"Look, Mr. Lex Luthor, sir—you cannot get me dissected. If you do, you might figure out how I got here—" Lucinda jabbed a finger in the air between them like she was warding off a demon.
"And if you do that, you'll destroy the future!"
Lex merely lifted a brow, the picture of calm disbelief.
"I-I already told you a clue about your future," she pressed, voice wobbling. "If you take me into one of your secret labs and experiment on me, you might never get there. Butterfly effect! Chaos theory! I don't know—science!"
Lex blinked, completely unmoved. "Lucy… I never said a word about dissecting you."
"How about experimenting?" she shot back, leaning in, eyes narrowing suspiciously.
"No. I believe not."
Lucinda squinted deeper. "…How about mild probing?"
"Lucy." His tone dropped a notch, the warning kind. "No."
She exhaled in relief—but only slightly. "Then what are we doing in Metropolis?"
"Just come with me." Lex shrugged, straightening his tie with maddening composure. "I need your opinion on something. You have advanced knowledge. I thought I could use your help."
Lucinda's mouth fell open. She leaned in like she'd just spotted a unicorn crossing the road. "Y-You're… asking for help?"
Lex nodded once. Curt, quick, like admitting it pained him physically. Then he turned away.
As he walked, he added over his shoulder—dry, utterly unbothered, like he was commenting on the weather rather than threatening her entire existence.
"Even great men ask for help. I'm merely selective with my sources—and you're inconveniently qualified."
He glanced back just enough to catch Lucinda trailing after him like a guilty Roomba. His eyes glinted.
"And since you clearly failed to answer my question…"
Lex paused—long enough for Lucinda's spine to consider ejecting itself from her body and running back to the cornfield. His gaze was steady, cool, and unfairly handsome in a way that made the threat worse.
"I'll let it go," he continued at last, voice smooth as polished steel. "For the sake of my bright future, as you claim." His lips curled in a small, knowing smirk. "But I will remain curious, Lucy. And curiosity, as you should know by now… is something I always satisfy."
Lucinda's laugh came out thin and trembling. "O-Of course, Mr. Luthor. Happy future, less suspicion. Got it." She pressed her lips together before they could say anything incriminating. "Just—give me a few minutes to get ready."
Lex nodded once, composed as ever. "Please wear something cozy. Labs are notoriously freezing."
Lucinda froze. "B-But I thought—"
"No dissecting," Lex cut in gently and angled toward her room with a polite gesture. "I promise."
The promise might have matched the glint in his eyes, but it didn't exactly soothe her. Lucinda still narrowed her gaze into razor-thin suspicious slits, mentally calculating her survival odds, then reluctantly retreated into her room to get ready.
The door closed behind her just as a familiar set of footsteps approached. Lex didn't even need to look—he simply tilted his head, smirk already forming.
"Clark," he drawled, "I've been seeing you more than usual. This doesn't have anything to do with you suddenly taking interest in my quite interesting housemaid, does it?"
Clark flushed instantly—because of course he did—and reached into his backpack. "Uh—no. Mom just wanted to give this to Lucy earlier, but she forgot, so I figured I'd drop by." He pulled out a clear tupperware with a proud little smile. "She also made one for you. Said you might like it, too."
As if summoned by the word "food," another tupperware emerged from the depths of Clark's bag like an excited Pokémon.
Lex chuckled—an actual, genuine giggle—and accepted the containers. "That's incredibly thoughtful of Mrs. Kent," he said warmly. "Good timing, too. We're heading to Metropolis. We can eat this on the way."
Clark blinked. His smile flickered—just slightly. "We?"
Lex didn't miss the tone. He smiled a little too pleasantly. "Yes, Clark. Lucy is coming with me."
Clark's smile returned, though now it looked suspiciously like one of those polite, tight ones people wear when their crush gets invited somewhere not by them. "I never pictured you as the type to take your housemaid to Metropolis, Lex," he said, trying for playful but landing closer to pointed.
Lex angled his head toward Lucinda's door, hands slipping into his pockets with practiced ease. "We saw her together first, Clark," he said, voice smooth but edged. "And don't pretend you didn't sense something… unusual about her that day."
Clark's grin sharpened—boyish, but not blind. "Maybe. But I think you're interested in her." He shrugged lightly. "You're both almost the same age, after all. Wouldn't surprise me."
Lex smirked. He highly doubted that. If he and Lucinda were already in the same time-plane, he and even Clark could legally qualify to be her father. The absurdity alone almost made him laugh—almost.
Clark left shortly after, just the right time for Lucinda to step out of her room wearing the clothes Lex had provided: denim pants and a beige, thin V-neck shirt.
"I see no cozy in those clothes, Lucy," Lex pointed out.
"I believe you know I'm originally clothless, Mr. Luthor, sir."
Lex lifted a single finger. "Ahh yes~ come with me."
He gestured for her to follow him down the hall. Lucinda trailed behind him and watched him swung open the double doors to his room with grace.
Lucinda nearly dropped to her knees and worshipped the threshold. She was instantly slapped by wealth: polished mahogany furniture, a bed big enough to have its own ZIP code, art pieces she was 70% sure belonged in a museum, and a scent so clean and expensive she felt poorer just breathing it.
Lex casually placed Martha's tupperwares on his bedside table like they were priceless artifacts, then strolled to his walk-in closet—an actual walk-in closet; not a wardrobe, not a cabinet, but a room made of clothes.
He rummaged for only a moment before turning back—only to find Lucinda still rooted in the doorway, staring into space as though she were quietly downloading forbidden quantum theories straight from the multiverse.
"Come on in, Lucy," he called. "Try this on for size."
Lucinda darted forward, obedient, starstruck, and thoroughly overwhelmed.
Lex slipped the coat onto her shoulders dnd his nose immediately scrunched when Lucinda suddenly disappeared. The coat was so big it swallowed her whole. Only her shoes stuck out at the bottom like two defeated punctuation marks.
Before she could even protest about being buried alive under Lex's oversized billionaire coat, he had already nodded in approval and turned on his heel.
"That would do," he said with infuriating finality. "Now take those containers and follow me directly behind the manor."
Lucinda stared blankly at his retreating back, then began pacing in circles, hunting for the containers he meant. When she finally spotted the two tupperwares sitting innocently on the bedside table, she grabbed them and scrambled after him.
Heaven knows how many times she tripped, nearly tripped, absolutely tripped, and once front-flopped—but each time, she miraculously saved the containers.
By the time she finally caught up to Lex, Lucinda was sweating, huffing, and wheezing like she had run a marathon while wearing a portable tent.
Lex, of course, looked untouched by mortal suffering. He stood ahead, speaking to a man in a black uniform.
Behind them, a helicopter sat on the lawn—sleek, polished, and expensive, blades idling like it was politely waiting to whisk Lex away to whatever billionaire activities he had scheduled.
Lucinda stared at the helicopter… then at Lex… then at the coat that had eaten her alive… then back at the helicopter. Her brain simply refused to process the sequence of events. Had that thing been sitting there the whole time? Was it stealth-mode? Cloaked? Did Lex Luthor install a mute button on aviation?
Knowing him… probably. At this point, Lucinda had accepted that being around Lex Luthor came with a consistent 40% chance of falling, dying, or being lightly interrogated by the FBI. She didn't even mind anymore. She also couldn't keep track of where they were in the Smallville timeline.
Her memory was foggy at best especially now that she had clearly ruined everything in this episode—she only vaguely remembered Lex and Roger Nixon having a tense conversation sometime later tonight. Or was it tomorrow? Or after someone inevitably blew up a barn? These episodes had a pattern... supposedly.
The co-pilot waved her toward the helicopter. Lucinda clutched the containers for dear life, her oversized coat flapping behind her like she was the world's smallest, most reluctant superhero.
Lex stepped in first—graceful, composed, and looking as if helicopters were merely elevators with better scenery.
Lucinda followed… far, far less graceful.
The moment she reached the door, the wind from the blades caught the oversized coat and flipped it over her head like a hostile, sentient blanket with a personal vendetta.
"H–Help…" Lucinda mumbled from somewhere inside the beige fabric abyss, one hand feebly waving out like she was asking for rescue on a deserted island.
Lex turned at the sound, froze, and visibly battled every molecule in his body that wanted to laugh. His lips twitched; his shoulders trembled; his eyes shone with unholy amusement. For one dangerous second, it looked like the billionaire might actually choke.
He cleared his throat sharply—an attempt at dignity, or CPR for his self-control—before stepping forward.
With one hand, he grabbed the back of the coat and lifted. Not tugged—lifted. Lucinda rose with it, dangling for a second like a misdelivered package before he set her neatly beside him on the seat.
Lucinda dozed off somewhere between the coat assault and stepping into the helicopter. She genuinely had no idea how she got buckled into the seat, but there she was — upright, breathing, and disoriented.
Beside her, Lex was no longer able to hold it in. A muted laugh escaped him — short, sharp, unguarded. Something that didn't belong anywhere near the Lex Luthor the world remembered, past or future.
Lucinda blinked at him. Not just looking — staring. And there he was, trying his absolute best to suppress the remaining laughter, his shoulders tensing, jaw shifting, eyes gleaming just a fraction too much.
Her expression quietly melted. She had never — ever — seen Lex laugh like this on screen. Not even when Clark pulled some wholesome farm-boy nonsense. Not when life was still optimistic, not when friendship was still easy, not when he wasn't yet an enemy of the world.
And up close…
Lord have mercy.
His smile was devastating. The kind of devastating that could start wars, end eras, and convince a woman to rewrite history just to see it again. The wind from the helicopter blades didn't help — it made his hair shift just slightly, made his features sharpen under the light.
He's so damned beautiful for the love of—
Lucinda internally screamed, loud, dramatic, and slightly panicked — the way someone screams after finding out their celebrity crush exists in 4K resolution beside them in a very enclosed flying metal box.
She sank deeper into the oversized coat, as if it could muffle the violent drumroll inside her chest. If the universe had any decency, it wouldn't eavesdrop on how ruinously her heartbeat kept skipping like a scratched CD.
She knew she had been inconsistent with her grand promise—Don't interfere, Lucinda, don't affect anything in Smallville, don't alter the timeline—but with Lex right beside her, quietly laughing for the first time in his entire fictional existence?
Her conviction didn't stand a chance.
"I want to see that smile until the end," she whispered, barely realizing the words had escaped her.
Lex's soft laughter stilled. He turned to her, the amusement fading into something serious, almost unreadable. His gaze sharpened like he was studying her again—not as a mystery, not as a threat, but as something that unexpectedly mattered.
Lucinda only smiled back, small and gentle, as if that could excuse her dangerous honesty.