Obsessions Chapter 14-B

And the second half of Chapter 14.





14 -B
Lex drifted out of sleep, slow luxurious process. Warmth, comfort, the smell of fabric softener and Clark filling his senses. Dream like. Almost he thought it was; one of those terrible, wistful dreams that would shatter the moment he opened his eyes to harsh reality. It wasn't until he moved and the full body ache hit him, at odds with soft sheets and comforting smell, that he realized it was real.

For a few moments he lay there, everything swaying, sickeningly adrift, disorientation hitting him so hard that his vision blurred. The room was unfamiliar. Posters on the wall, alcove windows with country print curtains, worn dresser and desk with a stack of what might have been school books stacked at the end. A book bag on a hook over a closet door.

Clark's room. Clark's smell on the pillow. Flashes of Clark appearing like a nightmare or a dream in front of him. He only vaguely recalled details from the rest. Faint recollections of a woman's voice, a woman's soft touch. Martha Kent.

The Kent farm. Clark had brought him home.

Clark had taken him from that place - - that place.

He jerked up, black panic crowding in around the edges, things swarming his head that he couldn't stop or control. His body ached, his shoulders did, everything below the waist throbbed with dull pain. He clutched the sheets, stared at white banding his wrists. White eaten through with tiny spots of dried red. He lifted a hand to his throat, but the collar was gone.

Decker was gone. Please God - - and Lex bent double and breathed. Just breathed and tried to get a grip on the anxiety that wanted to eat him up from the inside out. He'd hit the wall, Lex thought he remembered Clark flinging Decker into a wall. Clark appearing in front of him, materializing like a ghost or an alien with powers beyond human ken, and him fresh from a rage induced bout of torture and rape. Shame. Shame. Huge and ponderous.

He didn't remember much after. Save the niggling awareness that he'd called Clark and Clark had come. Clark had come. He half recalled a million years ago, Clark telling him he loved him - - earnest boy, earnest eyes - - there for him. Half destroyed for him.

He had to pee. Badly. He pushed sheets aside and found he was dressed. A pair of overlarge pajama bottoms and a t-shirt. He had no more memory of donning those than he did of getting his wrists bandaged.

His legs almost buckled when he put weight on them. Not so much the residual aches as simple hunger induced weakness, he suspected. There was a bathroom at the end of the hall. He leaned a hand on the wall over the toilet and winced, urine pink tinged and stinging like acid on the way out.

He shut his eyes, shuddering, flashback image of Decker close behind him, callused hand circling him, not even allowing him the decency of urinating on his own. He clenched his teeth, fighting back a weird empty sort of nausea. There was nothing even close to food on his stomach to come up.

He paused at the mirror, almost didn't recognize himself. He looked like some death camp survivor. Haunted and gaunt. So close to broken there was hardly a distinction. The faint red bruising around his neck made his skin crawl. He lifted fingers to it, tracking the edges where the collar had been. He could almost smell the leather. Almost smell the stink of unwanted sex.

The mirror reflected the claw footed bathtub with its drawn shower curtain behind him. The sudden need to douse himself in hot water was overwhelming. He pulled off the shirt with an effort. His shoulders were stiff, his side protested the raising of his arms. Shucked off the drawstring pants and almost tripped over them in his haste.

The water took a while to heat, but that was okay, he'd gotten used to cold showers - - cold water pumped inside him - -

God. God. He pressed his palms to the wall under the nozzle, quaking, vision black around the edges. The water was warm by the time he recovered enough to fumble for soap and a cloth folded over the rack hanging from the shower faucet. He scrubbed until his skin felt pink and raw, kept at it, until the water ran Luke warm and then cold again. Stood there blindly under the spray until a gentle rapping on the door finally snared his attention.

"Lex? Are you okay?"

He didn't know how long he'd stood there, but his fingers were wrinkly and waterlogged, and the fog on the mirror had had the time to dissipate.

He cut the water, took a breath and assured her he hadn't fallen and cracked his head open. Or slit his wrists and bled out.

He stepped out of the tub, slow moving, like an old man, or a young one only just beginning to appreciate the scope of all his aches. Took his time drying off, and redressing. He wasn't sure what to expect of her. Of her husband. They had reason enough to resent his presence.

But there was nothing but concern on her face when he opened the bathroom door. She had a tray in her hands with a mug of something sending up curls of steam in her hand, a plate and a glass of what might have been apple juice. He luck wasn't good enough for it to be scotch.

He stared at her, feeling as if he'd been caught at something and not knowing what or why.

"I brought you something to eat. I would have woken you earlier, but I think you needed sleep more than food."

He was lost for words and he was never lost for words. He blinked at her, stalled, until she said his name firmly. "Lex. Come sit down and eat something."

She moved into Clark's room and after a frozen second he moved to follow her. She'd sat the tray down on the desk. There was buttered toast on the plate along side the mug of soup. It smelled like heaven. He thought he might cry.

"How long," he asked instead. "Was I - -gone?"

"Twenty-three days."

He shut his eyes, trying to reconcile that in his head with the eternity he thought had passed. Twenty-three days wasn't so bad. He'd thought it months.

She pulled out the chair, and he sat down in it, legs practically giving out under him.

"Clark brought me here?"

"Yes."

"How did he find me?"

She opened her mouth, seeming perplexed. "We don't know. We think maybe he heard something - -"

Lex swallowed, staring at her, but not registering her features, remembering hanging in that basement half out of his mind and calling Clark's name. And Clark had heard.

"Eat, Lex." Martha reminded him what his stomach was already begging.

He picked up the mug, was shaking too badly to hold it one handed, so cradled it between both palms. Chicken soup, with soft, wide noodles and little diced vegetables that melted in the mouth. The finest chefs in the world had nothing on Martha Kent.

"How long have I been here?"

"Sixteen hours." She said, sitting on the end of Clark's bed. "You've been asleep for sixteen hours. We didn't call the authorities, Lex, But I think we need to. Your father at least ought to know you're alive - -"

They hadn't called - -? Ah, he did recall something along those lines. Him pleading with them not to.

"Let him wonder," he said bitterly.

He consumed the toast, drank the water and sat there, staring at Clark's books. Remembering Clark's blank stare. Wanting Clark here now and wondering why he wasn't.

"Clark? What's wrong with Clark?"

He saw the change in her face, the little crumple of exhaustion and worry that she couldn't hide and he felt himself crumple a little along with her. He almost didn't want to hear. He didn't have the strength to deal with one more blow.

"He - - Clark hasn't been himself since you were - - since we found him. He's healed - - physically - - but, mentally - - he's - - it's like he's just not there. He'll get better though. I know he'll get better."

He stared at her, aghast, remembering those holes in Clark's head so vividly it was as if the blood were staining his hands this very moment.

"God," he whispered. There was nothing in him capable of optimism. It had been wrenched, torn and shocked out of him at the hands of a madman.

He gripped the edge of the desk, trying to wrap his mind around it. Around everything. Twenty-three days. And Decker might still be out there. He wanted to crawl into a hole, never face his father, never face the probing questions of the authorities, the worse questions the press would throw at him, but there was no avoiding it. He still needed that story.

He could lie and claim there had been no kidnapping, no three weeks of hell that the press would stretch their imaginations speculating over. Say he'd been on a binge, say anything to avoid the jackals. He'd never cared so much when he'd been younger - - never had face to protect. A business that had probably suffered since his disappearance to maintain. Never had people that mattered to shield.

Priorities warred. Emotions he'd always been so damned good at hiding, surging with tsunami force, trying to cripple him. Fear/shame/guilt/the need to protect what was important to him. The only thing that was important to him.

He didn't give a fuck about the business, but Clark - - to keep Clark from getting dragged into the sordid affair this was sure to devolve into, he'd endure what he had to endure. He'd survived embarrassing press before.

But not in Clark's overlarge clothing. Not anywhere near this farm. He needed distance and he needed his own things to shore him up. He wouldn't face the authorities in shambles. And Lionel could rot in hell for all Lex cared, but he had a sway with the powers that be, and a mind for outmaneuvering tricky situations. He might be an asset, might have enough buried remnants of guilt for his past deeds that he could be persuaded to help a son in desperate need of a calm head and Machiavellian mind.

He looked back up at Martha, who was staring at him with wide, worried eyes.

"I need to go home."

He pushed himself up, legs shaky, a particular ache in his back that outshined the other various pains. Felt almost like a broken rib, and he thought Decker might have hit him high on the side with a fist wrapped in a leather belt after he'd spurred that last rage. Decker's rages had been more frequent during those last indecipherable periods between sleep. Whatever madness was eating at his brain taking firmer hold. He'd whispered promises to Lex of years of captivity, but Lex had the feeling he'd have snapped and killed him long before those dire threats could have been carried out.

"We'll take you home. Do you want to call anyone? The police? Your father to let him know?"

He shook his head. He didn't. He needed just a little more time to gather his calm. He worked his way down the stairs gingerly. The soup hadn't been enough. His stomach rumbled at the teaser, but if he stopped now, sat down and just let himself bask in the comfort of this time worn house, he might not be able to regather momentum anytime soon.

He froze, Martha on his heels, as Jonathan came through the kitchen door - - for a brief moment, having visions of Decker again. He shook it off. Forced himself to straighten when all he wanted to do was take a step backwards. There was a tremulous little flutter in his gut that he couldn't force down, at the man's glower and the heavy impact of his boots as he strode across the kitchen floor. Lex remembered very well this man's threats against him should he impose on his family again, this man's big hands tangled in his shirt when he'd come with the very distressing news of the situation Lex had brought down on their heads.

Funny that he hadn't particularly cared at the time, hadn't felt any particular fear - - but now. It was like anxiety had taken up residence and refused to vacate.

Jonathan looked over his shoulder, to Martha at his back, tightened his jaw. "You had your time, Lex. Have you come up with a way to keep us out of this?"

"Jonathan," Martha said, reprimand in her voice.

"Deflect and deny," Lex said simply. "You're good at that. You never saw me. I wasn't here." He forced himself to walk right up to Jonathan. "The sooner I'm out of here, the sooner we can put it to practice."

Jonathan muttered something under his breath, and Martha said something back, soft and sharp, but Lex wasn't paying attention, having caught sight of Clark through the kitchen window, standing in the middle of the dirt drive between house and barns. He moved around Kent, to the back door, not caring what the fuck the man thought. Clark was there and he needed to see how much of what he thought he remembered and what Martha had said was true.

The screen door swung closed behind him, and he walked out into the yard, barefoot. The sun was summer bright, high in the sky, so much warmer than flickering fluorescents. The yard smelled of cow dung and hay and the scent of whatever was in bloom in Martha Kent's garden. It filled his lungs, made his chest flutter from sheer appreciation. Clark did, standing there, white t-shirt, worn jeans, slope of neck, curve of biceps, strain of cotton across broad young shoulders.

He walked up next to him and Clark made no motion of acknowledgement. Simply stood, face turned to the sun, thick black lashes still on his cheeks. The only movement at all was the steady rise and fall of his chest.

Lex swallowed, aware peripherally of Jonathan and Martha on the porch and said very quietly for Clark and Clark alone. "I thought you were dead. I thought - -"

He broke off, all the things he'd thought, all the nightmares, all those Clark-dreams he'd tried to use as escapes damming up inside him. He pressed his forehead to Clark's shoulder and shuddered.

"You heard me when I called you. You need to hear me now."

The earth was liquid under his feet, the only solid ground Clark's shoulder, hard and unyielding. Like Clark's silence.

Clark was broken. Because of him. And maybe later he'd have it in him to attack the problem of fixing him head on - -if fixing were possible - - bits of brain and skull flashed across his mind's eye, relentless reminder of the scope of the damage - - but not now. He could barely think about it now, when there were so many pieces of himself strewn far and wide. Clark made it worse. Clark made him want to sink down and cry and he couldn't afford the weakness.

"Sorry. I'm so sorry."

"Martha will drive you to the mansion," Jonathan Kent laid a hand on his shoulder and Lex started, flinching back, heart thudding with fight or flight tempo until his vision broadened enough that he could recognize the man for who he was.

Jonathan looked a little surprised at his reaction, opened his mouth, shut it, muscle in his jaw ticking. Lex imagined he wanted him gone, imagined they were reluctant to leave Clark alone in his present state. Thank God they'd elected for Martha to take him, because he wasn't sure he could have dealt being trapped in the cab of a pickup truck with Jonathan. He suspected Jonathan had similar thoughts about him. God knew what else was going through the man's mind, with the way he not so subtly interposed himself between Lex and his motionless son.

Martha was coming down the porch steps, keys in hand, asking if he were ready.

He wasn't, but after a last look at Clark, he headed towards the truck anyway. Sun heated vinyl was uncomfortably hot through the thin material of his borrowed drawstring pants. There were a few cracks in the dash from age and heat. A gun rack with a shotgun on the rear window. The truck started up without a hitch though, when Martha turned the ignition. He didn't look in the rearview at Clark as she pulled down the drive.

"Tell me what's been happening? Who's been looking for me?"

"Everyone," Martha said. "State and local authorities. The FBI. Your father has his own private investigators searching as well, I believe."

So Lionel had pulled out all the stops. Gratifying, notion, if it hadn't been too little, too late. Lex tightened his fingers on the arm rest.

"We told them Clark was in shock. That he wasn't talking because of the trauma. They've been pressuring us to have him hospitalized. Hoping they could break through and get information out of him. They've set Child protective services on us and are trying to get a court order to have him removed for his own protection."

"God," He shut his eyes, a brief wash of vertigo assaulting him. He took a deep breath and chased it off. The last thing any of them needed was Clark in the hands of well-meaning medical professionals.
"Have you contacted a lawyer?"

"No," she said, soft ashamed voice. "We should have, but Jonathan doesn't hold much faith in - - he's been balking. Hoping Clark will snap out of it and it'll be a mute point."

"Your husband's a fool." Lex said bluntly. "I'll have my people take care of it."

"Lex - -"

He lifted a hand, waving off either refusal or thanks.

She drove for a while longer, hands tight on the wheel, then. "I know - - I know you've been through something horrible. If you need to talk - - I'm a good listener, Lex."

He almost laughed. Pinched the bridge of his nose instead, because the thought of having a heart to heart with Clark's mom about the last three weeks of torture and rape, was hysterically, morbidly hilarious.

"You need to talk with someone," she said softly, picking up maybe that he'd sooner slit his wrists than admit those things to her. "And the sooner the better. The longer you bottle these things up, the longer it'll take to heal."

He did laugh then. "An how many semesters of psychology did it take you to reach that conclusion?"

She gave him a look from the corner of her eye. A purse of naturally dark lips. "Four. But twenty- three years of marriage, and raising a child that finds trouble like he's magnetic north has given me a little insight. Nobody is ever so strong that they don't need a little help now and then. If you want to be able to help Clark, you have to help yourself first."

He swallowed at that shrewd observation, stared out at the summer corn flashing by the passenger side window. Leaned his head against the glass and thought as shrinks went, Martha Kent might be better qualified than any of cold-eyed bastards he'd ever been forced into seeing. There'd been a few after the meteor shower, when he'd been deep in his shame-coated shell, that his father had forced on him. None of them had been so much concerned for him, as they had been for kissing ass to Lionel Luthor.

"I won't hurt him," he said softly, breath fogging the glass. "I swear I'll never hurt him."

She sighed, reached out a hand and very gently brushed his forearm. He almost didn't flinch from the touch. "I know, Lex. I know you won't."

The walls along the perimeter of the estate flashed by. She pulled in to the gates, and he drew breath, gathering reserves.

The gates were open and the gate guard absent from the little ivy-covered gatehouse.

"Maybe he was called up the house," Martha suggested. It was possible. There was probably a great deal of traffic to and from the mansion related to the search efforts. But Lex felt a shiver of unease, regardless.

There were a few cars out front when they drove up. One he recognized as his father's assistant's, another domestic sedan with state plates. The tension eased. His nerves were so shot that a stray breeze could make him sweat at this point.

"This is as far as you need to go, Mrs. Kent. If anyone sees you, I'll come up with a story."

"Are you sure - -?" She was concerned. For him. He didn't know quite what to do with it.

Best course of action was to turn his back on her and walk up to the front door. He rather dreaded ringing the bell, but it beat walking around back in the hopes that one of the side doors or the kitchen were unlocked. His hand froze halfway there. The heavy cherry doors were open. One of them gaping about four inches, cool air leaking out from the opening. That shiver of unease came back with a ham handed vengeance.

He turned and she was still there, sitting in the idling truck, waiting for him to get inside. Like an adult waiting to make sure a child in her charge got safely home.

"Is everything okay?" she leaned out her window and asked.

"May I have the gun?"

Her eyes widened. "Lex - -? What - -?"

"Please."

He felt stricken. Pale. He clenched his fists to keep them from shaking. After a breath she cut the ignition and twisted to remove the shotgun from the rack. She opened the door, climbing out with it in her hands.

"Lex what is it?"

"I don't know. The door's open." He took the gun from her, wanting it in his hands. God knew she was probably a better shot with it, his experience with guns beginning and ending with handguns, but he needed it so bad he could taste the acrid flavor of metal on his tongue.

"Get in the truck and leave. Call the sheriff and get him out here."

"No." She shook her head, stubborn.

"It may be nothing. It may just be paranoia at work."

He didn't believe it. The bile at the back of his throat was testament enough of that.

"Then I'm coming in. I didn't feel right dropping you at the curb and running anyway."

God. Stubborn, stubborn woman.

He didn't have the patience to argue with her.

He used the muzzle of the shotgun to push the door open. The entrance way stared back at him, same as it always looked. Persian floor runners, elegant arrangements on 18th century hall tables, gothic mirror, utterly pretentious grandfather clock that had come straight from the halls of some French royal estate.

Silence. But the mansion was always silence. Heavy stone only occasionally groaning under its own weight. The runner felt thick and soft under his feet. It occurred to him that he'd never walked it barefoot before. He walked down it, onto hardwood floors, towards his office.

It was empty. The desk his father had brought it had papers and folders, here and there. The computer was open. The stock tickers rolling relentlessly.

"I'm going to see if Mrs. Chaddick is in the kitchen. She's usually here this time of day, isn't she?" Martha said, heading that way before Lex could stop her.

He went to the wall safe in the bookshelf. Slid aside the camouflaging book spines and keyed in the combination. In amongst his personal documents and papers, lay a gun. A 9mm Gloc, with the clip by its side.

He pulled out the gun, balanced the shotgun in the crook of his arm and slammed the clip into place. He felt marginally better. The feeling didn't last long. When he picked up the phone on his father's desk, there was no dial tone.

He swore softly under his breath. He had an extra cell in his temporary office on the second floor. He headed towards the servant's entrance, not prepared to leave Martha down here alone.

"Mrs. Kent?"

"Lex," her voice drifted up the hall. It sounded strained. He flipped the safety off the Gloc tracked her down. She was standing in the hall not quite to the kitchen, staring down at a streak of red on the floor.

She looked up at him, stricken. "There's no one in the kitchen - - is this blood?"

Of course it was blood. What else could it be.

"We're leaving. Now!" His vision was tunneling, his heart beating frantically at his ribcage. He needed out of the house, because Decker was here. He should have listened to that first bad feeling at the gate and turned tail and fucking run.

He half ran down the hall, lost his stride at a spatter of red on the hall wall. At the perforations in the plaster in the midst of it that could only be bullet holes. There were dark, dried smears on the floor leading to a broom closet directly opposite.

"Oh my God," she cried, seeing what he saw. He backed up a step, and she took one forward. Before he could yell for her to stop, she had the door open, and he was pointing the Gloc at a glassy eyed corpse on the floor. A tangle of limbs stuffed into a too small space. A man in a cheap suit that he'd never seen before.

"Lex, your father. Where's your father?" She was flushed, and terrified but she was thinking more coherently than he was. He could barely hear her over the rushing flood of blood in his ears. All he could focus on was getting out and what would happen if he didn't.

"Mr. Luthor," she cried. "Lionel, are you here?"

If his father were here, Lex doubted he was capable of responding. Not if Decker had been here. Decker had a score to settle, a betrayal to avenge and Lex had been asleep sixteen hours. Sixteen hours for the man to wreck his havoc and make his plans. God. He needed out of this house and its constricting stone walls.

"Martha, we have to go. We can call the authorities from the farm." He wasn't even sure it was safe there. But Clark was there, and another man with a gun and it was the only place he could picture at the moment that he wanted to be. He gave her a push with the hand holding the shotgun. She started moving, then hesitated, as Lex did, when a weak voice called.

"Help. Is someone there? Help."

His father's voice. Coming it sounded like, from the study, which had damn well been empty not more than a few minutes before.

She started that way, foolish woman who didn't know - -who couldn't comprehend the sorts of monsters that could live in a man's head - - the sorts of things those monsters could drive him to do.

Lex knew. All too well.

She got there first. Got through the stained glass doors before he heard her aborted cry, and the thud of what might have been a body.

He skidded to a stop, clutched his pair of guns and pressed his shoulder against the wall, when the ground wanted to fall out from under him.

"Martha?"

"Its cowardly, to send a woman in ahead of you, Lex," a voice rasped at him from inside the study. Decker's voice. "A punishable offense."

Lex rolled his head back, clenching his teeth to hold back the sob that wanted escape.

"Lex? Lex, are you here?" His father's voice, trembly and weak.

He swallowed, gathered his voice and answered, his voice not much more stable than his fathers. "I'm here."

"Come on in, Lex. Make it a family reunion," Decker's voice suggested. "Don't make me have to ask twice. They'll regret it before you do."

He slid the Gloc behind his back, into the waistband of his borrowed pants, adjusted his hold on the shotgun, and pushed himself off the wall.


Walking down that hall to the study door was the hardest thing he'd ever had to do. His balls felt like they wanted to curl up into his body, his stomach wanted to toss up everything she'd fed him.

He stopped in the doorway and took in the room. Martha was on the floor, a darkening bruise on the side of her face, a trickle of blood where whatever Decker had hit her with had broken skin. Probably the gun he had to the back of Lionel's head.

His father was in bad shape, heavy bruising about the face, blood matted in his hair and beard. Quite a bit of it staining his white shirt. His glasses were and his eyes were roving sightlessly. Decker didn't look much better. There was a huge hemotoma like bruise from temple to jaw line. His nose was swollen out of shape, badly broken, and one arm had been haphazardly tied to his chest with strips of dirty cloth. The way the man was breathing, harsh and rasping suggested broken ribs. When Clark had thrown him into the wall, there had been no semblance of restraint.

The look in his eyes though, was pure mad determination. The sort of single-minded focus that made Lex wonder if he felt the pain at all.

"Look at you with the gun," Decker grinned at him, well shielded by Lionel's body. "Make you feel safe, boy?"

Lex stared at him, not feeling safe at all, even with Decker battered to hell, and a hidden gun at his back.

"We waited for you to come home, Lex," Decker said. "Waited all night, and you didn't show. Had a good long time to tell your daddy here, all about our time together. Told him how obedient you could be given the right motivation. Told him what a good cocksucker you are. What a tight hole you got. Told him how I can ream you till you bleed and in a day or two, you're back to being snug as a ten year old boy."

"Fuck you," Lex said softly, fingers cramping up on the shotgun he was holding it so tightly.

"That all you got to say?" Decker changed the angle of his gun, pressing the muzzle into the hollow of Lionel's cheek. "Don't you want to say anything to your daddy, after going so long without seeing him?"

"Sure. Thanks for hiring the psychopath, dad."

There was a certain numb calm creeping over him. The details were excruciatingly clear. Martha was moaning softly, lashes quivering. There was blood running down the side of Lionel's jaw, mingling with the beard, trickling down his neck to soak the collar of his shirt. The door to the bookshelf safe was still open. He wondered if Decker had noticed it.

Decker's mouth thinned. "Put the gun down, Lex."

He canted his head. "I don't think so."

"Put the gun down or a I put a bullet in his head."

Lex had heard that one before. Seen the results of compliance. There would be blood either way. Lionel's or his.

"You're assuming you've got as much leverage against me with him, as you did with Clark."

"Lex, Lex," Lionel held out a hand in Lex's general direction. "Be reasonable, son. This isn't a man to toy with."

"You think?"

"Lex," Decker said softly. "Every second you make me wait, I will make you scream for. Put the gun down now!"

The last was delivered in that drill sergeants voice Decker liked to use when he was feeling particularly dominant. It made Lex flinch. Made his muscles clench up and his breath stall. The parts of him that this man had damaged made his fingers itch to obey the command; ingrained survival instinct to avoid pain. There would be humiliation and shame and violation that he wouldn't be able to stop.

But then, those things would come regardless of defiance or submission. Decker couldn't help himself.

"Fuck you," he said it again, softly.

"I guess he don't care after all, huh old man?" Decker purred.

And Lionel was saying, "Don't be hasty. We can talk about this. Whatever you want - - I can arrange."

"Whatever I want, huh?"

Decker stared straight at Lex over Lionel's shoulder. "See? He's willing to sell you out again to save his own ass. Guess I'm doing you a favor, huh, Lex?"

"Don't - -" Lex got that first word out, before the dry pop of the gun was ringing in his ears. The bullet shattered something in a cabinet across the room on its exit trajectory. And Lionel was crumpling, eyes wide and shocked and infinitely blinder than they had been a second before.

He hit the floor face first, blood leaking out onto wood tiles and Lex stared a moment too long, caught in the grip of a profound sort of disbelief. Shock.

"One more chance, Lex. I don't like killing women." Decker had the gun pointed at Martha Kent's head. She was trying to push herself up, dazed eyes fixed on Lionel. Whispering things Lex couldn't hear. Prayers maybe.

If there was a God, he'd never answered any prayer of Lex's.

"You will, anyway," he said softly. It felt as if there were cotton in his head, muffling everything. Maybe it even helped, blocking out the things that wanted to rip him apart.

Decker put the muzzle of the gun against Martha's head. "Last chance. Put the gun down."

Lex took a breath. Took his hand off the trigger and held the shotgun out away from him. Leaned it against the table inside the door. Spread his hands after, to emphasize his compliance.

Decker wet his lips, eyes fixed.

"Kill her and you might has well kill me now, too," he said softly, before Decker's demons could make him squeeze the trigger. "I'll fight you every step of the way, goad you until you snap and kill me anyway, and you know you will, and then you won't have anything. Let her live and whatever you want from me, I give. Total submission."

He saw the temptation. Saw the desire creep like some malignant disease into Decker's mad eyes. It made him sick, knowing he was the focus of it.

The gun swung away from Martha Kent. Lowered at Decker's side.

"Come here, Lex."

He moved, meeting Decker's eyes and not flinching, easing a hand behind his back and curling his fingers around the Gloc. No doubt Decker was a faster shot than him. A better one. And if he went down - - that wouldn't be so bad a thing in comparison to what he'd have to look forward to if he failed. The one thing he had going for him was the absolute certainty that when Decker killed him, he'd want to do it hands on. Not with a bullet from across the room.

He pulled the gun, and Decker saw it. Lex saw the moment, Decker realized what he had, saw that flash of indecision that he'd been counting on, and he pulled the trigger.

He heard the sound of a second pop, felt a dull impact in his arm, on the heels of the one his gun had made, but it didn't stop him from squeezing the trigger again. The impact of the second bullet threw Decker's bad shoulder back. The third one tore through his shirt, red blossoming in its wake. He crumpled backwards, feet from Lionel, and Lex kept walking, treading through the pool of his father's blood, squeezing the trigger, putting another bullet in. And another. Decker stopped jerking by the fourth or fifth - -just lay there, as the bullets tore in. And Lex kept squeezing the trigger, until all it did was click impotently against an empty clip.

There were hands on his wrist, trying to get him to stop, and soft, desperate words blurring in his ears, hardly heard through the echoes of gunfire in his head.

"Lex, he's dead. He's dead." Martha Kent, trying to pry the gun out of his hand. His finger was still spasming on the trigger. He stared down at the gun in his hand quizzically. Forced himself with an effort to loosen his grip and she extracted it from his hand, tossed it away like it was poisonous.

"Lex, you're bleeding."

He stared down at the blood on his feet. His father's blood. But she was holding his arm, and he stared numbly at a bloody score in his bicep. The sting was distant and odd.

He took a step backwards, out of the puddle of cooling blood, his hands starting to quake, teetering on the edge of an abyss. His knees gave out, and he went down, staring at the bodies, breath starting to come harsh and fast. His father's dead eyes, staring at him. His father's blood mingling with a madman's. Lex's running warm and steady down his arm.

"It's okay. It'll all be okay, now." Martha was on her knees next to him, none of those pesky strict personal boundary issues his family had always practiced. She had her arms around him and was crooning in the sort of voice you'd expect to hear used to comfort a panicked child. And Decker was lying there, and it was only his imagination that the chest rose and fell - - only his imagination that dredged up images from the last month so vivid they made him flinch and keep flinching.

"You're okay," she crooned. "You're okay. It's all over now."

He buried his face in her shoulder and shook.

To be continued . . .