I know, I know, technically it's Tuesday in England, but it's still Monday in the USA where the majority of my readers are from, so I'm escaping my lateness with a technicality. Haha.
I hope you have all had a wonderful week and that this week is fantastic for you too. Much love to all my readers/reviewers, you guys are awesome and I'm going to miss you so much when this finishes.
Xx
Previously; December 1st hits our darling story (Yes; I am aware if I'd started posting earlier this would have been fit wonderfully for xmas time... but that's beside the point, haha), and Lex has decorated his mansion for Lana, then proceeded to sexually assault her. Lana ran away to Teague's arms (because Jensen Ackles is FIT!) and Lex is cracking. Bart brought in some festive cheer and a Christmas revelation miracle occured. 33.1 was found and the plan was set. In Lex's rage he pulls the plug on 33.1, starting a chain of explosions, the first destroying the subjects in F-wing... exactly where Arrow and AC happen to be at that moment. *Tension music*
Chapter Forty-Four; Cracks
'There's a darkness in me that I can't always control. I'm starting to thinks that's my curse, why every relationship I have ends badly.' - Lex Luthor (Season Four, Episode Devoted)
"Arrow?!" AC called to the room, coughing against the smoke and dust curling its way into his lungs. "God damn it." he muttered, throwing a section of barbed wire from his feet. What was left of the computers and overhead lights were snapping with abandoned charges of live electricity, desperate to make the connections. The area was barely lit; dull, red, warning lights imbedded in the walls met the dim glow of furthest overhead bulbs casting the room in half shadow. AC pressed his hands to his thighs, freeing an underwater glow stick from a pocket; he could barely see a metre in front of his feet.
"Gimme something, where's Arrow?" Victor's voice was still ringing in his ears pressing for the information he didn't have himself.
"Com'on fishboy. Speak." Dinah was nervous, he could hear it in her voice, she'd probably be motionless on the stairs, staring at Bart or beating answers from him. Patience was not her strong suit.
He needed answers before he could dare to reply.
AC cracked the stick on his knee hard, a green hum of light cascading around him, growing brighter with each second.
The room was a haze of destruction. The walls were strong enough to avoid serious cracks, but the pit had crashed inwards, glass and concrete lay coated in blood and limbs. AC turned from the sight, pressing his eyes closed. If anyone was unlucky enough to be alive, they'd be in levels of pain beyond description.
His stomach swirled as he forced himself to look back. Had someone managed to reach the outside walls and protect against the blast? He hoped they had, but in the same thought, he prayed they hadn't… even protected from the inwards collapse, they wouldn't be a whole human anymore. Hesitant of the gore before him, he passed the light stick slowly over the pit, spotting nothing that moved or breathed. Nobody cried for help, nobody screamed in pain… dead. Probably for the greater good.
He turned back, taking a deep breath of dirty air and hunting for his partner. The ground was littered with building materials, he could be anywhere. AC forced his memory to the last place Arrow had been stood. He stepped himself over a few metres, raking his eyes over the carnage for anything green or human. The blast should have knocked him from the edge against the outer walls… he should be here.
"Arrow!" AC called out again, stepping further from the pit towards the walls. There were piles of concrete, glass and barbs, but where was Oliver? Inside his chest, a weight pressed on him… what if the silence echoed death?
No. Oliver was a survivor.
Besides, he had unfinished business with Lex, he wouldn't let himself die in Luthor's twisted prison.
He had to find him.
He raised the glow stick higher, illuminating the rubble and debris from the outer walls of the pit. It was a shocking sight, inspiring little hope and summoning the deepest fears.
Fingers!
AC rushed over, almost tripping another line of wire in his tunnel vision. As he closed in, the green leather peaked through the wreckage, a pained expression on an active set of features. He was alive.
A deep sigh exhaled from his lungs, his hands immediately seeking to discard the cement block partially crushing the archer's chest.
"Damn it man, can't you answer your own name?" AC hissed, adding humour only to lighten the severity of the grim situation. He had no idea of the damage his leader had sustained.
Oliver coughed a chuckle, the pain from the motion only there for seconds before the crushing weight was lifted and tossed aside. But the relief was momentary, as Oliver tried to stand, he felt the ribs of the barbed wiring scrape across his back, tearing the muscles. The blast must have shot some debris into him. AC took action, instantly pulling his friend from the barbs, tearing it from his back, but preventing any further damage as he moved. Better to hurt now than to paralyse later. At least, that was the idea, but the howl of torment leaving the man's dry throat speared AC with heavy guilt.
Arrow's curses rattled the hall, spiralling in a pit of feverous torment as he dropped to the floor again. AC repeated to himself silently that it was the best move rather than letting the barbs dig and tear more muscle… he did right… right?
"Anyone else… alive?" Oliver managed to speak, grinding his teeth to take back his grip on the agony. AC knelt down, a mirror of him, taking out the RL-65 they carried to fix his friend. "Don't." Oliver answered. Now was hardly the time to unleash any anger. He could continue with the mission, and his injuries were far better than ripping apart the next person that crossed him. "Not now anyway." he corrected, a lance of white hot pain burned through him, reminding him of his position and the state he would wake in tomorrow morning.
"Your back's a mess man…" AC offered with a grimace, refusing to look again at the bloody injury.
"Did anyone survive?" Oliver just asked. AC pushed back his guilt, sensing the friend wanted to move past it. He acquiesced, focussing on the mission.
"Doesn't look like it." AC admitted honestly, his gaze on the pit, the same as Oliver. "Whatever started it, it was designed to leave no survivors."
"Boyscout, you gotta move." Victor's voice came over the headset, Oliver's voice over the com channel was the confirmation of life they needed to breathe and continue. But Vic found a more pressing need that a greeting; Lex's insane decisions. "I've isolated all the other blasts, but there's one at the base foundations I couldn't remove."
Oliver turned his face to AC, both listening. There were more explosions to come?
"Give me the location. I'll handle it. Impulse, yo-"
"I got them. Go."
Bart sped to take over the stairwell, aiding those freed to their salvation as Clark sped all the way to the cleared basement, scanning the walls for the explosive. Victor directed him the entire way. All AC and Oliver had for updated success was the sudden vibrations heading through the floor and then silence, without any follow up screaming.
"We gotta get everyone out." Victor's voice came again. "The foundations look stable… but… we can't risk leaving any of the scientists in here for any length of time. The entire thing could collapse inwards."
"Got it."
Clarks confirmation proved his success and place in the team, without him, they'd probably be buried beneath rubble. Just what ran through Lex's mind when he triggered this sadistic command? Saving himself, or destroying others?
Oliver breathed a sigh of relief, pushing into standing, ignoring the white blots over his vision that reminded him of his pain. His focus came back to AC's concerned expression and the blood and scars across AC's arms. He wasn't the only one to take a beating in the explosion, and he, like his comrade, wouldn't let it stop him.
"Moving up?" Oliver proposed and with a nod, he followed AC out and up another level.
Dinah cleared the next floor by herself, Bart still on the stairs while Clark tied and rescued anyone alive, good or bad.
"Sleeping quarters. Empty." Arrow's voice once again came over the headset, she couldn't have been more relieved the second she'd heard his voice again. He'd had too many brushes with death recently. After tonight though, they could all rest easy, 33.1 would be over, and Lex would see his final days.
"Moving up a floor." AC followed with and she heard them re-enter the main chamber. Dinah grinned cockily, she was still ahead of those assholes even without Bart helping her out.
She was just finishing the level, checking all cells were open and empty, all collars removed, when Clark zapped in.
"You clear?" he asked.
"One more to go then I'm finished." she informed, secretly proud of herself. It wasn't easy being female on a team of all guys, Victor never took it well that he usually had to be sat at a computer while 'boobs' got to play in the field with the big boys. His words, not hers. Granted, he wasn't in a good mood when he said it, neither was he entirely sober, but the point remained. She felt sorry for him a few times, being isolated just because he was able to hack into anything known to man, but his use at that computer was invaluable. Dinah suspected it was one of the main reasons Victor wasn't opposed to the position of Chloe as friend rather than foe; it meant he wouldn't be trapped behind a desk anymore.
"I'll send Impulse to help finish off." Without letting Dinah get a word of argument out, he was gone. She sighed, but followed his path, taking the top level and meeting Bart outside the entrance to the last wing.
"We got this!" Bart grinned, a small victory of beating AC and Oliver sweet in both their minds.
"One left… it looks empty as well." she agreed, pushing through the doors to find all the lights off. "Any chance for a lightswitch?" she jested, but as she patted the walls she found that very item. Instead of blinking, cheap, clinical lights, she found blindingly bright beams showering the dark corridors, they both turned their face away. What purpose would these dazzling lights have in an empty corridor? To blind any lost visitors? Or just disorientate and fuck with the minds of his 'subjects'? Dinah scowled at the ceiling avoiding the white light sources.
"Empty test rooms." AC's voice came to both their ears. "Floors clean. Two left, tell me this next one has something on." he complained to Victor.
Dinah's eyes shot to Bart's, if the next floor was empty, they could lose their lead. Yes, it was a simply victory, materialistic on top of the heroism they were performing. But it was the little things like this that kept them smiling when the gore and horror they saw should freeze them motionless and depress them for days. People always say it's the simply things in life that make you happy, for the team, it was a critical truth.
"Run up and down, see if anyone's in here." she propositioned, her mind on the win. Bart smiled, smugly, but complied. He stopped after five empty cells though, eyes drawn to a window in the door.
"Cyborg; where's storage in the plans?" Clarks voice. They both ignored it, Bart focussed on the fifth cell, Dinah curious as to what gained his attention.
"Canary and Impulse are there, why?"
"I don't know, but the guards say there's priority that they needed to get from there."
"Must be a machine or something." Victor guessed. "Canary?"
Dinah rolled her eyes.
"Same as the other cells, if they want something, it's probably a person."
"359 was in storage." Victor suddenly recalled.
"And?" Dinah replied, adding a number and letter code of the door they stood outside. It clicked open within a few seconds, Victors voice following.
"He was visiting her daily… could be the priority." Victor guessed. Dinah accepted it with a shrug, walking in the cell with Bart, both hesitant to the cold form lying unmoving on the cot, a feed of green meteor liquid dripping from an IV into his arm.
"Do we take it out?" Bart asked, unsure.
"I guess… he's not moving." Dinah reached out, a hand to his form. "He's cold." she instantly spoke, then did the one thing she didn't want to. She pressed her fingers to his neck, hoping for a pulse.
"Is he?" Bart couldn't ask. He might deny it in every other opportunity, but he was still the youngest of the group, still timid when it came to the hard truth that he couldn't save everyone, he wouldn't willingly check for a pulse on a 'dead' man. That reality hit too hard to let him sleep peacefully.
"No pulse." she concluded. "You think it's the meteor rocks?" Bart shrugged, but took out the IV anyway. They waited, but as seconds passed, nothing changed.
"I'll check for others." And he sped out the room, running the lines of cells. "Empty but one." he reported back, standing outside the cell Dinah was currently in.
"Open it." she insisted. "This one's gone." Removing her fingers from his neck, she turned, leaving the cell and following Bart out.
He sped at his fast pace, she followed at a light jog. She heard him read out the number to the cell, but this time, the response was not ideal.
"It wants an additional security code."
Additional security code? Dinah would bet her life savings this test subject was the priority the guards spoke of. She closed in, listening to Bart spar with Victor about the codes.
She rolled her eyes, peering in through the murky window in the door. A dirty blonde form lay on a cot, feeding from the same IV as the dead friend a few cells down. She was as frozen as the last, unmoving, unresponsive.
"Is it even worth it?" Dinah spoke up. "If she's already dead."
"He didn't call it storage to hide dead people." Victor sneered. "Boyscout can break the do-"
"Think again. Meteor rocks." Dinah corrected, knowing the green hue of the IV's would render him powerless.
"Alright, I'll come see if I can get an electronic override. Aquaman, you alright for codes?"
"Looks like the same load of nothing as before, just testing labs and a few posh business rooms." AC answered.
Bart stared through the window again, whoever it was looked to have met the same fate as the boy down the hall. Wait… did her finger twitch?
"She's alive…" Bart whispered, trying to form words on his tongue, hoping against hope it was true.
Dinah's face came next to his.
"How can you tell? She dance and do a jig?" She was pissed at Lex for what he had created, and in true passive aggressive style, she was taking it out on anyone and everyone. "Then again… no point in giving a dead person an IV." she pondered aloud. Her eyes turned back to the previous cell, but he'd had no pulse at all, he was clammed over with a cold death. There was no hope for him.
"Satan came yesterday… she must be alive." Bart tried to rationalise. Both heads turned to Victor's boots at the other end of the corridor, he squinted away from the bright lights, a soft jog under his feet as he came closer. Dinah and Bart turned back to their reasoning skills, watching the motionless subject. Except… she wasn't entirely motionless.
"Did her finger just move?"
"I told you! She's alive!" Bart cheered.
"Not to burst your bubble, but dead people twitch…" Victor answered, ducking into the first open cell to confirm what Dinah had already clarified. Seconds later, he was back out, coming to the sealed door they stood before. The jack came out of his arm, an adaptation fitted and then forced into the electronic key card slot as he sorted his way through the system.
Bart and Dinah stood nervously behind him, but as the door clicked open finally, all three paused. Dead or alive?
"50 bucks, she's dead." Victor spoke, morbid, but he was a realist, and as his eyes raked over her, he saw the same condition as the previous inhabitant he visited.
"50 she's alive. I'm not seeing things." Dinah challenged, no less of a realist than Victor, but a believer in herself much more. She knew what she saw.
"50 she's a zombie." Bart submitted quietly, having watched far too many horror movies recently. But all heads turned back to the first cell, extending beyond reason to the fact Luthor's first zombie could walk out of the open door.
Victor rolled his eyes first, after taking a second of doubt. He was the first through the door, quickly followed by Bart. Dinah stood outside, not wanting the sight of another dead person carved into her memory. Lex had done many a thing worth his life ending, but… there was a big difference between reading files of the deceased and being faced to face with a life Lex had ended, Dinah didn't think she could take a second addition.
"She's cold." Victor announced, touching the body.
"But she moved." Bart replied with little fight. Had he seen the truth, or just what he wanted to see?
"She's white over, cold and unresponsive." Victor relayed the hard facts, taking his fingers to her neck for confirmation as Bart unplugged the IV sadly. "But…" Victor suddenly spoke. "This can't be…"
Dinah peered into the cell, watching as Victor took his hands to the form, placing her onto her back from her side where she had been positioned, his fingers back to her pulse point. Was she alive?
"Chloe!" Bart suddenly called aloud. All eyes went to him, but he was focussed on the girl, locked on the shape of her features, the dirty blonde cut that had once shone under moonlight. "CHLOE!"
His hands reached out, shaking her, trying to wake the human that had possibly slept her last sleep.
AC heard the haunting name fly across the earpiece and instantly turned to Oliver. All he found was the grunt of pain and the sight of a bloodied back as the man threw himself into a sprint, unfurling unknown energy to push him faster and faster towards her.
"Burn kits!" A nurse called, running past Lionel's guards as they stood outside his room.
"Got them. Doctor Patel has been paged." The second replied, flying past them again.
The guards passed a shrug between themselves, just everyday life for the nurses here.
Another several interns and nurses ran past in a rush, obviously leaving the on-call room and nurses station which was up the hall. Maybe not 'everyday' behaviour, they re-evaluated, seeing the multiple personnel running the corridor to the emergency unit.
A glance exchanged between the guards, then they turned to the familiar scent and sound of Lionel's nurse as she walked up to them for Lionel's hourly vital check. He'd been getting better for the past few weeks, but yesterday and today, he'd plummeted.
"Boys, need a coffee again?" she asked with a smile, like she always did. This time though, she looked worried beneath that.
"Nah, we're good Mary." The larger of the two responded. "What's going on?"
"Oh, explosions were reported at the Smallville fertiliser plant, reports are saying there were people in there. Gunna be a busy night." she offered with a sad expression. "But don't worry, I'm assigned to Mr Luthor all night." And she thanked them as they held open the door into Mr Luthor's room.
"Mary. Again. I told you. I'm fine." Lionel grunted, annoyed with the constant badgering.
"Mr Luthor, we almost lost you yesterday, I'm not letting a repeat happen." She grinned, the door closing softly behind her.
"What's the ruckus outside?"
"Oh Mr Luthor, don't you worry about someone else's problems, you just work on getting better."
"Don't patronise me, I know I'm dying. At least give a dying man the pleasure of an answer to his questions." he grumbled, watching her eyes scan the chart at the end of his bed for several seconds to recall her previous recordings.
"Alright, we'll make a deal Mr Luthor. You stay alive until tomorrow, and I'll tell you everything you want to know about today."
"Don't placate me like a child." But the grumble was without feeling. He liked the care Mary gave, he liked the way she smiled, unknowing of his crimes. Innocently blind to the corrupt darkness of his heart. To her, he was just another man to help heal.
"Deep breaths, same drill as always." Mary instructed and he blinked up to find her with the stethoscope in her ears, pressed to his chest. He blinked a few more times, trying to clear the dizziness from his vision. "Mr Luthor?" she repeated, noting his lack of response. "Mr Luthor, talk to me."
"I'm just… dizzy…" He reached out a hand to nudge away her hands and concern, but she caught it easily.
"Mr Luthor, you're freezing cold." This time, the alarm was in her voice. "Mr Luthor…" She saw the way his chest rose and fell faster and faster. She instantly reached out, slapping the code button for his room. Lionel Luthor was a critical and priority patient, as soon as anything went wrong, a doctor had to be called. And this was very wrong. "Breath with me Mr Luthor, stay calm." But his hands were flying out without any strength again, he kept trying to shake the dizziness from his eyes and then she watched him crash back on the bed, hands squeezed tight.
"What do we have?" The doctor asked, throwing open the door with a handful nurses behind him with a crash cart stood by. In the same instant, he took control of the entire room. "He's leaving us again. Damn it Luthor." And the doctor barked out order after order that Mary and the others fell into line to obey. But all too soon, the darkness swallowed Lionel Luthor. "We've lost him." The doctor announced.
"Call it Doctor." Head Nurse Agatha spoke, with the same sadness of the others. It was hard enough losing any patient, but a celebrity like Lionel, he wasn't always a pleasure to be around, but he was a favourite for all the nurses on the floor.
"Time of death; 3:33am."
Chloe woke several times, each for no longer than a few seconds. Whether it was hallucinated or real, she couldn't tell, but she felt the cold whip of fresh air across her skin, the warmth of a body carrying her. Voices argued somewhere in the present and past of her mind, alarm bells rang out, sirens too. But, each time, the effects of the drug pulled her back into its possession.
Oliver need no more blame adding but it came anyway. Victor would say he was finding punishment for his guilt as he lifted Chloe from the cot, insisting to carry her until they were back at Watchtower. He tried to cover the pain he felt with every step of the stairs, but in the back of his mind, Oliver was paying for his mistakes by feeling the agony of his wounds. Dinah would say he was holding on so strong for fear of losing her again. Each had their own views about their leader, but no-one said a word, no-one knew what to say…
He held her even as they travelled, the backseat of a black SUV speeding back into Metropolis past the ambulances. News had broken, emergency departments called, Clark had stayed to make sure the evidence was found incriminating both Lex and those who aided him. But the surveillance of the night's activities, specifically the 'storage room'; that came with them.
Nobody could have predicted the first time Chloe would have risen from unconsciousness would be to the motion of Arrow lifting her into his arms. Her reaction; to raise a hand to his face, and speak his name. Not his name, but Oliver's. Of course, then she'd blacked out, so who knew what it meant, but it plagued their minds. Did she know? Did Lex?
Emil was already in Watchtower when they arrived, prepared for the worst.
"What happened?" he instantly asked, seeing AC come through the doors, a box of papers in hand, the blood down his arm alerting the doctor.
"I'm fine, Oliver needs you more." He brushed off the worry and Emil turned his attention to the doors, ignoring Dinah and Victor carrying more boxes of medical research and locking on Oliver, who was carrying a petite blonde. An unconscious, undernourished blonde on the dangerous side of pale.
"Set her on the couch." he ordered instantly, taking charge, but as Oliver turned to follow the order Emil was seconds from a heart attack.
"Don't bother." Dinah spoke, appearing next to him. "He won't let you touch him until you've looked over her."
"Who is she?" he asked, pure curiosity as he lifted the medical kit from the floor.
"Long story." Dinah rolled her eyes. "But let's just say he's quite attached to her."
"What happened?" Dinah stayed by him as he chased Oliver's footsteps into the living area of the loft apartment. Dinah passed him the paper she'd kept onto since she walked in the door. "What is… oh…" Emil skimmed the chemical composition of the liquid that had been feeding Chloe. "This is highly dangerous…" he commented to himself in a mumble, lifting his eyes for a second to see how Oliver knelt by the sofa, holding the hand of the victim of this poison. The man had a cold sweat over his skin.
"Doc, do something!" Oliver cut into the doctor's analysis.
"You're white over, you need to sit down and let me bandage you."
"Her first." he corrected violently.
"I don't know what I can do." Emil panicked, skimming over the text again, with the chemicals Lex was using here, she was lucky to have a pulse. But… without weeks to test, he couldn't reverse anything and who knew what would happen if he mixed her blood with more drugs? She'd probably just have to get the product out of her system… which was a matter of wait and see. Emil hated that prognosis more than any other he'd had to give. Wait and see was putting hopes into a basket of probable darkness.
"Do something, anything." Oliver pleaded, letting his anger get the better of him. Emil nervously glanced over the paper again, lifting his eyes to the new additions to the room, hearing the ruckus. "Now!"
Emil crossed the room, paper still in hand, but could only appease Oliver with a check of her pulse, it was a little weaker than a resting state, something Oliver definitely wasn't comparable too.
"Her pulse should pick up as the drugs wear off." Emil cleared his throat to announce.
"That's it?!" Oliver questioned, agitated.
"Without any analysis of the compound I can't risk giving her anything, it could react and kill her." he defended nervously.
"You can't just leave her like this!"
"Ollie chill, the doc's doing all he can." Dinah warned, watching as the fist Oliver tried to form curled too tight around delicate, unmoving, white fingers.
"Do more!" Oliver pleaded with anger.
"I think I can give her some adrenaline… if, you let me at least give you something for the pain." Emil bartered. In Oliver's desperate mind, he couldn't find the strength to fight, just agreed and turned back to Chloe.
How could he have let this happen to her? He barely felt the warmth of Emil's fingers as he turned over his arm and pushed some syringe of drugs into the crease of his elbow.
"Now her." Oliver demanded, watching Emil as he went back to the medical kit, but it wasn't another syringe of adrenaline he lifted out, it was bandage. "What are yo…" Oliver trailed off, hearing a slur in his words, feeling a weight sway him. He blinked hard, trying to clear the heaviness of his eyelids pulling him into sleep. His eyes shot at Emil in curse, but his accusations paused as he gripped the sofa, trying to stop himself from falling over.
"Doc… did you just break your hippocratic oath?" Dinah asked, impressed and shocked.
"I took care of my patients." he curtly replied, feeling justified as he pushed the glasses back up his nose nervously. "And I would greatly appreciate if you helped me bandage him and tell me what happened tonight." Victor and AC shared an approving grin but took an arm of Oliver each, helping him up and off with the leather top so Emil could inspect and wrap the wounds. Dinah took seat on the chair, crossing her legs over each other and watched, knowing she could offer little more than the story to this situation.
"It went quite well… bar Lex's hissy fit." Dinah started. "Clark made sure everyone got out, despite my suggestion that we should leave the scientists to rot down there…" She rolled her eyes, boyscout was too good for his own good.
"Where's Bart? The little fast one?" Emil had yet to learn all their names perfectly. They'd only met a few weeks ago.
"Jolly Green told him to F-off back home." Dinah laughed. "He was getting a little annoying."
"He was just as worried as the rest of us." Victor corrected.
"If the rest of us had dated her." AC revised with a chuckle, helping Victor with the sleeping weight as they maneuverer him to an easier position for the Doctor.
"Can you blame him?" Dinah defended. "The man's never had any competition for a girl before."
"I though Bart said they were just friends." Victor asked.
"Yeah, but you guys seem to think 'just friends' means something else entirely when you're dating the girl." Dinah qualified.
"What did this?" Emil asked, pressing his fingers above one of the smaller cuts.
"Explosion pushed him onto barbed wire." AC answered. Emil's eyes said it all; what the hell was Lex thinking? AC just shrugged, he was none the wiser than Emil. The littlest Luthor had finally stepped off his rocker and thrown himself into insanity.
"I'll sterilise and wrap I think." Dinah left Emil to talk to himself, instead addressing the others.
"Does she know?"
"More importantly, does Lex?" Victor pushed, the sting of antiseptic flooding the room. It was a good job Oliver was already out otherwise this would have hurt a great deal more. Emil was gentle, even as he bandaged, the kids left to their own thoughts. As Emil finished, AC's thoughts grew worried.
"What if he's given her something?" he questioned, but before questions fired back at him, he spoke again. "We don't know what's she's got in her system, we hardly have the time to match up drug codes to her electronic records."
"Like what?" Victor took place with AC lifting Oliver to their shoulder and walking him through to the bunk they kept for overnight work in the back room.
"I don't know, maybe something that transfers what she sees to Lex."
"Let's try and keep suggestions in the realm of reality." Victor scoffed, settling Oliver down on top of the cover.
"Alright, what about some anger inducing thing, or some truth drug… we have no idea if she's going to wake up and try to bludgeon us all to death."
"Highly unlikely." Victor criticised, but paused on his way out the doorway. "But, you do raise a valid point."
"So what, one of us stays and watches her?"
"She'll probably be asleep for a while, gents." Emil answered, his targets set on AC now Oliver was bandaged up.
"So put her in the lock up." AC suggested, resigning himself to being the next patient.
"Oliver will kill you if he sees her back in a cage." Dinah argued, stepping herself into the conversation as she so often did.
"Then we hope she wakes up first." AC shrugged and saw reluctant agreement in Victor.
"Gone?" Lex repeated to the phone. "Find her now!"
"Sir, the police are already in the lab, there's talk of video footage being left… they have you on camera. Th-"
Lex hung up on his PI.
She was gone.
He was ruined.
She's destroyed him.
It was a stupid mistake to leave any evidence there, but he was conceited enough to think no-one would find it. Lex pushed his foot down on the accelerator, ignoring the flash of the speed camera and sets of red lights ahead. He had a more important problem.
Chloe.
He needed the names from her. He needed her back. How the hell did she get out? No-one reported seeing her leave at any point… so where would she go?
Lex knew of only one place. There were very few places Chloe felt comfortable… the slums used to be one of them, she'd even made friends here… a new father figure. Lex ground his teeth together, instantly changing course into the slums.
As soon as the car came to a stop, he pulled the gun from the glove box, having no fear as he walked with it in plain sight through the edge of the slums. Very few people turned to him with anything but fear. The way he liked it. The way he craved from Chloe. Obedience for fear of rebuttal.
Mothers turned their children back into the houses. Children of the slums had seen guns before, that wasn't the problem… the problem was Lex. It was his expression, the look of madness that would let no obstacles stop him from his mission. The threat of punishment if a toe stepped out of line. The hanging thread of sanity he was slipping from.
"Going somewhere with that?" a voice spoke behind Lex, it sounded bored, a gravelly smokers edge to it. The smell of a lit cigarette came with the newcomer.
"Nowhere you want to know." Lex answered and walked forward again.
"Wouldn't do that if I were you." The voice came again and this time it ticked off Lex to the point of him stopping and turning. He met a man with messy black hair falling over his face with a greasy cling, sharp cut features women would have called handsome… but nothing special.
"And why would that be?" Lex scoffed. The man took another draw of the cigarette before throwing it to the ground and crushing it under his foot. The very act annoyed Lex. Lex deserved instantly answers, not some dick to finish his cigarette before speaking his answer. His fingers twitched over the gun.
No.
Not yet.
He had no reason to shoot this jackass.
"Nothing here for you rich man. This isn't the place for your kind." The smoker's raw gasp of air drew into the tar coated lungs and Lex found himself disgusted with the piece of trash standing before him, telling him where he should and shouldn't be. Chloe had been here, Chloe had lived here, and she was exactly like him. If he was right, she was here right now. Hiding behind her pseudo father.
Like he didn't know about him… he knew everything she did.
Lex's eyes cut up to the man again. Those features… would Chloe have found them attractive… would she have slept with this man? Lex found his temper hitting the ceiling.
How dare she sleep with him?! Lex pulled up the gun, drawing the trigger neatly three times, each hitting the man, taking him down with ease. The blood poured, it gave Lex an ounce of calm for the pounds of tension.
He'd beat her until she cried when he dragged her back from here. He'd make sure she never left his side again! She belonged to him.
Lex stormed through the alleys and backstreets, a misty map in the back of his mind, it led him straight to the rackety home of Alfie Lockwood, old git and ex-marine.
"Where is she?" Lex demanded, raising the gun to the old man on the rocking chair. The chair instantly stopped rocking, the creak fading into silence. It seemed even the birds dare not chirp.
"I have no idea who she is, nor where she would be. So get the hell of my property lad." The grumpy old geezer ordered, having seen far too many guns to find the demanding man before him scary. But… Alfie stood, squinting through eyes that needed glasses. There was no nervous wobble in the man, just madness in his eyes. From the shined black shoes to the over coat without a mark of dirt on it, Alfie knew exactly who this man was, and what he wanted with the she he hadn't seen in month. She'd ran away. Good on her. He always wanted her to finally get the balls to betray Luthor.
Alfie's hand sank to his left, gripping the loaded shotgun firmly. It would be his deepest pleasure to put a shell into Luthor. Several infact.
"I know she's here. Just hand her over."
Alfie rose the gun slowly into his hold, making it clear to the rich kid he wasn't playing around.
"And if I don't?"
The words, whatever meaning they held, acted as confirmation for the little doubt in lex's warped mind. Chloe was here.
Lex took no time in wasting the old man, four shots hitting him in the chest. Lex didn't care for the overkill, it was a message, not a purpose. Nobody crossed Luthor and lived. The body fell back into the rocking chair, the creaking piece of furniture tipping over backwards, slamming the corpse into the porch floor.
Lex let himself in, stepping over the deceased, gun close by. A golden lab whined from the corner of the living room, backing up further from Lex as he entered. The dog was as old and decrepit as its owner, already dying, limping even as he tried to move backwards in fear, Lex may as well finish off the bastard. He lifted the gun, but the clip clicked empty.
"Your lucky day." Lex muttered under his breath and turned into the next room. He searched every room, every place one could hide. But Chloe wasn't there… His rage seethed. He slammed his shoe into the wall once, twice, three times. It did nothing for his anger, but he summed Chloe must have escaped through the backdoor while he dealt with the front guard.
Shouting her name, he slammed back the door, storming back into the tall, dirty alleys, taking down anyone who crossed him with second clip of bullets and hunted for the woman that wasn't ever there.
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Told you someones dies :) hehehe. I bet you all knew it was going to be Lionel, didn't you? Clever bunch.
Review if you have a spare second or two. Much love, see you soon for the penultimate chapter.
Xx