EPILOGUE

It was a sunny springtime morning, and Chloe felt the gentle flower-perfumed breeze of Montana caress her skin as she stood next to Lex under a group of oak trees- her hand enveloped in his warm grasp as the minister read the eulogy with which both their parents would finally rest in peace.

Much to Lex´s chagrin, Lionel hadn´t been prosecuted by Gotham´s DA office. His mental instability had convinced the authorities to commit him to a high-security asylum. It seemed unfair that after so much suffering and so many deaths, only the scientific team, and in all probability Lionel´s own son, would have to serve time- not everything had been said about the young tycoon´s fate and Chloe was still hopeful. However, if they were to live a happy and fulfilling life as the married couple they now were, they would have to make peace with the past- a past in which Lionel Luthor had played a major and tragic role.

Giving a Christian burial to Lillian´s clone had been the first of many steps to find closure. Lex had had everything arranged for the body to be deposited in the Memorial erected in Metropolis Cemetery and for the remains of the actual Lillian Luthor to be transported to her family´s ranch in Montana. Just as Lex had promised Chloe, Gabe Sullivan was also exhumed and brought to Lisbeth´s estate. It was only fitting that the two most important figures in both their lives rest next to the small baby, the fruit of the love which had survived the bravest of storms.

The minister closed the Holy Book, sealing the private ceremony, and Chloe leant into Lex, seeking his quiet strength and his warmth. It was a moment of communion shared only by Lillian´s mother, Lois, and their two closest friends- Clark Kent and Bruce Wayne- two special men who would become legends in their own right one day.

Lex looked at Chloe´s body pressed up against his flank- her head leaning on his left upper arm, basking in their closeness- and felt his heart soar. How many nights he had spent awake, dreaming of the day when he would call her his once again! Countless nights when he could only see a pitch black void in front of him, an ominous path that led straight to the destiny he had always fought against. And days... days of agony when he had seen her smile to her best friend that luminous smile which used to be his. Days of endless torture when he had looked into those green orbs and seen pure unadulterated hatred- a look so different from the one in which he used to get lost every time they became one.

He heard the clergyman say ¨Amen¨ and a welcome peace washed over him. He raised his eyes and for a second his heart stopped beating. There, beyond the white marble angel which guarded Julian´s grave, stood Lillian amidst the blue-bells and the lilies. She looked at him with those same blue-grey eyes he saw each time he faced a mirror. She seemed young, healthy, carefree; tendrils of her reddish brown hair played in the gentle breeze and a smile came to her mouth as her gaze drifted to the young woman whose hand- now wearing her son´s wedding band- was still enveloped in his.



¨Lex, ¨said Chloe softly, seeing an indescribable look of peace rare in his usually stormy blue-grey eyes, ¨is everything all right? ¨

¨It is now, ¨he responded with a quiet smile, bringing her closer to press a soft kiss on her mouth as Lillian´s graceful figure vanished into the fields of flowers she used to roam as a child.

THE END