(no subject)
9/10/06 04:57 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
roxyHope this works--everything is falling apart on me here :)
Title: Deal
Fandom: SV
Pairing:Clark/Lex
Rating: 3
Cover by![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
norwich36
Clark tossed and turned on the sofa, glaring into the dark. He was angry at Adam, angry that his parents wouldn’t let them sleep together—stupid—they’d slept together almost all summer, and it wasn’t like they were going to *do* anything. What fucking business was it of theirs anyway? And mostly, he was angry at Adam for agreeing. It wasn’t even like they demanded—they’d suggested…they asked….they were still afraid he was going to take off again, they were going to be walking on eggs around him for a while and did Adam let him take advantage of it? No—stupid Adam just smiled and agreed with every thing they said.
And there Adam was, sleeping upstairs in the soft comfortable bed, and meanwhile *he* was stuck on the lumpy old sofa, forced to listen to the fridge motor wheeze and gag, and cats out in the yard, fucking at the top of their lungs.
Asshole.
He huffed and flung himself to his side. Fine. He didn’t care. Tomorrow, he’d be gone anyway. He wasn’t going to come back until he found Lex no matter what. Lex was out there in the desert somewhere, he knew it. Screw them—they didn’t care. As far as he was concerned they could all go to hell.
“Oh crap. Oh geez.” He didn’t mean that. He blushed and punched his pillow up and tried to lay down again. All right. He was being an asshole. Nerves—being nervous brought out the jerk in him. He just didn’t want to be alone. He was too strung out to sleep. What if…what if Adam….
He shook his head. No. He was just on edge, and he needed—needed to be close to someone.
He grabbed his pillow and snuck up the stair, and headed for his room. The door was open.
He walked in, and Adam was awake, eyes open and watching him.
“Hi.”
“Hi.”
Clark shuffled into the room, head down a little, looking up through his bangs to see if Adam was mad.
“There’s a sleeping bag on the floor.”
“Yeah,” Clark said. “I see.”
“Your mom left it…you’re a big baby, you know?”
Clark grinned and threw his pillow down, slipped into the sleeping bag and smiled up at Adam. “Unh-hunh.”
“Good night, Clark.”
“I love you too.”
******
He drifted off slowly, and turning around, he found he was standing in the middle of miles and miles of sand, sand shifting this way and that, long swells of golden sand and heat, and nothing else. The sun beat down on him and he walked and walked. He called Lex’s name over and over until his voice was hoarse….
******
high as he was above the desert floor, still the sun beat down on him, so hot that even he felt it, his skin was warm and red… he couldn’t imagine humans in this heat, their delicate skin under the relentless glare of the sun. Delicate…at least, he knew Lex had been safe—even comfortable from the look of his dream. Maybe…that was why he hadn’t had dreams lately. Maybe they’d stopped hurting him, were being nice to him, maybe….
He angled downward until he touched down on the desert floor and felt a little tug of pride that he didn’t dig a trench again. He was learning to handle this newest example of otherness. This new thing, though—he had to admit--this was cool. He grinned a little before the weight of what he was doing swallowed his smile again. He sighed, dropped his head and concentrated.
He could heard the squeak of shifting sand, the sound of small things moving under the surface of it. He heard nothing more than that, no matter how he concentrated, there was nothing else to hear. Taking a deep breath, he launched himself skyward, rolling slightly as he did, staring up at the blue that seemed to go on forever and ever.
Up here, he could admit to himself that yeah…he was scared. Yeah, there was a part of him that was afraid that Lex was—was—it wasn’t just that he hadn’t dreamed of him in days and days…he didn’t have that little feeling, that touch of Lex he’d with him all the time, waking or sleeping. That feeling like Lex was touching him feather light and soft inside. He felt more alone now than he’d ever felt before, inside, where it hurt so much. He rose higher and higher, beyond the point where the sky was blue, to where it began to bleed into black, and stars were everywhere above him. His skin was cold, and tiny crystals of ice were forming in his hair, clinging to his lashes--it felt good. he rolled to look down, and under him he could see the whole world.
It made him cry, looking down on the world this way, this fragile bowl covered with lonely people, people who were hurting…he wiped his face and shuddered…people who hurt. He looked a moment more, and it didn’t even occur to him to be frightened or amazed at what he’d done…he was floating on the very edge of space and—it didn’t matter, all he really cared about right now, was Lex. He spread his arms wide and dropped back to the world, let himself go—
One way or another—today was the day he’d find Lex. He was certain of it.
******
Lex was prodded into what looked like an examination room. He looked around, not really curious, just—waiting. There was a table in the center of the room shaped like a wide cross, with restraints for wrists and ankles at each leg of the cross. He was pushed towards it and pulled across it, the two attendants who’d led him into the room buckled him to the table and moved away to stand like soldiers on either side of him.
A stray thought surfaced, making him giggle…stretched out like this, on the peculiar table—how Catholic, he thought--about to be crucified like Saint Andrew…
Morgan appeared in the doorway with Mr. Hati standing respectfully a step behind. Smiling kindly, Morgan petted Lex briefly. “I’m so sorry Alexander, but your father.” He shook his head, a look of fond exasperation on his face. “He can be so willful. At any rate, our association comes to an end now.” He looked at Mr. Hati. “I’d like to be back in the city by morning—clean up when you’re finished here. And don’t forget to turn off the lights when you leave.”
They chuckled and Mr. Hati said, “Yes father,” and closed the door behind Morgan. He grinned at Lex. “Just an old joke between us.”
He walked around the table Lex was spread across, trailing his fingers over his skin as he walked. Lex watched him without interest. He was waiting for what would come next, certain that it would be nasty, brutal and not much different than what he’d suffered before—just this time, he wouldn’t walk out of the room.
“Last game, Alexander. Last game.” He waited for one of the attendants to roll a metal cart to the table. Lex took a deep breath, let it out and closed his eyes. Mr. Hati tapped him on the cheek. “Ah-ah. You need to keep your eyes open. I can help you do that if you wish.”
Lex shook his head quickly, his disinterest dissolving away and fear rushing in to take it’s place. He looked at the gleaming array of metal instruments on the spotless white cloth. He recognized most—there were some he thought he’d rather be dead before find out what they did….
Mr. Hati sliced a long, long gash, from the base of Lex’s throat to his navel, shallow, barely splitting the skin. He jerked, and groaned, and the blade was levered under his skin—a million years in hell passed as it was yanked back and forth, lifting skin away from muscle. Lex arched, bit down on his lip so hard, blood poured down his chin. He jerked against the restraints, whipped his head back and forth in his fight to stay silent. Mr. Hati stopped and stroked his forearm. “You can scream—there is no one for you to be brave for, and I rather like the sound.”
Lex panted, his sides heaved and he grit his teeth but that man was right. There was no point in trying to keep what he wanted from him—he was going to get it sooner or later anyway.
The next time the knife went in, time compressed, every action was intensified, was crystal clear, and happened over and over, endless loop and he screamed, screamed his head off. He jerked and howled and Mr. Hati approved. The knife slid in through muscle, and glanced off bone—he levered a sliver of flesh out and chewed on it thoughtfully as he examined the items on the tray. Lex screamed until he felt light headed and his throat hurt, he screamed until--
--screamed again when water sprayed hard as needles against his flayed skin, and woke him, screamed when it stopped. Blood sluiced into the drains sunk in the tiles, the attendants swept squeegees around the floor, wiped the pink water off the surface of the table and Lex, stepped back so Mr. Hati could continue.
“I like to have a clear view of what I’m doing,” he smiled. Lex quivered as his body tried to heal what was happening as fast as it was happening. Time seemed to skip wildly—he closed his eyes and opened them, and the room was spotless, the smell of blood was gone, he was alone—he wondered briefly if what had gone before was hallucination or was this moment the hallucination? The knife slid in again as answer, a hot burning tug, he heard the edge of the blade grind against his bone and—
Fractured, time, in bits and pieces, it—and clearly he felt, hot and by turns so cold and tasted blood in his mouth, the water dried and he felt clammy—
That man leaned over and kissed him, hummed as if he tasted something delicious. “You know, after we finish with you, we have a new project. An ex-employee…” he chuckled, “An ex-everything now, I suppose, gave us interesting information about you…why didn’t you tell us about your other meteor affected friend?”
Lex had no doubt what friend he meant.
“After we’re finished here, we’ll collect him, too. I’m looking forward to the fun.”
And that, Lex thought, was about enough.
Time stretched out of shape, soft and sticky as hot taffy and filled him with—a good feeling. It was a very good feeling.
He looked inside himself and was surprised. He looked outside himself and was amazed. It was all so simple. He thought about how simple everything was while the bolts holding the table together expressed a desire to fall, so he let them. They unscrewed themselves, trembling little bits of metal he could feel with his mind—too slow. Faster. Bolts flew out of the table, dropped to the floor with click after click—he shook his head.
Too slow.
He sat up as his restraints fell to dust. He thought about how that felt and how there was a…a Thing holding everything together—felt that. He felt it holding the air back—he felt it under his feet, holding earth together—he felt it inside himself and saw how it held him together…he looked at the attendant foolish enough to still be within his reach. Put his hand on his arm and felt the Thing holding him together, stopped it and the attendant blew into a red mist, coating the walls and floor.
Lex stood and was the center of a whirlwind of metal, vinyl, paper, blood…Mr. Hati smiled and backed away, backed up until he was pressed against the slightly slimy tiled wall. Smiled as Lex reached out to silence the screaming attendant--the one smart enough to try to run. Lex twitched the Thing inside and unraveled it, skin dropped off muscle like wet sheets, veins slid down to heap around his feet like cooked spaghetti, and muscles turned to loops and loops of meat and organs slithered out of disintegrating bone...it was a loud disintegration. Lex watched it all fascinated. Fascinated.
He stared at his hands, spread out before him, searched the lines and whorls of his fingerprints, the pores, the minute sparkle of something in the creases of his flesh--he studied himself, looking for the difference…looked around the pink room. Locked eyes with that man.
That man stared at him, expressionless—the whirlwind collected, slowly drifted towards him, and bits of sharp metal lodged in his flesh—his lips peeled back in a pained snarl—or smile. Lex shrugged. Hard to tell with that one.
“Last game.” Lex’s voice sounded odd, he thought. Hollow and…he wasn’t sure his lips had moved--what he wondered, did it sound like to Hati? So unreal…he blinked, and it felt like it took a million years, and when his eyes opened again, that man was bleeding from a million wounds.
“Too simple.”
That man was whining now, but he needed to be screaming. Lex smiled.
******
“My hand is so far inside you, can you feel it?” Lex whispered, and imagined he laughed. “That’s a joke.” His hand twisted inside that man, feeling the weight of organs, the warmth of blood. Heat rose in his body, filling him—sweat ran down his back and legs and dripped to the floor…he slid his hand out and stroked his finger over that quivering arm and as he did, a fine red mist rose up and floated over the skin. Lex liked the effect, and did it again and again. He pulled an edge of torn skin up and it unraveled like knitting, falling away—where he touched, his fingertips left red and white blisters against that man’s flesh—and he screamed—shrieked. Lex was disappointed. It didn’t give him the satisfaction he thought it would. He waved his hand and wandered away and Mr. Hati danced in the center of his own white and red whirlwind—a fine fog red as roses swirled around him, he danced and got thinner, danced and got thinner….
Lex thought about that lack of satisfaction. He reached out, pushed a bit of his mind into that man’s and was surprised at the depth of pain he felt—amazed at his desire to hang onto life, no matter how horrific it had become.
Interesting.
He reached out farther and felt Morgan in his office, glanced over his thoughts, he watched staff clean the building, the apartments, watched his own room being dismantled, and a new one being stocked…interesting. He blew the wall out of the room he was in—reached along the Thing that held all of it together and plucked at it—exploded most things alive in the building. He was burning now, inside and out, the tiles under his feet ran like water. He walked out through the wall, and made the building into a fireball, and made sure two people felt it as long as possible.
He considered unraveling the Thing that held him together –it twitched when he touched it—he thought how easy it would be to unravel the Thing that held the earth together…people were monsters, they truly deserved to die…he’d walk a bit first, think about it, before he did it….
He walked out into the desert, with every step he left glass footprints…he walked and burnt, and healed, his skin peeled and fell in streamers and under that new pink skin formed and burnt, and after a while, he began using himself for fuel to sustain the healing, over and over, until his skin was black, and muscle dried on his skeleton. There was no sensation—no smell, no sound, no feeling, no sight.
All around him, in waves, things died…
A day, two days, weeks, months…time had no meaning, no place here. In the blackness, he heard that man mocking him, laughing, whispering. Lex shook his head and kept walking…his father teased him, laughed at him, officially disowned him—again. He shut his lashless lids against the black and walked on, on, on…Clark walked next to him silently for miles and miles before turning to him and saying, “You’re disgusting--,” Lex faltered, took a deep breath of nothing, walked on in the dark “-- what you did—it turned my stomach." Lex stopped. He turned his head towards him, and Adam looked back at him with sad eyes, said solemnly, “it’s true.” Lex yelled shut up and pulled at the Thing—pulled and….
The bubble around him collapsed, sight, sensation, and the horrible burning heat rushed in, closed in on him, and he screamed, physically, mentally, every cell, every particle of him screamed a long, long shattering scream— a tornado, a twister of sand and scrub and…things flew up—and exploded.
******
Miles away, high above the ground, Clark saw a red and black cloud swirl on the horizon, grow fat, collapse on itself and drop—he heard his name, so loud, he slapped his hands over his ears and it echoed loud and painfully inside his skull until he thought it would deafen him. He yelled back, LEX!
And heard faintly, Clark help me, kill me.
continued in part 5
Title: Deal
Fandom: SV
Pairing:Clark/Lex
Rating: 3
Cover by
norwich36Clark tossed and turned on the sofa, glaring into the dark. He was angry at Adam, angry that his parents wouldn’t let them sleep together—stupid—they’d slept together almost all summer, and it wasn’t like they were going to *do* anything. What fucking business was it of theirs anyway? And mostly, he was angry at Adam for agreeing. It wasn’t even like they demanded—they’d suggested…they asked….they were still afraid he was going to take off again, they were going to be walking on eggs around him for a while and did Adam let him take advantage of it? No—stupid Adam just smiled and agreed with every thing they said.
And there Adam was, sleeping upstairs in the soft comfortable bed, and meanwhile *he* was stuck on the lumpy old sofa, forced to listen to the fridge motor wheeze and gag, and cats out in the yard, fucking at the top of their lungs.
Asshole.
He huffed and flung himself to his side. Fine. He didn’t care. Tomorrow, he’d be gone anyway. He wasn’t going to come back until he found Lex no matter what. Lex was out there in the desert somewhere, he knew it. Screw them—they didn’t care. As far as he was concerned they could all go to hell.
“Oh crap. Oh geez.” He didn’t mean that. He blushed and punched his pillow up and tried to lay down again. All right. He was being an asshole. Nerves—being nervous brought out the jerk in him. He just didn’t want to be alone. He was too strung out to sleep. What if…what if Adam….
He shook his head. No. He was just on edge, and he needed—needed to be close to someone.
He grabbed his pillow and snuck up the stair, and headed for his room. The door was open.
He walked in, and Adam was awake, eyes open and watching him.
“Hi.”
“Hi.”
Clark shuffled into the room, head down a little, looking up through his bangs to see if Adam was mad.
“There’s a sleeping bag on the floor.”
“Yeah,” Clark said. “I see.”
“Your mom left it…you’re a big baby, you know?”
Clark grinned and threw his pillow down, slipped into the sleeping bag and smiled up at Adam. “Unh-hunh.”
“Good night, Clark.”
“I love you too.”
******
He drifted off slowly, and turning around, he found he was standing in the middle of miles and miles of sand, sand shifting this way and that, long swells of golden sand and heat, and nothing else. The sun beat down on him and he walked and walked. He called Lex’s name over and over until his voice was hoarse….
******
high as he was above the desert floor, still the sun beat down on him, so hot that even he felt it, his skin was warm and red… he couldn’t imagine humans in this heat, their delicate skin under the relentless glare of the sun. Delicate…at least, he knew Lex had been safe—even comfortable from the look of his dream. Maybe…that was why he hadn’t had dreams lately. Maybe they’d stopped hurting him, were being nice to him, maybe….
He angled downward until he touched down on the desert floor and felt a little tug of pride that he didn’t dig a trench again. He was learning to handle this newest example of otherness. This new thing, though—he had to admit--this was cool. He grinned a little before the weight of what he was doing swallowed his smile again. He sighed, dropped his head and concentrated.
He could heard the squeak of shifting sand, the sound of small things moving under the surface of it. He heard nothing more than that, no matter how he concentrated, there was nothing else to hear. Taking a deep breath, he launched himself skyward, rolling slightly as he did, staring up at the blue that seemed to go on forever and ever.
Up here, he could admit to himself that yeah…he was scared. Yeah, there was a part of him that was afraid that Lex was—was—it wasn’t just that he hadn’t dreamed of him in days and days…he didn’t have that little feeling, that touch of Lex he’d with him all the time, waking or sleeping. That feeling like Lex was touching him feather light and soft inside. He felt more alone now than he’d ever felt before, inside, where it hurt so much. He rose higher and higher, beyond the point where the sky was blue, to where it began to bleed into black, and stars were everywhere above him. His skin was cold, and tiny crystals of ice were forming in his hair, clinging to his lashes--it felt good. he rolled to look down, and under him he could see the whole world.
It made him cry, looking down on the world this way, this fragile bowl covered with lonely people, people who were hurting…he wiped his face and shuddered…people who hurt. He looked a moment more, and it didn’t even occur to him to be frightened or amazed at what he’d done…he was floating on the very edge of space and—it didn’t matter, all he really cared about right now, was Lex. He spread his arms wide and dropped back to the world, let himself go—
One way or another—today was the day he’d find Lex. He was certain of it.
******
Lex was prodded into what looked like an examination room. He looked around, not really curious, just—waiting. There was a table in the center of the room shaped like a wide cross, with restraints for wrists and ankles at each leg of the cross. He was pushed towards it and pulled across it, the two attendants who’d led him into the room buckled him to the table and moved away to stand like soldiers on either side of him.
A stray thought surfaced, making him giggle…stretched out like this, on the peculiar table—how Catholic, he thought--about to be crucified like Saint Andrew…
Morgan appeared in the doorway with Mr. Hati standing respectfully a step behind. Smiling kindly, Morgan petted Lex briefly. “I’m so sorry Alexander, but your father.” He shook his head, a look of fond exasperation on his face. “He can be so willful. At any rate, our association comes to an end now.” He looked at Mr. Hati. “I’d like to be back in the city by morning—clean up when you’re finished here. And don’t forget to turn off the lights when you leave.”
They chuckled and Mr. Hati said, “Yes father,” and closed the door behind Morgan. He grinned at Lex. “Just an old joke between us.”
He walked around the table Lex was spread across, trailing his fingers over his skin as he walked. Lex watched him without interest. He was waiting for what would come next, certain that it would be nasty, brutal and not much different than what he’d suffered before—just this time, he wouldn’t walk out of the room.
“Last game, Alexander. Last game.” He waited for one of the attendants to roll a metal cart to the table. Lex took a deep breath, let it out and closed his eyes. Mr. Hati tapped him on the cheek. “Ah-ah. You need to keep your eyes open. I can help you do that if you wish.”
Lex shook his head quickly, his disinterest dissolving away and fear rushing in to take it’s place. He looked at the gleaming array of metal instruments on the spotless white cloth. He recognized most—there were some he thought he’d rather be dead before find out what they did….
Mr. Hati sliced a long, long gash, from the base of Lex’s throat to his navel, shallow, barely splitting the skin. He jerked, and groaned, and the blade was levered under his skin—a million years in hell passed as it was yanked back and forth, lifting skin away from muscle. Lex arched, bit down on his lip so hard, blood poured down his chin. He jerked against the restraints, whipped his head back and forth in his fight to stay silent. Mr. Hati stopped and stroked his forearm. “You can scream—there is no one for you to be brave for, and I rather like the sound.”
Lex panted, his sides heaved and he grit his teeth but that man was right. There was no point in trying to keep what he wanted from him—he was going to get it sooner or later anyway.
The next time the knife went in, time compressed, every action was intensified, was crystal clear, and happened over and over, endless loop and he screamed, screamed his head off. He jerked and howled and Mr. Hati approved. The knife slid in through muscle, and glanced off bone—he levered a sliver of flesh out and chewed on it thoughtfully as he examined the items on the tray. Lex screamed until he felt light headed and his throat hurt, he screamed until--
--screamed again when water sprayed hard as needles against his flayed skin, and woke him, screamed when it stopped. Blood sluiced into the drains sunk in the tiles, the attendants swept squeegees around the floor, wiped the pink water off the surface of the table and Lex, stepped back so Mr. Hati could continue.
“I like to have a clear view of what I’m doing,” he smiled. Lex quivered as his body tried to heal what was happening as fast as it was happening. Time seemed to skip wildly—he closed his eyes and opened them, and the room was spotless, the smell of blood was gone, he was alone—he wondered briefly if what had gone before was hallucination or was this moment the hallucination? The knife slid in again as answer, a hot burning tug, he heard the edge of the blade grind against his bone and—
Fractured, time, in bits and pieces, it—and clearly he felt, hot and by turns so cold and tasted blood in his mouth, the water dried and he felt clammy—
That man leaned over and kissed him, hummed as if he tasted something delicious. “You know, after we finish with you, we have a new project. An ex-employee…” he chuckled, “An ex-everything now, I suppose, gave us interesting information about you…why didn’t you tell us about your other meteor affected friend?”
Lex had no doubt what friend he meant.
“After we’re finished here, we’ll collect him, too. I’m looking forward to the fun.”
And that, Lex thought, was about enough.
Time stretched out of shape, soft and sticky as hot taffy and filled him with—a good feeling. It was a very good feeling.
He looked inside himself and was surprised. He looked outside himself and was amazed. It was all so simple. He thought about how simple everything was while the bolts holding the table together expressed a desire to fall, so he let them. They unscrewed themselves, trembling little bits of metal he could feel with his mind—too slow. Faster. Bolts flew out of the table, dropped to the floor with click after click—he shook his head.
Too slow.
He sat up as his restraints fell to dust. He thought about how that felt and how there was a…a Thing holding everything together—felt that. He felt it holding the air back—he felt it under his feet, holding earth together—he felt it inside himself and saw how it held him together…he looked at the attendant foolish enough to still be within his reach. Put his hand on his arm and felt the Thing holding him together, stopped it and the attendant blew into a red mist, coating the walls and floor.
Lex stood and was the center of a whirlwind of metal, vinyl, paper, blood…Mr. Hati smiled and backed away, backed up until he was pressed against the slightly slimy tiled wall. Smiled as Lex reached out to silence the screaming attendant--the one smart enough to try to run. Lex twitched the Thing inside and unraveled it, skin dropped off muscle like wet sheets, veins slid down to heap around his feet like cooked spaghetti, and muscles turned to loops and loops of meat and organs slithered out of disintegrating bone...it was a loud disintegration. Lex watched it all fascinated. Fascinated.
He stared at his hands, spread out before him, searched the lines and whorls of his fingerprints, the pores, the minute sparkle of something in the creases of his flesh--he studied himself, looking for the difference…looked around the pink room. Locked eyes with that man.
That man stared at him, expressionless—the whirlwind collected, slowly drifted towards him, and bits of sharp metal lodged in his flesh—his lips peeled back in a pained snarl—or smile. Lex shrugged. Hard to tell with that one.
“Last game.” Lex’s voice sounded odd, he thought. Hollow and…he wasn’t sure his lips had moved--what he wondered, did it sound like to Hati? So unreal…he blinked, and it felt like it took a million years, and when his eyes opened again, that man was bleeding from a million wounds.
“Too simple.”
That man was whining now, but he needed to be screaming. Lex smiled.
******
“My hand is so far inside you, can you feel it?” Lex whispered, and imagined he laughed. “That’s a joke.” His hand twisted inside that man, feeling the weight of organs, the warmth of blood. Heat rose in his body, filling him—sweat ran down his back and legs and dripped to the floor…he slid his hand out and stroked his finger over that quivering arm and as he did, a fine red mist rose up and floated over the skin. Lex liked the effect, and did it again and again. He pulled an edge of torn skin up and it unraveled like knitting, falling away—where he touched, his fingertips left red and white blisters against that man’s flesh—and he screamed—shrieked. Lex was disappointed. It didn’t give him the satisfaction he thought it would. He waved his hand and wandered away and Mr. Hati danced in the center of his own white and red whirlwind—a fine fog red as roses swirled around him, he danced and got thinner, danced and got thinner….
Lex thought about that lack of satisfaction. He reached out, pushed a bit of his mind into that man’s and was surprised at the depth of pain he felt—amazed at his desire to hang onto life, no matter how horrific it had become.
Interesting.
He reached out farther and felt Morgan in his office, glanced over his thoughts, he watched staff clean the building, the apartments, watched his own room being dismantled, and a new one being stocked…interesting. He blew the wall out of the room he was in—reached along the Thing that held all of it together and plucked at it—exploded most things alive in the building. He was burning now, inside and out, the tiles under his feet ran like water. He walked out through the wall, and made the building into a fireball, and made sure two people felt it as long as possible.
He considered unraveling the Thing that held him together –it twitched when he touched it—he thought how easy it would be to unravel the Thing that held the earth together…people were monsters, they truly deserved to die…he’d walk a bit first, think about it, before he did it….
He walked out into the desert, with every step he left glass footprints…he walked and burnt, and healed, his skin peeled and fell in streamers and under that new pink skin formed and burnt, and after a while, he began using himself for fuel to sustain the healing, over and over, until his skin was black, and muscle dried on his skeleton. There was no sensation—no smell, no sound, no feeling, no sight.
All around him, in waves, things died…
A day, two days, weeks, months…time had no meaning, no place here. In the blackness, he heard that man mocking him, laughing, whispering. Lex shook his head and kept walking…his father teased him, laughed at him, officially disowned him—again. He shut his lashless lids against the black and walked on, on, on…Clark walked next to him silently for miles and miles before turning to him and saying, “You’re disgusting--,” Lex faltered, took a deep breath of nothing, walked on in the dark “-- what you did—it turned my stomach." Lex stopped. He turned his head towards him, and Adam looked back at him with sad eyes, said solemnly, “it’s true.” Lex yelled shut up and pulled at the Thing—pulled and….
The bubble around him collapsed, sight, sensation, and the horrible burning heat rushed in, closed in on him, and he screamed, physically, mentally, every cell, every particle of him screamed a long, long shattering scream— a tornado, a twister of sand and scrub and…things flew up—and exploded.
******
Miles away, high above the ground, Clark saw a red and black cloud swirl on the horizon, grow fat, collapse on itself and drop—he heard his name, so loud, he slapped his hands over his ears and it echoed loud and painfully inside his skull until he thought it would deafen him. He yelled back, LEX!
And heard faintly, Clark help me, kill me.
continued in part 5
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(no subject)
9/10/06 10:14 am (UTC)Fuck Fuck Fuck Fuck Fuck.
Wow, you have seriously earned this icon today.
I thought you were actually going to kill Lex off, for a second, there, but this is almost worse. Not that it wasn't great to see Hati and his minions get their karmic payback, but what has this done to Lex?
::Weeping and wailing and gnashing teeth.:: How the hell can Clark fix this, when he can't even cope with his parents?
(no subject)
9/10/06 01:36 pm (UTC)(no subject)
9/10/06 08:01 pm (UTC)I forgot to mention that I *loved* that after all he's been through himself, it was the threat to Clark that unleashed his powers. And this was, by the way, a beautifully written if completely painful-to-read chapter. And when I wondered if Clark could save him, I guess what I really meant was, can Clark even call him back to himself?, or is his individuality just going to be consumed by his raw power? Wah!
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9/10/06 01:33 pm (UTC)Not everything works.
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9/10/06 11:38 am (UTC)Forgive my confusion, but help!
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9/10/06 01:33 pm (UTC)And it's not comics, it's just me. *G* Sometimes an idea works and sometimes it just kind of...pfff
It was fun though! *G*
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9/10/06 07:11 pm (UTC)(no subject)
9/10/06 12:26 pm (UTC)(no subject)
9/10/06 01:29 pm (UTC)(no subject)
9/10/06 12:55 pm (UTC)I'm not sure what I think about this chapter, to be honest.
Has Lex developed the power to disrupt matter on its basic level? Was what they did to him to blame for him developing this power?
That was surprising, but I'm not sure what happened at the end...
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9/10/06 01:28 pm (UTC)That was surprising, but I'm not sure what happened at the end...
Well, you're not alone. *g*
Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't
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9/10/06 01:50 pm (UTC)But thank you for the deaths of Hati and Edge and the various evil minions. I suppose Lionel was too far out of reach...?
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9/10/06 01:55 pm (UTC)(no subject)
9/12/06 07:36 am (UTC)(no subject)
9/10/06 02:13 pm (UTC)(no subject)
9/12/06 07:37 am (UTC)(no subject)
9/10/06 03:47 pm (UTC)This is brilliantly written. Complex - it took me a couple paragraphs to catch on to where you were going - but geeze, so vivid! It hurt just to read it.
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9/13/06 04:28 am (UTC)(no subject)
9/13/06 04:24 pm (UTC)(no subject)
9/10/06 04:06 pm (UTC)*pet pet pet pet*
Duuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuude.
Oh, jayzus.
*flails*
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9/12/06 07:42 am (UTC)(no subject)
9/10/06 05:56 pm (UTC)I loved the description of his emotions and his perception of the world as he flew higher and higher…
As for what happened to Lex, I don't know what to say, other than you left me a little bit confused, though in awe of the awesomeness of the writing. :)
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9/12/06 07:44 am (UTC)(no subject)
9/10/06 06:40 pm (UTC)(no subject)
9/12/06 07:46 am (UTC)Well, thank you so much! I'm glad you enjoyed it. It was very interesting to write.
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9/10/06 08:12 pm (UTC)2. Lex coming unhinged was haunting.
3. I love when you draw us into Clark's head and we are allowed to see him dealing with the emotions and feelings which goad him to keeping going no matter what anyone, his parents or Adam try to say.
Fabulous installment.
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9/12/06 07:47 am (UTC)(no subject)
9/10/06 08:59 pm (UTC)Okay. I never expected to get or view or have a metaphysical experience while reading Deal 4E. We read these stories about meta humans, but I feel that you have given us an inside look into what it is to be meta at the point when the actual change takes place, at the point where the catalyst occurs, and at the point where the individual's state of mind and state of being reaches and grows beyond the point of metamorphosis. I feel that having Lex burn is a metaphor that relates to how he is changing. I would compare it to baptism in Christianity. It's rebirth. It's change. It's a cleansing of old flesh. It's a higher level of thought and being. It's the ultimate epiphany, and the truth is either going to eat him alive or help him to reach that point beyond himself.
I like how Lex's major change is internal, even though it's affecting the world around him. And about that…in a way, it's kinda like Lex's internal turmoil and/or power becomes too much to contain on the inside, so it grows beyond. It's the shit how the idea of Clark suffering like he has is the catalyst for the change. It really goes to show how these two are connected, even though they are separated for a large part of the story. Clark is suffering as Lex suffers. Clark is changing as Lex changes. Damn. It's like whoa.
I had to relate what's going on with Lex to "Carrie" or "Firestarter" or even "Highlander" for me to help make sense of what's happened. All of these characters started out as ordinary people, for the most part. Then something happened to them. The outcome was "good" for some and not so good for others.
I'm thinking that you didn't have Lex suffer through everything he did and go through such a change just to croak. I'm hoping that what's taken place is not a dream or a hallucination, even if there is a very surreal quality about this piece. This update was truly an experience. Your mind is a deep, dark, and beautiful place. Thanks for getting all deep and shit and sharing that with us.
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9/13/06 04:34 am (UTC)(no subject)
9/12/06 12:19 pm (UTC)(no subject)
9/13/06 04:25 am (UTC)