Title: It's Always the Meteor Rocks
Author: WyseQuack
Written: May 2003
Crossover: Smallville/ Buffy the Vampire Slayer (BtVS concepts only)
Rating: PG-13 (at worst)
Note to readers at fanfiction.net: In a devious attempt to maximize readership while complying with fanfiction.net rules I plan to rotate this story between the "BtVS Crossover" and "Smallville" categories. So, if you think you might want to come back and have another look at it later, be aware that it might be moved to the other category.
Disclaimer: I don't own either Smallville or Buffy the Vampire Slayer. I'm not making any money off this, I'm just having some fun with other people's toys.
Timeline/Spoilers: Shortly after "Exodus" (2003 season finale) for Smallville; Shortly after "Chosen" (series finale) for BtVS.
Summary: Another mystery crosses Chloe Sullivan's path.
Pairing: None. Pete Ross/Chloe Sullivan friendship.
Author's notes: As of the original writing, this is intended as a one-shot short story. The only characters who appear in it are from Smallville, but events and concepts from Buffy the Vampire Slayer are incorporated. I reserve the right to change my mind, and extend this at a later date, in which case BtVS characters might show up. But don't hold your breath.
Acknowledgments: I think I would have come up with the idea for this even if I hadn't read M. Scott Eiland's "Incidental Effects". I can't be one hundred percent certain, however, since I did read that before I wrote this. I suspect these two stories are far from the only two along these lines, anyhow. Regardless, just to be safe, I'd like to thank Mr. Eiland for the inspiration.
Feedback: If you want to tell me why you liked it - or even why you didn't - please do.
It's Always the Meteor Rocks
Chloe Sullivan stared in disbelief at the handle to the driver's door
of her convertible - which had just come off in her hand. The car
was in good shape, the handle hadn't been either rusty or loose - so
why the hell had that just happened? Why was she standing here in
the Smallville High parking lot, with the handle to her car door in her hand, and not on the car door where it belonged?
It made yet another addition to what was already a sucky day. The Torch office had apparently become a magnet for creeps and vandals, Clark was still alternating between being a pod person and the invisible man, and Lana - she and Lana were walking on eggshells around each other right now, and it wasn't doing anything to calm Chloe's nerves.
She spotted a loose stone, a little bit smaller than an egg, and walked over to give it a solid kick - mostly as a release of some of her pent-up aggression. Her sense of disbelief returned as she watched the stone soar through an arc of a couple hundred feet. She hadn't kicked it that hard - she couldn't have kicked it that hard!
"Whoa! Check it out, Mia Hamm!" came a familiar voice from behind her.
She turned around. "Hey, Pete," she said in greeting. "I take it you saw that too, then?"
"What? You nearly putting a rock in orbit with your toe? That's what I thought I saw."
"That's what it looked like to me, too," Chloe agreed, without enthusiasm.
"I guess you've been eating your Wheaties," Pete commented. "You going out for the football team in the fall? I mean, if you can kick a football half that far, we'd never need a punter."
"Maybe I'll think about it then. Right now, I just want to get home and crash, and not think about what a miserable day this was."
"What happened?" Pete asked, curious.
"For starters, the Torch office got ransacked - again."
Pete's reaction to that announcement struck Chloe as a little on the peculiar side, prompting her to ask, "Did you already know something about that?"
Pete said nothing, but his stricken look was practically a confession.
"But how could you?" Chloe asked. "Unless . . . " her voice trailed off. Then she said "Clark!?" in a voice that was equal parts shock and outrage.
"It's not what you think, Chloe," Pete said, trying to calm her down.
"You don't know what I think," Chloe declared hotly. "Right now, I'm not sure what I think."
"He's going through a lot right now," Pete started to try to explain.
"Don't make excuses for him," said Chloe in a very firm voice. "He can make his own. After all, he's had plenty of practice."
Pete studied Chloe as he thought about what to say next. "Chloe, what's going on here? We're all friends, aren't we?"
She shook her head, slowly. "No, Pete. We're not. Clark and I, I mean. Not anymore."
"What happened?" Pete asked, puzzled.
"You don't know?" Chloe asked, surprised. "I thought Clark forgot about everybody when he got wrapped up in Lana, but I guess it was just me. Wow, aren't I special." There was more than a hint of bitterness in the last sentence.
"Is this about jealousy?" Pete asked, still not sure what was going on.
Chloe shook her head. "No, Pete. I wish it was - in some ways that would make things so much easier."
"That what is it about?"
"You really don't know what's going on with me and Clark, do you?" Chloe asked.
"I didn't know there was anything going on."
Chloe nodded her head as she digested that. "See, that's part of the problem. Though, to be fair, I suppose I have to share the blame with Clark on your being out of the loop. The thing is, once he and Lana started to really get close, Clark forgot I existed."
Pete gave Chloe a skeptical look.
"I know what that sounds like, but this isn't about jealousy. It's not!" she insisted. "Okay, I admit the idea of Clark and Lana together didn't exactly thrill me, but I could have dealt - if they would have been honest with me.
"Instead I got a string of lame excuses, transparent invasions and insincere apologies. He kept missing deadlines on the Torch. We eventually had a big argument about it, and he wound up quitting."
"I did hear about that," Pete admitted.
"You think I was too harsh?" Chloe asked. Pete shrugged his shoulders.
"Look, Pete, I can accept missed deadlines where a real emergency is involved. But it was always 'Oh, Lana stubbed her toe,' or 'Oh, Lana, got a hair in her eye,' or 'Oh, Lana had a hangnail'. It was like when he was with Lana, the rest of the world didn't exist.
"This isn't the green-eyed monster talking, Pete. I can accept him putting Lana first. What I can't accept is his treating everybody else like crap because he's with her."
"Isn't that putting it a little strong?" Pete asked.
"Not from what I've seen," Chloe told him. Then she raised her hands in a half-hearted mock surrender. "Maybe it's just me he's treating like crap. But that's still not okay."
"Chloe . . . " Pete began.
"Pete, if you're going to say something to defend it, save it. Unless . . . do you think Clark could be mentally ill?"
"What!? No ! At least, I'm pretty sure not," Pete said, taken aback.
"Then save your breath. Because that's the only explanation on God's earth that can excuse a friend treating someone the way Clark has been treating me."
"Chloe . . . don't give up on him," Pete urged.
"It's too late for that, Pete," Chloe admitted with a touch of sadness. "I already have."
Pete just stared at her, not having any idea what to say to that.
"What is it they say," Chloe mused, "'to have a friend, you have to be one'? It just seemed to me I was the only one making the effort there any more, between Clark and me, so I asked myself why I still bothered. You know what, Pete? I couldn't come up with a good reason."
"And how do we stand? You and I?" Pete asked.
"I hope we're still friends, and I'd like us to stay that way," Chloe told him. "I'll even admit I haven't been pulling my weight on my end of it lately, and promise to try and do better."
"Agreed. I mean, I'll try and do and better about that myself. But what about Lana?" Pete asked.
"I don't have a problem with Lana," Chloe said.
Pete said nothing, but gave her a knowing look.
"Okay, I don't have the problem you think I do with her. She can have Clark Kent, the 2003 model. Except - right now, I think she deserves better. I'm pissed with Clark, I'm just irritated with Lana. And that's only because I think she should give her boyfriend a swift kick in the ass, and tell him to shape up. But it's not really my place to tell her that, is it?"
"You are pissed," Pete commented, staring at Chloe's hand. Chloe followed his gaze and looked at the wrinkled strip of metal in her hand. It took her a moment to realize it had started out as the handle to her car door.
"Pete?" she asked meekly.
"Yeah?"
"Can you give me a lift home? I don't know where this freakish strength came from, but combine it with my mood and I don't think I should drive. I don't want to risk tearing off my steering wheel in the middle of traffic."
"Good point," Pete agreed. "Sure, I'll give you a lift."
They headed over toward Pete's truck. "You really have no idea?" Pete asked.
"Knowing this town, it's more than likely there's some connection to the meteor rocks, but I just don't see what it is right now. I haven't been near a meteor rock in weeks, and it's not like I was hit by lightning or anything. It's just - all of a sudden, it happened. For no reason I can fathom."
"Must be kinda cool," Pete commented.
"Not really," Chloe said. "Suddenly, I'm bull-in-a-China-shop girl. The whole world seems marked 'Fragile' to me right now. I don't even trust myself to drive my own car. It's actually more of a pain than anything."
'Too bad you and Clark apparently aren't speaking to each other any more,' Pete thought to himself. 'He could probably help you deal'.
"Oh, and Pete? Could we keep this between us, at least for now?" Chloe asked. "Give me a chance to figure out why it happened, whether it's permanent, stuff like that?"
"Sure, Chloe," Pete nodded.
They climbed into Pete's truck, Chloe taking extra care to avoid causing any kind of damage.
The news came on the radio just as Pete pulled out of the high school's parking lot. The lead item concerned a town in California, which had apparently just been swallowed - in its entirety, no less - by a gigantic sinkhole.
"Those whacky Californians," a bemused Chloe commented, as she wondered why she was so certain there was more to that story than what she'd just heard. It wasn't like she had any direct knowledge about a catastrophe that had happened 1500 miles away. "Apparently, they'll build anywhere, except on solid ground."
"Yeah, but they don't need meteor-proof umbrellas, either," Pete responded.
"Geez, Pete. You make it sound like the rocks haven't stopped falling in fourteen years."
"Don't you have a wall in your office that more or less says, 'The rocks may have stopped falling, but the weird is still happening today?'" Pete rebutted.
"Guilty as charged," Chloe admitted. "But let's keep California weird and Smallville weird separate, shall we? It's not like anything anybody does there is going to affect us here - or vice versa. I mean, come on, it's halfway across the continent."
"Make sense," Pete said, as he nodded in agreement before making a left turn.
'So why aren't I completely convinced?' Chloe wondered silently to herself. Chloe looked again at the mangled piece of metal she was still holding in her hand. 'Nope, gotta be the meteor rocks,' she told herself.
THE END