't want to bother with her grimace.

"You might wanna try to stay inconspicuous, Blue," Spike suggested as he looked her tight outfit up and down. "That's a bit overmuch, eh?"

Illyria studied a faraway point, her crystal eyes laden with grief. "I shall call no attention to myself. Fear not, half-breed."

The mocking word carried not as much weight, because Spike knew it came only as a matter of habit and not of meaning. 'Well ain't that jolly? I'm happy coz the bird isn't too vocal 'bout her loathing.' Spike turned to the coffeehouse, utterly useless to either him or Illyria for it was only at this time of night when they began to come alive.

"Do you see any other woman wearing anything like that, and with blue hair?"

Illyria had the tenacity to look offended. "I am no mere woman! I am Illyria, god to millions before men even grew the backbone to raise themselves from the primordial soup that graced half the earth."

Spike raised his brows. The previous owner of the shell may have been a mere woman, but Fred was intelligent enough to get the point after that speech. Illyria, a two million year old god, took one beat longer before deflating the insulted stance and changed into Fred. It still gave him the chills, that. Illyria was night and Fred was the day. To watch Illyria move about looking like Fred was disturbing to say the least.

"This pleases you?" Spike chanced a nod. Illyria turned away from him. "I do not care if it does. This change pleases me now."

The vampire shook his head. He wondered why Illyria even tried. They were the only two left to wander the world with the strength and knowledge that in a world at peace, would remain needless. The stark sadness and loss was still evident in her eyes. He saw it clearly when she looked around the coffeehouse, then settled on a chair.

"He probably wanted to die anyway," he offered.

"This is about her again," she concluded. "About this Winifred."

Spike shrugged. If this happened just a few years ago, he would laugh at the absurdity of it. Then again, he thought, remembering Dru, maybe not. He certainly would not chuckle at it today because of the entire sordid love story with the Slayer. "In the end, he was just moving about waiting to die. He said he loved her most, even before he met her."

She had said the very same thing when she held the dying Wesley in her arms and kissed him. They would be together again. She knew nothing about the truth of her statement though, for in the years of her sleep it was only blackness. There was no one to meet in an afterlife, for there was no one more important than the self. "You truly believe this?"

"Haven't proved it wrong yet." He looked around, scanning for the face that had been appearing in his late night dreams. It was the face of an answer. "Now let's see if the man in my dreams is around here." After he realized the words that had come out of his mouth, Spike pressed down the urge to spit.

"My dreams are empty," she shared sadly.

"Cheer up, doll. Our mission right now is to remove the black cloud hanging over both our futures."

Illyria's gaze focused on him, and she reminded him, "There is no black cloud in your future. There is no future for you. I will kill you soon."

"That is the black cloud," he answered.

"Mommy!"

Chris was hit by a memory of his mother Piper turning and laughing as she takes up himself or his just a year older brother Wyatt into her arms and swings the baby around until the little boy is giggling with delight.

He turned and saw not his mother with her long straight dark hair, but a more slender woman with short blonde hair reaching for a little girl. Chris noted the dark bruising on the woman's arms. He was appalled by the thought of anyone hurting a mother. People might call it a complex, but to Chris, mothers were sacred. Anyone who raised a hand on someone weaker, and most especially on a mother, would be dealt with severely.

Was this the kind of evil he was supposed to stop? He wanted this to be, but he doubted that the Council of Balance Between Good and Evil would save him from eternal limbo because of domestic violence.

'Your mission is a man named Alexander Luthor,' one of the cloaked figures had informed him.

"Search for a clue, or anything to indicate that Alexander Luthor is from around here."

"Marra Luthor, stop pulling mommy's hair," came the woman's voice.

Chris snapped back to the scene in front of him. The woman looked happy. It was possible that the bruises came from an accident. He needed to know what it was about Alexander Luthor that sent the council searching for a lost spirit like Chris.

He proceeded towards a flight of stairs that called to him. Secrets were always on an upper level. The little girl's laughter followed him on his way up the stairs. He desperately hoped that Alexander was not hurting the child's mother, because then Chris would have to hurt him.

When he reached the top step, a flash of white caught his attention. Chris turned to the movement and saw a figure in a white shift gown pass. He recognized the familiar face and cleared his throat. He supposed he should be embarrassed, but he felt close enough to the savior of his life to announce his presence this way. When she did not acknowledge his presence, Chris grinned and walked closer to her and said, "Chloe!"

Chloe did not turn. He watched as she paused in front of a door and tried the knob. Actually, Chris blinked. She seemed to be fading just a bit. "Chloe," he tried again. Chloe's hand passed through the knob. She started to penetrate the door.

"AAH!" Chris yelped and stumbled backwards, tripping over himself and falling flat on his back.

He opened his eyes and took deep breaths. "What the hell was that?" he whispered to himself. Chris sat up, shaking his hair out of his eyes.

"What the hell was what?" asked a very transparent Chloe Sullivan as she grinned down at him wearing a suit.

Chris screamed in earnest now. Was it raining ghost Chloes in this future?

"You're the one who just appeared out of nowhere and you're the one screaming?" the ghost asked in disbelief. "And don't you deny it! I feel every change that happens in this house."

"I'm here to research," he said.

Chloe smiled broadly. "Research!" she gasped. "I love research! I miss research."

Chris winced. "Well have you researched the fact that there are two ghosts of you?"

"You know what, I didn't notice it before when I saved you or I would have left you to bleed to death," Chloe snapped. "But you're an asshole!" She started to walk away from him.

Chris extended his arms in a pleading motion, but it seemed that ghosts did not have eyes on the back of their heads either. He was not going to follow that ghost. Instead, he opened the door and slipped inside the room that the first ghost went to.

He stayed in the shadows and saw the bald guy that Chloe was arguing with earlier, well in this future that would likely be several years ago. The man was sitting behind his desk and was smiling at the ghost. The man could see the ghost! Chris wondered if this man had a third eye. The man pushed away from his desk and walked towards the ghost. His fingers traced the outline of the glowing cheek. The light started to fade from the cheek, and the man went back to his desk and pushed a button. The image flickered out.

"A hologram," Chris murmured. So was the other ghost a hologram as well?

The man walked out of the room. Chris moved away even more so that he would not be detected. He followed the man down the stairs.

"Daddy." The girl Marra jumped up and tried to reach for her father.

The man ignored the little girl and turned to the woman. "You should be watching the news, Maria, instead of living in your own private world."

Maria stuck out her chin and narrowed her eyes at her husband. "Is that all, Lex?"

Lex waved dismissively. "And for heaven's sake, teach the girl how to read and write. She's jumping all over the place like a little animal."

Maria itched to hit him so hard for that comment. No one called Marra an animal, especially not her own father. Always, after hurtful words, Lex would vanish into his library or the bedroom, and she was not allowed to disturb him. He worked on so many things. Maria suspected what he was up to, but did not really mind as long as he left her and Marra alone.

As soon as he was gone, Maria collapsed on the couch and reached for the cordless phone. She dialed a familiar number.

"Isabel," she sighed. "I can't do this anymore. He's used me as a replacement for someone I barely knew. Then he found out how different I was from her. Now we're both completely miserable."

Chris took a step back from the living room. He then turned around and looked up at the second floor.

There she was. His friend. Chloe wearing what would have been her favorite suit, watching sadly from the second level. The real ghost.

tbc