Chapter 59 - Chemistry

Clark had only been home for an hour when he headed back to the mansion. His dad was unhappy about it, to say the least, but he'd told them that Lex had had a breakthrough on some of the research about the caves, and his mom had given him permission to go before his dad could put his foot down. Clark had left the house before his parents could get into it.

Lex wasn't up in his study. Clark found it understandable, considering how recently he'd been in a lot of trouble because it was bugged—though he'd also had the mansion cleared of bugs pretty recently. Maybe he was just down in the experiment room because he wanted to talk about something related to the meteor rocks. His parents had recently revised their rules—they were okay with Clark and Lex being down there alone, as long as they weren't actually running experiments on Clark.

"They're chemical formulas," Lex said as soon as Clark was inside the experiment room.

Clark blinked. "What is?"

"The first time you read off one of those equations to me, you didn't say equals. You said makes."

"Hold on, slow down. The cave equations?"

"Yeah. You said they were equations, but you said makes, not equals."

Clark's head was already spinning a bit. "Isn't it the same thing in math?"

"In math, it is. But this isn't math."

Clark frowned and came over to have another look at the equation. It was as undecipherable as ever.

6(1x6+2x8)+6(2x1+1x8) = 1(6x6+12x1+6x8)+6(2x8)

"Don't chemical formulas have letters in them?"

"They do, but the letters represent numbers. How familiar are you with the periodic table?"

"Um." Clark shifted his weight. "I know hydrogen and helium and a few others. We haven't gotten very far in class."

"Do you know what the numbers represent?"

"Uh. The atomic number, right? Which is . . . the number of protons?"

"Exactly. Hydrogen is 1, helium is 2, and so on."

Clark frowned down at the equation again. "You think some of these numbers might represent elements?"

"I think the K might represent one we don't know."

Clark shook his head. "How did you get that by staring at this one? And how do you know which numbers are elements and which are just numbers?"

"Because I spent a lot more years of study staring at the same one, it just didn't look like this." Lex started rewriting the equation. "Hydrogen is 1. Carbon is 6. Oxygen is 8."

6CO2 + 6H2O = C6H12O6 + 6O2

Clark squinted. It looked so familiar. "I've seen that before."

"It's the chemical formula for photosynthesis," Lex said.

Clark never, ever would have gotten that. To be fair, though, he wouldn't have even spent any time looking at the equations if Lex hadn't insisted they were important. "Okay, what about the other equations?"

"Well, most of them are ones we know, different biological functions. But some are ones I don't recognize, and some of them have that variable, K."

"Do you think that's Kryptonite?"

"Not exactly. Those meteor rocks have more than one element in them. I think it's an element we don't have on earth, or we didn't until the meteor shower."

"You think it's an element in Kryptonite."

"Yes. And I think we can extract it."

Clark picked up the list of equations. "Okay. So this one is photosynthesis. What are the other ones?"

"I've been working that out." Lex picked up a second notebook, where he'd been jotting down the translations of each equation as chemical formulas. "Some of them are common biological reactions. Some of them I've seen before, but they replace an element with . . . K."

"Do they work? I mean, does the equation still make sense with the K?"

"I called you as soon as I cracked the code, Clark, I haven't started running tests yet. But the part you'll want to know is that some of these are quite a bit more . . . complex. There's a cypher here for building larger groups of molecules, and they form the basis for a genetic code."

"The equations tell you how the meteor rock affects people's genetics?"

"I don't understand all of it yet, but yes."

A thrill ran through Clark, and he couldn't help but grin. "So this will help you design the cure we were talking about!"

"Not a cure, Clark, it just switches the genes—"

"I know, I know." Clark wasn't fazed by that. He knew the mutations had given a lot of people . . . what had Lex called it? Homicidal tendencies. But Clark highly doubted either Ryan or Pamela would start killing people just because their mutation was flipped. In the meantime, their cancer would be cured.

"But to answer your question. If I'm looking at this correctly . . . yes. It would help us formulate the treatment. We'll need a few more mutants' samples, though, so we might need to contact Belle Reve."

"So people would have a choice, right? Between cancer and the other thing?"

"In theory. It's going to take a few weeks, but at least now it won't take months or years."

Clark couldn't help but grin.

"In the meantime, we have another problem at hand." Lex headed out of the experiment room and up toward his study.

Clark followed close behind. "What's that?"

"My father remembered . . . everything."

Clark swallowed. "He knows you tried to let him die?"

Lex flinched at that.

"Oh. Sorry." Clark had to start being careful about how he worded that, if he brought it up at all.

"It's okay, Clark. And yes, I have to assume he knows," Lex said.

"What are we going to do?"

"I'm coming to you for advice. You deal with this more often than I do."

Clark had no idea how to give advice on something like this. "I deal with what more often than you do?"

"Family. And, well, people wanting to kill you." Lex looked down. "I'd rather handle this like a Kent than like a Luthor."

"Sh-shouldn't you ask Pamela?" Clark wanted to be able to help, and Lex had a point that he'd faced a lot of killers over the past couple of years, but he was also only fifteen and didn't feel right giving advice to a twenty-two-year-old.

"I will. But I want your input, too."

Clark rubbed the back of his neck and paced. "I don't know, can you talk to him about it?" Clark almost winced as the words came out. They had sounded a lot better in his head; talking to his own father always made him feel better about whatever was wrong, but Lex didn't have that privilege.

"Not really a viable option at this point."

"I know. Sorry. Well . . . you were able to plant some bugs at LuthorCorp headquarters, right?"

"My father's on to me. He'll have them swept out in a matter of days."

"Well, then, maybe you have a few days."

Lex smirked. "A very Luthor answer."

Clark sighed—Lex really wanted his honest answer, based on things he'd learned from his own upbringing. None of them seemed to apply to Lex's situation, but apparently Lex still wanted his perspective. "I dunno, Lex. It seems like you and your father were always fighting before the tornado even happened. Do you . . . love each other?"

Lex's face fell.

"I'm sorry." Clark could have kicked himself. Lex had already made it pretty obvious that he didn't know how to answer a question like that. "Um, maybe stay away from each other for a little while."

"Refuse to play the game?"

"Yeah. I mean, it's really sad you two can't find any common ground, but, I mean, he's kind of . . . had his chance. You have other people who care about you. Maybe you can focus on them for a little while."

"On protecting them."

"Uh, sure." Once again, Clark didn't really have experience thinking the way Lex thought. "Don't worry about what your father thinks about you. It's more important what your friends think."

"And if he tries to bug the mansion again? Finds out about these experiments, or about you?"

"I'm not saying not to be ready for an attack. I'm just saying . . . don't provoke it."

"You mean don't provoke it any more than I already have."

"Lex . . . he beat you."

Lex let his breath out slowly.

"I'm just saying. You have the opportunity to do something really good with these experiments, and your father hasn't been able to stop you before. Don't let him stop you now."

Lex nodded. "If he already knows about the experiments, there's no point in stopping them. And if he finds out . . . it's unlikely he can trace them back to you, any more than my scientists can."

"Exactly. Just because the meteor rocks have these properties doesn't mean it has anything to do with me."

"Tell your father that," Lex muttered.

Clark squinted as something red appeared on Lex's forehead. It looked almost like . . . a laser pointer . . .

"Look, I appreciate your optimism, Clark, but my concern is—"

It hit him at once. Clark didn't have time to shout for Lex to dodge—he bolted for him and shoved him down under the desk as the wall behind them erupted with bullets.