Clark pivoted his telescope farther and farther towards the horizon. It was late September and the days were getting shorter. So, he took advantage of this darkness by increasing his – study of astronomy.
He continued slowly guiding the telescope downwards. He stopped and began to focus the lens. Sometimes he thought that focusing on something so close was more difficult than something that was millions of miles away. Maybe he just held certain objects to a higher standard.
She was draped in a red afghan, swinging on the porch swing. Perfect, Clark thought with a smile as he took his hands away from the focus.
"Clark!" a familiar female voice was at the entrance of the barn.
Clark straightened and began walking towards the voice, "I'm up here, Chloe." He heard heavy footsteps as Chloe hurried up the stairs and into his barn loft. He left the general area of his telescope. He didn't know if his friend knew what – stars he normally viewed, but didn't want to draw any unnecessary attention to it.
As soon as she was off the stairs she held up the white paper that she was holding. Clark didn't have to look at it to know what it was, today's edition of The Smallville Ledger.
"Did you see this?" she asked with wide eyes.
Clark sat down on the couch, "My parents showed it to me when I got home."
"And?!?" she said.
"And what, Chloe? They got their facts a little messed up. It's The Ledger, not The Planet," Clark tried to brush it off. He agreed with his parents, it was a good thing for him to be painted as a victim. Saving people all the time, being the hero, had gotten some people – suspicious.
"I know the people at The Ledger, Clark. This is no one there named Chad E. Rohen. And when I asked them about it, they said it was some guy that wrote it freelance and sent it to them. They checked the story with the police and they confirmed it," Chloe was obviously very agitated about the whole situation. She tossed the article onto the couch and walked over to the telescope.
Clark tensed up. "Well then, what's the problem?" Clark asked.
Chloe spun to look at him, "The problem is you were there. I was there; Pete was there. This story is a lie, a fabrication. And the police are in on it."
Clark knew that she was telling the truth. He was at the bank robbery; the story was inaccurate. "Why? Who would want something like that covered up? It was just a bank robbery," he tried his Chloe-leave-this-alone voice. The Chad E. Rohen, Rhone Chade anagram had not escaped him as it so clearly had his friend. She was obviously just trying to cover up her abilities. She didn't really use them, but she probably just didn't want anyone investigating. How she had falsified police reports was something that eluded him.
"I don't know," she said sarcastically to emphasize her statement, "maybe Smallville's resident billionaire."
Clark leaned back on the couch and looked at the ceiling. He sighed, "What could this possibly have to do with Lex? He was on the floor with everyone else."
Chloe set her jaw. She looked at the telescope. Its horizontal alignment and the direction it faced only served to agitate her further. "Not everyone else," she looked back to Clark.
"Rhone saved us from a couple of guys with guns, Chloe. We are lucky she was there," Clark saw that Chloe was about to say something, but continued with his thought. "And I know you think something is up because of that article in Pete's magazine. But she may not be the same person," Clark finished.
Chloe nodded, angry that her naïve friend was right. She set her hand on the telescope and twirled it on its base. She felt slightly better and wondered how long it would take Clark to once again align his telescope on Lang Prime.
"I still don't understand what you think this has to do with Lex," Clark added when he realized he was going to have to ignore what his friend had inadvertently done to obstruct his – stargazing.
"Did you even read the article? He obviously had someone submit that report to further his reputation as a good guy that got a bum wrap. God forbid, he even might have written it himself," she finished.
Clark had an idea, "Well, there you go. It was all a publicity stunt. The whole thing; the robbery, Rhone Chade's convenient appearance in Smallville," Clark hoped that Rhone would appreciate this. Chloe could be quite – tenacious. …Of course she would appreciate it. They had a – link in their abilities; he understood her need to cover it up.
Chloe gave him a look that said she didn't want to believe him, but she was. It made perfect sense. She walked over to the couch and plopped down, looking at the newspaper. The woman was a complete stranger and helped them with their chemistry homework. She was nice… Maybe after the fighting ring in Metropolis she just started doing things like this instead. But still…
"I want to interview her," Chloe said absently.
Clark looked at her, "I thought we just…"
"I want to know more about that underground fighting – whatever it is. A story like that would look great in my portfolio," she said. She had just lost what could have been one hell of a story about police corruption and vigilante justice, she sure as hell wasn't going to let go of this exposé about the Metropolis underground.
She pushed the off button on her phone and looked at it in her hand for a moment. She knew that Griffin was right. Finding a woman was much easier said than done. She hadn't even heard of a female candidate since she was recruited. And the only other one she had ever known was Thalia. But the two of them had – very different specialties.
"You," a voice interrupted her thoughts, "Really are their – leader."
She looked to her right, to the stunning man that sat two seats from her. He was looking at her, head slightly tilted. "Did I come off as the kind of woman that took orders?" she emphasized the word "took."
"Not for a moment," he shook his head slightly.
She began putting her computer back in its case. After a moment she said, "I'm not their 'leader,' I'm their EX-O."
He had heard the abbreviation before. He ventured with his previous knowledge, "Executive Officer." She gave a slight nod as she put the satellite receiver into her laptop case. "Aren't they two different terms for the same thing?" he questioned.
"I should hope not," she said as she sat in the chair next to Lex once again. "A leader has – drones. An EX-O has men. Executive Officers give orders, yes, but only when it is necessary; when it comes to our work, in the field, or on a mission. We rarely give them in other circumstances. Otherwise, we are more of a – guide," she paused and thought about what she had just said.
"Guide to what?" Lex leaned forward. She looked at him. He could tell that she was thinking.
"That's hard to explain," she concluded, "Probably because -- I'm not good at it." After a long moment she shook her head and quietly said, "He was."
She said it in such an absent way, looking across the room at nothing in particular. Lex thought about the EX-O she had mentioned as he watched her face become one of faint sadness. "Where is Bishop now?" he asked.
"When you're elected EX-O, you're EX-O for life. Until retirement or death," she explained. After a short pause she added, "EX-O's normally don't retire."
"I'm sorry," he didn't know what else to say. She obviously had a – kinship with the man.
"You didn't do it," she responded vacantly. She shook her head at the vivid memory of Bishop's death, "That was almost three years ago."
"You didn't know him for very long," Lex observed.
"Some people have the ability to radiate greatness. They change your life the moment they touch it," she looked at him seriously.
He felt as though she were looking into him, to his core, "I'm beginning to find that out."
"Why a woman?" he asked, breaking the long comfortable silence that had fallen between them. He was tempted to not say anything at all, to preserve the quiet that accompanied their work on the comic book. Why did he have to know everything – to ruin everything? Slightly delayed, he turned his head to gage her response.
She didn't move, aside from her drawing. Her eyes remained focused on what she was sketching. "Hn?" she still hadn't looked up.
Lex smiled at how engrossed she was in what she was doing. He leaned over slightly and looked at what she was drawing. She was absorbed for a reason; it was an exceptionally good panel. "What is the difference if the new person you – hire is a woman?" he clarified. The question had been running through his head since she had said it on the phone earlier.
She continued drawing and said, "Damn Affirmative Action and their gender quotas."
It had been a few hours since she had used her – infinite wealth of sarcasm on him. He assumed that she was still unsure of how he would react to his new knowledge of her – occupation, giving him a break. Maybe she thought that he might just be on edge for a short time. He really wasn't, but it was a – courteous precaution on her part.
She looked up at her companion and saw him raising an eyebrow at her in an amused I-know-that's-bull-shit-look. "I don't want to get into a whole gender superiority argument with you, but in many ways women are – well, better suited for my kind of work," she said informatively.
"Why better?" he asked. He set his inking pen aside and turned in his chair to face her.
Her voice became more flat, like the one she used when she became that person he didn't know. Like a person that saw more of the world than anyone else had any idea about; like a young person with a weight of wisdom on her shoulders. "When properly trained, women have better stamina and the difference in pain thresholds is – tremendous," she shook her head lightly at the last word. Her gaze told him that she was thinking of something.
"It appears that most of your organization is male," he ventured with his limited knowledge.
"I am the only woman," she verified.
"Why then…" his voice trailed off.
"Finding someone to recruit is difficult enough," she began, "but finding a woman is – near impossible."
"But if they are so much better for it…" he started.
"You have to find one that basically lacks the nurturer instinct," she concluded.
At that last statement, it occurred to Lex how much she had just revealed about herself. But he knew her, and didn't really believe it. She was the most wonderful woman that he had ever met – in a way that differed from his mother -- and one of the kindest people. He ironically wondered if the bank robber with the fractured skull felt the same way. Her occupation wasn't exactly geared toward compassion. A thought occurred to him, "You seem to have found a balance."
"Some time ago, I realized, that from my perspective, there were two groups of people in this world," she said simply.
"Just two?" Lex teased her simplification as she often did to his.
He was slightly startled at her response. "Just two," she repeated. "Those I protect, and those I protect them from," she clarified.
Lex was silent for a moment, "That is quite a burden."
Both her voice and expression became soft and honest, like the ones he knew, "That is quite an honor."
Lex shook his head and said quite softly, "Are you for real?" He didn't doubt that she believed what she just said. It was just so hard to believe that someone so young could be so – was there a word for it? Valiant?
She laughed lightly, "What kind of a question is that?"
An honest one, he thought to himself. Maybe he should try to touch her – to see if she actually was there. Of course she was… Maybe he should try to touch her anyway…
He cracked a small smile and shook his head faintly as he turned back to his inking. He wondered if some people were just born with that kind of altruism or if it was something that she was trained to think… He stole a glance at her again, as she returned to intently drawing her panel. …She was born that way. It radiated off of her like it radiated off of Clark.
She didn't understand why what she said would seem so unbelievable. But when she actually thought about it, it did seem a little unrealistic. …What happened to patriotism? No, what happened to – honor. Whenever she used the word honor, she always thought it – ironic. Maybe there was a reason things in her life had happened the way that they did. Perhaps certain things were meant to be. She stole a glance at Lex – and, sadly, other things were not… She looked back to her work. Like that was ever an option for you anyway, she thought dryly. Even if you could, he would never…
"I think that it should be left black and white," she said casually.
It hadn't occurred to Lex, "Isn't all of your work in color?"
"Only the ones that I've shown you," she said, pretending to taunt him.
"Do you have a lot of them?" Lex asked.
"Comic books in general or just black and white comic books?" she returned his question with a question.
Lex turned to face her fully, "Both."
"I have a lot that are in color, all of the fictional stories, basically," she said with a small nod.
"You write non-fiction comics as well?" he asked slightly surprised. He had never read any comics like that.
"Those are the ones that are in black and white," she added.
"Why?" he wondered out loud.
"Because I need to get them done fast, so they can be accurate – nonfiction," she clarified.
He tilted his head slightly, "What exactly are they about?" He didn't quite understand why something like that was – urgent. If it was something researched, it could definitely wait…
When she was going to say it out loud it sounded so vain. She wondered if he would think that. What does it matter what he thinks...? She looked at him, studying the contours of this skull… It does matter – he's my friend, she thought quickly.
Lex narrowed his eyes. He took this slight pause as a sign that she was concocting one of her vague statements that conveniently were just true enough to not be lies.
She decided not to lie… This whole friendship thing was just getting weirder and weirder. "They're," she paused for a very brief moment, "about me."
He turned his full attention to her, "Can I see them?"
She laughed lightly. When she was finished he was still looking at her – he was serious. Her face became one of slight surprise, "No."
"Why not?" he asked sincerely.
"They really aren't stories. Just little episodes – if something interesting happens on a mission, I like to keep a record of it," she explained.
"So, they are about your work?" Lex clarified.
"Basically," Rhone replied. Her life revolved around her work.
"I definitely want to see them," he said with a smile.
"Some of them have – valuable data in them," she concluded. "Some of it is so classified, I don't think God himself knows about it," she added as an afterthought. They were dangerous; they were honest. There were none from before the fighting ring in Metropolis; her life wasn't interesting enough. But they chronicled her life pretty accurately after she joined the E.I.F.
Lex regretted allowing a small look of disappointment cross his face. He diverted his eyes downward; he didn't want her to think of him as some rich kid that pouted when he didn't get something that he wanted. But he really did want to see them – they were about her. It would be true insight into how she saw herself. It was difficult to get that kind information about – well, anyone.
She saw the look. It was just an instant, and now she wanted to toss herself out a window. Well, not that it would matter, but it was the principle… "I'll see what I can do," she said softly.
Lex looked up and a wide smile spread across his lips.
Thank you, she thought as she returned his smile. …Damn it.