This is SO SELF-INDULGENT, oh, dear. /o\ AT LEAST THEY BANG AGAIN, I KNOW YOU GUYS LIKE THAT. You can always stop halfway through this and just pretend I spent the second half yelling OH BRUCE at you for five minutes. That's pretty much what this amounts to. OH BRUCE. YOU TRIED.
It would make one hell of a segue, but it would also stop them cold: Bruce still can't let Clark undress him.
(After, maybe. If he tells Clark and then—if Clark still wants to.)
But he's on a precipice and he feels like it—wide-open space in front of him, nothing holding him back; and what risk can there be of falling when you've got Superman under you?
So he doesn't stop at Clark's shirt buttons, Clark's fly. He undoes Clark's cuffs, too, slides each sleeve down over Clark's arms and hands with deliberate, exacting care, letting his fingers skim Clark's skin the whole way down; when he looks up again Clark is staring at him, eyes wide, mouth red and wet and open, hectic hot color rising in his face. "Bruce," he says, sounding breathless and surprised, "Bruce—"
"Clark," Bruce returns with a smirk, leaning in, "Clark," and kisses the angle of the jaw, the reddening cheek, that shining-soft lower lip.
He takes Clark's belt off, works his pants open, without having to ease up; but to actually get them out of the way he needs to move again. Clark kicked his shoes off on their way through the door, managed to toe one sock off before Bruce had tackled him onto the master bed—Bruce shifts away to tug off the other one, and tosses it over his shoulder before Clark can snatch it out of his hand.
"Bruce, Jesus, you shouldn't just throw my dirty socks onto—what is that?" Clark squints. "Porcelain? Some kind of priceless Tang dynasty—"
"—sock-holder," Bruce concludes, and Clark snorts and then tilts his head back onto the bedspread, laughing.
It's gratifying how quickly he stops when Bruce's hands land on his hips.
Bruce had a pretty good idea what Clark's cock would look like—he's felt the size, the shape, the weight of it; he knows exactly how hard it gets right before Clark comes, exactly how deeply Clark will groan if Bruce wraps his hand around it firmly and exactly how sharply Clark will gasp if Bruce teases him, runs his fingers up the underside just so, brushes the head of it lightly.
But he hasn't gotten to see it, until now. He hasn't gotten to see any of this—had been stuck only imagining how Clark's thighs might look bare and tensed and shaking, how the muscles might play across Clark's shoulders each time he bites his lip and clenches his fists and says Bruce's name.
And then says it again.
"Hm?"
"I get it," Clark's saying, "you're enjoying the view," and a whole new flush works its way up his throat even as he laughs again. "But I vote you do something other than just look at me."
Bruce gives him a long considering stare. "Well, if you insist, Mr. Kent."
They've fucked before. That part's not new. Not that it isn't always a treat to slide one slick finger into Clark, two, three—not that Bruce hasn't had plenty of practice restraining himself before he can start trying to make Clark ask him for four. And he'll never, ever get tired of Clark's thighs under his hands, Clark's gasps in his ears; of the sheer incandescent sensation of driving into Clark an inch at a time, Clark's eyes squeezed shut and those big strong hands fisted in the sheets, in Bruce's shirt, like he's just trying to hang on for the ride.
But if the truth's going to come out—
Bruce Wayne wouldn't cradle Clark's face like that, wouldn't waste time running his hands over all the curves and angles of Clark's back and arms. But Bruce does it anyway. Bruce Wayne wouldn't fuck anybody this slowly, Bruce Wayne goes hard and gets his and is satisfied—but Bruce doesn't make himself stop pulling Clark's head up for kisses, or tracing a finger over the lines of Clark's mouth, the hollow of his throat, the shadowed dip and cut of muscle across his bare hips.
And Clark doesn't make him stop either. Clark lies there and lets him—the tacit permission would be staggering enough, but that's not all. Clark loves it. He comes once before Bruce's cock is even inside him, crying out almost in surprise. When Bruce eases him through it, kissing him, pressing close, he does get a hand in between them and say, "Bruce—your suit, you shouldn't—" half into Bruce's mouth.
But he laughs, bright and glad, when Bruce murmurs, "Fuck the suit." And he's Superman, he could shove Bruce off him whenever he wanted—but he doesn't. He pulls Bruce in like he's afraid Bruce is going to try to get up and leave in the middle; he opens up for Bruce's hands and mouth and cock without a moment's hesitation. He doesn't seem to care that Bruce is fucking him half-clothed, or if he does it's not because he finds it unappealing. He pushes back into Bruce's thrusts, clutching at Bruce's shoulders, eyes heavy-lidded, gasping unsteadily, and he lets Bruce take him apart.
The body is, of course, able, but the spirit is weak: Bruce isn't sure Clark can actually get tired, but he certainly looks it. He lets Bruce clean him up afterward, moving only the bare minimum Bruce demands of him, pinked up and warm and smiling. When Bruce goes to shuck the suit jacket at last, to trade the slacks for sleep pants, he comes back to find Clark still completely naked and also solidly asleep.
In the master bed.
Well. As long as Bruce takes his cufflinks out, it'll be fine. He's slept in less comfortable things than dress shirts.
They'll talk about Batman when Clark wakes up.
In the moment he comes awake, he's not sure why it's happened. He doesn't hear anything, cracks an eye and doesn't see anything—no light turned on, nothing obvious that would have roused him. There's a faint shaft of moonlight coming in the side window, but it's not falling on Bruce's face, and won't for another couple hours.
He blinks twice and is awake anyway: there must have been something, and Batman doesn't shrug off unusual circumstances, doesn't chalk things up to chance or coincidence. It's always nothing, until it isn't.
A moment to take account (where he is, what he's wearing, whether he can fight in it if he needs to), and that's when he realizes the bed is shaking.
Trembling, to be precise, with transferred movement. It's Clark who's shaking.
For an inexcusably long moment, Bruce can only stare at him: he looks terrible, eyes screwed shut, expression strange and fixed, his whole body seized up tight like he's restrained. There's something awful, all wrong, about the angle his neck is at, the way his sleeping head is turned—
Bruce reaches for him, easing over—over him, above him; and all at once, in a snap that feels like it should be audible, he understands.
He recognizes that look. He recognizes how Clark is lying. He hadn't grasped what he was looking at, from the side. But from overhead—he's closed his eyes ten thousand times and seen this scrawled on the backs of them, recreated for himself again and again every line and slant and curve that makes up the excruciating grimace on Clark's face.
Clark is dreaming about Batman.
Bruce can practically see the moment the kryptonite blade comes down, the silent re-enactment of a furrow being carved into Clark's cheek—it's in the way Clark's expression shifts, the harrowed helpless wince of pain—
And he's just fucking sitting here watching.
He grabs Clark's arm, his shoulder, but Clark doesn't wake. "Clark," he says, and then again more loudly, squeezing hard, because it's not as though he'll do any damage—
(Not more than he's already done.)
The sound and the motion come at the same time, like Clark's wordless cry is what's shoved Bruce across the room; but then Bruce slams into the wall and Clark's arms slam into him, steel bars against his chest. The breath's knocked out of him and his ears are ringing, Clark's face an inch away: the skin around Clark's eyes is crawling with shadows, lines of them like rotting roots, which makes no sense when his eyes themselves are shining through the dark, red as coals—
"Oh, god," Clark says.
In an instant, the steel bars are gone. Clark stumbles back a step, hands pressed over his eyes—the glow leaks out between his fingers for a moment, but then he shakes his head, mutters something to himself, and it stops.
"Sorry, sorry. Jesus—Bruce—are you okay?" Suddenly his hands are all over, moving just a little faster than human-normal, feeling along Bruce's arms and shoulders, the back of his head—
"Fine," Bruce says. "I'm fine."
It's a little harder to see Clark's eyes now that they aren't glowing, but the moonlight's reflecting off the carpet just enough to show the look of relief on Clark's face.
"God, I'm sorry," he says again, hands soft now, relaxed against Bruce's chest. "I've never had that one before—"
Before. Christ, how many have you had? How often does this happen? Is this what you've been doing in the west bedroom by yourself, while I lie in here and—
"Seemed exciting," Bruce hears himself say.
"Usually it's just about the coffin," Clark says, quiet and shamed and sorry. "That one—that must have been—" He clears his throat and lets out a shaky breath. "I—haven't seen Batman since I came back. I didn't know that would happen."
As if he should have. As if he ought to have known, and been more careful to keep away from Bruce.
As if his worst nightmare weren't in bed next to him all along.
"It's fine," Clark says. "It's not really that bad, I just wasn't expecting it tonight." Lying, Bruce thinks, to the only person who'd believe it: himself. "It didn't happen like that," Clark adds, a little distantly, gaze somewhere else. "He wasn't there when they buried me. I don't know why—"
"Hey, hey, whoa," Bruce says, smiling, and puts his hands over the backs of Clark's. "Sorry, I'm going to have to take a rain check on the dream analysis. I've got a meeting in the morning—stay or go, whatever you want, but I need at least a little sleep."
His tone is easy and friendly, his expression warm: nothing Clark can find upsetting or object to. And Clark's generous. He won't make a fuss.
"Right, of course," Clark says, and then, "sorry," again, with a quick apologetic little smile. He hesitates and glances at the master bed, and then at Bruce, and a flicker of something crosses his face, so fast it's hard to read—disappointment? Dismay? One last helpless spasm of fear, thinking about Batman standing over him in his coffin— "I should let you get back to bed," Clark adds, sliding one warm hand up to the back of Bruce's neck. "See you in the morning?"
"Of course," Bruce says, and leans in for a firm, pleasant, but ultimately dismissive kiss.
(There is no path out of this. There never was. He lost Clark weeks ago, months ago—he lost Clark before he ever met him, before Bruce learned how to look at him and see anything but the apocalypse.
There is no path out of this. Absolution was a pipe dream.
FILL: as to which may be the true; Bruce/Clark, identity porn (15/?)
It would make one hell of a segue, but it would also stop them cold: Bruce still can't let Clark undress him.
(After, maybe. If he tells Clark and then—if Clark still wants to.)
But he's on a precipice and he feels like it—wide-open space in front of him, nothing holding him back; and what risk can there be of falling when you've got Superman under you?
So he doesn't stop at Clark's shirt buttons, Clark's fly. He undoes Clark's cuffs, too, slides each sleeve down over Clark's arms and hands with deliberate, exacting care, letting his fingers skim Clark's skin the whole way down; when he looks up again Clark is staring at him, eyes wide, mouth red and wet and open, hectic hot color rising in his face. "Bruce," he says, sounding breathless and surprised, "Bruce—"
"Clark," Bruce returns with a smirk, leaning in, "Clark," and kisses the angle of the jaw, the reddening cheek, that shining-soft lower lip.
He takes Clark's belt off, works his pants open, without having to ease up; but to actually get them out of the way he needs to move again. Clark kicked his shoes off on their way through the door, managed to toe one sock off before Bruce had tackled him onto the master bed—Bruce shifts away to tug off the other one, and tosses it over his shoulder before Clark can snatch it out of his hand.
"Bruce, Jesus, you shouldn't just throw my dirty socks onto—what is that?" Clark squints. "Porcelain? Some kind of priceless Tang dynasty—"
"—sock-holder," Bruce concludes, and Clark snorts and then tilts his head back onto the bedspread, laughing.
It's gratifying how quickly he stops when Bruce's hands land on his hips.
Bruce had a pretty good idea what Clark's cock would look like—he's felt the size, the shape, the weight of it; he knows exactly how hard it gets right before Clark comes, exactly how deeply Clark will groan if Bruce wraps his hand around it firmly and exactly how sharply Clark will gasp if Bruce teases him, runs his fingers up the underside just so, brushes the head of it lightly.
But he hasn't gotten to see it, until now. He hasn't gotten to see any of this—had been stuck only imagining how Clark's thighs might look bare and tensed and shaking, how the muscles might play across Clark's shoulders each time he bites his lip and clenches his fists and says Bruce's name.
And then says it again.
"Hm?"
"I get it," Clark's saying, "you're enjoying the view," and a whole new flush works its way up his throat even as he laughs again. "But I vote you do something other than just look at me."
Bruce gives him a long considering stare. "Well, if you insist, Mr. Kent."
They've fucked before. That part's not new. Not that it isn't always a treat to slide one slick finger into Clark, two, three—not that Bruce hasn't had plenty of practice restraining himself before he can start trying to make Clark ask him for four. And he'll never, ever get tired of Clark's thighs under his hands, Clark's gasps in his ears; of the sheer incandescent sensation of driving into Clark an inch at a time, Clark's eyes squeezed shut and those big strong hands fisted in the sheets, in Bruce's shirt, like he's just trying to hang on for the ride.
But if the truth's going to come out—
Bruce Wayne wouldn't cradle Clark's face like that, wouldn't waste time running his hands over all the curves and angles of Clark's back and arms. But Bruce does it anyway. Bruce Wayne wouldn't fuck anybody this slowly, Bruce Wayne goes hard and gets his and is satisfied—but Bruce doesn't make himself stop pulling Clark's head up for kisses, or tracing a finger over the lines of Clark's mouth, the hollow of his throat, the shadowed dip and cut of muscle across his bare hips.
And Clark doesn't make him stop either. Clark lies there and lets him—the tacit permission would be staggering enough, but that's not all. Clark loves it. He comes once before Bruce's cock is even inside him, crying out almost in surprise. When Bruce eases him through it, kissing him, pressing close, he does get a hand in between them and say, "Bruce—your suit, you shouldn't—" half into Bruce's mouth.
But he laughs, bright and glad, when Bruce murmurs, "Fuck the suit." And he's Superman, he could shove Bruce off him whenever he wanted—but he doesn't. He pulls Bruce in like he's afraid Bruce is going to try to get up and leave in the middle; he opens up for Bruce's hands and mouth and cock without a moment's hesitation. He doesn't seem to care that Bruce is fucking him half-clothed, or if he does it's not because he finds it unappealing. He pushes back into Bruce's thrusts, clutching at Bruce's shoulders, eyes heavy-lidded, gasping unsteadily, and he lets Bruce take him apart.
The body is, of course, able, but the spirit is weak: Bruce isn't sure Clark can actually get tired, but he certainly looks it. He lets Bruce clean him up afterward, moving only the bare minimum Bruce demands of him, pinked up and warm and smiling. When Bruce goes to shuck the suit jacket at last, to trade the slacks for sleep pants, he comes back to find Clark still completely naked and also solidly asleep.
In the master bed.
Well. As long as Bruce takes his cufflinks out, it'll be fine. He's slept in less comfortable things than dress shirts.
They'll talk about Batman when Clark wakes up.
In the moment he comes awake, he's not sure why it's happened. He doesn't hear anything, cracks an eye and doesn't see anything—no light turned on, nothing obvious that would have roused him. There's a faint shaft of moonlight coming in the side window, but it's not falling on Bruce's face, and won't for another couple hours.
He blinks twice and is awake anyway: there must have been something, and Batman doesn't shrug off unusual circumstances, doesn't chalk things up to chance or coincidence. It's always nothing, until it isn't.
A moment to take account (where he is, what he's wearing, whether he can fight in it if he needs to), and that's when he realizes the bed is shaking.
Trembling, to be precise, with transferred movement. It's Clark who's shaking.
For an inexcusably long moment, Bruce can only stare at him: he looks terrible, eyes screwed shut, expression strange and fixed, his whole body seized up tight like he's restrained. There's something awful, all wrong, about the angle his neck is at, the way his sleeping head is turned—
Bruce reaches for him, easing over—over him, above him; and all at once, in a snap that feels like it should be audible, he understands.
He recognizes that look. He recognizes how Clark is lying. He hadn't grasped what he was looking at, from the side. But from overhead—he's closed his eyes ten thousand times and seen this scrawled on the backs of them, recreated for himself again and again every line and slant and curve that makes up the excruciating grimace on Clark's face.
Clark is dreaming about Batman.
Bruce can practically see the moment the kryptonite blade comes down, the silent re-enactment of a furrow being carved into Clark's cheek—it's in the way Clark's expression shifts, the harrowed helpless wince of pain—
And he's just fucking sitting here watching.
He grabs Clark's arm, his shoulder, but Clark doesn't wake. "Clark," he says, and then again more loudly, squeezing hard, because it's not as though he'll do any damage—
(Not more than he's already done.)
The sound and the motion come at the same time, like Clark's wordless cry is what's shoved Bruce across the room; but then Bruce slams into the wall and Clark's arms slam into him, steel bars against his chest. The breath's knocked out of him and his ears are ringing, Clark's face an inch away: the skin around Clark's eyes is crawling with shadows, lines of them like rotting roots, which makes no sense when his eyes themselves are shining through the dark, red as coals—
"Oh, god," Clark says.
In an instant, the steel bars are gone. Clark stumbles back a step, hands pressed over his eyes—the glow leaks out between his fingers for a moment, but then he shakes his head, mutters something to himself, and it stops.
"Sorry, sorry. Jesus—Bruce—are you okay?" Suddenly his hands are all over, moving just a little faster than human-normal, feeling along Bruce's arms and shoulders, the back of his head—
"Fine," Bruce says. "I'm fine."
It's a little harder to see Clark's eyes now that they aren't glowing, but the moonlight's reflecting off the carpet just enough to show the look of relief on Clark's face.
"God, I'm sorry," he says again, hands soft now, relaxed against Bruce's chest. "I've never had that one before—"
Before. Christ, how many have you had? How often does this happen? Is this what you've been doing in the west bedroom by yourself, while I lie in here and—
"Seemed exciting," Bruce hears himself say.
"Usually it's just about the coffin," Clark says, quiet and shamed and sorry. "That one—that must have been—" He clears his throat and lets out a shaky breath. "I—haven't seen Batman since I came back. I didn't know that would happen."
As if he should have. As if he ought to have known, and been more careful to keep away from Bruce.
As if his worst nightmare weren't in bed next to him all along.
"It's fine," Clark says. "It's not really that bad, I just wasn't expecting it tonight." Lying, Bruce thinks, to the only person who'd believe it: himself. "It didn't happen like that," Clark adds, a little distantly, gaze somewhere else. "He wasn't there when they buried me. I don't know why—"
"Hey, hey, whoa," Bruce says, smiling, and puts his hands over the backs of Clark's. "Sorry, I'm going to have to take a rain check on the dream analysis. I've got a meeting in the morning—stay or go, whatever you want, but I need at least a little sleep."
His tone is easy and friendly, his expression warm: nothing Clark can find upsetting or object to. And Clark's generous. He won't make a fuss.
"Right, of course," Clark says, and then, "sorry," again, with a quick apologetic little smile. He hesitates and glances at the master bed, and then at Bruce, and a flicker of something crosses his face, so fast it's hard to read—disappointment? Dismay? One last helpless spasm of fear, thinking about Batman standing over him in his coffin— "I should let you get back to bed," Clark adds, sliding one warm hand up to the back of Bruce's neck. "See you in the morning?"
"Of course," Bruce says, and leans in for a firm, pleasant, but ultimately dismissive kiss.
(There is no path out of this. There never was. He lost Clark weeks ago, months ago—he lost Clark before he ever met him, before Bruce learned how to look at him and see anything but the apocalypse.
There is no path out of this. Absolution was a pipe dream.
All that's left now is damage control.)