A/N: 1st: UBER thanks to Deanine for beta work above and beyond the call of coursework. I am beyond thankful for her insight and assistance. I just hope her professors don't find out... :-)
2nd: I confess. I know nothing about Clark's Kryptonian parents or their language. I made it all up. I am also rather confused on when he may have actually left his home planet but - hey - it's fanfiction and I'm allowed to use my imagination. And it's not like Smallville is going by the book in every little detail (at least, I don't think it is.....) Having said that - I hope you can enjoy part 6 anyway.
Oh! And remember that *** marks the beginning of a memory or flashback and another *** marks the end (I still haven't beaten the formatting bug even with wonderful advice from those who have succeeded). Now you can read Chapter 6.
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Chapter 6
"I wonder if this is what it feels like to die?"
The thought was strangely clear to Clark, coming in pinpoint sharp through the thick haze that suffocated his conscious mind. The pain that had plagued him for hours, or maybe it had been forever, was duller now, almost nonexistent, and other things were making themselves known in its place. For instance, he could feel the blood moving thickly through his veins, like molasses through a tube. It was a strange unreal feeling and not entirely pleasant. In fact, Clark felt as if his entire body was moving in super slow-mo, like in the football games he liked to watch with his dad on Sundays. Not that he especially liked watching football on T.V., he just liked spending time with his father when they didn't have something to do or somewhere to be. His mom always left them alone during that time. She'd make a batch of her super nachos and disappear, leaving her 'men' to themselves.
"I'll miss that," Clark thought. Then he wanted to laugh. He found it extremely funny that his last thoughts were not of Lana or Chloe or even Lex, but of televised sports and snack food.
Without warning, the pain that had been fading away flared up anew. Clark's mind screamed as he tried to force his exhausted, unwilling body to move; move away from the pain, away from the fire that lanced up and down his leg and overflowed into the rest of him.
"Hold him still, Jonathan!" Martha cried, raising her voice over her son's hoarse screams. They'd agreed that Jonathan's weight would be best used holding Clark down should he become restless while they worked. She also knew that her husband was not up to the task of removing the shard. She wasn't either, truth be told, but there weren't a lot of options available.
Jonathan didn't answer his wife. He was too busy trying to keep Clark's thrashing body in the tub. "I underestimated how much strength he had left," he gasped, as much to himself as to Martha. "Can you see it?"
Martha looked down at Clark's swollen leg and the pliers buried in his flesh. The fragment was easy to see. Although it wasn't glowing as bright as one of the damn things normally would around Clark, it was still bright enough to see. And it illuminated the gore surrounding it with a sickish, green cast. She'd just gotten hold of the meteor fragment when Clark jolted, disturbing her fragile grip on the slippery rock.
Now she was trying to locate the plier's sharp ends in the midst of the blood and tissue so she might have another try but she needed Clark to stay still. Finally, Jonathan wrestled their son into a better position and she began the process again. Martha swore she could feel the flesh she was working around through the handles of the silver needle-nose pliers. "I never want to have to do this again," she thought as she pushed aside a thick strand of muscle. Clark's leg twitched beneath her fingers and he moaned in agony as she positioned the slender prongs over the shard. "It's almost done, honey," she whispered in the soft crooning voice she'd used when Clark was little and had bad dreams. "Mama's almost done. You just need to hold still for a few more minutes."
"Mama?" Clark croaked. "Mama! Make it stop! It hurts!"
"Oh, God, help me," Martha sobbed as she tightened her grip on the handle. "It's going to be alright Clark. Just hold on for another minute, baby." With shaking hands, she gently rocked the shard back and forth in the cradle of Clark's femur. She could feel it loosening ever so slightly as she tried to ease it out far enough for her to pull it free. She did her best to ignore Clark's screams and weak movements and focus on the small piece of the heavens that was squeezed between the pliers but her best wasn't good enough. His hoarse cries penetrated her concentration like a scalpel through skin.
Finally, she could stand it no longer and she gave the rock one hard, quick tug. A loud scream, a fleshy pop, and she was falling backwards. As her back slammed into the floor, she lost her painful grip on the pliers and they skittered away, leaving a smear of red across the shining white tile. Martha crawled after them as quickly as she could, wanting to be certain that she'd pulled the fragment free. Something small and bloody glowed by the toilet and she picked it up, taking the time to make absolutely certain there were no pieces missing from its edges.
"Martha!" Jonathan yelled to his wife even though she was only a few feet away. He couldn't help it. He was scared because, just as she had predicted, once the shard was freed the wound began to bleed. Heavily. And it seemed to him that a river of blood was flowing from his son's leg. "Martha get over here now!"
Martha heard the panic in her husband's voice but she had to make sure the shard was intact. "One second, Jonathan, I have to check this." She wiped the bloody fragment on her shirt and peered closely at the corners. The hideous stone was intact. With a small sob of relief, she tossed the shard into the lead box they kept handy for such emergencies and slammed the lid shut. Then she crawled over to the tub.
"Oh, God," she breathed, the sight of her son's lifeblood running down the drain giving her more of a start than she expected. "Can you hold up his leg?" Martha looked to Jonathan where he half lay across Clark's chest. "Has he quieted down enough for you to let him go?"
Jonathan nodded and released his hold on Clark's torso. Clark moaned and his head lolled back and forth across the back of the tub. "Mama," he whispered. "Make it stop. Please make it stop."
***
He heard his mother call his name.
"Amana!" he wailed.
The trim figure of his mother appeared in the doorway and he ran to her with his right arm cradled against his small body, tears streaking down his face.
"Ashay, what happened?"
His mother knelt beside him and took the rug-burned arm in her soft hands. She examined it a moment. "How did you do this, ashay? Did you slide down the ramp again?"
Clark nodded, his grey eyes brimming with tears. "It hurts, amana. Make it stop."
"I will do just that," she smiled as she pulled the medicinal spray out of her pocket. She'd heard him crying and somehow thought she might need it. The boy gave an exaggerated sigh of relief as the cool spray eased the pain of his raw flesh. He'd been chasing the emmet his father had given him for his birthday and tripped over the carpet on the ramp. He'd thrown his arms forward, hoping to stop his slide and he had, but his one arm was sore and red from the effort.
"Is that better?" his mother asked.
Clark grinned at her and nodded. "Yes, amana. Thank you." He bowed then. He'd seen his father do it several times and, to his two-year-old mind, it looked very grown up.
To his surprise and delight his mother laughed and picked him up in her arms, twirling him around so fast that the room spun. "Oh, Kalel! I do love you!"
Clark laughed, too, and held on, his chubby fingers entwined in his mother's hair. It didn't matter to him that her hair was the wrong color or that this place of his dreams wasn't his home. He wasn't even concerned that she called him by a different name. All he cared about was that he was safe here. And there was no pain.
***
Martha carefully wound the long strips of sheet around the tee shirt she was using as a bandage. With Jonathan supporting Clark's leg, she reached around and around, wrapping the wound tightly but not so tightly as to constrict the blood flow. *What little he has left* The thought came unbidden to her mind and she banished it with a mental shout, telling her subconscious to shut the hell up.
Clark moaned as she tied the strips together, securing the bandages.
"Eb shayte, amana. Dyun eb alte."
Martha's hands stopped their work and she stared at her son. She was aware that Jonathan, too, was staring at Clark, listening as the whispered words filled the bathroom. They'd heard words like that before, but not for a long, long time. When he first came to them, Clark didn't speak for almost two months. And when he did begin to talk, he spoke English. But in his dreams, Clark often called out in strange words that rang of distant galaxies and far off planets. There had been many nights when Martha sat by his bedside, soothing him out of a nightmare he hadn't the language to explain. To hear these words after so many years tore at her heart and made her wonder how far gone her son might be.
"Jonathan . . . "
"It's alright, Martha. Just finish up."
Martha's gaze moved from her son to her husband. The sky-blue eyes were a calm port for her stormy emotions and she let herself sink into them for a few brief seconds. Then she drew a deep breath and finished her work. Jonathan continued to hold up Clark's leg while she rinsed the blood down the drain. Then they sat him up hoisted him out of the bathtub.
Oddly enough, getting Clark down the hall had proved much more difficult than getting him up the stairs. Jonathan's strength was failing fast and he stumbled more than once during the short trip to Clark's bedroom. When they finally reached the bed, he dumped his son with a loud groan.
"I can't do anymore," he said, exhaustion evident in his voice. "I'm sorry, Martha."
Martha gathered her husband in her arms and held him tight. It's alright. We're done. We're done. I can finish up here. Why don't you take a shower and I'll see to your head when you get out. How does that sound? Okay?"
Jonathan blinked at her a moment then sighed. "A shower sounds good. I'll be downstairs." He hauled himself wearily to his feet and headed for the door.
"Downstairs? Honey, do you think you can make it that far?"
He looked down the hall toward the bloody bathroom and shuddered. "I'll make it."
Martha watched him leave, her eyes bright with sympathy. She didn't think she'd ever look at that bathroom the same way again, either. But she'd think about that later, because right now she had work to do. She covered the gashes on Clark's chest with the large gauze pads she'd found in the medicine chest. Then she taped them in place. She wanted to make sure she could get to them so she could check Clark's progress. If the gashes were healing, then she could be reasonably sure that Clark was improving. If they remained open . . . well, she'd deal with that if the time came.
When she was done, Martha sat down on the bed next to her son and smoothed the ebony hair away from his pale face. He was still hot to the touch but chills no longer wracked his body. For that she was grateful. Maybe it meant he was improving. She hoped so. Her fingers traced the face she loved so much. "You're so handsome," she said quietly. "I would never tell you this but I think those girls of yours are both fools. Someday they'll realize what they missed. Not that I'm saying looks are everything because they're not. I'm just saying that . . . you're one of kind Clark. You're smart and funny and nice. And if Chloe and Lana are too stupid to realize what a find you are they don't deserve you. I'm not sure we deserve you." The tears she'd kept at bay finally began to fall. "Oh, Clark," she sobbed, her chest heaving with the force of her emotion, "we love you so much. You have to come back to us. You just have to come back!
