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Title: The Wind At Midnight
Rating: PG-13 overall, I think.
Characters/Pairings: Will be Bruce/Clark. Bruce, Clark, John Corben, Luthor, Mercy, Dick this chapter.
Summary: Almost a quarter of a century ago, the cities of Earth were torn from the earth by some mystic upheaval and set flying, before threatening to fall back. To prevent the incredible loss of life if they fell, structures known as Ramparts were rapidly constructed, containing the material apparently most susceptible to the new mystical gravities of earth: silver. A new world order was built, as the deserts created on the surface during the Upheaval denied cultivation, based on Cities and flightpaths and park-grown food, a world in tentative political and physical balance. And now that balance is threatened.
Chapter summary: Escaping Palaces 101: don't end up near Lord Luthor's quarters, or alone with MCDF's homocidal commander.
Disclaimer: Characters are not mine. Conceit inspired by James Blish's 'Cities in Flight'. Rest is mine.
The Wind At Midnight
Part IV
They ducked hurriedly inside the room, and Clark paused for a moment in the middle of the floor, trying to orientate himself and figure out where exactly they were in the Palace. After a minute, the decor and the two floors they had descended outside gave him a fix, and he grimaced.
"What's wrong?" Wayne ... Bruce ... asked sharply. Clark turned to him, blinking to find him sitting on the edge of the bed massaging his left calf, and shook his head.
"You couldn't have picked a worse window to come in," he explained, and shrugged. "This is the Ambassadorial Suite on the 34th floor. Luthor's rooms are not two doors down from here, and heavily guarded!"
Bruce blinked at him for a minute, his hand pausing in its task, and then, abruptly, he burst out laughing. Clark stared at him in shock, but the other man just held up one hand in reassurance, and waited until his mirth had passed. Then he looked back up, his lips still twitching irredeemably, and smiled at a bemused Clark. "I'm sorry," he breathed, pulling himself under control. "I'm sorry. But that's just ... It's just perfect, really. Considering the day I've had. It's just perfect!"
Clark stared, before his own lips twitched, and he sat down beside the other man with a wry shake of the head. "I suppose it is, at that," he murmured. Bruce slid him a sideways glance, the humour dancing in his eyes, and returned to rubbing at his leg. "How bad is that?" Clark asked suddenly.
Bruce didn't look up. "Not bad. A pulled muscle, I think. It's just painful, and a little shaky. I won't be able to run at my best, that's all." He froze, however, when Clark moved to lay a hand over his massaging one, and looked at him sharply. "Comm ... Clark?" Clark smiled gently at him.
"Let me?" he asked. "I'm told I'm very good at massage. According to Lois, anyway. My friend," he explained hurriedly, when Bruce gave him a look. "Something about warm hands?" Bruce looked wary, but shrugged, and Clark set to work with a small smile.
He could feel the tightness in the limb, the heat of abused muscle, and from the feel of it knew that 'a bit painful' was probably something of an understatement. In fact, the man beside him had to be in a lot of pain all 'round. But he didn't show it, except in the obvious fatigue as he sat, or the occasional grunt when Clark accidentally hurt him. As Clark moved his fingers carefully over the injury, doing his best to soothe, he reflected that Lord Wayne appeared to be a very courageous man indeed.
After a moment, Bruce laid a hand on his shoulder, and Clark looked up in confusion. Bruce was watching him with a strange warmth in his eyes, a warmth that did strange things to Clark in turn. Then Bruce gave a rueful smile, and tipped his head towards the door. "That's enough," he said softly. "Thank you. But we have to move."
Clark blinked, then nodded. "Of course. Any ideas about getting past Luthor's chambers?"
Bruce smiled, and paused to pull the edge of the cloak forwards so he could rummage around in its depths. Clark blinked at him as he pulled forth two small ampoules of some clear liquid, and held them up to the light to check them over. Nodding in satisfaction, he handed one to Clark and palmed the other himself.
"What are these?" Clark asked, holding his up to examine it.
"The liquid inside reacts with air to produce a potent sleeping agent," Bruce explained. "We have a very talented bioscientist in Gotham who developed it, a Ms Isley. Anyway. Don't put pressure on the top of the ampoule, unless you urgently need to take a nap. I'm surprised these survived, actually, but since they did ..."
Clark carefully moved his fingers to hold it gingerly around the middle. "How many will they take out?"
"How many do they need to?" Bruce asked. Clark frowned as he brought a picture of the corridor outside to mind.
"Three, usually," he answered slowly. "Provided the alert upstairs hasn't increased it."
"No problem," Bruce smiled. "Just throw yours hard in front of the guards, and try to arrange for it to land top first. But don't worry too much if it doesn't. People usually either step on them or try to pick them up, so they should gas themselves one way or another." Which wasn't at all a cynical viewpoint, but howandever.
They moved cautiously to the door, and peeked out down the corridor. As expected. Three guards. Clark looked once at Bruce, who shrugged, and then tossed his as quietly as possible to land at their feet. It shattered with a light crunch, echoed an instant afterwards by Bruce's, which landed with some precision just beside the farthest guard, who looked down at the pieces with a startled grunt. A grunt that became a bleary snuffle moments later, as the young woman leaned back against the wall and put her hand to her face. Within a few seconds, all three had slid listlessly to the floor.
Clark watched as Bruce moved forwards confidently, wondering at the kind of man who would carry such things on a regular basis, and hurried after him with a frown on his face. A frown that deepened as the Nightlord stopped outside Luthor's door, and started to gently open it.
Clark darted forward as silently as he could, and grabbed Bruce's arm. Whatever else he might be guilty of, he was not going to let the man assassinate the Lord of Metropolis, no matter how justified he would be to do so. But Bruce only put a hasty finger to his lips, and slipped one hand back inside his cloak to pull out what looked like a small glass marble, dressed in copper wire. Clark frowned, but let Bruce roll the microGlass in through the crack in the door. That done, Bruce smiled slightly, and tipped his head back towards the corridor.
As they paused at the intersection, slipping hurriedly into an alcove in case someone passed, Clark turned to whisper urgently to him. "What was that for?" Bruce, leaning heavily against the wall while he pulled in harsh breaths against the wound in his chest, looked up in amusement.
"Know thine enemy, no?" he murmured back. "Now, Commander. Which way?"
Clark watched him for a minute, noting his pale colour with some alarm. Somehow, despite his obviously bad condition, Bruce's utter confidence made it difficult to remember that he was injured at all, let alone as badly as he really was. But the Nightlord was hurt, and whenever they paused to rest, he was showing it. Whatever momentary fears for Luthor's wellbeing Clark might have had fled, and he focused quickly on trying to get Bruce out of here.
"Ah," he murmured, trying to remember if there was anything in the building to help. Then, suddenly, he grinned broadly, ignoring Bruce's raised eyebrow. "Yes. Left to the end of the corridor, then up the stairs!"
"Up the stairs?" Bruce asked, carefully. "As in, back towards my 'guest suite'?" Clark shook his head.
"Past it. We're heading for the roof, Bruce. Trust me."
"I don't seem to have very much choice," Bruce noted absently, but he stepped back out into the corridor. "Lead on, Commander! Lead on." But when he saw Clark's frown of dismay, the distressed realisation of their positions that any other man would probably be taking horrible advantage of, Bruce paused to lay a hand lightly on his arm. "I do trust you, Clark," he reassured quietly. "I'm not sure why. But I do trust you."
Clark nodded slowly, and laid his own hand over that reassuring one to grip it lightly, and meet that calm blue gaze. "Come on then," he said at last, and Bruce smiled.
They made it to the stairs easily enough, and although getting up them was a slightly more fraught endeavour, at one point involving a surprisingly acrobatic vault by Bruce over the railings which had the injured Nightlord wheezing horribly on the last leg, they made it to the roof in relatively good time and, as far as Clark could determine, undetected. Which was just as well, really, as all Bruce could do for the first few minutes was sit in a crumpled heap and breathe, while Clark hovered over him anxiously. This didn't appear to agree with his companion at all, and after a minute Bruce waved an irritable hand in his direction, and pulled himself up to sit straight, scowling ferociously at Clark's concern.
"Well?" he demanded brusquely, then softened with a sigh when Clark raised an eyebrow. "Heh. Sorry. I meant why are we on the roof, oh helpful one?"
"Well," Clark murmured slowly, with an edge of mischief. "Since you ask so nicely ..." Bruce rolled his eyes and glared pointedly, until Clark conceded with a smile. "You seemed to have an excellent head for heights, your Lordship, and if that was you piloting your ... your boat?"
"It was," Bruce noted repressively, and Clark hurriedly moved on.
"How are you with a handsail?" he asked quickly, and smiled when Bruce looked up in sudden interest. Moving over to a storage shed on the far side of the roof, Clark pulled out the two sails it contained, and grinned as Bruce raised a pair of appraising eyebrows in his direction. "I have these stashed all over the City," he explained. "It's good training for the new pilots. Plus, sometimes I ... sometimes I just need to fly, you see?"
Bruce smiled gently, and nodded. "Skyborn," he said softly, warmly, and had Clark flushing. "Very well, oh Lord of the Skies. Just give me one moment?"
Clark stepped back over with a frown, and watched as Bruce fished around in his cloak once more and pulled out a small, low-range radioGlass. "I don't suppose you have a picnic in there, while you're at it?" he asked wryly. Bruce looked up sardonically, and fiddled with the thing in silence for a minute, until a spark flickered in its center and voices curled up through the Glass. Recognising Mercy's, Clark hurriedly came over, and sat beside him to listen in, feeling a vaguely guilty thrill in doing so.
"I've got Wayne's deputy on the Glass, Lord Luthor," Mercy's voice carried through. "Commander Grayson would like to speak with you."
"About time!" Luthor, this time. "Put him through, Mercy." A pause, and then: "You took your time getting back to me, Commander. One would think you were not concerned for the fate of your Lord and Master."
"Oh, I wouldn't say that, Lord Luthor." A young voice, strained but lively. "Lord, certainly, but I've never thought of Lord Wayne as my master." Clark saw Bruce's eyes crinkle in a smile.
"Be that as it may. You understand my terms, Commander?"
"They're hardly ambiguous, Luthor. Yes, we understand."
"And your answer?" Bruce stiffened beside him, listening intently.
"I'm afraid, my Lord," Grayson began, genuine regret in his tone. "That Gotham cannot accede to your ... request. Despite the consequences to our Lord, we will not concede control of the City to you. In fact, and I'm afraid my colleagues have descended into colloquialism here, but I am instructed to tell you that you can 'go to hell'."
There was silence for one ringing instant, and then Luthor replied, stiffly. "That ... is unfortunate. Certainly for Lord Wayne. But perhaps you will change your mind later, no? When you have had a chance to see for yourself these 'consequences' that you cavalierly dismiss?"
"I doubt it," Grayson answered softly. "And there is something you should consider, Luthor. Lord Wayne is more than my Lord. He is my father, in all but blood." Clark sucked in a startled breath, and turned to stare at the man beside him. Bruce ignored him, still listening intently. "Now think, Luthor. What possible reason could a good, dutiful son like me have for abandoning dear old dad to your clutches?" And with that little bombshell, he appeared to have signed off. Clark looked to Bruce in dismay, wondering how he would take to being shunted aside in a powerplay by his son, and blinked to find the man grinning from ear to ear.
"Good boy," Bruce whispered. "Very nice. Very nice indeed." Clark opened his mouth to ask incredulously what he meant, but Bruce held up a forestalling hand, and indictated that Clark keep listening. Mercy and Luthor were talking again, voices harsh and angry.
"That changes things," Mercy noted. "And on top of the escape. We need to alter the plan ..."
"No!" Luthor barked, then went on more slowly. "No. It may yet be bravado, and we've time still. Wayne won't get far, not in this City, and when we recapture him ... We can question him, see if the boy's bluffing. And even if he isn't, I need Wayne to answer my other questions."
"What other questions?" Mercy asked sharply, echoing Clark's sentiment on the roof. "I thought this was a straight takeover bid?"
Luthor sighed audibly. "Mercy, Mercy. You think so small. Of course it's a takeover bid. But it's so much more than that. Can't you see it?" Obviously she didn't, because he went on, in that same patronising tone that had Clark gritting his teeth. "Think of where Gotham has been, Mercy! Think of what that stubborn bastard has learned, what he's done to change her! The power he holds, the power that could be ours!"
"You mean you were listening to that rubbish he spouted in the Interview Hall?" she answered incredulously.
"Not rubbish!" he answered sharply. "Oh, not at all. Mercy, the evidence was before your very eyes! Why do you think I demanded to see Gotham in the light? Think about it. Those ribbed sails that are never raised. The modifications to the Rampart design. The oxygen dome that on the Nightside is used to absorb starlight. The sheer size of those Flight Engines! Gotham is a powerhouse, Mercy! A powerhouse designed to reach something we haven't discovered yet, and I want her! I want her."
As Mercy paused to let this sink in, Bruce straightened, blue eyes turning hard and calculating. "Then," she said slowly. "If we cannot take her using Wayne ..."
"I will blow her out of the skies, if need be," Luthor answered calmly. "While her crew are caught up wondering if I've killed him yet. I will blow her from the skies and wrest her secrets from the wreakage if I have to!"
On the roof, Bruce stood in one fluid movement at that, his injuries ignored, and Clark shied back from the ferocious determination in his chill gaze. To threaten his person was one thing, and the Nightlord took that with admirable and worrying poise, but to threaten his City was quite another. For a moment as he stood there, glaring down at the Glass, Clark was reminded of all those rumours, that here stood a man who had brought his City back from Hell itself. For his fury in that instant, Clark might believe it.
"We will stop him," he said quietly, and tried not to flinch when that searing stare swung on him. "Trust me. Metropolis depends on it as much as Gotham. For our Cities, my Lord, we will not fail!"
"Really?" drawled another voice, cold and sneering, and both of them swung towards the doors, dropping instinctively into identical defensive crouches. Bruce's eyes were flat and wary as he surveyed the intruder, but Clark felt his own widen in dismay as John Corben smirked nastily and stepped fully through the door, looking the pair of them over. "I can't say I like your chances, boys."
"Commander," Bruce said softly, with just a flicker of the eyes to warn Clark that this was not their first close encounter, and suddenly he had no doubt whatsoever that Corben was responsible for some of those fresher bruises on the Nightlord's face. But the MCDF Commander didn't seem to care about Wayne at all. His focus was entirely on Clark.
"I've been waiting so long for this," the older man noted with barely-leashed eagerness, as he carefully closed and bolted the doors behind him. He took a step or two towards Clark, testing, and sneered when Bruce automatically shifted to cover his companion better. "I've been waiting for years for you to outlive your usefulness, Kent. I must say, I didn't quite anticipate that some exotic Nightsider would be your reason, but hey! I'll take what I can get."
Clark paused in watching him flex powerful fists to send Wayne a panicked, apologetic glance. That had not been what he intended! But Bruce only smirked lightly, and shook his head, his eyes never leaving their foe.
Which was just as well, as Corben obviously wasn't in a talkative mood. With a heavy gait that was shockingly fast, the Commander ran them, one great fist swinging powerfully towards Clark's head. Clark ducked rapidly, and then Bruce's foot buried itself in Corben's side, shunting the man sideways. By about an inch. As the Nightlord backed off again in sudden dismay and rapid calculation, the MCDF man turned back to Clark with a hard smile.
"Not very familiar with Metropolite ways, is he?" he sneered. "Even after I broke his cheekbone for 'im." Clark found his own fists clenching, the image of Bruce in that room, prowling warily towards him, and the thought of how much courage that must have taken if Corben had been his last 'visitor' ...
"No indeed," Bruce said, with a definite sneer. "I generally don't make a habit of studying frost-maggots." Corben snarled, and rushed him, ugly intent in his eyes. With a roar, Clark seized the back of his uniform and pulled for all he was worth, even as Bruce flowed smoothly underneath the blow. Though the manouver only barely checked Corben's advance, it did have one other startling effect. It ripped away the disguising cloth, and bared Corben's back and shoulder to the air. Corben's metallic back and shoulder.
The man was made of brass.
Staring, both Clark and Bruce backed up, letting the ... creature turn after them, Corben smirking at their shocked appraisal. The mechanoid looked at them, then down at the cloth hanging limply from the gleaming brass rise of his shoulder, the copper wires that served as his tendons and nerves glittering in the sunlight. With a strange smile, Corben ripped the remains of the sleeve from his uniform in one harsh movement, and held up his mechanical arm in pride. Clark stared in fascination at the whirring of mechanisms beneath the cage of brass, the lazy curl of current along the wire nerves, glancing sideways to find Bruce frowning with concentration at the man.
Corben turned glittering, hateful eyes on Clark, that incredible arm swinging down to point at him accusingly. "Don't suppose you remember that little lightsailer accident sixteen years ago?" he asked bitterly. Clark shook his head, mind rushing desperately as he tried to figure out what the man was talking about. "No? Well, that's a damn shame, Kent. That really is a shame. Because you're going to die for it!"
He rushed them again, but this time, he wasn't aiming to hit them. Even as Clark ducked away from the flashing arc of one arm, the other scythed in underneath and locked fast around his throat. The vengeful Commander swept him off his feet to swing helplessly in the air, and pulled him in until he was face to face with that snarling countenance. Clark's hands sprang to the uniformed arm holding him, as Bruce leapt in from the side, trying to break Corben's grip on Clark's throat. The mechanoid didn't even look at him, just smashed one heavy metal fist into his chest. Though Bruce swayed back from most of it, still the hard metal kissed the bandage over his torso in passing, and the Nightlord fell back with an agonised grunt to land on all fours, barely able to suck in a breath.
Corben snarled into Clark's face, before the harsh lines of his face curved themselves into a triumphant smirk, and the mechanoid turned to drag him over to the handsails he had so recently pulled out of hiding. Grabbing one of them, he snapped the heavy sailbar with one hand, rendering it largely uncontrollable for anyone trying to fly it, and with a satisfied smirk started to drag both Clark and the sail towards the edge of the roof.
"That accident you don't remember," he started, conversationally. "Any idea what might have happened in it?" Clark tried to say something through the strangling grasp of his hands, but Corben wasn't really interested in a response. "I'll tell you. You and your bloody flyboys crashed a boat on me. Dogfight with the Shanghai forces, I think, back in that little incident over the Mongolian desert paths. Almost killed me, you did. Hah! Almost, I say!" He turned at the edge of the roof, shaking Clark like a leaf, and grinned toothily. "You did fucking kill me. And now?" He flipped the sail over the edge and caught it with one foot so that it lay horizontally out over the City, and swung Clark out after it until his feet rested lightly on the center of the damaged board. As soon as Corben released Clark, he was going to go arcing out over a skyscraper's worth of empty air on an uncontrollable handsail. "Now I'm going to kill you," Corben finished softly, as Clark stared at him in horror.
"Hey, ticktock man?" came a soft, conversational voice behind them. "Got any silver on you?" Corben turned his head slightly to eye the Nightlord, as Bruce pulled himself staggeringly to his feet, and sneered.
"No. Why?"
"Because you're going to need it," Bruce replied gently, and suddenly one arm snaked out from beneath the cloak, slinging a small black object directly at Corben. Bruce was already running as Corben released Clark to try and catch it. Clark missed a lot of what happened in the next second, as he started to fall and a panicked realisation of gravity fought with his instinctive acceptance of flight. But he noticed when a concussive blast propelled Corben out over the edge past him, one metal arm catching the sail in passing and ripping it out from under him.
For an endless second, Clark seemed to hang motionless in the air, watching the man drift away at an impossibly slow speed beneath him, and dimly recognised that he was going to die following him. Then a hand wrapped itself with bruising force around his upflung wrist, and reality returned as he hit the side of a building with a horrible smack, and almost tore himself and his rescuer loose. Above him, someone bit back a harsh gasp of pain, turning it into a heavy grunt.
After a moment, as his sight returned, Clark looked up, to see Bruce straining out over the lip of the building, his chest pressing painfully into the edge of the wall as he struggled to keep his tentative grip on Clark's arm. For a second, neither of them said anything. Then Bruce pulled in a strained breath, and managed a small smile.
"Well, Commander? What now?"
Part V: http://icarus-chained.livejournal.com/27530.html
