The Earth Like a Jewel, Glittering, Falling...
Pairing: Clark/Bruce
Rating: R
Disclaimer: The boys belong to DC and to each other, but not to me.
Notes: The next in a series expanding the "Absolute Power" story arc from Jeph Loeb's run in Superman/Batman. ( Other stories here).
Summary: As the new rulers of the globe celebrate their first Christmas after their takeover, the question is raised: what do you get the youthful godlike dictator who has everything?
Word Count: 1874
(A special thank-you to arch_schatten for giving me an image in a story ( "Unconventional Mechanics") that haunted me and inspired one of the scenes in this story)
"Oh, you better not shout, you better not cry, you better not pout, I'm telling you why." One of the newly-hailed kings of the world sang enthusiastically to himself as he wrapped presents for his parents. Clark was sitting at a huge table in a large empty room, all glowing steel and brushed black metal. A profusion of colorful ribbons and paper spilled across the stark ebony table. "He's making a list and checking it twice! Gonna find out who's naughty and nice!" Outside the huge windows, the Earth curved through a field of stars, glowing in reflected light. "He sees you when you're sleeping! He knows when you're awake!" The tip of Clark's tongue stuck out just a bit at the corner of his mouth as he finished up a tricky fold. "He knows if you've been bad or good--"
"--so be good for goodness' sake!" Bruce chimed in from the doorway. He leaned against the doorframe with his arms crossed, grinning. "I love that carol." He was in costume, as was Clark: their parents preferred to have them in uniform and technically on call when they visited the Watchtower. The cowl was pulled off and Bruce's steely eyes were alight with enthusiasm. "This is the first chance I've gotten to really explore this place, Clark, you wouldn't believe it! It's got everything, it's amazing. They must have had plans in place to build it the minute we took over." He took a running leap and tumbled across and over the vast table, ignoring Clark's protest as wrapping flew everywhere, ending up with his hands pressed to the curving glass walls. He pulled them back quickly. "Wow! That's cold even with gloves on." He turned back to Superman, tidying up the scattered bows. "Anyway, to summarize: coolest place ever."
Clark looked out at the parabola of Earth, washed with clouds. "It seems kind of big and empty," he said softly. "It's going to be just the three of them here while we're down on Earth most of the time."
"The teleport works fine, we'll see them like every other day." Batman answered cheerfully. "And it's time we get our own place anyway." Looking at Clark's face, Bruce relented. He dropped down on the table in front of Superman and cupped Clark's face in his hands, turning it upward. "Don't be sad, you know I can't bear to see you sad." He proceeded to distract Clark from his mood in the most surefire way he knew how, by kissing him thoroughly until he could feel the Kryptonian's spirits lift somewhat. He leaned forward and nibbled on an earlobe, then a silky expanse of neck. "Think of it this way: we're going to have to have sex in every room, and there're zillions of them..." He felt more than heard Clark's buzzing chuckle beneath his lips.
"No time like the present to get started," Clark said huskily, his mood shifting like quicksilver, and pinned Bruce gracefully to the black table. The two wrestled and tussled their way around the room until both were out of breath, Bruce with exertion and Clark with desire. Locked in a kiss, their deft hands removed equipment and clothing they knew by heart. Gloves, boots, belts and capes were scattered about the room, until finally Clark was plastered full-length against the huge expanse of window with Bruce's warm body pressed all along his back, his hot breath fanning his neck. The window was cool even to Superman's senses, and its slick iciness provided a maddeningly tantalizing contrast to the warm flesh pushing him insistently against the glass.
Caught between fire and ice, Clark opened his eyes and saw the Earth hanging, luminous in the star-dusted sky. In the black glass he could see Bruce's face reflected, his eyes closed and lips slightly parted, lost in dreamy passion. Clark felt his breath catch in his throat at the sight of his lover's face, spangled and studded with stars, hovering over the Earth like a rapturous angel. So beautiful...so precious... and then all coherent thought was lost in the wonder of what Bruce could do to him.
Fire and ice.
: : :
Clark had insisted on putting a tiny evergreen tree on the huge meeting table and playing Christmas carols in the background as his family gathered to exchange Christmas presents. There were few gifts--they were, after all, the family that really had everything--but the few they shared were meaningful.
Saturn Queen handed Bruce a sheaf of papers, which he unrolled onto the table. It took him a second to realize they were blueprints. "You need a lab, son," said Lightning Lord, "and a central location for your work and surveillance."
"We think upper Manhattan would be a good location," added Cosmic King.
Bruce pored over the blueprints in silence for a long time, the delight on his face making him look almost like an ordinary sixteen-year-old. Clark would have hugged his parents; Bruce merely said "Thank you," his eyes shining and his voice warm.
Clark tugged Bruce away from his blueprints and handed him a simple red-and-green envelope. Bruce opened it to find a photograph of Mt. Rushmore, the familiar faces replaced with Batman's and Superman's. Bruce laughed. "This must have taken you ages to Photoshop so well..." Bruce began, then trailed off, looking at Clark's beaming face. "You...you have no sense of proportion whatsoever, do you?"
"Nope." Clark smirked.
"Well, fortunately I do." Bruce held out a small box. Clark opened it to find a replica of the Earth in spun glass and gemstones. It was exquisitely delicate, glimmering in the darkness of the room as Clark suspended it by its silvery string between the two of them. He stood up to hold it against the vastness of space stretching beyond the windows, to see it mirrored by the real globe stretching below them. The filigreed glass caught the faint light of the stars, glinting blue and green. So beautiful...so fragile... Bruce looked up at him, the corners of his mouth curved gently. He opened his mouth to try and express how much it meant to him.
Several things happened very suddenly almost at once.
About a dozen spaceships materialized just outside the Watchtower.
Something rammed through the windows, spraying glass everywhere.
The ornament slipped from Clark's fingers, tumbling end over end, crashing to the floor to disintegrate into sparkling dust.
And Bruce looked up to see an obscenely fleshy plant wrapped around Clark's chest, pulsing, Clark's eyes blank and distant.
Saturn Queen, Cosmic King, and Lightning Lord sprang into action, their bodies sheathed with force fields from their rings, leaping through the shattered window before the blast doors slammed down a heartbeat later. Outside the Watchtower, the battle raged wildly, but Bruce had no eyes or ears for it. All his attention was taken up by his brother, sightless and silent, standing like a statue in the center of the room.
Mother! What's wrong with Clark? Help me!
I can't reach him, Bruce! It's some kind of mind control, I can't break thr-- A psychic cry of agony and searing pain as his mother's voice cut off in his head. Batman was alone in his mind and in the room.
He pulled at the plant with all his might; it merely throbbed disgustingly in his hands and wrapped itself tighter around Superman. Clark didn't seem to be in pain, merely deeply enthralled. Bruce was alone. Clark had left him! He grabbed his brother's shoulders and shook him, his voice rising in panic to a howl. "Clark! Come back! We'll die here without you, I'll die here without you, come back! Clark!" For a time there was no answer. Then Clark blinked. Once, then twice. The plant started to uncoil as Bruce pulled at it.
Then suddenly, both Bruce and the plant went careening across the floor as Superman threw them away from him, his whole body a spasm of agony. Dodging the plant's groping tentacles, Bruce ran to be at Clark's side, only to have Superman back away from him, his face a rictus of pain. "Get away from me!" he cried wildly. Batman stopped dead, staring at his brother. What had the plant done to him? Superman shook his head from side to side in mute agony, his hand held out to stop Bruce's approach. Then he slowly became aware of the battle still raging outside. With a cry of fury he smashed through another window to confront the attackers who had done--whatever they had done--to him.
Another blast door slammed down. Batman was alone.
Once an enraged Kryptonian enters a space battle, the tide usually turns fairly quickly, and this was no exception. Soon the few remaining ships were limping off, and the four battered fighters were floating together outside the Watchtower. Clark curled up into a ball in the vacuum of space, his cape wavering about him like flames. Bruce heard the exhausted thread of his mother's voice in his mind: "...Bruce...teleport us back..."
Batman quickly worked the teleport and his parents and his brother were back in the meeting room. Clark huddled on the floor alone, his arms wrapped around himself, his head on his knees, shaking. Bruce went to him, touched him gently on the shoulder. "Clark. What happened?"
Clark spoke in a raw whisper, as though he had been screaming. "I saw... Another world. It was...like the Age of Heroes our parents warn us about. We...you and I were together, but...everything else was different. Our parents didn't exist. In their place there were hundreds of costumed heroes and villains, the skies full of them, like eagles. We were not in control. People were free, free to choose and to live any way they wanted. Hero or villain. No masters. No..."
Batman understood exactly what Superman was trying to say. Mind control plants that trap you in a hellish vision of a world gone wrong. Leaving just enough to be familiar, but turning everything else into a ghastly mirror image, reversing and perverting what should be... His hand tightened on Clark's shoulder in sympathy. "It must have been terrible," he breathed.
Clark made a horrific noise, like a wounded animal. He raised his head and Bruce saw tears on his lashes like stars, his blue eyes laser-bright with pain. "It was-- It was--" He struggled for words. Behind Clark, Bruce saw their parents standing, frozen. Saturn Queen had her hand over her mouth; his fathers' eyes were wide. They looked, he thought for a split second, like children who had been caught playing with a toy they had no right to. Clark reached up and gripped his hand as though it were a lifeline, staring at his face with hungry intensity. He shook his head slowly and sanity seemed to return to his eyes. "It was...yes...it was terrible," he said dully. "Terrible," he repeated more firmly, nodding.
Bruce knelt beside his brother and gathered him into his arms. "It's okay. You're back, you're here with us now. You're home, you're safe." He kissed the tears from Clark's lashes, tasting the salt on his lips.
"You know I'd never let you forget the way things ought to be."
Rating: R
Disclaimer: The boys belong to DC and to each other, but not to me.
Notes: The next in a series expanding the "Absolute Power" story arc from Jeph Loeb's run in Superman/Batman. ( Other stories here).
Summary: As the new rulers of the globe celebrate their first Christmas after their takeover, the question is raised: what do you get the youthful godlike dictator who has everything?
Word Count: 1874
(A special thank-you to arch_schatten for giving me an image in a story ( "Unconventional Mechanics") that haunted me and inspired one of the scenes in this story)
"Oh, you better not shout, you better not cry, you better not pout, I'm telling you why." One of the newly-hailed kings of the world sang enthusiastically to himself as he wrapped presents for his parents. Clark was sitting at a huge table in a large empty room, all glowing steel and brushed black metal. A profusion of colorful ribbons and paper spilled across the stark ebony table. "He's making a list and checking it twice! Gonna find out who's naughty and nice!" Outside the huge windows, the Earth curved through a field of stars, glowing in reflected light. "He sees you when you're sleeping! He knows when you're awake!" The tip of Clark's tongue stuck out just a bit at the corner of his mouth as he finished up a tricky fold. "He knows if you've been bad or good--"
"--so be good for goodness' sake!" Bruce chimed in from the doorway. He leaned against the doorframe with his arms crossed, grinning. "I love that carol." He was in costume, as was Clark: their parents preferred to have them in uniform and technically on call when they visited the Watchtower. The cowl was pulled off and Bruce's steely eyes were alight with enthusiasm. "This is the first chance I've gotten to really explore this place, Clark, you wouldn't believe it! It's got everything, it's amazing. They must have had plans in place to build it the minute we took over." He took a running leap and tumbled across and over the vast table, ignoring Clark's protest as wrapping flew everywhere, ending up with his hands pressed to the curving glass walls. He pulled them back quickly. "Wow! That's cold even with gloves on." He turned back to Superman, tidying up the scattered bows. "Anyway, to summarize: coolest place ever."
Clark looked out at the parabola of Earth, washed with clouds. "It seems kind of big and empty," he said softly. "It's going to be just the three of them here while we're down on Earth most of the time."
"The teleport works fine, we'll see them like every other day." Batman answered cheerfully. "And it's time we get our own place anyway." Looking at Clark's face, Bruce relented. He dropped down on the table in front of Superman and cupped Clark's face in his hands, turning it upward. "Don't be sad, you know I can't bear to see you sad." He proceeded to distract Clark from his mood in the most surefire way he knew how, by kissing him thoroughly until he could feel the Kryptonian's spirits lift somewhat. He leaned forward and nibbled on an earlobe, then a silky expanse of neck. "Think of it this way: we're going to have to have sex in every room, and there're zillions of them..." He felt more than heard Clark's buzzing chuckle beneath his lips.
"No time like the present to get started," Clark said huskily, his mood shifting like quicksilver, and pinned Bruce gracefully to the black table. The two wrestled and tussled their way around the room until both were out of breath, Bruce with exertion and Clark with desire. Locked in a kiss, their deft hands removed equipment and clothing they knew by heart. Gloves, boots, belts and capes were scattered about the room, until finally Clark was plastered full-length against the huge expanse of window with Bruce's warm body pressed all along his back, his hot breath fanning his neck. The window was cool even to Superman's senses, and its slick iciness provided a maddeningly tantalizing contrast to the warm flesh pushing him insistently against the glass.
Caught between fire and ice, Clark opened his eyes and saw the Earth hanging, luminous in the star-dusted sky. In the black glass he could see Bruce's face reflected, his eyes closed and lips slightly parted, lost in dreamy passion. Clark felt his breath catch in his throat at the sight of his lover's face, spangled and studded with stars, hovering over the Earth like a rapturous angel. So beautiful...so precious... and then all coherent thought was lost in the wonder of what Bruce could do to him.
Fire and ice.
: : :
Clark had insisted on putting a tiny evergreen tree on the huge meeting table and playing Christmas carols in the background as his family gathered to exchange Christmas presents. There were few gifts--they were, after all, the family that really had everything--but the few they shared were meaningful.
Saturn Queen handed Bruce a sheaf of papers, which he unrolled onto the table. It took him a second to realize they were blueprints. "You need a lab, son," said Lightning Lord, "and a central location for your work and surveillance."
"We think upper Manhattan would be a good location," added Cosmic King.
Bruce pored over the blueprints in silence for a long time, the delight on his face making him look almost like an ordinary sixteen-year-old. Clark would have hugged his parents; Bruce merely said "Thank you," his eyes shining and his voice warm.
Clark tugged Bruce away from his blueprints and handed him a simple red-and-green envelope. Bruce opened it to find a photograph of Mt. Rushmore, the familiar faces replaced with Batman's and Superman's. Bruce laughed. "This must have taken you ages to Photoshop so well..." Bruce began, then trailed off, looking at Clark's beaming face. "You...you have no sense of proportion whatsoever, do you?"
"Nope." Clark smirked.
"Well, fortunately I do." Bruce held out a small box. Clark opened it to find a replica of the Earth in spun glass and gemstones. It was exquisitely delicate, glimmering in the darkness of the room as Clark suspended it by its silvery string between the two of them. He stood up to hold it against the vastness of space stretching beyond the windows, to see it mirrored by the real globe stretching below them. The filigreed glass caught the faint light of the stars, glinting blue and green. So beautiful...so fragile... Bruce looked up at him, the corners of his mouth curved gently. He opened his mouth to try and express how much it meant to him.
Several things happened very suddenly almost at once.
About a dozen spaceships materialized just outside the Watchtower.
Something rammed through the windows, spraying glass everywhere.
The ornament slipped from Clark's fingers, tumbling end over end, crashing to the floor to disintegrate into sparkling dust.
And Bruce looked up to see an obscenely fleshy plant wrapped around Clark's chest, pulsing, Clark's eyes blank and distant.
Saturn Queen, Cosmic King, and Lightning Lord sprang into action, their bodies sheathed with force fields from their rings, leaping through the shattered window before the blast doors slammed down a heartbeat later. Outside the Watchtower, the battle raged wildly, but Bruce had no eyes or ears for it. All his attention was taken up by his brother, sightless and silent, standing like a statue in the center of the room.
Mother! What's wrong with Clark? Help me!
I can't reach him, Bruce! It's some kind of mind control, I can't break thr-- A psychic cry of agony and searing pain as his mother's voice cut off in his head. Batman was alone in his mind and in the room.
He pulled at the plant with all his might; it merely throbbed disgustingly in his hands and wrapped itself tighter around Superman. Clark didn't seem to be in pain, merely deeply enthralled. Bruce was alone. Clark had left him! He grabbed his brother's shoulders and shook him, his voice rising in panic to a howl. "Clark! Come back! We'll die here without you, I'll die here without you, come back! Clark!" For a time there was no answer. Then Clark blinked. Once, then twice. The plant started to uncoil as Bruce pulled at it.
Then suddenly, both Bruce and the plant went careening across the floor as Superman threw them away from him, his whole body a spasm of agony. Dodging the plant's groping tentacles, Bruce ran to be at Clark's side, only to have Superman back away from him, his face a rictus of pain. "Get away from me!" he cried wildly. Batman stopped dead, staring at his brother. What had the plant done to him? Superman shook his head from side to side in mute agony, his hand held out to stop Bruce's approach. Then he slowly became aware of the battle still raging outside. With a cry of fury he smashed through another window to confront the attackers who had done--whatever they had done--to him.
Another blast door slammed down. Batman was alone.
Once an enraged Kryptonian enters a space battle, the tide usually turns fairly quickly, and this was no exception. Soon the few remaining ships were limping off, and the four battered fighters were floating together outside the Watchtower. Clark curled up into a ball in the vacuum of space, his cape wavering about him like flames. Bruce heard the exhausted thread of his mother's voice in his mind: "...Bruce...teleport us back..."
Batman quickly worked the teleport and his parents and his brother were back in the meeting room. Clark huddled on the floor alone, his arms wrapped around himself, his head on his knees, shaking. Bruce went to him, touched him gently on the shoulder. "Clark. What happened?"
Clark spoke in a raw whisper, as though he had been screaming. "I saw... Another world. It was...like the Age of Heroes our parents warn us about. We...you and I were together, but...everything else was different. Our parents didn't exist. In their place there were hundreds of costumed heroes and villains, the skies full of them, like eagles. We were not in control. People were free, free to choose and to live any way they wanted. Hero or villain. No masters. No..."
Batman understood exactly what Superman was trying to say. Mind control plants that trap you in a hellish vision of a world gone wrong. Leaving just enough to be familiar, but turning everything else into a ghastly mirror image, reversing and perverting what should be... His hand tightened on Clark's shoulder in sympathy. "It must have been terrible," he breathed.
Clark made a horrific noise, like a wounded animal. He raised his head and Bruce saw tears on his lashes like stars, his blue eyes laser-bright with pain. "It was-- It was--" He struggled for words. Behind Clark, Bruce saw their parents standing, frozen. Saturn Queen had her hand over her mouth; his fathers' eyes were wide. They looked, he thought for a split second, like children who had been caught playing with a toy they had no right to. Clark reached up and gripped his hand as though it were a lifeline, staring at his face with hungry intensity. He shook his head slowly and sanity seemed to return to his eyes. "It was...yes...it was terrible," he said dully. "Terrible," he repeated more firmly, nodding.
Bruce knelt beside his brother and gathered him into his arms. "It's okay. You're back, you're here with us now. You're home, you're safe." He kissed the tears from Clark's lashes, tasting the salt on his lips.
"You know I'd never let you forget the way things ought to be."