Chapter 6
Needless to say, Chloe Sullivan was not at her apartment. Clark was now making all his way to Lex's mansion. His heart was thumping fast but the rage inside himself overpowering his entire mind. A terrifying thought occurred to him.
What if the nightmare was true? But Lex was not possibly to know…
Lana's absence was painful before that but Chloe's presence gave him back the hope and strength he needed. Somewhere beyond it all, there was an urge inside his brain to move forward and he instantly felt imbued with an unheard-of strength. He pushed back the dark nightmare that was closing in on him. The sinister foreboding no longer had any meaning for him.
He almost always gave way to the overpowering instinct to throw in the towel and surrender that had engulfed his soul before, but he steeled himself to hold out until the bitter end… Save Chloe, save himself and then save Lex from his own sins. That was the line of priority.
Stay the course, Clark, said Jor-el somewhere inside Clark's mind.
After what seemed like a eternity, he arrived at Lex's mansion, and next, he stood at the room that seemed exactly the same like the room inside his nightmare.
Before he could think of anything else, he used his x-ray vision to scan every nook and cranny and his ears to detect ay sounds inside the mansion. Finding nothing in the entire room, Clark could only find himself listening to the swing of a pendulum inside a grandfather clock.
But then, he heard something else – someone's sobbing like a poor child in the vicinity of Lex's mansion.
It must be Chloe.
Without any second of thinking, he tried to locate where the muffled sounds originated and rushed there at full tilt.
There she was, gagged and tied, reclining on the wall inside the room where the Luthors ran their researches on him once. An ominous silence encircled the place.
"Chloe!"
Clark made a swift dash to the helpless Chloe. He quickly unfolded the gag from her mouth. Her eyes were red and puffy. Obviously, she had been crying for a long period of time.
As soon as Clark began to untie her, Chloe was eyeing at him with trepidation and stammered, 'Run, Clark! Just run, leave me here!'
Lex too, has told him to bugger off last time before Alexandra appeared…
However, just before Clark could say anything, the eerie stillness was broken by the approaching sound of footsteps echoing along the marble floor of the room.
A figure slowly took form and walked into the room. A tall and bald man advanced steadily through the entrance into the room like an English patrician, glaring at both of them with his furious blue eyes.
'Clark Kent, I assume you are being the savior again.'
'Lex, you don't have to do all this,' Clark exclaimed in a pleading tone.
'Clark, you don't understand. You don't understand how much the stones mean to me,' spoke Lex Luthor calmly.
The stones. All you want are just the stones.
Without a word, Clark sprinted to Lex and carried the man off his feet and just when he was about to fling him away in disgust, Lex held up his right hand which one of his fingers was now wearing a ring with a green kryptonite on it.
And in no time at all, Clark stumbled backward and slumped onto the floor. The pain, it came so sudden inside his whole body. His eyes widened, unable to endure the pain. Clark found himself impossible to believe the vision, the kryptonite on Lex's finger, yet the stinging pain that was torturing his flesh was undoubtedly true. He never knew Lex could find out his only weakness, just as Alexandra did. Despite the intolerable pain, Clark steeled himself for the pain, driving himself to stay the course against the pain that seeping through his skin every now and then.
Meanwhile, Chloe was watching in fear. She was crying like a kid and muttering something Clark couldn't hear.
The pitter-patter of someone's footsteps once again echoed throughout the entire room. Another figure appeared at the doorway but this time it was a woman.
For a moment Clark and Chloe thought they must be dreaming. Chloe found herself staring through unblinking eyes with a stark expression of bewilderment. It was unthinkable and yet there it was.
It was Lana Lang.
