Beat, Part 1

Title: Beat (Part 1)
Rating: PG-13
Fandom: Smallville
Pairing: Chlark, Chlois
Spoilers/Timeline: Post-Series
Disclaimer: I own very little, certainly not these characters. Please don’t sue!
Author’s Notes: So I’m hoping Clark grows a brain at some point. Maybe a little good, old-fashioned Kryptonian education can help. This one’s pretty fluffy for me. I posted it as a WIP at K-Site, and didn’t want to add it here until it was complete.

---

Solitude.

It is all the man who was once Clark Kent has known for years.

In that time, the last son of Krypton has accumulated lifetimes of knowledge and an intimate understanding of the powers granted by the yellow sun shining to the South.

His hyper-sensitive hearing has been dampened by the fortress shielding until now. This will be the last skill he perfects before meeting his destiny. His last task before freedom.

He understands why the world needs him. Even before he bowed to his birth-father’s will, those closest to him instilled pride in his abilities and a will to serve those who could not help themselves.

It is their memories he honors through every day of his exile.

“Still your mind, Kal-El. Concentrate.”

He controls his breathing and wills his heart to slow.

“Filter out the sounds of your own body. Filter the wind, the voices. The million natural and unnatural sounds of this world.”

The silence is far more absolute than even the isolation affords him. It is deafening.

“Concentrate on a single human heart. One you know well.”

There is one he can recall easily. One who makes him feel safe, trusted, admired.

“Recognize its cadence.”

Slowly, a steady rhythm invades his existence, warming his entire being. He has blocked the sound of his own heart, but he can still feel it rattling his ribcage.

“Take note of its speed. Is its bearer asleep, excited, frightened? Listen.”

He listens. She sleeps. She dreams. Hours pass in the world beyond. He hears the tempo accelerate when she wakes, probably late. He can’t help but smile.

It is a strong, sure beat. It quickens periodically with the inevitable excitement of her day-to-day existence, and he feels his own race to match it in shared anxiety.

Days, then weeks pass as Kal-El concentrates, meditates, becomes attuned to that heartbeat, stripping away the other sounds emanating from that same body, one by one.

There are moments of exhaustion where he can feel the physical weight of a world of sounds pressing down around him, daring him to slip into chaos for a moment. Only his own desperation to connect to another being keeps him focused on that single pulse, even in his dreams.

She is the one he longs more than anything to see, to tell the secrets he uncovered in this place. He needs to tell her what a fool the boy who left was.

His skin burns with the itch to reach out.

After an eternity, his father’s voice interrupts his meditation.

“It is time to move to the next phase of your conditioning, Kal-El. Concentration has been mastered, but it is a childish game compared to the task of expanding your focus at will.”

He steels himself for what is to come. Father’s cautions are rarely without painful consequences.

“Slowly, with control, expand your focus to include other sounds of that body. Notice the respiration, the slide of blood through the pulmonary system.”

Her breath is rougher than he remembers. He wonders briefly if it is because she spends too much time in the city with no reason to return to the wide open spaces they shared in youth. She was always one to push her body past its limits.

“Now, Kal-El, expand your focus to include the voice. Do not stop monitoring the pulse and respiration. Can you hear their words? Does their heartbeat quicken to indicate a lie? Or remain steady in honesty?”

Her heartbeat quickened while father spoke. Her respiration increased as though she was under stress. Instinct tells him it was not deception that drove the increase. He pushes his senses outward.
His world shatters at the first English he hears in over four years.

“I…do.”

Concentration broken, his mind explodes in a cacophony of sounds; of pleas, shrieks, clamors, and clangs. He is chaos. He is lost.

Darkness swallows him whole.

---

He wakes to silence like he has never heard before. It’s claustrophobic.

He realizes the absence of her heart is what deepens the emptiness. The anguish returns, this time without the madness.

She is lost to him. He is still lost.

He knows he never gave her a reason to wait. It wasn’t until he was alone, utterly alienated from all he once knew, that he understood the nature of his heart. His old life fell away, and with it, the pointless boundaries erected.

They were lines drawn in the sand by a boy who knew nothing.

He wonders who she said those words to. Wonders how much time really passed while he was here. It could be years, it could be decades. His sense of time has been warped by the meditation required to master both information and skill.

He would trade the near-eternity he knows he will live, trade his powers, trade the fate of the universe, to be the man she was speaking to.

If wishes were horses… Jonathan Kent used to say that. His other father with the kind eyes and simple truths.

Clark Kent gave up on changing the past years ago. No matter the warning, the cost always surprises you in the end.

“Kal-El.”

Jor-El’s voice is a thunderclap in the silence.

“You must resume.”

Clark closes his eyes, breathes deeply to clear his mind. He can’t bear to focus on the rhythm of her heart. He needs comfort, so he seeks the only rhythm he knows better than hers.

Martha Kent will always embody strength through love, and he needs her more than ever in his misery.

Ah. There it is. Like a warm blanket on a dark night. Soft, but strong. Like the woman it belongs to.

He acclimates quickly, stripping away the interference. Then slowly forces the boundaries of his focus outward.

“I’m so relieved to hear you’re safe…Lois.” Her voice is hushed, but amused. “Call me when you’re back home in Metropolis.”

Pulling out a fraction, he hears a low beep and the click of a cellular phone snapping shut. He is blind to her surroundings, but as he pulls his senses outward, he can hear the rustle of her heels on carpet. Further still, he hears large oak doors opening, and a respectfully hushed “Senator Kent.”

He can almost see the imperceptible bow as a young man greets his mother.

Steadily over the next few hours, he expands his senses to include the floor of the senate. Rustling papers, hushed arguments, and official statements create a perfect picture, with his mind unconsciously matching imagery to sounds.

Throughout, he is able to maintain his focus on Martha Kent’s heartbeat.

Later, he follows her through the halls and across the street to her office, where she greets an assistant named Kylie, and brushes through to an inner office.

She drops her briefcase on a maple desk. From the slide and whoosh, coupled by the sounds of traffic and birds, Clark knows she is standing idly by the window. She sighs heavily.

The rhythm tells. She’s worried about something.

Miraculously, she stills. He hears the rustle of her hair as she turns to examine the rest of the room.

“Is someone there?”

His heart leaps into his throat.

“Clark?”

He hears her scrub her face with her hands and laugh nervously. “I must be getting senile.”

---

In the weeks that follow, Clark Kent learns to hone this power. It will be his most valuable asset in the quest to save humanity from itself.

Soon, he has learned to distinguish a thousand voices, calling out at once. They are the multitudes, but they are individuals, their heartbeats and laughter, unique.

Thousands of voices become millions. Millions spill into billions. Each is unique. Each knows love in its own way.

This is the most burdensome gift of the yellow sun. It gives him the means, and therefore the responsibility, to choose.

He knows that even he, for all his powers, cannot be everywhere at once. He must inevitably choose who dies in order to decide who lives.

He is trained in the logic of his people. He understands the necessity. But he is still a child of Earth, and the very idea tears him to shreds.

He still blocks that single heartbeat. He knows he is a coward. That he could miss it if something happened to her, but he isn’t ready to hear her content without him. Not when he never had a chance to tell her what she really meant to him.

Soon, he will face the world. Once he is well settled in his new life, he will seek her out to congratulate her. Not before.

He returns to his meditation, identifying and prioritizing crises even in his sleep.

In the morning, he finds street clothes laid out for him.

“It is time, Kal-El.”

There are no tears at this farewell. The fortress will be his refuge whenever the weight of the world becomes too great. It is his father’s last gift.

He is dressed and knocking on the door to Martha Kent’s apartment in 10 seconds flat.

This time, he feels his mother’s love as much in the words as in the embrace. Even on a rainy afternoon in Washington D.C., she smells like home.

---

His mother has always nurtured with food, so he soon finds himself staring down the biggest meal he’s seen since his last Thanksgiving at home.

Not that he minds in the least. The Kryptonian dishes his father replicated had been bland at best. God, he missed the smell of meatloaf and mashed potatoes.

She’s updated him on the farm, Lana, her time in congress, and even that nasty business with Lex. He could only be relieved that the rest of the world finally recognized the criminal mastermind for what he was and had him safely behind bars.

His mother nods at his assessment of Lex’s crimes exceeding what he was imprisoned for, then pauses, slightly wary.

“Clark, there’s something else you should know. Chloe…”

He cuts her off. “I know, mom.”

“You do? How?”

“At the end of my training, I learned to use my hearing to find anyone on Earth. I heard her.”

Inexplicably, she beams. “Well, it’s about time.”

Shocked by her reaction, he looks down. His third helping of mashed potatoes becomes fascinating.

“Clark?” His mother sounds confused. Maybe she doesn’t read his reactions as well as she used to.

“Is she happy?” He’s ashamed at the weakness in his voice.

“Of course she is. It’s what she always wanted. The name thing didn’t seem to bother her as much as I expected.”

Pain lances through him. He’s not sure why. It’s not like he thought he was what Chloe always wanted, but he’s terrified that is exactly what she is to him. And he’s missed all the chances he’s going to get.

Puzzled, his mother takes mercy on him and changes the subject.

“So, tell me all about Jor-El’s ‘destiny’.”

He knows she hates the idea of trusting his Kryptonian father, so it’s that much more meaningful that she trusts Clark enough to support his destiny as savior to mankind. She even calls in some favors to get him a decent cover story for the last four and a half years.

Apparently, Clark studied journalism in Europe. He even has a job waiting for him at The Washington Times. It’s not The Post or The Planet, but it is a start. He’s into his own apartment in less than a month, and he’s promoted to the third floor three months after that.

Having super-senses definitely helps when you’re on the city beat, and he discovers that journalism is a great cover for being in the right place at the right time to do some good.

Despite his competitive streak, he never once picks up a copy of The Planet, and he steadfastly avoids looking at his mother’s subscription when he visits.

He knows his long-term goal is to return to Metropolis. After all he’s been through, it still feels like his city. It has absolutely nothing to do with the fact that it’s her city, too.

After two years at The Times, he submits his portfolio to The Planet. He’s surprised to hear back from Perry White less than a week later.

“Kent! You little rascal! I knew you were hiding a real reporter under that bumbling farmboy routine.”

“Um, thank you?”

“So, I find myself in a position to settle my debt. Can you join me Thursday at 9:00am sharp?”

“Sure, Mr. White, but…may I ask why?”

“Why, to interview for the newest position opening up in my bullpen, of course. Tell me you did enough research to know who The Planet’s latest and greatest Editor In Chief is.”

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Continued here...