Chapter Text
Clark quickly stood up, moving across the room to Wayne. He bent down, reaching to help the other man out of his own zipties.
For a second, he thought he saw something predatory flash in Wayne’s eyes, gone as quickly as it’d appeared. The billionaire gave him a guileless smile, teeth still streaked with blood.
“Crazy how you found something to break the zipties with. I didn’t even see anything in here!”
Clark panicked briefly, then mimed holding a knife as he reached behind Wayne, snapping the plastic ties with a pinch of his fingers. His smile wobbled briefly as he looked back down at the other man.
“Guess it was my lucky day,” he said, feeling his cheeks redden slightly. “Anyway, we should probably escape.”
And once you’re safe, I’m coming back...
Wayne nodded, glancing at the door seriously. It was almost cute to watch him screw up his face, rallying his three brain cells to think of a plan. “We need to figure out where we are, and then look for an exit.”
Clark could see through walls, so the point was moot, but he digressed. “Right. Do you think they’ll notice us if we’re gone?”
Wayne winked at him, standing slowly. “Not if we’re quiet. And fast.”
Heat curled through his gut, snagging his attention. Clark shoved the attraction down, willing himself to focus.
“Okay. Let’s go.”
If he’d been anyone else other than Brucie Wayne right now, he was sure Kent would’ve caught on.
Stumbling into the hallway, he’d made himself giggle, catch Kent’s arm, and flirtatiously declare that the reporter was a “good luck charm” and that only his “impeccable bravery” could lead them to safety.
Perhaps he was laying it on a bit thick -- Brucie might not know what “impeccable” meant, but it seemed to shore up Kent’s shoulders. Which was good, considering he was Bruce’s only source of intel in an unfamiliar location.
Despite this, Kent blatantly using his X-Ray vision in front of him, confident that he wasn’t intelligent enough to notice, rankled more than a little. A small child -- not even one he’d trained -- could tell something was going on.
If anything, it made the charade a little easier on his end. All he had to do was giggle, pause at a hallway, and run a hand down Kent’s arm, teasing.
“Left or right?” he asked, deep down hating -- hating -- that Alfred would probably link up with them while he was still deep undercover like this.
Kent paused, scanning the corridor with distant eyes. “Left. I think there might be an exit up ahead.”
Internally, Bruce rolled his eyes. Externally, he widened them, looking aghast. “How do you know?”
Kent blinked, obviously not prepared -- still -- to be questioned on the source of his miraculous information. “I...uh…”
Bruce let him flounder, listening carefully as he let his own gaze go distant. Kent probably wouldn’t even notice -- Brucie was always sort of living in his own world.
If he wanted to escape with the mission completed, he still needed to get them to plug in the dummy phone. Short of walking into their tech room and plugging it in himself, that left him with limited options.
Especially if he had to convince Kent to come with him, if only to preserve the idiot’s tenuous grasp on his secret identity. Surely, with Brucie safe and sound somewhere, the idiot would probably fly right back to the warehouse without even changing his clothes.
There. He could hear voices down the hallway to their right. Guards patrolling, most likely, which meant wherever they’d put the phone, it was nearby.
Now to convince Kent to go that way.
“I think we should go right,” he pressed, tugging on Kent’s arm. “I have an idea.”
Kent blushed at his overly flirtatious tone, as he had been all night, then looked conflicted. Without giving away his powers, he couldn’t exactly make an argument one way or the other why they couldn’t go Brucie’s direction.
Bruce prayed that it stayed that way, and Kent didn’t take the risk of revealing himself, but he didn’t have high hopes.
“Awesome. Let’s go!”
Clark felt a twinge of nervousness up his spine as Wayne led them directly toward the men who’d kidnapped them, hanging off his arm and doing so much insinuating with his eyes, Clark was worried he’d break something.
It was almost like Wayne wanted them to get caught. He shook his head, dismissing that thought entirely. If anything, Wayne probably thought he was helping.
Which was, frankly, adorable. He’d never sensed outright maliciousness from Wayne, only a desire to help others. It wasn’t the billionaire’s fault his worldview was so...limited.
Now, however, impressively recovered from his earlier injuries, Wayne seemed to be teasing the thread of attraction between them, flirting in between every breath until Clark was flustered enough to stop paying attention to their surroundings.
When they were a few rooms away from where the kidnappers seemed to be set up, he fought through the haze of embarrassment and lust, shaking his head.
“We should turn back. This definitely isn’t the way out,” he protested, looking around. “We might get caught again.”
Wayne shrugged, looking around without a care in the world. “I need to find my phone. Pretty sure it must be around here somewhere.”
“Wait,” Clark said, actually surprised, “we’re looking for your phone? ”
“I need it,” Wayne said, like it explained everything. For him, it almost did. “Why do you look upset?”
“We need to escape,” Clark said, voice rising, “It’s not safe here!”
“Shhhhh,” Wayne said, grabbing his bicep. “Come here. I think I heard something.”
He let the billionaire shove him into a small closet, closing the door behind them. To Clark’s astonishment, two men walked down the hallway a second later, clearly patrolling.
He hadn’t even thought to listen to them, too busy being shocked by Wayne’s materialism. It was just a phone -- Wayne could buy the entirety of Apple as simply as normal citizens bought new iPhones. Several times over.
They waited until the footsteps passed in silence. Once Clark was satisfied they were far enough away, he reached for the door.
Wayne caught his wrist, shaking his head.
“Not yet.”
“We can’t stay in here forever,” Clark said, anxiety growing, “We need to--hey. What are you doing?”
Wayne had sunk to his knees, looking up at him imploringly through his lashes. His lips were pursed, heat simmering in his eyes.
“Think you can stay quiet?”
Keeping Kent distracted and somewhat willing to adhere to his plan had been fairly easy, so far.
Yet, as they clearly stumbled closer to the people Kent wanted to “protect” him from, his resolve had strengthened, protectiveness flaring in the way he held his shoulders, in the way he gazed at Bruce.
It wasn’t enough to distract him from the overall plan, but the tension between them seemed to burn for a moment, as Bruce considered Kent’s position -- that he was something to be protected. Cherished, even.
It would be laughable to anyone back at the Manor, but that concern caught at something within Bruce, tugging at him. Something primal.
It was almost too easy to kneel in front of the other man, mind whirring through a million other ways to distract the reporter other than this.
No, he wanted to. He really, really kind of did.
“Think you can stay quiet?” he asked, looking up and knowing what kind of picture he made, pupils dilated and lips slightly open.
Kent immediately went beet red, opening his mouth. No sound came out, and he closed it a moment later, clearly trying to find words.
Bruce let a hand drift across the front of Kent’s pants, teasing. “You don’t have to say yes…”
“Wayne --”
“Bruce, please,” he said, letting his voice deepen. Not too close to the Batman’s growl -- that would be too risky -- but close enough. “Just a yes or a no, Kent…”
“Clark,” Kent insisted, swallowing hard. His throat worked up and down. “C-call me Clark.”
“Clark,” Bruce said, humming around the name. He looked up again. “Yes?”
The other man swallowed again, eyes wide and pupils dilated. He was breathing heavily, despite the lack of need for it. “Y- yes.”
Bruce reached for Kent-- Clark’s-- pants, briefly debating the ethics of sexual intercourse under a false identity. He undid the zipper, sliding them down, and decided that their relative secret identities -- yet undiscussed -- probably cancelled each other out.
He’d prepared himself for a little warm up, knowing he hadn’t given the other man much warning, only to find himself pleasantly surprised. Clark was rock hard against his stomach, his cock a long bulge that nearly sprung out the top of his boxers, precome already darkening the fabric.
Impressive. Bruce whistled his surprise softly, getting an aggrieved sound from Clark above him.
“Shhh,” he said, ghosting a breath over the damp underwear. The other man twisted, a low keening noise escaping him. “You’re beautiful. Don’t worry.”
Bruce rolled his underwear down, letting Clark’s cock spring free. He made sure to lock eyes with the reporter, asking one final time for permission.
The other man nodded, looking dazed. He was still breathing heavily, looking absolutely floored by what was about to happen.
Bruce wondered about the last time Clark had let someone do this for him. It had to have been a while, considering how desperate he seemed, halfway to coming without even being touched.
So sensitive, he recalled, leaning forward. With a slow, agonizing pace, he swallowed the other man down to the root, throat working gently around him in tantalizing contractions.
Clark made a muffled sound, like he’d been punched, and let his head fall back, hitting the wall with a soft thunk.
Bruce smiled around the cock in his mouth, slowly working it up and down, twisting his tongue around the head as he did. His lips strained slightly around the girth, so he made each move up and down count.
Clark groaned as he sped up, his cock slamming into the back of his throat with every stroke. Bruce kept a tight hold on his gag reflex, smirking internally as he felt the other man’s hips twitch against him.
He pulled off with a pop, licking his lips. Above him, Clark looked absolutely wrecked, blinking slowly as he processed the sudden halt.
“You can fuck my throat as hard as you like,” he growled up at the reporter, “but you have to stay quiet.”
Clark’s cock twitched at the words, growing impossibly harder in his hand. With a pointed look, Bruce took him into his mouth again, restarting with a pace that left the other man with little time to brace himself.
He felt his amusement grow as Clark still held back, clearly worried about hurting him. So goddamned polite…
With a hidden smirk, he reached his other hand between the reporter’s legs, finding his perineum and pressing down suddenly.
Above him, something shattered, the pieces sprinkling down as Clark grabbed Bruce’s hair with a shout, fucking deeply into his throat and coming in short, furious spurts that left him trembling.
Bruce swallowed obligingly, wincing internally. There was no way someone didn’t hear that.
Sure enough, just as he’d coaxed a gasping Clark back into his pants, the closet door flew open, revealing two guards.
From his position on the floor -- still kneeling and flushed, covered in what looked like the pieces of a mop -- Bruce gave a casual wave.
“Hey boys!”
Clark’s face was burning in embarrassment as they were led down the hallway.
To be fair, it had been burning on and off ever since he’d run into Bruce Wayne -- just Bruce, now, and how weird was that? -- but he was certain he was the reddest he’d ever been in his entire life.
He’d also been the hardest he’d ever felt in his life, which was the cause of their current predicament.
To his relief, they weren’t taken back to the room they’d woken up in. Instead, the guards took them to what looked like the main hub for their operation, full of computers, schematics, and a few corkboards with photos pinned to them, connected by red string.
The sheer cliché of the moment nearly overwhelmed him, and he let out a slightly-strangled chuckle. For some reason, Bruce turned toward him, and they shared a similar look: what the fuck are these idiots doing.
At the front of one of the tables stood the man Clark suspected of being the ringleader in the bathroom extraction, mask finally off. He was older, grey in the temples and clearly displeased.
“You let them escape?” he asked the two guards.
“I have no idea how they got out of the zipties, sir,” one of the guards said, looking nervous. “We found them in the hallway closet…”
He trailed off, to Clark’s relief, feeling his face heat up.
“Whatever,” the leader said, “I needed Wayne anyway. Might as well interrogate them here.”
Clark glanced at Bruce, his worry spiking. The other man seemed to be... thinking? Or something close to it. Maybe he was just tired from their previous activities.
The leader approached, stopping in front of the billionaire. “Mr. Wayne?”
“Yes?” Bruce responded pleasantly, if a little distant.
“I need the passcode to your phone. Don’t make me ask again.”
Clark felt his eyes begin to burn, fists clenching at his sides. He remembered exactly how they’d asked last time. It had left Bruce beaten half to death, drugged and alone.
“I already told you. I don’t remember it,” Bruce said, shrugging. “I have too many phones.”
“Oh, for--” the older man cut himself off, unholstering his gun and pressing it against Bruce’s forehead. “Tell me what it is!”
Clark’s stomach plummeted as he watched the man’s finger, hovering slightly over the trigger. Was he fast enough to get in between them if he chose to fire? He couldn’t breathe, focused intensely on the way the muzzle pressed against the billionaire’s skin.
Bruce, unphased by the gun, shrugged again. He smiled up at their captor. “I guess I could try.”
The man dropped the gun, gesturing at one of the guards, and Clark could breathe again, chest unfreezing.
They needed to get out of here -- quickly.
So far, Bruce’s backup plan was going well.
Barring the brief moment Kent’s eyes had flashed red, which he was certain no one had noticed but him, they’d managed to get into the room with the phone and their central computer setup.
But their captors were still in the room with them. And that made plugging in the phone and getting out before it fried everything with an EMP pulse a tad bit harder. Not impossible -- but harder.
His dummy phone was shoved unceremoniously into his hands, clearly still unopened. God, but these criminals were stupid. Jason would be smothering him with the “I told you so’s” when he returned to the Manor.
He’d really had higher hopes. Ah well. Maybe a dumber approach was the solution, after all.
For a moment, Bruce fiddled with the phone, drawing up one of the failsafe screens he’d left, pretending to try and enter his passcode.
“Oh crap,” he said, letting a hint of uncertainty thread through his voice. “It says I need to...update? Before I can open it again.”
The older man -- Dominic Cass, if his intel wasn’t mistaken -- frowned, glancing down at the phone. “What?”
“It says I need to plug it in and let it update.” He showed him the screen, keeping the innocent expression firmly on his face. “See?”
He saw the gun whipping toward him and sighed internally, knowing he had to let the hit land. The gun caught him across the temple, slamming his head to the side.
“So plug it in!”
A few feet away, Clark looked about ready to burst. He could see the red in his eyes starting again, and shifted their timetable up a few minutes. One of them had to get out of here with a little plausible deniability, and it wasn’t going to be him, it seemed.
Whatever can’t be explained by eccentricity isn’t worth explaining, Alfred said in his mind. Bruce smiled to himself, tasting the bitter iron of blood again. Wise words indeed.
Kent seemed gullible enough. It might work.
“Do you have a cord?” he asked their captor pleasantly. A second later, one of the guards handed him one, looking slightly sheepish. “Lovely. Thank you.”
He crossed toward the computer, Dominic watching him, and plugged the phone into the main PC he could see. They had about two minutes, now.
Plenty of time.
“Did you know that a few years ago, I was thinking about buying a warehouse too?” he asked the group. “It was going to be renovated into apartments. I always loved that industrial feel. Something about the old bricks.”
In the ensuing silence, Clark finally obliged him. “No, I didn’t know that, Mr. Wayne.”
Bruce checked his watch, humming to himself. “I thought I told you to call me Bruce.”
“R-right. Of cour--”
Before Kent could finish that thought, he was leaping into action, grabbing the barrel of Dominic’s gun and slamming his fist into the man’s unprotected elbow. With a howl, Dominic dropped the gun entirely, cradling his dislocated joint.
Bruce wasted no time, dispatching the older man with a brutal kick to the temple, then catching a blow on his forearm from behind before he could remember he wasn’t wearing armor.
The two guards circled him, fists up. Bruce almost laughed.
A quick jab, a few kicks, and one somewhat show-offy flip later, the two men were down on the floor, out cold. Just on time, the desktop pinged, signaling the start of his program.
“Time to get out of here,” he said to a gaping Kent, grabbing his arm. “Let’s go.”
Wordlessly, Kent followed him into the hallway and out toward the doors, never questioning how he knew the right way. He was probably still in shock.
They got out into the parking lot and Bruce paused, finally catching his breath. If Alfred wasn’t already on his way, then the program activating would make sure he was.
“How-- how did you--with--” Kent babbled, wide-eyed. “Why didn’t you do that before!”
Now it was Bruce’s time to flounder for an answer.
“They, uh, took me by surprise,” he mumbled, letting his head dip in faux embarrassment. “And I was...scared.”
Kent raised an eyebrow, clearly not buying that. “That didn’t look like you were scared to me.”
“Well, I’ve only had a few lessons,” he said, smiling, “I have this personal trainer shipped in from Israel once a month, she’s amazing. Teaches a blend of krav maga and martial arts with added Zumba and Pilates frameworks. It’s quite something. Lot’s of kick-dancing and Pitbull songs, really. Have you ever tried Zumba? It’s exhausting !”
He could practically feel the way Kent’s eyes glazed over. Good.
“I can’t wait to tell Gal all about this exciting little misadventure,” he said, smiling wide. It wasn’t solely for Kent’s benefit anymore -- he could see Alfred’s car in the distance, a few warehouses away. “And my prince in shining armor.”
That got the desired effect. Kent blushed prettily, ducking his head. His eyes were a piercing blue in the low light, warm and carefully amused.
He really needs to stop wearing glasses , Bruce thought.
Clark was still processing Bruce’s explanation -- and the last thirty minutes, frankly -- when a gleaming Rolls-Royce pulled up in front of them, beeping promptly.
Bruce grinned at the driver, waving. “Alfred!”
So it was his butler. He couldn’t find it in himself to be surprised -- Wayne’s minder was infamous for his caretaking responsibilities. Of course he’d managed to track them down.
Alfred leaned out of the window, looking only mildly impressed by the debacle his ward had gotten into.
“If you could get in the car, sir,” he said, glancing at Clark. “Will Master Kent be needing a ride as well?”
Bruce jumped into the backseat, rolling his own window down. He leaned out toward Clark, hanging over the glass.
“No, I don’t think so,” he said, winking at Clark, “Mr. Kent has his own transportation back to Metropolis, I believe.”
“I do?” he asked, confused.
“I’m sure you’ll think of something on the fly, Mr. Kent,” Bruce said, winking again. Clark’s stomach dropped as the billionaire started rolling up the window, everything around him shuddering to a halt.
He knew. He knew the whole time.
“Wait,” he said, putting a hand out. Wayne paused accordingly, another guileless smile across his face. “I--”
A thousand questions swirled within him, begging to be asked. Instead, he opened his mouth and asked the dumbest one.
“What about your, uh, phone?” he said awkwardly, “I know you wanted to go back for it.”
Inside the building, something began to spark, spreading across the room they’d just vacated. With a muffled boom, the power for the entire building went out, leaving them in the dark.
Wayne glanced at his watch, humming. There was a smirk curving his lips, ever so slightly.
“I decided I didn’t need it anymore, I suppose.”
“Master Kent,” Alfred nodded at him, shifting into drive. Clark stood back obligingly.
Wayne winked at him as the car started to move, grinning wickedly. “Call me?”
“You don’t have your phone,” Clark said dumbly.
“Oh dear. You’re right,” Wayne said, looking momentarily perplexed, “I’ll figure it out.”
“Sure,” Clark said, grinning. “Mr. Wayne.”
“Mr. Kent.”
The window rolled up. By the time the Rolls-Royce was out of sight, he was still smiling.
The End!