Clark wanted to super speed back to the farm, but he didn't. His shoulder still hurt really bad, and his whole body felt tired and feverish. So he didn't speed into the house; he snuck into his bedroom to grab a clean set of clothes, and then he went to the loft. He knew which chores his parents would each be doing at this time of the morning, and he just avoided being where they would be.

His parents would ask too many questions. Clark had washed the blood away from his arms, face, and chest, but there was still some on his pants and socks, and he wasn't wearing a shirt, and he was soaking wet from his bath in the creek. If they saw him before he could get changed, they would want to know why. And if they caught him before Lex and Dean and Sam returned, they'd want to know where the other boys were.

Clark's heart was still pounding from the fight, and part of him just wanted to curl up in a corner and cry. But it felt really nice to change into clean clothes, and by the time he made his way out to the loft to wait for his brothers to return, he felt more hungry than anything else. Lucky for him, he'd stowed some snacks in a little cabinet in the back of the loft. He was just finishing eating when he spotted Sam and Lex walking through the cornfield, and Dean a few steps behind them.

Clark ran out to meet them. He did his best to look innocently curious as he asked, "How did it go?"

"We're all fine," Sam said, smiling, though he still held his arm stiffly. Clark winced—he knew he had held onto Sam's hand too hard when he'd been removing the bullet. "No one suspects anything?"

"I saw my parents at a distance, but they didn't see me. It's almost lunch time, they'll be expecting us to come back."

"Good," Dean called from a few steps back. "I'm starving."

They were all quiet for the last minute or two of the walk to the house. Clark walked them over to the side door that led into the kitchen, and he could smell lunch before he even opened it. Chicken fried steak, scrambled eggs, toast, potatoes, and fresh squeezed orange juice.

His mom looked up from the table as she was setting down the last of the spread. "You boys are late," she said, but the smile in her eyes let Clark know she wasn't really upset. "Wash up."

"Yes, ma'am," both Sam and Dean said in near unison, and Lex smiled at Clark. They were going to be okay.

Just before Clark sat down at the table, it occurred to him that he hadn't actually told Sam about those bodies he'd left a little distance away from the cabin. He was pretty sure they hadn't actually been dead; someone needed to come shoot those werewolves. But he decided not to say anything, since his parents were listening. Sam and Dean were professional monster hunters. They definitely would have checked the area for more bodies, and they wouldn't have missed anything.