Title: A Complicated Life
Fandom: Smallville - Pairing: pre-Clex, w/Conner
Rating: PG - Size: 4,514
Type: drama
Warnings: none
Spoilers: DCU Conner back-story.
Summary: When Clark makes a discovery about Conner, honor forces him to tell Lex. Lex comes by to see for himself.

Disclaimer: Only mine in my dreams. ;-) This story was written for free entertainment purposes only and may not be reproduced for profit or altered without permission.

Notes:
AU after end Season 2 with a judicious mixing of post-season stuff and DC Universe. Kon/Kon-El/Conner is the canon DC test-tube baby of Superman and Lex Luthor. Yes, they actually went there; and now we can too. ^^;
For

twilighthdfan's Birthday Fic, who asked for "something to do with Clex and Kon." ;D Also used for the CW land challenge #11, Big Bang. (Twilight said I could ^^) Beta by Ronda (Thank you! ^^) Cross-posted to Archive of Our Own

A Complicated Life

Conner had finally gone to bed.

Clark stared at the contents of his refrigerator and desperately wanted a beer but finally settled on a glass of milk. He took it to the family room and sat down, staring at the wall across from him.

Even though Conner had been with him for three months, it wasn't until today that the Justice League had finally rooted out the last of the files relating to the cloning project. The explosions had destroyed much of what there had been. Trying to recreate information from the fragments that had been left had been difficult, even for the experts. And what they had found out...

With a gulp, Clark turned to look through the walls. Conner was sleeping peacefully, sprawled over his bed in such a way to make the bed look much smaller than it actually was. When Clark was young, his mom loved to take photos of him sleeping and then show him later. Conner looked just like Clark from back then. Fourteen years old and already bigger than his peers, yet still just a teenager at heart. An arbitrary fourteen, since Conner was really only a possible year old, accelerated in his cloning chamber, but still a teenager for all that.

Fourteen and the world changes.

The milk was gone. Clark looked forlornly at the empty glass and then sighed. He was putting this off because he didn't want to. But he knew he had to. The right thing to do. And Superman always did the right thing. Didn't he?

Clark picked up his phone and dialed a number that was still second-nature to his fingers, ingrained in his soul, though he hadn't used it for twelve long years.

"What?" The voice on the other end barked at him. Not quite the familiar greeting Clark used to get way back when.

Clark closed his eyes to the past. "Lex, it's me. Clark."

"I know that, idiot. What do you want?" Lex Luthor wasn't giving an inch and didn't pause in his reply.

Caller ID was such a pain. Clark shook his head. "How come this number still works?"

This time, there actually was a pause. Lex's reply was a fractionally less annoyed, though the thaw barely touched the surface. "When I get new phones, I forward the old number, filtered appropriately."

And apparently Clark was still on the permitted calls list. He took a deep breath, "Lex, I'm sure you've seen my son..."

"Your little mini-me? Oh yes. He's quite the spitting image," Lex said dryly. "Congratulations. I didn't think you and Lois would figure out cloning as a viable method to your... difficulties."

Clark winced. "We didn't. Lois and I broke up six months ago."

There was a longer pause. "My sources need to be fired, obviously. Then I'm even more surprised that you would do it yourself."

"We didn't tell anybody. And I didn't do it."

"Good sources shouldn't need words. Then who?"

"We're still friends. Somebody who wanted me to fight myself."

"Ah. Is that what they're calling it nowadays?" Lex's tone was so laden with innuendo that he didn't even get to the second half of the conversation before Clark lost it.

"Lex!" Clark crumpled the phone. He swore at the ruined piece of plastic in his hand and quickly grabbed another one from the closet and hooked it up. It only rang once before it was picked up.

"Another phone? What brand do you use? I should buy stock in the company." Lex sounded amused.

At least Lex had answered. Clark hadn't been sure he would. But he had better tell Lex what he'd called about before they got in a fight about something else. "I can't be viably cloned. The people who made Conner spliced in human DNA."

There was silence on the other end for so long that Clark wondered if Lex had hung up. "Lex?"

"Whose DNA?" Lex's voice was flat and still, carefully controlled.

Clark knew this moment, he'd been going over it for the whole day, since the moment he'd found out. It didn't make it any easier. "Yours."

"I'll be right over."

There was a click and then Clark was listening to a dial tone. He looked at the phone for a moment then hung up. "Well, that went well."

Twenty minutes later there was a soft knock at the door. Even with super-hearing, Clark only heard it because he was expecting it. He opened the door and he and Lex just looked at each other for awhile.

Lex had and hadn't changed over the years. Even at this hour of the night, he wore a three-piece suit, with a white shirt and dark purple tie. He was carrying a briefcase. Clark wondered if Lex had been working when he called.

Height was one of things that didn't change. Even though in his mind, Clark always remembered Lex as his height or a little taller, Lex was still a couple inches shorter than Clark. Clark thought he remembered Lex taller just because Lex always had such presence, and because he'd had Lex up on so high of a pedestal. Even now, those couple of inches didn't make that much difference as Lex stared calmly at him, not intimidated by Clark's height at all.

Lex had kept himself in good shape. There were a few more lines on his forehead, a few around his mouth. No more scars, making the one on his lip stand out for the oddity. Lex's eyes were still piercing, with that shade of coloring between grey and blue; a steel blue, with the attitude behind to match. Though Clark remembered when the steel had been there in color only, at least when Lex looked at Clark.

Years ago, when Clark first knew him, Lex had looked at him with smiles and hope. The eyes had been soft, wondering. They could pin other people with a glance, but for Clark it had always been a pause and a caress. Over time, the looks had changed to frowns and bitterness. Now... Now Clark couldn't read Lex's expression.

He stepped to one side, belatedly inviting Lex in.

Lex strode through the door like he owned the space, though he did it quietly. "I want to see him." He kept his voice low.

It was a squeeze around his heart, but Clark nodded. He hoped... he hoped Lex wouldn't want to take Conner away, because Clark would fight if Lex did. Clark didn't know what Conner would do. He and Conner were still circling warily around each other, not sure what to make of this new relationship.

"This way." Clark led the way down the darkened hallway to Conner's room, formerly the study. He opened the door and let Lex look.

Thanks to a night-light that Conner insisted on (in the shape of a sea shell, of all things), there was a dim radiance in the room. Still, though, all that could really be made out of Conner was a large lump under the covers and a shaggy head on the pillow. One arm stuck out at an angle, the fingers curving up loosely. Clark fought the urge to walk in and tuck the arm under the blanket and make sure Conner was okay. Instead, he sharpened his hearing to listen to his son breathe, very faintly whistling in his sleep.

Lex stood for several minutes, not moving, just watching. They didn't speak.

Finally, Lex walked away and disappeared into the family room. Clark stood for a moment more, then closed Conner's door and went to join Lex.

Lex handed him the briefcase. "There's two-hundred and fifty thousand. Expenses for teenagers will run much higher, of course, particularly when he gets into college. I'll set up a fund and arrange for you to get the money through a legitimate route."

Clark gaped at him. Finally, his mouth worked. "I don't want your money!"

"So like your father," Lex sneered. "Why did you call me, then?"

"My dad was a good man and he was right!"

"Your father lost the damned farm because he wouldn't take a loan from your Grandfather! Leaving my own offers out of it."

"My dad lost the farm because of me," Clark said tightly. "And we already thanked you for getting it back for us. We didn't ask for it, but we were grateful."

Lex snorted and dropped that subject to return to the other. "Why did you call me?"

Clark growled, "Because it was the right thing to do. You're his father too and you deserved to know."

Lex stared at Clark for a moment and then laughed harshly. "Funny, I don't remember us having slept together... This isn't a high-school after-school special! You're not the girl who has to go to the boyfriend. 'Honey, I'm pregnant.' What right thing? They spliced some genes together!"

"If you really thought that, you wouldn't be here now!"

"The cloning is probably something left from my father's experiments," Lex said tightly, "I wasn't able to track down that branch of his research. Forgive me for my curiosity as to the results. They stole my genes and I want to know what else they might have there. What is the League doing about this?"

Deflection, parry, and riposte. It had been awhile since Clark had dealt with Lex on such a personal basis. He scrubbed a hand through his hair. "They're taking care of it. Don't... don't get involved. I'll make sure any genetic samples we find are all destroyed. Most already went up when the lab exploded."

Lex glanced around the room and then prowled to the easy chair and sat down, sprawling in it like he had every right. He narrowed his eyes. "If you didn't want me involved, the stupidest thing you could have done was to call me. What is going through that convoluted mess you call a mind?"

Clark realized he was still holding the briefcase and dropped it on the floor. He stalked to the couch and sat down. "It was the right thing to do," he muttered, even though it sounded really stupid now. "Look, Lex. If you'd found out on your own and I hadn't told you, you would have been pissed to hell."

"True enough. But you just thought of that." Lex tapped his fingers on the couch arm. "You haven't been thinking at all about this, have you? You're just too freaked out to be a father at twenty-nine with a teenage son." Lex shook his head. "Have you arranged for identification? Birth certificate? Social Security card? Who was the mother? Why did Conner just show up now?"

"I... the League is handling that." Clark ran his hand through his hair again and closed his eyes.

Lex snorted. "I'll get them. They'll be more reliable that way."

Clark's eyes shot open. "No! Lex, you can't... I won't have..."

"What, you don't want illegal activities to get identification for somebody who doesn't exist?" Lex laughed. "I assure you, Clark, that the League's methods of getting these are just as illegal as mine. There is no legal way to obtain illegal identification! So in the end, it doesn't really matter. The main thing is who can do the better job at providing it that won't expose Conner to more danger."

"And that's you?" Clark mocked.

"It sure as hell isn't them. Conner's mother is Jessie Brooks."

Clark was completely thrown by the segue. "What?"

"Jessie Brooks. The gal you dated and dumped in high school. She and her father left immediately after that incident and went back in the witness protection program. They changed identities a second time and their records are pretty well buried. I'll go back and bury them some more to make sure. But your fling with her resulted in a pregnancy that nobody knew about because she'd left town. She died recently and told Conner about you so that he would have family when she was gone."

Clark gaped. "We didn't... we never... Jessie and I..."

"Oh, sure you did," Lex leveled a gaze at Clark. "I heard about that club where you dumped Lana to go home with Jessie, and I saw my car the next day."

Clark blushed scarlet. "We didn't..."

Lex waved a hand. "Doesn't matter. Everybody in your high school, hell, everybody in Smallville believes something did. Or at the very least, they won't be surprised when they find out that something had."

The logic, Clark had to admit, actually worked. He'd been thinking along the lines of something from the summer he'd run away to Metropolis, but Jessie was somebody that Smallville would know and who couldn't be tracked. Having Superboy appear on the scene at the same time as Clark acquired a teen-aged son was harder to disguise than just a pair of glasses. The stronger they made Conner's back-story with people who would back it up, the less risk to Conner in connecting him and Superboy. The Metropolis summer story, while plausible, wouldn't be as real to the people in Smallville as "Jessie and Clark's illegitimate son." Clark winced at just thinking the words inside his mind.

Lex's mouth hardened. "Fine. But you will take the money or I'll just find another way for it."

Clark blinked, then realized Lex had seen him wince and misinterpreted it. "No..." At the expression on Lex's face, Clark realized he'd done it again. "No, I mean – not what you – it's not that, it's... You're right."

It was Lex's turn to blink. "What?"

There hadn't been very many occasions where Clark had said that. He gave a wry grin that was half-apologetic. "You're right about Jessie. I'd been thinking of the Metropolis summer, but Jessie..." Clark remembered Jessie, with her devil-may-care attitude and ability to just have fun regardless of what was up. Though his memories were layered in the muddled fog that all his red kryptonite experiences held. That, and longing for more of it. Whenever Clark thought of it, he wanted it back again, the freedom and the release. Yet people had that mental check in their head for a reason. Judgment and thinking through what consequences actions could bring was better than uncontrolled freedom.

"Do you ever wish..." Clark snapped his mouth shut. Speaking of thinking things through, that particular question perhaps should never be asked. There were some things Clark just didn't want to know.

Lex tilted his head to one side, his expression softer than it had been since he'd walked in the door. "What do I wish?"

In amongst the Jessie memories were other ones. Of Lex's eyes travelling over Clark as he'd walked in with his new outfit. Of the way Lex's breath had caught in his throat. Of a time when Clark had meant the world to Lex. Red Kryptonite Clark had noticed as well.

"Do you wish you'd taken the offer?" And Clark had just got through telling himself he wasn't going to ask that. He closed his eyes.

"To run away to Metropolis with you?" Lex grinned. Clark's eyes were closed and he could hear the grin. It reminded him so much of what he couldn't have anymore. He opened his eyes to look at the grin and his heart turned over.

"No." Lex stretched out in the chair, settling in for real, unlike his earlier posed sprawl. "You weren't yourself. It would have worn off, eventually, and if I'd gone with you, then you would have hated me." Lex's mouth tightened again. "On the other hand, maybe I should have. It would have spared me some of the in-between angst for the same final result and gotten a good fuck out of it along the way."

Yes, well, there had been a reason Clark hadn't wanted to ask. He looked away.

Lex stood up. "You'll take the money. If Conner ever needs anything, you will let me know. None of your stupid morals getting in the way if it is important."

"You could just give the money to me – I certainly won't turn it down." A grin in a voice very much like Lex's.

How had Clark missed it before? He stood up and turned around, Lex doing the same. Conner stood in the family room doorway and raised his eyebrows at them.

"Dad. And... Dad Two? Father's too stiff and stodgy. Pop? Pa?"

Lex grimaced. "You don't have to call me anything. And the money stays with Clark. I wouldn't give a newly released teenager a blank check or we might have something very like your father's mess to solve."

Clark rolled his eyes. "You liked those new clothes of mine!"

"But your father didn't."

"Actually, he objected more to the stereo." And the overdrawn credit card, of course.

Conner kept looking at them, his mouth turned up in an easy smile. "I'm kind of getting the impression here, there's a bit more to this story than just mortal enemies."

He walked all the way in and plopped down on the floor next to the briefcase, regarding it happily. "Cool. No more generic corn flakes."

Clark didn't try and protest. The cereal was pretty awful, but it was also really cheap.

Lex raised an eyebrow. "Generic corn flakes? Clark, I think your reporter's salary does a little better than that."

"Nobody notices what they eat in the morning anyhow," Clark muttered.

"Start the day as you mean to go on, as your father used to say."

"Says the man who only has coffee until lunch."

Lex grinned again. "Touché."

"Yeah, really getting that impression." Conner leaned back against the couch and regarded Lex with open curiosity. "If you're the villain, why do you care?"

Clark cringed at the question but kept his mouth shut.

Lex, incongruously, relaxed with a nod of approval at Conner. "If Clark is telling the truth, which he inevitably does, except when he's lying through his teeth badly, then you're flesh of my flesh. Or at least of my DNA." He shrugged. "Giving a pile of money now is better than being sued for child-support later."

Conner snorted. "You're just as bad as he is."

"Oh no... I'm a lot worse," Lex said, his voice dropping down low and sinister. "Do not reject that villain label just because you see us talking. A polite enemy to your face is just one you have to watch your back for later."

"Didn't sound too polite when you two were arguing loud enough to wake me up," Conner remarked mildly, not giving an inch.

Clark guiltily glanced at the walls between the living room and the bedrooms. He hadn't thought of that. When he and Lex got going...

Conner laughed harshly, a dark bitter note in there that Clark hadn't ever heard before, but was an echo of Lex's. Conner regarded Lex with narrowed eyes. "Villain? A villain is a person in a lab coat who stands outside your tube and marks things down on a paper and moves on to the next. A villain is somebody who casually kills your older brother because he didn't meet some standard. Villains put you in memory baths and electroshocks and surgeries until you have just enough free-will to know who and what you are but don't have so much that you won't submit to their conditioning. Villains send you to kill your father for no reason but curiosity. And then they blow up your siblings when they fail.

"No, I think I know what a villain is." Conner's hard eyes dared Lex to rebut the statement.

Lex had on his most expressionless face, put on after the first sentence and not giving an inch. He stared back at Conner.

Clark looked between the two and wondered if he should say anything. Silence seemed wiser.

"There are no others? None at all?" Lex finally asked, avoiding the 'villain' part altogether.

"They blew up the lab," Clark answered, remembered pain scarring him deep. "When it didn't work. They blew it up, along with all the others. They didn't have my invulnerability." Not completely. There had probably been pain before they died, though. Clark had found skeletons. Each one a son lost.

Lex made an aborted gesture, a start of a reach to Clark before he pulled back. He turned to Conner, "How did they give you memories?"

Accepting the segue, Conner shrugged. "Green gel baths. At least five of them, though there might have been more before I knew myself. It's a mix of things, probably from a few different people. A childhood I never lived... They also did straight learning dumps, to feed knowledge of math and sciences. I think they went a bit overboard on that." He glanced at Clark, "High school is going to suck, I know most of it already. I still think I could be eighteen – go straight to college."

Lex shook his head at the same time as Clark did. "Clark a father at twelve? Impossible."

"Kids do it! Romeo and Juliet were only thirteen."

"I might have done it," Lex grinned a feral memory. "Farm-raised wholesome clean Clark? Wouldn't have happened. You've only got a few possible windows for being his son, and none before he was fifteen."

"But don't I look too old for fourteen?" Conner protested, his eyes sparkling with the fight.

Lex snorted. "You look just like Clark did at fourteen. I thought he was eighteen when we first met. Seventeen at the youngest."

Clark finally had to interject himself into the conversation. "You did?"

There. The soft gaze with the corner of the mouth turned up. It was a ghost of the look Clark always used to get. Lex's eyes ran over Clark with an echo of memories. "I don't give fourteen-year-olds trucks they can't legally drive. I didn't find out you were fourteen until your fourth time visiting, when you mentioned freshman high school."

And Lex had remembered an urgent appointment he had to get to and rushed off, leaving Clark alone in the castle. Clark remembered that moment, though he'd never known why. At the time, he'd just put down to one of those strange rich people things. Clark had been fascinated by Lex back then, so different from anybody else he knew.

"So, I want to know about the car." Conner took the thread back up. "What sort of a condition was it in?"

Lex snorted. "You're fourteen. I'm sure you can imagine it for yourself."

Clark blushed.

"And my mom? What was she like?"

"I didn't meet her myself – just heard about her from Chloe and Lana and all my staff." Lex's mouth twitched up. "Your dad had been lusting after Lana for ages, but as soon as Jessie showed up, he only had eyes for her. She was rebellious teenager in small-town school. Tight clothes, rings, collar... had an attitude yet was smart enough to avoid the jocks and the rebels and latch onto your dad instead. He turned rebellious too for awhile, running his dad's credit card to the max and taking her out for dancing and more. I'd offered my cars for ages – that was the only time he ever accepted. Everybody in town thought she'd slipped him some drugs, or was a drug, since he was right back to farm-fresh sobriety after Jessie left."

"Wow, Dad." Conner looked at Clark with admiration.

Clark sighed, "It was meteor rock. Red kryptonite. I wasn't myself. And it's nothing to be proud of." He'd left Lana in the middle of a rough area, taken advantage of Lex's generosity, betrayed his dad's trust, and did... things... with Jessie he shouldn't have.

Lex looked at him fondly as their eyes met with memories. "You weren't that bad. I did a lot worse at that age with drugs, and I'd chosen that path. Yours was forced upon you. With the kryptonite, you never wanted that route."

"Yes, I did," Clark responded with pain and longing. "That summer in Metropolis. You'd just gotten married, would be gone from my life. I'd blown up the cellar. Mom lost the baby. Running away with red meteor rock... none of that hurt as much."

Lex looked startled. "I would never have been gone from your life. Ever. Helen wasn't that important."

"When you marry, that's your best friend then."

Lex's mouth twisted. "That was your parents. I'd never seen anybody who loved each other so much or for so long before I met them. Best friends, lovers, and companions. And they raised you the same way."

Clark had to turn away from the naked pain Lex showed. It was too much. Too many of the memories, too much of the paths not taken. Too hard to think of what might have been.

"If you ever even think about taking drugs, I want you to come to me first," Lex said firmly. "Controlled circumstances only, and never ever with only your peers. It's not worth it. There are other things if you want to rebel."

Clark looked back around to find Conner watching Clark instead of Lex. When their gazes met, Conner smiled slightly. "I think I've already had my share of rebellion. You're right, Dad Two, it's not worth it."

A son. A son who loved him and cared for him, though they hadn't lived those years together. It was strange and wondrous. Clark returned the smile, unaccountably proud of Conner.

Lex stood up and Conner and Clark looked back at him. Lex's gaze was shuttered again. He turned away. "I'll send the documents by in a few days. The money will be arranged later." With quick strides, Lex headed for the door.

Two blurs of super-speed, and Clark and Conner were at the door ahead of Lex, completely in accord. Conner sent Clark a look that said plain as day 'shut up', and Clark acceded to his son.

"So, dinner on Wednesday?" Conner asked casually, blocking Lex's exit without being too obvious.

Lex blinked at him, uncharacteristically uncertain.

"I want to hear more about Jessie. And some of those others. Clark and Grandma would never tell me those sorts of stories." Conner leaned against the wall, daring Lex.

"Chloe will," Lex replied, deflecting the request.

"Chloe's not my second dad."

"Spliced genes don't make a parent."

Conner's mouth twitched up. "Dinner on Wednesday. Here. Dad will cook. If you're not here, Clark and I will be at the penthouse."

"Blackmail from a Kent? How novel."

Clark could tell Lex was having a hard time not being amused. Lex glanced from Conner to Clark and his gaze lingered on each.

"Perhaps." Lex finally said. He opened the door, Conner finally stepping out of his way. Then Lex was gone.

Conner looked at Clark. "So what are we having for dinner Wednesday?"

Clark snorted. "Whatever Lex is serving at the penthouse."

They grinned at each other. It was a start. Not one that Clark had ever expected to have. A son, and a second chance, both together. It was a complicated life, but somehow, they would make it work.

END