slayers_desire | Embrace the beast

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Embrace the beast

Five days ago had been a good day for April, since she had been able to protect Clark during a LOL and later helped him to fly. The days following had been normal enough, until the time came for April to return to her Nexus and complete some of her 'hero' expectations.

The situation had been easy enough at basic appearance, all April thought she had to do was get rid of one pesky demon that had a small town under its spell. What she did not know what that the spell had convinced all the mortals that they had to protect the demon.

That in itself had been difficult. April couldn't harm a mortal intentionally. But they sure as hell could harm her. By the time she had managed to get through the small riot crowd of people with their torches and home-made weapons, April had to call out her Beast to fight the demon one-on-one. It had been a more difficult battle than she had anticipated, because every now and then some innocent would try to protect the demon.

Then in the last moments of defeating the demon, he had burnt a rune into her shoulder, right before he took his last breath. It took April five seconds to realize that because of the burning rune, the Beast was not going away. And she was stuck in that form. It gave more reason for the already frightened villagers to attack her some more.

It took a whole lot of control not to fight back, and somehow April managed to get back home. There were small fires still smoldering on her clothes when she appeared at the door to her Nexus apartment. Opening the door slightly, the exhaustion came over her and she sort of slumped to the floor.

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"I need to remove the rune." April drinks again. She remembers flashes of everything he said, while she was in the other form. And knows he wants to help. "I have a book of runes, on the self over there."

He makes sure she has a good grip on the mug before he goes to look. It only takes a few moments to find which book she means, and on his way back he flips through it as quickly as he dares to find the symbol. "Here."

April draws her finger over the symbol in the book, then reaches back and tenderly traces the one on her back. "Yes. This is it. Control. Desire. A unpredicatable rune."

Reading over the Latin in the book, April sighs and takes another long drink of blood. "Difficult to remove too."

He doesn't really like the sound of that. "Difficult how?"

He really hopes it isn't some extremely long ritual or something requiring human sacrifice or something like that, because that's the last thing they need today.

"Don't worry. No human sacrifices." Her abilities still seem to be working at the very least. "Returning control won't be hard. You have helped with that already."

April takes his hand. "By reminding me of my promises to not become the monster. By telling me you need me..."

"Removing desire..." She pauses. Then flips through the pages to find some clue. The memory of his hard denial to her Beast's flirtation is still there.

Clark gives her hand a light squeeze of reassurance. He wasn't lying when he told the Beast that he needed both of them, but he thinks he needs April a lot more.

He also thinks that what the Beast was doing was a lot less flirtation and a lot more hardcore seduction, although he's never really had a girlfriend let alone had sex at any point in his life, so his position is rather biased.

Another ebb of pain from her rune, but there is a part of it that is definitely faded now that Clark looks at it again.

Trying to ignore Clark's stray thoughts, April coughs. "Desire is the need to possess. The two most powerful emotions to destroy desire is fear. And love."

"Oh." Clark knows that if he wanted to, he could be plenty scary. The dark part of him that comes out when red kryptonite is in play, the cold and cruel Kryptonian son, his own normal feelings of rage. But he never, ever wants to turn any of that on her. Having someone looking at him with fear in their eyes makes him feel sicker than a bellyful of kryptonite.

"What do we need to do?"

Again, his thoughts practically leap at her from where he sits, so close to her. And April touches his face. "Even in your darkest moment, I want to be the light. Not afraid."

She finds the page with the love rune. "I am hoping this will work. You reminded me of how powerful love could be, with describing what your mother did for you."

He can't think of anything to say to that, so he simply puts his hand over top of hers. It's strange, coming to rely on someone so much after such a short time. Yet it feels so very right. He doesn't know where he'd be without her help. Nor where she'd be without his.

"Well," he admits, "she did have help from a little hunk of black kryptonite." Which reminds him that he'd planned to bring some traditional green with him, but in all the fuss after practice it didn't even occur to him. "But these runes seem plenty powerful to me." Just as the meteors of his home affect him so deeply, he assumes the runes of hers hold similar sway over her.

"They are powerful magic." April smiles gently at him. She squeezes his hand slightly. "Clark... I need you to burn this rune overtop of the other one."

She would trust no one else to do this for her.

He sucks in a breath. That's a tall order, being asked to deliberately cause harm. Something he's never done in his life. Something he's been trained not to for his entire childhood. But he would do almost anything to help her, and even doctors have to cut open their patients to save lives.

"Okay. How... do I just... with my eyes, or is there a spell or ritual or something?" Accepting the need doesn't mean he won't be nervous or paranoid about getting it wrong.

"Just with your eyes, using your heat vision. The spell is in Latin and I will cast it." Accepting the fact she might have to do it through clenched teeth. Her Beast could handle the pain, but she is not allowing her other side to return tonight.

Her shirt is torn anyway, so she just removes it completely off her shoulders.

He's so unsettled by what he's about to do that he doesn't even get embarrassed about seeing more of her than he has yet. He takes a long, hard look at the rune in the book, the one that he's about to burn into her. This is the most important thing his heat vision has ever done and he will never forgive himself if he screws it up.

He knows he can control it well enough to write with it. It's hard to not know, after he burned the Kryptonian glyph for hope ten feet high on the side of the barn. But he wants to make absolutely sure. Especially since he's going to have to ignore the smell of sizzling flesh as he goes.

He takes another deep breath, and when he lets it out, he settles his laserlike gaze on the still-burning rune on her shoulder. "All right. Let me know when you're ready to start."

April takes a breath. She can sense the fact that Clark is unsettled, and reaches back with one hand to take his. Skimming over the spell first, as to not mess up herself, there is a soft smile on the young woman.

Having desire for Clark was difficult to handle, because it was new and different. Besides, desire was all about possession and April did not want to possess Clark.
Feeling love for him would not be new or unusual. She already respects him. Admires him. And cares for him on that deep level of friendship and possibly more.

"Ready." April squeezes his hand. Slowly she cants the spell that goes with the rune. As prepared as possible for the heat vision that Clark will be using in his part.

((bed))

He doesn't say anything to warn her before he starts, not wanting to break her concentration. Which is pretty funny, considering he's interrupting it by burning the hell out of her shoulder.

He carefully grasps her upper arms to hold her still, no matter how much she may or may not move in reaction to the pain. He focuses solely on the shape of the replacement rune, and feels the familiar heat leech into his eyes as she begins to speak.

Love.

The only reason he would do this to anyone.

He begins to carefully inscribe the rune into her flesh.

Her whole body jumped slightly at the burning pain, so it was fortunate that Clark is grasping her upper arms.

The only thing that keeps her going is that she can feel the spell start to work. As the rune is burnt into her, and she speaks the words, there is less and less desire. And more that comforting glow of love.

As the Love rune is cast onto her shoulder, the desire rune starts to fade. Until after a very long five minutes, both the rune is complete and the spell is finished. After speaking the last words, April feels quite woozy, but secure in his hold.

He keeps his hold on her even after they're done, sensing her wobbling a little. "Are you okay? Did it work? The other rune is gone."

April nods, and rests her head on his shoulder. "It worked. You did a good job." It is nice to just be held by him. Knowing that he is there supporting her.

"Good." He really doesn't want to have to do that again, although he knows that if he had to, if he was given this exact same situation, he would've done the exact same thing.

He shifts his grip to a more comfortable one, more of an embrace than holding her still. "Does it still hurt?"

"I can feel it, but it does not burn anymore." April is content in the embrace. The rune has a slight glow to it, not as bright as before. The one thing to note that it doesn't seem to heal, as previous heat wounds from their sparring battle.

Flashes of memory still tug at her heart. "I am glad you were here. I do not think anyone else could have handled my other side so effectively."

"I'm glad I was able to help." He gives a nervous laugh. "You scared the crap out of me, you know. Finding you lying out there like that."

"I am just glad you found me." And not someone else. "Why did you come here, anyway?"

"I'm glad it was me that found you, too." He's seen how humans can react when they're scared, and it's not always noble or brave. "I stopped in for some advice and you weren't there. I was worried and wanted to make sure you were okay." He sounds a little embarrassed, but not much. It's not like she has to come say hi to him whenever he's in, and she could have been out... grocery shopping or something. Not everything's a life or death situation. But this time it was, or at least a serious snag in her life that she might not have come out of alone.

There is a soft smile from April when Clark admits that he was worried about her. She lifts a hand to brush her fingers through his hair. "I hope your advice seeking wasn't anything too serious. And that you found solutions."

"Of course, we can still talk now." She remembers him saying something to her Beast about discussing wanting the 'real her'. "About anything."

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