The Great Collision of Monday Last	  The Great Collision of Monday
Last

 by Amanda

 Major "Nicodemus" spoilers ahead. Thanks to Rhiannon for this
inspiration--this story *can* be read as a prequel to "The Dragon Dances
at Midnight," but it works fine as a standalone piece. Also, thanks to
Stacie for letting me write this stuff instead of, you know, doing actual
work. 

 

  

 "Where's Dr. Hamilton?" 

 "How should I know?" 

 "I know he was here, Lex!" 

 Lex's eyes narrowed. "And what if he was, Clark?" He stepped out from
behind the desk, the morning sun through the ornate stained glass casting
a sinister red glow over the scene. 

 "You lied to me." 

 "He needed my help, Clark. He knew I had the diary, and that I was
looking for a cure." 

 "You're still lying!" Clark lashed out and knocked over the chair beside
him. 

 "Then you tell me what he was doing here," Lex replied calmly, the
challenge clearly evident in his voice. 

 "It was your project, wasn't it? But he screwed it up and came running to
you to fix it." Lex opened his mouth to reply, but Clark cut him off. "If
my father hadn't been infected, you wouldn't have done anything, would
you?" Clark fought back the hot tears that threatened to spill from the
corners of his haunted green eyes, cursing himself for losing it in front
of Lex. Crying like a five-year-old with a skinned knee wasn't going to
help him intimidate Lex into admitting the truth. "You would have just let
them die! A few more casualties in your private war wouldn't have even
mattered, because people *don't* matter to you." 

 "That's not true, Clark." Lex set his jaw, determined not to let Clark
know that he had just hit a nerve. "Not anymore." 

 Not anymore. There was so much truth in those words, and more often than
not Lex thoroughly regretted that. He wasn't supposed to care about
people. He was to know them just well enough to find a weakness to exploit
and then toss them aside when they were no longer useful. 

 Smallville had changed all that. 

 Before Smallville Lex would have never believed that another human being
would have been willing to risk his own life to save Lex's. Of course, he
had discovered that Clark hadn't had to risk much of anything except his
father's acceptance, but still, Lex had never been able to forget the
feeling. It had crept into his psyche, spreading like a cancer that
obliterated Lex's lifelong conditioning. 

 He looked at Clark, watched him shake with rage and fight to hold back
tears, and he knew that he was supposed to see weakness--a pathetic little
boy letting his emotions undermine his purpose. 

 But he couldn't 

 He saw instead strength, strength of conviction that Lex would never
have. A strength forged by love. 

 It wasn't strength that kept him from expressing his love for Clark. It
was weakness. 

 Admitting the truth required more strength than Lex could ever hope to
have. 

 "Clark, I'm sorry." 

 Clark laughed, the harshness of it piercing Lex's chest like a knife
slipping between his ribs. "I'm sure you are," Clark snapped. "You're
sorry that I found out." 

 Lex's voice softened. He was dangerously close to pleading, but pleading
was too much like begging, and Luthors didn't beg. They commanded, but
never begged. "You know what I meant." 

 "How would I know that?" 

 Lex took a deep breath and prayed to a God he'd always cursed that he was
strong enough to throw everything away. 

 "Because you know I care about you."  

 Clark forgot to be angry. He forgot why he was angry, and he forgot why
he had come to the castle in the first place. 

 You know I care about you. 

 It was a bit of an understatement to say that Clark hadn't been expecting
to hear that. He felt like he had just been hit over the head with a
meteor rock. The slight softening of the voice and the relaxation of the
muscles in his jaw and forehead would have been undetectable to those who
didn't know him well, but for Clark it was as though Lex had waved a white
flag and surrendered to his emotions. 

 "Lex, I..." Clark didn't know what to say. Though he'd dreamed of the
moment that Lex would trust him enough to let him in, he had never
considered that it would come at a time like this. 

 "I care about you too, but the past few days...we don't trust each other.
What kind of relationship can exist without trust?" 

 "I can accept that you don't trust me. Why would you? I'm a Luthor. We're
famous--infamous, actually--for our ulterior motives." The sarcasm wasn't
lost on Clark. He winced slightly and looked away as Lex took a step
closer. "But to know that you think I don't trust you...I'll admit, I'm a
little disappointed." 

 Disappointed, of course, meaning hurt. Sometimes it seemed that Lex spoke
a language of his own. Like certain tonal Asian dialects, one had to
listen to Lex's inflection and modulation to understand his words. Clark
knew that, too. 

 "I want this to work, Lex, you know I do." *You don't know how much I
do.* "But there's always going to be this thing between us." Clark sighed,
sadly, hoping he wasn't about to destroy the closest relationship he'd
ever had with anyone. 

 Lex swallowed hard. "Then it can't work, can it?" He too sounded
resigned. He tried to turn away, but Clark grabbed his arm. 

 "I want it to work." He looked deep into Lex's eyes, and Lex nearly
shivered as he felt Clark's gaze seemingly reach inside him and touch the
soul he'd always doubted he had. 

 "So do I," Lex whispered, the last vestiges of his emotional resistance
falling away. He felt his inner self begin to separate like oil from
water, with Lex rising to the surface and Luthor being left behind in the
darkness. 

 It terrified him. Both of him. 

 "Lex, you can make anything work. Why not this?" 

 Why not this? It was a fair question. For once in his life, Lex told his
Luthor conscience (if it could be called such) to fuck off. 

 "Why not this?" he whispered, and gently leaned forward and brushed his
lips against Clark's. He felt Clark's lips upturn in a smile, then part to
allow Lex access to his beautiful mouth. Lex moved deeper into the kiss,
his tongue gently exploring Clark's surprisingly soft lips. He sensed
Clark's inexperience, and allowed Clark to continue his own
less-than-graceful exploration. 

 Clark pulled away first. "Lex?" 

 "Yes?" 

 "I think it's working." He put his hand on the back of Lex's neck and
pulled him in for another long, deep kiss.   
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