slayers_desire | kidnapping Clark to a red-sun Earth

"I shouldn't have asked you to open that box." April is really going to hate surprise packages at her door after this. Just as a side note.

"Fine wanted you to be paranoid of those closest to you. He wanted this to happen... and we just can't let him win. We just can't." She wrings her hands a little anxiously. Dealing with Fine is such a delicate balance.

"I think there were others in the Nexus that tried to help to. Fine obviously didn't know who he was dealing with. A man who has such a strength of friends. Good friends," This of course includes Victor.

Victor gets blushy, starts to squirm, the hand holding Clark's twitches hard, another one of Victor's tells that she's feeling wobbly. Gosh, it wasn't anything, she was just doing what's right, and she isn't thinking that to be modest, she just doesn't see it as anything else but What Must Happen Because I Love You So Much. A platonic love, but a very strong love.

"Box?"

And she gives Clark's hand another squeeze, looking at him, trying to think if there's anything else she can do to help.

He tries to think back, remembering being in the Nexus, but not coming up with much more than a hazy conglomeration of faces and sounds. It's rather disconcerting for a guy who normally has perfect recall. "I'm going to have to do a lot of apologizing. And thank them all for trying to help."

Clark takes another few deep breaths, just soaking in the light, gathering more energy to talk. "There was a box on April's doormat, with a note claiming it was from Lex. I opened it for her and..." He holds up his hand, the one that had the cut on his finger, now just a fine white line that's on its way to disappearing. "That when I got infected."

"Maybe Victor or I should do that. I think it might be better for you not to return to the Nexus for a little while." April caresses his hand.

Finishing the details of the story, April added, "After Clark started acting strange... I called Lex to thank him for the gift. To ask him about the rock for my geology assignment. He informed me it wasn't from him."

"I started to wonder who would try to place the blame on Clark. And I immediately thought of Professor Fine." She is not sure of how much Clark has told Victor of Fine. "I had a vision telling me that Fine is a dangerous man. And Clark was told by others that Fine is going to try to bring forth Zod, a powerful Kryptonian enemy."

"I sensed Fine once. He is not human. We believe he goes under the name Brainaic, if that is more recognizable. And when I sensed the silver Kryptonite... it felt the same as sensing Fine. Like it was a part of him."

"I believe Fine could have benefited from this. Somehow."

"Braniac... is more recognizable, yeah." She bites down on the inside of her cheek again, gives his hand another squeeze and lets it go, scratching at her scars from under her sleeve.

It's time for Victor to pull out the crisis-voice. You know the crisis-voice. Like people who talk folks down from jumping off buildings, the crisis-voice is calm, warm, certain, and without question. It's a pretty great contrast to how she can't stop messing with her arm. "You couldn't've known that the box was a trap. Even if you opened it, certainly Brainiac would've found another way to get the kryptonite into Clark. It must've been on some sort of homing system, anyway."

Clark thinks about that. "He's been trying to get me on his side. If he made me distrust everyone else, maybe he was trying to set it up so he could 'save' me. So I'd trust him more." It seems really extreme, and if it is Fine, it tells him that Brainiac doesn't care about collateral damage. Because if Chloe hadn't been there at the right time, Clark would've murdered both his parents out of terror.

He blinks up at Victor, a little disturbed that this would've happened no matter what. "Homing system? Why do you say that?"

"I wonder if there is some way to fake the paranoia... just enough so that Clark could go to him and learn what his 'rescue' act was going to be."

April added two more cents. "The meteor rock had no sharp edges. Clark. I think it was going to activate upon contact of your skin."

"Because he couldn't've known that you would've opened it. Or that you would've even touched it at all. It's a pretty ineffective plan, all things considered, if there isn't a way to guarantee it."

He shakes his head a little. "No, that's a bad idea. If he expected to get the, um, splinter back I wouldn't have it in me anymore." And he's not at all eager to touch it again. He idly wonders where it is, whether they left it at the other place where they cured him or if April PINpointed it to her safe, but decides that it ultimately isn't important so long as it isn't near him.

He's a bit disconcerted to hear that the meteor didn't have any sharp edges, because it actually hurt, like a knife slicing through his fingers. "That makes sense." He looks up at April. "It didn't hurt you? Just me." He's not surprised, because it's kryptonite, and it always acts different with him than with other people.

He finally feels he has enough energy to sit up, so he does, carefully. He feels as wobbly as a newborn calf, but he's slowly getting better the longer he sits in the sun.

"We are screwed either way. He will learn that you were cured. And will wonder how..." April sighs.

She gently hugs him when he sits, to act as support and to just bloody hug him. "The only thing that hurt about that damn rock was seeing the state it put you into. And how it changed you."

"It was worse than seeing Kal. Or Kal-El." Mostly because neither his red kryptonite side or the brainwashed side viewed her as the bad guy. April really hated feeling the betrayal that Clark was infected with. "It twisted all my words and actions. Thank goodness Victor got through to you."

"We might not be as screwed as you think," she says, thoughtfully, tapping her lower lip with one extended index finger as she thinks about it. "Because to get pissy, he'd have to admit to doing it to start with. And pretty much unravel his own plan."

She's there to support him if he needs her, one hand against his side. "I was lucky. I'm... it sounds stupid, but I'm sorry that I had to lie to you and make-believe betray you. I'd never do it in real life."

He hugs April back, glad to feel a loving touch and be able to appreciate it for what it is, because he hasn't had much of that since he was infected. "I'm sorry I worried you. I know you didn't betray me. You never would."

He pulls out of the hug a little, puts his other arm around Victor in a half-hug. "I know. If you hadn't done that I probably would've run away. I was seeing some pretty crazy stuff. You were only trying to help me. And it worked."

It is a relief to hear his words. And have that connection to his normal feelings. "Of course not. I love you."

April wrestles with some stupid emotions herself. "And I am sorry Victor. For... being upset you could reach him and I couldn't."

"It should not matter. When someone needs help. They should get it."

She relaxes into that hug, breathing out slowly, her body has finally caught up to her mind and has started calming down.

"Oh, gosh, don't sweat it. I'd probably feel the same way you do. Honestly, it was luck, and the fact that, uh, I have a lot of experience in crisis situations, but mostly it was luck. I was really scared it wouldn't work."

"I love you too," he tells April sincerely, knowing that it won't erase the hurt he caused, but hoping that it will help. That she can start trusting him again, because his faith in her was restored with the cure.

"It almost didn't," he says to Victor, very seriously. "Getting me to go along with it, that is. I think I was about this close to imagining you turning on me too, and it never would've worked if that had happened. Or you would've had to corner me with green kryptonite to catch me. Chloe tried but she didn't want to get close enough to incapacitate me, and I got away." He may not remember a lot of specific details, but being subjected to kryptonite for real tends to be more vivid. "It really was just luck. And... I'm sorry for saying I would kill you." He's very, very glad that they went someplace with a red sun, where he couldn't hurt her.

Leaning her head on Clark's shoulder, April is glad she released the pain of not being able to help him. Because she knows it was the way things happened. And that Clark does very much still trust her. And love her.

"Good thing for having back-up plans."

"Good thing for April having this place in her PIN, because... God, I gotta say, I was grasping at straws until then. And, don't even fret about the death threat. Honestly, I wouldn't even be grumpy with you if you did try to off me." She reaches up, ruffles his hair gently, and then smooths it back into something neater and closer to orderly. "It was totally luck, and I feel really, really lucky. Definitely hits the list of the scariest things to happen this week, but I'm so glad it's okay now."

Clark leans into April a little too, because he's still weak and shaky and needs a little support, and because he's enjoying physical contact that doesn't hurt. And that it's her, well, that helps a lot. And he imagines they're probably going to have a long, long talk when they get home.

"As much as I hate being Kal, I'd much rather deal with red kryptonite than do this ever again," he agrees, a hundred percent sincere. He looks down at April again, lightly stroking her upper arm with his thumb, trying not to expend too much energy but needing to give and receive a little reassurance after the horrible experience they all just shared. "Good thinking, finding a place like that. We probably won't be able to use the same one again but it was a great idea, not telling me about it."

April's own fingers gently stroke the side of his body. And she places a soft kiss at his forehead. She doesn't comment on Kal. That persona is difficult for her to deal with too.

"One of our Nexus associates shared the coordinates with me. Last time you had been LOL'd into Kal-El."

A glance to the couple, and the pang she feels in her stomach isn't jealousy, but it's jealousy's distant second cousin. She wonders if she ought to come up with an excuse to leave and give them time alone.

Victor doesn't actually mind Kal except for that he's using Clark's body and sometimes ends up upsetting Clark. Kal as a person, though... not so much of a problem with him, as long as he isn't hurting anyone. She figures saying as much would be a mistake right now. "Yeah," she says, trying to find a foothold in the conversation. Settling on just 'yeah' instead.

Though Clark is leaning on April, he still reaches out to put a hand on Victor's knee, because she played such a big role in saving him, he doesn't want her to feel forgotten or left out. "Thank you. Both of you."

He runs a hand over his face. "How bad do I look?" He's looking a hell of a lot better than he did by the time they got the silver kryptonite out of him, but he's still a wreck.

For her part, April is avoiding too much touchy-feely moments in respect of Victor. "Compared to how you looked before. Better."

"You could still probably get on the cover of a magazine," she tells him, after a serious appraising look, hand on the back of his hand. Relaxing. She's hyperaware of social cues, and she never wants to outwear her welcome or make other people feel uncomfortable.

"Only if it was a tabloid," he says, with a teensy snort of laughter. "And speculation on how bad the other guy looks." He knows there's no way he looks like he usually does, because he is almost uncomfortably sticky and his whole body still hurts with that low-level ache, slowly fading away. And he can feel the dark circles under his eyes when he rubs at them, trying to get back to some semblance of normal.

He still doesn't have the energy to get up unless he absolutely has to, but he feels kind of guilty for dragging them out here and wasting time lying around in a field. He's not used to needing recovery time, and it's throwing him off. "Sorry."

"You will feel better once you get home and have a shower." Of course facing the parents is included in that statement.

"Don't be sorry."

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