Chapter Thirty-Two - Wanting To Get Things Off Your Chest
"Is that it?" asked Clark, as Chloe finished her story. "Ra's just let Lionel go?"
"Uh-huh," replied Chloe, nodding.
"The man's clearly an idiot," said Zod, stroking his beard. "He should have killed Lionel while he had the chance."
"But then we would have missed that riveting story," added Ursa. "Anyway, I've decided that it's my turn to speak next. If anybody's got any problems with that then I'm sure a little gentle persuasion wouldn't go amiss."
As Ursa cracked her knuckles, The Doctor decided to intervene. "Very well, Ursa, you can go next, but first I think we all need a break for, say, ten minutes."
Welcoming The Doctor's words, everybody got to their feet and started wandering out of the console room.
Clark, who still wanted to talk to Chloe and tell her all the reasons he'd kept his secret from her, was dismayed to see that she was far more interested in the other him that was Lex.
Lex looked at Chloe, who'd grabbed hold of the question marks on his collar. With a gleam in her eye, she led him out of the console room. Suddenly she stopped.
"I'm sorry about revealing your secret, Clark, but you must have known it would happen anyway."
Lex nodded. "That's okay. I'm the one who should be apologizing - telling you that that honesty session was something to look forward to. I couldn't tell you the truth because -"
Suddenly Chloe's hand was over his mouth. "You don't need to explain, Clark, not any more. I know you've got your reasons and I'm sorry that I ever doubted you. But don't worry, Clark, those doubts are over now and I know deep down inside who you really are."
Chloe felt Lex smile beneath her hand, and then she smiled back. "I've got a surprise for you, Clark, but first you've got to close your eyes."
Lex closed his eyes and suddenly felt something - a makeshift blindfold - being tied around his head. As Chloe led him by the hand through the Tardis' labyrinthine corridors, he asked "Can I have a clue?"
"It's what you've been missing all these years, Clark. I'm going to give you what you could never have. I'm going to satisfy your deepest desire. Today, Clark Kent, all your dreams come true."
Lex wondered for a second if Ursa had switched minds with Chloe, and then suddenly they came to a stop.
"Where are we?" asked Lex.
"We're in the Tardis' dressing room," said Chloe, searching the racks of clothes. "Just looking for something to make your eyes light up… Ah, I think we've got just the thing."
Lex heard Chloe striding towards him, and then, without removing his blindfold, she tore off his jacket and started unbuttoning his shirt. "Not long to go, Clark. Just be patient."
And then he felt her pull his shirt off and then, for some unaccountable reason, put another shirt back on him.
"Does that feel good?" she asked.
"Does what feel good?" asked Lex, not feeling anything. "I don't understand."
Chloe took his blindfold off. "Now do you understand?" she asked, as Lex lowered his head to see the plaid shirt he was now wearing. His pretence of being Clark had required significant acting ability so far, but this was another level entirely. "Wow, Chloe, it's great," he said enthusiastically, smiling on the outside while cringing on the inside. "I can't remember the last time I wore one of these."
"That's okay, Clark. That's what friends are for. Now let's get back to the console room so the others can see it."
Inwardly, Lex made a mental note to make Chloe Sullivan pay for this indignity, although he wasn't sure whether he'd ever be able to come up with a punishment of sufficient proportions to fit this particular fashion crime.
Surprisingly, to Lex, only Rose Tyler burst out laughing when he walked back into the console room wearing the plaid shirt. "What's that you're wearing?" she asked, in the briefest of pauses between her laughter.
"I think it looks really good on you," said Clark honestly and consolingly, although it didn't console Lex in the slightest but instead just rubbed salt into the wound.
Ursa's eyes widened. "And I thought that I was sadistic," she thought aloud.
The Doctor interrupted things, desperate to keep to a timetable that he'd not yet got around to writing. "Okay, it's time for yet more honesty, courtesy of Ursa."
Ursa stood up, and looked around the audience with an icy stare making it clear that only a fool would dare to interrupt what she had to say.
"My name's Ursa," she started. "Now I was going to skip my history, thinking that you wouldn't really be able to cope with it, but if your stomachs are strong enough to have listened to Clark's endless whiny comments about his so-called love for that primitive pink primate Lana then I figure they'll be able to handle anything that I can throw at them."
Zod looked up at Ursa with a frown. Having heard a small fraction of Ursa's anecdotes before, he thanked Rao that he hadn't yet eaten.
Meanwhile, in 1961 Smallville, as Lana listened to Dexter discussing his day at work, she was grateful that her years as a waitress had taught her to feign interest in even the dullest of subjects.
"Hey, Lou, you seem to be back to your old self," commented Dexter. "Although your coffee's certainly improved. I don't know what this is but you ought to patent it."
Lana smiled. Even though it was undoubtedly her beauty that kept customers coming back to The Talon, she'd always prided herself on making a great cup of coffee. "Thanks," she replied. "It's nothing special."
Dexter stood up and walked behind her, putting his arms on her shoulders. As Lana drank her coffee, she suddenly noticed his hand going down towards her blouse and starting to unbutton it. "Hey, there's still some time before we need to set out, what say you and me -" he started.
Lana went white. She considered throwing her coffee over Dexter, or just rendering him unconsciousness with a quick kick, but, then again, Lana wasn't one for over-reacting. He was her great-uncle after all and he did think she was Louise, even though she was far more beautiful, so Lana had to think of a way to let him down gently.
"Not now, Dex. I'm still not feeling right. Maybe later."
"Okay," Dex groaned, withdrawing his hand. "Later it is."
Lana shivered at Dexter's words and wondered whether it was time to tell him the truth, to break his heart half as much as hers had been broken back in the future of 1989. No, she couldn't do that. Not now. Maybe later.
Ursa had been talking for twenty minutes now, and during that time the gruesome subject matter had had hardened reporter Jimmy Olsen fleeing to the bathroom at least twice. As he returned, ashen-faced, to the console room, it looked for an instant like Ursa's tales may have taken a gentler turn.
"I still remember the first time," said Ursa, unemotionally. "The pounding of flesh on flesh. Our muscles taut, our breathing labored, both of us bathed in sweat, his body writhing beneath me, the moans, the screams - I knew it was wrong, but it felt so right - and then finally there was the silence, as we lay there next to each other. As I lay there, shivering, listening to the rapid beating of my heart, I turned to face him, and asked him whether murder was really such a crime … Naturally he never replied."
Rose Tyler looked up at Jimmy's face, and his hand held over his mouth. It looked like something would have to be done, and she'd have to be the one to do it. "Stop, stop, stop," screamed Rose Tyler. "I can't take it any more. I'm not surprised the Tardis is unhappy, what with Norma Bates on board."
"Rose is right," admitted Chloe grudgingly. "Sure, Ursa's stories would make a great article but are we really safe with this Annabel Lecter among us? She's … she's …"
"Inhuman?" said Ursa. "I'd take that as a complement."
"They're right," said Jimmy. "We can't continue with her on board. She'd murder all of us."
"Murder a few aliens? Big deal," retaliated Ursa. "The Doctor does that sort of thing all of the time without remorse."
The Doctor, who'd been sat, silently thinking, suddenly got to his feet. "Ursa. You can continue to travel with us providing you agree not to commit any murders during that time. Fair enough?"
"Well, if you put it like that," said Ursa, putting her hands into the folds of her costume, "then I've got to say that I'm not willing to bow to your unreasonable demands."
General Zod rolled his eyes and wished he was back in the comparative safety of a battleground, while The Doctor, failing to comprehend Ursa, could only echo her. "Unreasonable demands?"
"Indeed," said Ursa, pulling out a lead-lined box with one hand , and a device with a button on it with her other. "Now if you really want me to be honest and show you the shallows of my soul then that's what you'll get."
With that she dropped the device to the floor, and, with her foot pressing down on the button, and Lex's scream of agony diverting everybody's attention, she opened the lead-lined box and shoved its contents against Clark's chest.
"Time for some brutal honesty," said Ursa with a smile.
