The Ripple Effect
The house on Shepherd Street was a small frame house, like many in Smallville. The fully-equipped darkroom wasn't so common; neither was the huge aquarium next to it. The son of the house liked having both his passions close together. He'd developed a new passion recently, along with some new talents.
Lana Lang ducked into the Torch office hurriedly, looking over her shoulder as she came in.
"Avoiding border guards?"
Lana jumped, whirled, and smiled at her best friend and roommate, Chloe Sullivan. Editor of the school newspaper, she was never to be found without her digital camera except when she was in this office. Lana had once joked that Chloe took the camera into the bath with her. Their friend Pete had made a mildly dirty joke that had Chloe chasing him around the newsroom. Their friend, and once sort-of suitor Clark had turned away, fighting the blush that was the bane of his life - but was so cute!
"Just the cheerleading squad," Lana grinned.
"You quit the team nearly two years ago, Lana. I think the Pom-Pom Mafia have forgiven you for your desertion."
Lana gracefully dropped into the chair next to her blonde friend. "Actually, it's more like Felice and Isabel. They've been snapping and snarling all week. I think Felice actually reduced the newest recruit to the squad to tears."
"Y'know, they're not the only ones. Melissa Polenska in Drama Club, and Sophie, that senior who does modeling in Metropolis? They've both been acting jumpy and weird the past week or so."
"I also have a contribution, ladies." Lana and Chloe turned around to see Pete Ross coming towards them, his normal wide smile on his face. "I can name you four different jocks who've been acting like they've just found out that not only have their cornflakes been peed in - they've been soaked in the stuff for years. Sam and Eric on the football team with me, Chris on the basketball team, and Kenny, that guy who does the pentathlon."
Chloe frowned thoughtfully and bit her lip. Recognizing the look, Pete and Lana exchanged glances, and rounded back to Chloe.
"Chloe, this is not Wall of Weird material," Lana said, trying to head Chloe off before she really got started. Last week, Chloe had come home covered head to toe in blue mud. Gabe Sullivan, not the most house-proud of men, had come close to blowing his stack over the mess on the couch. Chloe's allowance had been cut for the next month to pay for the cleaning.
"Gotta go with Lana on this one," Pete chimed in, sensing the Sherman tank gaining momentum. "I mean, teenagers having mood swings, taking it out on their peers - that's not exactly hot news, especially in high school."
"Yeah, maybe." Then Chloe's eyes brightened. "But that's what happens to normal teenagers - like us."
Pete flexed his muscles, Tarzan-style, as he said, "Speak for yourself, Chlo! I happen to be a superior example of the species."
Chloe absently leaned over the desk and swatted him with a ruler. "Look, your average teenager goes through angst, true. But not these people! We're talking about the cream of the high school crop - the Golden Crew, who usually have such a good time in high school, that the rest of their lives don't live up to it." Lana grimaced, thinking how close she'd come to that herself, as Chloe rumbled onwards. "I mean, look at who we're talking about! The guys are all jocks - not just jocks, but star ones. We've got the football quarterback, and the head of the defensive line. Chris has been named MVP on the basketball team for three years running. Kenny's supposed to be our best shot at a track state championship in years.
"Then there are the girls. Head Cheerleader Felice and her second-in-command - who was also voted Homecoming Queen. Melissa's been the Queen of the Drama Club since Dawn Mills disappeared - both literally and figuratively - and Sophie Chu, Smallville's own supermodel. Granted, popular people can have problems too - like a hair gel catastrophe or something - one or two of them, maybe. But all of them? At the same time?"
Lana opened her mouth, and then closed it without saying anything; Pete didn't even bother. "Okay, what kind of time frame are we talking about?"
"Well, how long have the guys been acting strangely?" Chloe asked him.
Pete thought for a moment, then replied, "Well, Eric and Sam have been stomping around for a good three weeks now. Not so sure about the other two, but at least a week. How about the girls?"
Lana chimed in, "Felice and Isabel have been acting like they have industrial strength PMS for about four weeks. Melissa was fine last week."
"Hmm, Sophie joined the club sometime in the last couple of days, I think. So, any particulars about the way they're acting?"
Pete interrupted, "Ladies, may I suggest we adjourn to the Talon? I for one would think better with a mocha latte in front of me."
Lana's doe-eyes widened until she could give Bambi competition, and she exclaimed, "The Talon! Chloe, my shift starts in ten minutes!" At Chloe's blank look, she added, "You promised to give me a ride, remember?"
"Yeah, on Wednesday-"
Pete and Lana chorused, "It IS Wednesday!"
Chloe jumped like she'd been stung, and dashed around the room turning off equipment. "Don't just stand there, turn something off and let's go!"
Half an hour later, Pete and Chloe were ensconced in their favorite booth with hot coffees in front of them. Lana joined them, the after-school crowd having left, and the after-dinner crowd still a couple of hours away. Besides, she could keep an eye on the entire ground floor from this booth - which was why Chloe liked it so much.
"Where's Clark?" asked Lana.
"With Lex," grumbled Pete. He and Clark had lost ground in their friendship when Lex Luthor had arrived in Smallville; they'd regained it when Pete had become aware of Clark's true origins, but Pete was very aware that it was a responsibility he'd rather not have had. After the death of his almost-girlfriend Kyla, Clark had started drifting towards Lex again, so that now most of the time he spent with Pete was either when a new meteor mutant showed itself, or when Clark wanted to let loose with his gifts for a little while.
Pete had never really been able to get past his family's hatred with the Luthors, but he'd learned not to mention it when Clark was around, noticing the pinched, unhappy look the alien farmboy wore. In return, Clark did his best not to mention Lex.
As if Pete's musings had conjured him up, the angelic-looking teenager strolled through the doors, heading straight to them. Stopping a waitress on the way to give her his order, he swung into the booth next to Pete.
"Hey guys. What's up?"
"Chloe's on the track of a mutant who spreads teenage angst," Pete snickered. "Deliveries done?"
"Yeah, I'm meeting Lex."
Lana looked at her watch. "You made it here already?"
"Mom was heading into town anyway, she dropped me off down the street," Clark immediately replied.
Pete took a sip of coffee to hide his frown. One of the earliest results of learning Clark's secrets was finding just how often and how easily he lied. It had brought Pete face to face with the realization that a large part of what he'd previously considered Lex's bad influence on Clark was, in fact, an already existing facet of Clark's personality, if simply a result of the crushing secrets he was forced to keep. It still disturbed Pete that Clark had a dark side that was previously unknown to him, and that he hadn't even had an inkling of it before. Also, having found out early on - at the end of a poison needle - what the possible consequences to Clark's secret getting out could be, the possibility that he could put Clark, or even worse, himself, in similar situation again haunted Pete. Mr. Kent had assured him that the burden sat more lightly with time. Pete sure hoped so. All in all, he would have rather stayed in blissful ignorance.
As Pete mused, Chloe had been filling Clark in on the wave of gloom infecting formerly superior high school students. Clark gave that thoughtful look that used to make Chloe's knees wibble, then he looked past her and brightened.
His back straightened, his mouth stretched into a half-grin, and the light in his eyes increased by at least double. Pete could swear his complexion actually glowed, and he had no need to follow Clark's gaze. Chloe and Lana didn't need to look either.
"Hi Lex."
"Hey Lex."
The bald young millionaire strolled up to the table, and gave the table his trademark half-smirk, half-smile. When his gaze reached Clark, his eyes softened almost imperceptibly, and his lips stretched into a genuine, if small, smile.
"Ready to go?" he asked Clark.
Clark nodded eagerly. "Mary's spent the last three days giving me hints about the 'something special' planned for dessert."
"I don't know what it is either, but I promised your mother I'd let you bring some home."
Chloe had always gotten along with Lex - mostly due to Clark's influence, and that of her father, who was gaining more and more responsibility in LexCorp. That, along with her own fearlessness (and lack of tact) in pursuit of a story, prompted her to ask, "Lex? Up for a pop quiz?"
Lex gave her an amused look. "On what subject?"
"Hypotheticals of human behavior." Lex nodded, looking interested now, and Chloe leaned forward. "Okay, you have a group of teenagers. All beautiful, at least decently wealthy, popular, acclaimed, well treated by adults and loved - or feared - by their peers. Top of the heap, normal adolescent woes passing them by. Suddenly, all of them start acting differently. Irritable, take out their mood on others, nervous. Acting paranoid."
Lex leaned on the booth and frowned. "Any particular time they're worse than usual - any places they suddenly avoid, or act reluctant to approach?"
"Lockers," Pete remembered. "At least two of them look real jumpy when they get near their lockers. Either in the hall or the locker room."
"Cars, too," Lana added, Pete's memory triggering her own. "Felice was looking in her car yesterday like there were bees in the front seat."
"Well, given the information you've given me, my best guess would be a severe shakeup of their world view. Threat to their security, and their belief of their own superiority. Did they all start acting like this at the same time?"
"One or two at a time over the past month, near as we can tell," Chloe said, intrigued.
"Best guess? They're being blackmailed."
"You have personal experience of this?" Pete asked.
Clark looked sideways, a trace of a smirk on his own features, as if he knew what Lex was about to say.
"People have tried," Lex said with a full-blown smirk. "Thing about would-be blackmailers, though, is that they tend to have even worse secrets in their own lives. They're all cowards at heart; so they won't stand up to someone who turns their weapons back on them. This behavior is ongoing, correct?"
Chloe nodded. "Then you're not dealing with an information broker, who'll sell evidence then get out while they can. That type's simpler to just pay off, in the end. High school kids don't have much money as a rule-"
"As a rule, yeah," Clark teased gently.
"So I'm guessing you're dealing with someone who's getting off on the power trip. The thing about high school, is that those without power feel it more keenly than adults, who generally tend to just get on with their lives. They long for popularity more intensely, and resent those who have it more deeply. I'd say that someone who felt neglected is relishing the chance to have power over those who lorded it over him or her. The money's secondary; the most important thing is making the victims squirm. Hypothetically speaking."
"Hypothetically speaking," Chloe grinned.
"If this behavior has been a recent thing," Lex told Chloe, "then I'd say you're dealing with someone who's only just started their career. Try someone who's into photography of some kind, or carries a tape recorder around - someone who took advantage of an opportunity. This person's ripples wouldn't spread so far without evidence. Two, maybe three people might believe he had the information without proof, but no more than that."
"Ripples?" asked Lana.
"It's the ripple effect. The blackmailer found out one person, probably by accident - they could have set out to target someone, but given we're dealing with high schoolers here, I doubt it. They discovered what it was like to have someone else in their power, and they wanted more. With each person, the power rush increases, and with each person, the ripples of influence spread further. Each person touched by the blackmail takes out their troubles on someone else, so the ripples start anew."
Pete looked at Lex thoughtfully. Lex occasionally showed a side of himself that surprised Pete; like when Lex had come in during the situation at the plant with Earl Jenkins, or how he'd helped out Clark with the whole Ryan thing. Now, what Lex was saying described a lot like what he'd heard his dad say about Lionel Luthor. Pete tried to imagine what growing up with someone like that was like, and shivered.
"Ready to go, Clark?"
Clark grabbed his cup, chugged the last bit of his coffee, and stood. "I am now."
Clark and Lex exchanged smiles again and left with Clark throwing a farewell wave.
"More grist for the rumor mill," Pete sighed. Chloe was staring into space with the 'wheels are turning at light speed' expression, but Lana registered what he'd said, and looked at him with an enquiring expression.
Pete just shook his head. Both Chloe and Lana had been romantically interested in Clark for some time, until Clark put an end to it with a 'let's be just friends' speech. This had confirmed what Pete had long thought but never told the girls; that Clark wasn't nearly as interested in them as they - or even he - had thought. Pete had also never told the girls that rumors had swirled around the locker rooms for almost two years about Clark and Lex, and the exact extent of their relationship. From what he'd overheard his dad and uncles talk about, quite a bit of the town's adult population liked to speculate on the subject too.
He'd even heard one of Whitney's buddies sneering that since Kent was obviously a fag, they'd chosen right for the Scarecrow; a piece of information that had shocked Pete to the ground. He never would have dreamed that Clark was the Scarecrow last year - or that Clark ever would have gone through an experience like that and not told him. But then he'd learned about Clark's origins, and Pete realized Clark had been through a lot of trauma that he'd never shared, except with his parents. But Pete had made some hints to Jonathan Kent once, and it was obvious that neither of his parents knew about the Scarecrow incident, either. So Clark could only have shared that particular trauma with Lex. It was that realization that stopped Pete from quizzing Clark on the subject of his friendship with Lex.
"Okay, so who are the suspects?" Chloe asked.
Pete thought for a minute. "I can't think of anyone who's into audio stuff a lot. A couple guys in the drama club, maybe, but they're into music and stuff, too. They wouldn't be into blackmail like this - they've got identities of their own, y'know? Also, no one who's really into film making either, not since Donnie Stanley graduated last year. Dawson sure wouldn't find any like-minded people at Smallville High."
"So that leaves someone who's into photography," Lana stated. "We don't have a photography club or anything - the only people I can think of work on the Torch. Anyone else?"
Chloe thought for a minute. "Darkroom! If someone's been taking photos for proof of something wrong - 'cause these people aren't embarrassed by anything, at least not this badly - they'd need to get the photos developed. If they took the film to a developing place in Smallville, whoever developed the film would probably tell the Sheriff or the kids' parents. Not very effective. The blackmailer would need to develop and make prints themselves."
"So that leaves the Torch again, doesn't it?" Pete asked.
Chloe sighed exasperatedly. "I can't believe I had a new mutant right under my nose and didn't realize it! Okay, there are only a few photographers on the Torch staff. I do a lot of it myself."
"Jackson Fischer," Pete said, the words almost popping out of his mouth. "He's really into photography - and he has his own darkroom, doesn't he?"
"That's right," Chloe replied. "I made him the main news photographer because he has a talent for finding newsworthy shots - he has a real need to know·" she trailed off, grimacing. "And all of a sudden I'm seeing how that could be a bad thing."
"You didn't get tipped off by the fit Clark had over you snooping into his biological parents behind his back?" Pete snarked. Chloe gave him a hurt look, but Pete's return gaze was implacable.
Even without knowing about Clark's background, he still would have thought that she was way out of line on that one. He adored Chloe, but that didn't let her off the hook for how irresponsibly she'd acted over that. Clark had ASKED her to drop it, and she hadn't. Pete thought Clark should have stayed mad at Chloe for a while longer, actually. From what Pete could see, it hadn't slowed Chloe down at all, and if she kept charging in the way she did, one day she was going to really hurt someone.
It was one reason he'd counseled Clark to never tell Chloe what he was. Chloe would see it as the story of the century; best case scenario, it was plain cruel to dangle something like this in front of her, knowing she could never tell anyone. Worst case, she would start digging deeper - because Chloe seemed permanently heedless of the consequences of her own 'need to know'. Thus drawing the attention of someone who could follow her straight to Clark - someone with very unfriendly intentions to Clark and his powers. Pete used to watch X Files like anyone else; the thought of what the government could do to - or with - Clark gave him the cold sweats.
Lana broke the tension with, "So, what next?"
Chloe shook off Pete's comment, and said, "Well, since Jack has his own darkroom, we should check it out. He's more likely to be keeping stuff there than anywhere else. If there's nothing there, we go back to the suspect list." Chloe looked at her watch. "He's bound to be home by now, want to try tomorrow?" Pete nodded, and she asked, "You, Lana?"
Lana nodded, then asked, "Does this make me D'Artagnan?" Chloe raised her eyebrows, and Lana added, "Well, Clark and you two are normally, like, the three musketeers on these things. But I've only been involved a couple of times. If you guys and Clark are Athos, Porthos and Aramis, does that make me D'Artagnan?"
Chloe broke 'serious investigative reporter' mode to giggle. "Why not?"
"What about Clark?" Pete asked.
Lana shook her head. "He's going with Lex to Metropolis tomorrow night, remember? The foundation LexCorp set up to fund research into brain cancers is having a fundraiser, and Lex is determined to get Clark into a 'decent suit' if it's the last thing he does."
The next day saw the trio taking the Pete-mobile to Jack's house, but no one was home.
"So, what now?" asked Lana.
Chloe thought for a minute. "I've stopped by here to pick up photos from Jack before - he doesn't have a scanner and refuses to use digital cameras, so I need to get the hard copy. Jack's darkroom is out the back of the house, so let's go have a look!"
Pete and Lana followed her down a small path down the side of the house and across the backyard, to a small shed. The glittering structure next to it caught Lana's eye, and she stopped in front of it. "What is this?"
"Jack's aquarium," Chloe told her. "Biggest one in Lowell County, he told me. Six feet tall, six feet long, and three feet deep."
"Oh, right," Lana remembered. "Jack did that project for the last science fair on his chameleons."
Chloe went on to try the door; as she'd expected, it was locked. She'd invested in a set of lock picks during her internship at the Planet, so she grabbed them and went to work. Lana watched her in shock; Pete in mild disapproval, muted by the fact he couldn't really say anything, given the situation.
She quickly popped the lock, and they trooped in. Chloe felt around for the light switch; if she remembered rightly, the bottom switch was the safelights, the top the regular ones. She switched on the safelights, first, just in case. The eerie orange glow made the room look like something out of a Halloween haunted house.
"Spooky," Lana remarked.
"Have a look to see if Jack's left out anything that could be affected by the regular lights - we don't want him to know we've been here," Chloe ordered briskly.
After getting the okay from Pete, Chloe put on the regular lights. "So, let's see what we can find. I found a spare key to that filing cabinet in his desk at the Torch, so I'll take that. You guys have a look around for anything hidden."
Chloe methodically went through the files in the cabinet, nicely labeled. Blackmailer or not, Chloe admired his filing system; it seemed to work a lot better than hers. Meanwhile, Pete went through the desk, and Lana was shifting boxes and looking in the closet to find something. She was making some bangs, and Chloe made a mental note to give her tips on quiet searching.
Chloe was halfway through the bottom drawer, when Lana exclaimed, "Look at this!"
Chloe turned, but all she could see was Lana's back. Pete came from behind her, and they went to Lana together. Lana was sitting on the floor in front of the closet, and she'd removed a panel from the back, revealing a magazine-type rack attached to the wall. The reinforced sides to the closet covered the gap between the closet and the wall, making the rack invisible from the sides. The rack was stuffed full of yellow envelopes, each labeled with a name - in alphabetical order.
Chloe reached forward and grabbed the one with Felice's name on it, opening it up.
"Chloe, should we be doing this?" Lana asked in concern.
Chloe was about to sigh, then realized Lana had a legitimate concern. "Look, what Jack's doing is wrong, and he needs to be stopped. But if these people have done something wrong as well, they need to face the consequences of their actions. If we don't look at these, we don't know whether we should send them to the cops, or the principal. Or even if some of them should just get their photos back."
Pete nodded reluctantly, and reached for Eric's envelope. Lana reached for Melissa's.
Chloe took out a series of date-stamped photos, showing quite clearly that Felice had broken into the locker of another girl on the cheerleading team - one that Felice particularly disliked, but who had gotten onto the team before Felice had been made captain and could choose the members. Felice was shown taking out a prescription bottle, and substituting the pills with something Felice brought out of her own bag. Jack had opened the locker after Felice had left, then taken a close up shot of the bottle.
"Anyone remember if Liz Barnes was taking medication?"
"Doesn't she have bipolar disorder? I remember that she had that 'episode' a couple of months ago. She was in hospital for a week or so, then they adjusted her medication and sent her home," Lana replied.
With a grim look on her face, Chloe displayed the shot of Felice replacing the pills. "Looks like Felice tampered with her meds."
With a matching look, Pete displayed held up his own envelope. "Eric was having a lot of trouble with history. Looks like he took a few shortcuts preparing for that big test we had last month - like breaking into the teacher's desk to get a look at the test."
They both looked at Lana. She shook her head and held tight to the envelope. "Melissa didn't do anything illegal, or against school rules. I vote we just give these back to her." Chloe gave Lana her best beseeching look, the one that never failed to get her the remote off her Dad. Lana wasn't immune to it either; she sighed and revealed, "She's been seeing Derek Wheeler."
"Despite the fact that the Wheelers and the Polenskas are in the middle of a very nasty court case about Mrs. Polenska landing in hospital after eating at the Wheeler's restaurant," Pete continued.
Something had been nagging at Chloe, and now it hit her. She looked at some of Felice's photos again, then craned her neck to look at Eric's. She then leaned forward and took the envelope out of Lana's hand. Lana went to protest, but Chloe soothed her with, "I just want to check something." A minute later she exclaimed, "I thought so!"
"Thought what?" Pete asked.
"Look at these photos - the angles, I mean," Chloe held up the photo of Felice for emphasis. "She's straddling the bench, and this is a profile shot. To get this, Jack would have needed to be standing against the opposite bank of lockers. And Eric?" she pointed at the photo Pete held. "The shot was taken near the back wall, see the windows on one side, and the door on the other? I bet if we looked at the others, we'll find that Jack needed to be within ten to fifteen feet to get them. So how does he get that close without them seeing him?"
"You're not suggesting another invisible man scenario, are you Chloe? We've already had two of those and another would be a stretch," Pete pointed out.
Chloe frowned. "Good point. I doubt the same mutation would occur more than a couple of times. Meteor mutations don't work that way. I've only come across a couple of cases where a particular 'talent' has happened more than once." Chloe looked at a wall-mounted photo of Jack's aquarium, and it hit her. "Chameleons!" She hurried outside to the aquarium, Lana and Pete hot on her heels.
They all gazed into the aquarium, before Lana asked, "Do you really think Jack's somehow become a human chameleon? How could that happen?"
"All the mutants who weren't affected at the time of the shower itself have been altered by something in their immediate environment." Chloe squinted at the far wall of the aquarium, then hurried around to get a closer look. "Check out this panel of glass! It's different from the rest of the tank. Maybe Jack fell in, and they bit him for invading their turf! How many does he have, anyway?"
"At least two dozen," Lana remembered. "I remember him telling me at the science fair that he breeds them for an exotic pet store in Metropolis. All the ones he has now, he bred and raised himself in Smallville-" she broke off, and all three of them looked at the chameleon currently on view, lying on a branch near the glass. Suddenly, the chameleon's tongue shot out, trapping and swallowing a fly that had been sitting on the inside of the glass. Chloe stooped to take a closer look at the glass. There was a green stain right where the chameleon's tongue had touched it.
"Remember Greg Arkin?" Chloe pointed out. "He took on the abilities of bugs after he was bitten by a swarm of them - you need a certain level of toxicity to trigger the mutation. They'd been feeding in Smallville's infected ecosystem for generations. If these chameleons have all been bred here, then they - and their parents - must have been feeding on plant life that grew in Smallville all their lives."
"So what do we do now?" Lana asked. "We can't let Jack keep doing this. But if we go to the police, it's our word against his - and breaking and entering isn't exactly legal either."
Chloe shrugged. "We give the photos to whoever's appropriate. We leave a note for Jack telling him that if he does this again, we'll tell his victims who it is, and let them deal with it. Given Eric's temper, I'm guessing that would land Jack in hospital, and he'll know that."
The three of them took all the evidence they could find - the negatives were in another envelope in the desk - and made tracks.
Later Thursday night
Lana carefully locked the door, and sat down on her bed, looking at the envelope in her hands. Since she'd been the one to initially find Jack's blackmail envelopes, she'd checked them out before calling Chloe and Pete over. The one labeled 'Luthor' had immediately jumped out at her, and she hadn't been able to resist taking a peek. She'd only had the first photo halfway out before knowing this was something that she shouldn't show anyone else.
Lana was a 'nice' girl, but she had as much curiosity (and hormones) as the next teenager, as well as cable. Lana's 'fairy princess' image was no proof against the appeal of Brian Kinney and Justin Taylor, and her 'Queer as Folk' addiction was one of her most guarded secrets. So while Lana herself was sexually inexperienced, she could tell gay sex when she saw it, even when - or especially when - it could only be seen from the waist down.
Pete was as blinkered on the Luthors as he had ever been; one look and he'd be telling everyone in town that Lex couldn't confine himself to one gender. Even in the twenty-first century, small-town Kansas could be very close-minded. Lex had enough on is hands dealing with Smallville's population as it was. Chloe already had the hardened journalists' view that there was no such thing as 'none of her business' when it came to something or someone newsworthy. She would probably keep quiet in Smallville, but she wouldn't be able to keep something this juicy to herself forever. At the very least, she'd tell her father, and who knew what would happen then?
Lana, on the other hand, had never had anything but good come from associating with Lex Luthor. Granted, she'd had problems with Lex before, but that was down to that mutant wife of his, and he'd done his best to rectify things. With or without the Talon, Lana had never, in her personal knowledge, come across anything that indicated Lex didn't deserve the same privacy as everyone else. So before she called over Chloe and Pete to see what she had found, Lana had slid the envelope into her inside jacket pocket without a word.
Now, as Lana took her first good look at the pictures, her eyes widened and she silently blessed the impulse that had led her to keep the envelope to herself. She hadn't seen Lex's partner in the pictures previously, and while she hadn't known about this relationship, she wasn't really surprised. Part of her had suspected the extent of the relationship between Lex Luthor and Clark Kent all along.
Lana thought about giving these to Lex for about one second - then the blush that set her skin on fire from her hairline to her breasts put paid to that idea. Clark was definitely the person to go to. It would also give her the chance to tell him that his relationship with Lex made no difference to their friendship. Having a secret love like this couldn't be easy; it would help Clark to know that there was at least one person he could just talk to about it. And yeah, she was curious.
Sunday night
Lana climbed the stairs to Clark's loft, surreptitiously squeezing the envelope in her inside jacket pocket.
Clark was sacked out in his hammock, but as she came up the last few stairs his head came up. "Lana!" he called, smiling to see her. Lana smiled a little nervously in return, walking across the loft as Clark climbed out of the hammock. Clark picked up something from the trunk he used as a table, and told her, "Pete filled me in on the thing with Jack Fischer. For what it's worth, I think you guys did the right thing with the photos."
Lana grimaced in memory. While some of the photos had gone back to the people in them, the photos of Sophie's shoplifting habit had gone to the Smallville PD. Meanwhile, Eric was off the team for cheating on the test, as well as another member of the football team, who they hadn't suspected before as he'd been in a bad mood for months - a result of the steroid abuse that Jack had captured on film.
"Before I forget - this is Chloe's, isn't it?"
Lana looked at the barrette in his hand and sighed explosively in relief. "Thank goodness! Chloe lent it to me, but I lost it somewhere last Thursday. I was afraid that I'd lost it at Jack's place. It's pretty distinctive, and Jack worked at the Torch - if he'd recognized it, he'd know who sunk his operation."
"I can't imagine he'd be very pleased," Clark told her, his voice neutral. "He might even have come after her."
"Well, he hasn't been seen since school on Friday, so I don't think we have to worry about him."
"I doubt it. Not anymore."
Something in his voice made Lana look at him sharply. There was something hidden behind his eyes that once would have drawn a question from her, or a comment on honesty. But Henry Small had taught her that some secrets were better kept, and that everyone was entitled to privacy in their lives, even from their friends. Even from those that were more than friends.
"Anyway, that's sort of why I'm here," Lana said. "I haven't been able to catch you alone all weekend, so I finally resorted to tracking you to your lair."
Clark grinned, and Lana bit her lip, before taking out the envelope. "I found this with Jack's other photos. I - well, I was curious, so I took a look at it first." She passed him the envelope, adding, "Clark, no one else has seen these but me - and Jack, wherever he is, but I took a look at the note in there, and I don't think he's told anyone about these, either. Lex isn't the type of person who you can pull a shakedown on. He strikes back, and hard and fast. Even Whitney knew that - that's why he realized he was in over his head with that gang when they tried to mess with Lex."
Jack had put notes in each envelope, about the amounts each person was paying, the circumstances the photos had been taken in, and a few ideas on how to turn on the pressure. The only note in Lex's envelope had said, "Emergency use only."
Clark took out and read that note first; then he looked at the photos. He went pale, then red, then his skin turned it's normal golden shade, as he licked his lips, and his eyes took on a heated, glazed-over look. Lana couldn't blame him in the least; she'd needed a glass of water after looking through the photos. She wouldn't have thought Lex was the type to enjoy being tied up, though. But even with the chains, Lana had absolutely no doubts that their relationship was completely consensual on both sides.
Clark suddenly remembered that she was there, and looked at her. The look in his eyes hurt Lana for a moment; Clark had never before looked at her like he was appraising her as a potential foe. A guardian who wasn't sure whether she was a danger or not.
"I'm not going to tell anyone, Clark, I swear. But I thought it would be better if these came directly from me," Lana moved closer, and said gently, "and I thought you could use a friend to talk to."
"Yeah, maybe," Clark said, that beautiful smile breaking over his face.
Lana smiled in return, then her smile turned mischievous as she teased, "Pretty hot stuff, Clark. I asked Whitney once about why porn turns guys on so much, but I didn't understand his answer. I think I get it now, but I don't think he'd understand the appeal in this case."
Clark blushed, looking proud of himself at the same time. Lana grinned in return, then poked him in the ribs. "So? Gimme the details, Clark. Spill!"
Clark laughed in return, then pulled her down with him to the couch. Lana had barely sat down before Clark started talking, the words spilling from him like a waterfall. Lana simply listened to her friend.