Chapter twenty-six
Title: Calling a Truce: The (26/27)
Authors: destinyawakened and mjls
Rating: pg-13
Pairings/Characters: Tony Stark/Bruce Wayne
Summary: Bruce gets a visitor and Dick decides it's about time they get Bruce out.
Warnings: spoilers for Batman Begins, The Dark Knight, and Iron Man
Disclaimer: We don't own or claim to own the characters or settings, the books mentioned or make any money.
Parts: One | Two | Three | Four | Five | Six | Seven | Eight | Nine | Ten | Eleven | Twelve | Thirteen | Fourteen| Fifteen| Sixteen| Seventeen | Eighteen| Nineteen | Twenty| Twenty-One | Twenty-Two | Twenty-Three | Twenty-four | Twenty-five |
"Wayne! You have a guest," a guard said from the front of Bruce's cell. The man opened the door, and Bruce put his hands out to have them cuffed and then dragged slightly from the room.
"Who is it?" Bruce asked in a low, monotone voice. He was hardly in the mood for guests, seeing as though he had just had no another brawl with four other inmates just hours earlier. He still bleeding, in fact, on his knuckles and his ear. Bruce won, but not without some scuffing up.
"Well it's not your boyfriend --"
"--Husband --"
"--Whatever. It's not him or any of your other family that comes to visit. Some taller fella, dressed real nice," the guard said, pushing Bruce into the conference room where a few other families were gathered. Bruce stumbled slightly from the shove, stopping just short of a man sitting on a couch in a nicely press black suit, lounging with one leg crossed over the other. Bruce nearly felt his flesh crawl as his eyes met the piercing blue ones of Lex Luthor.
"Oh Bruce, don't look so surprised. Admit that you missed me." Luthor said, grinning just slightly. Bruce furrowed his brows; he hated Luthor more than he hated Joker. Almost. It was a close tie.
"I've told by my lawyer to admit to nothing," Bruce replied, annoyed. Luthor patted the cushion on the couch next to him.
"Take a seat, Bruce, we need to have a little...ah," Luthor smiled,"chat."
Bruce glanced over the seat once, then Luthor, before sitting down as far as he possibly could get from Luthor. "What can I do for you, Lex?"
"Well, seeing as you're going to be tried for murder and likely not found innocent, I thought I would offer up my services to you. We both know that if Stark has to pick between WE and his own precious SI, WE is going to go down the drain," Luthor looked down at his fingernails, looking up at Bruce briefly to grin at him sincerely.
"I don't need your help," Bruce said calmly, tightening his hands together. "Tony can handle things just fine."
"Oh, I have no doubt that he could try," Luthor started. "It's going to take a toll and like I said before, your husband would just let WE drop like a dirty piece of cloth, and I would hate to see the Wayne name go down for something like this."
"You mean murder?"
Luthor shrugged.
"No," Bruce said simply, trying to keep his voice under control. Luthor was up to something; Bruce could almost smell it.
"Bruce, you don't have a case. There is no chance you can prove you were framed," Luthor said with a sigh, smiling smuggly at Bruce, a twinkle in his eye.
Bruce froze for a second, his eyes darkening as they narrowed on Luthor. "Strange, Lex. I don't remember telling anyone what my defense was going to be. That's all been underwraps."
Luthor shifted slightly; " I just assumed that a man of your importance and stature would attempt to claim to be framed. It's all very typical. Very...predictable, Wayne."
"Get out," Bruce demanded darkly, but Luthor didn't move. Bruce stood and walked to the door where the guard was standing. "Guard! This man is harassing me. I'd like to be taken back to my cell. Now!"
Luthor laughed; "You're making a big deal out of nothing. You'll regret this. Your name will be tarnished..." Luthor kept talking but Bruce allowed himself to be taken from the room before he could hear anything else he said. As Bruce was pushed back into his cell, all he could think about was how somehow Luthor knew something, knew about the frame up. The newspapers weren't told a thing and no one was allowed to talk from WE or his family. No one knew his defense.
Oh how Bruce wished he could talk to Tony now and see if they had found something already that would get him out of here for sure. He couldn't just keep getting in fights with the inmates and hope that Tony could talk it all away again. It's been days since he had last seen his husband and Bruce was aching just to see him in front of him and telling him that they were getting to a solution. And as if Bruce's wishes were answered, the guard returned only a few minutes later.
"You're very popular today," he said in a snide manner that made Bruce frown. The guard cuffed him again and dragged him back down to the conference room. Bruce sighed as he was once more left standing in the middle of the room, but this time it was empty all except for Tony, who looked a terrible mess. In short, he looked like he hadn't slept for days and his body was running on the last strands of caffeine coursing through his veins. Bruce nearly expected his husband to fall down and sleep on the floor any second now, but Tony decided to sit down and lay his head on his folded arms on the table and waited until Bruce sat down in front of him.
Bruce felt automatically bad that Tony was running himself thin on his behalf. This was never what he wanted to happen. "You look terrible," Bruce said to his husband softly, trying to ease the mood between them into something lighter.
"That's the understatement of the year..." Tony muttered, "at least I found out who's behind this. Took me way to fucking long that's for sure."
"It's only been a few weeks. could have been a lot longer, " Bruce said softly, first folding his hands on the table, but then folding them under the table instead. Tony look bad enough, he didn't need him worrying over more of the fights Bruce hadn't gotten into on top of it. "So whats the news? Is it Luthor? Because I swear that son of a bitch knows something."
"No it's Stane. At least, his annoying brat that has repulsor technology in his fingers. Asshole's been wanting to bring me down for ages now..." Tony frowned, "What makes you think of Luthor?"
Bruce sighed heavily, rolling his eyes. "Luthor was here not more than ten minutes ago. He was trying to convince me to sell my company over to him or let him take over for the sake of saving the company and my name. He was letting on to knowing more about my case than anyone besides you, me and my lawyer should know."
"...Peculiar, I never really did like Lex and he was the reason I had to go back home during our trip in Vegas. Remember?" Tony frowned.
"A bit too convenient wasn't it?" Bruce mused for a moment. "And me being called back here, couldn't have been an accident."
"...Want me to get the boys to investigate further while I deal with Stane?"
"I'm not sure if it'll be worth the time just yet. We both know how Lex works. He covers his tracks well enough. We might never find out the truth there. The boys are better off helping you with Stane."
"He'll be a bitch to track down, if he's anything like his father, which I hope he isn't."
Bruce forced a smile; "You'll definitely need the boys then." Bruce took one hand and rested it on Tony's arm, forgetting about keeping anything from him. "You need to get some rest first, Tony."
Tony shook his head and whispered a soft 'no'.
"What do you mean 'no'?" Bruce asked worriedly. "You've just about solved it now, haven't you? Finding Stane and getting his confession will get me out of here. Take a day and rest."
"I don't want to risk him finding out about us knowing and go even deeper into hiding. We got to strike now while he still thinks we're trying to get you out. Rest can wait until you're in our bed with me."
Bruce more than understood; Tony had finally taken a page from his book and put the case first and what needed to be done to solve and win. Bruce nodded at his husband, resting his elbows on table, and rubbing his thumb against his lip. "Okay."
"Besides, I haven't slept in our bed since we last slept in it together and I'm not going to crawl into it alone."
"So you haven't slept? Or you've been sleeping in my chair in my office again?" Bruce asked, a small smirk crawling across his face.
"That and you know, the couch, and...well not that I actually slept a lot since we last slept together but okay yeah."
Looking at Tony, Bruce realized that the man had been running himself dry on his account and the guilt that overcame him was enough to show on his face and Tony to start denying how he was to blame. Bruce kept looking at his husband and wondered what else he had taken from him by putting his faith in him to get him free. He knew, more than anyone else, how busy Tony's life could be, how hectic it would get when he tried to calm it down. If Bruce was at home, he would've had Tony locked up in the bedroom without any way to escape, only letting him out after he had caught up on the lost sleep, even if Tony denied he had lost any.
"Either way, we got to start thinking about how to--" Tony stopped, "Bruce are you even listening to me?"
"...Huh? What?" Bruce blinked his thoughts away and focused them back on the gorgeous eyes of his husband. "Yes ye- no not really."
"You're lucky I was talking about business and not something of great importance to you then," Tony smirked.
"I thought business was important."
"Not unless Wayne Enterprises also wants to send a rocket up in space to investigate distant planets. I don't think you're ready for that yet my little musketeer."
Bruce smiled and shook his head. Stark Industries would always be one step ahead of the curve thanks to Tony's genius' mind and he would never stop telling Bruce so. It was a good thing Wayne Enterprises was trying to compete with SI in the tech field.
"Maybe not," Bruce said, not really caring. He couldn't even figure why Tony had brought this up to begin with; it wasn't as if Bruce at that moment would care much.
"Well considering you weren't paying attention I thought I'd talk some business with you cupcake," Tony smirked, "but now that I got -- wait is that guard checking you out?"
Bruce turned his head slightly to look at the guard and then smirked a little as he turned his attention back to Tony. "Wouldn't surprise me," he said in annoyed whisper.
"...Asshole."
"He's not, Tony. That guy has a wife and kids at home," Bruce rolled his eyes. "He just doesn't like me much. No one here really likes me much."
"...Well you'll be out soon so it doesn't matter. Just don't get bum-raped cause that ass is mine."
Despite himself and how miserable he really was there, Bruce smiled slyly at his husband; "I've been fending them off. You're the only one that gets to rape me."
"Eh, Babs says you can't rape the willing," Tony shrugged.
"Smart girl."
"The best," Tony nodded, "I'm going to get her to intern at SI if I can. Talents like hers should be used and not sheltered away."
"Be careful, she might outshine you."
"Nonsense, no one can outshine this gorgeous man!"
Bruce grinned at Tony's ego, shaking his head at how his husband could be so full of himself at random times. If it wasn't for the fact that he was grinning, Bruce would've thought he actually meant it. Then again, Tony didn't mean half of what he said about himself even if everyone thought he did. The guard came closer to their table and Tony got up, realizing that his time with Bruce was once again over. He sighed and kissed Bruce on the lips before he watched his husband being dragged away by the guard, glaring at his back for taking away the man he loved.
----
Strutting out of the prison, Tony thought about what Bruce had told him about Lex visiting him and decided to call ahead to make sure there was information about the man on his desk by the time he got to the mansion. He stopped on the way for some of Bab's favorite muffins (because he considered himself a nice man and he did promise earlier) and then drove his car onto the Wayne grounds, not even parking it properly before he ran towards the cave. He hoped they would've found out something while he had been out visiting Bruce.
"Okay. Spill the beans, potato's, tomato's, whatever you feel like," Tony said, putting the bag of muffins on the desk and ignoring Babs immediately grabbing for them.
"Lex has nothing to do with all of this. At least not that we know off. Even if he is, we can't prove it. We should bundle up our energy and put it to good use."
"Like in finding the brat who's father tried to kill me? Yeah, we should but the problem is that he's nowhere to be found. I'm running him through my mass-recognition program now back in Malibu through Extremis. Shouldn't be too hard to find him considering we got about 15 satellites covering every inch of the planet."
"You got a mass-recognition program back in Malibu?" Babs asked, looking impressed, "do tell me why you haven't installed it on the computers here yet?"
"Because Bruce doesn't know. It's brand new, first time I'm using it. Well, it's been sitting on the shelves for a few months now, I just never found a good situation to put it to use until now."
Tony sat down in Bruce's chair and threw his head back, closing his eyes momentarily while he checked up with everything running through his head thanks to Extremis. The recognition program had no luck yet and they really needed to get Bruce out of prison before something bad would happen. Something like him actually being stuck there and Tony having to sleep in their bed alone. He felt Barbara's hand on his forearm but ignored it, trying not to fall asleep but it was hard. After all, he'd been running himself dry for the past few weeks.
"Right!" Tony jumped out of the chair and clasped his hands together, "no sense in sitting here moping and hoping it'll turn out to be a party full of rainbows! Dick, why don't you check out the nasty clubs in Gotham? He's bound to boast about his success somewhere. Babs, you contact your father and send him Ezkeziel's information, tell him it's important because you saw this kid rob a store or something on your way to school, whatever, you're smart enough so figure something out. I'll just go and drink a whole lot of coffee before I'll fly over to SHIELD in New York and see if they have got something on him that we don't."
"I thought you could get into SHIELD's computer from here out?" Dick inquired.
"Yes but what isn't mentioned is that the kid was also shadowed by SHIELD people for a while until they decided he wasn't dangerous enough to spill men on. There are bound to be some stuff at headquarters that's not in his digital file. Also, Fury probably got some information after lock and key with the claims on the SHIELD leader can see. Knowing him."
-----
Dick decided to take a few matters into his own hands. They needed clear and fact information on Stane in order to take him down. The only way to achieve that was to get a confession, but cornering the little shit into doing that wasn't going to be easy. There were ways to plant bugs in his hotel room (if they knew where it was, which they didn't), maybe even send in a spy of sorts. That was when Dick remembered a certain machine Bruce had brought to the bunker the first few months Dick had started training with him. The machine was busted at the time but slowly over the past nearly four years, Bruce had been piecing it back together. Dick asked what it was, and Bruce told him it wasn't important because it wasn't something he actually needed to use.
Later Dick found out from Lucius Fox that the machine was somewhat of sonar device that bounced cellphone signals and configured a 3D map using those waves. Bruce had used it his first go around with the Joker to track him. The machine wasn't fully operational yet, but with Tony's expertise and Babs helping out, Dick was sure it could be done in no time. If Stane was in fact in Gotham, as they assumed his was (to be sure Bruce's trial went off without a hitch) they could hopefully not only track him down but catch him in the act of talking about his plans.
It was worth a try and Dick was positive it could work. He just had to get Tony in on it and get things moving as soon as possible.