Codes: Clark, Lois, Lana, Bruce Wayne, Clark/Lex Lana/Pete
Rating: PG-13
Summary: Evening at the White House.
by svmadelyn
"There were eight separate exit points, but we sealed off seven. We wanted to ensure they´d have to come through the final one, where we were waiting with the cyclinator. It´s this—picture a desert in a box, basically. It dried out all the moisture from the mud creatures, leaving only the dirt behind. Diana rigged about six of these here and…” Bruce stretched across Clark to show him on the map, a pointed jab at the last corridor, "here.”
"But one got through," Clark mulled.
"Yeah. It doubled back around us before we even knew it´d gotten the fuck past, threw Diana in one of the revolving rooms, tried to get the cyclinator away from Flash, but J´onn managed to send the sucker in there anyway, and…you know. Dirt." Bruce finished neatly.
Clark snickered. It was weird. Every four or five months, Bruce would just show up for a few hours and talk with him. Sometimes they´d go raid the kitchens, or just plop down and watch some bizarre foreign film Bruce brought, but they always wound up sprawled in the comfortable chairs in front of the fireplace in the Blue Room, perusing through files Bruce wanted to show him on his laptop, papers like these Bruce wanted to show him something on.
Clark didn´t really understand why Bruce came; he just…liked it. He liked knowing that Bruce had a little bit of a crush on Diana, even if he´d throw himself off the Gotham State Building before he´d ever utter a word. Clark figured that was probably for the best. Selina didn´t share all that well. He liked—being aware. Kept in the loop, even though he was years removed from it.
Bruce stretched and rolled up the map. "What´s up with you?"
"Huh?" Clark asked intelligently, startled out of the nostalgic reverie Bruce´s visits tended to evoke for a few hours.
"You´re just…never mind. I could eat."
"I suck at the whole hosting thing," Clark said gratefully, rising, knowing Bruce was following even if you could never hear.
"You´re the first gentleman. I always have such high expectations when I visit you." Bruce managed to keep a straight face, and people would *never* suspect Batman of having a sense of humor, but Clark knew they were all wrong.
It was a warped sense of humor, true, but it was there nonetheless. Clark managed a little grin over his shoulder and he stopped, stock-still in the hallway.
"Forget the way?" Bruce snorted.
"No. I just realized it´s been awhile since I actually smiled without thinking about it." Clark told him quietly, weaving through the corridors once more.
Bruce didn´t say anything, but then, his thinking had always been louder to Clark than his actual voice. Clark pushed open the kitchen door and pulled open the fridge, staring thoughtfully.
"There´s cold chicken. And watermelon?" Clark asked, mouth watering already. The watermelons around here made up for a *lot*. Bruce was already pulling out knives and plates, setting them down with a low thunk as Clark pulled out a couple of beers and placed those down in front of the stools too.
"After seeing this breakfast island, I had my kitchen renovated." Bruce said conversationally, slowly biting into a drumstick.
Clark nearly choked on his first slice of the watermelon. "Yeah?"
"Well, it´s big. But it´s really…useful too, when it´s this size."
Clark eyed Bruce´s hand as it stroked the cool granite absently.
"Yeah," he repeated non-committally. They chewed in silence for a few minutes, Bruce muttering something about hiring away the White House chefs, and Clark not bothering to defend Lex´s ability to keep them employed in his house. Bruce´s head turned a bit toward the door, listening.
"Who´s out there?" Clark asked, wiping his fingers finally on a towel.
"Miss Lane for certain." Bruce said, plucking the towel from Clark´s hands. "Someone else too. Mrs. Ross." He said decisively, the words practically overlapping.
Clark narrowed his eyes. Show-off. Clark couldn´t hear a thing.
"Let´s clean up?" Bruce asked, already picking up his plate and fork. Clark nodded, pitching the bottle in the recycling bin. He rinsed off all the dinnerware and placed it neatly in the dishwasher, not realizing Bruce was watching every movement.
"What?" Clark asked, trying to keep the defensiveness out of his voice.
"Nothing. It´s just…you´re probably the only one in your position who´s ever done that in this house."
"Can take the boy out of Smallville, but can´t take Martha Kent´s lectures out of the boy," Clark laughed, freaking himself out with all this humor flying around the place.
The door swung open just as Clark had placed his hand to push it himself. He grinned at Lana´s surprised face.
"I didn´t realize anyone would be in here," She laughed, her perfume finally wafting up to Clark´s nose. He sneezed.
"Sorry. I know you don´t like my perfume." Lana teased, even as Lois came up from behind her and rolled her eyes at Clark´s utter weakness when it came to women´s fragrances.
He crushed Lois gently into a little hug. "What brings you by?"
"I wasn´t feeling the greatest, so I skipped out on the fundraiser," Lana said, her voice slightly muffled since she was facing the fridge.
"And I was bored, so I just said I wanted to walk Lana out. And, you know, didn´t go back." Lois smirked, finally stepping away from Clark.
"Don´t say anything about Pete being upset, please." Lana said, dropping a container of strawberries on the counter.
"I wouldn´t." Clark´s surprise seemed to shake Lana into actually looking at him, and she smiled, a slow, genuine one, and fuck, Clark wanted to know when people actually smiling was so rare he could feel a little squeeze in his chest when it happened.
"I know you wouldn´t. I didn´t mean to say that. I´m--"
"Lana, no—no more apologies, okay?" Clark asked, rubbing his temple a little bit. Bruce had been following the conversation silently, his stance automatically having fallen into that of the jaded, bored billionaire he tended to adopt anywhere that wasn´t in the suit.
Lana laughed, and it was almost contagious. Lois picked out a fork from the drawer and sat down next to Lana, who tilted the strawberries at her silently. Clark reached in between the forks and snuck one out, hoping he had a winning expression on his face that would prevent fork stabbage.
"…are they that good?" Bruce asked curiously, pulling one out himself. They all sighed. Clark couldn´t take it anymore, he just started laughing and couldn´t stop.
Lois broke next, maybe just because she was so relieved to see Clark, like this, not wrapped up in a blanket and sipping cocoa and typing non-sensical words in his novel.
"You´re all insane." Lana giggled, and promptly rose and sauntered back to the fridge, the pale green evening gown really working for the full effect, and even Bruce´s eyes were doing that odd blue twinkle thing they did sometimes. "We´re going to do this right," she said decisively, re-appearing, arms laden with milk, yogurt and wheat germ.
"Oooh," Lois breathed, gesturing gracefully at the strawberries with her fork, in a distinct ‘after you´ motion.
"I don´t know about you, but I could eat more." Clark said, watching as Lana mixed the milk and yogurt in a creamy blend around the berries, and then sprinkling it with the wheat germ.
"Oh, screw that. Just heap it on there." Lois said, doubling Lana´s paltry sprinkling.
"When you´re right, Lois, you´re really right," Lana sighed in satisfaction as she drew the first taste out of her mouth.
"When?" Lois asked, and Clark could practically see the air-quotes.
"Want to join us for a movie?" He blurted out, suddenly wishing none of them would leave. Maybe ever.
Lois blinked and licked her fork distractingly. "I was planning on being at that thing for at least another couple hours, so I don´t have anything else I need to do." Lana just looked at each of them slowly, and nodded, already gathering up the strawberry container in her hands.
"Hmm. We need other fortification though." Lois said meaningfully and Clark pulled out the entire case of beer with a flourish. Lois grabbed a bag of Oreos from the pantry. "Do we need milk?" She asked.
"There´s beer." Clark said blankly. But he reached back in and pulled out a quart hiding out in the corner, just in case. Bruce did a kind of double take, perhaps wondering if he was seeing the other halves of the world´s most powerful politicians cracking up. He just grabbed cups, and Clark was even more grateful that Bruce just didn´t believe in talking all that much. Well, that, and Clark knew that Bruce was scarily into the learning by observing method of acquiring knowledge.
"Right. Let´s move!" She said brightly. They took the elevator up to the third floor.
"Hmm. The sixth bedroom?" Lana asked Clark judiciously.
He grunted, hefting the beer. "Fourth. Bigger t.v."
"So moved." Lana said, sliding open the door, every inch the hostess Clark was not. Lois slid along on the bed, her silky dress making obscenely nice noises against the covers. Clark plopped down beside her, lying flat on his stomach, tearing open the cookies with single-minded dedication. Lois sighed and reached for a pillow behind her, tossing it in Clark´s general direction. Clark propped himself up on the pillow in between cookie search-and-rescue attempts. Bruce leafed through the small collection of DVDs along the side table idly.
"I´m good with whatever you all want to watch," Lana said quickly. "So long as my strawberries are left mostly in peace." She sat down on the floor right underneath Clark´s head.
"…Secrets of the Caped Crusader?" Bruce´s voice got more strung out with each word. Lois looked up from passing a bottle to Lana.
"I have no clue how that got in here," Clark said hurriedly, and it was true. …though, he knew Lex had held a private screening in the White House movie room. And by private, Lex had just invited himself, probably throwing popcorn at the screen and muttering obscenities.
"Movie hit a little too close to home?" Lana asked, sucking on a piece of fruit lightly.
Bruce gripped the DVD box so hard Clark was surprised it didn´t crack. "Excuse me, Mrs. Ross?"
Lana narrowed her eyes. "I can pretend I didn´t say it, if you´d feel more comfortable. Doesn´t make it any less true," She added, almost an afterthought.
They all stared. Lana shrugged a little self-consciously. Lois made a little fluttering motion with her hand, barely containing her enchantment with the entire sequence of events.
"Reminds me of New Zealand," he said finally, looking up at Bruce, letting him decide.
Bruce´s laugh was short, startled, the very best kind. He looked directly at Lana, evaluating her. She appeared to sense it, but unlike anyone else Clark had seen under Bruce´s direct regard, she didn´t straighten or seem to think anything of it.
"New Zealand is where my…where--"
"His girlfriend found out." Clark and Lois stated calmly.
Bruce stood motionlessly, before shifting to sit on the floor across from Lana, facing Lois and Clark on the bed as well. "Catwoman. She and I—we have this…thing." He said awkwardly. Lana´s mouth twitched, but she wisely said nothing, just a slight, polite nod of interest, and Bruce took it well. Clark mentally filed a note that should Bruce ever need blackmailing, he could tell Selina how he described their relationship.
"She was trying to pull off this convoluted heist," Bruce began, warming to the subject, the film by his thigh forgotten. Clark wondered if Bruce even realized he sounded so…proud of Selina. "It was incredibly intricate. Multiple players, at least three or four different crimes going on to distract us properly, keep our resources divided, like she knew where each of us would go ahead of time, before we even took on our assignments."
"I went to New Zealand of course; I knew she was there, and I could feel that somehow, all the crap that was happening was all her doing, but I didn´t really understand why until I checked through some channels."
"You´re skipping over something," Clark said lazily, twisting open his cookie. He offered the plain side without the middle to Lois.
She was the one in every million freak who didn´t like the cream.
"I´m the one telling the story here, Clark." Bruce blinked at his own words. "I have no clue the fuck why, but there you have it."
"Right, right," Clark held up his hands, placating.
"Yeah. The mines. There were these diamond mines that were just discovered—a chain of at least three of them. Catwoman´s plan was to…pick them up." Bruce coughed.
Lana swirled her fork in the now pink milk. "Pick them up?" She looked behind her at Clark, confused.
"Yes. Literally. Pick them up. She had these high-tech tractor beams, these… I don´t even know how to describe them." Clark wiped at his mouth a little bit, brushing off the crumbs that always gathered at the corners.
"So I´m flying in there, I see these bright blue tractor beams hauling a *cave*, and for a second I couldn´t even radio to say that I´d found her."
Lana dropped her fork in the mixture and set it aside. "What did you do?" Even Lois sat up a little for this; she hadn´t ever gotten Bruce to get this far into the story.
"I was all set to disable the tractor beams, but we were flying over Wellington at that point, and I didn´t want anyone crushed, obviously. Catwoman knew it, so she kept…circling the area, like she hoped I´d run out of gas or something." Bruce chuckled a little at the memory, and Clark can feel Lois´ interested twitch beside him.
"She suddenly starts flying toward the harbor and as soon as she hit the open water, I opened fire and disabled the beams. I…overshot." Bruce swallowed; he´s never been good about admitting when he´s made one of his rare, rare mistakes.
"Her plane went down with the caves. I landed on the Bat-pontoons, retrieved her in the water and took her on board the Bat-copter."
"…bat-pontoons?" Lois echoed weakly, taking another cookie half from Clark.
"…Bat-copter?" Lana choked.
Bruce fixed them both with a glare clearly meant to set them straight, but Lana burst out laughing on the floor. "I´m sorry, Mr. Wayne. It´s just…I—I´m sure it´s helpful to call things by easily remembered names." She said finally, clearly calling upon every diplomatically inclined cell her body possessed.
And Lana Ross´ body possessed a *lot* of those.
"Oh God, Bruce, you suck." Lois said cheerfully. "Okay, so she´s flopping around in the water, probably about to kill you at this point, right?"
Clark was watching, fascinated. Bruce was…flustered, off his game.
This was *so cool*.
Bruce pulled his knees into a more comfortable position. "Yes. She wasn´t pleased. I cuffed her to a pipe and started the b—the helicopter up again."
"Kinky," Lana said suddenly. Lois stared at her like she´d sprouted wings and declared that the Inquisitor was a legitimate paper.
"Well, she got loose of course," Bruce said, clearly desperate to get back on track.
"Of course," Clark nodded seriously.
"She came up behind me with this vial of acid from the lab and--"
"You keep a lab on your helicopter?" Lana asked curiously.
Bruce simply fixed her with his well, who the fuck doesn´t confused stare, and she pursed her lips. "She comes up with this acid, and I wasn´t certain if the vial she had was just hydrochloric or sulphuric. She was waving this around in my face, so I pulled the helicopter into a spin to distract her. She went flying to the floor, and I tried to get the vial away from her, but the stopper popped off and went flying at my face. I had to pull the mask off. There wasn´t even time to knock her out first." Bruce sighed.
"Wow. What´d she say?" Lana asked, extracting her second drink out of the case.
"She didn´t say anything for a second. I think it was the first time she couldn´t come up with something to say. I punched her, and luckily, she passed out."
Lois had buried her head in her hands, body shaking. Clark rubbed her knee. "You okay?"
"It´s all just—so romantic." She bit out, shifting to lie on her stomach, thigh pressed to Clark´s.
"Do you want me to continue this or not?" Bruce demanded, finally seeing that all three of them were sitting there trying not to laugh aloud, even Clark who´d heard this story before.
Both versions.
"Of course. They haven´t heard about the dancing competition yet." Clark said, rolling a bottle at Bruce.
Bruce set his jaw. "So I get back up to the controls, manage to get us landed safely. She´d regained consciousness."
Lois buried her face in the coverlet, shoulders shaking hard. "Of course she did." She hiccupped, raising her head enough to take a long drink.
"She sat down next to me. Didn´t say a thing. She just kept…staring at me. I thought that would continue for at least another second, so I looked back at the controls, and the next thing I know, I´m looking up at her from the ground."
"Handcuffed." Clark supplied helpfully. "Handcuffed, and she tied his legs together."
"But the weird thing is, I can feel the mask on my face again." Bruce continues, like Clark never interrupted at all, like Lois isn´t having a hernia on the bed, like Lana isn´t sitting on the floor like it´s kindergarten storytime. "She´d gotten involved with Harley Quinn on this one, and she´s prancing about like it´s Thanksgiving and she´s the one who gets to kill the turkey."
"People don´t really prance when they kill turkeys, Bruce." Clark protested.
"I´m giving them a mental image." Bruce said silkily. "Catwoman tells her that she has some kind of special plan for me, and Harley tells her that so long as ‘her puddin´ gets to see me at the end of it, she doesn´t care. I told her that ‘her puddin´ was going to wind up in the harbor first, and then I was knocked unconscious again."
"Don´t you both feel really safe that this guy is responsible for saving the world a lot?" Clark asked, biting his lip.
"I know I feel really safe knowing you´re looking out for the world." Lois said, sliding across the bed to rest her head on the other half of Clark´s pillow.
Lana just blinked and said nothing.
"And that does it." Bruce said, smoothly rising to his feet. "It´s time for the interactive part of our…retelling tonight." He held out his hand, inches from Clark´s face. "Up and at ‘em, Kent." Clark blinked and took Bruce´s hand uncertainly. Bruce pulled him close and grinned, that shark grin that made blood run cold, the Joker cry, …that grin that made Clark feel weirdly giggly and happy suddenly.
"I get up and I´m in a tuxedo, this number taped to my chest. Catwoman was in this…fucking amazing suit, and we both have our masks on. I have no clue to this day what got them to let us in the competition at that point. She whispered to me that Harley was waiting to take me back to the Joker, and that she was going to let them unless we won. Then this fucking tango music starts blaring, and she spins me out, kicks me in the thigh and tells me to move. At this point, I figure, what the hell." Bruce spins Clark out dramatically, Lois whooping from the bed egging him on.
Lana scooted up to her knees, wobbling a little, and moved to take Clark´s old seat on the bed. "Oh God!" She cried out, eyes actually watering. Lois smacked her hand gently as she let her liquor bottle drop to the floor. Lana gave it over wordlessly.
Clark decides to pull his end of it; since he´s the one who got Bruce into this story anyway. "And then you told me you dipped her, right? Right in front of that panel of judges." He demonstrates, hoping he´s not throwing his back out with the movement.
"The judges were these guys in these freaky masks too! It was an underground dancing competition, grand prize of $200,000 for the winners. The only thing is, they had this Russian roulette tournament set up to off one of the losers, and all the people contributing toward the pot got to bet on a, who would die, and b, who would win the competition."
Lana snorted on the bed and reclaimed her beer from Lois.
"I recover quickly when I´m hit, it´s the training," And damned if Bruce doesn´t manage to make it sound impressive despite the fact he was knocked down twice by the same person in a matter of minutes. Clark allowed himself a little feeling of smugness that that had never happened to him. Unless he counted that time with Lex in Costa Rica.
Or that time in Maui.
Which he so wasn´t. "I can honestly say I can´t think of any two people who deserved one another more." Lois said, raising her newly twisted open bottle in the air. Lana clinked it with her own, the liquid sloshing over the covers.
"And I manage to help her put together what I have to admit, was a spectacular routine. We´re both…limber." Bruce finishes, and it´s at this point that Clark spins him out and pulls him to his chest, Lana screaming and twisting on the bed she´s laughing so hard, Lois crying and trying not to choke on her drink.
And it´s at that point that the door swings open and a harassed looking Pete comes in and stops dead in his tracks at the sight of his wife curled up on the bed, practically sitting on Lois, and Bruce Wayne wrapped up in Clark´s arms.
"Pete, what´s…" Lex trailed off, taking in the scene.
Clark felt a distant urge to pull away, but that´d say he thought he was doing something wrong, and he wasn´t. He was re-enacting the singularly most unusual courtship period of all time, perhaps only second to his own. Bruce steps forward, and Clark can´t see, but he knows the grin´s on full force, the one that makes Lex want to lead federal raids into the batcave every few months.
Usually those impulses come about right after Bruce has visited Clark. Pete works his jaw for a second before he exits and leaves Lex standing in the doorway, glances at Lana again like he doesn´t even know who she is, and it strikes Clark again that no, Pete doesn´t know who she is and hasn´t cared in a very long time.
"Smallville, come back to bed." Lois smirks, drawing out the words on her tongue, and God, it´s so petty, it´s so, so petty, but he loves the way Lex stiffens, the way Lex´s hand seizes up like it´d be so natural to walk over and shove Lois off the bed.
"I think that you´re all sufficiently impressed with my hidden identity and fighting techniques by now," Bruce states, in that dry, dry tone, and Clark slides to the floor helplessly.
"Who won?" Lana asked, and damned if it isn´t genuinely curious.
"Oh, we won." Bruce sounds annoyed that it was ever even in question. "But then Harley opened fire on half the judges and made off with the two hundred grand."
Lois reburied her face in the bed at the words.
"Goodnight, Bruce." Lex said carefully, like he didn´t trust himself to say anything beyond those two words, eyes moving over Lois´s body, before resting on Clark, red and warm and shaking breathlessly on the floor. Bruce bends and presses a hand to Clark´s shoulder. His thumb brushes Clark´s cheek for the briefest second and Lex takes a tiny step, but checks himself.
"I´ll see you?" Bruce asks, but it´s never a question.
"Don´t forget your laptop." Clark manages to hiccup.
"Of course." Bruce practically saunters out of the room. Lana manages to get to her feet and walks past Lex, murmuring a quick good night.
Clark continues to sit and laugh until he thinks he´s going to be sick, but can´t help but sober when Lex, one foot in front of the other like he´d thought to move closer, but thought better of it, fixes him with this shaken, lost look, gone so quickly Clark will be convinced he imagined it when he wakes up the next morning.