Three days passed before I could look at the files.
The broken arm was healing—faster than normal, thanks to the System, but still frustratingly slow. The frostbite scars on my hands ached in the November cold. And every time I closed my eyes, I saw Jeff Palmer's face—desperate, exhausted, broken by powers he never asked for.
That could have been me. Still could be.
[STABILITY: 80%. RECOMMEND: STRESS REDUCTION PROTOCOLS.]
"You're brooding." Chloe dropped a stack of folders on her desk, making me jump. "I know that look. That's your 'contemplating the darkness of the human condition' look."
"I don't have that look."
"You absolutely have that look. It's very dramatic." She sat across from me in the Torch office, expression shifting from teasing to serious. "But if you're done contemplating, I found something."
The folders were thick with photocopies—hospital records, transfer documents, police reports. All connected by one common thread.
"Meteor freaks," I said, reading. "These are all the meteor-affected individuals who were captured over the past year."
"Captured, yes. But look at where they went."
I flipped through the pages. Greg Arkin: transferred to "specialized care facility." Coach Walt Arnold: transferred to "specialized care facility." Sean Kelvin: transferred to "appropriate containment unit."
"They all use the same language," I said slowly. "The same vague terminology."
"Exactly. So I started digging. And here's the thing—none of these facilities exist."
The temperature in the room seemed to drop.
"What do you mean?"
"I mean I can't find them." Chloe pulled out a map dotted with red pins. "Smallville Medical releases a meteor patient, paperwork says they're going to 'Grandville Psychiatric.' But Grandville Psychiatric doesn't have any record of receiving them. Neither does any other hospital in the state."
"They're disappearing."
"They're being TAKEN." Chloe's voice was hard. "And the paperwork all routes through the same place: LuthorCorp subsidiary companies."
33.1.
The name surfaced from my meta-knowledge like a corpse rising from deep water. Project 33.1—Lex's secret program to study and weaponize meteor-affected individuals. It wasn't supposed to exist yet, not fully, but maybe I'd been wrong about the timeline. Maybe things had been set in motion earlier than the show suggested.
"Have you told anyone?" I asked carefully.
"Who would I tell? The sheriff's department is useless—half of them are on Lionel Luthor's payroll. The state police don't care about missing criminals. And the FBI..." She trailed off, frustration evident. "Nobody cares about people who were already monsters."
"They weren't monsters. They were victims."
"I know that. YOU know that. But to everyone else, they're just problems that got solved." Chloe leaned back in her chair. "Cole, I think something really dark is happening in this town. Something that goes way beyond meteor freaks causing chaos."
I thought about what to say. How much to reveal without exposing my impossible knowledge.
"There's a facility," I said slowly. "I've heard rumors. A LuthorCorp research division that specializes in... unconventional subjects."
Chloe's eyes sharpened.
"What kind of rumors?"
"Nothing concrete. But if I were looking, I'd start with the Cadmus Labs subsidiary. They have a building outside Metropolis that officially handles 'agricultural research.'" I met her eyes. "What kind of agricultural research needs that much security?"
She was already writing in her notebook.
"Cadmus Labs. Got it. Anything else?"
"Be careful." The words came out more forcefully than I intended. "Chloe, if LuthorCorp is doing what you think they're doing, these aren't people who leave loose ends. They have resources, connections, power. If they find out you're investigating—"
"Then I'll be another meteor freak who disappeared. I know the risks."
"Do you?" I grabbed her wrist, forcing her to stop writing. "This isn't a school newspaper story. This is the kind of thing that gets people killed. Are you SURE you want to go down this road?"
For a long moment, Chloe just looked at me.
"You know more than you're saying," she said quietly. "About these people, about what they're doing. I've suspected for a while now, but..." She shook her head. "How, Cole? How do you know things you shouldn't?"
Because I watched it happen on television. Because in my world, Smallville was just a show, and these horrors were just plot points.
"I can't explain," I said. "Not yet. Maybe not ever. But I promise you—everything I know, I'm using to help. To protect people like us."
"People like us." She pulled her wrist free, but gently. "Meteor-affected, you mean."
"Yes."
"Then we're on the same side." Chloe gathered her files, expression determined. "I'll look into Cadmus. You keep your eyes open for anything weird with new captures. Together, maybe we can figure out what LuthorCorp is really doing."
[ALLIANCE STRENGTHENED: CHLOE SULLIVAN → RESEARCH PARTNER (65).]
I nodded, though my stomach churned with the weight of what I knew. 33.1 would grow into a nightmare—hundreds of meteor freaks experimented on, tortured, broken down into components for Luthor weapons programs. I could stop it. Maybe. If I was careful, if I was smart, if I found the right leverage.
Or I could accelerate it by asking the wrong questions.
The Talon was busy when I arrived.
Afternoon coffee rush, students grabbing drinks between classes, the comfortable hum of small-town social life. I found a table in the corner and ordered black coffee, trying to organize my thoughts.
"Mind if I join you?"
Lex Luthor stood beside my table, cup in hand, smile perfectly pleasant.
Every instinct screamed warning.
"Free country," I said.
He sat across from me, movements elegant and controlled. Up close, he looked exactly like the show had portrayed—bald, sharp-featured, eyes that missed nothing.
"I've been meaning to talk to you," Lex said. "We met at the Talon renovation, what, two months ago? I've been following your... adventures... with interest since then."
"Adventures?"
"The fire at the school. The incident at the fertilizer plant. The situation with that invisible young man." Lex sipped his coffee. "You seem to find yourself at the center of a lot of unusual events, Cole."
"Smallville is an unusual town."
"It is." His smile didn't waver. "Which is why I've invested so much in understanding it. The meteor rocks, the mutations, the possibilities—fascinating stuff. The kind of research that could change the world."
He's fishing. Trying to figure out what I know, what I am.
"I'm just a high school student," I said carefully. "I don't know anything about research."
"No? Because I've heard differently." Lex leaned forward slightly. "I've heard you've been asking questions about LuthorCorp medical facilities. About patient transfers. About where certain... special individuals... end up after their capture."
My coffee suddenly tasted like ash.
"I'm a journalist. Asking questions is what we do."
"Of course. The school paper." Lex's tone was light, but his eyes were sharp. "Just remember, Cole—curiosity is a valuable trait. But some doors, once opened, can't be closed. And some questions have answers you don't really want to hear."
"Is that a warning?"
"It's advice. From someone who's been where you are." Lex stood, straightening his coat. "Smallville has secrets. Deep ones. Most people live their whole lives here without discovering them, and they're happier for it."
"And if I don't want to be most people?"
His smile turned cold.
"Then you'd better be very, very careful."
He walked away without another word. I sat in the Talon's corner booth, coffee growing cold, mind racing through implications.
Lex knew I was investigating. Which meant he'd been watching me closer than I'd realized. Which meant every move I made from now on would be scrutinized, analyzed, recorded.
33.1 is real. It's happening. And I just put myself on their radar.
[WARNING: LEX LUTHOR THREAT LEVEL ELEVATED. RECOMMEND: INCREASED OPERATIONAL SECURITY.]
The System's assessment matched my own. I'd been too aggressive, asked too many questions, drawn too much attention. Now I was on a billionaire's watch list—a billionaire who had no qualms about making problems disappear.
But I couldn't stop. Not when I knew what was coming.
I pulled out the copied files Chloe had given me and started making notes. Patient transfers. Timeline correlations. Possible facility locations.
If Lex Luthor wanted to make me a target, fine. I'd been targeted before.
The difference this time was that I knew how to target back.
That night, I couldn't sleep.
The apartment felt too small, too quiet, too much like a cell. I sat by the window, watching Smallville's lights flicker in the distance, thinking about the people who had disappeared into LuthorCorp's care.
Greg Arkin. The bug-man who'd attacked the girl in Miller's Field. I remembered the terror in his eyes when Clark had captured him—not rage, but fear. Fear of what he'd become, what he couldn't control.
Coach Walt Arnold. The pyrokinetic who'd almost killed Principal Kwan. His last words before unconsciousness had been "I'm sorry"—a man apologizing for powers that had consumed him.
Sean Kelvin. The ice freak who'd nearly killed me at the reactor. Even frozen in containment, he'd been alive. Conscious. Suffering.
And now Jeff Palmer had joined them. Shipped off to a "specialized care facility" that existed only on paper, to become another test subject in Lex Luthor's collection.
[ELEVATED STRESS HORMONES DETECTED. RECOMMEND: REDUCED ANXIETY. SLEEP INITIATION PROTOCOLS AVAILABLE.]
"How?" I asked the empty room. "How am I supposed to reduce anxiety when I know what's happening to them?"
The System had no answer. It never did, for the questions that mattered most.
I pulled out my phone, typed a message to Kara.
Can't sleep. Want company?
Her response came within seconds.
On my way.
Twenty minutes later, she slipped through my window—her preferred entrance, a habit she'd picked up from Clark. She found me still at the window, still staring at the lights.
"You're thinking about the missing meteor freaks," she said. Not a question.
"How did you know?"
"Because it's what you always think about when you can't sleep." She settled beside me, close enough that I could feel her warmth. "You carry too much, Cole. The weight of everyone who can't carry their own."
"Someone has to."
"Yes. But not alone." Her hand found mine. "Tell me what you're planning."
I wanted to lie. To protect her from the darkness that was coming. But Kara had faced darkness before—had watched her world die from the window of a damaged spaceship. She deserved better than comfortable lies.
"LuthorCorp is experimenting on meteor-affected humans," I said. "Building some kind of research program. I don't know how big it is yet, but I know it's real, and I know Lex knows I'm investigating."
"That's dangerous."
"Very."
"And you're going to investigate anyway."
"Yes."
Kara was quiet for a long moment. Then she squeezed my hand.
"Then we investigate together. You, me, Chloe, Clark—all of us. Whatever LuthorCorp is doing, they won't expect to face people like us."
"People like us?"
"People who don't give up." She smiled, soft and fierce. "People who protect those who can't protect themselves."
I thought about the meteor freaks in their cells. About the numbers on their files instead of names. About the experiments that were coming—the torture, the weaponization, the dehumanization of people who were already struggling to stay human.
I couldn't stop all of it. But maybe I could stop some.
"Tomorrow," I said. "I need to check something at the Torch. Chloe found some transfer records that don't make sense—patient routes that go nowhere. If we can trace where they ACTUALLY went—"
"Then we can find them." Kara nodded. "What time?"
"After school. Four o'clock."
"I'll be there."
She stayed with me until dawn, watching the lights fade and the sun rise over Smallville. No words were necessary. Just the warmth of her presence, the promise of her support.
The investigation was dangerous. Lex Luthor was watching. And somewhere in the shadows, meteor-affected humans were disappearing into a program that would eventually become 33.1.
But I wasn't alone anymore. And that made all the difference.
[OBJECTIVE UPDATED: INVESTIGATE LUTHORCORP PATIENT TRANSFERS. PRIORITY: HIGH. ALLIES: AVAILABLE.]
The sun rose over Smallville, painting the town in shades of gold and orange. A new day. New dangers. New opportunities.
I was ready.