Four days. It had been four days since Lucinda disappeared from everyone's line of sight, and somehow, the world had continued functioning without asking her permission.
Nothing had happened since she left the "hospital" Elizabeth had sent her to. No kidnappers. No meteor freaks. No suspicious scientists. No dramatic explosions. Honestly, it was almost insulting.
Now she was staying in one of Elizabeth's rest houses—a mansion, technically, because apparently Elizabeth didn't believe in owning anything smaller than a building with its own weather system.
Lucinda sat quietly in the garden, staring at the plants. She had been staring at them for several minutes, not because they were particularly interesting.
She was simply waiting for one of them to grow a face and start giving her life advice. Sadly, none of them did.
"Miss Bryce?"
A voice cut through her emotional moment.
Lucinda looked to her right and found Marcel standing a few steps away, one of Elizabeth's guards. Apparently, Elizabeth didn't trust her enough to leave her unsupervised, because she was convinced Lucinda might escape at any moment and run straight back to Lex.
Honestly, Lucinda probably would—with or without the guards.
But Elizabeth had already explained that the kidnapping had been the only way to make Lucinda disappear from Lex's life without giving him the chance to come looking for her. It might still cause trouble, but at least Lucinda couldn't interfere with canon anymore.
It hurt. Truly.
A lot had already unraveled because of her meddling, and she didn't even know where any of it was heading anymore. That uncertainty scared her more than she wanted to admit. So, for once, Lucinda decided to stay put.
"Yeah, Mars?" Lucinda answered lazily.
Marcel's eye twitched.
"For the nth time, it's Marcel, Lucy," he corrected, sounding like a man who had already lost this battle several times.
He walked over and stood beside her.
"Okay, Mars," Lucinda sighed. "What brings you here?"
Marcel winced, rolled his eyes, and exhaled through his nose. "You haven't eaten anything since last night. If you have a death wish, at least don't make it a problem for me. I don't want to lose my job because you decided starvation was a personality trait."
Lucinda's lips thinned. Marcel was only nineteen. Nineteen for the love of anything unholy! Far too young to possess that much attitude—and, frankly, far too young to have the face of someone who looked like he had already filed his taxes twice.
He was also annoyingly mature. Lucinda stared at him. Marcel stared back. Neither spoke.
Finally, Lucinda sighed. "Fine. I'll eat."
"Good."
"But I'm not happy about it."
"I didn't ask you to be."
She narrowed her eyes. She was beginning to understand why Elizabeth had hired him. Marcel annoyingly matched her eccentric energy, which was probably the worst possible combination for everyone's sanity.
Marcel had never appeared in Smallville. His backstory didn't matter either, and yet Lucinda had already heard some "chismis" from the maids whose names she couldn't remember and honestly had no intention of learning.
Apparently, Marcel Faustus was Elizabeth's half-brother.
And that, ladies and gentlemen, had absolutely never been part of Smallville lore.
As far as Lucinda was concerned, none of this was her fault. She hadn't summoned Marcel into existence. Elizabeth was the one who had taken her in, meaning whatever new characters were suddenly appearing in her life were firmly outside Lucinda's department.
Still, the resemblance between Marcel and Elizabeth was undeniable.
Same eyes. Similar features. Similar expressions. Even a toddler could tell they came from the same testicles.
"Will you stop looking at me like I'm some kind of mistake?" Marcel hissed.
"Oh, you are," Lucinda hissed back without missing a beat. She stood up and marched past him.
Marcel gasped in genuine disbelief before following Lucinda toward the kitchen. He didn't even get the chance to talk back because, despite her size, Lucinda walked far too quickly, leaving Marcel struggling to keep up.
She disappeared around the intersection, which nearly gave him a heart attack. It only took him a few seconds to find her again, standing near the entrance to the kitchen and staring at a crisp newspaper. Her own photograph was plastered across the front page beneath a painfully bold headline: MISSING — $100,000 REWARD.
"Would you look at that!" Marcel faked a gasp when he read the notice. He snorted and loomed over Lucinda simply because he could. He was as tall as Clark, though nowhere near as bulky. "I didn't know you'd be worth $100,000. Are your internal organs that valuable?"
Lucinda didn't even bother making a face. Her elbow simply found its way into Marcel's gut. He immediately doubled over with a groan, while Lucinda calmly went on her way toward the kitchen as if nothing had happened.
Three maids were already waiting for her, standing around a long dining table covered with every possible Filipino dish they could pull from their recipe books. There was chicken adobo, sinigang na baboy, pancit bihon, lumpia, garlic fried rice, grilled bangus, beef caldereta, lechon kawali, tortang talong, and a bowl of steaming arroz caldo sitting right in the middle.
Lucinda stopped.
Elizabeth had clearly made sure she was comfortable during her stay until they could find a way to send her back to her own world. Apparently, "comfortable" meant feeding her like she was attending a Filipino fiesta every single day.
Lucinda slowly approached the table, still processing the sheer amount of food in front of her.
Marcel eventually recovered enough to walk over and pull out a chair for her. "Sit down now, Your Majesty," he said with a smile.
It was a smile so fake, it probably would've floated in water.
"I'd haul that chair at you if you keep getting on my nerves, Mars. You'll see," Lucinda said, returning the smile. Her smile was just as fake—so fake, it could probably be recycled.
She was about to sit down when the telephone nearby rang. Everyone's attention immediately shifted toward it. Marcel gestured for Lucinda to sit down first while he took the call, so she did.
Lucinda only watched him from the corner of her eye as the maids began filling her plate with food. Marcel answered the phone and spoke in a low voice. She couldn't hear what was being said, but she could make out a few words from the movement of his lips.
Marcel noticed her staring and immediately turned away.
"Suspicious," Lucinda mumbled under her breath.
By the time Marcel placed the phone down and turned around, Lucinda was still staring at him, eyes narrowed into suspicious little slits.
"Don't worry," Marcel said, batting his eyelashes with an almost criminal amount of elegance. "I'm not trying to sell you for more than your original price."
Lucinda's expression remained flat, but internally, her ego had taken a small hit.
Because, unfortunately, the man's eyes were beautiful.
He honestly looked like he had walked straight out of an anime—the kind of character who appeared harmless for the first few episodes before everyone discovered he had been hiding seventeen secrets and possibly a tragic backstory. His tousled hair framed his soft eyes and defined jawline, giving him an annoyingly effortless charm.
Tall. Handsome. Mysterious. Definitely anime-coded.
Marcel gestured for the maids to leave, and once they were out of earshot, he walked over and sat in the chair beside Lucinda. He said nothing. He simply stared at her, his eyes occasionally flicking toward her spoon and fork as though silently waiting for her to start eating.
"I'm going to use this fork to stab your eyes, Mars," Lucinda said with a smile, pointing the fork at him as though presenting evidence in court.
Marcel chuckled. "You know, I'm not really surprised someone like Lex Luthor offered so much just to find a maid." His lips thinned slightly. "You're really different. Aside from the fact that you're not from this universe…" He blinked. "Unless you already told him that part. Then it would make sense why he's acting that way."
Lucinda exhaled.
Yep.
Marcel knew.
"I hate to break it to you," Lucinda said, placing a hand over her chest, "but it is merely my beauty that made someone like Lex Luthor offer that much to find me."
She faked a sob and wiped away an imaginary tear. "Oh, how hard it is to be me. The burden of being gorgeous is truly unbearable."
"Uhm… actually, the person who called earlier was Lex," Marcel blurted casually.
Lucinda nearly convulsed.
"W-What?" she gasped.
"Yep, you heard it right." Marcel casually flipped his tousled bangs out of his eyes. "He was actually asking Elizabeth for help to find you, and my lying sister agreed to help. Even Lionel knows you're here and is pretending to help Lex."
For a moment, Lucinda's heart twinged. Her jaw tightened as an uncomfortable realization settled in. Everyone around Lex had been making him look like a fool while he desperately searched for her.
Everyone.
Including her.
"Ahhh, you're mad, ah," Marcel teased, his tone turning deliberately provocative. "I was actually considering letting you escape. But after hearing Elizabeth's reasoning, I changed my mind. She's right. If you stay with Lex, you'll eventually get him—and Clark—killed."
Lucinda's brows drew together. "Killed?"
"Yes, Lucy. You heard me right." Marcel leaned back in his chair, his expression becoming noticeably more serious. "You've meddled too much. Things have been unfolding faster than they're supposed to, and I think you've already noticed that."
Lucinda remained silent.
"You know the plot," he continued. "You know what comes next, who appears later, and roughly when they're supposed to appear. That's the problem. Every time you interfere, you create a chain reaction. One change leads to another, and suddenly events that were supposed to happen years from now could happen much sooner."
Lucinda's grip tightened around her fork.
"You're not just changing small things anymore," Marcel explained. "You're accelerating the timeline. Villains who aren't supposed to appear yet could be drawn into the story early. Conflicts could happen before Clark or Lex are prepared for them. People could make decisions based on information they were never supposed to have."
He crossed his arms.
"And what do you think happens when you keep pushing everything forward?"
Lucinda swallowed.
"Lex and Clark aren't ready yet," Marcel said plainly. "They're still too young, too inexperienced, and nowhere near prepared for everything that's coming. You might think you're helping them by warning them or changing certain events, but sometimes knowing too much too early is just as dangerous as knowing nothing at all."
Lucinda stared down at her untouched food. Marcel's voice softened slightly.
"You're trying to save them, Lucy. I understand that. But you might accidentally be bringing the things that will destroy them straight to their doorstep."
Lucinda wanted to ask a hundred questions. She wanted to know what had changed, how much damage she had already caused, and whether everything could still be fixed. But somehow, only one question managed to escape her lips.
"How is he doing?" she muttered.
Marcel's expression softened. He heaved a deep breath before answering. "If I have to be honest? Not good." His lips thinned. "Even Lionel doesn't understand how you managed to make such a huge impact on him when you've only known each other for such a short time."
Lucinda swallowed. Her heart clenched painfully, but she refused to linger on it. "Does Lionel know about me?"
Marcel shook his head. "As far as I know, he only considers you his son's latest obsession. Nothing more."
Lucinda sucked her lips together and nodded. That answer was somehow both reassuring and insulting.
"Can I ask you for a favor, though?"
"Hmm?" Marcel leaned closer, letting her know he was listening.
Lucinda looked up and met his eyes. "If ever…" Her lips quivered slightly. "If Elizabeth finds a way to send me back to my world, can you give something to him?"
"Sure," Marcel answered immediately.
Lucinda reached into the pocket of her dress and pulled out a small telegram sealed with wax. She held it out to him.
"I was planning to ask Elizabeth to do it for me," she explained, "but I think it's better if she doesn't come here herself. She needs to stay away from me."
Marcel hesitated before accepting the telegram.
Lucinda continued. "You know how suspicious he is. He probably already has someone watching Elizabeth's movements."
"Of course." Marcel nodded. "Classic Lex Luthor." He glanced at the sealed telegram. "Don't worry. I'll make sure he gets this myself once you're safely back in your world."
"And one more favor," Lucinda added quickly.
Marcel looked at her. "Yes?"
"Can we not talk about him anymore?" Her voice became firmer. "And don't mention his name in this place."
Marcel stared at her for three full seconds.
Then he sighed, defeated by the sheer seriousness in her expression. "Fine. But I'll only agree if you stop calling me 'Mars' and start calling me Marcel."
Lucinda's lips thinned then smiled. "Deal."
It was painful. Truly painful. But it would be far worse if Lex ended up in danger simply because she couldn't let go.
She had to protect him from the consequences of her existence in his world. At least, that was what she kept telling herself.
Because if Lucinda were being completely honest, she wasn't trying to save Clark and Lex's friendship anymore. She was trying to save whatever it was she had with Lex.
And yet… she couldn't. Because, from the very beginning, she was never supposed to have anything with him.
Lex was destined to marry Lana Lang. And Lucinda? She was destined to stand somewhere outside the story and watch it unfold before her eyes.
That was her role. A viewer. A fan. It shouldn't be more than that.
And no matter how much she wished otherwise, she couldn't change the ending simply because, for once, she had found herself wanting to be part of it.