Disclaimer: The young superhero and millionaire depicted within this story are not mine but oh, what fun they could have if they were.

Notes: Season One nostalgia, takes place directly after Hug. Ages ago, an X-files episode titles challenge was issued. I promptly wrote this in response and then let it sit on my hard drive until now.

Kids don’t forget, every time a person gives feedback, an angel gets her wings. www.livejournal.com/users/redkisskate

"..and Dad says that I can come over whenever I want. As long as it's ok with you, of course."

Clark is almost glowing with happiness as he eagerly explains the senior Kent's newfound ability to not froth at the mouth at the very mention of the name Luthor. It's Lex's reward for wielding the collective legal power equivalent to a small thermonuclear device in the efforts to free the Kent farm from Bob Rickman's airtight contract. So now Clark can sit guilt free in Lex's office, beaming with satisfaction from across the desk, and no longer fear being hit with Jonathon Kent's well polished "Luthors: a discourse on evil in twenty platitudes" sermon as soon as he returns home.

Lex would love to share in Clark's joy, really he would, but it's taking all of his concentration right now to not run from the room in full-blown hysterics.

The cause of his distress is currently crawling across his carpet on six loathsome feet, its brown carapace nicely contrasting with the cream of its environment. The common, household Periplaneta Americana. A fucking cockroach

God, how Lex despises them.

Or more to the point, how he despises that special combination of gut wrenching terror and nausea that the creatures never fail to inspire.

His entire body seized in a fight to contain a primordial need to flee, he watches in sick fascination as it moves ever closer under the cover of Clark's excited words. Driven, no doubt by some cruel and uncaring god, straight at Lex.

What the hell was a roach doing in Kansas, in the middle of his fucking castle anyway? And isn't this the exact thing that weekly visits from the exterminators are meant to prevent?

In the past, Lex has heard one too many Howard Hughes jokes to make him comfortable taking more radical steps in infestation prevention. But, if he can just survive the next five minutes with his dignity intact, he's locking himself in his lab and not coming out until he can find a way to eradicate every one of those six-legged horrors from the Earth. Enduring a few urine in a glass jar digs from his father would be a price Lex would gladly pay for the total annihilation of the entire goddamn Anthropoda phylum.

True to form, Lionel Luthor has always been contemptuous of his son's phobia. Such disdain would hurt more, but Lex couldn't help but notice that once on "vacation" in South America, when confronted with a vampire bat tangled in his luggage, the lecture on "How Luthors Are Afraid Of Nothing" had been as faint as a vapor trail behind his father's rapidly exiting form.

Lex suspects that it was his habit of leaving rubber bats in his father’s office that was the final factor in the decision that left him exiled from Metropolis and head of the family crap factory.

He wonders if his father knows of Smallville’s high freak quotient or if that is just a happy coincidence to be added in with the sixty hour weeks and a building full of suspicious employees who are just waiting for him to screw up spectacularly that has so far made up his experience here in the sticks. God, it had taken days for Lex to have a full night's sleep after hearing the rumors of a Bug Boy stalking Lana Lang. That rural Kansas could offer teenagers a chance to grow their own exoskeleton is just more proof of the Smallville equals hell equation that in all honesty, Lex doesn't need.

Wait a minute. Stop and rewind. Cockroaches... Smallville.... Mutants... Holy crap! Horrific visions of *mutated* *intelligent* *flannel wearing* roaches are dancing in his head when Clark notices his distraction.

Fuck

"Umm Lex, are you OK? You look a little pale. I mean paler than usual, not that you're freakishly pale or anything"

Blushing slightly at his verbal clumsiness, Clark flashes a rueful smile. He's clearly curious about Lex's near sycophantic twitching.

The roach seizes this moment to quickly cover the remaining distance between itself and Lex.

It's a struggle, but somehow Lex finds the strength of will needed to resist jumping onto his desk. His resolve lasts until the creeping thing disappears from his line of sight and before his mind has a hope of controlling his actions, he's up and standing a good five feet away as the back of his chair hits the floor.

"Lex? What's going on?"

Certainly he would like to answer Clark, but at the moment he can't afford to take his focus away from the insect's last known position. Oh God in Heaven, what if it can jump?

"Lex!" Strong hands at his shoulders and he's gently turned to confront over six feet of concerned farm boy.

"Clark" Lex replies, his brain rocketing along at a breakneck pace. How to make his way to the door as quickly as possible without alerting Clark to the reason? He sees a movement from the corner of his eye and sangfroid be damned. If the quickest way out is through Clark Kent, well then that's just the way things are going to have to be.

It's like hitting the world's softest brick wall and to his horror, the ricochet actually bounces him closer to the desk. Like all the worst things in life seem to do, the next few minutes unfold in agonizing slow motion. Startled by the sudden movement or maybe for the sheer hell of it all, the goddamn cockroach chooses that moment to abandon it’s shelter for a quick tour around the chair, before diving back under Lex's one of a kind, Cazzaro desk. To his utter shame, he can control neither his wildly wind milling arms or his decidedly unmanly shriek of terror. And then it's over and he's on his ass, a sitting target for whatever sick game the befucked bug now felt like playing.

Oh, hell no. Not for Lillian Luthor's little boy.

All in one millisecond, he's up like a jack in the box and out the room. This time prudently detouring around the obstacle also known as his best friend.

Once he’s safe on the right side of the doorway to his former office, the fight or flight shakes ease off and Lex forces himself to meet Clark’s bewildered gaze. Unable to think of a single thing to say, all he can do is to grimly watch Clark swivel his head from Lex and to the desk several times, before letting out an "ohhh" in an enlightened tone.

And then there’s another pause as he, Clark and the fucking cockroach all contemplate the situation.

Clark finally breaks the now deafening silence and gratitude so overwhelms Lex that there is an embarrassingly obvious time lag between Clark’s question and his comprehension.

"Hey, why don't you just wait there for a second?"

At his belated nod, Clark closes the office door, and Lex is left alone to slowly comprehend the true scope of his humiliation.

Really the only way this could get better was if Clark stumbles across his secret stash of BattleStar Galactica memorabilia and squashes the hideous thing with an autographed photo of Dirk Benedict.

He's in deep despair, with his head thrown back hopelessly against the sofa, eyes closed to block out the scene of his shame, when the noises stop from the room next door and Clark joins him on the couch. He hears Clark take a breath and then release it, obviously unsure how to deal with his friend's sudden descent into insanity. Lex can sympathize. All in all, it's a hideously awkward moment.

"So, um.., it's dead"

"Good, it can join the last vestiges of my self-respect"

More silence, and then a nudge in his side from Clark "Come on, it's not like there aren't a million people in the world who get freaked out by roaches"

"Yes, twelve year old girls, spinster aunts and me"

There is a quick snort from his right, but when Lex opens his eyes, he's confronted by one of Clark's more earnest expressions. There is a trace of the expected amusement, but mostly his face is open with honest sympathy and it's warmth hits Lex with a rush. It leaves an oddly light yet liquid feeling somewhere in the vicinity of his chest and to be unbelievable sappy, Lex is pretty sure the area in question is his heart. The feeling bubbles up until without any effort at all until he's giving Clark his rarest expression of all, a simple smile without any agenda whatsoever behind it.

A few blinks later, Clark's returning the smile with a dazzling one of his own and it takes an outrageous amount of effort to break free from those eyes. Sternly refraining from the temptation to lean closer, Lex regroups his battered dignity and tries like hell to change the subject

"Come on, your heroics should be rewarded. I think I know where the cook keeps the ice cream"

As he had hoped, the promise of sugar and empty calories has completely diverted Clark's focus and he‘s up and moving toward the kitchen before Lex‘s sentence is even finished. Thank you God, for a teenager’s attention span.

He’s well on his way to repressing every single moment of the last ten minutes when Clark turns to smile over his shoulder.

"You know, even if I hadn't been able to kill it, I'm sure that spider under your chair would have caught it eventually."

And just like that, his old friend adrenaline is back, singing up and down each nerve and he prays that Clark doesn’t notice his hollow laugh.

"Spider?"

Well, fuck.