Lar, Part Two: The Rest Of The Story

Part 2

I was patient. I waited, biding my time. Understand; I'm not generally a patient woman. No, I'm not. But with Lar I've leaned patience and that's been good for me. Not, I'll admit, that Lar is patient. Far from it. He's just about the most impatient being you'll ever meet. But like so many other things about himself, he hides it well. He forces himself to be tranquil when it's not his nature. Most people don't understand Lar at all, and that suits him just fine. They understand Mon-El perfectly. Not Lar, though. When he needs someone to understand Lar, then he flies to me. My poor Mon. So much fear. Sun Boy once said to me, "But how can you be so in love with someone who doesn't need you, Shady?" Honestly, it was all I could do not to burst out laughing. Shades of Talok, I'm an honest woman if I'm nothing else. I need to be needed. And Lar needs me.

Almost as much as I need him.

Lar is my hope. He lets me know that Tasmia Mallor is the hero that she always wanted to be. The hero that she was born to be. He's the bravest man I've ever known. Oh, he's afraid; Lar is afraid of a lot of things. But he faces his fears, conquers them. A fearless man is a fool, not brave. Lar is the best, the strongest. And if someone like Lar loves me and respects me, then I really am a hero worth my name and my proud lineage.

When he returned from that mission to Bendor's World, I knew that my wait was over. Mon likes missions where he can use his hands, his body and strength. He's got a bright mind, yes, but thinking a problem through isn't as satisfying for him as *doing* something about it. The holopress sometimes wonders, since Mon's the strongest, why he's only been Leader once, and that briefly. That's why. It didn't suit him at all. He dislikes the limelight. In any Legion hologram or flatpic Mon is always the one standing in the back away from the holocams. And he won't make decisions for others. On Bendor's World he'd just finished a vast emergency reclamation project. A desert, once covering almost a third of the planet, was now fertile once more and waiting to feed the hungry people of that small world. He'd be relaxed and happy. That was important.

"Gods, I missed you," he whispered to me as I melted into his embrace. Then he spotted the half-empty bottle of Silverale sitting on the table where Jo left it and lost the beginnings of what might have been one of his rare smiles. I cherish those smiles. Clark and I are almost the only ones who ever see them, and to lose something precious like that ... I crushed a brief flash of anger at Jo and was ashamed of myself. Taking his hand, I led Lar to the couch, settling his head in my lap.

"Lover, we have to do something about Jo." He turned his face away from me with a shuddering sigh.

"I - know ... "

"Do you remember what I told you the first time we ever made love?" I outlined the curve of his jaw with my lips and felt him shiver slightly at my touch. So sensitive ... He tried to smile for me, he really did.

"To have and to hold ... and to let go ... " he said in a raw, hoarse voice that touched my heart like fire from the sun. "You told me I'd have to be the one to do it, because you never could." Nodding, I held him very tightly.

"It's time to let Jo go," I said.

For an instant I saw panic almost overwhelm him. But my Mon is a fighter. Grim, he beat it back into some small, dim corner of his mind to be dealt with later. He struggled with his anger and beat it down until it was a choking tightness in his chest that I could almost see, almost feel. In the end he was left with only the sadness. Seeing him it was hard not to hate myself for what I'd done to him. That grief could burn as pure as this was something that I knew. But I never wanted *him* to know it. And I could've stopped it all with a word. He'd never have taken Jo as a lover if' I'd objected. Never. But it wasn't in me to deny him any more than it was in Tinya to share Jo.

Sitting up, he lay his head on his knees for a moment and I spread myself over his back like a blanket. Beneath my flushed skin, I could feel his muscles tense, rolling like coiled steel. Such a strong back ... But was it strong enough for this?

He lifted his head and climbed to his feet. I didn't have to ask where he was going or what he'd do.

Things happened rather quickly after that. Lar went to the gym and began exercising with the special equipment Brainy installed just for the two of them, Lar and Jo. He ran and he pumped and he fought and he practiced his unarmed combat skills in VR until I thought even he must be tiring. From the Monitor Board I watched him. Blok looked at me curiously when I offered to take the rest of his shift, but I only smiled and sent him happily on his way, looking for Mysa.

When Jo found him there events cascaded even more swiftly. The minute Lar saw him, he knew. Jo's eyes were shining, radiating happiness the way Sun Boy radiates light. Obviously, Tinya had taken him back into her heart and bed. But the price, too, was obvious. When he gazed at Lar his smiled wavered, then faded from sight. Lar released his exercise bar and for an endless second they only stared at one another.

"Lar - I - " Jo swallowed hard his fingers curling and uncurling in sad agitation.

Wordless, Lar reached for him. Like a falling oak, Jo Nah, Ultra Boy of The Legion of Super-Heroes, lowered his head onto my lover's chest. After a moment Lar raised Jo chin and smiled at him. Jo looked so stricken, I winced to see it. Lar and I both saw him gathering himself. Soon he was going to speak and wound himself with his favorite weapon - guilt. But Lar didn't let him. Mon's kiss was chaste, almost virginal, with nothing of passion in it. Confused, Jo waited on Lar.

"Go home, Jo," Lar whisper in his ear, "Go home."

Startled, Jo regarded Lar closely, searching for the truth. Lar dug deep within himself for the joy Jo needed to see. Like a fountain, it welled up and came spilling out Mon's eyes. Joy begat joy and the relief and happiness Lar and I saw mirrored on that flushed face was worth whatever pain that gave it birth. Lar's arms enfolded Jo and his hand curled around the back of his neck protectively. The gruffness of his voice masked deep gratitude and affection.

"We're not done yet, you know that, don't you? Still friends?" he demanded. Jo's smile blossomed back to life.

"We'd better be," he cracked, "You still owe me money, buddy. Dirk did hit on Shvaughn." Their laughter was sweet to my ears.

"You two set me up!" accused Mon. And then Jo was gone as brashly as he arrived, without fanfare but not without the strength they have lent one another. Heart to heart. Warrior to warrior. Nothing can take that from them. Nothing.

I waited out the rest of Blok's shift and then I went looking for Lar.

Tasmia didn't say anything. Most of all she didn't tell me that things were going to be all right. She knew better. When she found me sitting on my solitary asteroid, staring into the heart of all the beauty surrounding the Fire Rings of the Beta Carinae system, she sat down wordlessly at my side. She hadn't had to search for me. There was no need. She knew *exactly* where to find me. She always does. Without effort, with the closeness of her body, she shouldered the burden of my guilt and sadness, giving me her strength. I cradled my head on her breasts, and I felt the soft kisses she reigned on my hair. Then, lifting my chin she gently kissed my eyes because she knows that always leaves me breathless.

"You never do anything by half measures, do you, lover?"

Sometimes I wonder how it's possible for one person to know another as well as Tasmia knows me. But it doesn't frighten me. Not anymore. There are things about me that no one else will ever know; that I don't want them to know. Parts of me that I can't bear for anyone else to see. Things that I'm ashamed of. The vanity ... the violence ...

Tasmia knows them all. And she still loves me.

"Keritalyn?" I murmured into the softness of her pillowing breasts. Tasmia tells me that I have a terrible accent when I speak her native language. But the word for 'soul mate', the light at the heart of darkness, was one of the first Talokian words she taught me. She cupped my face.

"Always," she said.

When I die and they lay bare my heart to bury after Daxamite custom, they'll find Tasmia Mallor. When I feel sad, or happy, when I feel anything at all except the hollow, fleeting satisfaction that comes with spent anger, it's because Tasmia Mallor gave me my heart.

She is my heart.

This site is dedicated to the memory of Dannell Lites, who died unceremoniously on 16 September, 2002, in Kansas City, MO. Other than characters, place names, etc., which are ©DC Comics, Marvel Comics, Warner Bros., WGBS or any other television/movie owner, or Wizard Magazine, all content is ©2002 Dannell Lites. Background set ©2002 by SleepyHead. Please do not use without her permission. Site url= http://dannfan.50megs.com/