Title: Look! Up In The Sky!
Author: me_ya_ri
Email: me_ya_ri@yahoo.com
Rating: G
Challenge: Wave 26 – Mystery: Prompt #13: It's a bird, its a plane...hey! What the heck is that!?
Notes: Set in early seasons, pre-rift, but no specific spoilers.
Summary: Clark goes to visit Lex for his regular chess lesson and stumbles into strange happenings. Then Chloe calls and needs his help figuring out a mystery.

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Clark hummed quietly as he headed into Lex’s mansion. His chores were all done, his homework was finished, his parents were busy, and he had all of Saturday to spend with Lex. He wasn’t sure how the day could be better, other than Lex letting their after-chess-lesson make-out session go farther than some groping and really hot kissing. He might not be willing to admit to Mom and Dad that he was gay, but he certainly wasn’t hiding that from himself or Lex anymore.

“A duck?”

Lex’s shout echoed down the hallway, making Clark blink. He looked in Lex’s office, but he wasn’t there. It took a second to follow the echoes of Lex’s voice to the kitchen, where Lex was talking to the cook and a scientist from LuthorCorp. A highly distressed scientist from LuthorCorp, Clark thought, watching the man wring his hands and quiver while facing Lex’s anger.

“Hey,” Clark said, tapping on the door. “Is something wrong, Lex?”

“Clark,” Lex said, frowning at him until his face cleared, and then he sighed. “I’m so sorry, Clark. I completely forgot about our appointment this morning. An emergency came up, and I’m afraid I have to deal with it right away.”

He glared at the scientist who flinched and seemed to shrink a size. Clark looked at the cook who gave a tiny shrug behind Lex’s back, though her eyes were dancing with laughter. There was a large hole in the window where something had blasted inside, but there was no sign of whatever it was that had done the damage.

“Well, we can always reschedule for this afternoon or something,” Clark offered. “I’ve got all my chores and homework done so I’m free all day today. Want me to check back later on?”

“That would be great,” Lex said, looking relieved. “I’ll call you when I get this straightened out. Hopefully, it won’t take too long.”

His glare had the scientist shrinking even further into himself. Clark thought the man might have lost about a foot of height in the few minutes he’d been there. Clark nodded and left, wondering what sort of problem had Lex in the kitchen (he never went in the kitchen) with a scientist (who looked like he’d never been in a kitchen before either) talking about a duck. Nothing reasonable occurred to him as he drove home, but some of his wilder speculations did make him laugh aloud. He was halfway home when his cell phone rang.

“Hey!” Chloe said, sounding worried and confused. “Can you come by the Talon?”

“Sure,” Clark said, turning towards town. “Is something wrong?”

“Well, there’s this…thing, and I was hoping…well, that you could come help out,” Chloe said.

“Thing?”

“Yeah…um, well, you’ll see when you get here, I’m sure.”

The Talon was crammed with people when he got there, all excited, all talking at the top of their lungs, all running around looking for…something. Clark found Chloe with a magnifying glass looking at a small hole in the wall. The hole went right through the brick and out into the alley. It was about two feet wide. Clark thought it kind of looked like someone had fired a canon into the alley through the wall.

“Hey, Chloe,” Clark said, managing to edge his way through the crowd. “What’s up?”

“Clark!” Chloe said, using tweezers to pull something out of the brick wall. “What do you think this is?”

Clark took the tweezers, looking at the little bit of black fluff. He frowned, shrugging and shaking his head after a minute.

“No idea,” Clark said. “What is it?”

“Don’t know,” Chloe grumbled, sighing. “I was hoping you would. But it was left by the whatever-it-was that stopped the robbery of the Talon.”

“Lana was almost robbed?” Clark asked, horrified. “Why didn’t you say so in the first place?”

“Well, because of this,” Chloe said, waving aimlessly at the hole with her magnifying glass. “Besides, Lana’s fine. She’s over there talking to the cops. She said that this guy came in and demanded money and she was about to kick him to the curb—he was apparently like four foot nothing and had no weapons—when there was this…noise.”

Chloe stopped, looking uncomfortable. She put the piece of fluff away in a tiny plastic bag, sealing it, and labeling it with the date, location and time found. Chloe appeared to be in a CSI mood. She put away her magnifying glass. She studied the hole. She looked out of it at the debris, apparently completely absorbed in the examination except for the fact that she was clearly avoiding his eyes. She fidgeted, doing her level best not to meet Clark’s eyes.

“Um, noise?” Clark prompted finally. It didn’t look as if she was going to continue without prompting.

“Yeah,” Chloe said, fidgeting with her earrings. “Lana said it sounded kind of like a…quack.”

“Oh-kay,” Clark said, cocking his head in confusion. “So there was a quack. Then what?”

“Well, then there was this huge whoosh of air, something black, red, and blue hit the would-be robber and knocked him out,” Chloe said all in a rush, “and then the something smashed through the wall and disappeared.”

“There’s a superhero duck in Smallville?” Clark offered, getting a smack from Chloe.

“Be serious!” Chloe said, laughing in spite of herself.

Clark grinned and was all ready to claim that he was serious when there was a scream outside the Talon, followed by screeching metal and a man’s shout. He and Chloe forced their way through the crowd to run outside. There was an older woman sitting on the sidewalk clutching her purse, with a cop kneeling next to her. And then there was the man wrapped up in the light pole about five feet off of the ground, squirming and cursing at the top of his lungs.

“What happened?” Chloe exclaimed, hurrying over to the older woman.

The woman's shocked eyes were very wide as she tried to follow Smallville etiquette that required they avoid discussing the obviously weird occurrence that had somehow wrapped a power pole around a criminal in the middle of Main Street in broad daylight. Not the easiest thing to do, since all weirdness was supposed to wait until no one was around, and do its thing preferably at night. Obviously, no one had notified this particular bit of Smallville weirdness of the standard operating procedures, Clark thought, as he tried to stifle a giggle.

“That…ruffian tried to steal my purse!” the woman exclaimed furiously, clutching the precious object harder.

“And then what?” Clark prompted, trying not to loom as Chloe and the cop restored the woman to her feet. It wasn’t easy when he was so much larger than everyone else.

“Um, well,” the woman began hesitantly, still trying to follow the normal rules for Smallville.

“There was a quack, a whoosh of something black, blue, and red, and then the guy was wrapped in a power pole?” Clark offered helpfully, getting another whack from Chloe.

“Yes,” the woman said, looking relieved that she didn’t have to be the one to say it aloud.

“Really?” Chloe and the cop said at once, both astonished.

“Weird,” Clark commented. “That’s the third duck-sighting today. Must be something in the water, I guess.”

This time Chloe whacked Clark a lot harder, hard enough to warrant him flinching. Chloe and Clark spent the next three hours tracking down near-duck-sightings. A building fire was put out with an almighty quack that everyone in the county heard. A tree was rescued from a climbing cat that ended up covered with suspicious black feathers. The furry marauder was terrified of birds after that (especially ducks). Two cars were destroyed when drag racing on a deserted, backcountry road. The drivers swore that they’d run into a duck, but no feathers (or corpses) were left behind. A small child was saved from drowning. She talked about the cute cape the duck was wearing. That story had Clark laughing so hard that there were tears in his eyes, while Chloe was pulling out her travel bottle of aspirin.

“It’s not funny!” Chloe complained as they headed to Lex’s manor.

“It's a bird, it’s a plane...hey! What the heck is that!?” Clark gasped, nearly crashing the truck as a black, blue, and red blur shot in front of them.

“I have no idea,” Chloe said, sounding like she was grimly certain exactly what she’d just seen but was unwilling to admit it.

“It looked like a little black duck in a blue vest with a red cape on it,” Clark said, earning yet another whack. “You’re going to give me bruises if you keep doing that, Chloe!”

“Just drive,” Chloe growled at him. “Follow that….”

“Stoooooper Duck!” Clark said, laughing and getting whacked again.

They made it to the mansion without any more Superduck sightings. Clark asked the one guard on duty where Lex was, and they were pointed out to the grounds surrounding the mansion. Chloe followed him, scanning the woods for anything black, blue and red, while Clark scanned for Lex. To heck with random mutated ducks (in little blue suits with red capes), he wanted to see his boyfriend!

“Lex!” Clark called, finally spotting him and what looked like the entire staff. They all had nets, just about the right size for catching a duck. Even Lex had one. Clark thought he looked like he was trying to catch a monster-sized butterfly.

“Clark,” Lex said, turning a bit pale at the sight of him and Chloe. “Ah, we’re still dealing with the….”

“Superduck?” Clark offered helpfully, flinching once more from Chloe’s whack.

“You…know about that?” Lex said, looking vaguely ill.

“Well, there have been all these strange events in town,” Clark said, shrugging, “and everyone’s heard a quack just before seeing this black, blue and red blur. Superduck’s saved a lot of people today. He’s done it in a slightly…cracked way, of course.”

Clark didn’t say ‘quacked’ way, only because of the warning glares leveled at him by Chloe, Lex and his staff. He wasn’t sure he could avoid that many whacks, and he was sure that Lex, at least, would break his hand whacking Clark. He didn’t pull his punches, especially not for really bad puns.

“See! The suit was a good idea!” the scientist said, getting a furious glare from Lex. “Well, I thought it was anyway.”

“What?” Chloe demanded, looking from Lex to the scientist and back.

“An experimental subject escaped,” Lex growled, glaring harder at the scientist who did the shrinking thing again and was rapidly approaching gnome-size, “and we’re trying to recapture it.”

Clark and Chloe ended up being conscripted into capture duty after Lex explained the experimental program. Apparently, the scientist had been working on a formula that granted increased strength, speed and flight to a subject. His favorite animals were ducks. Thus, Superduck was born.

“I call him Superduck, too,” the scientist confided after Clark had been paired up with him so that Chloe could pick Lex’s brain as they searched. Clark would have preferred to be paired with Lex so that they could sneak off and make out together, but he couldn’t exactly say that in front of everyone. Lex looked like he’d rather have done it that way, too. Clark thought there should be a standard pairing pattern that had him with Lex, but then it might be a little too obvious that they were (sort of) dating.

“He’s like…a strange being from another world,” the scientist said, eyes gleaming with delight, “because of the meteor rocks we used, you know. Faster than a speeding bullet, stronger than a locomotive, able to leap tall buildings in a single bound. It’s really quite amazing. He’s very gregarious and likes people. Not especially bright compared to a human, but brilliant for a duck.”

“Um, so maybe we ought to play on that to lure him in?” Clark said, finding the conversation a little weird even for his weird mood today. “You know, make like someone’s in distress and call for Superduck to save him?”

“Oh, that’s a great idea!” the scientist said, beaming at Clark.

It didn’t take too long to set up their little trap. The scientist played the victim, pretending he'd fallen and couldn't get up. Clark hid in the bushes close by, ready to pounce on Superduck when he appeared. The scientist cried out for Superduck, and darned if there wasn’t a quack within a couple of seconds. There was a whoosh, during which Clark’s awareness sped up, letting him see the critter. Superduck was a little black duck, with bright, intelligent eyes, a blue vest with an “S” on the front, and a nice red cape that appeared to get in the way of its wings as it tried to fly. Obviously it didn’t matter, because it was using other powers to fly, not its wings. It didn’t even flap as it zoomed closer.

Clark dove and tackled the duck before it could ‘save’ the scientist. There was a short, furious battle where Clark was being battered by incredibly powerful feathered wings—and getting bruised!—the scientist was screaming for Lex and the others, and then Clark was sitting on the muddy ground, holding an armful of panting duck in a mini super-suit as the scientist petted it and crooned to it.

“Caught it,” Clark panted, spitting out black feathers as Chloe and Lex ran up. “Wow, he’s fast and strong.”

“Good boy,” the scientist crooned, taking his duck from Clark. “You’re such a good boy, Superduck. You did so good helping people today. I’m so proud of you! Now come on back home, and I’ll feed you some nice mash, and you’ll have a good rest with Mrs. Superduck, and play with the baby Superducks….”

He wandered off, petting and crooning to his super pet. Chloe and Clark stared after him, Clark with his jaw dropped open. Lex was groaning, his face in one hand and the oversize butterfly net drooping to the ground. Clark turned back to Lex, staring up at him. He was pretty sure that the bruises the Superduck had given him were going to heal a lot more slowly than normal, because he still ached. He was also pretty sure he was a disaster area, covered in mud, feathers, and grass, sitting there in the mud after winning a battle against Superduck. It beat normal Smallville weirdness by several miles, which meant that he should shut up and never speak of it again, but his funny bone just couldn’t let it go, even if he never got laid by Lex because of it.

“You’re breeding a Superduck army? Who are you, Aardvark Radnick?”

“I’ll Aardvark Radnick, you!” Lex snapped before bursting into laughter. “God, at least he didn’t make super-rabbits. I don’t think I could deal with that.”

Chloe groaned, muttering about being dropped into a Scooby Doo episode as she stomped back to the mansion, already on her cell phone.

“Why not?” Clark asked, spitting out another feather.

“What? You’ve never seen that Loony Tunes cartoon?” Lex asked, heading back to the mansion with his net. “I think I have it on DVD. We can watch it after you get cleaned up.”

“That’d be great!” Clark grinned and followed him, brushing feathers and mud off as he went. “Do you have any spare clothes I could borrow? Mine are kind of trashed.”

“I think I might,” Lex said, that gleam in his eyes. “I’ll have to check.”

Clark grinned at Lex. Lex’s lips were twitching as he led the way. There was just enough bounce in his step to make Clark hopeful. Maybe today wasn’t a lost cause after all—there might still be that make-out session he’d been looking forward to!

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