sydsvaughn
24th January 2004, 05:25
Hey all, this is a darker one, not a lot of happy feelings here, but perhaps what Chloe might be feeling after "Whisper." Either way, I think I needed an outlet for my frustration, so let me know what you think
UPDATE!!! There is now a music video to go along with this fic. It's posted under the same title in the music video category on this board! As for the song, it's been "fanficed" and "videoed" before, because its so fitting for so many ships! So here is my take on "Going Under" by Evanescence.
Please tell me what you think! (Oh, one more note, it branches off into a sort of AU ending that is, I know, definitely not where the show is going. I figure I might expand this into an AU series, but tell me what you think!)
~*~*~*~*~*~
Drowning In You
By: SaraC
Rating: PG-13
Spoilers: Through "Whisper" (Season 3)
Summary: Chloe's had enough of trying to protect everyone but herself
Disclaimer: Not mine. All belong to the WB and their creators
Author Notes: This came to me after watching "Whisper" and realizing that Chloe, while in part responsible for things, does not deserve all the grief she has been getting. Here's my take on what might be going through her mind and why she's had enough!
~*~*~*~*~*~
Now I will tell you what I've done for you
Fifty-thousand tears I've cried.
Screaming, deceiving and bleeding for you
But you still won't hear me.
-"Going Under" by Evanescence
~*~*~*~*~*~
Chloe stood on the bridge, looking out over the peaceful river, her car idling quietly behind her. There was a beauty to the crisp day, a freshness in the air that seemed to say spring was not far away. Birds chirped, water flowed, everything seemed right and peaceful in the little town of Smallville.
Everything, that is, except her life.
Her eyes were dark and sorrowful as she thought about the past few days and the drastic changes her life had undergone. In two short days the life she'd built with her family and friends in Smallville had come crashing down around her and everyone involved with her.
She did not kid herself, knowing she'd begun the cycle of destruction by allowing her hurt and anger to entice her into a deal with the Devil himself. Still, was it so wrong of her to want to lash out at someone, several someone's, who had hurt her over and over again, although not deliberately? It was not as if Lana, Clark, even Pete had not done something stupid in the heat of anger, Clark was a classic case, his secrets and lies an accepted part of everyone's life.
So why was it so different for her? Why could no one forgive her mistake, her bad judgment call? What made everyone else in this damned town so righteous that they could be forgiven their mistakes but not her?
Ever since their confrontation about her working for Lionel, Clark had been avoiding her. He was not overly rude about it, and he and Pete certainly seemed concerned over her reaction to her father's firing, not to mention Clark had asked Lex about it, but upon getting an answer for her, she'd noticed Clark had been distancing himself. It hurt, although honestly, she'd expected it. Despite the fact that she'd forgiven Clark a hundred times over for the secrets he'd kept and lies he'd told her, it was obviously a completely different ballgame when it came to forgiving her.
Even Martha and Jonathan had been colder than normal, expressing their sympathy for Gabe's predicament, but still managing, without words, to make her feel guilter than sin. Not that she wasn't, but it hurt even more when she saw how welcoming and warm they were to Lana. As for Lana, her pseudo-roommate had also been less than sympathetic. She'd spent more time weeping over the thought of 'losing' another loved one, even though Gabe was not her father. Not to mention her own life seemed taken up with her newest love-slave, Adam. Not to mention the "poor me, I got trampled by a horse" refrain that she was singing to anyone who would listen. Personally, she really did not mind, Lana never having been someone she'd really wanted as a friend. But it hurt nonetheless to see Lana getting the sympathy that might have been hers, considering whose father Gabe really was.
Pete was the same, something that hurt a lot more than she'd thought it would. He, like Clark, had been concerned for her upon the news of Gabe's firing, but in the following weeks, he too had taken to avoiding her. Obviously, Clark had told Pete about her deal with Lionel and now he was condeming her as well. Then again, she'd always suspected that Pete knew more about Clark and his secrets than she did, and despite her acceptance of that fact, it did not lessen the hurt.
While her own guilt over her part in things was huge, a part of her could not help but realize that despite her deal with Lionel, she hadn't betrayed Clark. Or at least, she hadn't given Lionel anything more than what he'd already had.
In fact, some of the information she'd given the bastard was deliberately misleading, geared to steer Lionel into a direction that did not involve Clark. In her own way, she looked at it as her attempt to atone for her lapse in judgment- by protecting her friend. She had put herself and her family at risk by agreeing to work with Lionel, she knew that and accepted the responsibility. But when she'd realized how stupid she'd been, she'd immediately begun to take steps to right that wrong. On a larger scale, she'd taken steps to protect everyone she loved, even at the cost of her own happiness.
And it wasn't only Clark she'd been trying to protect.
Her heart ached anew as she thought about the other man she'd entered into a deal with. On the outside, it would seem she'd gone to him for help, knowing only the son could help defeat the father. But her other reason was more personal. She'd known that if she could help Lex take down his father, see the kind of man Lionel had become, it might, in some strange way, steer him away from following the same path.
She hated the tiny part of her that believed Lex was capable of becoming his father. While she and Lex were not the greatest of friends, there had always been something between them. She would never admit it to anyone except herself, but she was attracted to the billionaire. There was something appealing about the way he treated her like a woman, not like a child to be catered to, like her friends always had. He didn't pull any punches with her, including warning her about how dangerous his father could be.
It was why she'd decided to trust him with the information she'd uncovered about Lionel's plot to kill his parents, and Morgan Edge's influence in it. His words, "I'll protect you, Chloe," had been the final seal on her decision. She'd taken a risk and decided to trust him. To give him everything she had and everything she might find on his father. In a strange, twisted way, she'd done it not only to protect herself, her father and her friends, but to save Lex, to protect him from his father's treachery.
But Lionel had destroyed that hope of hers as well.
~*~*~*~*~
I'm going under
~*~*~*~*~
But just when she'd thought she was above water again, and Lionel about to fall, everything had gone wrong. All her efforts to protect Lex, Clark, her father, herself, had been shot to hell by the simple fact that Lionel somehow found out about her deal with Lex.
It probably hadn't helped that she'd lost her temper with Lionel and threatened him to his face, either.
Still, she did not regret standing up to the bastard. She'd realized, somewhere deep inside, that she'd given Lionel the only ammunition he needed to destroy her father and her life, but she could not take a minute more of his threats, his roughness, his pure cruelty for everyone by himself.
Not to mention she'd been holding onto a spark of hope that Lex might be faking his memory loss and that it was all part of a larger plan to beat Lionel that he hadn't clued her in on yet.
Obviously, however, her efforts had been for nothing.
The final straw was her father's firing. She could still see the shock in his eyes as he'd tried to explain to her why Lex had fired him, although he was not sure himself. When she'd heard her father telling her that Lex believed he was the one spreading rumors about his boss's sanity, through her and then to Clark, she'd felt an immediate rush of guilt, followed soon after by a heated rush of anger and despair.
If she'd wanted proof that Lionel's electroshock therapy had worked, she now had it. Lex had chosen, as he had before, to protect Clark over her. He'd deliberately put this on Gabe, and by default, her head, instead of implicating Clark. Now Lex too was avoiding her at all costs, acting as if they'd never had any contact whatsoever.
Obviously, Lex remembered nothing of their deal, of their tentative friendship, of his passion to bring down the bastard that was Lionel Luthor.
The bitterness of the knowledge was like a knife in her heart, even though she knew Lionel's brainwashing was the cause. Or at least, she had to believe it was the cause. The alternative was too painful to contemplate.
She laughed harshly as she realized that even if Lex did remember, it was possible he had just been playing her, working with his father all along to get what information she had. She hated to believe that about him, but she knew him well enough to realize that it would not take much to start him down the same path his father walked.
It was why she'd fought so long and hard to keep him with her, with Clark, with his friends and those who would support him and encourage him to become the brilliant man she knew he could be, instead of the successor to the magnificent bastard she knew his father embodied.
She'd spent the past two months sacrificing her friendships, her future career, in some cases even risking her life, protecting those she loved. All, it turned out, for nothing.
She was so tired of it all.
Tired of being made out to be the villain of the piece. Tired of being made to feel as if she were always the one lacking in the sphere of her friends. Tired of taking a backseat to the nauseating pinkness that was Lana Lang's life and reign over Smallville's rather dim citizens. Tired of having to see the pain and hurt in her father's eyes as he agonized over why Lex, a man that despite his reputation, Gabe Sullivan respected and admired, would fire him without warning.
She was also scared out of her mind that what she'd set in motion, could never be undone.
Scared of what her father's eyes might reflect if he ever found out that she was the reason all of this had happened. Scared of what else Lionel might do to Clark if he ever truly found out the secret the boy was keeping. Scared that Lex, the man she'd begun to allow herself to love, was now headed down a path that there was no turning back from.
The evolving emotions had, by now, mutated into anger and frustration, a bitterness taking root in her soul that began to color the way she saw her life, and the people in it.
~*~*~*~*~
Don't want your hand this time
I'll save myself.
Maybe I'll wake up for once
Not tormented daily, defeated by you
Just when I thought I'd reached the bottom.
~*~*~*~*~
She'd always considered herself a self-sufficient woman, capable of taking care of herself and her life. But the past few months had shown her spending more time taking care of others, protecting her friends, her family, instead of herself.
And while it was a selfish thought, she wished someone for a change, would take care of her. Would stop to ask her how much pain and regret she felt at agreeing to work for Lionel. How her gut twisted watching Clark, Lana and Pete act as if they wanted to be anywhere but around her. How her heart ached to watch Lex become a miniature version of his father.
But those thoughts were useless and would do her no good. She'd learned her lesson, the hardest way possible.
She was truly alone in the world. She had no one to rely on, to trust, even her father, much as it pained her to admit, would never look at her the same when he learned her secrets, the end to which she'd attempted to justify her means.
While they were bitter thoughts, she found they'd also given her a bitter strength. A bitter strength that made her determined to right what she'd wronged, no matter what the cost.
That strength allowed her to brave her friends, her family, Lex and even Lionel. To look through them and around the pain they caused her as she used every contact, every connection, every shady associate she'd developed over the past few years to deal a final blow that would strike Lionel as hard as he had stricken her.
Despite the fact that no one was protecting her, that she knew Lionel would continue to find ways to ruin, perhaps end, her life, she'd risked it all in a final, desperate attempt to protect those who had caused her the most pain she'd ever felt in her young life.
And in a strange, twisted way, she'd succeeded.
Her gaze turned to the huge manila envelope sitting on the front seat of her car. She smiled bitterly, knowing that the envelope contained all the evidence that would save Clark, Lex, Smallville, her father, and perhaps in a grandiose way, the world- from Lionel Luthor.
It hadn't been easy to get.
She'd had to use plenty of illegal tricks, contacts and sources she'd never thought she'd have to call on. She'd called in every favor she'd ever been owed, and worked night and day to make sure that her 'favors' were for her alone, and not reported back to Lionel. In the end, it had been only through the efforts of a friend she'd met a few years ago on a trip to Los Angeles, and the rather shady agency that Cordelia worked for, that had finally provided the evidence that would break Lionel Luthor.
She'd risked her reputation, her sanity and even her life to get what now rested so peacefully on the passenger seat of her car. Evidence she knew that Lex had been trying for years to get, but which she'd succeeded in attaining in months. A bitter satisfaction flowed through her at the thought, although it was tinged with the pain that always came from knowing the kind of man Lex could have become if Lionel had not corrupted him.
That would have been a man she could love.
~*~*~*~*~*~
I'm going under
Drowning in you
Falling forever
I've got to break through
Going under
~*~*~*~*~*~
Now, as she stood at the edge of the bridge, looking over the water below her, she contemplated what she was about to do. The repercussions would bring Lionel down, but they could, potentially, destroy LexCorp as well. Despite her anger and hurt over how Lex had treated her, the last thing she wanted was to see his years of hard work crumble, so she'd taken every precaution to make sure that did not happen. However, she knew it was a possibility she'd have to risk if it meant getting rid of Lionel for good.
Not that Lex would thank her. Sadly, with his father's brainwashing, he would probably take over the empire and build it into an even greater threat. It hurt deeply to think like that, but it was an option she had to consider. However, a spark inside of her hoped that, by exposing Lionel to the world, Lex's memory would be jogged, and with the help of Clark and the Kents, perhaps, he could still be kept on the right path.
It was a faint hope, but one she was gambling it was worth risking it all for. She had nothing else to lose. Everything she had had been taken from her.
Which was why she saw no reason to not go through with her plan. The only regret she would allow herself to feel was for the fact that her father would miss her. He wouldn't understand, and it would be an added worry he did not need at the moment, but there was no other way.
Besides, when enough time had passed and Lionel was out of the immediate loop, she might contact him. But not immediately. It would be too dangerous, since she would have to completely disappear, to cease to exist, to evade the wrath of Lionel Luthor. Even from prison, his reach was long and treacherous.
It was the hardest decision she'd ever had to make, but after weeks, perhaps months of thinking about it, she knew it was her only choice. Thankfully, her friends in LA had offered her the means to achieve it, now all that remained to be done was to carry it through.
She'd set this all in motion with her decision to deal with the Devil. If she'd have known where it would lead her, she would have turned and walked away. But hindsight was just that, the past, behind her. The only thing she could do now was to make what amends she could and to look forward, towards a new future and a new life.
Hopefully, her old life, her friends and family in it, would find a way to forgive her by her actions and start new lives of their own, out of the clutches of Lionel Luthor. If not, it was not her responsibility. She'd done the difficult part. She'd protected them and eliminated the threat to their safety in the process. What they did with the fallout was completely up to them.
She only wished she would be around to see it first hand, instead of anonymously, from half a world away, as a completely new woman.
But that was not to be, perhaps it had never been meant to be at all.
Wiping away a tear, she walked back to her car, her mind made up. There was no turning back. She'd been dragged under for the last time by this town, by her friends, by the Luthors.
Now, it was time to breathe on her own.
~*~*~*~*~*~*~
The End
UPDATE!!! There is now a music video to go along with this fic. It's posted under the same title in the music video category on this board! As for the song, it's been "fanficed" and "videoed" before, because its so fitting for so many ships! So here is my take on "Going Under" by Evanescence.
Please tell me what you think! (Oh, one more note, it branches off into a sort of AU ending that is, I know, definitely not where the show is going. I figure I might expand this into an AU series, but tell me what you think!)
~*~*~*~*~*~
Drowning In You
By: SaraC
Rating: PG-13
Spoilers: Through "Whisper" (Season 3)
Summary: Chloe's had enough of trying to protect everyone but herself
Disclaimer: Not mine. All belong to the WB and their creators
Author Notes: This came to me after watching "Whisper" and realizing that Chloe, while in part responsible for things, does not deserve all the grief she has been getting. Here's my take on what might be going through her mind and why she's had enough!
~*~*~*~*~*~
Now I will tell you what I've done for you
Fifty-thousand tears I've cried.
Screaming, deceiving and bleeding for you
But you still won't hear me.
-"Going Under" by Evanescence
~*~*~*~*~*~
Chloe stood on the bridge, looking out over the peaceful river, her car idling quietly behind her. There was a beauty to the crisp day, a freshness in the air that seemed to say spring was not far away. Birds chirped, water flowed, everything seemed right and peaceful in the little town of Smallville.
Everything, that is, except her life.
Her eyes were dark and sorrowful as she thought about the past few days and the drastic changes her life had undergone. In two short days the life she'd built with her family and friends in Smallville had come crashing down around her and everyone involved with her.
She did not kid herself, knowing she'd begun the cycle of destruction by allowing her hurt and anger to entice her into a deal with the Devil himself. Still, was it so wrong of her to want to lash out at someone, several someone's, who had hurt her over and over again, although not deliberately? It was not as if Lana, Clark, even Pete had not done something stupid in the heat of anger, Clark was a classic case, his secrets and lies an accepted part of everyone's life.
So why was it so different for her? Why could no one forgive her mistake, her bad judgment call? What made everyone else in this damned town so righteous that they could be forgiven their mistakes but not her?
Ever since their confrontation about her working for Lionel, Clark had been avoiding her. He was not overly rude about it, and he and Pete certainly seemed concerned over her reaction to her father's firing, not to mention Clark had asked Lex about it, but upon getting an answer for her, she'd noticed Clark had been distancing himself. It hurt, although honestly, she'd expected it. Despite the fact that she'd forgiven Clark a hundred times over for the secrets he'd kept and lies he'd told her, it was obviously a completely different ballgame when it came to forgiving her.
Even Martha and Jonathan had been colder than normal, expressing their sympathy for Gabe's predicament, but still managing, without words, to make her feel guilter than sin. Not that she wasn't, but it hurt even more when she saw how welcoming and warm they were to Lana. As for Lana, her pseudo-roommate had also been less than sympathetic. She'd spent more time weeping over the thought of 'losing' another loved one, even though Gabe was not her father. Not to mention her own life seemed taken up with her newest love-slave, Adam. Not to mention the "poor me, I got trampled by a horse" refrain that she was singing to anyone who would listen. Personally, she really did not mind, Lana never having been someone she'd really wanted as a friend. But it hurt nonetheless to see Lana getting the sympathy that might have been hers, considering whose father Gabe really was.
Pete was the same, something that hurt a lot more than she'd thought it would. He, like Clark, had been concerned for her upon the news of Gabe's firing, but in the following weeks, he too had taken to avoiding her. Obviously, Clark had told Pete about her deal with Lionel and now he was condeming her as well. Then again, she'd always suspected that Pete knew more about Clark and his secrets than she did, and despite her acceptance of that fact, it did not lessen the hurt.
While her own guilt over her part in things was huge, a part of her could not help but realize that despite her deal with Lionel, she hadn't betrayed Clark. Or at least, she hadn't given Lionel anything more than what he'd already had.
In fact, some of the information she'd given the bastard was deliberately misleading, geared to steer Lionel into a direction that did not involve Clark. In her own way, she looked at it as her attempt to atone for her lapse in judgment- by protecting her friend. She had put herself and her family at risk by agreeing to work with Lionel, she knew that and accepted the responsibility. But when she'd realized how stupid she'd been, she'd immediately begun to take steps to right that wrong. On a larger scale, she'd taken steps to protect everyone she loved, even at the cost of her own happiness.
And it wasn't only Clark she'd been trying to protect.
Her heart ached anew as she thought about the other man she'd entered into a deal with. On the outside, it would seem she'd gone to him for help, knowing only the son could help defeat the father. But her other reason was more personal. She'd known that if she could help Lex take down his father, see the kind of man Lionel had become, it might, in some strange way, steer him away from following the same path.
She hated the tiny part of her that believed Lex was capable of becoming his father. While she and Lex were not the greatest of friends, there had always been something between them. She would never admit it to anyone except herself, but she was attracted to the billionaire. There was something appealing about the way he treated her like a woman, not like a child to be catered to, like her friends always had. He didn't pull any punches with her, including warning her about how dangerous his father could be.
It was why she'd decided to trust him with the information she'd uncovered about Lionel's plot to kill his parents, and Morgan Edge's influence in it. His words, "I'll protect you, Chloe," had been the final seal on her decision. She'd taken a risk and decided to trust him. To give him everything she had and everything she might find on his father. In a strange, twisted way, she'd done it not only to protect herself, her father and her friends, but to save Lex, to protect him from his father's treachery.
But Lionel had destroyed that hope of hers as well.
~*~*~*~*~
I'm going under
~*~*~*~*~
But just when she'd thought she was above water again, and Lionel about to fall, everything had gone wrong. All her efforts to protect Lex, Clark, her father, herself, had been shot to hell by the simple fact that Lionel somehow found out about her deal with Lex.
It probably hadn't helped that she'd lost her temper with Lionel and threatened him to his face, either.
Still, she did not regret standing up to the bastard. She'd realized, somewhere deep inside, that she'd given Lionel the only ammunition he needed to destroy her father and her life, but she could not take a minute more of his threats, his roughness, his pure cruelty for everyone by himself.
Not to mention she'd been holding onto a spark of hope that Lex might be faking his memory loss and that it was all part of a larger plan to beat Lionel that he hadn't clued her in on yet.
Obviously, however, her efforts had been for nothing.
The final straw was her father's firing. She could still see the shock in his eyes as he'd tried to explain to her why Lex had fired him, although he was not sure himself. When she'd heard her father telling her that Lex believed he was the one spreading rumors about his boss's sanity, through her and then to Clark, she'd felt an immediate rush of guilt, followed soon after by a heated rush of anger and despair.
If she'd wanted proof that Lionel's electroshock therapy had worked, she now had it. Lex had chosen, as he had before, to protect Clark over her. He'd deliberately put this on Gabe, and by default, her head, instead of implicating Clark. Now Lex too was avoiding her at all costs, acting as if they'd never had any contact whatsoever.
Obviously, Lex remembered nothing of their deal, of their tentative friendship, of his passion to bring down the bastard that was Lionel Luthor.
The bitterness of the knowledge was like a knife in her heart, even though she knew Lionel's brainwashing was the cause. Or at least, she had to believe it was the cause. The alternative was too painful to contemplate.
She laughed harshly as she realized that even if Lex did remember, it was possible he had just been playing her, working with his father all along to get what information she had. She hated to believe that about him, but she knew him well enough to realize that it would not take much to start him down the same path his father walked.
It was why she'd fought so long and hard to keep him with her, with Clark, with his friends and those who would support him and encourage him to become the brilliant man she knew he could be, instead of the successor to the magnificent bastard she knew his father embodied.
She'd spent the past two months sacrificing her friendships, her future career, in some cases even risking her life, protecting those she loved. All, it turned out, for nothing.
She was so tired of it all.
Tired of being made out to be the villain of the piece. Tired of being made to feel as if she were always the one lacking in the sphere of her friends. Tired of taking a backseat to the nauseating pinkness that was Lana Lang's life and reign over Smallville's rather dim citizens. Tired of having to see the pain and hurt in her father's eyes as he agonized over why Lex, a man that despite his reputation, Gabe Sullivan respected and admired, would fire him without warning.
She was also scared out of her mind that what she'd set in motion, could never be undone.
Scared of what her father's eyes might reflect if he ever found out that she was the reason all of this had happened. Scared of what else Lionel might do to Clark if he ever truly found out the secret the boy was keeping. Scared that Lex, the man she'd begun to allow herself to love, was now headed down a path that there was no turning back from.
The evolving emotions had, by now, mutated into anger and frustration, a bitterness taking root in her soul that began to color the way she saw her life, and the people in it.
~*~*~*~*~
Don't want your hand this time
I'll save myself.
Maybe I'll wake up for once
Not tormented daily, defeated by you
Just when I thought I'd reached the bottom.
~*~*~*~*~
She'd always considered herself a self-sufficient woman, capable of taking care of herself and her life. But the past few months had shown her spending more time taking care of others, protecting her friends, her family, instead of herself.
And while it was a selfish thought, she wished someone for a change, would take care of her. Would stop to ask her how much pain and regret she felt at agreeing to work for Lionel. How her gut twisted watching Clark, Lana and Pete act as if they wanted to be anywhere but around her. How her heart ached to watch Lex become a miniature version of his father.
But those thoughts were useless and would do her no good. She'd learned her lesson, the hardest way possible.
She was truly alone in the world. She had no one to rely on, to trust, even her father, much as it pained her to admit, would never look at her the same when he learned her secrets, the end to which she'd attempted to justify her means.
While they were bitter thoughts, she found they'd also given her a bitter strength. A bitter strength that made her determined to right what she'd wronged, no matter what the cost.
That strength allowed her to brave her friends, her family, Lex and even Lionel. To look through them and around the pain they caused her as she used every contact, every connection, every shady associate she'd developed over the past few years to deal a final blow that would strike Lionel as hard as he had stricken her.
Despite the fact that no one was protecting her, that she knew Lionel would continue to find ways to ruin, perhaps end, her life, she'd risked it all in a final, desperate attempt to protect those who had caused her the most pain she'd ever felt in her young life.
And in a strange, twisted way, she'd succeeded.
Her gaze turned to the huge manila envelope sitting on the front seat of her car. She smiled bitterly, knowing that the envelope contained all the evidence that would save Clark, Lex, Smallville, her father, and perhaps in a grandiose way, the world- from Lionel Luthor.
It hadn't been easy to get.
She'd had to use plenty of illegal tricks, contacts and sources she'd never thought she'd have to call on. She'd called in every favor she'd ever been owed, and worked night and day to make sure that her 'favors' were for her alone, and not reported back to Lionel. In the end, it had been only through the efforts of a friend she'd met a few years ago on a trip to Los Angeles, and the rather shady agency that Cordelia worked for, that had finally provided the evidence that would break Lionel Luthor.
She'd risked her reputation, her sanity and even her life to get what now rested so peacefully on the passenger seat of her car. Evidence she knew that Lex had been trying for years to get, but which she'd succeeded in attaining in months. A bitter satisfaction flowed through her at the thought, although it was tinged with the pain that always came from knowing the kind of man Lex could have become if Lionel had not corrupted him.
That would have been a man she could love.
~*~*~*~*~*~
I'm going under
Drowning in you
Falling forever
I've got to break through
Going under
~*~*~*~*~*~
Now, as she stood at the edge of the bridge, looking over the water below her, she contemplated what she was about to do. The repercussions would bring Lionel down, but they could, potentially, destroy LexCorp as well. Despite her anger and hurt over how Lex had treated her, the last thing she wanted was to see his years of hard work crumble, so she'd taken every precaution to make sure that did not happen. However, she knew it was a possibility she'd have to risk if it meant getting rid of Lionel for good.
Not that Lex would thank her. Sadly, with his father's brainwashing, he would probably take over the empire and build it into an even greater threat. It hurt deeply to think like that, but it was an option she had to consider. However, a spark inside of her hoped that, by exposing Lionel to the world, Lex's memory would be jogged, and with the help of Clark and the Kents, perhaps, he could still be kept on the right path.
It was a faint hope, but one she was gambling it was worth risking it all for. She had nothing else to lose. Everything she had had been taken from her.
Which was why she saw no reason to not go through with her plan. The only regret she would allow herself to feel was for the fact that her father would miss her. He wouldn't understand, and it would be an added worry he did not need at the moment, but there was no other way.
Besides, when enough time had passed and Lionel was out of the immediate loop, she might contact him. But not immediately. It would be too dangerous, since she would have to completely disappear, to cease to exist, to evade the wrath of Lionel Luthor. Even from prison, his reach was long and treacherous.
It was the hardest decision she'd ever had to make, but after weeks, perhaps months of thinking about it, she knew it was her only choice. Thankfully, her friends in LA had offered her the means to achieve it, now all that remained to be done was to carry it through.
She'd set this all in motion with her decision to deal with the Devil. If she'd have known where it would lead her, she would have turned and walked away. But hindsight was just that, the past, behind her. The only thing she could do now was to make what amends she could and to look forward, towards a new future and a new life.
Hopefully, her old life, her friends and family in it, would find a way to forgive her by her actions and start new lives of their own, out of the clutches of Lionel Luthor. If not, it was not her responsibility. She'd done the difficult part. She'd protected them and eliminated the threat to their safety in the process. What they did with the fallout was completely up to them.
She only wished she would be around to see it first hand, instead of anonymously, from half a world away, as a completely new woman.
But that was not to be, perhaps it had never been meant to be at all.
Wiping away a tear, she walked back to her car, her mind made up. There was no turning back. She'd been dragged under for the last time by this town, by her friends, by the Luthors.
Now, it was time to breathe on her own.
~*~*~*~*~*~*~
The End