Story Downloaded from Open Scrolls Archive (https://www.openscrolls.net)
Title: Scenes from the Blue (#3079)
Author: FatiferousPoet
Chapters: 3
Archive: DC Universe
Category: Alternate Universe
Description: When being faster than a speeding bullet or more powerful than a locomotive isn't enough, what do you do? Clark Kent and the people around him. RPG writer credits: Fatey/Scribe/Eva
Published: 11 Nov 2006
Updated: 12 Nov 2006
Warnings:
Type: Drama
Characters: Clark Kent and various Cast as they appear
Chapter 1 - In the News Today
Disclaimer: The characters, places and specifics belonging to show Smallville are not my own. They own the rights, etc.
Credit(s): The piece below contains two lines of a 'paper printing premise' from another project/author (Scribe).
Feedback: Feedback is always appreciated, so if you liked this (or didn't!) please leave a review!
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November 6 in the year 2006
The Kent Family Farm
Smallville, Kansas
U.S. of A.
Earth
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"There's a page missing."
"Can you hear me? I said 'there's a page missing'....."
"Sorry Honey. What did you say?"
"There's a page missing from today's Planet. I was looking for Chloe's column and it was continued on page thirty-two."
"Really? The Daily Planet forgot to put in the page?"
"I doubt they 'forgot' to put in a page. They're a multi-million dollar organization and those machines hardly ever fail."
"They might have missed a page."
"I guess."
"You're probably not missing much."
"Except the rest of Chloe's column."
"Yes. Well, that."
"Wait a minute."
"What?"
"Page fifty-five is in here."
"Okay."
"Yes... it's in here."
"Imagine that."
"Page fifty-five's been torn and it's..... it's been torn in the middle where it would have been paired up with page thirty-two."
"Oh? Maybe it became caught in the machine."
"It's a well calculated, folded tear."
"Is it?"
"Yeeeeeeeeees."
"Don't look at me like that."
"Well?"
"Well what? What do you want me to do? Call and make a complaint?"
"Mom."
Okay. Her tone. He could hear her voice off in it's tone. Guilty. She tore out the page and was now covering something up.
And not answering him. "Mom?!?"
"Yes, Clark?"
"What did you do with the page?"
A soft laugh, Martha continued clipping her hydrangea near the sink, still unable to look at him, "What possibly makes you think I did something with that page?"
Putting the paper down, he began circling the kitchen table, searching her nearby book stacks for work. "Where did you put it?"
Trying to be light, her eyes stealing a glance at his actions, knowing what he would do, Martha added, "I didn't put it anywhere Clark." Guilt, her eyes shifted back to the plant before looking down, "Not exactly."
He followed her gaze and frowned, looking through the cabinet door and then when he didn't immediately find what he was looking for, Kal-El X-rayed his vision further past the thick plastic of the garbage can. There. Finely shaped pieces of paper. Criss cross cut. Tiny strips of newsprint less than one inch in length. Shredded. "What on earth," the natural expression came out of his mouth. "What did you do? Enron it?"
She stepped out of his way, leaning her hands over the sink into the cool, running water as Clark went mini-dumpster diving. Martha said nothing, knowing she should have left the page in there, but somehow had to hope this might work. Some days she couldn't take that hurt expression on his face and seeing him mope about near the barn this morning was one of those days. Jonathan would have told her to leave it be and let the boy become a man and Martha would agree with him to do so, but her baby's look got to her today. Most of the time she could do it, hold up on her own, but this morning wasn't one of those days.
Martha regretted doing it.
Picking up small bits of paper, under a discarded ground beef wrapping, Kal-El turned the finely shredded newspaper in his fingers and frowned. None of his kryptonian talents could piece it back together again but that didn't stop him for reaching in for another sample. There is was. It caught his eye.
The truncated phrase 'ana Lang'.
"What was the article about?" Quick, his chin turned up to look at Martha. Despite making new friends, even female, Clark had never gotten over the girl next door. "Mom?" His voice sharp when she didn't answer him right away. "What was that article about?"
A slow, deep breath, Martha evenly spoke, "Clark, don't take that tone with me."
"Mom!"
She gave in a bit, "I know I shouldn't have done this, I'm sorry! It was a stupid thing to try to do... but it doesn't matter and you'd be better off forgetting there even is an article." Damn the luck of the draw and Chloe's article placement. Martha hadn't realized it was being continued on the other side of that page. "It's.... it's the lifestyle gossip column." Nothing but apology was worn on her face.
Eyes narrowing, not at her actions as much as what 'gossip', 'lifestyle' and 'Lana Lang' might have in common, Kal-El excused himself without much by means of words. Instead, he was gone in a flash with the front door left swinging open and closed, as if by the wind. "Oh Clark...." Martha sighed, guessing where he might go or do.
The Kent Farm flew by his vision, every detail perfect and seen despite how fast he was traveling over the land. In seconds he was zooming past the Kapatelis farm, past 'Criss Cross Point' where the two main freeways met and onto the rural city line where farm lands gave in to what was considered built up downtown. Right before the cornfield edge is where he slowed, coming to an abrupt stop to the human eye, however Kal-El felt nothing out of the ordinary. A slight jolt of his clothes and hair, but his organs remained in place as if he were standing still.
There it was.
Twenty feet out of the cover of the corn fields, across the street, was the corner Smallville Newspaper stand next to 'Cathy's Coffee Cafe'. Bold and quick was his advance, jaywalking across Highway Four with little worry that traffic might plow over him. Smallville hardly saw that type of vehicular activity at this time of day and if he did get hit, it would be the car that took on the damage.
The Daily Planet. The print looked so official and regal, coming out of big city Metropolis, but Clark Kent had no respect for the headlines that the paper donned. "Morning Clark," Bobby Raeton greeted, having known the boy since he was a toddler. "Didn't see you parking at Cathy's."
"Yeah," Clark looked over at the man, "I'm in stealth mode today." Bobby was a friendly man and Clark only played along because he wasn't in the mood for explanations. "How much for a paper?" He knew the price, already digging out coins from his pocket.
"Fifty cents on Mondays....." The older man began before Clark chimed in with him, "and fifty cents on every day but Sunday." The silver passed palms and Clark took the paper from Bobby who had unstacked one for him. Both men continued, "On Sunday, it's that times two plus a quarter."
"Thanks."
There was hardly a moment to wait and he was flipping the top corner pages on a mission. Bobby watched him as the young man clumsily turned the pages in haste. "Looking for a sale Clark?" The Kent boy shook his head as his eyes began to read, fast. His expression went from tight to upset. "Something wrong there?"
Clark looked up, a torn feeling in his gut that he knew he had no right to be aching from. "No. Nothing. Everything's... fine....." Tucking the paper under his arm, he walked away from Bobby without saying a word and fumbled in his jacket pocket for his cell phone. Bobby Raeton watched Clark as he departed, noting the youth wasn't even watching where he was going and slightly banged into the free standing local paper for town. That paper, while considered competition because it was free-no-charge, had its front page whipped open after the corner was bumped. The wind catching the edge at the right moment and sending it soaring upward.
'Match made in heaven.'
'True love.'
Gag.............................................
He was a good hundred yards away before he made his call and put the phone to his ear, having every intent on calling Chloe to bitch up a blue streak at what her fellow co-worker wrote in the damn paper. Never mind the fact that he hadn't read the part on his mother yet. Only that Lana had been living with a certain rich bachelor in his large estate. Sitting down on 'Old Brownie', a large, local rock that had been on the side of the road for decades, Clark parked himself up on it, sitting to face the road as he heard the ringing on the other side.
Taking out the paper, he began reading the article on Lex and Lana again, not realizing that he had subconsciously dialed Lana's cell phone number and not his best friend, Ms. Sullivan.
Clark Kent
"Born in Space. Lost on Earth."
.
Chapter 2 - THE Article - 6th November 2006 - The DAILY Planet
COMMON DISCLAIMER: The characters, places and specifics belonging to show Smallville are not ours. They own the rights, etc.
SPOILER WARNING: The below writing is usually around current season episodes of Smallville. Read at your liking.
CREDIT(s): WRITTEN BY SCRIBE - The piece below is NOT WRITTEN BY ME, but rather a part of this book's storyline. This entire piece is written and posted here with permission from Scribe.
SCENE SETTING PREWORK: Today's News as delivered fresh to your doorstep from The Daily Planet:
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TODAY'S PAPER
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T H E D A I L Y P L A N E T
6th November 2006
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NO LIGHT ON DARK THURSDAY
By Perry White
Two months following the world-wide phenomena known as Dark Thursday and the Pentagon is no closer to explaining what occurred on that fateful day when the world experienced the catastrophic failure of power grids not in the continental United States but also across the rest of the globe. Wide spread speculation to explain the blackouts range from terrorist detonation of nuclear weapons in the upper atmosphere, solar flares and the more improbable alien invasion reported by the Daily Inquisitor. However, despite all this wild and unsubstantiated theories, no real explanation has been offered by any government on Earth to shed light on the world wide blackout that led to the complete breakdown of civil government.
While the authorities are not eager to provide any answers regarding the cause of Dark Thursday, the resulting chaos has left an indelible mark on the body politic. In Washington DC, Senator Knight has been championing the improvement of emergency services, reminding the House of uncomfortable parallels between the Katrina Fiasco and Dark Thursday. It was no surprise that Congress has approved an additional 500 million dollars to the Federal Emergency Management Agency to bolster police and fire services in the hopes that there will be no repeat of the rioting and looting that took place during the disaster. In London, the British Parliament has also approved similar funding and there are reports of the same initiatives in Moscow, Tel Aviv and Beijing.
Commercial America is also reaching deep into their pockets with companies such as Lexcorp, Queen Industries and Wayne Enterprises offering millions in donations as well as construction and engineering resources to aid in the rebuilding. Queen Industries is preparing to make available the schematics for its satellite construction to both the Pentagon and NASA, seeing that those were the only satellites to function during the disaster.
"Some aspects of our satellite construction will remain a trade secret of course," quotes CEO, Oliver Queen, "but our methods of EMP shielding will be of use to prevent future phenomena like Dark Thursday from crippling our communications grid."
For now, the effects of Dark Thursday has invoked a spirit of unity, not seen since 9/11 and while government bodies, corporate rivals and the general public seemed polarized into rebuilding what's lost, the unspoken truth about what happened that day still lingers in the minds of many Americans.
How can we prevent Dark Thursday from happening again, if no one is talking about what did?
~~~~~~
CAT'S TAILS
By Catherine Grant
Dahlings, are you just as stunned as I?
It's been weeks since notorious playboy Lex Luthor, CEO of Luthorcorp decided to go farming for lady love in the Iowa cornfields and came up with fellow meteor disaster survivor Lana Lang. You remember her right? The little princess who lost both her parents during that famous meteor shower? Seems like a match made in heaven since little Lexy lost that glorious red hair in the same disaster. Anyway chums, it look like it might indeed be true love since Miss Lang has moved into the Luthor Mansion.
Kudos to you darling, hope you do better than the last woman to prowl around those halls. Meow Cat!
Meanwhile, Oliver Queen continues to tempt fate by dating Daily Inquisitor reporter Lois Lane. Ollie, dahling, if you're going to get your own press agent, let your PR people handle it! Miss Lane's last article involved either alien invasions or the Green Arrow Bandit (oh gag on that name!). Of course Miss Lane is no stranger to the limelight, having cut her teeth in the fame game as to die for cause she's so nice Martha Kent's assistant. Talk about going above the call of duty to muster those campaign funds?
Speaking of the Senator, do I smell romance in the air? Lionel Luthor does seems to be paying a great deal of attention to the Widow Kent. The duo have been seen at numerous soirées around town and one has to wonder if the relationship is strictly professional.
Not that I'm one to talk dahlings but if there's smoke, then there has to be hanky panky...
And what is it about Metropolis these days? Rumour has it that newly crowned Prince of Gotham City, Bruce Wayne may be on his way to Metropolis. Well ladies, get thee to those salons right away, little Bruce has grown right up and does he look like the cream in this Cat's bowl!
Well that's it for now, I'm off to cover Milan where my friend Binny and I are going to torture the models by throwing donuts at them. Ta ta!
THE DAILY PLANET
Chapter 3 - Call Answered
COMMON DISCLAIMER: The characters, places and specifics belonging to show Smallville/DComics are not ours. They own the rights, etc.
SPOILER WARNING: The below writing is usually around current season episodes of Smallville. Read at your liking.
CREDIT(s): FatiferousPoet (Clark), Eva (Lana) & Scribe (Diana) - Posted with permits from an RPG (and from Eva/Scribe).
SCENE SETTING PREWORK: Thinking he's dialing Chloe, Lana answers Clark's incoming call from within the Lex's Manor.
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November 6 in the year 2006
Smallville News Stand
Smallville, Kansas
U.S. of A.
Earth
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Lana watched as the kindling slowly begin to curl the offending pages of that big city rag one of her best friends considered the greatest paper in America. She could almost picture Cat, that bleach blonde muck raker's fake tanned face, in the flames.
There was even music in the background, though she didn't really think the Gorilliza's Feel Good went with paper burning. She shook her head realizing it was her phone going off. She pulled the phone from the back pocket of her jeans and flipped it open with out so much as looking at the caller ID.
“Yes?” She answered much more curtly then she normally would have.
"Hey! I'm glad I got you!" Clark didn't waste a power breathed moment, "Can you believe this shit? Did you read what our little friend wrote in this morning's Daily Planet about LuthorCorp and citing the 'princess' of Smallville? It's disgusting!! How can they print crap like that, that's what I want to know!! God! Doesn't it make you want to just.... just puke your guts out?!?"
Lana's eyes widened and a pang of guilt suddenly shot through her right behind the realization of who she was talking to. She still pulled the phone away from her ear to look at the caller ID. Clark it said in blue letters. She still had him on speed dial.
“Clark?” She asked quietly pulling her hair behind her ear.
About to go on, when the only response Chloe could give was his name, Clark blinked and all but stammered into the phone, "Lana...?"
The brunette looked at her phone again and walked to stand in the door way of the study looking out into the hall. She wasn't looking for Lex, honestly, she wasn't.
“Yes.”
What did he mean doesn't it want to make you puke your guts out?
“And since when did you start using that sort of language?”
"Uh," Clark gulped, feeling Smallville loser all over again. "I don't know. End of last semester?" He suddenly felt like a rated 'M' for mature, cheap television program or was it rated 'I' for Idiot? It was his turn to steal a glance at his phone to confirm he really made this outgoing call. Not that it changed anything. Clark tried to recover, "So, uh, what do you think of that article? Pretty bad, huh?" His face was turning as red as his flannel shirt. "Sorry you guys got, uh, attacked like that."
He physically winced, not wanting to APOLOGIZE for what the stupid article said about her and LEX of all people. Clark felt sick.
He called her to ask about the article? That didn't make any sense, they'd barely spoken for weeks.
“Well. . . Lex is Lex, so I should probably learn to deal with it.” Lana replied “It's just a bad week for Princess comments.” She added leaning her head to the door.
The distance between she and Clark had never been further and while she knew they had both made the right decision, by ending their continually doomed romance, a part of her couldn't help but regret that distance.
"Yeah," he glanced down at the date, "Happy early birthday....." The paper was closed and folded over, the Daily Planet front page blaring the month and year at him. "Sorry."
He never could bring himself to tell her that it was due to his arrival that caused her parents death. There was so much he had to tell her again, but never did.
She smiled thinly.
“Thank you, Clark.” She said with a nod of her head. “Nell wants to take me and... “
She stopped herself before saying the next word. She wasn't enough of a bitch to throw Lex in Clark's face when they talked. “...go out to dinner, probably Red Lobster. She claims its my favorite restaurant.”
Not a bad recovery she told herself.
He frowned, having mentally filled in the blank before she tried to back track and re-route. Clark guessed since he was covering up this whole intent in calling, he could let that one slide. Damn, but it stabbed. "Well, I guess you'll have a good time then."
What was he saying? Who was he right now?
His voice softened, "Lana?" God, he missed her so much.
She could picture the expression that went with the sound of Clark's voice. Those big blue eyes of his and that wounded weight of the world turn to his lips. She closed her eyes and wondered how they had come to this spot after everything.
“Yes?” She answered when she should have been telling him good bye.
His lips parted and the words he wanted to say, that he always loved her and even now, after everything, he couldn't stop loving her.... So much Clark wanted to tell her and he regretted being the fool time and time again for not going after what he wanted.
"Have a Happy Birthday." His voice was above a whisper.
The stab of guilt became a razor cut in her stomach. Guilt for talking to Clark and feeling as she did when she was with Lex or guilt for the pain she had and was causing Clark, she didn't know. It was to soon, too much, and like so many times in her life she just couldn't deal.
“You already said that.” She said trying to sound light but knowing the emotions bled into her voice.
“I should be going. I'm going to be late to class if I don't get moving. It was nice of you to call. I've. . . I've missed talking to you.” She added quickly.
“Give my love to your Mom?” She continued and then she managed a grin. “And Chloe is four on your speed dial.”
He was with her, about to tell her how much he missed her too and that he'd gladly tell Martha. Clark was about to say all that, and more, but her last comment derailed him.
Angry, at himself, Clark gritted his teeth. "Sure. Good bye Lana." Without waiting, he ended the call.
Disgusted with himself, he curled forward and pressed the cell phone to his temple. "Speed dial four...." If he was sick before reading the article, he felt a hundred times worse now.
She closed the phone and took a deep breath. She hadn't meant for her quip to be cruel. How did this happen; how did it not work between she and Clark? It should have worked, damn it. It should have worked. Wondering just how this morning could get any worse or more complicated as she turned and went back into the study. Her answer was sitting right there large as life in the form of Lionel Luthor who had been there the entire time.
Shit. . . Lana thought.
Hey if Clark could say it she could think it.
~~~~
Lex.
" Lex is Lex. "
Lana knew what Lex was like, so how could she? How could she take up with him? Move in with him? Gripping his mobile, Kal-El looked down at the 'Call Ended' display that showed he was disconnected but it wasn't enough. He had half a mind to block his incoming number, call the Luthor Estate and disguise his voice in asking for Lana. Was the paper right that Lana had moved in there? Had he honestly known deep down but had been forcing himself blind to fact?
A stupid move for one who had so many visual talents.
If she intended, she could almost match his speed in flight but it was not necessary. She guessed he was heading towards town and took her time in her approach, careful to set down a good distance away so no one saw her. Dressed in a light floral dress that swung around her ankles, Diana found him not long after, holding a phone in his hand, looking rather upset.
The soft curse escaped his lips and Kal-El heard footfalls approaching. Given the distance of the stride, the weight of the body and grace in those steps, he should have guessed she might come looking for him. He charged past her place like a bat out of Gotham.
Clark turned around, still holding the phone near and dear as if it were his last lifeline on 'Who Wants To Be A Millionaire'. Certainly not the farm boy from Kansas; he'd rather die then end up heartless like Lex.
Although, Lex did have Lana.....
He was trapped.
"Hi Diana." his blue eyes took her in, not moving from his stony perch. If Clark Kent had ever looked reserved or sad before to Diana, today he hit a new low of miserable.
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Clark Kent
"Born in Space. Lost on Earth."
&
Lana Lang
"Princess of the Meteor Showers"
&
Diana
"of Themiscyra"
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