A/N: As much as I wanted to, I just couldn't go through with a consummation scene. I have a friend that reviews "Smallville" and he has some real opinions (that I agree with) about the subject. Not that he's a prude (far from it), but he didn't think it meshed well with the Superman character and what we've grown up knowing about Clark. But that doesn't mean that he can get a little action… and doesn't Chloe deserve it?

Now, before you start reading… Who do you think interrupted them?

Chapter 11

Chloe's head snapped around with the new voice. Behind her, she saw the white faces of Lana and Lois. What? Are they joined at the hip now? she wondered caustically. Why are they here? What did they see? She was blushing bright red and couldn't figure out how to stay covered other than remain within Clark's protective embrace. Why couldn't they have waited an hour? She buried her face in Clark's neck. She could just believe she'd fallen into his arms so quickly given how she'd always felt about him, but she couldn't face another encounter with the twin Ls.

Clark stared at the two girls who were staring at them accusingly. When Chloe had buried her face in his neck, his anger rose quickly… not only for interrupting them, but for causing Chloe embarrassment. She didn't deserve it… and especially not from them. He stared at Lana and mentally dared her to say anything. Their break-up had been mutual because he'd started hiding his true nature again and she had been terrified of him dying… again. Clark quietly admitted to himself that then and now he had outgrown his youthful passion of his childhood crush. After the meteor shower, they'd resumed their relationship and taken it to the next level, but couldn't get beyond their old complaints. However, their behavior over the last couple of days was quickly ramping up his temper… Something he tried to keep a firm grip on at all times. "What do you two want?" he barked. When they flinched, he felt a warm satisfaction instead of the embarrassment he normally would have burned with.

Somehow, he wasn't surprised that Lois was the first to recover. "This is a public lake… We came to go swimming."

He looked at her appraisingly. If they hadn't been fully dressed and carrying nothing that said picnic or dip in the lake, he might have bought it. He rolled his eyes. Was it really worth confronting them about it? "Whatever," he sighed. "Just turn around for a moment, please."

Lana looked at him and pouted. "Why? It's not like we haven't seen this type of thing before," she snarled. "And if you didn't want to be seen, why would you be doing that type of thing here? At least I always had a sense of decorum during our interludes!"

Chloe turned and looked at the other girl over her shoulder. This was getting entirely out of hand. She got up from the ground and put her hands on her hips. Fine, if she wants me to be embarrassed for a perfectly natural thing happening between two people, she can just look as much as she wants. I have nothing to be embarrassed about! "That's right, Lana. Your decorum included coming downstairs from Clark's room and running into his parents… then running out the door as soon as Mr. Kent barked at you." At Lana's shocked gasp, Chloe laughed cynically. "What? Did none of your time running around killing people as Isobel put some steel in your backbone? Why don't you just go back to the Talon where you can hold court and tell everyone how badly you've been treated…? After all, why veer from tradition?" She bent over and picked up her shirt and pulled it over her head.

"Chloe!" Lois gasped, her hand against her heart.

When Chloe's head reemerged from the material, she turned on her cousin. "Don't even get me started with you, Lois. I'd have quite a few hard truths for you if you weren't my cousin. You have never liked Clark or shown any interest in him and now you want me to believe you have some sort of relationship? Forget it! You have your job at the Talon and maybe you can go comfort Lana." She had had just about enough of this and her patience was running thin. "Clark's chosen to be with me. If you can't handle that, maybe you should get out of town."

Clark could only stare at the beauty that was Chloe. Why has it taken me so long to realize what a strong person she was and how much I am attracted to her? Have I been such a follower that I couldn't realize that Chloe was worth a million Lanas? He watched the two girls beat a hasty retreat and applauded Chloe with great glee. "Man, you were great, Chloe!"

She looked at him strangely for a moment before taking a bow. Now that they were alone again, the attraction between them cropped up again, pulling her into his arms. She moved back a step for good measure. "Clark, I don't know if we should be doing this…" she murmured quietly, licking her lips with nerves.

Clark got to his feet and started toward her. All he really wanted was Chloe in his arms and now she was trying to run away? "Chloe," he said softly, reaching out his hand for her. "We didn't do anything wrong…"

Chloe looked at the earnest young man before her and could feel tears welling up in her eyes. "Clark, it's not that we did anything wrong… and it's not that I'm embarrassed about getting caught. It's just… Don't you think it's odd how we practically fell to it, totally forgetting our mission? That there's a timeframe now? Especially since this is a brand new feeling between us…?" She looked down. It had been her wildest dream come true, but she had to take into account that Clark might be falling under the spell of the transmission… or, if Jor-El was the source, they'd both been influenced while being at the Fortress.

Clark's heart started to pound within his chest. Is Chloe going to run away from me? I can't imagine what I'd do if she… He shut off that destructive train of thought as quickly as he could. Lana had accused him of being clingy when he'd started having to hide things from her again. She'd stated it as one of the reasons for their final break-up. He didn't want to start that trend with Chloe, even though he had few, if any, secrets from her. He decided that being reassuring would be the best course of action. "Chloe, this isn't a brand new feeling and you know it."

She glared at him. "If you're talking about my high school crush on you, Mr. Kent, you can just…"

Clark held up his hands in defense. "Chloe, that's not what I meant and you know it. I had some pretty strong feelings for you freshman year… That's why I'd asked you to the spring dance…"

"And left me standing on the dance floor to run after Lana." She had tried to inject some humor into her rejoinder, but it totally fell flat. She looked at him with stricken eyes. "Clark, I didn't mean… I know why you went after Lana…"

Clark looked at her seriously. He had known that this was when their troubles had begun… both as a couple and as friends… but he had hoped they'd been past it. This was going to keep cropping up if they didn't face it. "Chloe," he tried to be gentle, but he knew that the hurt was still leaking through. He cleared his throat and tried again. "Chloe, after the tornado, you ran off for the summer. And when you came back…" This had always been his problem when he thought of a relationship with Chloe. "When you came back, you said that it had all been a mistake and we should just be friends. You didn't even give me a chance to explain back then… I couldn't even tell you that I would have much rather been with you at the dance than chasing after Lana. If she hadn't gotten hurt, I would have been back at your side within minutes…"

Chloe closed her eyes. That dance had been branded in her heart and she wasn't sure if she was ever going to forget it. "Clark, I know… I was just thinking that myself earlier. It's just that I was so hurt that you'd 'choose' Lana over me that I decided to try and salvage our friendship… and couldn't give you the opportunity to suggest it to me… It would have broken my heart." Tears began streaming underneath her closed eyes and coursed down her face.

Clark's heart broke to see them… but he was also a bit angry that she hadn't even given him a chance to explain or anything. "You didn't trust me…"

Chloe looked up at him, her heart in her eyes. "Never that, Clark. I just had my abandonment issues and the fear that I wasn't good enough for you."

Clark was floored. She wasn't good enough for me? And how could she think that? Chloe's the most self-aware and confident girl I know! He watched her for a moment and noticed she was trembling. He took her hand and pulled her gently toward one of the benches that occasionally appeared on the shore of a lake. When they were comfortable, he put his arm around her shoulder and she sighed and leaned against him. "You still have that fear, don't you, Chlo? You're afraid that when I don't need you for this mission any more, I'll go back to Lana or, worse, get interested in Lois."

Where did that insight come from? Chloe wondered, gazing up at him in shock. He was never this understanding in high school. "Maybe you're right, Clark, but I've never really blamed you for it. I know what and who I am… I'm not the easiest person to be around."

He laughed. "Like I am? Let's see, you're put in danger regularly because of me, you accidentally get dragged into the vortex and plunged in the Artic, you were in danger of losing yourself… Oh, and don't forget the years of lying to you so I could 'keep' my 'secret'."

She joined in his laughter for a minute. "You're right, you are too much trouble." She made a move to stand and would have walked away if he hadn't had her hand captured in his. But then something he said triggered something within her… "Clark, you know that the entire town knowing your secret isn't too far-fetched, right? I mean, you've saved a lot of people and put a lot of people in Belle Reeve. In fact, it's damn near miraculous that the entire world doesn't know that Clark Kent is a superhero… or at least an alien."

"You're right," he said softly. "I've pondered that a lot but I couldn't stop helping people. That would have been nearly criminal."

"Not to most of the population," Chloe snarked. She looked at him consideringly. "You know, it wouldn't be that hard to put you in some sort of disguise… and it wouldn't have to be that much. It's sort of that hiding in plain sight, ya' know?"

Clark laughed and pulled her into a big hug. "Chloe, only you…" He just shook his head. Then he sobered. "We have bigger fish to fry, unfortunately. Do you any memories that might help us figure out where the source is coming from?"

"Clark, how could I?" Chloe asked impatiently. "I was unconscious at the time!"

He shrugged. "At first, I was hoping we had a kidnapping and impersonation ring going… but that would have been too easy. I was kinda' hoping for the Stepford effect where they were either androids or had a chip implanted, but it was happening too quickly. It has to be something that hits the subconscious." He looked at her intently, confidence in her mental capability shining in his eyes. "Maybe it felt like a dream or something."

Chloe wanted to scoff at his suggestion. It was too mystical for her preference… but it did seem to be the likely problem and there was scientific evidence that hypnotism worked. But did she remember anything? She closed her eyes and tried to think back. Suddenly the images that had crossed her mind during her time at the Fortress started flashing again and she forced herself on concentrating on focusing on each image one at a time. The first one showed Clark's ship… the one she'd seen from the Kents' pictures when they'd realized she'd had the 411 on Clark and hadn't written a story about him and wasn't going to. The second one showed another ship, but larger and black. Then there was a slow motion mini-movie that showed how fast Clark could move. Then the ship… Then the image of Clark accidentally seeing through the wall to the girls' locker room. Then the ship… Then Clark pulling Chloe's coffin out of the ground in one smooth motion. Then the ship… She didn't have to have the pictures continue. "Something's coming from the ship, Clark. The one Lana saw after the meteor shower."

A/N: I'm not sure how much I like the Chloe memory flashback, but I thought a lot about what the Transmission would do to a person and thought that if you concentrated really hard, you could slow down the images.

Markmark261: Yeah… the thing with the shirts. Well, in Chapter 8, Chloe was dressed lightly in a chemise/tank top and when Clark decided to take her to the Fortress, he had her layer on another of his flannels… So there were two shirts of Clark's at the scene… but I probably didn't make a big enough deal about why there would still be a shirt to take off.

OK, with the big make-out scene… I don't want to get too into it because I know you haven't seen it all yet… but there's a reason why it was at least semi-plausible. :D I don't know though… It was my first real attempt at a true sexy scene and I'm not sure how great it was. I'm more a humor gal, as you well know and I just felt a little stilted, ya' know? But it worked and I'm going to go a little more into why they're so intensely drawn to each other a little later… :D

Thanks for the proofing. "Soul-shattering" is now hyphenated… because I couldn't think of a truly good reason why it shouldn't be… :D

KentCharm: You know, it's funny. While I really enjoy "Smallville" and its look into the early life of Clark Kent, I'm not sure they're doing Superman the justice he should have. Although, they did get hunky Tom Welling to play Clark, so who am I to truly complain:D I think they need to write Lois out of the series soon. She doesn't belong in Clark's life that early. They were supposed to first meet at the Planet! It drives me nutso that Lois is now billed in the credits before Chloe… and I can only pray that they don't intend to write Chloe out soon… 'cause you know this time it'll be permanent. But I have my prejudices…

Also, I believe there are quite a few more than five episodes left in the season. Typically, 20-22 episodes are done a year. They just do lots of breaks in-between… You know, it's Thanksgiving… It's Christmas… It's Groundhog's Day… Anything for a party… :D

Vee017: Welcome to the group! I'm so glad you've been enjoying the story. I've been meaning to update this chapter for quite awhile, but I let it go on forever… :S Sometimes I'm so lazy that I could just curse! I'm also glad that you like the way I format my story. Sometimes when you do a one-shot story, it's too quick and you feel like you miss stuff.