I knew there'd been something different and vaguely peaceful about the last few weeks, no matter how hectic. I just didn't realize exactly what it was until these past few days, when my father returned to Smallville.

To make matters even worse, Helen left town for a few days, leaving the wedding plans in my less than capable hands. I was in the middle of making some decision about cake, in fact, when my father made his presence known.

He claimed to be coming in peace to give me a wedding gift, although he didn't miss the opportunity to complain about his not receiving an invite. What was his gift? A honeymoon trip to the Carribean. Why? Because he just wants me to happy.

Yeah, right. He must want me out of town for some reason. The question is what reason?

I don't know.

Yet.

He didn't manage to make it out of town himself, however. An employee of his ended up in the local hospital, so he wanted to make a personal visit. I went to the hospital myself to see what I could discover about the nature of their relationship. My father claimed he was just concerned, and that I was being paranoid.

I prefer to think of it as being well informed.

I went to have a conversation with his favored employee, but found the man to be unconscious. However, his "daughter" was a bit more informative. And she claimed my father was a bad man, which, I must admit, made me much more inclined to trust her.

She disappeared into thin air before I could discover anything concrete.

I did some private digging of my own, and got the man's address. I also found out that the little girl's name was Emily, and she'd died six years ago. I went the next night to investigate, and guess who I found in the basement?

Do I even really need to say his name?

Clark acted immediately suspicious, demanding to know what I was doing there. I pointed out that we were both breaking and entering, and people in glass farms shouldn't throw stones at the mansion. Although not in those words, exactly.

I told Clark what I knew about Emily, and that my curiosity had been piqued. Clark claimed that the reason my father has been refining meteor rocks is to fund a cloning experiment. He went on to say that the lab had been in little Emily's basement, but that somehow it'd been moved overnight.

I wonder who could be behind that.

I went to talk to Emily's father, and confirmed most of my suspicions. He expressed concern both for and about Emily, and said that she'd turned out wrong, somehow, when it came to matters of conscience.

I confronted my father, and the confrontation was, of course, completely pointless.

At least I know more now about what he's up to.

I'm sure the information will be useful, somewhere down the road.

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