ISSUE 18:

Ryan sat in the back of the long black Wayne family limousine. Kal-El and Bruce sat opposite him at a table, clearly discussing something important, Alfred couldn't drive anymore so they had a new chauffeur called Damien, who was an excellent driver and bodyguard, with amazing fighting credentials, but he was quite insulting and brash; so no one spoke to him.

Ryan felt quite alone as poured himself out a small glass of champagne. Since they'd rescued the alien, Bruce had decided to spend any free time he had on him; setting up his new life, working out his powers and training him so that he could stand on his own, although the two of them had very different ways of dishing out justice with Bruce preferring fear tactics while Clark preferred hope and light which his powers hopefully inspired in people.

But he was fine with that, he could now go out and take down gang after thug after gang which he had no problem with at all. Finally he had some independence but he still missed having his mentor correct him on minor things like the way he held the 'batarang' or how he threw down the smoke pellet.

Yet tonight would sort that out, they had just taken one of Bruce's numerous private jets from Gotham to Metropolis; where they would first be attending an event for which Clark could get a job at the Daily Planet, then he would be attending a business meeting with Bruce at the formidable Lex Corp and then they would be having an 'after hours' meeting at Lex Crop as the Bat and Nightwing.

When Clark said he was leaving, Ryan felt slightly sad that his new friend was going but now he couldn't wait. He would finally be the centre of attention, which sounded selfish but since he'd arrived Clark had taken centre stage with his perfect face and body and his ground shattering super powers, and now he could be trained to his fullest and one day be on par with the alien from another world who got his powers from the Earth's sun.

Ryan slurped down the drink and watched as Bruce handed over a large leather folder to Clark. Clark then got up from the table and slid onto the couch at the back next to Ryan with a grin on his face.

"Why do you look so happy?" Ryan asked, pouring himself another drink.

"Because it's actually happening," Clark replied with a grin. "Bruce has created a whole life for me, apparently I'm a shoe in for the job and I already know someone there!"

"Who?" Ryan asked, shocked.

"Lois Lane," he said with a smile. "She's a reporter at the Planet and apparently I might get to work with her!"

"But Clark Kent's never met anyone before," Ryan suddenly realised. "You met her as Superman didn't you."

"Yeah."

"Then she won't like Clark Kent then will she," Ryan said, crushing Clark's smile. "Clark Kent has to be nerdy, clumsy, the opposite of the god-like Superman. So she won't see you the same way."

"You don't know that," Clark replied, trying to keep up his own belief.

"I kinda do buddy," Ryan said with a smile. "But don't worry I'm sure you'll find someone out there who likes Superman and Clark Kent."

Clark didn't reply, he just reached for the champagne bottle and poured himself a drink; though it was pointless, he couldn't get drunk unless he drunk a lake's worth.

The two sat in silence the rest of the way, Ryan half wishing he hadn't crushed Kal's dream of being with this 'Lois'.

The Daily Planet had definitely done well on this event. Hiring out a massive hall made of marble with large columns and glass windows and domes above. People sat around on the white cloth covered tables or stood at the well stocked bar or danced and chatted on the main dance floor.

Calm music played as the main, large oak, double doors opened and three large, toned, handsome men entered. Bruce Wayne, dressed in a sharp black tuxedo strutted in; followed by his right hand man Ryan Connolly, who since he'd quit the Police had become known as Rick Gray, and on the other side was the large, muscular, spectacle covered Clark Kent.

People looked around to see the sharply dressed newcomers and then back to their business.

"Bruce!" shouted a warm voice from the crowd. Suddenly a man with grey strands in his styled black hair stepped out from the huddle, with one hand he smoothed out his expensive looking tux while holding a drink in the other.

"Perry," Bruce smiled back, losing his cold edge and adopting a warmer; more social, attitude.

The two shook hands warmly and smiled at each other.

"So how you been?" Perry enquired.

"Fine," Bruce replied. "Great even, the companies doing great and I'm living it up."

"Typical Bruce, life and soul of the party."

Ryan could tell that Clark was frowning behind him. He had only met the Bat side of Bruce, not the alter ego that he adopted in public. When he was younger, Bruce was known for being an arrogant playboy who threw wild parties every night; though in his older years he had slowed down but still attended social events.

"And how's the paper been?" Bruce asked the smiling gentleman.

"Good, though we are having to slowly integrate onto the internet but I've fought hard to keep the paper a paper and hope it'll stay that way till I'm dead and buried."

"I'm sure it will," Bruce replied warmly. "But I really wanted to talk to you about the job you had spare in the Investigative reporting department. And I have a man that you're going to want to meet."

Clark stepped forward with a big smile on his face. Perry looked him up a down, the suit did hide most of Clark's overly muscular body, so Perry wouldn't make the connection between him and the god on Earth.

"I dunno Bruce."

"You haven't seen him at work yet," Bruce replied with a smile. "And if not then you owe it to me, as a favour."

"Fine, fine," Perry sighed. "What's your name kid?"

"Kent sir," Kal-El smiled, already adopting his goofy alter-ego. "Clark Kent."

"Well Kent, I'll see tomorrow in my office, 9am sharp."

"Great," Clark smiled at him. "You won't regret it sir."

"I hope I won't," Perry replied. He brushed Bruce and muttered, "You owe me." Clark smirked as he listened in with his enhanced hearing.

"Well anyway," Perry smiled at them all. "Enjoy the party and don't brake anything."

The trio and Perry turned to part when the Editor in Chief of the paper shouted, "Kent come with me a second."

"Sure sir," Clark shouted back, turning away from Bruce and Ryan. "See you two in a bit."

"Yeah see ya," Ryan replied, patting Clark on the back.

Ryan followed Bruce to the bar as Clark walked off with is brand new boss. "So what now?" Ryan asked his mentor.

"We mingle," Bruce replied, reaching to the bar and grabbing them a drink each. He handed one to Ryan and the two walked off into the crowd of people.

Lois hated these sort of events, people got too drunk and then got a bit too touchy. She pushed her long black hair behind her ear and made her way through the crowd in a form fitting black strapless dress topped off with high heels and a clutch purse.

"Hey Lois!" a familiar voice shouted from behind him.

She turned around to see her Boss, Perry White, flanked by a tall, broad shouldered, man in a tight fitting tuxedo and circular spectacles.

"Yes Chief."

"Don't call me Chief," Perry snapped. "I wanna introduce you to the new reporter we hired. Lois this is Clark Kent, Clark Kent; Lois Lane."

Clark stared at her at first, she looked absolutely perfect and he felt mesmerised by her.

She held out her hand. Clark slowly looked down and laughed. "I'm sorry." He shook her hand, being careful of his grip, and smiled. "It'll be a pleasure working with you."

"Oh we'll see, "she retorted with a smile.

"Well I'll leave you two to talk," Perry said, swaggering off.

As soon as Perry was gone she dropped her smile. "Look Kent, I'm not being rude but the front page is my area and I'm the top writer here so if you wouldn't step on my toes that would be great."

Clark frowned. He had met a flirty, fun, and happy Lois Lane but now he was seeing a more vicious, ruthless side with her.

"Of course, I just want to work at the paper and-"

"Just don't get in my way," Lois snapped, turning around and strutting away. Clark couldn't help but stare and yet he still felt crushed. This woman who he thought had liked him was actually a bit of a power mad bitch.

As soon as she was in the crowd, Clark heard a strange sound from outside and then the sound of someone scratching on the glass above. He looked up with his X-Ray vision, moving his glasses down his nose, and saw that men were all across the rooftop and they were breaking in!

Time for action, he smiled, walking off into the men's toilet, tearing open his pristine white shirt; luckily not pulling off the buttons.

Bruce and Ryan moved through the ball, laughing and mingling between possible clients. Bruce looked up to see something move at the dome above. He grabbed Ryan by the wrist and pulled him in close.

"You did bring your wrist compact costume?" he asked in a hushed voice.

"Yes," Ryan said, Bruce letting go of him. "Why?"

Bruce motioned above them. "You're going to need it."

Ryan looked up to see men slowly opening up the multiple glass domes above them, they were breaking in!

The two walked off towards the men's toilets, both of them producing two metal bracelets from their suit jacket pockets.

The party continued on, people danced and laughed together. Suddenly glass erupted above them and people suddenly began to lower themselves down on ropes. People screamed and moved to the sides of the room. Suddenly a large fat man floated down on what looked like an umbrella.

He folded up the umbrella object and stared at the crowd, showing his disfigured face. He had a long nose and what looked like three fingers hidden in pristine white gloves. He wore a top hat and a tuxedo which barely fit over his large stomach.

"Ladies and Gentleman, I am the Penguin and I will be relieving you of your cash tonight!" he sneered in a nasal voice.

People were frozen still.

"Hurry up you idiots!" he shouted to his mask goons who came with him. "Take their cash!"

"That's not going to happen!" shouted a voice from above. The whole crowd looked up to see Superman, the super powered alien, flying down towards the centre of the room. His boots touched the ground and all eyes were on his alien blue and red suit.

"Who are you?" sneered the Penguin.

"I'm Superman," he replied. "And I'm here to stop you."

Before the Penguin could make a remark, metal objects flew out of nowhere and struck three of the goons in the chest, knocking them to the ground. There was a loud whooshing sound and Nightwing, dressed in a completely metal suit with black plating and a bright blue bird across his chest and down his arms, swung on a grapple hook down next to Kal-El.

"Who's that?" people murmured across the crowd.

"Who are you?" the Penguin sneered.

"I'm Nightwing but now's not the time to chat," he smiled. He flicked his wrists and his two batons landed in his palms.

Then a large shadow fell across the ball room and everyone looked up to see the Bat standing over the dome.

"Who the hell is that?" The Penguin sneered again.

The Bat extended his cape and jumped down from the down, he fell through the air and kicked the Penguin in the face. His metallic boots hit the marble flooring and the metal plates flexed all over his body so that he could move with ease.

"No time to talk," he grunted.

That was the signal for all the heroes to move out. Nightwing produced batarangs and threw them at a couple of goons running towards him. Superman clenched his hands into fists and punched one in the chest, being careful not to break any moneys. The Bat grabbed The Penguin by the collar and held him aloft.

"What do you want?" he growled as chaos erupted around him.

"Money," The Penguin sneered. "Isn't that what everyone wants?"

"No," the Bat retorted. He reeled back his fist and punched the Penguin in the throat and dropped him to the floor. The Penguin sat on the ground rasping for air as the Bat Monster turned to the crowd to see that his two protégés had taken down the goons.

Superman twisted his head and stared out into the street. "Hey Bat, we have a problem."

Superman ran at super speed towards the windows and the Bat and Nightwing followed. They looked through the large glass panes and saw what was going on outside in Metropolis. Slowly, six oversized toy-like robots were powering down their rocket jets and landing on the ground.

The Bat analysed the robots with cold eyes. "This is the Toy Man's work, though he hasn't done anything on this scale before. Superman, you take the robots. Nightwing follow him and find a computer in the wreckage, then trace it's signal back to the source."

"What about you?" Nightwing asked, setting his gauntlets to grapple hook.

"I'm going to have a chat with the Penguin," the Bat replied in his growling voice. "All this happening on one night can't be a coincidence."

"Okay," Superman replied, his eyes glowing red slightly. He bent his knees and flew into the air like a blur. Nightwing aimed his grapple at the open top of the building and fired it; being pulled off into the air.

The Bat turned around to see the Penguin picking up his hat and umbrella and trying to climb to his feet. He strutted over, his cape lapping behind his heels, and flipped him over onto his back with his foot.

"Who is your commander?" he growled, leaning down close to the man's fat face.

"What?" he trembled, looking into the Bat's plain white eyes.

"Someone has coordinated you to attack this hall while Toy Man attacks the city," the Bat barked. "Who coordinated you and are there going to be any more attacks?"

"The...the Light," the Penguin stuttered.

"The Light?"

"They are everywhere and they own everyone," the Penguin said, clearly terrified. "They'll kill me for telling you."

"Are there going to be any more attacks?" The Penguin was quiet for a second longer than he needed. The Bat slammed his head into the marble. "Answer me!"

"They've only told me that Toy Man and Black Mask were coming down," the Penguin sneered, his vision starting to blur. "But I heard someone else was coming."

"Who?"

"Cad-Cad-Cadmus," he stuttered, his head aching.

The Bat let go of the dazed man and climbed to his feet, his cape completely enveloping his metal armour. He'd read one of the files relating to that name on the server connected to the Commissioner's computer. And all he could think of how fucked they were.

A robot fell to the ground with a loud crunch, luckily only hitting the deserted road and not the buildings. Kal-El zipped above the skyline and checked on the ground below to see that Nightwing was unharmed as he made his way through the rubble; towards the main processor of the gigantic robot. As soon as he was sure Nightwing was safe, he turned to another robot which was walking down the street, knocking down a whole building.

He powered up his heat vision and shot a powerful beam of coursing red energy at the robot's chest. It burnt through the metal and came out the other side. The robot collapsed but Superman flew underneath it so that it didn't crush the bystanders that were running from the chaos. He grunted and pushed the now dead robot and pushed it onto it's back, not crushing any person underneath.

He spun to another robot and clenched his fists, ready to punch the next automaton's head in.

Nightwing instantly found the core processor in the wreckage and instantly took the USB Plug in cable on his utility belt and plugged himself into the computer. The defences on the suit's computer were at the top level of protection in the world so he wasn't worried about getting a virus from the device.

He hoped the device still had some slight power left and was still connected to the signal as he rapidly hacked his way into the system with precision. He kept typing out reams of code as the signal began to grow fainter and fainter.

He cracked the last ream of coding and finally located the source of the control signal. He was controlling them from the top of the Daily Planet.

He pressed the temple of his domino mask. "Hey Supes, top of the Daily Planet building."

"Who are you?" asked a female voice from behind the Bat.

He turned around to see Lois Lane, reporter from the Daily Planet, standing behind him holding a compact video camera. The Bat produced a small bat shaped device and threw it, it landed on the camera with dead accuracy and with a motion of the hand, the camera shut off.

"Hey what the hell?" she barked.

"No press," the Bat growled, brushing past her and towards the window.

"Are you friends with Superman?" she asked.

"Acquaintances," the Bat replied, watching along the skyline to see another robot fall.

"Fine, who are you?" she asked as the Bat turned from the window and stood underneath the open glass dome.

"The Bat," he growled as he held up his arm and fired his grapple hook into the air. The device pulled him into the air and Lois watched until he disappeared. She then turned to the window and looked down just as Black Mask's army made their way down the street of Gotham killing who they wanted and braking whatever they wanted.

"This is a war zone," she murmured.

Superman deactivated the ear piece and turned to the Daily Planet. With his heightened vision, he looked to the roof top of the Daily Planet and saw a small man wearing a creepy plastic head, standing on the rooftop holding a tablet like device.

He felt a tug in his stomach and he zipped towards the man. On his way he knocked one robot back and punched another in the head. He banked left and got out of the way of one robots fists and kept heading towards the Planet. Clearly their controller was trying to protect himself but no mere robot could stand up to his might.

A robot stepped in front of the building and Superman pushed out his arms. He kept moving and ploughed straight through the robot's body with ease. The robot fell straight down and Kal-El touched down on the building.

"Please don't hurt me!" squealed the small man, with a child like voice, from inside his plastic head.

Superman picked him up and tore the tablet out of his hand. He crushed it with ease.

"No my toys!" he screamed. "Fix it! Fix it!"

Superman sighed with pity and punched the midget's plastic head in with a single blow. He dropped the now blinded psychopath and turned to see Nightwing touching down on top of the Planet's roof with the aid of his wings and pulse technology in his boots.

Nightwing activated the communicator in his mask. "Bat, we've taken down the Toy Man but an army is gathering in the streets."

"That's not the worst of it," the Bat replied as Superman activated his ear piece and stood with Nightwing on the edge of the building; looking down to see the mob moving down the streets lead by a man with a completely black head. "They've got someone else coming and he's not something we can handle."

"What?" Superman asked, narrowing his vision on the man with the black face.

"Black Mask has amassed an army of men on the streets to cause chaos and they also have a secret weapon coming," the Bat paused. "Basically, he's a teenage clone of you Kal-El."

"What?" Superman uttered, completely shocked.

"They took a sample of your DNA, cloned it and then brainwashed the clone to be under their complete control. He doesn't have some of your powers but he is still highly dangerous and will put up quite a fight with you."

"Oh fuck," Nightwing muttered.

"And I also have a feeling that someone else will make a guest appearance."

"Who?" Nightwing asked him.

"Every hero has a villain who can battle him," the Bat told the two of them. "And you might meet mine. But as I said, just a hunch."

"Let's hope so," Nightwing smiled weakly. "Because if he can keep up with you then I'm worried."

"You should be," the Bat replied bluntly.

Superman looked across to see the Bat soaring through the night sky, using the cape as a pair of wings.

"Now, me and Nightwing can handle the army for now but I'd like you to keep an aerial watch until Project Cadmus or Superboy they've jokily named him, arrives. Focus on him completely and don't let anything distract from taking him down; do whatever it takes."

"Okay," Superman said shakily. He'd never faced anyone as powerful as him before and that scared him for the first time.

"Nightwing get down here and we'll make our way through these chumps," the Bat told him through the ear piece. "But be prepared to go solo if my counterpart appears."

"Okay," Nightwing extending his wings. He then turned to his friend, Superman, with a broad smile. "I'll see you when we're done here."

"Sure will," Superman smiled, unsure on the outcome of their current battle.

Nightwing bent his legs and flew downwards towards the mob of men to join his mentor in battle. Superman stood on the roof, trying to calm his breathing, this would be his most dangerous battle so far. He didn't know the outcome but he could tell they weren't going to come out of this unscathed.

AUTHOR'S NOTE:

Issue 18 and I'm honestly proud of it. I have left this on a cliff hanger as it was getting long and I decided it would be more dramatic if I had the end of the battle in a chapter of it's own. So that was fun and the nerdiest of you will know who Bat's opponent is and who is Superman's upcoming one. I hope people aren't that bothered about the change in Lois Lane but fuck it; it's my universe. I did have this battle planned later on but I thought that this was the right time to break out with the best I have. We see Clark leave and another story arc will begin.

I hope you guys liked it and if you could review it that would be great. Also if you're wondering why Bruce is the Bat and not Batman, don't worry you'll find out soon enough.