Clark drove up to the mansion and got out of the pickup truck. He was curious what Lex had the could be his. He didn't remember leaving anything over here. Clark was greeted at the door by one of Lex's security guards and was lead to the study.

"Hi. Lex. What's up? You said you had something of mine."

Lex remained speechless. He reached for a drawer and retrieved an object and placed it on the front of the desk. It was Clark's class ring. "Does this look familiar to you?"

Clark's face paled slightly as he saw the ring, but tried to act nonchalant.

"It looks like a class ring." Clark said, " uh ...where did you find it?"

"Oh, I just found it lying around." Lex answered cryptically. "Clark, I see that you don't have your ring on. This is probably yours. It could have fallen off sometime when you were here at the mansion."

"Uh, yeah. It is probably mine. Thanks for finding it for me." Clark said as he picked up the ring and started to put it in his pocket.

"Why don't you put it on, Clark? You are supposed to wear your class ring. Not put it in your pocket. You will just end up losing it again."

Clark hesitated for a moment; he just couldn't put the ring on again. He couldn't do that to his parents of himself. However, he couldn't let Lex suspect anything either. He nervously put on the ring, but to his surprise nothing happened.

"Yeah, Lex. I guess you are right. You should wear your class ring." Clark said. "I better be going. I'll see you later." Clark turned and walked out of the room.

Lex looked perplexed. He sat down in his chair and put his hands together contemplating what just happened.

"Why didn't it seem to have any effect on him? I know it does. He is still trying to act like nothing happened. How can he continue to lie to me? " Lex angrily threw his glass shattering it against the fireplace.

As soon as Clark was outside the mansion he immediately tried to take the ring off. But it seemed like it might be too late because then the affects of the flares kicked in making the strength of the ring worse than ever. Clark tugged at the evil stone to try to remove its growing hold on him. He could feel its power starting to take over him.

One final tug and Clark managed to pull the vile ring off. He sat down in the truck exhausted. He then placed the ring in the glove compartment and drove home.

Chloe was doing straightening in the Torch office and was going through some old files and storing them in the nearby closet.

"Umph! I know why people only do this once a year." Chloe said to herself as he put a box down in the floor of the closet. She stood there for a moment to catch her breath before getting back to work.

Just as she was about to turn around and leave the closet a hand clamped down on her mouth and her arm was twisted behind her.

"I am not going to hurt you." The voice rumbled. "So stay still. I just have a message to deliver."

Chloe didn't care what he had to say and started squirming which resulted in her arm being held tighter and now in an almost painful position.

"I said stay still. I don't want to hurt you." Chloe couldn't quite place the voice. It sounded familiar but it seemed to have an edge to it that she couldn't figure out.

"So, are you going to be still now?" Chloe nodded her head. "Good. The message that I want you to give is for Clark Kent. Tell him to meet me at Old Creek Foundry at midnight."

Chloe was then thrust on the floor of the closet. She managed to get a glance at her assailant quickly before the door was slammed and locked. Chloe sat there stunned. She couldn't believe what just happened. How could he be here? She hadn't heard anything about someone breaking out of Belle Reve. Would they have released him? What would Eric Summers want with Clark?

She knew she wasn't going to get any answers sitting on the floor She looked around the room and found a screwdriver and began to undo the doorknob.