Action and Re-Action 6: Appeal
Title: Appeal
Pairing/Characters: Clark Kent/Bruce Wayne, Brainiac, Sam Lane, John Henry Irons, Alfred Pennyworth
Continuity: Comics, set during Action Comics #7 ( scans) and #8 ( scans)
Rating: PG
Warnings: None
Summary: Metropolis (and Bruce in it) have been miniaturized and kidnapped into space. Superman intends to reach them--even though he can't fly.
Word Count: 2800
Notes: Action and Re-Action is a series retelling the new versions of Action Comics and Justice League with a Superman/Batman angle. All chapters and notes on the series available here.
"I've always known Superman was a magnificent mountain of a man," murmured Bruce Wayne as Lois Lane glared at him, "But this is taking it a bit too far."
Superman towered over the city of Metropolis, looming into the sky like a Colossus. He reached out to touch the glass trapping the city, and people cried out in terror and supplication. Bruce tried to remind himself that it was they who were miniaturized, that Superman was normal-sized, but it was no good: from his point of view, Superman was well over a thousand majestic feet tall.
The voice of their alien kidnapper hissed and rustled through the hold, cruel and implacable, as Superman stared at the city below him, the millions of lives. Bruce tore his mind from the sight of Superman's acres of abdomen peeking out from beneath his tattered t-shirt--he had more important things to consider right now.
First: how had Superman gotten to the spaceship?
Robots lurched from the shadows to grab at Superman with pincers and tentacles. He shook them off, but it was an effort: his movements weary. He stopped to catch his breath, glaring into the recesses of the hold and waiting for another attack.
Second: how could a millimeter-high Bruce Wayne help him?
: : :
The answer to Bruce's first question took place on Earth about a half hour ago, although he wouldn't know it for a while.
"I need an oxygen tank, a harness, and some kind of ramp."
General Lane barked orders and soldiers leaped into action.
"Dr. Irons, what angle do you think is best for the ramp?" Superman asked as a flatbed truck was repurposed into action.
Irons looked appalled. "You're not thinking of jumping into space."
"I'm not thinking of it at all," Superman said, buckling the harness on. "I'm doing it."
Irons shook his head. "You need to hit twenty-four thousand miles an hour to make escape velocity. That's impossible."
"That's suicide, son," growled Lane. "You've never been clocked at more than six hundred. We can get men up there in--"
"--Not enough time," Superman cut him off. "I have to get up there now." He squinted into the sky, zooming in on the spaceship that held everyone he cared about in the world--everyone who understood him at all. Jimmy. Lois. Mrs. Nyxly.
Bruce.
"I've never needed to go that fast," he told Sam Lane's worried face. "But I need to now. I'll make it."
A stunned-looking Irons helped him set the ad hoc ramp at the best possible angle. "You're crazy," he said. "I like that." He clapped Superman on the shoulder. "Don't get yourself killed."
Clark grinned. "I have no intention of it."
Then he started to run toward the ramp.
He was calculating his approximate speed, timing the landscape rushing by, when he felt his shoes start to give way, the soles tearing off. He didn't slow down, running barefoot, picking up speed, the wind cutting his jeans like knives until he hit the ramp and went
up
and
away.
It wasn't enough, he realized as the Earth fell away beneath him, wind resistance disappearing as the air grew thin. It wasn't enough. He was slowing down, he was going to start falling soon, he wasn't going to make it. He was going to fail them all. Lose Metropolis. Lose Bruce. Desperate, he spotted a satellite and managed to get it underneath him, pushing off with all his strength, feeling a surge of exultation as finally reached the spaceship (all honeycombed octagons and snakey tentacles), found a fingerhold, and hung on with all his might.
He was looking for a place to tear an entrance, fingers scrabbling across the greasy-textured metal looking for a flaw, when the tentacles coiled around him.
A surge of blinding pain and everything went black as he felt himself being lifted into the ship.
: : :
"You are not of this world." The mechanical voice's purr was a thundering boom in the skies of bottled Metropolis. "You are valuable. Precious. You are wasted here. I will keep you safe."
Bruce whirled and ran from the hotel lobby, running for the elevators. Somehow the electricity was still running (an energy grid embedded in the floor of the bottle? he wondered, before reminding himself it didn't matter), and within moments he was out on the roof. The air was uncanny and still--not even a breath of wind.
"The people of this world hate and fear you," the voice was continuing. "They turned against you because the unknown terrifies them. Not one person there can ever truly be your equal, and you know it. I give you a choice now: save this city or save Kandor, the city of your birth world." In one of the thousands of darkened bottles, a light came on, limning delicate alien towers. In a case next to it was a snow-white suit of some supple cloth, full-size. "Live forever with people who fear and despise you, or don the indestructible armor of the Kryptonians and join them as a lord among men. Choose."
Bruce stared up at the sky, resisted the urge to yell.
"Clark," he said, quiet even in the stillness. "Clark Kent."
Superman's vast gaze snapped unerringly to where Bruce stood on the rooftop. Bruce lifted his hand in a wave and found that suddenly, he had no idea what to say. It all sounded desperately hokey: I believe in you, I trust you, what was next, would he start singing "The Wind Beneath My Wings"?
So he said nothing, just raised his hand and called Superman by his name, there in the eerie quiet under the glassed-in sky.
A smile touched Superman's bloodied lips, and he nodded, once.
Then he took off his shirt.
Bruce blinked at the sight of a gratifying amount of rippling muscles. "'Indestructible?" said Superman, turning to smash the case with the white suit in it. "Thanks for letting me know." He pulled out the pristine cloth and--oh my, he was reaching down toward his fly and--
Bruce craned his neck, but the stand Metropolis was placed on cut off any view below the waist, and he gave up with a small sigh.
As Superman pulled the suit up to his neck, it closed up seamlessly, molding to his body. Bright primary colors spread through the cloth, radiating out from the heart until he was clad in red, blue, and yellow. "I don't choose between lives," Superman announced. "I'll fight you for all of them--all of them!" His voice broke suddenly into a yell as he glared at the ceiling. "And then they'll be sent home!"
"This is their home, they have no other," clicked the metallic voice as a form like a metallic centipede uncoiled from the shadows, looming over Superman. "Their worlds are gone. Krypton is gone. Soon Earth will be gone. Join the collection or die!"
For Bruce the final battle was an exercise in agonizing helplessness. He watched as John Corben--Metal-0--threw punch after punch at Superman. "Behind you!" Bruce yelled once, seeing a tentacle looming behind Superman, and Clark whirled unerringly to sever it with a laser gaze.
When he gets us out of here-- It clearly was a question of when, not if-- I'll find some way to join him, some way to fight beside him, no matter what. A suit, something that distracts people from noticing I'm just a man, something that makes me more--
His mind was still leaping ahead, filled with fervent plans, when Superman's hand smashed into the bottle that held Metropolis and lifted out the Kryptonian rocket, now the size of a thimble in his giant hand. With a contemptuous flick, he sent the rocket speeding at the creature looming over him.
The creature howled as the rocket hit it like an indestructible bullet, and crystalline spikes bloomed from within it, shattering outward into a luminous snowflake, a snowflake that sang in an joyous alien language.
The last thing Bruce Wayne heard was Superman's weary, shaking voice telling the computer to return Metropolis. The last thing he saw was Clark bathed in golden light, the blood on his face limned with radiance, sinking to the floor as the world fell away.
: : :
"I have to make a suit."
"Thank heavens you're safe, sir," Alfred said in relief as Bruce came bursting through the door. "I saw--"
"--I have to make a suit." Bruce was already rummaging through his desk, grabbing paper and pencil.
"Certainly, sir." Alfred was nothing if not game. "Double breasted, single-breasted...?"
"Not too heavily armored, I need to be able to move. With a cape, for intimidation. And a cowl. Like this." He sketched a figure with hasty strokes. Alfred blinked at the spike-like ears on top of the cowl. It should look ridiculous, but somehow it didn't.
"Very well, sir. When would you like this suit by?"
Bruce was doodling stylized bats onto the chest. "The end of the weekend at the latest."
Alfred cast him a sidelong glance to see if he was joking. "Oh dear."
: : :
"...so he's still up there," Bruce finished. He hadn't stopped working through his entire retelling: pulling out a ream of kevlar, sizing up swathes of leather. "I assume he's doing clean-up, checking on the other bottled cities, making sure the threat is contained by his Kryptonian tech. I think he can come back when he wants to, if he got there on his own power. I need to be ready when he gets back."
"'Ready'?" Alfred looked dubious for the first time since Bruce had returned to Gotham last year with wild ideas of hunting down criminals in the night.
"Ready to help him. To fight by his side."
"You...are aware this is a man who can run fast enough to break free of the Earth's gravity? A man who can get hit by a tank and laugh? I don't mean to be harsh, Master Bruce, but wouldn't your support be more useful in a less...front-line capacity?"
Bruce shook his head. "We have to be equals on the field. I can't charge into the fray like he can, but I can do other things. I can make up for the lack of firepower with strategy, tactics." His scissors slipped and he hissed in annoyance. "I have to."
Alfred watched him for a long moment. "This is about more than putting in a good team effort, isn't it."
"Yes." Bruce bit out the word and bent back to work.
Alfred reached out for the scissors. "Allow me to cut the leather, sir. You work on modifying the boots."
Bruce shot him a grateful glance and let him take the scissors. "I just wish I could get some message to him, somehow. I don't think he has an email address up there."
Scraps of leather fell to the ground like rain as Alfred wielded the scissors. He frowned thoughtfully, then said, "I believe I might have a suggestion in that area."
: : :
Clark tripped over the Kryptonian syllables and grimaced, then tried again. This time the computer responded, chiming as if it were pleased at his progress. The lights dimmed to a comfortable level for the people of Randizullian, with their sensitive eyes, and Clark smiled to himself as he stepped out of the room.
It had taken him two days of work to go through the database and figure out what environment was best for each bottled world, to reserve rooms for cities with special needs. It was difficult to communicate with the inhabitants, but he had tried to make clear that he had their best interests in mind. Someday, he hoped, he could find new worlds for each of them.
New worlds... The sheer amount of information on the ship staggered him. He had access now to data about tens of thousands of worlds; the boy who had stared up at the mystery of the stars now had at his fingertips the proof of life strewn throughout the galaxy, even in other galaxies altogether.
He could even go there someday, travel the stars in the ship he had started to call his Fortress.
He looked out the window at the gentle blue-green curve below him, dotted with clouds, and couldn't help a wry smile. The universe was open to him in a way he'd never even dreamed of...and all he wanted to do was cherish this beautiful blue speck in the darkness, keep it safe.
The stars could wait, he supposed.
Stumbling over the unfamiliar syllables, he asked the ship to tap into the satellite transmissions from Earth and display them on the bank of monitors that lined the back wall. A cacophony of noise rattled from the speakers, and it took him a moment to remember the right words to turn down the volume. News, fashion shows, BBC documentaries, the Spice channel all jumbled together in a welter of images. After a moment, Clark said "Narrow feed to transmissions from the last forty-eight hours containing search term: Bruce Wayne."
All but four of the monitors faded to black. Three of the stories mentioned Bruce, but one actually had his face on the screen, and Clark narrowed in on that one.
"Gotham's native billionaire, Bruce Wayne, was actually in Metropolis when it was abducted, and he's here to give WGTH an exclusive interview."
Bruce was wearing an impeccable navy-blue suit with a scarlet tie, and Clark couldn't help but wonder for a moment if those colors were pre-meditated. The reporter was asking, "Given the fact that you've had some harsh words to say about Superman in the past, has your experience changed your view of him at all?"
Bruce flashed a raffish, sidelong smile at the reporter. "Well, Summer, a real man knows when to confess he was wrong. And I think it's time I admit that my criticisms of Superman may have been hasty and even ill-advised. There we were," he said dramatically, waving one hand in the direction of space, "Trapped on an alien spaceship, millimeters high, with no way to return home. But Superman came to save us--if I've heard correctly, he jumped into space to save all of us. He fought for us all--not just the people of Earth, but for the thousands of worlds that had been stolen before us. That's heroism."
"People have reported that Superman stayed up on the spaceship. Do you think he plans to return, or will he leave Earth now?"
"I have no doubt he'll return," Bruce said firmly. "He may not be genetically human, but Earth is his home. I'm sure he's cleaning up and recovering. In fact, I suspect he has technology that will enable him to monitor television channels, and in case he does, I'd like to address him directly." He looked away from the reporter and straight into the camera, his facile smile fading and his voice lowering to something low and intimate. "Superman. You leaped into the unknown to face a monstrous foe and save us all, and we can never thank you enough. I just hope..." He swallowed and looked down for an instant. "I hope that someday I'll have the chance to make a leap of faith like you did, a chance to help you like you helped all of us."
The reporter wrapped up the story and Clark turned off the channel, letting silence fall across the ship once more. He looked out at the Eastern seaboard of the United States below him, lights glimmering on as dusk slowly descended, and felt a smile tugging at his face. He was pretty sure he wouldn't be needing a playboy billionaire to charge in like the cavalry and save him anytime soon, but there was a kind of comfort to knowing Bruce was sincere under all the exaggeration.
That Bruce was down there in that spreading gleam of lights, thinking of him--it was all the support Clark would ever need.
---
( Part 7)
Pairing/Characters: Clark Kent/Bruce Wayne, Brainiac, Sam Lane, John Henry Irons, Alfred Pennyworth
Continuity: Comics, set during Action Comics #7 ( scans) and #8 ( scans)
Rating: PG
Warnings: None
Summary: Metropolis (and Bruce in it) have been miniaturized and kidnapped into space. Superman intends to reach them--even though he can't fly.
Word Count: 2800
Notes: Action and Re-Action is a series retelling the new versions of Action Comics and Justice League with a Superman/Batman angle. All chapters and notes on the series available here.
"I've always known Superman was a magnificent mountain of a man," murmured Bruce Wayne as Lois Lane glared at him, "But this is taking it a bit too far."
Superman towered over the city of Metropolis, looming into the sky like a Colossus. He reached out to touch the glass trapping the city, and people cried out in terror and supplication. Bruce tried to remind himself that it was they who were miniaturized, that Superman was normal-sized, but it was no good: from his point of view, Superman was well over a thousand majestic feet tall.
The voice of their alien kidnapper hissed and rustled through the hold, cruel and implacable, as Superman stared at the city below him, the millions of lives. Bruce tore his mind from the sight of Superman's acres of abdomen peeking out from beneath his tattered t-shirt--he had more important things to consider right now.
First: how had Superman gotten to the spaceship?
Robots lurched from the shadows to grab at Superman with pincers and tentacles. He shook them off, but it was an effort: his movements weary. He stopped to catch his breath, glaring into the recesses of the hold and waiting for another attack.
Second: how could a millimeter-high Bruce Wayne help him?
: : :
The answer to Bruce's first question took place on Earth about a half hour ago, although he wouldn't know it for a while.
"I need an oxygen tank, a harness, and some kind of ramp."
General Lane barked orders and soldiers leaped into action.
"Dr. Irons, what angle do you think is best for the ramp?" Superman asked as a flatbed truck was repurposed into action.
Irons looked appalled. "You're not thinking of jumping into space."
"I'm not thinking of it at all," Superman said, buckling the harness on. "I'm doing it."
Irons shook his head. "You need to hit twenty-four thousand miles an hour to make escape velocity. That's impossible."
"That's suicide, son," growled Lane. "You've never been clocked at more than six hundred. We can get men up there in--"
"--Not enough time," Superman cut him off. "I have to get up there now." He squinted into the sky, zooming in on the spaceship that held everyone he cared about in the world--everyone who understood him at all. Jimmy. Lois. Mrs. Nyxly.
Bruce.
"I've never needed to go that fast," he told Sam Lane's worried face. "But I need to now. I'll make it."
A stunned-looking Irons helped him set the ad hoc ramp at the best possible angle. "You're crazy," he said. "I like that." He clapped Superman on the shoulder. "Don't get yourself killed."
Clark grinned. "I have no intention of it."
Then he started to run toward the ramp.
He was calculating his approximate speed, timing the landscape rushing by, when he felt his shoes start to give way, the soles tearing off. He didn't slow down, running barefoot, picking up speed, the wind cutting his jeans like knives until he hit the ramp and went
up
and
away.
It wasn't enough, he realized as the Earth fell away beneath him, wind resistance disappearing as the air grew thin. It wasn't enough. He was slowing down, he was going to start falling soon, he wasn't going to make it. He was going to fail them all. Lose Metropolis. Lose Bruce. Desperate, he spotted a satellite and managed to get it underneath him, pushing off with all his strength, feeling a surge of exultation as finally reached the spaceship (all honeycombed octagons and snakey tentacles), found a fingerhold, and hung on with all his might.
He was looking for a place to tear an entrance, fingers scrabbling across the greasy-textured metal looking for a flaw, when the tentacles coiled around him.
A surge of blinding pain and everything went black as he felt himself being lifted into the ship.
: : :
"You are not of this world." The mechanical voice's purr was a thundering boom in the skies of bottled Metropolis. "You are valuable. Precious. You are wasted here. I will keep you safe."
Bruce whirled and ran from the hotel lobby, running for the elevators. Somehow the electricity was still running (an energy grid embedded in the floor of the bottle? he wondered, before reminding himself it didn't matter), and within moments he was out on the roof. The air was uncanny and still--not even a breath of wind.
"The people of this world hate and fear you," the voice was continuing. "They turned against you because the unknown terrifies them. Not one person there can ever truly be your equal, and you know it. I give you a choice now: save this city or save Kandor, the city of your birth world." In one of the thousands of darkened bottles, a light came on, limning delicate alien towers. In a case next to it was a snow-white suit of some supple cloth, full-size. "Live forever with people who fear and despise you, or don the indestructible armor of the Kryptonians and join them as a lord among men. Choose."
Bruce stared up at the sky, resisted the urge to yell.
"Clark," he said, quiet even in the stillness. "Clark Kent."
Superman's vast gaze snapped unerringly to where Bruce stood on the rooftop. Bruce lifted his hand in a wave and found that suddenly, he had no idea what to say. It all sounded desperately hokey: I believe in you, I trust you, what was next, would he start singing "The Wind Beneath My Wings"?
So he said nothing, just raised his hand and called Superman by his name, there in the eerie quiet under the glassed-in sky.
A smile touched Superman's bloodied lips, and he nodded, once.
Then he took off his shirt.
Bruce blinked at the sight of a gratifying amount of rippling muscles. "'Indestructible?" said Superman, turning to smash the case with the white suit in it. "Thanks for letting me know." He pulled out the pristine cloth and--oh my, he was reaching down toward his fly and--
Bruce craned his neck, but the stand Metropolis was placed on cut off any view below the waist, and he gave up with a small sigh.
As Superman pulled the suit up to his neck, it closed up seamlessly, molding to his body. Bright primary colors spread through the cloth, radiating out from the heart until he was clad in red, blue, and yellow. "I don't choose between lives," Superman announced. "I'll fight you for all of them--all of them!" His voice broke suddenly into a yell as he glared at the ceiling. "And then they'll be sent home!"
"This is their home, they have no other," clicked the metallic voice as a form like a metallic centipede uncoiled from the shadows, looming over Superman. "Their worlds are gone. Krypton is gone. Soon Earth will be gone. Join the collection or die!"
For Bruce the final battle was an exercise in agonizing helplessness. He watched as John Corben--Metal-0--threw punch after punch at Superman. "Behind you!" Bruce yelled once, seeing a tentacle looming behind Superman, and Clark whirled unerringly to sever it with a laser gaze.
When he gets us out of here-- It clearly was a question of when, not if-- I'll find some way to join him, some way to fight beside him, no matter what. A suit, something that distracts people from noticing I'm just a man, something that makes me more--
His mind was still leaping ahead, filled with fervent plans, when Superman's hand smashed into the bottle that held Metropolis and lifted out the Kryptonian rocket, now the size of a thimble in his giant hand. With a contemptuous flick, he sent the rocket speeding at the creature looming over him.
The creature howled as the rocket hit it like an indestructible bullet, and crystalline spikes bloomed from within it, shattering outward into a luminous snowflake, a snowflake that sang in an joyous alien language.
The last thing Bruce Wayne heard was Superman's weary, shaking voice telling the computer to return Metropolis. The last thing he saw was Clark bathed in golden light, the blood on his face limned with radiance, sinking to the floor as the world fell away.
: : :
"I have to make a suit."
"Thank heavens you're safe, sir," Alfred said in relief as Bruce came bursting through the door. "I saw--"
"--I have to make a suit." Bruce was already rummaging through his desk, grabbing paper and pencil.
"Certainly, sir." Alfred was nothing if not game. "Double breasted, single-breasted...?"
"Not too heavily armored, I need to be able to move. With a cape, for intimidation. And a cowl. Like this." He sketched a figure with hasty strokes. Alfred blinked at the spike-like ears on top of the cowl. It should look ridiculous, but somehow it didn't.
"Very well, sir. When would you like this suit by?"
Bruce was doodling stylized bats onto the chest. "The end of the weekend at the latest."
Alfred cast him a sidelong glance to see if he was joking. "Oh dear."
: : :
"...so he's still up there," Bruce finished. He hadn't stopped working through his entire retelling: pulling out a ream of kevlar, sizing up swathes of leather. "I assume he's doing clean-up, checking on the other bottled cities, making sure the threat is contained by his Kryptonian tech. I think he can come back when he wants to, if he got there on his own power. I need to be ready when he gets back."
"'Ready'?" Alfred looked dubious for the first time since Bruce had returned to Gotham last year with wild ideas of hunting down criminals in the night.
"Ready to help him. To fight by his side."
"You...are aware this is a man who can run fast enough to break free of the Earth's gravity? A man who can get hit by a tank and laugh? I don't mean to be harsh, Master Bruce, but wouldn't your support be more useful in a less...front-line capacity?"
Bruce shook his head. "We have to be equals on the field. I can't charge into the fray like he can, but I can do other things. I can make up for the lack of firepower with strategy, tactics." His scissors slipped and he hissed in annoyance. "I have to."
Alfred watched him for a long moment. "This is about more than putting in a good team effort, isn't it."
"Yes." Bruce bit out the word and bent back to work.
Alfred reached out for the scissors. "Allow me to cut the leather, sir. You work on modifying the boots."
Bruce shot him a grateful glance and let him take the scissors. "I just wish I could get some message to him, somehow. I don't think he has an email address up there."
Scraps of leather fell to the ground like rain as Alfred wielded the scissors. He frowned thoughtfully, then said, "I believe I might have a suggestion in that area."
: : :
Clark tripped over the Kryptonian syllables and grimaced, then tried again. This time the computer responded, chiming as if it were pleased at his progress. The lights dimmed to a comfortable level for the people of Randizullian, with their sensitive eyes, and Clark smiled to himself as he stepped out of the room.
It had taken him two days of work to go through the database and figure out what environment was best for each bottled world, to reserve rooms for cities with special needs. It was difficult to communicate with the inhabitants, but he had tried to make clear that he had their best interests in mind. Someday, he hoped, he could find new worlds for each of them.
New worlds... The sheer amount of information on the ship staggered him. He had access now to data about tens of thousands of worlds; the boy who had stared up at the mystery of the stars now had at his fingertips the proof of life strewn throughout the galaxy, even in other galaxies altogether.
He could even go there someday, travel the stars in the ship he had started to call his Fortress.
He looked out the window at the gentle blue-green curve below him, dotted with clouds, and couldn't help a wry smile. The universe was open to him in a way he'd never even dreamed of...and all he wanted to do was cherish this beautiful blue speck in the darkness, keep it safe.
The stars could wait, he supposed.
Stumbling over the unfamiliar syllables, he asked the ship to tap into the satellite transmissions from Earth and display them on the bank of monitors that lined the back wall. A cacophony of noise rattled from the speakers, and it took him a moment to remember the right words to turn down the volume. News, fashion shows, BBC documentaries, the Spice channel all jumbled together in a welter of images. After a moment, Clark said "Narrow feed to transmissions from the last forty-eight hours containing search term: Bruce Wayne."
All but four of the monitors faded to black. Three of the stories mentioned Bruce, but one actually had his face on the screen, and Clark narrowed in on that one.
"Gotham's native billionaire, Bruce Wayne, was actually in Metropolis when it was abducted, and he's here to give WGTH an exclusive interview."
Bruce was wearing an impeccable navy-blue suit with a scarlet tie, and Clark couldn't help but wonder for a moment if those colors were pre-meditated. The reporter was asking, "Given the fact that you've had some harsh words to say about Superman in the past, has your experience changed your view of him at all?"
Bruce flashed a raffish, sidelong smile at the reporter. "Well, Summer, a real man knows when to confess he was wrong. And I think it's time I admit that my criticisms of Superman may have been hasty and even ill-advised. There we were," he said dramatically, waving one hand in the direction of space, "Trapped on an alien spaceship, millimeters high, with no way to return home. But Superman came to save us--if I've heard correctly, he jumped into space to save all of us. He fought for us all--not just the people of Earth, but for the thousands of worlds that had been stolen before us. That's heroism."
"People have reported that Superman stayed up on the spaceship. Do you think he plans to return, or will he leave Earth now?"
"I have no doubt he'll return," Bruce said firmly. "He may not be genetically human, but Earth is his home. I'm sure he's cleaning up and recovering. In fact, I suspect he has technology that will enable him to monitor television channels, and in case he does, I'd like to address him directly." He looked away from the reporter and straight into the camera, his facile smile fading and his voice lowering to something low and intimate. "Superman. You leaped into the unknown to face a monstrous foe and save us all, and we can never thank you enough. I just hope..." He swallowed and looked down for an instant. "I hope that someday I'll have the chance to make a leap of faith like you did, a chance to help you like you helped all of us."
The reporter wrapped up the story and Clark turned off the channel, letting silence fall across the ship once more. He looked out at the Eastern seaboard of the United States below him, lights glimmering on as dusk slowly descended, and felt a smile tugging at his face. He was pretty sure he wouldn't be needing a playboy billionaire to charge in like the cavalry and save him anytime soon, but there was a kind of comfort to knowing Bruce was sincere under all the exaggeration.
That Bruce was down there in that spreading gleam of lights, thinking of him--it was all the support Clark would ever need.
---
( Part 7)