Pairings are up to you guys, so let me know who you want together. I will not, however, under ANY circumstances be pairing Clark with Lana. Other than that, I'll let you decide who's with whom. Clark and Chloe aren't set in stone, so pick their soul mates, Lex's, and Lana's. :) Remove from oven and enjoy... Sorry... too much homeschool style home ec.

DISCLAIMER :gasp: Mommy, is that a four-letter word?

Chapter Three: Answers

Clark took several deep breaths in a vain effort to steady his nerves. If Lex saw... Leaving that thought unfinished, he knocked on the door to Lex's study, where he could usually be found.

"Come in," came the reply. One more deep breath and Clark took the plunge.

Lex smiled up at him, that cheerful smile that seemed to be reserved for him. "Ah, Clark, just the man I wanted to see. Take a seat, buddy."

The younger boy did as was requested of him, and Lex signaled the lone servant in the room to leave. The elderly maid left, closing the door behind her.

"I wanted to talk to you about something, and I assume you have something of importance to talk to me about too." Lex's tone and eyes said loud and clear that he could see right through him. It remindedClark all too well of the disadvantagesand weakness he had felt when his powers had been passed to Eric for a few days. At the same time, Lex's eyes didn't hold the malice, the predatory gleam, or the desperation Eric's had. All Clark saw in the man's eyes was concern.

Lex waited, and after a few minutes had passed he took Clark's uncharacteristic silence as his cue to continue. He took a deep breath, then looked his young friend right in his innocent blue eyes and said, "I saw you jump off the cliff at Crater Lake last night."

Silence.

"Although I must admit I am rather intigued that you survived-- seemingly without a scratch-- that isn't my concern. My curiosity is piqued, but whatever the cause of your survival is, you've kept it a secret up until now, and I sincerely doubt you'll tell me now. But I do ask that you tell me why you jumped in the first place."

Now Clark averted his gaze to the wine-colored carpet, as if he might find the answer there. Nearly ten silent minutes passed.

Lex spent those ten minutes agonizing as his head spun with morbid thoughts. My one true friend tried to commit suicide last night. Why? Suddenly he felt sick, as a few theories came to him. Are his parents abusing him? No, Martha wouldn't; she's the gentle type. Jonathan is more violent, yes, but I've only seen that side of him when he thinks he's protecting his family. Could it be because something happened to him? Whatever that could possibly be, he'd have to have been keeping it a secret. I know Clark, though. He always has to be a hero. There have been scads of opportunities for something horrible to happen to him.

Feeling a bit green around the gills due to his dark theories, Lex turned his thoughts to another of the mysteries surrounding Clark Kent. How did he survive jumping off that cliff? No human being could possibly do that. Then again, there's also no way any human being could be hit by a speeding Porshe, slammed into a gaurd rail, and live to tell the tale either. Last time I tried to research the incident though, I almost lost Clark's friendship. I won't make that mistake again... But I do need to find out why Clark went suicidal. I can't lose him.

Finally the boy in question spoke, rousing Lex out of the macabre depths of his mind. "I jumped for the same reason I lived through the jump, and through being hit by your car."

Lex stared at Clark. Damn. Didn't I just promise myself I wouldn't ask him about how he survived those two incidents?

As it turned out though, Lex didn't have to ask. Clark voluntarily dished up the gruesome answers, although he was slow and hesitant about it.

"Y-You know that disk you found in the cornfield?" Lex wasn't about to interrupt this story with a spoken reply, so he just nodded. "Well, it's a key."

Lex's mind whirled back to the professor, That guy I hired--what was his name?-- who was obsessed with the meteor rocks. He claimed it was a key too. But to what?

"It's the key to a spaceship in our storm cellar." Seeing his friend's dubious look, Clark said with a grim, unsmiling face, "I'm dead serious here, Lex." A swirl of emotions danced in the teen's eyes, so tightly woven together that Lex could barely make them out. There they were though, in this rare display of emotions Clark usually hid from the world. Anger, sadness, and emotional pain.

Then Clark hit him with the big revelation he'd been building up to. "When my parents adopted me-- they found me in the same cornfield you found that disk in, during the meteor shower. I'm an alien, Lex." He gave Lex a few minutes to let that sink in before he continued.

"Have you ever wondered how those meteor-affected people Chloe's always writing about in The Torch go down? Why they disappear, or give up, or lose their powers?" Lex nodded, silently guessing at what Clark would say next, but letting the boy speak his piece. "I do that, Lex. Being an alien comes with certain gifts."

Clark grabbed the chair his friend was sitting in, stacked it on top of Lex's desk, and proceeded to lift the desk effortlessly with one hand. He set it back down, then ran across the room at superspeed. After he came to a stop in front of the far wall, he used his heat vision to light the three candles in the candelabra.

"Those gifts are superstrength, superspeed, superhearing, x-ray vision, and heat vision. So far, anyway. The abilities started out with just superspeed and superstrength. My other abilities appeared and developed as I got older. I also don't feel heat, cold, or pain. But all these gifts come with a curse that more than makes up for all that."

Tears welled up in Clark's eyes. "I can't- I don't-" he took a deep breath and finally got it out. "I can't feel anything. Chloe kissed me the other day, and you know how usually people feel more than just the pressure of someone's lips on theirs? That's all I felt."

"I thought you were keeping something like this from me. Why--" he noticed the look on the teen's face and put his rant on hold. Just because I was raised by an unfeeling, uncaring SOB doesn't mean Clark has to suffer from it. Besides, I can always ask him later.

Lex climbed down from his chair, off his desk, and walked over to Clark. He hugged the now crying boy. Lex looked up at the ceiling, as if toward God, and hoped, There has to be something I can do to help...