Gardens of Wayne Manor: Battle (40/42)
Title: Chapter Forty: Battle
Pairing/Characters: Clark/Bruce, Bruno Mannheim, Lois Lane
Rating: PG
Warnings: None necessary
Continuity: The Gardens of Wayne Manor is an AU series in which Clark Kent and Bruce Wayne's lives intertwine at an early age. Click here for the complete series and series notes.
Word Count: 1600Summary: Open warfare breaks out between Roman Sionis and Bruno Mannheim for control of Intergang. When their rival armies meet halfway between Gotham and Metropolis, someone is there to stop them.
"Superman! Whoever you are! Red and Blue Guy! Superman! I knew it! He's here, and he'll stop you!"
Lois Lane's voice reached him over the vicious drone of engines, and Clark pivoted to locate the source.
Of course, there she was--grasped in the iron claw of the largest of three or four dozen silvery-purple mecha looming in the skies above Metropolis. As Clark gaped, her fists drummed on the visor that protected Bruno Mannheim's face. "Put me down, you big bully!"
Mannheim's booming laugh was magnified across the city as he gazed at the small bright figure standing in the air, confronting his troops. "'Superman,' eh? That's the dumbest name I ever heard. Oh well. Come to battle me for the right to control Metropolis...in your nifty pajamas?"
Clark--Superman--crossed his arms, feeling his cape snapping around him. "Metropolis controls her own destiny, Mannheim. Not me, and certainly not some tin-plated tyrant like you."
"Oh," Mannheim sneered, "You're some kind of Dudley Do-Right, I see. The colors suit you, then." With his free hand, he gestured to his men. "Okay, boys. Let's give the suits a little practice before meeting Sionis."
Five of the mecha released a barrage of missiles at him while another five broke off to close with him directly.
Superman deflected the missiles upward into space a moment before his first opponent reached him. An armored fist slammed into his solar plexus and he grunted in surprise as pain twisted his muscles, a familiar sense of wrongness making his head swim. That strange metal...
He jabbed a punch at one mecha while kicking another, keeping his blows controlled to avoid critically injuring the people in the suits. A visor shattered under his fist and there was a burst of static. Without pausing, Superman cracked together two of the other mecha and watched them careen out to sea, their pilots ejecting at the last second. Ignoring the wrenching pain from the roundhouse punches being aimed at him, he fought on.
"Miss Lane," he heard Mannheim say over the sound of shrieking metal. "You are becoming more of an annoyance than you are worth." Superman dodged another blow and looked over to see Lois attempting to jimmy open Mannheim's visor with her car keys. With a contemptuous flick of his wrist, Mannheim hurled her away from him, her gasp snatched away by the wind.
Superman broke away from the mecha attempting to grapple with him and swooped after her, picking her falling body out of the air as gently as possible. Her eyes opened in bewilderment as she realized she wasn't falling any more, then fixed on his in shock.
"It's a pleasure to finally make your acquaintance, Ms Lane," Superman said, smiling.
"What are you doing?" she cried.
"Um, trying to save you?" He felt a brief spark of worry that she had recognized him as her hapless co-worker, but there was no recognition in her eyes.
"How are you doing this?" she said, looking around wildly.
"It's a little complicated," he said wryly, but she was already looking behind him, her eyes wide.
"Okay, okay, you can explain later--but you have to go get Mannheim!"
Superman landed on top of the Daily Planet, letting her slide out of his arms. Looking up, he could see that Mannheim's little army was well to the south now, heading toward Gotham.
"I still get an interview later!" Lois yelled after him as he leaped back into the air. "I'm taking that as a promise!"
: : :
Batman looked up to see the skies of Gotham dark with powersuited figures--there had to be at least a hundred. He shot another grapple and swung between two buildings, releasing a new grapple just in time to break his fall and start a new parabola. The pain in his arm was a dull ache, dimmed by adrenaline. The memory of Alfred's face when he woke Bruce with the news of Sionis's action--tense, drawn, concerned but resigned--hurt him more.
His thoughts turned to Clark, turned away by Alfred, waiting in the bungalow. For a brief instant, he wondered why there was no sadness at missing him yet again. They were so close but so far, it should have been agonizing to realize he had slept through Clark's visit. And yet... Somehow he felt like everything was happening as it should. Something was going to happen. Something as mundane as waking up, something as momentous as a sky filled with flying mecha.
Something right.
Batman swung upward, angling around a skyscraper until he was almost level with the fleet flying through Gotham. Reaching into his belt, he pulled out a tab of plastic explosive. At the height of his next arc, he released the grapple and landed briefly on one of the gleaming black mecha. He heard the dull whump as he pushed off, wind roaring in his ears, the grapple line singing, and the mecha sagged in the air, spiraling slowly toward the ground as smoke gusted from a shoulder joint.
Chaos broke out in the fleet, and there was a sharp whine of projectiles nearby as Batman faded into the early-morning shadows once more. Using rooftop heating vents to mask himself to infrared, Batman circled the army and struck again on the east side, sending another of Sionis's men to the ground.
But there were too many, and his guerrilla strikes were barely making a dent in the vast numbers. The mecha broke off their pursuit of him, wheeling in perfect unison to head north, toward Metropolis.
Batman swung after them through the increasingly lower buildings that filled the urban sprawl between the two great cities. He wasn't attacking them any more, he was watching their movements, keeping an eye on the way they moved together.
His eyes were narrowed thoughtfully as he slipped north through the meagre morning shadows, stalking the fleet.
: : :
Flying south, Superman caught up with Mannheim in a few moments. He darted between the bulky mecha, striking at the leader of the squad, but Mannheim gestured and two of his men swiveled to strike at Superman.
Superman dodged, his very flesh flinching unconsciously from the touch of that corrupt metal, and a missile hit him in the small of the back. It only knocked him down a few yards, but the acrid smoke filled his eyes and made them water, opening himself up to another hammerblow from a mecha. He fought back, grappling one more out of the sky, a barrage of punches disabling its controls and sending it crashing into a parking lot, but Mannheim continued inexorably south to where a massive fleet of Sionis's black mecha were waiting, hanging in the air.
The Gotham army was much larger than Mannheim's select group, but their machines were cruder, less deadly, so the battle was much more even than it seemed. Superman quickly became only a small part of the overall chaos as the two forces clashed in a maelstrom of violence. He smashed one of Sionis's machines to the ground and disabled another with a burst of heat vision, but there were too many to stop easily. He had to get to the source.
Looking for his enemy, Superman spotted Mannheim's suit in the air near the Highville library's distinctive faux-medieval ramparts. Another missile streaked by him, shattering a window, and Superman coiled himself to confront Mannheim. But as he launched himself at the boss, he heard a shrill, terrified cry imploring someone to run!
Below him, a woman looked back in horror at a boy in a red sweater, her hand outstretched as if to vainly grasp his across the distance between them. He had pitched forward onto the broken pavement and was now looking up, his eyes wide in something like wonder, as the shattered windows fell in a cascade straight at him.
Superman broke off his attack on Mannheim and shot downward.
: : :
As the two armies met with a shrieking of metal and shattering of glass, Batman nodded grimly to himself. He had enough data now, it was just a matter of getting back to Gotham and stopping this madness.
He swooped through the chaos, catching a grapple on the battlements of the Highville library, releasing another to return to Gotham--
A shriek rang out over the squeals of stressed metal. Batman looked down, took in the scene in an instant: the horrified mother, the endangered child.
With one smooth motion he reversed his direction, skimming low, his cape flung wide on the wind.
: : :
Putting his back to the boy and facing the hail of glass, Superman let the glittering shards shatter on his chest and face, throwing his arms out to shield the child.
As the last fragments and dust sifted to the ground, he turned his head to reassure the boy.
: : :
Spreading his cape wide, Batman swooped in to shelter the boy beneath its folds, wrapping his arms protectively around the small frame. The child's wide blue eyes stared up at him as he braced himself for the impact: the light nomex would deflect the worst of it, but it would still...
Would still...
No blow fell.
Puzzled, Batman cautiously turned around.
: : :
The din of battle, the shiver of shattering glass, the shouts and cries of terror: all fell away and froze into silence as their eyes, for the first time in four long years, met.
( Chapter 41)
Pairing/Characters: Clark/Bruce, Bruno Mannheim, Lois Lane
Rating: PG
Warnings: None necessary
Continuity: The Gardens of Wayne Manor is an AU series in which Clark Kent and Bruce Wayne's lives intertwine at an early age. Click here for the complete series and series notes.
Word Count: 1600Summary: Open warfare breaks out between Roman Sionis and Bruno Mannheim for control of Intergang. When their rival armies meet halfway between Gotham and Metropolis, someone is there to stop them.
"Superman! Whoever you are! Red and Blue Guy! Superman! I knew it! He's here, and he'll stop you!"
Lois Lane's voice reached him over the vicious drone of engines, and Clark pivoted to locate the source.
Of course, there she was--grasped in the iron claw of the largest of three or four dozen silvery-purple mecha looming in the skies above Metropolis. As Clark gaped, her fists drummed on the visor that protected Bruno Mannheim's face. "Put me down, you big bully!"
Mannheim's booming laugh was magnified across the city as he gazed at the small bright figure standing in the air, confronting his troops. "'Superman,' eh? That's the dumbest name I ever heard. Oh well. Come to battle me for the right to control Metropolis...in your nifty pajamas?"
Clark--Superman--crossed his arms, feeling his cape snapping around him. "Metropolis controls her own destiny, Mannheim. Not me, and certainly not some tin-plated tyrant like you."
"Oh," Mannheim sneered, "You're some kind of Dudley Do-Right, I see. The colors suit you, then." With his free hand, he gestured to his men. "Okay, boys. Let's give the suits a little practice before meeting Sionis."
Five of the mecha released a barrage of missiles at him while another five broke off to close with him directly.
Superman deflected the missiles upward into space a moment before his first opponent reached him. An armored fist slammed into his solar plexus and he grunted in surprise as pain twisted his muscles, a familiar sense of wrongness making his head swim. That strange metal...
He jabbed a punch at one mecha while kicking another, keeping his blows controlled to avoid critically injuring the people in the suits. A visor shattered under his fist and there was a burst of static. Without pausing, Superman cracked together two of the other mecha and watched them careen out to sea, their pilots ejecting at the last second. Ignoring the wrenching pain from the roundhouse punches being aimed at him, he fought on.
"Miss Lane," he heard Mannheim say over the sound of shrieking metal. "You are becoming more of an annoyance than you are worth." Superman dodged another blow and looked over to see Lois attempting to jimmy open Mannheim's visor with her car keys. With a contemptuous flick of his wrist, Mannheim hurled her away from him, her gasp snatched away by the wind.
Superman broke away from the mecha attempting to grapple with him and swooped after her, picking her falling body out of the air as gently as possible. Her eyes opened in bewilderment as she realized she wasn't falling any more, then fixed on his in shock.
"It's a pleasure to finally make your acquaintance, Ms Lane," Superman said, smiling.
"What are you doing?" she cried.
"Um, trying to save you?" He felt a brief spark of worry that she had recognized him as her hapless co-worker, but there was no recognition in her eyes.
"How are you doing this?" she said, looking around wildly.
"It's a little complicated," he said wryly, but she was already looking behind him, her eyes wide.
"Okay, okay, you can explain later--but you have to go get Mannheim!"
Superman landed on top of the Daily Planet, letting her slide out of his arms. Looking up, he could see that Mannheim's little army was well to the south now, heading toward Gotham.
"I still get an interview later!" Lois yelled after him as he leaped back into the air. "I'm taking that as a promise!"
: : :
Batman looked up to see the skies of Gotham dark with powersuited figures--there had to be at least a hundred. He shot another grapple and swung between two buildings, releasing a new grapple just in time to break his fall and start a new parabola. The pain in his arm was a dull ache, dimmed by adrenaline. The memory of Alfred's face when he woke Bruce with the news of Sionis's action--tense, drawn, concerned but resigned--hurt him more.
His thoughts turned to Clark, turned away by Alfred, waiting in the bungalow. For a brief instant, he wondered why there was no sadness at missing him yet again. They were so close but so far, it should have been agonizing to realize he had slept through Clark's visit. And yet... Somehow he felt like everything was happening as it should. Something was going to happen. Something as mundane as waking up, something as momentous as a sky filled with flying mecha.
Something right.
Batman swung upward, angling around a skyscraper until he was almost level with the fleet flying through Gotham. Reaching into his belt, he pulled out a tab of plastic explosive. At the height of his next arc, he released the grapple and landed briefly on one of the gleaming black mecha. He heard the dull whump as he pushed off, wind roaring in his ears, the grapple line singing, and the mecha sagged in the air, spiraling slowly toward the ground as smoke gusted from a shoulder joint.
Chaos broke out in the fleet, and there was a sharp whine of projectiles nearby as Batman faded into the early-morning shadows once more. Using rooftop heating vents to mask himself to infrared, Batman circled the army and struck again on the east side, sending another of Sionis's men to the ground.
But there were too many, and his guerrilla strikes were barely making a dent in the vast numbers. The mecha broke off their pursuit of him, wheeling in perfect unison to head north, toward Metropolis.
Batman swung after them through the increasingly lower buildings that filled the urban sprawl between the two great cities. He wasn't attacking them any more, he was watching their movements, keeping an eye on the way they moved together.
His eyes were narrowed thoughtfully as he slipped north through the meagre morning shadows, stalking the fleet.
: : :
Flying south, Superman caught up with Mannheim in a few moments. He darted between the bulky mecha, striking at the leader of the squad, but Mannheim gestured and two of his men swiveled to strike at Superman.
Superman dodged, his very flesh flinching unconsciously from the touch of that corrupt metal, and a missile hit him in the small of the back. It only knocked him down a few yards, but the acrid smoke filled his eyes and made them water, opening himself up to another hammerblow from a mecha. He fought back, grappling one more out of the sky, a barrage of punches disabling its controls and sending it crashing into a parking lot, but Mannheim continued inexorably south to where a massive fleet of Sionis's black mecha were waiting, hanging in the air.
The Gotham army was much larger than Mannheim's select group, but their machines were cruder, less deadly, so the battle was much more even than it seemed. Superman quickly became only a small part of the overall chaos as the two forces clashed in a maelstrom of violence. He smashed one of Sionis's machines to the ground and disabled another with a burst of heat vision, but there were too many to stop easily. He had to get to the source.
Looking for his enemy, Superman spotted Mannheim's suit in the air near the Highville library's distinctive faux-medieval ramparts. Another missile streaked by him, shattering a window, and Superman coiled himself to confront Mannheim. But as he launched himself at the boss, he heard a shrill, terrified cry imploring someone to run!
Below him, a woman looked back in horror at a boy in a red sweater, her hand outstretched as if to vainly grasp his across the distance between them. He had pitched forward onto the broken pavement and was now looking up, his eyes wide in something like wonder, as the shattered windows fell in a cascade straight at him.
Superman broke off his attack on Mannheim and shot downward.
: : :
As the two armies met with a shrieking of metal and shattering of glass, Batman nodded grimly to himself. He had enough data now, it was just a matter of getting back to Gotham and stopping this madness.
He swooped through the chaos, catching a grapple on the battlements of the Highville library, releasing another to return to Gotham--
A shriek rang out over the squeals of stressed metal. Batman looked down, took in the scene in an instant: the horrified mother, the endangered child.
With one smooth motion he reversed his direction, skimming low, his cape flung wide on the wind.
: : :
Putting his back to the boy and facing the hail of glass, Superman let the glittering shards shatter on his chest and face, throwing his arms out to shield the child.
As the last fragments and dust sifted to the ground, he turned his head to reassure the boy.
: : :
Spreading his cape wide, Batman swooped in to shelter the boy beneath its folds, wrapping his arms protectively around the small frame. The child's wide blue eyes stared up at him as he braced himself for the impact: the light nomex would deflect the worst of it, but it would still...
Would still...
No blow fell.
Puzzled, Batman cautiously turned around.
: : :
The din of battle, the shiver of shattering glass, the shouts and cries of terror: all fell away and froze into silence as their eyes, for the first time in four long years, met.
( Chapter 41)