Title: Before a Live Studio Audience (Transcripts from an Unaired Episode of 'U.S. Cops'), Chapter 10

Author: Ren Makoto

Pairing: Clark/Matches, Clark/Hemingford, Clark/Bruce, etc., etc., and so forth. Kara, Dick Grayson, Scarecrow.

Warnings: Adult themes, language, not beta-read.

Summary: Cousins and comrades and Cranes (Oh, my). Clark's weekend off is spent in interesting ways. Banter, undercover cops, and coffee! Yay!

::

Saturday

Clark had only one think he absolutely had to do and that wasn't until lunchtime so his morning was free.

And *he* was free for the first time in weeks, back in the city he called home. His first impression after stepping of the train was: Metropolis is very sparkly.

His eyes were practically stinging from all the sparkle and it was great. He couldn't remember the last time he'd seen anything sparkle. Well, Malone's big teeth and ugly glasses kinda sparkled. And Hemingford's eyes.

But Gotham didn't do sparkly. And like his city, certainly nothing about Bruce Wayne sparkled. So Clark soaked it all up, stored it for later. He'd need all the glittery goodness he could get to make it through another week once he went back to that damned city.

The train from Metropolis to Gotham was always so very short. It was unnerving to think that this much corruption was always just a quick jaunt away.

So, it was his first off day in forever and the list of things he could very well do read like this:

1) Go see Lois ('cause if I'm careful, I can be where she is and make it look like a coincidence. "Lois?! Wow, I didn't know you had coffee at this coffee shop EVERY Saturday at eleven and that your order a grande vanilla latte with banana nut bread every time unless they're out and then you curse and have a tantrum until they find or make you some. Not a freakin' clue.")

2) Hang out in his apartment, cleaning and being mopey

3) Go see his shrink about his stupid, stupid dreams

The shrink option won hands down, mainly because he was pretty sure Lois would know he was lying. Also, he wanted to get his head together. It had been a very strange week.

But once he was through the doors at the tasteful, downtown office, Clark was struck with the same feeling he managed to forget about in between sessions: Dr. Jonathan Crane made him nervous. Always and very.

He'd come via referral and Clark hated to disagree with his primary care physician. Still…

"Where do I know you from?" Clark asked. The couch threatened to swallow him whole and that was no small feat. He gave up on comfort, sat back up and placed his feet on the floor. "Did we…work together or something?

There was an idea in his head that Crane was maybe a bully at his school. Sure he was a ghostly stick now, but maybe he had been a big, round bruiser in elementary school. College?

The thin, pale-eyed man raised a perfect eyebrow. "Clark, we do this every time. You always ask and I always tell you: I've been your psychiatrist for five years now."

Clark's dubious expression was comical, like a monkey with a Rubik's Cube. "Have you?"

"Yes. I have a file on you the size of a dictionary. Fascinating stuff."

"Um. Yes." Clark adjusted his tie, now eyeing Dr. Crane with the expression he usually reserved for him: Vague discomfort mixed with inexplicable caution. "It's just, sometimes I think I met you before then. You're sure I don't know you from…somewhere else?"

Dr. Crane smiled that smile that had never put anyone at ease. Ever.

"Did you have somewhere in mind?"

Clark opened his mouth, scratched his head. Images of cornfields and orchards spun through his mind. A murder of midnight carrion crows pecking at the eyeballs of the dead.

The blink of an eye later and it was all over. He shrugged and gave a dorky laugh. "Nope. Never mind. Sorry about that."

"It's quite all right. You still apologize too much. We'll work on that another day." A weak smile made Crane look near death, one injection of formaldehyde shy of an open-casket viewing. "Well, this appointment was unexpected. Of course, but I'm ALWAYS willing to bump someone to talk to you, Clark."

"Gee. Thanks…?"

"Don't mention it." Crane shifted one long leg over the other and there was something so boneless about it that Clark squirmed. "So," he said, smiling his thin smile, "what's been bothering you lately? What new fear has crept its way into your soul, unbidden and yet so pervasive that it twists your waking life and corrupts your dreams?"

Clark's laugh was like a dying engine. "Right. Um. No. Well. Yes. It IS dreams. But I'm not sure about all that unbidden, corruption stuff, though."

"Dreams?" Crane asked, sitting forward slightly.

"Yes. Dreams."

"Scary dreams? Frightening dreams?"

"Um. Yes…?"

Crane's unnatural blue eyes widened and he flipped open the notepad that had been resting uselessly on his lap. "Do tell!" he said, the excited pulse at his neck suddenly visible.

"Well," Clark tried, casting his mind back. "There are two dreams. I have them both pretty regularly."

"Is one scary? Scarier than the other?"

"Yes."

"Start with that one."

"Okay," Clark said. His eyes darted to the door, anxious like Clint Eastwood in that movie, just hoping for a papier-mâché head to make it all better. Why did he still come to this guy? "The scary one has all this green light. Or maybe it's a green stone. And it's everywhere."

"The light or the stone?"

"Both. Maybe the green light comes from the green stone. Like the stone has some power. It's glowing…?"

Crane bit his lip. "I'm failing to see the frightening part here, Clark. Work with me. Can you cut to the part that makes you wake up screaming in terror? The good parts?"

Clark squirmed a little more, feeling stabbed through by those watery, pale eyes. "Yeah. Um. Well, the light hurts. The light from the rocks. And I'm falling."

"Ohhhh. Yes. Falling dreams are always bloody awful. They're even better if you hit." He gave Clark an appropriate span of time to jump in with, "Boy, aren't they ever! I hit every time! Guts everywhere! Head in fragments!" When Clark just looked marginally uncomfortable, Crane gave up hope, saying instead, "Falling dreams usually have to do with the dreamer feeling out of control. Is there something in your life you feel is beyond your ability to cope with? Influence?"

For a minute, blue, blue eyes flashed in his mind. And he thought he knew who they belonged to, until the handsome face was twisted by a cruel smirk and the perfect body was ruined with callused hands, that wretched suit.

"I guess," he said at last. "But what really scares me about the dream…okay, see this bad dream is directly connected to the good dream."

Crane all but threw his hands up in frustration. "Fine. If you feel like you simply MUST tell me this nonsense: What's the good dream?"

Clark felt another awkward laugh clawing its way up his esophagus. "Sorry, Dr. Crane. I think I'll keep that one to myself. You'll just make fun of me."

Crane made a show of flipping through his notepad. "You mean I'll make fun of you because of ONE little dream when I have five years worth of awkward sex stories, inferiority complexes and social ineptitudes to choose from? You really don't know me very well, Clark. You wound me. Please, share your story. Oh, please do. I can't wait to add it to your file."

"I can fly," Clark ground out, headache forming.

Crickets chirped. Stars in the heavens died. Several species went extinct.

Finally, Crane spoke. "Excuse me?"

"In the dream. I can fly."

"And it scares you?" That little eyebrow couldn't get any higher.

"No!" Clark said, cheeks flushing. "Not at all. I feel alive. Free. The sky is where I belong."

"Uh-hmmm," Crane said, writing something with marked deliberateness. Clark had the fear that it was something like, "Institutionalize immediately. Throw away key."

Pressing on like a determined soldier, weary from the trenches, Clark stumbled through his explanation. "That's why the dream with the green glow is so scary. It's because I'm falling, but as I'm falling I KNOW I can fly but that it's not working for whatever reason. I know I should be able to just…"

Take off, soar, coast on the air, feel weightless and alive and right and whole, he didn't say.

Clark rubbed at his face heavily, under his glasses, digging deep at his temples. "Okay, that's my story. What does it all mean?"

Dr. Crane lowered his pencil, shifted his own glasses with practiced care. "I think that the dream is trying to tell you something. Something about yourself that you've been hiding."

Clark peeked through his fingers, frowned. "Something I've been hiding?"

Crane nodded slowly, suddenly a wise sage handing out prophesies. "I think that there's more to you than even you know. This dream, it's trying to tell you that, underneath all that we can see—underneath what even you can see—there is a man waiting to be noticed, someone tired of being ignored."

Clark swallowed and felt something inside him swell, like a balloon was expanding in his soul. Something about this felt right, felt true.

"Maybe you feel it too, the presence of this man hidden inside you. He's someone who will not go away, will not be quieted."

"Who is he?" Clark asked, almost breathless with anticipation. One more swift shift of glasses and Crane leaned forward. "Clark, have you ever considered the possibility that you're gay?"

The balloon burst, never to inflate again. All that swelling confidence became a circus balloon giraffe tattered by the sticky Keds and Nikes of spoiled children.

"Wha—?" Clark sputtered.

"It's a reasonable question." Again, the notepad was consulted. "I mean…you sure do pick unobtainable women. They're always WAY out of your league. It's like you're doing it on purpose so that you have a valid excuse to turn to a man instead." Flip, flip, flip went the notepad. Clark wondered how many times Lois' name was scribbled in dark, heavy letters.

"Well, Doc, thanks for the chat."

"But we still have forty-five minutes left." Crane's sharp smile made him look like the bad guy in those free comics they gave to kids, the ones warning them to stay away from drugs and drug dealers.

"Right. Um. I'm just gonna…swallow the cost of the rest of the session and just…go. Now."

The, "Wait, come back!" that chased him from the room was enough to make him shudder again.

Dr. Crane was a strange, terrifying little man.

::

At loose ends, he elected to kill all the time he'd found by running from his mental health provider and did a crap job at it. Window shopping only vaguely wounded time, he found. Feeding the birds kind of gave time a headache and an ulcer.

Finally, it was a quarter to noon and he wandered towards the meeting place.

"Hey, Clark! Good to see you! How are you?" Kara beamed. Her hug was surprisingly strong and her hair was like gold in the ubiquitous Metropolis sunlight.

As always, his cousin looked lovely and fresh. A tech geek at the station, Kara had always been eager to help Clark. When he asked her why she bent over backwards to help, she said it was because Clark had always taken care of her. She owed him, she said.

And Kara had long since grown accustomed to the ins and outs of the fast paced broadcasting world, but it hadn't always been that way.

Being new at the station wasn't easy and Clark remembered what it had been like when he first started. The MBS building was massive and confusing for starters. And the hierarchies were impossible to figure out without a guiding hand. Lois had been that for him; he had wanted to be the kinder, gentler version for Kara. As she was always there when he needed her, he guessed he must have done something right.

"Well, I've been in Gotham for weeks, so I'm as good as can be expected," Clark said.

"That bad, huh?" she asked as she settled across from him at the charming café down the street from the MBS skyscraper. From here, he could see the gargantuan golden globe atop it circling, circling.

If 'That bad' could explain the scary yet intriguing intensity of Bruce Wayne, the infuriating—possibly criminal—lazy stupidity of Matches Malone, the horror of the autopsy and the strange murders, his 'date' with Hemingford and the kiss thereafter…

Well then, yes, it was 'That bad.'

Instead of launching into an explanation, Clark said. "Yes. Yes, it's that bad."

Kara flashed a smile, ordered a coffee and a water when the waiter stopped by. They skinny kid gazed at her even while he took Clark's order. Kara either didn't notice him drooling over her, or didn't care.

"Hang in there, Clark," she said brightly after the disappointed waiter skulked off. "When you hit rock bottom, things can only look up. Isn't that what you always told me?"

"I guess, but you never actually hit 'rock bottom.' I've been spitting out gravel for days now. But thanks, anyway," he managed and pushed his glasses up his nose. "So, actually, I need a favor."

"Name it," she said on a yawn. That was the most amazing thing about Kara. She didn't care if it was difficult or even dangerous. She wanted to help. Not just Clark, but everyone she met. Clark wondered what it took for a girl to become so brave, so determined to prove herself.

"I need you to run some plates for me. Under the radar."

Kara's eyebrows lifted. "You DO know that you only follow cops around for the show, right? That you're not actually a cop?"

Clark pouted, tried not to pout and only made it worse. "I know, I know. But…this is important. I've got a hunch."

Her eyebrows couldn't get any higher. "A hunch? Clark, when was the last time you had a hunch?"

"I've maybe never had a hunch."

"Yeah, I figured. Oh, there's just GOT to be a story here and I'm not doing a single thing for you until you fill me in!"

With a little prodding, Clark told her. He started at the beginning. By the time he got to Hemingford Gray, he was blushing and stuttering, but he finished, grateful to have the squirmy, uncomfortable bits done with. He left out his weird hearing. The last thing he wanted was for Kara to think he was a freak.

"But that doesn't make any sense," Kara said, taking a sip of her coffee. "If Hemingford really is working for Bruce Wayne, then why would he lie to YOU when Wayne must have told HIM that you were there to witness the break-in? Why try a lie out on the one other guy who knows the truth?"

Clark shook his head. "I can't explain it. But I don't think the lie was for me: I just so happened to be there. I think maybe Hemingford was really just lying to cover for Bruce Wayne to Commissioner Gordon and the others, in case someone decided to put two and two together. I mean, Wayne gets taken off suspension and then the building of the guy responsible for the suspension gets vandalized? I'd suspect Bruce right away."

"But then why isn't he worried about you ratting him out?"

Clark fidgeted with his coffee cup and shrugged. "I guess he knows that I'll incriminate myself if I call him on the lie." At Kara's doubt-filled expression, he added, "It's all a bit weird, I know, but this is my life these days."

"Okay, so this is really all very shocking. You're breaking and entering, first of all. And you're acting like it's not a big deal, second of all. And you're kissing British nobility?"

"Um. Former."

"Whatever! He kissed you."

Rubbing his face heavily, Clark nodded, an embarrassed, awkward motion. "Uh, yeah."

"And something about the kiss gave you a 'hunch'?"

Clark shook his head. "No. Um. Not the kiss. It was after all that. See, Hemingford had this butler—"

Kara gawked at him. "Wow. Kinky."

"Kara! Nothing happened. With him or his butler!"

"Suuuure."

"Are you going to listen or what?"

She smiled a mischievous smile behind her coffee mug. "All ears!"

He glared at her, but then began again. "His butler dropped us off at my hotel."

Kara was biting the inside of her mouth, he could just tell. All manner of filthy jokes were circling around in her clever little brain, dying to come out.

"Uh-huh," was all she let escape, but even that sound was suggestive and naughty.

"And I got a good look at his license plates and I started thinking about all the cars."

"Hemingford's?"

"Well, Malone's, actually." Clark remembered the almost sleepless night he'd had, thinking about the kiss and what it meant and didn't. Then his eyes had drifted shut and there behind his eyes had been a perfect picture of Hemingford's plates. Then he'd seen the plates on Malone's sleek black cars, all of them together, side by side like a puzzle he just needed the final piece to. He'd jerked awake, stared dumbly into the dark. "Cars," he'd muttered.

Kara drummed her fingers on the table. "So, let me get this straight: You kiss Hemingford and it makes you think of another man?"

"No!" Clark blurted and several people at nearby tables turned to stare at them. He lowered his voice and calmed his tone. "Malone drives all these fabulous cars, and I think they're stolen. He has an Aston Martin."

"Ohhh. Shiny. And what does this have to do with Hemingford? Or Bruce?"

Clark scrunched his face up in concentration as he explained, "I don't know. Really, I just…have a feeling. Something's not right and this might be the first step to finding out what's going on. And if Hemingford's up to no good…"

"What, you want to have him arrested? That kiss must have been rubbish."

"It has nothing to do with the kiss!" he hissed as quietly as possible. "Just, maybe there's a connection between these guys, you know? Something bad."

Kara looked at him speculatively. "Well, cases have been made on less, but it's still pretty flimsy. And Malone's a cop, so that's a problem," Kara offered with a smirk. "When you run the plates on a cop's car, the cop finds out two minutes later. Law enforcement, gotta love it."

"Can you do it without them finding out?"

"Hmmm," Kara said. "I think I know a trick or two. What are the numbers?"

Clear as day, Clark could see the cars in his mind, the beautiful Aston Martin and the sleek Lamborghini as well as Hemingford's subdued town car. He rambled off the make, model and plate of each car.

"Wow," said Kara, grabbing a napkin off the table and a sparkly pink pen from her purse. "That's more than enough information. Your memory is scary sometimes, Clark."

My memory and my hearing, he thought. And Clark was hoping the surprises would stop soon.

He made a non-committal noise to Kara's statement. "These are some nice cars," she said. "How hard could they be to find?"

"This won't get you in trouble, will it?" Clark asked.

"If they catch me? Yes." She gave an impish laugh and winked. "But they have to catch me first."

::

Day Fifteen

Face buried in his hands, Clark sat at Bruce's desk doing nothing. His state-of-the-art, tiny, feature-filled, expensive, and ultimately useless camera was forgotten on the desk beside him. He groaned.

He'd enjoyed his time in Metropolis, getting away from this project and the failure it was turning out to be. But now that he was back in Gotham, he felt out of place once again. Malone was a no-show and Jimmy had thrown his hands into the air in frustration an hour ago and said, "I'm going to go get drunk."

"It's eleven in the morning!" Clark had protested.

"Yes," Jimmy had agreed simply and stormed out of the MCU. He'd taken Clark's entire crew with him. They'd tried their best to get him to go along, but some sick sense of obligation to his job kept him from going along. They wouldn't put up with this much longer and he wondered if Jimmy wasn't two steps away from asking Lois to pull the plug on the whole thing.

Two hours later, and he was regretting his responsible streak. Fifteen days of filming and they had nothing to show for it and a bar stool was sounding pretty nice.

"Whoa, looks like you're having a bad day."

The voice was crisp, educated, and just a little playful.

Clark looked up and just stared. In full Gotham Cop Blue, the voice belonged to a handsome, clean-cut young man. Clark guessed he was about 22 or 23. It was easy to tell he'd never make it past the 5'10" he filled with his leanly muscled frame. Strangely familiar blue eyes stared down at him.

"H-have we met?" Clark tried. It was on the edge of his mind, like having peanut butter stuck to the roof of his mouth. If he could just tongue it down, he could swallow it, taste the awesome taste of Peter Pan Crunchy and feel satisfied, knowing who this guy was.

He thought about that mental trail one more time. Crunchy peanut butter. Tongues. That sparked something. This kid…

Tongues…

Something about tongues…

"Nah! Try that line on someone else!" the cop answered back with a laugh and it knocked Clark back to reality. Then he stuck out a hand. "Dick Grayson. Officer Dick Grayson. Just call me Dick." He gave a laugh and a shrug like he couldn't believe he was saying what he was saying.

He had a firm, friendly handshake and a megawatt smile to go with it.

"Oh. Clark Kent. I'm with the—"

"Oh, I *know* who you are," Dick said with that same easy manner. He crossed his arms, hitched one hip onto the desk and looked so damn comfortable on Bruce Wayne's desk that Clark was taken aback.

"H-how?"

"Bruce told me."

He figured that opening and closing his mouth like a fish for long moments might be attractive. Somewhere. "Um…I'm confused," Clark admitted at last. "I've only met Detective Wayne once. Well…twice. Kinda, and…"

With a jerk of his thumb, Dick indicated the desk where Clark was sitting. "Be that as it may, it seems like you made quite an impression on my dad."

If Clark had been drinking coffee, it would have been a spit-take. "WHAT?" He waved his hand around, searching for something to make the world make sense. "He's your father?"

"Well, yeah."

And the floor fell out of Clark's world. "You mean…he raised you and you're not dark and scary?"

That got a laugh so loud out of Dick that the entire floor of the MCU turned to stare at them. Clark looked nervously around the room and then back at the young cop whose eyes were watering.

He wiped at the tears, but more just kept coming. "Whoo, hooo…That's a good one."

He let the last laugh out with a high-pitched exhale. "Wow, thanks for that, Clark. I haven't laughed that hard in a long time. So my dad's dark and scary?"

"I'm sorry, that just slipped out," Clark said with a wince.

"No, no, it's okay. It's always neat to see someone else's perspective on the guy. I've known him a long, long time, you know. Everybody sees him a different way. It's like he's a million different people," Dick said with a wink like it was all too funny.

Clark felt like the joke was beyond him. "So, um, I've never seen you around the station before."

"You around that much?" Dick asked.

"Um, yeah. When we're not filming. When Detective Malone's not around."

Dick leaned in a little closer, lowered his voice. "And he's never around?"

Clark took a deep breath. "No. But neither are you."

Another infectious smiles pulled at the corner of Dick's mouth. "Busy, busy, busy," he said. "Gordon's a slave driver. Have you seen the coffee cups? He *enjoys* making life difficult. There are words for people like him."

Clark smirked and secretly agreed. "Well, be that as it may, you might be busy, but I think Malone just sleeps. A lot."

"With everything, I think," Dick said and waggled his eyebrows. "The man's a beast."

Clark felt a laugh he hadn't known was inside him swirling up. "So you know Detective Malone really well, too?"

"He was my training officer," Dick said with a shrug. "Your next episode should be about nepotism in the Gotham Police Department. You'd win an Emmy."

And Clark, he couldn't really help it: He liked Dick Grayson. The guy thought everything was a joke and not in a cruel, vicious way like maybe Matches Malone. Dick just didn't have a mean bone in his body. Clark couldn't figure how Malone and Bruce could be such influential figures in Dick's life without causing lasting damage. Dick Grayson was a walking talking miracle.

"Well, speaking of the show, I was wondering if I could ask you a few questions on film?" He waved at the camera on the desk and when Dick frowned felt like he'd kicked a puppy or something.

"Hmm, well," Dick said and scratched at his smooth chin. "I'd love to help you there, but I can't. I mean, I really, really can't."

"Oh," Clark said with regret in his voice. "That's okay. It's just, we don't have much footage. And a first person account on your dad would be great. I mean, nobody wants to talk about Detective Wayne because he's terrifying and nobody has anything good to say about Malone. I mean, they respect him, but they think he's a jerk, you know? He kinda is, actually. And it would be nice to have a fresh perspective on both of them. I've never actually gotten Wayne on film and I'm starting to think he's a ninja or something. Or maybe a vampire because I've never seen him during the day, either."

Clark knew he was babbling, he just didn't know how to make it stop. Dick's expression was one of concerted effort not to laugh very loudly.

"Wow. Matches was right: You're a comedian."

Clark sat forward. "But I thought you heard about me from Detective Wayne."

Dick looked at him sharply. "Listen, I talk to both of them, don't I? They're partners. And they talk to each other. Small world."

"It is, isn't it?" The Jersey accent left no doubts as to the owner of the voice.

Clark looked over his shoulder while Dick sprung to his feet and came to attention. His handsome face looked suddenly nervous. "Sir," he said.

"Officer Grayson, what are you doing here? In uniform? What the hell are you thinking?" His eyes drifted to Clark, then back to Dick who swallowed heavily.

"Nobody saw me," he said.

Malone's eyes narrowed. "You can prove that? You know the name of every person that passes by this fucking building?"

"Nobody recognizes me like this and—"

"Again: How do you know? One slip is all it takes."

"I just wanted to—"

"To what, Officer?"

Clark listened to the exchange with confusion. Why was Malone upset with Dick?

The young officer lowered his head. "I just wanted to say hi. I wanted to meet Clark." He sounded strangely young right then, like a scolded kid caught with his hand in the cookie jar. Then, boldly, he raised his eyes again. "And I wanted to see you. ME. *I* wanted to see *you*." His eyes flicked up and down Malone's horrible green suit and he took another deep breath. "I guess I picked the wrong day."

He turned to Clark abruptly. "It really was good to meet you, Mr. Kent. Keep on doing whatever you're doing."

"Wha—?" Clark tried, shaking his head slowly. "I don't…"

"Never mind. Just…it's good. What you are. Whatever you are. It shakes things up."

Malone's posture went rigid. Dick turned his cool blue eyes on Malone and gave him a bruised look. He held it as he said, "Some people need a little spice in their lives."

And with that, he spun on his shiny heels and left as quickly and silently as he'd come.

"Change before you leave!" Malone shouted after him. Dick's back stiffened, but he just kept walking.

He watched Dick leave with some sadness. He seemed like a good guy and it would have been nice to talk to him a little longer. Then he turned his attention to Malone. "What just happened?"

Malone just sighed. He mumbled something unintelligible, and then his posture shifted to something Clark would call resigned. "That camera of yours off? No tape recording or nothing?"

Clark held up his hands, surrender style. "Everything off the record. I promise."

"Walk with me."

So they walked. It was a winding, seemingly endless route they took through the old building, Malone never speaking.

They were in a long, abandoned hallway in a part of the precinct that Clark had never seen before when Malone finally decided to talk. He didn't stop walking, as if the motion kept him from analyzing what he probably saw as a mistake: Telling Clark anything important at all.

When they reached the end of the corridor, he just spun around and started back the other way. Clark followed eagerly. His patience paid off when Malone spoke.

"Officer Grayson is a good cop. I should know: I trained him." There was real pride in his voice and Clark thought that was oddly charming. Malone continued, "Only…he's too good. He's too good and maybe I pushed him into something too soon. I just…he said he could do it and I believed him."

Clark shook his head. "What?"

"He's undercover. Deep cover. Has been for almost ten months now."

Understanding hit Clark like Malone's accent that first day. "You're worried that his identity was compromised by his coming to the station today?"

"In uniform, for God's sake!" Malone cried. He made the Sign of the Cross and it was so small and quick that he could have been shooing a fly instead. "What if somebody saw him? A lot is riding on this."

"What's he investigating?"

"Can't believe I'm telling you this, but there's a nasty new drug on the street," Malone said and shook his head. "Narcs want to know where it's coming from, how it's getting on the street. They've got nothing. But Dick's on to something. I know he's close."

Clark suddenly remembered Gavin King telling him about Live, the terrible drug found in both drowning victims' blood streams. Could this be what Dick Grayson was investigating? Was Dick trying to help Matches solve the case?

They turned and went back down the hall. Mind awhirl, Clark asked, "So, what's his cover?"

Malone looked at him, step unfaltering. "You don't know? Really? Not at all?"

Clark floundered. Sure, something about Grayson seemed familiar, but he couldn't put his finger on what it was. "No. Not a clue."

"Funny. Dick will get a kick out of this and I guess I owe him an apology." He slapped Clark on the back hard enough to make him stumble. "Kent, your lack of guile has made you gullible."

"Excuse me?"

"Never mind."

"Um. Does that mean you're not going to tell me?"

"Honest, Kent, you're the greatest. Yes, that means I'm not going to tell you."

They turned again, keeping pace; strides as different as night and day. Malone kind of loped and Clark, well, he figured there was nothing about his walk worth mentioning. He just walked. Malone didn't speak again until they were halfway down the hall again.

"So, everyone's telling me you made a love connection."

Clark blushed and cursed himself for it. "Um. Me and Sir Hemingford went out. Talked. We had a nice dinner."

"So I hear," Malone said, lines at his eyes crinkling. Even his mustache seemed to leer.

"Nothing happened."

"Sure," Malone said.

"Really."

"Uh-huh."

"He's nice. A gentleman."

"Of course," Malone said. "Let me know when he proposes."

Clark sputtered. "How is this any of your business?"

"It's not, I guess," Malone said, "but it could be if you'd let me make a little money off your sweet ass."

Clark almost tripped and fell on air. "Wha—?" he demanded through a cough.

"I mean, you'd clean up nice. Lose the glasses, show a little sternum bush. They boys say this Gray guy is loaded. Maybe we could charge by the night. The hour? How long do you think you could—"

"We are not having this conversation," Clark said. He broke stride and stomped away, heading towards the corner that would take him back to the front of the MCU.

"Hey!" Malone's voice chased him down the hall. "I was just kidding. Well, kinda kidding. Okay, I wasn't really kidding, but can you blame a guy for trying?"

"Can it, Malone!" Clark shouted back.

"Okay, well, fine then! Screw you, Kent! Just because you won't put out, doesn't mean we all have to suffer for it!"

"I'm not humoring that with a reply!"

"Hah! You just did!"

"Shut up!"

"Only if you put up!"

Clark disappeared around the corner and Malone chuckled. "Kent, Kent, Kent. You are a fucking miracle," he said, shaking his head.

Then he followed after him, a lazy stride some called a lope.

To Be Continued…