Hiya.

So it turns out I am SuperBat trash. I dunno how or why that happened, especially since I hate Batman with the biggest rage boner that's ever graced this planet. I'm also very set on avoiding all work in the world, including and especially the fics I have going and should be finishing instead of introducing a new piece. But at least this one is finished. I'll upload the other two chapters in an moment.

-Cro

When Clark Kent finally woke up, it was to harsh sunlight piercing through his super-sensitive eyelids. He groaned and smashed his freezing pillow to his face, arguing to himself that he'd earned a late morning, or even, he thought hopefully, a day off. Journalists don't get days off, and neither, for that matter, do superheroes.

Superman stubbornly clenched his eyes closed, but one of the reasons he'd flown to his Fortress of Solitude following the Justice League's late-night battle with Lex Luthor was because he knew he'd need the extra kick of the bitter cold to get himself back to work the next day. He thought longingly of the warm, cozy apartment he kept in Metropolis, where after being exposed to as much Kryptonite as he had been, he could draw the curtains tight and sleep off the weakness in his limbs.

But there are no such luxuries for heroes, and being that he was nearly four hundred miles away from a decent cup of coffee, nor arctic dwellers. He groaned and, as resentfully as a good American boy from Smallville, Kansas could, threw himself out of bed.

That the kryptonite poisoning was still not out of his system was obvious when he found himself facedown upon the ice floor of his fortress. How nice a day off would feel on his exhausted muscles! Hypothetically.

But instead of giving into his impulses, Clark carefully pulled his civvies over his fresh, yet temporary, bruises, and gently pulled his Superman suit over those.

It had been a while since Lex Luthor used kryptonite on him. Bruce Wayne made it his business to purchase and control the supply. Once, he sold Luthor a hunk of charcoal painted green. Clark relished the memory of Luthor's face when he discovered the ruse to the tune of alien fists, as he slipped on the ice and crashed to his already bruised knees. He tried to ignore the human pain and leapt into the sky, though he clumsily stumbled on actual thin air.

Flying through Winnipeg, as he neared his favorite Tim Horton's he realized that he'd left his wallet in his Fortress of Solitude- and, patting his chest at the breast pocket under his suit, his glasses.

Stupendous. But Clark Kent knew that he couldn't trust himself to fly back to the North Pole and not fling himself back into bed to curse every Thursday he would ever have to endure again. So he flew on, pointedly speeding up every time he caught the scent of freshly baked croissants with his super nose.

Barely ten minutes had passed since Clark had woken up when he passed Gotham. Gotham was not exactly out of his way, and he thought gently that somewhere in that crime-ridden city slept an exhausted Bruce Wayne, likely bandaged to the neck by his faithful butler after Clark had dropped him off just shy of midnight, bruised and bloodied and stubbornly refusing to feel the wounds from Luthor's dozens of kryptonite-tipped bullets.

Alfred!

Clark often joked with Bruce that Alfred never slept, citing the fact that despite all the odd hours he visited Bruce, or dropped off Batman, he had never once not been greeted with a cup of tea and a cookie or two (Clark refused to call them "biscuits.")

Contemplating this, Superman decided to hang a left and pick up Batman for the damage control meeting the Justice League had called at the Watch Tower this morning.

In no time at all, Clark Kent touched down at the Wayne manor and tapped the knocker politely. It being barely dawn, he didn't worry too much about being seen by nosy citizens. The only ones up in Gotham at this hour were criminals, and it was well that they should see the streak of blue and red soar across Gotham; those that were not cowed by the threat of the Dark Knight were likely to be put off their activities until they watched Superman leave.

But though Superman could hear movement beyond Wayne Manor's magnificent door, no one came to answer. This puzzled Clark- Alfred made it a point never to let a guest wait more than twenty seconds at the door, no matter how many secret passages and high-speed elevators his old bones had to take. Confused, Clark knocked again.

"C'ming," a muffled and pained voice gasped from within. "'M c'ming."

Clark was taken aback. "Alfred? Are you okay?! I'm coming in!"

He ignored the feeble protests and slammed his body against the heavy door, snapping the lock and letting himself in in a panic.

But Alfred was nowhere to be seen. Instead, a hunched figure leaning against a beautifully wrought table in the foyer appraised Superman with annoyance. "I said I was coming," Bruce Wayne groaned.

"Bruce?" Clark asked, dumbfounded. "What are you doing up? You need to get some rest, you need to…" Clark drifted off as his eyes travelled down his friend's body. The bloodied bandages were loose and clumsily wrapped, as if he'd had to apply them himself, and his face was wracked with pain and exhaustion; he's gotten as far last night of taking off his pants, but didn't seem to have gotten to his pajamas yet, said the pinstriped boxers. Instinctively, Clark dashed to Bruce's side and caught him as he stumbled forward.

"Where's Alfred?" Clark asked as he led the scourge of Gotham's underworld inside his mansion. "Is he actually sleeping?"

The joke was ill-received, if it was received at all. "Alfred took some vacation time," Bruce said weakly. "He's in Paris for a few weeks, and I'm perfectly capable of taking care of myself." But Clark noted that he didn't try to struggle as Clark repositioned his arm around the wounded waist.

"So you put yourself back together last night?"

Bruce snorted grimly. "Barely."

"Why didn't you tell me you were alone when I dropped you off? I could've stayed, I could've-"

"No," Bruce said shortly, and the image of Batman throwing himself between Superman and Lex Luthor's fatal machine gun flashed, unbidden, into Clark's mind, and mortified, he settled Bruce softly onto the sitting room sofa.

"Would you like some aspirin?" Clark asked gently, trying to convey the only contrition the famous Batman would ever accept. "Coffee?"

"I was just in the middle of preparing the coffee," Bruce grimaced, but as he struggled to stand up, Clark pushed him firmly back down.

"I can get it," he insisted.

"But you don't know how to use a French press."

"I'll figure it out. If Flash can manage it, I don't think I should be worried." He let the joke about Flash and his passion for caffeine in all its various forms hang in the air, but Bruce Wayne let it fall dead as he closed his eyes against a fresh wave of pain.

"And then we'll see about getting you properly bandaged up," Clark added, hesitating before heading to the massive kitchen to find his partner a little relief.