FIC: Gestalt (with Rai_Daydreamer)
Title: Gestalt
Challenge prompt: "17. All these pieces of you" --20_inkspots (Dark set-- full table here)
Which came first: Story
Pairing: Clark/Bruce
Rating: NC-17
Word Count: 4300Summary: When Clark and Bruce are sundered from their superhero identities, they find themselves needing each other more than they expected.
Continuity: The "JLA: Divided We Fall" storyline...on Earth-192 (AKA "The Earth where canon is exactly the same except Clark isn't married to Lois," because adding Lois to this story was more angst than I felt up to).
Gestalt: a configuration or pattern of elements so unified as a whole that it cannot be described merely as a sum of its parts.
Clark Kent was on his way to the Daily Planet when he heard it: "Look! Up in the sky!" His head snapped up in time to see the blur of red and blue that went by on its way to somewhere--somewhere very important, Clark assumed.
Clark continued on his way to work.
Two days ago, mysteriously, unfathomably, six members of the Justice League had somehow been...split. The Martian Manhunter, Green Lantern, Plastic Man, the Flash, Batman and Superman had been suddenly standing face to face with John Jones, Kyle Rayner, Eel O'Brian, Wally West, Bruce Wayne and Clark Kent. The heroic and the civilian identities were fissioned, and Clark Kent was now a human being--not a depowered Kryptonian, but a man with human DNA, a Kansan, a reporter. He had watched Superman step away from him, leaving him feeling...ordinary.
Clark Kent, he had quickly discovered, was not a good typist, had a tendency to get indigestion after eating spicy food, and was afraid of heights. He had sat at his kitchen table the first night staring blankly at the wall, trying to remember even a scrap of Kryptonian. He knew "Rao" was a god, but...it meant nothing to him. A meaningless sound. Like "Krypton."
Like "Kal-El."
When he realized he couldn't picture Jor-El and Lara's faces, that he couldn't remember what the Fortress of Solitude looked like, he had started to shake, the coffee in his mug spilling over onto his hands. "Ouch," he had whispered, touching the scalded skin, unsure if what he was feeling was joy or terror. "Ouch."
Today, when he saw the man walking into the Planet near the end of the work day, he felt the same feeling grip him. There were gaps and holes in who he was now, but Bruce Wayne was not one of them.
"Bruce," he said cautiously as the other man approached his desk.
Bruce nodded, staring at him. He was impeccably dressed, elegant and handsome as always. He looked exactly like the Bruce that Clark had memories of.
Except the eyes.
"I was wondering if I could talk with you," Bruce said. "In private somewhere."
Clark stared down at his desk, covered with paper. Work was so much harder now, even with so much more time to do it. "I'm really far behind," he said, irresolute.
Bruce's hands clenched abruptly; Clark could see the nails digging into the palms. Bruce's face was rigid, his jaw tense, his nostrils flared. "Please," he hissed between gritted teeth.
"I'll...I suppose I can finish up tomorrow," Clark stammered.
"Your apartment. Now. I'll drive," Bruce snapped and headed for the elevator. Clark trailed behind, worried and unsure.
The ride to the apartment was a nightmare. Bruce's knuckles were white on the steering wheel, and as the sun set, darkening the streets, his mood seemed to darken with it. When a car cut him off, Bruce began hissing a stream of vicious invective that seemed to apply to everything and anything around them--the city, the traffic, pedestrians, his own car. Clark held on for dear life, his heart pounding, as they careened through the streets.
In the apartment parking garage, Bruce squealed the car to a stop, nearly hitting the wall. "What are you staring at?" he demanded of Clark.
"You seem...angry about something," Clark noted inanely as they got out of the car.
The smile Bruce gave him was a tortured facsimile of his playboy grin. "Me? Life's great, Clark. Never been greater. I'm free, you see. I'm finally--free."
Clark pulled out his keys and headed for the elevators. "But free of what?" he asked as the doors opened.
Bruce gestured expansively, stepping into the elevator after him. "The responsibility, Clark! My days are finally my own! I owe Gotham nothing, nothing at all. Why, yesterday I just--" he choked slightly, "--just sat around reading, for fun! Agatha Christie, even!" His laugh was too loud. "Do you know how great it is to not be able to guess the ending?"
Clark let them both into the apartment. "Then why are you here?"
Bruce's fists clenched again; he didn't seem to notice. "I just wanted to talk to someone."
"What about?"
"I don't--I don't know." For a second, Bruce's face was very bleak. He went to the window and stared out over the darkened city. "You know, he isn't in Gotham much. The boys are picking up the slack, since I...can't, now." He rested a fist against the window.
Clark nodded. "He isn't...on Earth much, either. I'm not sure it matters to him a great deal anymore."
Bruce was breathing heavily. "Oh, I doubt it ever did. Why should it? Why should any of this bullshit matter to him? To either of them? It's all--" he punched the window lightly, but hard enough to make Clark jump, "--all so pointless. Nothing ever gets solved. It just goes on. And on and on, every night. Every night." His shoulders were tense, his whole body coiled with fury.
Clark stared out at the stars. "I'm sure it mattered to him. I'm sure of it."
Bruce's head snapped around from the cityscape to Clark, and Clark flinched before the glare like a blow. "You're so fucking sure. That must be nice."
"I'm not--" Clark started, but Bruce was continuing, his voice rising higher.
"It must be nice to be able to just show up to work and shuffle papers from inbox to outbox, nice to know you've got a loving happy family for you in fucking Smallville. What did you lose when you lost him? Nothing but grief and solitude, Clark!"
Bruce was shaking now, his teeth gritted in fury, eyes staring. He took a step toward Clark, raising a clenched fist slightly, and Clark fell back, feeling alarm--no, it was more than alarm, it was fear--go through him like lightning. "To hell with this," Bruce snarled. "Why did I even bother to come here? You don't give a damn either." He pivoted sharply and stalked toward the door, his every movement screaming of...annihilation. Someone else? Himself? Clark had no idea, but he knew he couldn't let Bruce leave like this.
"Don't--" he started, reaching out to grab Bruce's arm as the other man went by.
At his touch, Bruce wrenched his arm away, his teeth bared. "What the hell do you want?" His voice was like a clock wound far too tight, gears straining and screaming in agony.
"You're going to hurt yourself--" Clark broke off as Bruce stabbed a finger at his chest.
"What do you care? You paper-shuffling mouse."
Superman always seemed to keep his cool when insulted; Clark was surprised to feel himself go tense and hot as words came tumbling out unplanned. "Mouse? You come storming into my workplace, disrupting my day, dragging me at breakneck speeds back here to whine about your empty life? As if it's my problem you're a pathetic shell of a man? Well, you can--"
He had half-expected it, had accepted the risk when he decided to keep Bruce here at any cost, but he still wasn't prepared for the wild swing that glanced off his cheekbone. Snarling, Bruce tripped over his own feet on the follow-through and stumbled heavily into Clark, his shoulder colliding with Clark's chest, knocking the wind out of him and sending them both tumbling to the floor. Clark grappled ineffectually with a maelstrom of inept and inaccurate punches, trying to pin the infuriated man to the floor. His forehead connected with Bruce's nose and Bruce made a sharp sound of pain, struggling against Clark's grip. Clark tasted blood and held on for dear life until he realized, slowly, that the curses Bruce was snarling no longer seemed to be directed at him. The other man was shaking, not struggling, his body wracked with sobs instead of anger.
Clark started to ease his grip cautiously, but Bruce grabbed his shoulders and rocked against him in agony, so Clark wrapped his arms around the man again and held him, listening to him swallow pain and fury. "God--God--" Bruce gasped against his shirt, "--I can't bear it, I can't, I'm so angry all the time, I want to kill someone or die, I don't care which. I'm just--" He shuddered, choking, "I'm just pieces of a person, and all the worthless pieces, all the little dirty pieces that mean nothing--"
"--No." Clark cut off the flow of words, pulling away from Bruce enough to look him straight in the eye. "That's not true, Bruce. You're--" He shook the other man slightly, gripping his shoulders, "--You're all the passion and the pride and desire, all the bright pieces, the ones that cut and focus light--" He didn't know exactly what he was saying, but Bruce was listening to him. And not trying to hit him. "You're all the essential things, I know it. You're the heart of it, the heart and soul, that anger and passion and burning." There was something in Bruce's eyes like the moment before he had swung at Clark, like and yet not like. "You're all the pieces that love--"
Bruce lunged at Clark again, knocking him to the floor. Clark struggled under the assault until he realized that the grappling was very different this time around. His brain eventually caught up with his body--which was already aroused and demanding and thrusting against Bruce's pinning hips--and he groaned and pulled Bruce closer, hearing cloth ripping and buttons popping, feeling Bruce's teeth close on his shoulder in an agony of pleasure.
They didn't make it to the bed.
As a matter of fact, they didn't make it to getting undressed. Bruce ripped his shirt off, clumsy and demanding, teeth and hands on him, raging with need now. Clark managed to get Bruce's belt undone, get a shaking, desperate hand around the man's erection--and Bruce threw back his head and shouted something incoherent, bucking against Clark's hand, his own hands slamming against the floor in a rictus of climax.
Clark lay on floor, still trying to catch his breath, his body still aching and wanting--and then Bruce was unzipping his fly, bending his dark head to lick and suck greedily. Clark remembered sharp teeth in his skin and braced himself, but Bruce's mouth was gentle, terribly gentle, soothing any fear, caressing, until Clark tipped over the edge as easily and sweetly as falling into sleep. Falling into safety.
They lay tangled together on the floor, Bruce's head pillowed on Clark's thigh, Clark running his hands through Bruce's hair silently. Something had broken there, somehow, Clark thought, broken for better or worse.
Bruce muttered something against his leg and Clark tugged lightly at his hair. "Come up here and say that to my face."
Bruce shifted upward, resting his head on Clark's chest. "I said, you can function better because there's so much more of you in Clark."
Clark held Bruce against him and stared at the ceiling. "I don't know. Maybe I can function better because there's so much less of me."
"Don't be stupid," Bruce said, but his voice held no anger.
Clark sighed. "I'm afraid," he said.
"Of what?"
Clark laughed slightly. "You name it. Afraid of heights. Afraid of traffic. Afraid of paper cuts--paper! Paper is treacherous, Bruce, don't let anyone tell you otherwise." He drew a long, careful breath, feeling Bruce's weight on him, solid and warm. "I'm afraid of getting hurt, I suppose."
Bruce's fingers traced the bite mark on his shoulder, the rising pattern of blood like roses under his skin. "I'm sorry."
"I don't mean that kind of hurt," Clark said, pulling him close again.
: : :
"No. No. No." Bruce's eyes were closed. He shook his head from side to side as if he were in pain, his face banded in the moonlight from the blinds. "I can't do it."
They had managed to get from the floor up to the bed between long, desperate, gasping kisses. They had roused each other to frenzy once again--and then they had hit the wall.
"You don't want to," Clark said, feeling oddly bereft.
The sheets bunched in Bruce's hands and he shuddered. "Jesus, Clark. You think I don't want to fuck you? But I can't--can't trust myself. I--" he held his hands out in front of him; they were shaking. "I've got no control, Clark. I'll hurt you, I know I will. I'll get started and won't listen to you and I'll just--just--take and--" Clark reached out and tried to uncurl his clenched fists, but Bruce pulled away. "It's so easy to hurt a person, Clark," he whispered, his eyes tightly shut. "People think Batman has the power to hurt, but any fool can hurt. The power to choose when to hurt, and when not to...that's real power. Power I don't have anymore. I want you so badly, I can't trust myself."
Clark kissed his closed eyes, stroked his hair until the shuddering subsided a little. He traced his hands down Bruce's chest, trailing over unmarred skin. Batman had all the scars now, he had left Bruce nothing. No evidence of his work, his struggle, his suffering. Nothing but the pain. "You can do this, Bruce. I know you can. You'll stop if you hurt me. I know you will." He took Bruce's face in his hands, waited until the pain-fogged eyes focused on him again. "I trust you."
"You can't trust...a piece of a person."
"But I do." He was smiling, he couldn't seem to help it despite it being a totally inappropriate reaction. "We're two pieces, Bruce. We fit together." He pressed against Bruce, letting the other man feel his arousal. "We fit together," he repeated, feeling Bruce responding.
It didn't go terribly well the first time; they were both clumsy and nervous and it did hurt a little. When Clark gasped Bruce stopped dead, shuddering with the urge to move deeper, his face locked into a mask of mixed lust and dread. "Keep going, it's okay," Clark had managed, biting at his lip as the sensations threatened to tip back over into pain, threatened to tip...and then didn't. "It's okay," he whispered in surprise. "Bruce, it's really okay," he repeated, and Bruce pushed forward with a sound that seemed torn from him, pushed again--and collapsed onto Clark with a shocked, abrupt gasp.
Bruce disentangled himself and slid down beside Clark, breathing heavily. "I--I stopped. When you..." Bruce mumbled.
"Yes. Thank you," Clark said softly, holding his hand, feeling the muscles relaxing slowly. There were half-moons bitten into the palms; Clark kissed each of them.
"You didn't finish..." Bruce said.
"That's okay," Clark said. "I didn't really expect, the first time...I was impressed I managed it at all, considering." He curled up behind Bruce, spooning against the other man. "It'll be better next time," he murmured into Bruce's hair.
It was much better the next time.
: : :
The next morning, Clark called in sick to work, ignoring Perry's bluster. He was delightfully sore in a host of different places and he needed a chance to relax with Bruce and figure out what was going on. Bruce was still asleep as he went to take his shower, enjoying the hot water on various bruises, soaking his aching muscles. He remembered the terror and fury in Bruce's eyes the night before, the way the other man had sobbed in his arms. They were both just fragments of men, but maybe they could make something work. Maybe what they felt for each other could be enough to give them a safe place, a shelter.
Maybe love would be enough, he thought, wincing at the word, unable to avoid it.
He dried off and stepped into the bedroom to find it empty. "Bruce?" Voices from the other room; the television was on. "Bruce?"
The living room was empty too. The television was still blaring: news of a random school shooting. Tear-streaked children's faces. Smears of blood on the pavement.
The remote was in fragments on the ground in front of the television. Clark was alone in the apartment.
: : :
Clark finally tracked down Bruce at a local CelestialDollars, yelling at the cashier because she hadn't gotten his order right. Bruce was leaning over the counter, his fists balled in front of him, eyes wild as the cashier cowered away from him. "Bruce, Bruce," Clark said soothingly, cautiously. "You're not really mad at her, she's not what you're mad at. Please. Come back home. No more television."
Bruce caught at his arm like a drowning man. "No one gets it right, Clark! It's important to get things right!"
"I know. I know." Clark pulled Bruce into an embrace, trying not to be embarrassed in front of the gawking customers. Bruce was stiff with fury, but after a moment he slumped against Clark and let himself be led back to the apartment.
"I'm sorry. I'm so sorry," he muttered as Clark closed the door behind them. He scrubbed a hand across his face. "The news. I couldn't stay here and watch those kids cry. I had to--to get out--to do something--and there's nothing I can do--"
Clark pulled him down onto the couch. "It's all right. Just stay here with me. I know it's not enough. But it's something."
Bruce buried his face in Clark's neck. "Nothing's enough. Not for me, not like this. But this is...a lot, Clark." His hands were gentle and urgent. "It's more than you can know."
Clark felt his body arcing into the touch. No fear here, only comfort. "You're more than you know," he said before they moved beyond speech entirely again.
: : :
The days passed for Bruce in a kind of daze, a welter of slowly building fury. When he was with Clark, when they were curled up in their warm nest of blankets, the bleak rage would back off just enough that he could cling to sanity. But Clark couldn't always be there, and when Bruce ventured outside, alone or beside Clark, his nerves felt scraped and raw beyond bearing, ready to break at the slightest provocation. The sight of a homeless man on the street was enough to leave him pounding his fists in futile protest against a brick wall, feeling the knuckles tearing, unable to stop the hammering of his heart and the clenching of his body.
Later, Clark kissed each abraded knuckle tenderly, his eyes sad. "Too much passion," he whispered into the gaps between Bruce's fingers. "It's killing you, love."
Bruce felt perhaps he should protest the endearment, but it seemed more important to get Clark out of his clothes as quickly as possible.
: : :
The night Bruce convinced Clark to take the active role in sex was a triumph for him: his body tensionless and compliant, letting Clark take pleasure from him, feeling no need to demand or to require, floating enraptured in a sort of peace.
He was watching Clark sleep, after, when he noticed a flicker at the window. He looked over to see Superman hovering outside the window, his uniform changed to the stark and streamlined black of his Kryptonian garb, his eyes bright and calm.
Bruce lifted himself carefully from the bed and went to the window. "What are you doing here?" he asked the Kryptonian quietly.
The wind lifted Superman's hair slightly. He held out a hand. "I came to ask you to go with me."
"To go--what?"
Superman's face was both serene and oddly intense. "I want you too, Bruce. Did you think it was only him?" His mouth lifted slightly at the corner, an arrogant smile, yet not cruel. "Come with me."
Bruce stared. Superman--the pure Kryptonian, the super-ego personified--was everything he craved: controlled power, restraint, calm and perfect. Bruce felt a faint surprise that he wasn't angry at the being's presumption; apparently it wasn't in him to be angry at either Clark or Superman. Interesting.
"Don't you have Batman?"
No answer beyond a flicker of repulsion on the elegant face. Behind him, Bruce heard Clark shift in bed, heard him snore slightly.
Superman waited, his hand outstretched.
It seemed extremely unlikely Superman ever snored.
Bruce backed away from the window a mere fraction and saw resignation flash through those unearthly blue eyes. "Please don't be offended--"
"Never," murmured the Kryptonian.
"--but Clark needs me. And...and I need him. I'm sorry."
Superman's expression didn't alter. "I understand," he said, moving away from the window. "But Bruce," he added as Bruce started to close the window. "Understand this. I need you too. Don't ever think otherwise."
Clark rolled over and nestled against Bruce as he got back into bed. "Whazzat?" he muttered, half-asleep.
Bruce kissed his forehead. "Nothing important," he whispered.
: : :
They were carrying home Chinese takeout in a downpour, sharing an umbrella, when it all came to an end. A news marquee was screaming with video of the JLA locked in combat with some terrifying sixth-dimensional being, apparently the being that had split them to begin with. Clark ignored it steadfastly; there was nothing he and Bruce could do. Suddenly, he caught sight of a hand pulling him away, heard a guttural voice demanding money or your buddy gets it, saw Bruce explode into protective fury.
Saw him get beaten to the ground.
Slowly he realized the hands he was struggling to escape from belonged to friends: Kyle and Wally, holding him back while Eel O'Brien forced Bruce to choke on his own rage and blood. Fear was bright behind Clark's eyes--why had their friends turned on him, why, why were they hurting Bruce--when Eel swiveled and addressed someone: "We'll end up like this, mad dogs frothing on the ground, waiting to be put down. Is that what you want?"
Bruce's broken "No" tore at Clark's heart, but Eel was glaring past Clark to someone else, hidden in curtains of rain. John Jones stepped forward, staring at the form of Bruce Wayne panting and shivering on the ground. Clark looked into his sad human eyes and understood: if losing Krypton had been both a grief and a release to him, surely losing the anguish of his past would have been a blessing for John. "Help him," he whispered, and John turned to stare at him. "He needs to be whole, John. Please. Help him." On the marquee behind them, scenes of devastation. The JLA was losing.
John's shoulders sagged. "I understand," he said.
Kyle and Wally stepped forward to help Bruce to his feet, but Clark elbowed them aside angrily, reaching down to put an arm around his lover.
Together, six ordinary humans started to make their way toward a fight they knew they could never win.
: : :
The battle raged around them and within them. Bruce hardly even saw Diana throwing herself at the Cathexis, barely noticed her division into a frozen statue and a formless spirit. Bruce Wayne was tangled in Batman, merged with Batman--but not Batman. They were struggling, unable to reconcile. He could sense Batman's distaste at being combined with the seething mass of emotional turmoil that was Bruce: tactics, strategy, logic and reason were tainted by grief and fury. No. Batman would remain free of this imperfection.
For his part, Bruce remembered the placid insistence of the Kryptonian: I want you too. If integrated, Clark--Superman--would want him still.
But would a Bruce integrated with Batman still want Clark?
Panic rose in Bruce as he remembered the bliss of safety, the joy of needing and having his need met and fulfilled. He didn't want to give that up. He wanted to need Clark.
Batman didn't need anyone, Batman's cool and ordered thoughts reminded him.
He felt rejection and revulsion tear through him: in a blur of desperate rage he thought, better to go mad by Clark's side than be sane forever without him!
He felt the schism cleaving him, ripping him into pieces--and through the chaos and agony, he heard Diana's voice. The Spirit of Truth rang in his heart and his soul..
Trust in yourself, my friend, my comrade. You are far greater than all of your pieces combined. You are more.
Trust in yourself and be whole.
Bruce and Batman let go of the anger, let go of the need for control. Let go of divisions, of separateness.
He was whole.
: : :
Superman was staring out of the Watchtower windows as Batman approached, staring at the inky and star-studded darkness. As Bruce watched from a distance, he put out a hand and touched the window--no, Bruce realized suddenly, he wasn't looking at the stars, he was looking at his own reflection, dark-twinned in the glass.
Batman drew closer, making enough noise to alert the Kryptonian he was near. Clark bit his lip slightly as Bruce came up beside him, half-turning to face him, his hand still resting on the glass. Their reflections were dim before the stars. "I'll understand if--if that was all," Clark said levelly. "You're whole now, you don't need me."
"I don't need you," Bruce agreed. He reached out to cover Clark's hand with his own, moving it away from the glass, putting his gloved palm against the bare one. "But I love you," he said, ignoring the shock in Clark's eyes as he had ignored the hurt at his first words. He closed his grip around Clark's hand, interlacing their fingers; after a moment Clark's fingers curled to enfold his hand in turn.
They stood there, fingers entwined, pale skin and black leather. "We fit together," said Bruce. "All the little pieces of us. We fit together."
He leaned forward and kissed Superman.
In the shining window, Clark's reflection kissed him back.
Challenge prompt: "17. All these pieces of you" --20_inkspots (Dark set-- full table here)
Which came first: Story
Pairing: Clark/Bruce
Rating: NC-17
Word Count: 4300Summary: When Clark and Bruce are sundered from their superhero identities, they find themselves needing each other more than they expected.
Continuity: The "JLA: Divided We Fall" storyline...on Earth-192 (AKA "The Earth where canon is exactly the same except Clark isn't married to Lois," because adding Lois to this story was more angst than I felt up to).
Gestalt: a configuration or pattern of elements so unified as a whole that it cannot be described merely as a sum of its parts.
Clark Kent was on his way to the Daily Planet when he heard it: "Look! Up in the sky!" His head snapped up in time to see the blur of red and blue that went by on its way to somewhere--somewhere very important, Clark assumed.
Clark continued on his way to work.
Two days ago, mysteriously, unfathomably, six members of the Justice League had somehow been...split. The Martian Manhunter, Green Lantern, Plastic Man, the Flash, Batman and Superman had been suddenly standing face to face with John Jones, Kyle Rayner, Eel O'Brian, Wally West, Bruce Wayne and Clark Kent. The heroic and the civilian identities were fissioned, and Clark Kent was now a human being--not a depowered Kryptonian, but a man with human DNA, a Kansan, a reporter. He had watched Superman step away from him, leaving him feeling...ordinary.
Clark Kent, he had quickly discovered, was not a good typist, had a tendency to get indigestion after eating spicy food, and was afraid of heights. He had sat at his kitchen table the first night staring blankly at the wall, trying to remember even a scrap of Kryptonian. He knew "Rao" was a god, but...it meant nothing to him. A meaningless sound. Like "Krypton."
Like "Kal-El."
When he realized he couldn't picture Jor-El and Lara's faces, that he couldn't remember what the Fortress of Solitude looked like, he had started to shake, the coffee in his mug spilling over onto his hands. "Ouch," he had whispered, touching the scalded skin, unsure if what he was feeling was joy or terror. "Ouch."
Today, when he saw the man walking into the Planet near the end of the work day, he felt the same feeling grip him. There were gaps and holes in who he was now, but Bruce Wayne was not one of them.
"Bruce," he said cautiously as the other man approached his desk.
Bruce nodded, staring at him. He was impeccably dressed, elegant and handsome as always. He looked exactly like the Bruce that Clark had memories of.
Except the eyes.
"I was wondering if I could talk with you," Bruce said. "In private somewhere."
Clark stared down at his desk, covered with paper. Work was so much harder now, even with so much more time to do it. "I'm really far behind," he said, irresolute.
Bruce's hands clenched abruptly; Clark could see the nails digging into the palms. Bruce's face was rigid, his jaw tense, his nostrils flared. "Please," he hissed between gritted teeth.
"I'll...I suppose I can finish up tomorrow," Clark stammered.
"Your apartment. Now. I'll drive," Bruce snapped and headed for the elevator. Clark trailed behind, worried and unsure.
The ride to the apartment was a nightmare. Bruce's knuckles were white on the steering wheel, and as the sun set, darkening the streets, his mood seemed to darken with it. When a car cut him off, Bruce began hissing a stream of vicious invective that seemed to apply to everything and anything around them--the city, the traffic, pedestrians, his own car. Clark held on for dear life, his heart pounding, as they careened through the streets.
In the apartment parking garage, Bruce squealed the car to a stop, nearly hitting the wall. "What are you staring at?" he demanded of Clark.
"You seem...angry about something," Clark noted inanely as they got out of the car.
The smile Bruce gave him was a tortured facsimile of his playboy grin. "Me? Life's great, Clark. Never been greater. I'm free, you see. I'm finally--free."
Clark pulled out his keys and headed for the elevators. "But free of what?" he asked as the doors opened.
Bruce gestured expansively, stepping into the elevator after him. "The responsibility, Clark! My days are finally my own! I owe Gotham nothing, nothing at all. Why, yesterday I just--" he choked slightly, "--just sat around reading, for fun! Agatha Christie, even!" His laugh was too loud. "Do you know how great it is to not be able to guess the ending?"
Clark let them both into the apartment. "Then why are you here?"
Bruce's fists clenched again; he didn't seem to notice. "I just wanted to talk to someone."
"What about?"
"I don't--I don't know." For a second, Bruce's face was very bleak. He went to the window and stared out over the darkened city. "You know, he isn't in Gotham much. The boys are picking up the slack, since I...can't, now." He rested a fist against the window.
Clark nodded. "He isn't...on Earth much, either. I'm not sure it matters to him a great deal anymore."
Bruce was breathing heavily. "Oh, I doubt it ever did. Why should it? Why should any of this bullshit matter to him? To either of them? It's all--" he punched the window lightly, but hard enough to make Clark jump, "--all so pointless. Nothing ever gets solved. It just goes on. And on and on, every night. Every night." His shoulders were tense, his whole body coiled with fury.
Clark stared out at the stars. "I'm sure it mattered to him. I'm sure of it."
Bruce's head snapped around from the cityscape to Clark, and Clark flinched before the glare like a blow. "You're so fucking sure. That must be nice."
"I'm not--" Clark started, but Bruce was continuing, his voice rising higher.
"It must be nice to be able to just show up to work and shuffle papers from inbox to outbox, nice to know you've got a loving happy family for you in fucking Smallville. What did you lose when you lost him? Nothing but grief and solitude, Clark!"
Bruce was shaking now, his teeth gritted in fury, eyes staring. He took a step toward Clark, raising a clenched fist slightly, and Clark fell back, feeling alarm--no, it was more than alarm, it was fear--go through him like lightning. "To hell with this," Bruce snarled. "Why did I even bother to come here? You don't give a damn either." He pivoted sharply and stalked toward the door, his every movement screaming of...annihilation. Someone else? Himself? Clark had no idea, but he knew he couldn't let Bruce leave like this.
"Don't--" he started, reaching out to grab Bruce's arm as the other man went by.
At his touch, Bruce wrenched his arm away, his teeth bared. "What the hell do you want?" His voice was like a clock wound far too tight, gears straining and screaming in agony.
"You're going to hurt yourself--" Clark broke off as Bruce stabbed a finger at his chest.
"What do you care? You paper-shuffling mouse."
Superman always seemed to keep his cool when insulted; Clark was surprised to feel himself go tense and hot as words came tumbling out unplanned. "Mouse? You come storming into my workplace, disrupting my day, dragging me at breakneck speeds back here to whine about your empty life? As if it's my problem you're a pathetic shell of a man? Well, you can--"
He had half-expected it, had accepted the risk when he decided to keep Bruce here at any cost, but he still wasn't prepared for the wild swing that glanced off his cheekbone. Snarling, Bruce tripped over his own feet on the follow-through and stumbled heavily into Clark, his shoulder colliding with Clark's chest, knocking the wind out of him and sending them both tumbling to the floor. Clark grappled ineffectually with a maelstrom of inept and inaccurate punches, trying to pin the infuriated man to the floor. His forehead connected with Bruce's nose and Bruce made a sharp sound of pain, struggling against Clark's grip. Clark tasted blood and held on for dear life until he realized, slowly, that the curses Bruce was snarling no longer seemed to be directed at him. The other man was shaking, not struggling, his body wracked with sobs instead of anger.
Clark started to ease his grip cautiously, but Bruce grabbed his shoulders and rocked against him in agony, so Clark wrapped his arms around the man again and held him, listening to him swallow pain and fury. "God--God--" Bruce gasped against his shirt, "--I can't bear it, I can't, I'm so angry all the time, I want to kill someone or die, I don't care which. I'm just--" He shuddered, choking, "I'm just pieces of a person, and all the worthless pieces, all the little dirty pieces that mean nothing--"
"--No." Clark cut off the flow of words, pulling away from Bruce enough to look him straight in the eye. "That's not true, Bruce. You're--" He shook the other man slightly, gripping his shoulders, "--You're all the passion and the pride and desire, all the bright pieces, the ones that cut and focus light--" He didn't know exactly what he was saying, but Bruce was listening to him. And not trying to hit him. "You're all the essential things, I know it. You're the heart of it, the heart and soul, that anger and passion and burning." There was something in Bruce's eyes like the moment before he had swung at Clark, like and yet not like. "You're all the pieces that love--"
Bruce lunged at Clark again, knocking him to the floor. Clark struggled under the assault until he realized that the grappling was very different this time around. His brain eventually caught up with his body--which was already aroused and demanding and thrusting against Bruce's pinning hips--and he groaned and pulled Bruce closer, hearing cloth ripping and buttons popping, feeling Bruce's teeth close on his shoulder in an agony of pleasure.
They didn't make it to the bed.
As a matter of fact, they didn't make it to getting undressed. Bruce ripped his shirt off, clumsy and demanding, teeth and hands on him, raging with need now. Clark managed to get Bruce's belt undone, get a shaking, desperate hand around the man's erection--and Bruce threw back his head and shouted something incoherent, bucking against Clark's hand, his own hands slamming against the floor in a rictus of climax.
Clark lay on floor, still trying to catch his breath, his body still aching and wanting--and then Bruce was unzipping his fly, bending his dark head to lick and suck greedily. Clark remembered sharp teeth in his skin and braced himself, but Bruce's mouth was gentle, terribly gentle, soothing any fear, caressing, until Clark tipped over the edge as easily and sweetly as falling into sleep. Falling into safety.
They lay tangled together on the floor, Bruce's head pillowed on Clark's thigh, Clark running his hands through Bruce's hair silently. Something had broken there, somehow, Clark thought, broken for better or worse.
Bruce muttered something against his leg and Clark tugged lightly at his hair. "Come up here and say that to my face."
Bruce shifted upward, resting his head on Clark's chest. "I said, you can function better because there's so much more of you in Clark."
Clark held Bruce against him and stared at the ceiling. "I don't know. Maybe I can function better because there's so much less of me."
"Don't be stupid," Bruce said, but his voice held no anger.
Clark sighed. "I'm afraid," he said.
"Of what?"
Clark laughed slightly. "You name it. Afraid of heights. Afraid of traffic. Afraid of paper cuts--paper! Paper is treacherous, Bruce, don't let anyone tell you otherwise." He drew a long, careful breath, feeling Bruce's weight on him, solid and warm. "I'm afraid of getting hurt, I suppose."
Bruce's fingers traced the bite mark on his shoulder, the rising pattern of blood like roses under his skin. "I'm sorry."
"I don't mean that kind of hurt," Clark said, pulling him close again.
: : :
"No. No. No." Bruce's eyes were closed. He shook his head from side to side as if he were in pain, his face banded in the moonlight from the blinds. "I can't do it."
They had managed to get from the floor up to the bed between long, desperate, gasping kisses. They had roused each other to frenzy once again--and then they had hit the wall.
"You don't want to," Clark said, feeling oddly bereft.
The sheets bunched in Bruce's hands and he shuddered. "Jesus, Clark. You think I don't want to fuck you? But I can't--can't trust myself. I--" he held his hands out in front of him; they were shaking. "I've got no control, Clark. I'll hurt you, I know I will. I'll get started and won't listen to you and I'll just--just--take and--" Clark reached out and tried to uncurl his clenched fists, but Bruce pulled away. "It's so easy to hurt a person, Clark," he whispered, his eyes tightly shut. "People think Batman has the power to hurt, but any fool can hurt. The power to choose when to hurt, and when not to...that's real power. Power I don't have anymore. I want you so badly, I can't trust myself."
Clark kissed his closed eyes, stroked his hair until the shuddering subsided a little. He traced his hands down Bruce's chest, trailing over unmarred skin. Batman had all the scars now, he had left Bruce nothing. No evidence of his work, his struggle, his suffering. Nothing but the pain. "You can do this, Bruce. I know you can. You'll stop if you hurt me. I know you will." He took Bruce's face in his hands, waited until the pain-fogged eyes focused on him again. "I trust you."
"You can't trust...a piece of a person."
"But I do." He was smiling, he couldn't seem to help it despite it being a totally inappropriate reaction. "We're two pieces, Bruce. We fit together." He pressed against Bruce, letting the other man feel his arousal. "We fit together," he repeated, feeling Bruce responding.
It didn't go terribly well the first time; they were both clumsy and nervous and it did hurt a little. When Clark gasped Bruce stopped dead, shuddering with the urge to move deeper, his face locked into a mask of mixed lust and dread. "Keep going, it's okay," Clark had managed, biting at his lip as the sensations threatened to tip back over into pain, threatened to tip...and then didn't. "It's okay," he whispered in surprise. "Bruce, it's really okay," he repeated, and Bruce pushed forward with a sound that seemed torn from him, pushed again--and collapsed onto Clark with a shocked, abrupt gasp.
Bruce disentangled himself and slid down beside Clark, breathing heavily. "I--I stopped. When you..." Bruce mumbled.
"Yes. Thank you," Clark said softly, holding his hand, feeling the muscles relaxing slowly. There were half-moons bitten into the palms; Clark kissed each of them.
"You didn't finish..." Bruce said.
"That's okay," Clark said. "I didn't really expect, the first time...I was impressed I managed it at all, considering." He curled up behind Bruce, spooning against the other man. "It'll be better next time," he murmured into Bruce's hair.
It was much better the next time.
: : :
The next morning, Clark called in sick to work, ignoring Perry's bluster. He was delightfully sore in a host of different places and he needed a chance to relax with Bruce and figure out what was going on. Bruce was still asleep as he went to take his shower, enjoying the hot water on various bruises, soaking his aching muscles. He remembered the terror and fury in Bruce's eyes the night before, the way the other man had sobbed in his arms. They were both just fragments of men, but maybe they could make something work. Maybe what they felt for each other could be enough to give them a safe place, a shelter.
Maybe love would be enough, he thought, wincing at the word, unable to avoid it.
He dried off and stepped into the bedroom to find it empty. "Bruce?" Voices from the other room; the television was on. "Bruce?"
The living room was empty too. The television was still blaring: news of a random school shooting. Tear-streaked children's faces. Smears of blood on the pavement.
The remote was in fragments on the ground in front of the television. Clark was alone in the apartment.
: : :
Clark finally tracked down Bruce at a local CelestialDollars, yelling at the cashier because she hadn't gotten his order right. Bruce was leaning over the counter, his fists balled in front of him, eyes wild as the cashier cowered away from him. "Bruce, Bruce," Clark said soothingly, cautiously. "You're not really mad at her, she's not what you're mad at. Please. Come back home. No more television."
Bruce caught at his arm like a drowning man. "No one gets it right, Clark! It's important to get things right!"
"I know. I know." Clark pulled Bruce into an embrace, trying not to be embarrassed in front of the gawking customers. Bruce was stiff with fury, but after a moment he slumped against Clark and let himself be led back to the apartment.
"I'm sorry. I'm so sorry," he muttered as Clark closed the door behind them. He scrubbed a hand across his face. "The news. I couldn't stay here and watch those kids cry. I had to--to get out--to do something--and there's nothing I can do--"
Clark pulled him down onto the couch. "It's all right. Just stay here with me. I know it's not enough. But it's something."
Bruce buried his face in Clark's neck. "Nothing's enough. Not for me, not like this. But this is...a lot, Clark." His hands were gentle and urgent. "It's more than you can know."
Clark felt his body arcing into the touch. No fear here, only comfort. "You're more than you know," he said before they moved beyond speech entirely again.
: : :
The days passed for Bruce in a kind of daze, a welter of slowly building fury. When he was with Clark, when they were curled up in their warm nest of blankets, the bleak rage would back off just enough that he could cling to sanity. But Clark couldn't always be there, and when Bruce ventured outside, alone or beside Clark, his nerves felt scraped and raw beyond bearing, ready to break at the slightest provocation. The sight of a homeless man on the street was enough to leave him pounding his fists in futile protest against a brick wall, feeling the knuckles tearing, unable to stop the hammering of his heart and the clenching of his body.
Later, Clark kissed each abraded knuckle tenderly, his eyes sad. "Too much passion," he whispered into the gaps between Bruce's fingers. "It's killing you, love."
Bruce felt perhaps he should protest the endearment, but it seemed more important to get Clark out of his clothes as quickly as possible.
: : :
The night Bruce convinced Clark to take the active role in sex was a triumph for him: his body tensionless and compliant, letting Clark take pleasure from him, feeling no need to demand or to require, floating enraptured in a sort of peace.
He was watching Clark sleep, after, when he noticed a flicker at the window. He looked over to see Superman hovering outside the window, his uniform changed to the stark and streamlined black of his Kryptonian garb, his eyes bright and calm.
Bruce lifted himself carefully from the bed and went to the window. "What are you doing here?" he asked the Kryptonian quietly.
The wind lifted Superman's hair slightly. He held out a hand. "I came to ask you to go with me."
"To go--what?"
Superman's face was both serene and oddly intense. "I want you too, Bruce. Did you think it was only him?" His mouth lifted slightly at the corner, an arrogant smile, yet not cruel. "Come with me."
Bruce stared. Superman--the pure Kryptonian, the super-ego personified--was everything he craved: controlled power, restraint, calm and perfect. Bruce felt a faint surprise that he wasn't angry at the being's presumption; apparently it wasn't in him to be angry at either Clark or Superman. Interesting.
"Don't you have Batman?"
No answer beyond a flicker of repulsion on the elegant face. Behind him, Bruce heard Clark shift in bed, heard him snore slightly.
Superman waited, his hand outstretched.
It seemed extremely unlikely Superman ever snored.
Bruce backed away from the window a mere fraction and saw resignation flash through those unearthly blue eyes. "Please don't be offended--"
"Never," murmured the Kryptonian.
"--but Clark needs me. And...and I need him. I'm sorry."
Superman's expression didn't alter. "I understand," he said, moving away from the window. "But Bruce," he added as Bruce started to close the window. "Understand this. I need you too. Don't ever think otherwise."
Clark rolled over and nestled against Bruce as he got back into bed. "Whazzat?" he muttered, half-asleep.
Bruce kissed his forehead. "Nothing important," he whispered.
: : :
They were carrying home Chinese takeout in a downpour, sharing an umbrella, when it all came to an end. A news marquee was screaming with video of the JLA locked in combat with some terrifying sixth-dimensional being, apparently the being that had split them to begin with. Clark ignored it steadfastly; there was nothing he and Bruce could do. Suddenly, he caught sight of a hand pulling him away, heard a guttural voice demanding money or your buddy gets it, saw Bruce explode into protective fury.
Saw him get beaten to the ground.
Slowly he realized the hands he was struggling to escape from belonged to friends: Kyle and Wally, holding him back while Eel O'Brien forced Bruce to choke on his own rage and blood. Fear was bright behind Clark's eyes--why had their friends turned on him, why, why were they hurting Bruce--when Eel swiveled and addressed someone: "We'll end up like this, mad dogs frothing on the ground, waiting to be put down. Is that what you want?"
Bruce's broken "No" tore at Clark's heart, but Eel was glaring past Clark to someone else, hidden in curtains of rain. John Jones stepped forward, staring at the form of Bruce Wayne panting and shivering on the ground. Clark looked into his sad human eyes and understood: if losing Krypton had been both a grief and a release to him, surely losing the anguish of his past would have been a blessing for John. "Help him," he whispered, and John turned to stare at him. "He needs to be whole, John. Please. Help him." On the marquee behind them, scenes of devastation. The JLA was losing.
John's shoulders sagged. "I understand," he said.
Kyle and Wally stepped forward to help Bruce to his feet, but Clark elbowed them aside angrily, reaching down to put an arm around his lover.
Together, six ordinary humans started to make their way toward a fight they knew they could never win.
: : :
The battle raged around them and within them. Bruce hardly even saw Diana throwing herself at the Cathexis, barely noticed her division into a frozen statue and a formless spirit. Bruce Wayne was tangled in Batman, merged with Batman--but not Batman. They were struggling, unable to reconcile. He could sense Batman's distaste at being combined with the seething mass of emotional turmoil that was Bruce: tactics, strategy, logic and reason were tainted by grief and fury. No. Batman would remain free of this imperfection.
For his part, Bruce remembered the placid insistence of the Kryptonian: I want you too. If integrated, Clark--Superman--would want him still.
But would a Bruce integrated with Batman still want Clark?
Panic rose in Bruce as he remembered the bliss of safety, the joy of needing and having his need met and fulfilled. He didn't want to give that up. He wanted to need Clark.
Batman didn't need anyone, Batman's cool and ordered thoughts reminded him.
He felt rejection and revulsion tear through him: in a blur of desperate rage he thought, better to go mad by Clark's side than be sane forever without him!
He felt the schism cleaving him, ripping him into pieces--and through the chaos and agony, he heard Diana's voice. The Spirit of Truth rang in his heart and his soul..
Trust in yourself, my friend, my comrade. You are far greater than all of your pieces combined. You are more.
Trust in yourself and be whole.
Bruce and Batman let go of the anger, let go of the need for control. Let go of divisions, of separateness.
He was whole.
: : :
Superman was staring out of the Watchtower windows as Batman approached, staring at the inky and star-studded darkness. As Bruce watched from a distance, he put out a hand and touched the window--no, Bruce realized suddenly, he wasn't looking at the stars, he was looking at his own reflection, dark-twinned in the glass.
Batman drew closer, making enough noise to alert the Kryptonian he was near. Clark bit his lip slightly as Bruce came up beside him, half-turning to face him, his hand still resting on the glass. Their reflections were dim before the stars. "I'll understand if--if that was all," Clark said levelly. "You're whole now, you don't need me."
"I don't need you," Bruce agreed. He reached out to cover Clark's hand with his own, moving it away from the glass, putting his gloved palm against the bare one. "But I love you," he said, ignoring the shock in Clark's eyes as he had ignored the hurt at his first words. He closed his grip around Clark's hand, interlacing their fingers; after a moment Clark's fingers curled to enfold his hand in turn.
They stood there, fingers entwined, pale skin and black leather. "We fit together," said Bruce. "All the little pieces of us. We fit together."
He leaned forward and kissed Superman.
In the shining window, Clark's reflection kissed him back.