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It isn’t often that criminals get a one-up on Bruce. It’s even less often that they’re able to get within five feet of him and are able to do anything with the close proximity. He can see the news articles now: ‘Batman wounded in fight with escaped convict! Gotham vigilante losing his edge?’, ‘Man, or Bat? The Dark Knight flaps his wings into the night at the sight of the shining Superman.’, ‘Guns 1, Batman 0!’
With a groan Bruce makes a mental note to purchase a bottle of scotch just to read those amature columns, surely they’d make for a late-night pick me up like some comedy reel. Tonight was a complete shit show; somehow the security in Arkham Asylum allowed an incarcerated man to slip through their fingers and back out into Gotham within two hours of his court hearing.
Sloppy fucking operation.
The man had broken into, and robbed, a gun store when Bruce finally found him again and the two had a… Less than ideal run in with each other that resulted in Bruce being shot and the man being detained by Metropolis’s pride and joy.
As Bruce slumps further into his chair he’s careful not to jostle the wound on his side. A clean through shot, all things considered. It’s one thing to be shot, it’s another to have to dig the bullet out yourself.
Bruce feels fucking sticky, claustrophobic in his own gear and he begins the process of undressing.
Leather slips against skin with a kiss, limbs squeezed and rubbed raw from the night’s work as Bruce makes careful work to remove the harnesses around his thighs, straps wet with sweat, buckles eager to unfasten. Most nights he wouldn’t bother with such tenderness, such care for his own belongings, much less for his own body. He may not have the superhuman restoration that Clark has, but he will heal in time. For now the pain in his stomach is little more than a low throb, matched with the tingling that tickles his thigh as blood returns to flesh.
Most nights. Lately Bruce hasn’t been alone to strip the persona of justice with his own hands.
The batarangs clink together as he sets them aside, uncaring about the ever increasing scratches and scuffs on his desk that litter the glossed wood like his own scars. Oh well. He’ll buy a new one eventually when he cares enough about it, maybe light ash or walnut instead of mahogany. The leather straps that make up the harnesses come next; tossed on top of the faux daggers. If Clark were here…
A low, disbelieving laugh, more of a heavy exhalation out of his nose than anything, slips from his lips as easily as a sigh. If Clark were here. A thought he doesn’t dare entertain. A proverbial can of worms even the venerable Batman is hesitant to open.
It’s not as though he holds contempt for the man, much of the opposite in fact, if there were a gun to his head that forced him to admit it. From the way his night has gone... Bruce shoves the feelings down before they can become more than a twist in his stomach, a flutter in his heart. Clark had made his feelings on the matter, about Bruce, abundantly clear the day he stood proud and told Bruce he’d always remember the way his heartbeat sounds.
Bruce scrubs his non-bloody hand through his hair and slicks it away from his forehead, leans back into the cool leather of his chair as if that will cure his racing mind. Clark… Damn it all.
Memories of their last rendezvous taunt Bruce with phantom brushes of a warm hand against his cheek, breath ghosting across his neck, the swipe of a tongue down his sternum. Bruce shudders, squeezes his eyes shut to escape the way his cock twitches. He won’t entertain it tonight. He won’t. There are things he needs to do…
Bruce always was an imaginative child, though.
Thoughts of sun-kissed skin crowded over his, beauty marks and freckles mapped out in seas of constellations a world so far from Earth replicated with ease, fingers pressing into his hips to urge him closer, closer. “C”mon, one more for me, please. That’s it Bruce, just like that— just for me. Please Bruce, please—”
Bruce slams his palm against the desk and stands like the chair itself shocked him and the damned thing rolls away from the force of it as the door to his study receives a heavy knock.
“A guest, Master Wayne. Shall I send them up?”
Now?
Bruce’s heart hammers against his chest like a war drum despite the blood rapidly filling out his cock. He can’t catch his fucking breath. “I am not seeing visitors at the moment, Alfred, please send them my regards.”
“Not even me?”
Bruce’s head snaps up at the light that pools into the darkened room, Clark’s face outlined in a golden glow as he smiles and pokes his head around the door, his dimples casting pillow-soft shadows across his cheeks.
Why him? Why now?
“I doubt you’d leave even if I asked” —Bruce knows that’s not true as he waves Clark in. He says it anyway with a sigh, feigning annoyance when he is anything but— “come in, Clark.”
Clark enters and closes the door behind himself with a muted click, his smile unchanging even as Bruce turns his attention back to stripping himself of leather and spandex, uncaring of the eyes he feels roving over his body in calculated passes.
It’s not like he’s never been naked around Clark before, nor is he ashamed of the way he looks.
“You’re so perfect— so beautiful all for me. Fuck, Bruce, I’m—”
Bruce wishes he’d turned them away now, the rampant thoughts made worse by the object of such desire padding closer to the desk, eyes full of worry.
“Bruce?” Clark calls, palms flat against the desk as he leans closer. Bruce can see the veins in his arms, the toned muscle that flexes and protects so selflessly, arms that he’s seen choke a man to unconsciousness, not death— never death. He can smell the car exhaust and grime of Gotham’s criminal underbelly in Clark’s musk, the last hour of aftershave and cologne that cling to his skin, an intoxicating sea of scents that’s so undeniably Clark and yet so akin to the city Bruce calls home.
Bruce feels fucking drunk on it. On him.
“Your heart rate is erratic, are you okay?”
“I’m doing fine.” Bruce answers quickly as he peels off his thin undershirt, hissing softly at the way the fabric has dried on top of the scabbed over wound at his side. “Thank you for your concern, though, I’ll send an edible arrangement to the Daily Planet for compensation.”
That’s not enough and Bruce knows it not with Clark ‘won’t take I’m fine as an answer’ Kent standing mere feet from him. He’s a walking, breathing, irritating MRI machine of a man. Damn him. Damn everything.
“I don’t want fancy fruit, Bruce,” Clark laughs, the sound sweet like spun sugar on Bruce’s tongue; a sound reserved only for the quiet moments shared between friends. Friends. That’s what Bruce has convinced himself they are. Just friends. “Besides, I don’t think I can explain to my coworkers just why Bruce Wayne would be sending gifts to my desk.”
Fair point.
Bruce can feel blood drip down his hip in a ticklish roll, knows Clark can smell it from where he is. There’s no point in trying to hide anything.
“Make yourself useful then,” he says instead, “there is a first aid kit in the liquor cabinet over there. Bring it here for me.” Despite knowing Clark most likely has x-rayed through every wall in his house Bruce points with his chin to the aforementioned cabinet and watches for a brief moment as his companion pads over where directed.
Ever the errand boy. Bruce chuckles inwardly at his teasing remark and swipes the blood away with his fingers before it can go much further, he cringes at the tackiness of it rapidly drying and staining his skin.
Bruce startles at the feeling of hands holding onto his thighs, of fingers that squeeze and knead the life back into the raised, red welts of where his gear belts had rested. Clark is kneeling between Bruce’s legs, gazing up at him with a worried, puppy-eyed expression, lips turned down in a pout.
“You wear those far too tight, Bruce.”
A selfish part of Bruce locks the image away deep in his mind; Superman, on his knees, looking as though he’s about to beg. A shiver climbs its way up Bruce’s spine leaving goosebumps raised in its wake. He’s still hard from the betrayal of thoughts from earlier.
Heat rises to Bruce’s cheeks and he turns his head away, not-so-subtly hiding behind the hand propped beneath his chin. It’s too much to look at Clark right now, too much to focus on the way Clark gives the reddened flesh his full attention. He’s never known him to do things half-assed.
Bruce’s mind fills in the lack of Clark in his vision with more memories. Memories of Clark’s fingers petting over his prostate, milking him for every drop with words of encouragement, praise dipped in honey and rolled in sugar; the finest dessert all for Bruce to savour. Clark’s lips are always so soft even as they press between his shoulder blades, as they murmur his name in prayer.
“You’re doing so well, Bruce, that’s it. Can I have one more, just one I promise, please? You’re so… So fucking perfect, thank you, thank you Bruce—”
“Is this why you left?”
“What do you mean?” Bruce asks stubbornly, blinks away the phantom feeling of Clark’s chest pressed to his back. None of that right now he scolds himself.
“I… Superman, came to help, and you left,” Clark’s voice sounds distraught, blanketed in concern. “You were shot?”
“It’ll heal.”
“We both know you’re too stubborn to give it time to heal properly.”
Bruce glances away again, avoids Clark’s eyes the same way he’s avoiding his comment. “I was unaware this had become an intervention, Mr. Kent.”
A soft sigh falls from Clark’s lips instead of words. Bruce is wrong for that and he knows it, but he never asked for help. He hadn’t asked Clark here, much less asked him to worry so much. Friends. Friends don’t….
White hot pain blooms against Bruce’s side that quickly numbs to a painful throb, the cool press of wet cloth following like a tease. For a split second it reminds him of ice cubes, of ice-cooled lips and searing heat, dual sensations that once had him on the edge for hours.
Bruce nearly jumps out of his chair, his hand instinctively flying to grab a fistful of Clark’s hair like an anchor to keep him afloat. “I’m sorry,” Clark isn’t sorry, Bruce can hear the way he smiles around the word. “I need to clean your wound before it gets infected.”
“Warn me next time.”
“I did warn you.”
Bruce doesn’t let go of Clark’s hair with the next pass of the alcohol soaked cotton around the entry point, carefully lifting the blood from his skin like pigment from a painter’s palette. It hurts, part of him says and squirms away from the sensation. It feels good, the other part muses. His wires are crossed, have been crossed for a long time, but here? Now? They might as well have been the same fucking wire this entire time.
Sucking in a breath Bruce holds it in his lungs until they burn, breathes out as slow as he can to keep the jack hammering of his heart to a minimum. Clark’s hair is so soft between his fingers, his dark curls circling like jewelry Bruce wouldn’t mind wearing for the rest of his life; Bruce can’t help but pet through them.
He’s still undeniably aroused, only made worse by the pleasure-pain of Clark cleaning him up. The act is incredibly domestic.
“Bruce,” hot breath fans across his abdomen and Bruce, against his better judgment, looks down to meet Clark’s eyes. Sees the conflict of sheer want battling with the urge to protect. It’s clear which side has won when he speaks again. “May I?”
“Are these the small town manners of Clark Kent I’ve heard so much about?” Bruce teases through the stutter in his heart, through the breath that catches in his throat. It’s mean to pick on him like this, but Bruce isn’t known for his chivalrous nature.
Bruce’s soul almost comes out of his skin at the way Clark worries his bottom lip. Like a child caught swiping cookies from the jar before dinner. “Please, Bruce.”
“As if I would say no to you,” Bruce whispers.
The relief Bruce feels as the cool night air hits his cock is borderline euphoric when Clark pulls the briefs down his hips, shimmying the fabric to rest just below the still pink puckerings of batarang indentations.
Clark’s hand is hot against his skin, the friction made slick with precum that Clark laps up with his tongue, kisses the plush head of his cock with near reverence before taking him in to the hilt. They’re just getting started and Bruce is strung tight, a hairline trigger that will go off at any moment and Clark is tiptoeing dangerously close to the sensor.
“I’ve always wondered” —Bruce lurches forward a bit as Clark runs his tongue along the underside of his cock, his other hand tangling to meet the fingers at the back of Clark’s head— “just who taught the Beacon of Hope how to use his mouth like this.”
Clark only hums in response and wraps his hand around Bruce to give him a few wet tugs, the sensation sending shockwaves through Bruce that reverberate out of his throat in a breathy moan, long and drawn out. He has wondered, though, all things considered, because it certainly wasn’t him.
Bruce’s pulse drums in his ears, drowned out by the lewd sounds of Clark sucking him off. He’s not going to last. He never lasts long when it comes to Clark. Bruce preferred running long distance over sprints in his youth anyway, it’s no secret that Batman has a seemingly unending supply of stamina.
“Clark—” Bruce warns halfheartedly at the feeling coiling in his belly like a viper preparing to strike but Clark only doubles down, his nose nestled against the dark hair above his cock. The feeling of Clark swallowing around him, the sight of his mouth full of cock, Bruce can only whine in warning.
The orgasm shoots through Bruce like a bullet, pleasure sparking behind his eyes in Clark shaped visages, the moans that spill from his lips sounding more and more like a name as he spills down Clark’s throat. Clark hums once more in response, greedily swallowing every drop he milks out of Bruce.
“I need you,” Bruce hears himself say, watches from outside of his own body at the way his hands scramble to cup Clark’s cheeks and raise him up from his knees, lips slick with spit and cum. “Clark, please.”
Clark kisses Bruce without hesitation like it’s the only thing that will keep him alive. Their teeth knock together from the force of it and that only serves to raise another moan from Bruce’s throat. To think that he is so capable of fraying the threads that hold Superman’s self control in its steadfast place, he is the one who has become the subject of all of Clark’s affection.
Clark’s. The possessiveness of the word burns like liquor on Bruce’s tongue. Friends don’t end up in this position, friends don’t worry like Clark worries, they don't care like Clark cares. Friends. The rational part of Bruce’s mind knows that’s far from the correct label to put on any of what they’ve done, if there is a label to put on it at all.
The only label he wants…
“Yours,” Bruce breathes against Clark’s mouth, the word a reverent prayer on his lips; a promise long gone unspoken, shared between two souls.