I own . . . nothing.

Just as Jack Sparrow was narrowly not escaping from the jail-Lois realized that she needed to talk to Chloe about something.

In typical Lois-fashion she did not ease into it, she just blurted it out.

"I think I might have feelings for someone who . . . isn't Oliver."

Chloe tried to hide her smile. Really? She was pretty sure she already knew that. Then again, Lois needed to talk, so Chloe was going to let her.

"I like Oliver. I really, really do. I enjoy being with him, but . . . "

"He's not the person you want to spend the rest of your life with. He's nice, but he's not it. I know what you mean."

"Yeah, yeah you do." Lois was incredibly aware of the fact that Chloe understood exactly how confused she was.

"What are you going to do about it?" Chloe had to ask. Because Lois couldn't keep doing this. She couldn't string Oliver along when she already had feelings for someone else.

*cough*Clark*cough*

"Nothing." Oh. Well, that made things more than a little awkward.

"Why not?" Chloe knew she was being slightly judgmental-especially since she'd been with Jimmy even though she knew it wasn't right, but at least she hadn't been falling for someone else. Except-she had feelings for Clark for most of her relationship with Jimmy anyway. So she really couldn't judge.

She changed tactics.

"Are you sure that's what you want?" Chloe tried to put some sort of supportive vibe into her voice as she asked the question, but she kind of thought she failed.

"No, not really. But Ollie is such a great guy. He's funny and sweet and . . . even though his history pretty much sucks, I trust him not to hurt me."

"I get that." She did. Chloe felt something when she was around Oliver, like she could really, truly trust him. He wouldn't hurt someone on purpose-unless he was really doing it just to save them in the long run. Which of course, would make a girl like Lois-or Chloe for that matter-want to slap him silly, but that was besides the point.

It was strange. They'd seen each other occasionally since they'd met . . . and every time was somehow important, comforting, eye-opening. He was special.

It was scary how much she'd shared with him. Sure, he was her cousin's boyfriend, but that didn't mean she should have told him how she felt about Clark, Jimmy . . . or anything really. In fact, under the circumstances, she shouldn't have told him anything.

But she hadn't listened to that little reasonable voice.

"Maybe you should help me." Lois snapped her fingers as if she'd come up with a brilliant idea.

Which, possibly, it could have been.

That is, if Chloe had any idea what she was talking about.

"With what?"

"Help me convince him to get a timer. Once he does, chances are, things will be fine. He'll probably get a countdown, and we'll just . . . break up."

Chloe stared at Lois as if she'd lost her mind. Which, to be completely honest, Chloe rather thought Lois had lost her mind. This plan was ridiculous and definitely avoiding the real issue-which was that Lois still wanted a guarantee, no matter what she said.

"No. Absolutely not. I want nothing to do with this plan. First, it would be highly hypocritical, as I don't want a timer myself-" Which was slightly less true than it had been before, but she wasn't going to tell Lois that, or she would get implanted so fast the world would spin off its axis.

Okay, so maybe that was a little bit dramatic. But it was mostly true. "Plus, it would be much easier to just break up with him." Chloe liked Ollie, and it would be hard for her to see him get hurt . . . but at least then she wouldn't spill her guts to him anymore, or have to spend time with him . . . because she was really starting to like him. It was a problem.

"But it's more fun this way." Lois said that, but Chloe heard the underlying words. But it's safer for me this way.

"So what about this other guy? How does he feel about you?" Actually, beyond the obvious sexual tension, Chloe didn't know what was going on in Clark's head. He'd been supportive of her, but rather withdrawn when it came to his own feelings. Having his heart repeatedly stomped on had forced him to put some walls up.

"I don't know."

"When did you realize you had feelings for him?"

"Earlier today. Before we started this," Lois waved around at the obscene amount of snacks and the movie on the screen.

"Wow." Chloe hadn't realized how recent of a development this was. "Maybe you should give it some more time, before you make any decisions." Saying that, for some reason, made her heart hurt a little bit. She felt a pang in her chest.

Lois nodded, but Chloe was too distracted by her thoughts to really notice, because she'd just realized something important, and bad.

Really, really bad.

Damn it.

She was falling for her cousin's boyfriend-who she really wasn't even in love with. And really, who knew how he felt? Complications, complications.

Chloe understood for the first time that this was why people cared so much about the timer. It made everything . . . clear. It made things easier. Easier wasn't always better, but it was often harder to turn down, even if it was wrong.

But maybe, just maybe, things weren't as they seemed. Maybe wrong wasn't so wrong.

Maybe there was a bit too much gray in this world.

Lois had decided that the wait and see approach really wasn't her thing. Lois Lane did not wait and see, she went out and found the answer to her question.

So she stood nervously in front of the door and knocked.

This was a conversation she desperately needed to have.

The door opened.

"We need to talk," Lois said firmly, pushing her way through the doorway.

Some things in life couldn't wait-especially love.

Chloe Sullivan wondered briefly if she'd lost her mind. She wanted to close her eyes, click her shoes together and magically wake up from this nightmare.

Okay, so she was pretty sure she'd mixed those metaphors pretty horribly, but she had a point. Probably.

She'd talked to Clark about the whole Oliver buying Timer stock thing, and come to realize that that wouldn't stop Lex.

Nothing would stop Lex. She needed to get to the center of his plan, find out what he was planning on using to control minds, and destroy it-or get it out of his hands, depending on what, or who it was.

But here she was, spying on Lex Luthor-and she still couldn't get over it. She was doing this, without backup, and it was probably a really bad idea.

In addition to finding out exactly what he was up to, she needed a timer, to see how it worked, of course.

It seemed, however, that you couldn't get your hands on an unimplanted timer very easily. So she was considering getting one. For the purposes of the investigation, of course.

And if it just so happened that she managed to meet her One, well, it wouldn't hurt. Much.

Ever since Lois had gotten her timer, and Jimmy had gotten his . . . she really was considering it.

She didn't want to be alone. And if she could use it to possibly help save the world, well, all the better.

But that was off in the future. Right now, what she really needed was to discern exactly what Lex's plan was, and see if she could find out how his planned functioned.

Lex Luthor was an abomination of a man. Evil in human form, if that were possible. Chloe rather thought it were indeed possible.

She'd noticed that there had been a bit of noise made about a woman capable of mind control who had disappeared around the time that Lex had taken a business trip to her hometown. She seemed like a nice girl, so Chloe had decided to give her the benefit of the doubt-she probably needed saving more than she needed destroying.

Chloe needed to figure out what Lex's plan was. Even if it involved breaking and entering.

What in the world was she doing?

Obviously, she was upset. But that didn't mean by any sort of standard that she should be breaking into a LuthorCorp building and . . . well, he didn't know what she was planning on doing there.

He was glad he'd noticed her suspicious behavior and followed her.

He'd been out patrolling to blow off some steam, and he couldn't help himself.

She was the type to have a plan. That plan was probably incredibly dangerous, and she didn't have backup.

Someone really needed to get some sense into her. She didn't seem like the type of woman to go off half-mast, without thinking about her own safety. But apparently she was more like her cousin than he had originally thought.

Chloe got into Lex's computer's fairly easily. It took a little more work to find what she wanted. "Aha!"

She finished up what she was doing and stood up. Just because she could, she did a little happy, joyful dance.

She didn't even realize that someone had come up behind her until he spoke, "Is that really what you want to do in the middle of a LuthorCorp building after hours, right after you've accessed files that I'm assuming are private, and that Lex Luthor wouldn't want you to have?"

Startled, she dropped her bag. And an alarm went off.

Crap.

"We need to go."

The Green Arrow grabbed her arm and started pulling her from the room. They managed to escape to the roof, where they took a zipline to another rooftop.

Once they were there, he turned to her and just stared silently.

"Well, I got what I needed, which was the important part." Chloe was rather proud of that. If she managed to get to the source of what Lex Luthor's plan was, then things would be a lot better. After all, Oliver purchasing shares in the company instead of Lex wasn't going to cut it. Lex was nothing if not resilient and creative. He would figure out a way. Apparently he was going to attempt to transmit the signal that this woman gave off through the timers in order to affect them.

So yes, she had done a good thing.

And if it hadn't been for her little surprise visitor-she would have been fine. She completely ignored the fact that she had acknowledged how foolish she'd been being earlier. Now, she was defensive.

"You need to be more careful," he said, breaking her train of thought.

"No, I don't really think so. Because it was obviously your fault that we almost got caught in the first place. Not mine. I was fine."

Stubborn little woman. He sighed with obvious frustration-which actually came out sounding hilariously like a lion throwing a fit.

She giggled.

Chloe Sullivan giggled. And in her attempt to squelch her giggling, she snorted.

Then she just burst out laughing altogether. She'd already lost it, she decided. There was no point in denying the inevitable.

"Chloe, this isn't a laughing matter." His attempt to be serious just spurred her laughing on.

"You need to be more careful, really. If something were to happen to you, I'd blame myself."

He would, she realized. Damn heroes. Always taking off more than they could chew, always taking on the weight of the world onto their shoulders. That was enough seriousness to stop her laughter.

"You really shouldn't." After all, if something had gone wrong, she would have called for Clark. And if she had gotten hurt, it would have been her fault.

"But I would." Physically, he drifted closer to her.

Chloe-partially energized by the adrenaline rush she'd felt when they'd escaped from the building, and partially relaxed because of her laughing fit-didn't really notice.

"You shouldn't. In fact, why in the world were you following me around anyway? I did reform your reputation, didn't I?"

Yes, she had.

"I wasn't being attacked by a mugger, was I?"

No, she wasn't. "Not exactly, but you were in trouble."

Now she felt a thrill. She felt something ramping up inside of her, something she decided to define as anger-but was just as likely to be anticipation. "You're not my keeper, Mr. Green Jeans."

"No," he moved closer, "But you definitely need one."

Chloe opened her mouth to spit out a retort when she saw his eyes darken.

Oh dear.

She should step away.

She didn't.

He leaned down, and kissed her.

He felt completely alive.

And everything felt really right. And it was really, really wrong.

Hehe. Yes. Cliffy.