babydee1 | Chlollie Fanfic: Disintegration, Chapter 30 (Reply)

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Title:              Disintegration
Author:          BabyDee1
Pairing:          Chlollie
Rating:           NC-17 (this chapter PG-13)
Warnings:     Episodes re-writes for 8.14 (Requiem); character death
Timeline:      Season 8 episodes, from Odyssey - Doomsday
Disclaimer:   All characters belong to the CW & DC comics.
Summary:     Chloe and Ollie’s relationship gets fractured through a series of miscommunications and interferences. Fourth Book in the Chlollie series, sequel to Slingshot, Trajectory and Misdirection.
Feedback:      …in spades. :-)

Read previous chapter here.

Read story from the beginning here.

Chapter 30

It would be several more weeks until an unlikely person pretty much delivered Lex Luthor to him on a silver platter.

Months on end of searched and wild goose chases, not to mention millions of dollars in costs…and Lex had been on his doorstep all the time.

Oliver stared at the dimly-lit trailer sitting in a field in the middle of nowhere, and clenched his fist tightly as he walked towards it. He slotted his skeleton key into the lock and turned the handle, then held his breath as he pushed the door open.

The scene that greeted his eyes was…bizarre. Yes, it was Lex; but not the way he’d pictured him. His skin was mottled and covered in burns, and there were wires going into and coming out of almost every inch of him. There was a gas mask over his face which was connected to an oxygen tank; one eye was completely covered by a healing mask while the other stared at him in shock.

Oliver didn’t feel sorry for him one bit.

“We’ve been playing a very expensive game of tag, Lex,” Oliver said wryly as he approached the man in the chair. “Do you have any idea how many frequent flier miles I racked up trying to find you?”

Lex blinked furiously and made a repetitive, tapping motion on the small screen by his chair with his one functioning finger.

“So you send as many silent signals as you like, Lex,” Oliver said, folding his arms. “I’ve cut your alarm off. And your lifeline to Tess has been disabled, too; lo-jacking her like that?” He tut-tutted and shook his head. “Bad idea.”

Lex’s eye narrowed and tracked him as he walked slowly across the room to one of the many computer screens and activated it.

“Let’s see…what’s this?” he asked as he studied the screen. “Hmm…blue prints for the power suit currently grafted to the former Mrs Luthor’s body,” he said, clicking through screen after screen. “It must eat you up alive that after sinking millions of dollars into that project, she snagged it at the last minute.” He clicked through the screens again, pausing when he got to another one on which he spotted his name.

“I’m guessin’ this isn’t your Christmas Card list,” he said to Lex, who glared at him in reply. Oliver magnified the screen and clicked on the list, which was headed up by the name Clark Kent.

“Clark, huh?” Oliver said. “Why am I not surprised?”

He clicked on the name, and immediately a tally of Clark’s weaknesses appeared on a drop-down list, along with a lengthy list of procedures to be carried out “…upon successful capture of the subject.” Oliver narrowed his eyes and saw that the target date for the project was scheduled for just a few days away.

“Let me guess,” he said dryly. “This little mission would have gotten the go-ahead if you’d been in possession of the power suit,” he said. “And I see you had plans for each and every one of us.” He scrolled through the list, stopping when he got to Chloe’s name. He clicked on it - and the blood drained from his face.

Up until now, he’d had to guess what had been done to her during that month in Black Creek; now the truth of it was laid before him in stark reality. It was a relief to read from the reports that she hadn’t been invasively sexually assaulted, but there were images of her stripped naked and strapped to a table, and he didn’t think she’d have undressed voluntarily; they wouldn’t have either had to tie her down, sedate her, or force her to forget by subjecting her to a mind-altering substance. The thought of her suffering the indignity of being prodded and poked by strangers while completely naked and unable to even raise a hand to cover herself was simply too horrifying to imagine.

Bile began to rise up in his throat, and he covered his mouth to stop himself from being sick. The more he scrolled, the more he saw evidence of the experiments and procedures they’d carried out on her until finally he came to the real reason why she’d taken.

“You wanted her healing ability,” he said hollowly. “You found a way to isolate it and extract it into the suit, which was supposed to rig you up back to your former glory once it was on your back.” He turned to face Lex, clenching his jaw - and his fist - hard. White-hot rage bubbled up in him and he took several deep breaths to keep himself under control.

“I bet you’re really pissed that whatever you did to get it out of her destroyed it for good,” he taunted. “Because now, she can’t bring you back. Unless of course you have plans to kidnap her again…”

A brief flash of guilt flickered in Lex’s good eye, and Oliver turned back to the report.

Subject to be recovered and reinstituted at Opal House, it read. And the date of recapture was the same as the day they’d planned to take Clark.

“You bastard,” Oliver swore as he turned back to face him. “What were you going to do to her this time, huh? Torture her until her body was forced to heal itself, to jumpstart her healing ability again?”

Oliver shook his head and laughed harshly. “Well, you’re never going to get that chance,” he said. “In fact, you’re never going to hurt another human being again. I have no regrets for what I’m about to do to you, Lex Luthor. Know that you brought this upon yourself.”

He strode purposefully towards Lex, and placed the seemingly harmless toy monkey which he’d gotten from Winslow’s collection by his feet.

“I will never again stand by and watch you harm the people I love,” he said as he pressed the button to activate the timer on the device, then calmly stood. Lex’s eyes whitened and he made strange, indeterminate grunting sounds as he tried in vain to distance himself from the object at his feet. The monkey’s hands began to move, making the cymbals clap and the toy tremble and vibrate entertainingly.

“Goodbye, Lex,” Oliver called over his shoulder as he walked to the door. “Enjoy hell. Oh - and send my regards to your father.”

He closed his ears to the sound of Lex’s desperate grunts and shut the door behind him. He swallowed and walked on, not turning back, not even when a massive boom assailed his eardrums and the sky lit up with a bizarre orange glow behind him, accompanied by a gush of heated air which propelled him forward.

He didn’t turn back. His eyes drifted shut as the burning need which had haunted his soul for months quieted and cooled, along with the scene of desolation behind him.

Finally he turned back to where the trailer had been, where now only a flaming, burnt-out wreck was all that remained of the harbinger of so much pain.

Lex was gone. The threat of his terror and tyranny was finally over.

***

Chapter 31…