![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
seriousficTitle: Where They Can’t Find You
Fandom: The Dark Knight + Superman Returns
Rating: PG-13
Word Count: 3,186
Characters/Pairings: Bruce Wayne, Clark Kent, (Bruce/Clark pre-slash?), the Joker, Gordon, Alfred
Summary: Superman is right to be worried after the Joker escapes.
The cold open was a handheld camera’s view of Wayne Manor, rebuilt, the bars on the gates occasionally cropping into view. It was night, and the lights were on in only a few windows. “Today on lifestyles of the rich and vacuous,” the Joker’s nasal voice came dully. “Bruce Wayne, philanthropist, philander, and all-around nice guy when he isn’t drinking his weight in vodka.”
Joker’s breath came hotly over the soundtrack. “But good news, have-nots. The, ah, haves? They can die just as quick… or as slow and painfully,” he added thoughtfully, “as all of Gotham’s huddling masses, yearning to be free. And as regular viewers of our program know, I’m a man of my word. But I’ll prove it anyway. Twelve midnight, this Sunday-Sunday-Sunday, Bruce Wayne goes to that great big hedge fund in the sky. Mark your calendars.”
Clark turned the video off before the Joker’s laughter could really pick up steam. “He was outside your house, your parents’ house.” Superman was outraged on Bruce’s behalf. He had a thing about the sanctity of homes.
Bruce had just been getting out of his car when Clark had scooped him up. It was so fast that he had bruises up and down his side from the retrieval and the flight. At the Fortress of Solitude, Clark had coats ready for him. Bruce had selected one, a thick parka, and zipped it up as Clark played the video that explained why. It had been delivered to the Daily Planet, along with several other media outlets, and would be playing on-air in a few minutes. It was Saturday, shortly after ten o’clock, but there were poisons that could take a long time to act.
Bruce just stared straight ahead, lost in thought. “He couldn’t possibly know. Nasty coincidence, that’s all. Sometimes I think the universe really is on his side.”
Clark placed his most consoling pat on Bruce’s shoulder. “You can stay here in the Fortress as long as you like. There’s about a hundred guest rooms, so take your pick.”
While not overtly shying away from his touch, Bruce’s temperature seemed to drop until Clark just had to take his hand away. “I’m going back to Gotham. I’m going to face him down and tell him I’m not afraid.”
“Bruce, don’t be stupid. This is your pride talking, not your intellect.”
“Pride? Gotham is trembling in fear all over again because of him, Kal-El. I can’t abandon it. The people need someone to rally behind. If we all stand as one…” he looked away, clamping down hard with his jaw. “If I can’t do it as Batman, I’ll do it as Bruce Wayne.”
Clark didn’t scowl as he danced his fingers over a crystal. Through a satellite uplink, the Daily Planet database was accessed and headlines of Bruce the playboy covered the diamond walls. “The problem with that is people think of you as a womanizing trust-fund baby who burnt down his own mansion.”
“I wouldn’t be the first delinquent who made good. My old persona was necessary to divert suspicion. Maybe it’s time to shed that skin for a more useful one.”
Clark cleared the walls with a swipe of his hand. “Listen to yourself! You’re talking about who you are”
“I can’t keep up the illusion that I’m a spineless geek while the people I care about are in pain. Maybe you can, but it’s inhuman to deny that part of yourself.”
Instantly, just from the kicked-puppy look on Clark’s face, Bruce knew “inhuman” was the wrong word to us. And for the first time since Rachel had slapped him across the face, he felt a hot blush of shame creeping up his neck.
“I’m not spineless, I’m mild-mannered,” Clark said stiffly. “And it’s who I am. My whole life hasn’t been consumed by some… mask.”
“Just five years of it.”
Clark crossed his arms, stung. “That’s not fair. And the Joker must have you really riled up if you’re taking cheap shots like that.” He sat down beside Bruce, rounding his arms down to his lap. “He scares you, doesn’t he?”
Bruce didn’t answer. Just tapped a staccato pattern into the tabletop, three beats then stop, three beats then stop.
“Bruce?”
“He’s right,” Bruce said at last, thumping the tabletop with closed knuckles.
“About what?”
“People.”
Clark shook his head. “You’re both wrong.”
Bruce snorted in derision. “You’ve been gone a long time.”
“I could be gone a hundred years and the Joker would be dead wrong.”
Bruce leaned back in his chair, crossing his legs, perversely becoming more impenetrable as he seemed to ‘relax’. “Someone once told me that if you create enough hunger, everyone becomes a criminal. He was right.”
“The human heart is subject to monstrous deceits, but we…” Impulsively, he reached across the table and wrapped Bruce’s wrist in his thumb and forefinger. “You… can still be a great people.”
“How can you still believe that?”
“It’s easy. I look at you. You took the darkness that covered you and you turned it into something… miraculous. You’ve given Gotham hope.”
“Hope I can’t live up to,” Bruce confessed.
“You will.” Clark let go of his hand. “If you don’t give up.”
“Then I have to go back, don’t I?” Bruce asked, a slyly mocking smile settling into place.
Clark stood up angrily, walking a short ways with his hands on his hips. “Ask for my help.”
“As bad as the Joker is, he can’t kill as many as an earthquake, a tsunami. You’re needed.”
“So are you. And the world can get by a lot easier without me than Gotham can without you. Five years proved that.”
“I’m going back,” Bruce repeated.
“Then so am I.”
“It’s a free country,” Bruce said nonchalantly.
“You’re welcome,” Clark said.
***
Clark took his new status as bodyguard very seriously. Under the guise of doing an in-depth interview of Bruce, he became the millionaire’s shadow. Bruce dealt with Gordon’s well-meaning protection, always feeling a twinge of guilt when he looked at Clark. How many people could Superman be saving? How many children were becoming orphans because of Bruce? It was just one more thing he couldn’t endure, but had to learn to nonetheless.
Alfred thoughtfully brought out coffee for Bruce and lemonade for Clark as they sat in the study, unable to sleep.
“My favorite,” Clark said. “How’d you know?”
“You said so in an interview once, Master Kent.”
“I’m just a reporter. I don’t give interviews.”
“You didn’t.” Alfred, almost smugly, slipped on his reading glasses. “Wot? You didn’t think a pair of these ruddy things was going to fool everybody, did yah?”
Bruce smiled at the frenetic look Clark gave him. “In the event of my death, Alfred’s to send my files to you and Commissioner Gordon.”
“It won’t come to that,” Clark said firmly.
“Guess we’ll know by Monday.” Bruce got up and went to the window, loosening his tie. He could just see the city lights. Clark joined him. With his telescopic vision, he could see the buildings, the people, the squalor. He supposed Bruce had the nicer view.
“I want to make a statement,” Bruce said. “To them. To let them know they don’t have to be afraid.” His head bowed, as if unable to take that distant light. “It’s a lot easier to give them something to fear.”
“It always is. Tell them the truth.”
“Do you want a panic?”
“The Joker is out there, yes. But he can be beaten and good people are doing just that. So tell them so.”
“I think I’m gonna need some more coffee.”
Alfred already had some waiting.
***
Something in Bruce squirmed and winced at the flashing lights that the press greeted him with. And to think, he’d been worried that reporters wouldn’t want to stand next to him. Every Gotham City correspondent had showed up literally at his front door, assembled on his pavilion atop the folding chairs that’d been set out. The police were lining the lawn, but Bruce still felt exposed. He wished the sun would drop and his armor would take him in, the Joker would appear in his sights. But right now, this was where he could do the most good.
“I’ll make this quick. I wouldn’t want to preempt anyone’s soaps.” A few camera shutters snapped. Bruce gripped the podium he was standing at. “So much for breaking the tension… Rachel Dawes was a friend of mine. The Joker killed her. And now he’s threatened to kill me. But I’m not afraid and I will not be forced out of my home and my family’s home. The men and women of the Gotham City Police Department captured the Joker once. They’ll do it again. I put my complete trust and faith in them. If you want to leave, that’s your call. But not me. Gotham’s my city, our city, Rachel’s city. I won’t give it up to some punk in greasepaint. Thank you for your time.”
He walked away, keeping his cast-iron concentration on not walking faster or slowing down. Clark was waiting for him inside, pen and notepad in hand. He clicked his Zebra pen shut and tucked the pad into his jacket pocket.
“Think they bought it?”
“Heck, Bruce, I bought it.”
***
Despite his words, the usually cool and welcoming darkness felt unseasonably warm that night. For the first time since he’d put on the mask, Bruce dreamed of his parents dying. He woke up in the fugue between sleep and wakefulness, went half-asleep to the bathroom to relieve himself. One of the female officers whistled appreciatively at the half his silk pajamas didn’t cover. He saw that Alfred was sitting outside Bruce’s door among the police officers guarding him, a shotgun across his knees.
“Go back to sleep, Master Wayne. Almost morning now.”
***
Despite everything, it felt good to have people in Wayne Manor again. Alfred felt it too, attending to the policemen’s needs with a spring in his step. Bruce’s memories of childhood were crowded. It seemed every day his parents were throwing a party or having guests over, and once more filling the mansion to the brim with people seemed to honor their memory in a way Bruce couldn’t put into words. And Clark was the best of the lot; so much like his father, the brother he’d never had, or even Harvey. Even with his possible impending death, it was one of the better days of Bruce’s life.
“I’ve got to say, Mr. Wayne, you’re taking this a lot better than I would.” Gordon waved off a plate of hors d'oeuvres that Alfred was offering.
Bruce shrugged. “Your boys are putting their lives on the line for me. Seems the least I can do is make it easy on you.”
“I can think of quite a few people who would say their taxes pay my salary and leave it at that.”
“Oh, my accountants don’t let that happen.”
The explosion seemed to up-end the room, filling it with smoke and fire. In an instant, Bruce was separated from Gordon, hearing his shouted orders like a distant echo. A drumroll of automatic gunfire drowned him out; Bruce hugged the floor with the others. The smoke stung his eyes. He could see a gas grenade rolling along the floor, spewing its venom. Bruce picked it up and threw it out the window before a coughing fit overwhelmed him. An incredible strength gripped his arm and pulled him to his feet. He felt an overwhelming relief at the thought of it being Clark, but even through his tears he could tell it was one of the cops. He allowed himself to be dragged out the door, down a flight of stairs, then into a smoking room. The cop – it was the one with the beard, what was his name, Napier? – locked the door behind them.
“Alone at last,” he crooned in a high, nasal voice.
Bruce felt a tremor in his hands as the cop peeled off his thick beard to reveal jagged scars along his cheeks.
“You really should check references when you hire contractors to rebuild home sweet home,” the Joker said as he unbuttoned his police uniform to reveal a purple tuxedo T-shirt underneath. “Otherwise, you never know who you might hire. Ex-cons, illegal immigrants, me… I sent those home videos from your mailbox. And ever since I’ve been having a little sleepover. This old place is full of secret passages, all kinds of places to store cop uniforms, bombs… even Jimmy Hoffa!”
He beat a staccato against his thigh with the revolver in his hand. “I had a feeling you wouldn’t run and you didn’t let me down. But that little Oscar clip moment of yours? Sent a shiver down my spine. You tell Gotham they have nothing to fear but fear itself, then I kill you… what does that make me?”
His smile was slow and burgeoning.
“But where’s your knight in shining Nomex, the Bat? It’s not a party until he gets here and I do so enjoy killing people in front of him.”
Bruce forced his voice to stay light, not guttural, when he so dearly wanted it to darken enough to choke the Joker. He wanted the Joker to know just before he caved his face in. “Maybe he has better things to do than feud with scum like you.”
“Believe me, no one wearing a cape has something better to do with their weekends than play good cop, bad cop with me.” The Joker paused and opened a glass window over a bookcase. “Hey, Paradise Lost. Found it. Anyway, I don’t want there to be any bad blood between us just because I’m going to kill you. Now, take Rachel D’aww—“
“Dawes!”
“I don’t keep track of these things,” Joker explained patiently. He kept circling Bruce as Bruce kept equidistant from him, slightly hunched like he was a predator about to pounce. Joker, on the other hand, held his head high as he strolled over the carpet. “I didn’t kill her. Hell, I liked her. She had the tightest little…”
Bruce surged forward and Joker jerked the pistol up, stopping Bruce with its barrel against his head.
“Put down the gun. Fight me like a man,” Bruce said through the gun barrel poking into his cheek.
“Now, if you had the gun, would you do that?”
“I’d rip you apart with my bare hands.”
“Not much incentive for me to put down the gun. Sit down!” He shoved Bruce down into a plush chair. “I didn’t kill Dawes. It was the Batman. I just told a few of my boys to pick her up, show her a good time, and they couldn’t tell I was joking. Go figure! But that Batman, well, just because the two of us, I don’t think his intentions were entirely honorable. If he’d gone to save Dent, like a real hero would… then we wouldn’t be having this conversation! But he chose to be selfish and he had to be punished for it. Only. Fair.”
The doorknob turned. The Joker kicked Bruce, chair and all, onto his back; then he pressed himself against the wall next to the door as Clark walked in.
“Bruce?”
The Joker’s gun cocked next to his head.
“What have we here?” the clown asked.
***
The windows weren’t shattered. They were under fire and yet that fact was at the forefront of Jim Gordon’s mind. Every cop instinct in his body told him that was important. The smoke was thinning and his ears had stopped ringing. He looked to each of the room’s exits. No gunmen and he couldn’t hear any shots from there either. They were coming from outside, yet the windows weren’t broken.
Covering his mouth and nostrils with his sleeve, he ran to the nearest window and threw it open. There was a boombox underneath the windowsill. The sound of gunfire was coming from there. He switched it off.
“Where’s Wayne!?”
***
“I was just explaining to Brucie here how whatshername’s death was all because the Batman chose to chase some tail,” Joker said as he manhandled Clark down beside Bruce. “You’re that reporter who’s always getting the scoops on Supes, right? Who would he have saved: Harvey Dent, white knight of Gotham City, or simpering ex-wife-to-be…”
Bruce sat up sharply and Joker kicked him across the chin. Clark caught him, pulled out a handkerchief for his split lip.
The Joker pulled the curtain aside, looking out at the night. “No bat. Guess he must be in hibernation. Okay then, maybe when I kill the next guy on the Forbes’ Top Fifty…”
***
Gordon’s head jerked upward when he heard the gunshot. “Upstairs!”
***
Joker walked out of the study, a clipping from Forbes in hand. “Who the hell is Ted Kord?”
Two bullets ripped into his chest and he went down, the gun slipping from his fingers.
“A little warning next time?” he moaned.
Gordon kicked the gun away from his hand as his men swarmed in. “Stop or I’ll shoot,” he said dryly.
As his officers cuffed Joker, Gordon moved into the study. Wayne and the reporter were inside, Bruce sitting heavily on the ground, Kent curiously examining a window.
“Did you get him?” Bruce asked.
Gordon nodded. “We got him.”
“He just missed us,” Clark explained, gesturing to the broken window pane.
***
The Joker was taken away in an ambulance bound for Arkham, raving how he had hit Clark, he had. Most of the cops were sent home, although a team stayed behind just in case it was another part of a Machiavellian Joker plot. And Bruce found Clark turning over a smashed bullet in his hand, enjoying a glass of cool lemonade.
“That was some good work back there.”
Clark tossed the Joker’s bullet into the trash. “No thanks are necessary. I got a pretty swell story for the chief out of it,” he said nonchalantly.
“You’re welcome.”
Clark polished off the lemonade. “Well, I suppose the world will be needing Superman.” He unbuttoned his shirt as he walked to the window. “Be seeing you.”
“Clark?” The Kryptonian paused at Bruce’s nearly inaudible utterance. “If you ever need any help…”
“You’ll be around.” Clark smiled. “Yeah, I know.”
Bruce watched the skies, long after Superman had flown out of sight.
Alfred picked up Clark’s dirty glass for the dishwasher. “I suppose it’s too much to ask that you get two nights of sleep in a row.”
“Far too much.” Bruce set out for the grandfather clock, stopping to pick up the glasses Clark had left atop his pile of clothes. “He’ll be back for these.”
“You seem entirely too lacking in trepidation for that, Master Wayne,” Alfred said, only slightly mocking.
“I know this world needs people who are more than heroes,” Bruce said wearily. “Still, it’s nice to have people who can just be heroic.”
“Or friends,” Alfred added.
Bruce handed the glasses to him. “Don’t wait up, Alfred.”
“Never do, sir. It’d cut into my beauty sleep.”
Fandom: The Dark Knight + Superman Returns
Rating: PG-13
Word Count: 3,186
Characters/Pairings: Bruce Wayne, Clark Kent, (Bruce/Clark pre-slash?), the Joker, Gordon, Alfred
Summary: Superman is right to be worried after the Joker escapes.
The cold open was a handheld camera’s view of Wayne Manor, rebuilt, the bars on the gates occasionally cropping into view. It was night, and the lights were on in only a few windows. “Today on lifestyles of the rich and vacuous,” the Joker’s nasal voice came dully. “Bruce Wayne, philanthropist, philander, and all-around nice guy when he isn’t drinking his weight in vodka.”
Joker’s breath came hotly over the soundtrack. “But good news, have-nots. The, ah, haves? They can die just as quick… or as slow and painfully,” he added thoughtfully, “as all of Gotham’s huddling masses, yearning to be free. And as regular viewers of our program know, I’m a man of my word. But I’ll prove it anyway. Twelve midnight, this Sunday-Sunday-Sunday, Bruce Wayne goes to that great big hedge fund in the sky. Mark your calendars.”
Clark turned the video off before the Joker’s laughter could really pick up steam. “He was outside your house, your parents’ house.” Superman was outraged on Bruce’s behalf. He had a thing about the sanctity of homes.
Bruce had just been getting out of his car when Clark had scooped him up. It was so fast that he had bruises up and down his side from the retrieval and the flight. At the Fortress of Solitude, Clark had coats ready for him. Bruce had selected one, a thick parka, and zipped it up as Clark played the video that explained why. It had been delivered to the Daily Planet, along with several other media outlets, and would be playing on-air in a few minutes. It was Saturday, shortly after ten o’clock, but there were poisons that could take a long time to act.
Bruce just stared straight ahead, lost in thought. “He couldn’t possibly know. Nasty coincidence, that’s all. Sometimes I think the universe really is on his side.”
Clark placed his most consoling pat on Bruce’s shoulder. “You can stay here in the Fortress as long as you like. There’s about a hundred guest rooms, so take your pick.”
While not overtly shying away from his touch, Bruce’s temperature seemed to drop until Clark just had to take his hand away. “I’m going back to Gotham. I’m going to face him down and tell him I’m not afraid.”
“Bruce, don’t be stupid. This is your pride talking, not your intellect.”
“Pride? Gotham is trembling in fear all over again because of him, Kal-El. I can’t abandon it. The people need someone to rally behind. If we all stand as one…” he looked away, clamping down hard with his jaw. “If I can’t do it as Batman, I’ll do it as Bruce Wayne.”
Clark didn’t scowl as he danced his fingers over a crystal. Through a satellite uplink, the Daily Planet database was accessed and headlines of Bruce the playboy covered the diamond walls. “The problem with that is people think of you as a womanizing trust-fund baby who burnt down his own mansion.”
“I wouldn’t be the first delinquent who made good. My old persona was necessary to divert suspicion. Maybe it’s time to shed that skin for a more useful one.”
Clark cleared the walls with a swipe of his hand. “Listen to yourself! You’re talking about who you are”
“I can’t keep up the illusion that I’m a spineless geek while the people I care about are in pain. Maybe you can, but it’s inhuman to deny that part of yourself.”
Instantly, just from the kicked-puppy look on Clark’s face, Bruce knew “inhuman” was the wrong word to us. And for the first time since Rachel had slapped him across the face, he felt a hot blush of shame creeping up his neck.
“I’m not spineless, I’m mild-mannered,” Clark said stiffly. “And it’s who I am. My whole life hasn’t been consumed by some… mask.”
“Just five years of it.”
Clark crossed his arms, stung. “That’s not fair. And the Joker must have you really riled up if you’re taking cheap shots like that.” He sat down beside Bruce, rounding his arms down to his lap. “He scares you, doesn’t he?”
Bruce didn’t answer. Just tapped a staccato pattern into the tabletop, three beats then stop, three beats then stop.
“Bruce?”
“He’s right,” Bruce said at last, thumping the tabletop with closed knuckles.
“About what?”
“People.”
Clark shook his head. “You’re both wrong.”
Bruce snorted in derision. “You’ve been gone a long time.”
“I could be gone a hundred years and the Joker would be dead wrong.”
Bruce leaned back in his chair, crossing his legs, perversely becoming more impenetrable as he seemed to ‘relax’. “Someone once told me that if you create enough hunger, everyone becomes a criminal. He was right.”
“The human heart is subject to monstrous deceits, but we…” Impulsively, he reached across the table and wrapped Bruce’s wrist in his thumb and forefinger. “You… can still be a great people.”
“How can you still believe that?”
“It’s easy. I look at you. You took the darkness that covered you and you turned it into something… miraculous. You’ve given Gotham hope.”
“Hope I can’t live up to,” Bruce confessed.
“You will.” Clark let go of his hand. “If you don’t give up.”
“Then I have to go back, don’t I?” Bruce asked, a slyly mocking smile settling into place.
Clark stood up angrily, walking a short ways with his hands on his hips. “Ask for my help.”
“As bad as the Joker is, he can’t kill as many as an earthquake, a tsunami. You’re needed.”
“So are you. And the world can get by a lot easier without me than Gotham can without you. Five years proved that.”
“I’m going back,” Bruce repeated.
“Then so am I.”
“It’s a free country,” Bruce said nonchalantly.
“You’re welcome,” Clark said.
***
Clark took his new status as bodyguard very seriously. Under the guise of doing an in-depth interview of Bruce, he became the millionaire’s shadow. Bruce dealt with Gordon’s well-meaning protection, always feeling a twinge of guilt when he looked at Clark. How many people could Superman be saving? How many children were becoming orphans because of Bruce? It was just one more thing he couldn’t endure, but had to learn to nonetheless.
Alfred thoughtfully brought out coffee for Bruce and lemonade for Clark as they sat in the study, unable to sleep.
“My favorite,” Clark said. “How’d you know?”
“You said so in an interview once, Master Kent.”
“I’m just a reporter. I don’t give interviews.”
“You didn’t.” Alfred, almost smugly, slipped on his reading glasses. “Wot? You didn’t think a pair of these ruddy things was going to fool everybody, did yah?”
Bruce smiled at the frenetic look Clark gave him. “In the event of my death, Alfred’s to send my files to you and Commissioner Gordon.”
“It won’t come to that,” Clark said firmly.
“Guess we’ll know by Monday.” Bruce got up and went to the window, loosening his tie. He could just see the city lights. Clark joined him. With his telescopic vision, he could see the buildings, the people, the squalor. He supposed Bruce had the nicer view.
“I want to make a statement,” Bruce said. “To them. To let them know they don’t have to be afraid.” His head bowed, as if unable to take that distant light. “It’s a lot easier to give them something to fear.”
“It always is. Tell them the truth.”
“Do you want a panic?”
“The Joker is out there, yes. But he can be beaten and good people are doing just that. So tell them so.”
“I think I’m gonna need some more coffee.”
Alfred already had some waiting.
***
Something in Bruce squirmed and winced at the flashing lights that the press greeted him with. And to think, he’d been worried that reporters wouldn’t want to stand next to him. Every Gotham City correspondent had showed up literally at his front door, assembled on his pavilion atop the folding chairs that’d been set out. The police were lining the lawn, but Bruce still felt exposed. He wished the sun would drop and his armor would take him in, the Joker would appear in his sights. But right now, this was where he could do the most good.
“I’ll make this quick. I wouldn’t want to preempt anyone’s soaps.” A few camera shutters snapped. Bruce gripped the podium he was standing at. “So much for breaking the tension… Rachel Dawes was a friend of mine. The Joker killed her. And now he’s threatened to kill me. But I’m not afraid and I will not be forced out of my home and my family’s home. The men and women of the Gotham City Police Department captured the Joker once. They’ll do it again. I put my complete trust and faith in them. If you want to leave, that’s your call. But not me. Gotham’s my city, our city, Rachel’s city. I won’t give it up to some punk in greasepaint. Thank you for your time.”
He walked away, keeping his cast-iron concentration on not walking faster or slowing down. Clark was waiting for him inside, pen and notepad in hand. He clicked his Zebra pen shut and tucked the pad into his jacket pocket.
“Think they bought it?”
“Heck, Bruce, I bought it.”
***
Despite his words, the usually cool and welcoming darkness felt unseasonably warm that night. For the first time since he’d put on the mask, Bruce dreamed of his parents dying. He woke up in the fugue between sleep and wakefulness, went half-asleep to the bathroom to relieve himself. One of the female officers whistled appreciatively at the half his silk pajamas didn’t cover. He saw that Alfred was sitting outside Bruce’s door among the police officers guarding him, a shotgun across his knees.
“Go back to sleep, Master Wayne. Almost morning now.”
***
Despite everything, it felt good to have people in Wayne Manor again. Alfred felt it too, attending to the policemen’s needs with a spring in his step. Bruce’s memories of childhood were crowded. It seemed every day his parents were throwing a party or having guests over, and once more filling the mansion to the brim with people seemed to honor their memory in a way Bruce couldn’t put into words. And Clark was the best of the lot; so much like his father, the brother he’d never had, or even Harvey. Even with his possible impending death, it was one of the better days of Bruce’s life.
“I’ve got to say, Mr. Wayne, you’re taking this a lot better than I would.” Gordon waved off a plate of hors d'oeuvres that Alfred was offering.
Bruce shrugged. “Your boys are putting their lives on the line for me. Seems the least I can do is make it easy on you.”
“I can think of quite a few people who would say their taxes pay my salary and leave it at that.”
“Oh, my accountants don’t let that happen.”
The explosion seemed to up-end the room, filling it with smoke and fire. In an instant, Bruce was separated from Gordon, hearing his shouted orders like a distant echo. A drumroll of automatic gunfire drowned him out; Bruce hugged the floor with the others. The smoke stung his eyes. He could see a gas grenade rolling along the floor, spewing its venom. Bruce picked it up and threw it out the window before a coughing fit overwhelmed him. An incredible strength gripped his arm and pulled him to his feet. He felt an overwhelming relief at the thought of it being Clark, but even through his tears he could tell it was one of the cops. He allowed himself to be dragged out the door, down a flight of stairs, then into a smoking room. The cop – it was the one with the beard, what was his name, Napier? – locked the door behind them.
“Alone at last,” he crooned in a high, nasal voice.
Bruce felt a tremor in his hands as the cop peeled off his thick beard to reveal jagged scars along his cheeks.
“You really should check references when you hire contractors to rebuild home sweet home,” the Joker said as he unbuttoned his police uniform to reveal a purple tuxedo T-shirt underneath. “Otherwise, you never know who you might hire. Ex-cons, illegal immigrants, me… I sent those home videos from your mailbox. And ever since I’ve been having a little sleepover. This old place is full of secret passages, all kinds of places to store cop uniforms, bombs… even Jimmy Hoffa!”
He beat a staccato against his thigh with the revolver in his hand. “I had a feeling you wouldn’t run and you didn’t let me down. But that little Oscar clip moment of yours? Sent a shiver down my spine. You tell Gotham they have nothing to fear but fear itself, then I kill you… what does that make me?”
His smile was slow and burgeoning.
“But where’s your knight in shining Nomex, the Bat? It’s not a party until he gets here and I do so enjoy killing people in front of him.”
Bruce forced his voice to stay light, not guttural, when he so dearly wanted it to darken enough to choke the Joker. He wanted the Joker to know just before he caved his face in. “Maybe he has better things to do than feud with scum like you.”
“Believe me, no one wearing a cape has something better to do with their weekends than play good cop, bad cop with me.” The Joker paused and opened a glass window over a bookcase. “Hey, Paradise Lost. Found it. Anyway, I don’t want there to be any bad blood between us just because I’m going to kill you. Now, take Rachel D’aww—“
“Dawes!”
“I don’t keep track of these things,” Joker explained patiently. He kept circling Bruce as Bruce kept equidistant from him, slightly hunched like he was a predator about to pounce. Joker, on the other hand, held his head high as he strolled over the carpet. “I didn’t kill her. Hell, I liked her. She had the tightest little…”
Bruce surged forward and Joker jerked the pistol up, stopping Bruce with its barrel against his head.
“Put down the gun. Fight me like a man,” Bruce said through the gun barrel poking into his cheek.
“Now, if you had the gun, would you do that?”
“I’d rip you apart with my bare hands.”
“Not much incentive for me to put down the gun. Sit down!” He shoved Bruce down into a plush chair. “I didn’t kill Dawes. It was the Batman. I just told a few of my boys to pick her up, show her a good time, and they couldn’t tell I was joking. Go figure! But that Batman, well, just because the two of us, I don’t think his intentions were entirely honorable. If he’d gone to save Dent, like a real hero would… then we wouldn’t be having this conversation! But he chose to be selfish and he had to be punished for it. Only. Fair.”
The doorknob turned. The Joker kicked Bruce, chair and all, onto his back; then he pressed himself against the wall next to the door as Clark walked in.
“Bruce?”
The Joker’s gun cocked next to his head.
“What have we here?” the clown asked.
***
The windows weren’t shattered. They were under fire and yet that fact was at the forefront of Jim Gordon’s mind. Every cop instinct in his body told him that was important. The smoke was thinning and his ears had stopped ringing. He looked to each of the room’s exits. No gunmen and he couldn’t hear any shots from there either. They were coming from outside, yet the windows weren’t broken.
Covering his mouth and nostrils with his sleeve, he ran to the nearest window and threw it open. There was a boombox underneath the windowsill. The sound of gunfire was coming from there. He switched it off.
“Where’s Wayne!?”
***
“I was just explaining to Brucie here how whatshername’s death was all because the Batman chose to chase some tail,” Joker said as he manhandled Clark down beside Bruce. “You’re that reporter who’s always getting the scoops on Supes, right? Who would he have saved: Harvey Dent, white knight of Gotham City, or simpering ex-wife-to-be…”
Bruce sat up sharply and Joker kicked him across the chin. Clark caught him, pulled out a handkerchief for his split lip.
The Joker pulled the curtain aside, looking out at the night. “No bat. Guess he must be in hibernation. Okay then, maybe when I kill the next guy on the Forbes’ Top Fifty…”
***
Gordon’s head jerked upward when he heard the gunshot. “Upstairs!”
***
Joker walked out of the study, a clipping from Forbes in hand. “Who the hell is Ted Kord?”
Two bullets ripped into his chest and he went down, the gun slipping from his fingers.
“A little warning next time?” he moaned.
Gordon kicked the gun away from his hand as his men swarmed in. “Stop or I’ll shoot,” he said dryly.
As his officers cuffed Joker, Gordon moved into the study. Wayne and the reporter were inside, Bruce sitting heavily on the ground, Kent curiously examining a window.
“Did you get him?” Bruce asked.
Gordon nodded. “We got him.”
“He just missed us,” Clark explained, gesturing to the broken window pane.
***
The Joker was taken away in an ambulance bound for Arkham, raving how he had hit Clark, he had. Most of the cops were sent home, although a team stayed behind just in case it was another part of a Machiavellian Joker plot. And Bruce found Clark turning over a smashed bullet in his hand, enjoying a glass of cool lemonade.
“That was some good work back there.”
Clark tossed the Joker’s bullet into the trash. “No thanks are necessary. I got a pretty swell story for the chief out of it,” he said nonchalantly.
“You’re welcome.”
Clark polished off the lemonade. “Well, I suppose the world will be needing Superman.” He unbuttoned his shirt as he walked to the window. “Be seeing you.”
“Clark?” The Kryptonian paused at Bruce’s nearly inaudible utterance. “If you ever need any help…”
“You’ll be around.” Clark smiled. “Yeah, I know.”
Bruce watched the skies, long after Superman had flown out of sight.
Alfred picked up Clark’s dirty glass for the dishwasher. “I suppose it’s too much to ask that you get two nights of sleep in a row.”
“Far too much.” Bruce set out for the grandfather clock, stopping to pick up the glasses Clark had left atop his pile of clothes. “He’ll be back for these.”
“You seem entirely too lacking in trepidation for that, Master Wayne,” Alfred said, only slightly mocking.
“I know this world needs people who are more than heroes,” Bruce said wearily. “Still, it’s nice to have people who can just be heroic.”
“Or friends,” Alfred added.
Bruce handed the glasses to him. “Don’t wait up, Alfred.”
“Never do, sir. It’d cut into my beauty sleep.”
