Chapter 75 - Practice

"Ready?"

Clark shifted his weight from one foot to the other, standing in the doorway of the barn. This was his thirteenth time trying this, and he hadn't quite gotten it yet. "Yeah, I'm ready."

"Go!"

Clark had done this before, a couple of times. It had been in moments when he needed his reflexes to save someone. The world had slowed down and become crystal clear, even as he sped through it faster than he ever had. But so far, every time, reflexes like that had to be triggered.

He sped from one side of the barn to the other as fast as he could, and he willed his eyes to focus on the slip of paper his father had left by the running camera. For the first time, he saw the message written there— 4546 8902.

Clark brought himself to a halt, and the dust and hay settled in the barn. He didn't think he could prevent the gust of wind that he always caused when he ran—that would probably mean defying the laws of science.

He stepped back into the barn, and he looked up at his dad, who was watching from the loft.

"4546, 8902."

His father's eyes lit up. "You were able to see it?"

"Yeah." Clark grinned.

"Well, it's a short distance, and a short message, but . . ."

"It's a start."

"It certainly is." His father came down the steps and turned off the camera, then he looked back through the footage. He frowned. "Ah . . . son . . ."

"What's wrong?"

"You, uh, weren't quite fast enough that time."

Clark felt himself deflate. "Really?"

"Well, from the loft you looked just as fast to me, but, well, take a look." He turned to stand beside Clark, showing him the screen, and rewound the playback. "All of the other times, the camera didn't pick you up." He scrolled through the earlier trials. "Well, this one had a bit of a blur . . . so did this one . . . but no one would recognize you, they wouldn't even recognize you were a person. But in that last one . . ."

Clark watched himself run past on camera. His face was blurred, but it was possible he could be recognized. "Great. I'll never get this."

"Hey, don't give up, son. If you got a handle on your heat vision, I think you can get a handle on this."

"Aren't you going to tell me it's not worth it? If I mess it up, there's a risk someone could learn my secret."

His dad sighed heavily. "Come sit with me. Take a break."

Clark shrugged and followed his dad up the stairs to the loft. His dad sat down on the couch, and Clark sat across from him.

"Son, I'm not gonna lie to you. The thought of you going and spying on Lex's people, it makes me more nervous than I can tell you."

"So why are you letting me?"

His dad looked down for a moment. "Because a lot of people got hurt when Lionel decided to attack his son, and he need to be stopped. There's a lot at stake here. You know that, I know it, and like you said, you're not the kind of person who's going to stand by."

Clark didn't want to ask, but he knew he had to. "Do you think, if I hadn't become friends with Lex, we wouldn't have this problem?"

His dad frowned. "I've had a lot of time to think about that. The truth is, I don't know. We'll never know. But I do know that your powers attract, ah, a certain attention. And . . . I don't think you're destined to hide away from the world. If it wasn't Lionel Luthor, it would be someone else."

Clark nodded slowly. Part of him wanted to smile—he really hadn't expected his father to respond this way. Another part of him, though, just felt the weight of the world of his shoulders, considering who he was and where his life was going.

"Son . . . much as it pains me to say it, you did a good thing, becoming friends with Lex. Who knows where he would have ended up without you?"

Clark let himself smile, just slightly, but it didn't last. "It won't do either of us any good if I can't figure this out."

"You will, Clark."

Clark looked up to find his father looking him right in the eye.

"You will."

"How do you know?"

"Because it's who you are. You've figured out everything else. And I'm not going to let you give up. Not if it takes us a hundred tries."

Clark took a deep breath. "Write a new message. Let's try again."

His father smiled, and he stood to clap his son on the shoulder before heading down the stairs.

Over the weeks that followed, Lex didn't hear anything about Smallville, or about his father, or about Clark. As far as Lex was concerned, no news was good news. It meant that, for the time being, either his father believed the lies Lex was feeding Helen, or he was choosing to act as though he did. Either way meant no more casualties, for now.

But he did hear something about Helen.

It fell into his lap. He had already shaken hands and paid closing fees to the investigator he'd sent after her, but he'd paid a little extra for good work, and the investigator had taken it upon himself to thank Lex for that. He'd done a little more digging on the circumstances of Helen's previous employment, and it turned out that she hadn't been completely honest—not that that was a surprise.

What was a surprise was the extent of it. She'd been let go for a criminal medical malpractice, and she'd managed to pull the right strings to sweep it under the rug. He was sure she wasn't mentioning it in any of her job interviews now.

Lex wasn't going to tell her, but playing defensive wasn't a long term strategy. He was hiding out, separated from everyone he'd ever cared about just to protect them, and in the meantime, he truly wasn't doing much of anything with his own life. It was time to take the one advantage he could.

He invited Helen to his apartment for dinner, except this time, he didn't bother with hiring a chef—he didn't anticipate them getting as far as eating. He greeted her at the door dressed more casually than he usually did, and he found her having dressed down a little as well. Easy to attribute to them settling into their relationship.

"You look well," he told her.

She looked him over with a smile. "So do you."

"How's the job applications?"

She groaned as she shrugged off her sweater and hung it up. "About what you'd expect."

"You'd know better than me. Perks of a rich daddy stringing me along in the family business."

Helen blinked. "I . . . I'm sorry?"

"Of course, if I was looking for a job, I wouldn't be doing it while trying to hide criminal malpractices in the very field where I was job hunting."

The response was instantaneous. Lex always enjoyed this part of calling out people who were working against him. Her whole stance became guarded, muscles tightening as though ready to run, and her eyes narrowed, but her voice dripped with shock. "You investigated me."

"I'd like to have this conversation without recording devices, if you don't mind."

"Excuse me?"

"I don't insult your intelligence, Miss Bryce. Please, don't insult mine."

Helen turned toward the door. "I'm leaving."

"I sincerely doubt that, since you don't know what I'm planning to do with the information about your malpractice."

She crossed her arms and turned to face him. "You're one to criticize the skeletons in my closet."

"If you've done your homework properly, you know I'm innocent of the negligence of which I've been accused."

Her jaw pulsed. "Why do you think I have a recording device?"

"Trust me when I say you'd rather this conversation take place off the record."

Helen's voice caught. "You're as bad as your father." But she took the bug out from behind her ear. "Happy?"

He held out his hand, and she scoffed and dropped it into his palm. He let it fall to the floor, where he crushed it beneath his heel. Then he bent down to pick it up and held it out to her. "You can tell him it was destroyed during, ah, a particularly passionate session of lovemaking."

She didn't even look at it. She just shook her head, her gaze boring holes in his face. "I take it back. You're worse than your father."

"But my conscience is clean."

"What do you want, Lex?"

"I want you to work as a double agent."

"Double cross Lionel Luthor?"

"What's the matter? I thought you said I was worse than him."

"How do you know he doesn't have the same dirt on me?"

"He wouldn't have wasted a hundred thousand dollars if he did."

She shook her head, looking away and laughing wryly. "I suppose you're going to tell me that, at your status, investigating the girls you date is just par for the course."

"I do my homework. But in your case, if you're curious? I pegged you as a spy right away."

She looked back at Lex. "Do you know what your father would do to me if he found out?"

"I can protect you from him."

"Like you protected your friends back in Smallville?"

That stung. He knew she was right, but he stood to gain quite a lot of ground if she would agree to help. "Work with me, and I can not only protect you. I can employ you. You're a bad physician, but your history in biomedical research shows great potential, with the proper supervision."

"What do you want?"

"I want to know what my father sent you here to find out."

She swallowed. "He wanted to know what you were doing. Whether you were going to try to rebuild your company at a distance."

"No, there's more." He knew the answer to his question, but he wanted to make sure he'd fully convinced her to turn over to his side. "What did he send you to ask?"

She fumed, shifting her weight, then finally said, "About that friend of yours. Clark."

Good. Now she was telling the whole truth. "Why?"

"You'd know better than me."

"I'm afraid that's where you're wrong. Clark's an ordinary kid, but he means a great deal to me. Aside from that, I have no idea why my father would be interested in him."

"I've asked him. He told me it wasn't any of my business."

"Well then. That's your assignment. Find out why my father wants information about Clark."

"How am I supposed to do that?"

He took a step closer, allowing himself to relish the way his enemy shrank back from him. Damn, being away from Clark was taking its toll. He put on his smoothest, most menacing tone: "I suggest you get creative."