The sun was shining so hot these days, the temperature in the house was as hot as the current mood. As if it was not bad enough that everyone was already mad on each other…

Clark was sitting in the dining-room, typing on the laptop. Lois was in her office, still trying to get an overview of what happened/ would have happened/ will happen/ or might happen next. Jordan was in his room and hopefully studied, as his parents ordered him.

One week had passed since their life once again was turned upside down. In the middle of the current Lex-Luthor-crisis, suddenly an elder Jonathan from the future arrived…

The older Jonathan didn't tell them how they will defeat Luthor! He didn't came back to say hello. He came back to take Jordan's powers and leave with not more than a letter left behind to force them to move back to Metropolis. When that got prevented by Lois' earlier arrival back home, the elder Jon was taken captive by them and used the chance to scold them for their bad parenting, their wrong choices, their mistakes, and their lack of respect for him that led him to leave them.

It tore open old wounds. And it was a painful reminder that Clark, Lois, Sam, Jordan and Jon made mistakes, that led to the inevitable break up of their family in the future and that Clark failed in so many ways as a father to both his sons. Lois was upset because of her own mistakes, too. And Jordan got a painful lecture about his own behavior and his point of view on life.

All in all, this week was exhausting, awful, upsetting and too eventful, for that that they were mostly at home…

Clark leaned back in his chair and rubbed his eyes. All the glaring on the screen was too much even for Superman's eyes. The air in the house was sticky. Clark felt unpleasant. And ever since last week's events, Clark felt as if all the photos of Martha and Jonathan Kent Sr. in the house were looking on him in anger, and in a scolding way. It got so worse, Clark avoided looking at some pictures, because he could swear Martha was scolding him from them. Knowing how disappointed they would be of him, too.

Clark lifts up from the chair and walked over to the window to get some fresh air in the house. A soft breeze of country air blew in the room and Clark took a deep breath.

"CLARK…" Lois suddenly yelled. "Close the window, it stinks!"

Clark closed the window again and moaned. Growing up here made him blind for the scent of fertilizer and dung that blew over from the neighboring farms from time to time. Or from their own fields. Why Mr. Branden has to spray the fertilizers today? On such a hot day, when the soft breeze is blowing the stench over to them. But Clark obeyed. He knew that Lois was mad on him already. He didn't need to upset her more.

Lois was mad on Clark, Jordan, and Sam. But mostly she was mad on herself. She was mad on Clark, for giving Jonathan the feeling that he doesn't love him because he is powerless. She was mad on Jordan for his arrogance and for acting superior towards his brother. She was mad on Sam for trying to take advantage of Jordan's powers and trying to get Jonathan out of the family, to focus on recruiting Jordan and Natalie as his weapons for the DOD.

But mostly she was mad on herself. For not seeing it before. For not supporting Jonathan when she had to. For not showing him her love enough. And for not preventing him struggling and suffering under the neglect of his family, the bullying he received from Coach Gaines and the team, and the hate and the rejection he received from the people of this town from the day they moved here. And not only after the day he got caught with the X-K.

The whole family went through a lot, ever since they moved here. They literally stumbled from one crisis to the next since Clark revealed his secret to the boys. First John-Henry, who at first was an enemy, then Morgan Edge, then General Anderson, Ally Allston, Bruno Mannheim, Lex Luthor… an adult, superpowered Jonathan from the future who wanted to destroy Jordan's superpowers to prevent him from destroying the world was not a big surprise. At least it shouldn't be.

They could be in Italy now! Relaxing on a beach, sightseeing, shopping… like they planned before Luthor unleashed the mutated Bizarro and caused Clark to fight for days on the moon before he could return. Just to see that the barn burned down, the town got damaged and other things.

Luthor was quiet for now, but they had to be careful. But Luthor was now their least problem. Jonathan was still mad on them. And since his elder self showed up, the boy was so upset. Knowing that all his attempts to have a good life will be ruined by his brother in future. Like he already did in the past. And the boy had to witness his older self and the older Jordan both die. Or just crumbling to dust? What ever happened to them?

Then there was Jordan now! Ever since he lost his powers, the boy was permanently mad on everyone. Lara's scan revealed that they will return in the next 4 to 5 weeks. But Clark and Lois knew, that there was no way to deny, that this was indeed a chance for the boy to learn from it.

There was one specific sentence from Jonathan (the younger one from the present) that had a lasting impact on everyone: That he had to learn the hard way, that he can't solve everything with powers. And the last week made it evident that Jordan became so dangerously dependent on his powers, that he was barely able fulfil even the simplest things. His powerlessness revealed that the boy was so immature. His grades were revealed to be dropping for months now. And the fact that he has no license literally trapped him on the farm. The following weeks had to be a lecture for Jordan.

Jordan was upset. But his powerlessness really seems to have an effect. His arrogance seemed to get less. And he seemed to think about his brother and how he is handling his life without powers more. His missing drivers-license forced Jordan to walk or wait for one of his parents to drive him. Now he really regretted to had made fun about Jonathan's license. Especially since his parents let him wait or let him walk to town. And Clark suddenly realized that he had no clue what to do with Jordan, since everything they mostly did together had to do with his powers.

Then there was Lara, who was extremely mad and disappointed on all of them, too. Not only she figured out that Jonathan never met Jor-El, never got taught about his heritage, was openly excluded from everything because of his powerlessness and denied his heritage because of all these reasons. She also figured out that Clark lied to her in so many ways and that he was primarily responsible for all of Jonathan's problems, his struggles and the denying of his heritage. Lara was just an A.I., but she was also an exact copy of the real Lara, who was a proud powerless Kryptonian, with no experience what it means to have powers.

Hearing that Jonathan does not accept his Kryptonian heritage because he has no powers and that his entire family consequently shows him that he is useless without them and has no right to know anything about Krypton and that he gets excluded was a huge shock for her and it hurt her proud Kryptonian heart. Telling them openly that, if Krypton would still exist, they would had brought a huge shame over their house and that they would all had been dismissed.

Clark tried to deny it and defend his decision. Or that it was not as bad as it sounds. But there was no way to deny it. When he had the chance to take Jonathan to his fortress and introduce him to Jor-El, he didn't do it. When he actually should had taken Jonathan to his fortress to check him, he didn't. When they found Lara, Clark didn't dare to introduce Jon to her immediately, too. After his Bizzaro-doppelganger attacked, Clark didn't want him to hide there, even if they might had found there a way to stop Jon-El. There were countless of opportunities and reasons to bring Jonathan to his fortress. From the day Jordan developed powers, to check if Jonathan gets them to, to his X-K abuse to check if it didn't poisoned or otherwise affected him negatively. No surprise Jonathan sticks so much on his 'humanity'. And Clark knew that Martha would had disowned him, too much earlier. Insisting on bringing Jonathan to Lara and Jor-El, too.

That's why Lara kept him in the fortress. That's why she scanned him multiple times after she kicked them all out and taught him as much as possible about their family-history and to prove him that he is a full legit member of the house of El and that he is allowed to call himself Kryptonian, too. And to keep sure that Jonathan is not influenced negatively by his family, she kicked them all out and openly said that she hopes Jordan does not get his powers back. She also didn't want to help them to find a way to get his powers back faster. And she told them to not disturb Jonathan during their time at the fortress to keep sure the boy does not get locked away by them forever again. Openly saying how 'unforgivable' it was to not to introduce him to Jor-El, too.

Clark was sad about his mothers harsh behavior towards them and their temporary ban from the fortress. But he knew that the living Lara, who lived on Krypton, who never had powers, who was a family-focused person, and who was proud on the culture, the values, and the customs of their world would had reacted the same way. He hurt her Kryptonian-Pride!

Then there was Sam, but Clark was so mad on his father-in-law now, that he didn't want to think about him right now. No matter what recently happened to him and that he will need them a lot in the future due to his current situation. What Sam did was absolutely unacceptable. And Lois and Clark were both extremely upset about not realizing it earlier. Still not knowing what to do with Sam now…

"CLARK! I SAID CLOSE THE WINDOW!"

Lois annoyed yelling pulled Clark out of his thoughts…

"THE WINDOW IS CLOSE!" Clark yelled back. He didn't want to yell, but he inadvertently did so.

Ever since the arrival of the older Jonathan, the mood in the house was worse than ever before. Lois was so extremely irritable, she looked at him as if she wants to divorce him every moment. As if she was waiting for him to give her just one more reason. Lois did what she always did when she was mad on him: Working more than normally!

Clark walked over to the closed door of her home-office and carefully knocked.

"Lois, the window is close!"

"And why it stinks here like cow dung?"

"Shall I ask Mr. Branden to wait with the fertilizers to a time when it is not that hot?"

No response! Instead he could just hear Lois opening and smashing the drawers on her desk as if she was desperately looking for something. Carefully Clark risked to open the door to put his head inside and saw the mess.

The whole room was a mess of documents, photos and conspiracy walls. Weeks ago, after Clark converted the room back into an office, it turned into their 'find-Luthor-headquarter'. Now it was a weird mix of Luthor, future Jonathan, several people from town and how to make amends with Jonathan headquarter.

Ever since last week's events, the whole family seemed to have bad luck. First Jordan's troubles in school. Then Clark received a lot of weird messages from others. Partly very offending stuff that let him doubt if the people in town were really like he guessed. And Lois was very upset because someone posted a very incriminating Video of her two days ago. A video, she knew was her own fault and that made her very angry at herself again. He ignored that the construction of the new barn made no significant progress…

Clark saw that Lois was eagerly searching her desk.

"Where is my thick black marker?" she asked without even daring to look at Clark.

"I didn't take it!" Clark respond carefully.

"JORDAN!? DID YOU TAKE MY MARKER?" Lois yelled upset towards the ceiling.

There was no response from upstairs. Without his superhearing, Jordan couldn't hear them. Especially when he was wearing headphones. Clark suddenly spotted the marker on the ground and took it to hand it to his wife.

"Here is it, Lois."

Lois turned around and took it without saying anything. That was the moment Clark could see that Lois was looking worse than during her chemo-treatment. Her face was pale. She had bags under her bloodshot eyes. Her hair was messy and her clothes were sweaty. Without thanking him she took the marker to write something on a note to hang it on one of the walls.

"Would you please go upstairs to check if our son is really studying!"

"Sure!" Clark said and left the room. Scared to say anything that would upset her more.

Clark went upstairs and knocked on Jordan's door.

"Jordan?"

No response from inside. Clark opened the door and found Jordan sitting with headphones on his desk. Trying to focus on his textbook. The teenager noticed the arrival of his father and turned to him. His face and his shoulders were visibly red from sunburn.

The first day of his powerlessness, Jordan spend outside in the sun, thinking his powers would return if he just spends enough time absorbing its energy. But his body reacted with a sunburn instead. The first ever of his life.

"Your mother called you!"

"I didn't hear!" The boy said ashamed and pulled of his headphones.

With his superhearing, Clark could hear that it was no music. Jordan was listening to an audio-book. A male person talking about how to learn more effective. Jordan used his superspeed to do all his schoolwork to have more time for his training. The boy attend to no extracurriculars, was in no school-club and only doing for school what was really necessary. Unlike Jonathan, who was doing all his schoolwork and the studying like everyone else. Jonathan had no superpowers, but his grades were always better than Jordan's. One more thing they never honored…

"Is everything all right?" Clark asked.

"Yes, I think so!" Jordan said. But it was a lie. His face and his shoulders were aching. The air in his room was hot and sticky. But the boy didn't want to open a window, as his room was in direct wind direction of the fertilizer stench. And even with closed windows and wet towels on the windows, it stank. Clark noticed a lot of undone work on the boy's table…

"You should keep the door open." Clark advised and went downstairs again. Wondering how he could miss that Jordan was neglecting school in favor of his superhero-training for so long. One more thing that had to change.

Clark went back to Lois' office and saw that she stopped rushing around. She was just standing there and glared on her investigation. Clark looked on it and didn't see anything. Which was an indication that Lois had problems on focusing…

Was it the heat? The stench? The current conflict with Jonathan? Ever since last week, the whole farm seemed to become more and more dismissive. As if the house wants to tell them: move out! Or get away!

"Any progress?" Clark asked politely.

"Aww…" Lois moaned. But she was calmer than usual. "… there is so much to handle… but I think… I was able to connect at least the first time."

Lois was calmer now and went to the board to show Clark what she was able to reconstruct.

"Adult Jonathan… came to this exact time, because of the seminar. We already know, if Jordan didn't lose his powers, he would have flown over to the seminar, to 'safe' Jonathan."

"And instead he would had broken his arm!" Clark added.

"And as we both know, that Lex Luthor…" Lois turned around and pointed on the photo of the bald sociopath. "…is looking for a way to discredit me, you, our family, Superman and the Smallville-Samaritan, he uses the pictures and videos of Jordan breaking Jonathan's arm again. People start to connect the dots, see the connection, Jonathan's life gets ruined again…"

"So, the short version is, that this incident helped Lex Luthor to figure out our secret." Clark concluded.

"And that led to all the other things: Public exposure! Jonathan leaving because we don't help him. People making fun about his powerlessness. The family breaking apart…"

Lois stopped talking when she stood in front of the cards where she wrote down the other events, the older Jonathan told them about and she tried to sort them chronologically. But she didn't know how. His faked suicide, being experimented on, the death of his fiancée, his plan to destroy the fortress, the release of his book, his new own fortress, the moment they dismiss him for his powers, Clark's, and Lois' divorce…

The d-word was floating around in their minds, ever since Clark told her what the adult Jordan told. If it was true, they don't know. But just thinking about it made them pensive.

Lois was always convinced that she never leaves Clark. Otherwise… she was a woman with principles. A woman with her own will and who was strong. She knew, the only reason for her to divorce Clark would be if he… No! Lois didn't even want to think about it. Her face turned pale, sweat start to run down her face again and she felt as if the walls were getting closer and the room tried to swallow her. The longer Jonathan was not here, the more Lois felt unpleasant in this house.

Lois stumbled towards the window. Right now, the stench outside didn't matter. Lois felt so claustrophobic, so she opened the window, but regretted it immediately.

Now even Clark (usually smell blind) winced when a wave of stench blew into the room.

"Arghh… Clark… go and talk to Mr. Branden! Please…"

"Yes, Lois… aghhh… how can he do that today…"

Clark knew Mr. Branden his whole life. He knew this man was an experienced farmer. He should know that this was not the right time of the year to fertilize with dung. In the hot weather it was just nose-rape…

Clark grabbed his keys and went to his truck to get to their neighbor and talk to him. To show Lois that he really cares. Once Clark was gone, Lois tried to focus on her research again, when she suddenly noticed Jordan in the kitchen. The boy looked for something to drink in the fridge.

"Sorry, I just…" Jordan said. He felt awkward with his mother alone. Knowing how mad she was on him.

Lois tried to find some words. She felt awkward around Jordan, too. After everything what happened. Suddenly someone knocked on the front door.

"Who is that now?" Lois asked. She turned around and saw herself in the mirror. She looked awful. "Jordan, could you please open the door?"

The teenager nodded. This was the first friendly conversation they had for days, and Jordan didn't want to ruin it. So, he went to the front door and wondered who it could be. Whoever it was, seemed to be impatient. The knocking became louder and stronger. Without his powers, Jordan couldn't see or hear who it was.

"I'm coming!" Jordan yelled.

Jordan opened the door. Actually, hoping it was Jonathan who returned from the fortress. But he was not prepared to see this woman…

A woman… around 60 or even older Jordan guessed. Grey hair, old damaged clothes, and scars. A big scar on her forehead and one on her throat. From surgeries he guessed. And she was emaciated. But this was not what scared the shit out of Jordan. It was the fact, that despite all the scars, he recognized his mother Lois in this old lady. And she was mad…

"Jordan?!"

"M… Mom?"

"What?" The younger Lois asked when she came into the corridor and froze in shock when she saw her older self. Lois was so shocked that she dropped the glass with water she was holding and shattered it.

"Hello… I guess you didn't expect me…" the older Lois said. "I… Just had to see with my own eyes… if my son was successful…"

Without warning, the older Lois suddenly swung a golden shivering dagger… and pinched it directly into Jordan's left shoulder.

"AGHHHH…"

"CLARK…" Lois screamed.