stands_for_hope | for knightbynight: For now and hereafter...

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for knightbynight: For now and hereafter...

[some time after the events here]

Superman and Batman were partners in more than a work sense. Bruce Wayne and Clark Kent were an adorable (if mildly ridiculous) couple. Kal-El of Krypton and a man who defied any definition outside of the single letter 'B' made time on weekends, worked around world crises and teenage tempers, and occasionally fell into bed together when the stars aligned. Thankfully, they aligned relatively often.

Wayne Manor received a delivery of organic produce and baked goods once a week from a small, independent farm in the heartland. Lois Lane was a little less likely to agree with snide comments about the uselessness of Bruce Wayne, especially after seeing the utter madness that was Clark's desk after a few weeks. The texting habits of a certain blond teenager in Kansas rose sharply... and in parallel to that of a certain former street punk in Gotham.

Life was... well, it was good, even if it was also Life. Until it wasn't. Until everything changed.

They all had enemies, of course. But the problem with Superman's enemies was that they were coherent enough to decide to team up. And crazy enough to use the kind of weaponry that could make whole cars just vaporize into nothing.

Crazy enough to point that weapon at a somewhat-pinned Batman and a Wonder Woman who was digging him out from the rock. Crazy enough to point that weapon at Batman.

Bruce.

B.

Clark didn't even make the choice. His heart made it for him. The beam shot out of the Toyman's mechanical monstrosity and Clark flew, the pain of the beam itself nothing on the fact that he was leaving Bruce behind. That his vision of them as old men together would never happen. That he was leaving behind a world that needed him.

The guilt that, if it meant saving them, saving him, he didn't regret a thing.

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It wasn't often that Clark got petulant and difficult. He knew how terrifying it could be for people, because while others might dent a wall or kick a can, Clark could to so much more damage in a state like that. That's why he made a point of keeping calm, of reminding himself how ridiculous he was being... why he always tried to be the mature one.

Right now, he didn't have the bandwidth for it. Not even a little. So that 'please' was probably the best decision Bruce had made since he'd entered the room. That 'please' dropped Clark's shoulders an inch on either side and had his throat loosening up enough for him to feel like he could breath.

He still couldn't speak, but he walked over and, still teetering on the edge of something incredibly foolish, looked Bruce in the eyes and waited.

For several moments, Bruce did nothing.

At least he did nothing that was outwardly obvious.

He held Clark's eyes - or let Clark hold his - while his blood pressure dropped, his breathing slowed and deepened and his pulse settled into a perfect, resting, sort of steadiness.

When he moved, it was slow and not at all cautious and put one hand on Clark's shoulder, and then the second lightly against Clark's jaw. No grip - none at all - just open, calloused palms, and kept holding Clark's eyes.

All he said, once he'd said anything at all was, "Stay with me."

Literally Clark. Follow what he was giving you.

He let his eyes close, let Bruce's hands settle on him, leaned into them and took. Let those hands and the veins beneath them, the heartbeat within them, the flex and flow of cells inside them... he let Bruce be everything for the moment and blocked out everything else. The world really would have to do without Superman for a little longer.

Bruce had pretty impressive control over his body, but it was conscious control. That meant for the time being he was very, very capable of holding it, but that it was virtually impossible for him to do so long term. Which meant-

Which meant now that he realized why Clark had been asking for what he'd been asking for and grasped the scope of it, that what Clark needed Clark was going to get. Or, at least, Bruce would do his damned best to hold this and when he couldn't he'd have to suck it up and be direct.

Or consider drugs.

Maybe all of it.

"If this works," he said, voice deliberately pitched so low and quiet it was more subvocalizing than really speaking, "then this is what we do."

He knows what Bruce is doing. He can't not know. It'd be near impossible for him to miss on a good day. Right now, hyperfocused and edging close to a panic attack, it's like listening to a well-ordered symphony instead of the usual daily mill and bustle of traffic.

"No one can do this all the time," and his voice was soft, careful. Relaxed. "The strain on you... Bruce. I just--"

He closed his eyes again.

"Just for a few days. Just... tell me for a few days. I'm still... figuring out how to be in the world again. I'm sorry, Bruce." He hoped it was a few days. He had to hope. But-- "I'm sorry this is what came back. I am... so sorry."

"I can do this for as long as you need me to do this." His voice is still crazy, crazy soft and controlled. Some of that is in deference to Clark, some of it is a response to what he's doing to himself physically. "I'll tell you for as long as you need me to tell you."

He's just stating facts, though. It's not... caving in or indulging Clark or even agreeing. It's not arguing. It's like saying the sky is blue or he is Batman. It just, simply, is. "I'm not sorry about what came back. What came back is you. You aren't going to be who you were, but who you are and who you will be is not something you ever, ever, need to apologize to me for." Still with fact stating.

He closed his eyes and let his forehead settle against Bruce's.

"Tell me I don't have to listen. Just..." he swallowed, hard. "Tell me I'm not abandoning them."

Them. The people who put their faith in him. The people who did their best to take his message to heart. The people who listened to what he had to say, who stood up and made a difference. The people who trusted him.

He swept his thumb over Clark's cheekbone, and then slid his fingers around to splay and spread wide against the back of Clark's neck. "You aren't abandoning them and you don't need to listen."

Getting Clark back to a position of being able to handle the world was going to take time, and some concerted effort, but first it was going to take - time and... insulation. "The world was never just your responsibility, anyway."

He wanted to tell him about the funeral he attended once. That funeral, because he'd been close enough. Because he'd only been a few moments too late. He wanted to tell Bruce about Mike, the Smallville kid who'd put his car on the train tracks and waited for Superman to save him. Waited so he could tell his hero how much he meant to him. Mike, the kid who'd died because he'd been just that few seconds too late, and his brother Henry who'd been positively devastated. Their parents who'd never be able to look at their surviving child without thinking of the one who hadn't.

Or hell, that cult someone'd started up, people throwing themselves out of windows for him to save them like a Jesus H. Swooping Christ.

Shit like that. Shit like that got into his head and it... it was a bit much for even him. It was the kind of thing that made Clark Kent want to hang up his cape while at the same time making it utterly impossible.

And now--

"I believe you, Bruce," and that was why he'd needed Bruce. Batman had to tell him. Batman would never let him slack on the job. Batman was making a tactical decision for his health, unclouded by sentiment. "I trust you."

Clark....

Bruce knows. Bruce has always know. There's nothing so intimately connected to Superman, nothing so known and obvious, that he doesn't. Usually he leaves it alone, lets it go and lets Clark handle it the way Clark wants to handle it but right now -

He's still leaving the details alone, but he knows.

"No you don't - but you'll pretend for as long as you need to. When you don't need to, you'll stop." Which worked out okay. Worked out perfectly because it was a sign that Clark was ready.

"I trust you more than I trust myself right now," he answered, keeping his tone even and his voice low. It was hard, but he could do that at least.

"I know you trust me."

Trust wasn't the same as belief. That belief that he was mentioning was tied up in all Clark's self-doubt. It would stabilize. Bruce pressed his fingers against Clark's spine, tilted his head slightly and barely grazed his lips across Clark's mouth. It might have been an accident.

Keep trusting me, he thought, as he said: "This isn't permanent, but you need to give yourself longer than a few days."

"I hate leaning on you like this," he admitted quietly. "I always lean on you."

And he leaned in for another soft graze of lips before tucking his head against Bruce's throat.

Bruce moved his fingers up an inch or two, to lightly graze the hair at the back of Clark's neck. "If you always lean on me, I've never noticed much less minded." That was truth, at least, though at the moment it was literal and obvious enough for him to.

Even the using Bruce as... a personalized white noise machine didn't register that way for him.

His eyes slipped closed, the touch loosening him up the way it always did, the way Bruce's hands could always undo him. He swayed, letting himself rest against Bruce.

"Thank you."

Bruce kept using that touch to keep Clark looser, started stroking the flat of his hand down Clark's back with gentle, but firm, pressure.

"Mm."

Wait, that wasn't a reply, not really. "Come on, let's lie down." They were going to be doing this for a bit, and once he got up again -

He was going to go find a blood pressure medication that wouldn't kill him and look into procuring it.

Clark is so easy to move when, almost floating under Bruce's hands. He went to the bed, the big dark wood and red silk bed, and pulled open the blanket.

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for knightbynight: For now and hereafter...

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