Part I
Chapter Four: Donnie's

It was Saturday morning, which meant it was time for work.

Groggily Chloe rose from her bed having only managed to catch a few hours sleep, and threw herself towards the shower.

Chloe hated weekends. She also hated her job; waitressing for a ridiculous $3.00 an hour for eight hours at a time, four, torturous days a week. She didn't have to work, she knew, but she chose to for a number of reasons. One, it made her feel a little less guilty that David was financing most of their little mission and though $400 a month was nothing compared to the money he pulled, it allowed her the small amount of independence she'd grown accustomed to. Chloe was happy knowing that she could at least afford to support herself and pay the rent.

She'd landed the job at Donnie's Diner during her first few weeks in Metropolis. Lex's money had run out faster than she'd anticipated and with no means of paying her rent for the previous apartment she had lived in, she'd been forced to find alternative means. The job at Donnie's hadn't landed in her lap straight away and after finding no job that paid enough, Chloe had shamefully resorted to the last form of income there was: prostitution.

It hadn't been for long and there really hadn't been that many men. Still unwilling to parade along the streets of Metropolis, Chloe had adorned herself in the few nice clothes she'd still owned, and trailed her way through bars and clubs, enticing young (and sometimes old) men with her beautiful, seventeen-year-old body. Then she had brought them back to her apartment, done what had been required of her and then cried herself to sleep, $60 richer but nevertheless more hollow than she had been the previous night.

It had been dark, degrading existence and one that had thankfully only lasted three weeks. She had landed her job at Donnie's during her sixth week in Metropolis and by then she had already been forced to sell her laptop, which she had traded in for a low grade PC and an extra bit of cash to pay her rent and support her little mission that had then been under constant risk of falling through due to lack of finances.

Back then she had been working full-time at Donnie's, seven days a week, eight hours a day, sometimes even ten. Three weeks later she had met David. A month later she had lost her apartment and had been forced to stay with David in his small, one-bedroom apartment for six weeks, most of which she'd spent camping out on his sofa. By then she and David had become fast friends and it had been the hacker who had found her new apartment. This apartment. With more money than he knew what to do with (she'd once asked David why he lived in such a shithole if he had so much money in his pockets but he'd simply replied that he was too lazy to move elsewhere for the time being. A month later he'd moved into an apartment so lavish it had to have been a close mimic of The Ritz itself) David had acquired for her a top-of-the-range computer system with every gadget and technological device she would ever possibly need. With six weeks worth of wages she'd rented out her new apartment, settled herself in and hadn't moved since. And it was all down to David.

Chloe shuddered at the thought of what might have happened to her if she had never met the hacker. Fortunately she had and now, even though she wasn't living the life of Riley like David was, she was living quite comfortably. Though she knew her dreams of becoming a reporter had long since been destroyed, she'd still discovered that she could also make a fair wage by writing freelance. Occasionally, when she got the time, Chloe would send in articles and columns to numerous newspapers and magazines, under a different alias, of course, which would often bring in a nice tidy sum that was kept aside for emergencies. The only people who knew she wrote them were David and Perry White, who was now the leading editor at the Daily Planet. He only printed her work occasionally, though, because despite his change in status, Perry was still carefully watched by Lionel and his people, as was the paper itself. Lionel already knew her work from the columns she had written as a teenager and it would not take the eldest Luthor long to notice her work if it was printed regularly. Perry may have felt secure in his position as editor due to the uncompromising evidence he had against Lionel, but there was always a chance that Lionel would go back on his word if he knew Perry was catering to a woman he'd recently destroyed.

So Perry very rarely printed her work and only a number of select newspapers were often willing to accept work from an unknown source. But the few pieces that she did manage to get published provided her with enough financial backup in case her other sources happened to dry up. She was also working less hours at Donnie's now, meaning that if the diner were ever forced to let someone go, their first choice would be part-timers like her. Not that it was a problem right now but Chloe could never be too careful. After all, one never knew what the future would bring.

With her eyes closed, the blonde allowed the warm spray of the shower to ease the ache from her tired muscles. Twenty minutes later she reluctantly left the small cubicle and dried herself off, grabbing her uniform from the closet as she towel-dried her hair. She sighed heavily and threw the uniform on her bed and moved over to the cordless phone. Punching in a long-since memorised number, she brought the handset to her ear.

"Good morning, Chloe," David chimed into the phone after his caller ID had informed him exactly who was calling.

"Fuck off."

"Didn't we go through this yesterday morning?"

David heard Chloe huffing over the phone. "My life sucks, David. My life sucks."

"At work this morning?" he asked with a smirk, knowing full well that she was. Oh, how he loved winding her up.

"Yes," she grumbled tightly, "I am. Hence the sucking of my life."

"The sucking of your life?" David mimicked playfully. "Are you sure journalism is your forte?"

"Shut it, stud or I'll have Mae flame-grill your ass."

David chuckled at the sound of his former girlfriend's name and shook his head. "Yeah, yeah," he said, smiling.

"How's Mark?" she asked in a soft voice. "Still shaken up?"

The hacker turned to the boy in question, who was currently engrossed in a computer game. Grinning to himself David turned back to the window and stared out at the Metropolis landscape before him.

"He's doing okay," he answered truthfully. "He didn't sleep much last night but that's to be expected. I'm trying to keep him entertained, keep his mind off the whole thing."

She was silent for a second and he assumed that she was nodding to herself the way she always did when she was on the phone. A moment later he heard her mumble, "mmmhmm", having finally realising that David couldn't see her nodding. He laughed to himself, finding it both strange and comforting how he knew this girl so well.

Brushing the thought aside, he said, "I'm gonna try and follow up one of the leads today. From what Mark's told us, Dana's sister is still out there. If we can find her then we'll have enough to bring Lionel down."

"How can you know that for sure?" Chloe countered. "Lionel's probably got her locked up somewhere, my guess is one of his labs. And let's say we do manage to spring her free. Whose gonna believe us? Whose gonna believe that Lionel Luthor used meteor rocks to clone Dana Leigh and then purposely blew up his own lab to cover his tracks? No one in their right mind would believe it, David. Never mind the authorities."

"You're forgetting the fact that Lionel had the lab cleared out before it blew, including Dana and her sister. Mark did say that his brother was one of the technician's who helped move the girls. It's funny how he died so tragically after being privy to one of the most dangerous and unethical projects under Lionel's tail." He paused and then added, "You gotta admit, Chloe, there's something dodgy about the whole thing. Why kill twenty-three people for the sake of one project if it wasn't something he wanted to keep to himself? Lionel knows it could ruin him and now so do we. I think it's worth a shot. After all, what have we got to lose?"

He heard Chloe sigh. "You're right," she finally said, "we need to check this out, see what Lionel's up to. I also want to know why he bothered letting Dana go. After having her caged up for so long, why let her back out into the world? Wouldn't it have been easier just to kill her?"

"He did kill her, Chloe," he reminded her gently.

"Yeah, but that was because he didn't want us getting a hold of her. She'd been living on the outside for two years before then, according to Mark."

David had to admit, it was a little strange. After all, Lionel had kept Dana locked up in a lab for several years, having stolen her away from her home in Atlanta. And then, just before the lab explosion three years ago she'd been released back into the outside world. According to what Mark's brother, Daniel, had told him, they had provided her with a new identity, an apartment and enough money to live comfortably on. But why? Why go to all that bother for a girl that everyone thought had already died? And if she was so important that they felt the need to integrate her back into everyday society, why have her killed three years later?

There were a lot of unanswered questions and David was determined to find the answers. And by the sounds of it, so was Chloe.

"Look, I'm gonna leave Mark here while I track this lead down. Can you come here when you've finished work? Make sure he's okay?"

"Yeah, no problem," Chloe said.

"Good. Now get your ass to work, soldier."

Chloe moaned dramatically. "Slave-driver!" she cried. "You can't get rid of me fast enough, can you!"

"Bye, Chloe," David laughed into the phone.

"Sllllllaaaaavveeee-drrriiiv--"

He hung up, chuckling to himself. Shaking his head he replaced the handset and turned towards his charge.

"Mark?"

"Mmmm?" the teenager responded absently, eyes firmly glued to the screen in front of him.

"I have to go out for a while. You gonna be okay here?"

"Uhhhhhhuuhhhhh," Mark drawled.

"Remember not to use the phone while I'm not here. If someone phones make sure you check the caller ID first and if it's someone you don't recognise, don't answer it. Chloe'll be here to check on you later."

"Okay."

"I mean it, Mark," David said firmly, drawing the boy's attention away from the screen. "Don't answer the phone and don't answer the door. Chloe has her own key so she'll let herself in."

The teenager nodded timidly and said again, "okay."

David smiled reassuringly at him. "Right, I'll be back later. There's plenty of food in the fridge if you're hungry."

"Thanks, David," Mark said softly. "For everything."

The hacker nodded at the boy's sincerity and replied, "No problem." With that he grabbed his keys from the small table beside the sofa and slipped quietly out of the apartment, locking the door behind him.

That afternoon found Lex Luthor standing outside Chloe's apartment. Rain pouring down in heavy sheets against the pavement, the young billionaire peered up at the two storey building before him, adorned in his traditional black raincoat and carrying a large, black umbrella to protect himself against the harsh weather. Stepping forward he pressed the buzzer for the second floor apartment; the apartment he had been told belonged to a twenty-year-old Chloe Sullivan.

The report he'd read that morning had been less insightful than he'd hoped. The only information his man had been able to salvage had been a brief record on Chloe's high school years (she'd passed her finals with flying colours, apparently), an employment history regarding her short time with the Daily Planet (he never did find out how Chloe had managed to become the youngest reporter in Daily Planet history, but at the time it had been no concern of his), plus several clippings of her past columns (which, he had to admit, were quite sharp for a then sixteen-year-old girl), and an address.

Which had led him here, to the outskirts of Metropolis. It was the last place he'd ever expected to find Chloe Sullivan and he himself had been surprised at how easy it had been to track her down. Clark had never managed to track her down the occasional times he had tried a few years ago. Chloe had obviously had the smarts to cover her tracks or she'd been living under a different name. Now, though, according to the report Lex had received, the apartment she apparently occupied had her name on the lease.

Probably thought there was no point in hiding anymore, he thought. He assumed that Chloe had already turned eighteen at that point and by then the authorities would have been unable to contain her, as well as anybody else. After all, she had just turned seventeen when she'd fled Smallville. She'd only needed to disappear for a year before she was legally an adult and therefore able to look after herself. And it seemed that Chloe had managed to do just that, though how well she was actually looking after herself was questionable by the looks of this place.

When no one answered, Lex pressed the buzzer again. He waited a few seconds. Still no answer. Concluding that Chloe was in fact not home, Lex grudgingly turned around and headed back for the car. He was just about to slide into the warmth of the limousine when he heard the clicking of a door opening behind him and a loud, strong voice calling to him over the harsh pounding of the rain.

"Hey!" someone shouted, drawing his attention towards a small, round woman with fiery red hair. "You lookin' for the blonde upstairs?" she asked, unwilling to step out into the cold weather and remaining where she was beneath the small roof that hung over the doorway.

Squinting his eyes against the droplets coating his face, he headed back towards the woman. "I'm looking for Chloe Sullivan!" he replied loudly so his voice could be heard over the din. "Does she live here?"

"Yeah," she confirmed, "she lives here. Workin' 'til six, though." The woman glanced past him, towards the black limousine that was still waiting for him. With a tilt of her head, she said, "Whose askin', anyway? I'll let the pixie know when she gets home."

Lex trusted this woman as far as he could throw her and by the look of her short, stout legs and heavy arms, he guessed it wouldn't be that far. Changing tactics, he asked, "Can you tell me where she works? It's important that I speak with her."

The woman seemed to be contemplating his request for a second, looking for all the world as if he'd just asked her to spit-shine his shoes. Then, with narrowed eyes, she said straightforwardly, "What's in it for me?"

Lex shook his head. This woman was unbelievable. Stepping forward he dug his hands into the pocket of his black slacks and drew out a small roll of money. He peeled off three, one-hundred dollar bills, and offered them out to the woman.

Snatching the notes with pudgy, pale fingers, the woman smiled smugly at him. "You'll find the li'l pixie at Donnie's Diner. Five blocks from here."

"Thank you," Lex replied insincerely, turning away from the small redhead, who was already heading back inside.

The young Luthor made his way back to the limousine and slipped in gracefully.

"Donnie's Diner," he ordered the driver, and then settled back into the warm, leather seats. This was going to be interesting.

"Can you believe him?" an indignant voice sounded behind her, drawing Chloe's attention away from the plates of food she was carrying. Tilting her head she turned to see one of her fellow work mates pointing towards her boss with a hooked thumb and a scowl on her face.

"S'up, Cheryl?" Chloe asked, carrying on down the diner towards a table on her right. Smiling mechanically at the customers nestled into the soft, red booths, she placed their plates down and then swivelled back around towards the counter.

"Prick wants me to do overtime," the brunette waitress clarified, bending down to clear a stack of plates from a nearby table. "Says if I don't do the shift he's gonna can my ass."

Chloe squeezed her eyes shut. "Sorry, Cheryl," she apologised softly, "that's my fault. I've got a bank appointment Tuesday and it's the only time they can fit me in."

The buxom brunette shook her head. "It's not a problem, Chlo'. I don't mind covering for a friend. It's his attitude. Pisses me off."

She was, of course, talking about their boss, Donnie, who was currently shouting orders out to the four waitresses who were on the floor today. He was a large, bald man, surprisingly hygienic with a good set of teeth which he flashed at every opportunity. He was a hard bastard, a slave-driver in every sense of the word, but when push came to shove Donnie was a softy at heart. He was well-known for taking in runaways, single mothers struggling to get by and even the occasional prostitute who'd just had enough, and though he liked to pretend he was a mean son-of-a-bitch, the fact was that Donnie would go to hell and high water to protect his girls, as well as his two sons, Jason and Tim.

Jason, who had just hit fifteen, worked the floor along with the girls on most days except today. Saturday's he spent with his mother, Donnie's ex-wife. However, Jason's brother, Tim, who was almost eighteen, worked only on the weekends, flipping burgers and occasionally working the counter. It was well-known that Tim had a thing for Cheryl, the twenty-two-year-old single mother who had worked at Donnie's for the past three years, and even now the young boy was watching the brunette with gleaming eyes.

Poor kid, Chloe thought. He had no idea that Cheryl was sleeping with his dad.

She smiled sadly at the thought and noticing that Tim had caught her staring, she waved at him. He waved back, blushing profusely. Chloe grinned and shook her head.

"Cheryl," she said, addressing her friend. She leaned in and lowered her voice so the rest of the diner could not hear, and said, "You're only pissed at him because you're the one used to giving orders and not the other way around." The young blonde bent down and scoped up two plates in each hand. She winked mischievously at the scowling brunette on the way back to the counter, who squealed and whirled sharply to whip Chloe's ass with the dish cloth in her hand.

"You're atrocious, Sullivan!" Cheryl scolded good-naturedly. The waitress attempted to look insulted but the feigned indignation twisting her features softened into amusement, and then she was giggling, her laughter filling the small diner. Cheryl's laughter was loud and contagious, drawing the attention of everyone in the diner, but the brunette didn't care--she never did. She went about her job, cleaning tables and clearing plates, all the while shaking with silent mirth even though the joke hadn't been that funny. Still, it was the way Cheryl was. Good-natured, light-hearted and always there to plaster a smile on your face whether you wanted her to or not. She was the first person Chloe had ever confided in about her past, though she'd left out the details about Lionel and his dealings. But she knew about her father, about her escaping Smallville and even about the three, degrading weeks she'd spent selling herself for rent money.

When she'd first arrived at the diner she had kept to herself. No one had even known her last name. She was just Chloe to anyone who tried to talk to her, because back then it had been a constant struggle to keep her identity hidden, to keep herself hidden so the authorities wouldn't have been able to find her and take her away.

She'd known the authorities--and her friends--would stop looking eventually. Institutions like that were not concerned with little runaways that proved to be more trouble than they were worth and after a few months she'd had no doubt that they would stop looking for her.

She had no idea if they had stopped, or even if they had started in the first place, but it had been just over two years since she'd revealed to Cheryl her last name and no one had yet to come looking for her. Even her apartment was leased under her full name. So after a while Chloe had stopped caring about keeping herself hidden. By then she'd been a legal adult and therefore old enough to take care of herself. But even though she no longer kept to herself, she didn't make waves either, not willing to risk drawing attention to herself. More specifically, Lionel's attention. She knew she was in no real danger, really, because Lionel would not even consider that a young, runaway orphan might be behind his up-and-coming downfall. Chloe had the element of surprise on her side. However, she knew not to push her luck. She knew Lionel was a smart man and that if she were to do anything dramatic, he would be the first to take notice. She also knew that her association with David put her in danger, too. He was, after all, wanted by several government agencies and probably even Lionel Luthor himself.

So Chloe kept quiet. She kept her private life private and her social life never exceeded the walls of the diner and David's apartment. Most would assume it was a lonely life, and to some extent it was. Without her father Chloe had never felt more alone, yet at the same time she was content with the small circle of friends she had gained. She still had the emotional capacity to care about people, to love them and cherish them. Often she fought exceedingly hard not to let people into her life, because though she knew it was ridiculous, a small part of her still worried that one day she would lose them, too. That one day the wound would be reopened and she would not have the energy to pick herself back up again. But she also knew that without her friends, without people like David and Cheryl, she would become the one person she swore she would not become; bitter, empty and callous. She refused to let Lionel beat her in such a way and so far she had succeeded.

The few close friends she had never questioned her need for privacy, especially the select number of waitresses who worked in the diner. They each had their own secrets, their own skeletons, and most of them were too concerned with keeping their own lives private that they did not question her own need for privacy. It was the way she liked it and her friends, especially Cheryl and Donnie, respected that fact.

It had taken a long while for Chloe to get to this point. She hadn't been looking for friends when she'd first started working at the diner. Still afraid that someone might find her, Chloe was more secretive than she'd ever been. But eventually she'd warmed up to a hard-assed, soft-hearted Donnie and after working side-by-side with Cheryl for several months, the young brunette had suddenly decided to confide in Chloe about her own tragic past. It was then that Chloe had finally realised that Cheryl had the potential to be a much-needed friend in her life and from then on the two had only grown closer.

Cheryl's presence in her life was another thing she was constantly thankful for. She loved her friend intensely. However, her affection for the girl was nothing compared to the fierce love the brunette felt for Donnie. Though she did not like to admit it, Cheryl had fallen big time for their menacing boss. In fact, the pair doted on each other so much she was surprised that she was the only one who knew about their little affair.

Chloe smiled to herself as Cheryl's laughter bubbled up once more. She turned just in time to see Tina, a redheaded waitress with a body to die for, sauntering away with an empty glass in her hand. Shifting her gaze slightly, Chloe noticed that one of the male customers in the far end booth was dripping. He'd obviously gotten too frisky with the short-tempered Tina and now his two friends beside him were roaring with unadulterated laughter.

She shook her head and bent to wipe down a nearby table. Did they never learn? It was always Tina who got most of the slack due to her soft looks and highly-defined curves, yet it was Tina who was the most masculine out of all them, with her vulgar sense of humor that sometimes reminded Chloe of Mae, and a mean right hook that most often reminded her of herself.

"Clean up in aisle fuckin' nine!" she heard Tina's voice over the quiet buzz of an almost-empty diner. Soon the place would be buzzing with nine-to-five workers, looking for a quick coffee and a hearty dinner before they retired for the night to curl up with their partners in bed, or curl up alone. So she went about her job, clearing the tables and cleaning them down, ready for the five o'clock rush.

She listened with half an ear as Tina and Donnie squabbled over her behaviour (again) and then, with a loud huff, she undid her apron, and informed Donnie that she was going for a much-needed break. She was hot and achy and tired of listening to the constant arguments that filled the small diner, and Chloe had the strangest urge to stand out in the cool, refreshing rain, if only for a few minutes.

Too busy fighting with the fiery redhead Donnie did not hear her, but Chloe was already grabbing her coat and heading for the door--

which opened to reveal a smartly-dressed, somewhat soaked, Lex Luthor.