-- Chapter 5 -- Talk to Me --

Soft blue light and gentle whispers from a thousand voices filled the world. Clark drifted through a warm safe place. There were too many voices speaking at once for any one to stand out and Clark didn't even bother trying to distinguish between them. This feeling: no worries, no fear, no hope, no anger - this was peace.

Clark? Baby, please come back. Open your eyes.

A single cry no less gentle than the whispers surrounding him, cut through the veil of blue and Clark felt a trill of fear. Mom? She sounded scared, unsure. Clark wanted to answer, but he couldn't move, couldn't reach out to her. The other whispers increased as if trying to blot out the offending emotions welling up in him. Clark wouldn't surrender to their peaceful embrace again.

With a force of will Clark mustered the strength to call out into the void. "Stop!" The whispers ceased immediately and the strange paralysis seemed to fade back. "Mom? Are you here?" Clark moved through the hazy blue void, groping for anything substantial. His mother needed him, but there was nothing and no one. "Somebody, I heard you. Wherever this is, I want out. Someone let me out!"

The world flashed white and Clark was aware of himself again, the floor under his feet, the rock curled in his fist. He sucked in a breath of air and opened his eyes. Sunlight wasn't streaming across the kitchen anymore, but his parents were still there. Mom was resting her head on Dad's shoulder, and he was stroking her back gently. If it were possible, they seemed even more strained than before... Clark stared down at his hand, at the now dormant stone. A wave of chills washed over him and he dropped the offending object. "What happened? Are you guys okay?"

His parents weren't slow to react to his questions. They came out of their chairs and to his side, touching him as if they needed assurance that he had really spoken, that he was okay.

"Are we okay?" Martha asked. "You scared us to death." That phrase didn't quite do justice to the last two hours of waiting, the exquisite agony of not knowing what was happening or if it would ever end.

Jonathan snatched up the blue stone and sealed it into the little lead box on the table. "Look here, son," he said. Clark turned and let his dad get a good look into his eyes. The relief that welled up in Jonathan when he saw his son staring out at him was overwhelming. "You're shaking." He ran a hand across his son's bare arm and winced. "Could be because you're freezing."

Clark shrugged and tried to stop shivering. "A little chilled maybe."

Martha seized on the chance to help with something. Warmth she could provide. "Let's get you warmed up. I'll put on some hot tea, and I want you under the blanket in the living room."

Jonathan ushered his son across the kitchen and tucked him under the old patchwork quilt, which normally draped the back of the couch. The initial relief at having Clark wake up from the strange trance he'd fallen into was fast fading and questions were boiling in Jonathan. "Son, I have to ask you what happened. I know you asked your mother and me that question already, but we don't know anything. That little blue rock just showed up in the storm cellar. You came home and grabbed it. Then you went all catatonic on us."

Clark could remember the warm place, the voices and the calm, the peace. "I went catatonic? Was it for long?"

"Two hours. Long enough to terrify us," Jonathan said.

"I had a dream." Clark paused, trying to find words for the strange experience he'd only just awoken from. "It was warm and I knew I was safe. There were voices that I couldn't understand and a song that just made me want to sleep. It was the most calming place in the world. All soft blue and familiar, it was like...I don't know what it was like." Clark still felt chilled but not as badly as before. He clutched the quilt tightly around himself, having to consciously loosen his grip so as not to rip the old fabric to shreds. "You said this rock just showed up in the storm cellar. How? Who put it there? Does someone know about me now?"

"We just don't know," Jonathan said. "I don't want you to be afraid though. We'll keep you safe. Martha and I won't ever let anything happen to you. You know that." Jonathan refused to listen to the tiny voice inside him, which insisted on pointing out that they hadn't even been able to help Clark today when the tiny blue rock attacked. How were they supposed to defend him against an entire military or national security agency?

"I have tea, very hot," Martha said. She set her little tray on the coffee table and offered the steaming cup to Clark. To her credit, her hand hardly shook at all. "Are we warming up a little?"

Clark let the blanket loosen a bit around his shoulders and nodded. "I feel almost normal again."


Motionless like a statue, the Eradicator stood a silent vigil in the woods near her ship. Following the embarrassing failure with Mr. Luthor, she had taken the only logical course of action open to her. She entered into a comprehensive self-diagnostic and restart. Given, it was a slow process, but necessary to help alleviate any further mistakes before they could occur. Miscalculating and somehow missing or damaging her Kryptonian was not an option.

Unfortunately for the Eradicator, she was barely midway through her level one diagnostic when the Kryptonian found the message she left at his life pod. The information, which would allow her to finally seek her master in earnest was logged and stored for review following the completion of her self-maintenance. Oblivious to her good fortune, she continued to test the neural pathways making up her AI, eternally blind to the growing distortions in her logic pathways but hyperaware of her logic failures.


Flanked by his parents and still wrapped in a blanket, Clark couldn't help feeling seven years old. The first time he took off running really fast his mom had bundled him into a blanket, plied him with tea and taken his temperature repeatedly. The blanket with tea was always a first solution with his mom. A blanket and tea could fix almost anything, anything except him and ailing farms. It couldn't make him normal, and it wasn't going to make the corn crop turn a profit. "I know we've had a little drama this afternoon," Clark said. He leaned forward and stared down at his hands. "But I think we ought to go ahead with the family meeting as planned."

Martha shook her head and exchanged a look with Jonathan. "Tomorrow, we'll discuss the farm tomorrow. I don't think my head would be in it tonight."

"Listen to your mother. Things can wait one more night," Jonathan said.

"I don't want to wait one more night..." Clark's comment was cut off by the phone's ring, and Jonathan headed for the wall phone. With a sighed he turned to his mom. "The indecision is driving me crazy," Clark said. "I can't think, concentrate."

"Clark, it's Mr. Sullivan. Have you seen Chloe this afternoon?" Jonathan called. "She hasn't made it home yet. Her dad's a little worried."

It was almost strange, coming out of the orbit of his own problems to worry about Chloe. It felt good to let go of those familiar unchanging crises. Clark shook his head. "I saw her around 6th period. She was planning on checking out a story this afternoon." If his parents were too freaked out to talk about the farm, then Clark could occupy his mind and his worrying on something else. Chloe was probably just asleep at the Torch, but any activity was better than sitting around the house, not talking about the pink elephant in the room. "Tell Mr. Sullivan that I was running to the Torch anyway, and I'll check on her for him."

Martha followed Clark for a couple of steps. "After what happened this afternoon, I think you should stay home and get a little rest." In all honesty, she thought he needed rest less than she needed to keep an eye on him. "You know Chloe's fine."

"I won't know she's fine unless I check. It'll take a few minutes and the run will warm any of those lingering chills right out of me," Clark said.

"Hold up, son," Jonathan said. He joined Martha and shook his head. "Listen to your mother on this one. You've had a shock to your system."

"I swear it'll be fine," Clark said. He tried a smile on, but it felt forced. "Chloe might really be in trouble. She finds more danger than anybody has the right to."

The protests Martha was about to offer died on her lips. She needed him to stay for her piece of mind. He needed to check on Chloe for his sanity. "Hurry home, okay," she said.

Jonathan turned a surprised look to Martha. "What?"

Clark didn't wait for his father to agree. "Thanks. I won't be long."