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The whipping of the wind nearly drowns out the quiet ping as Clark taps his earpiece. A thousand feet over the Gotham skyline, the stench of the seaport drifts airily past while the cawing of gulls fights for dominance over the League comm line.
“Checking in. Thirty seconds out.”
The Martian's voice crackles to life in Clark’s ear. “Affirmed. Any sign of him so far?”
“Not yet. No pings on the Tower’s visuals?”
“None.”
Clark sucks the sky into his lungs, holding it for a breath before letting it seep through his teeth. An hour ago, a code had been issued to all active members for a mid-level brief. Of the on-world members, three responded within minutes. Except one. Batman’s comm seemed, for all intents and purposes, dead.
Normally, a non-answer from the Bat was a given. Gotham kept him busy enough, but the team had come to expect at least a refusal before comms were cut. The silence was worrying, to say the least.
The last Clark heard, Bruce was meant to be a guest at some foundation event on the upper east side. He never allowed the standard GPS with which most Leaguers were outfitted–the most one could hope for was a fleeting signal before a big bust. But even then, it seemed he didn’t trust them not to blow his cover. They only got as much as they did because of a few close calls Clark or the others had been lucky enough to catch.
With a little reporter research of his own, Clark had gleaned the location and timing of the event. Not that social media posts required much sleuthing, really, but Bruce’s exact whereabouts were still a mystery as far as the League was concerned. Clark made a mental note to enforce check-ins from all members going forward.
Minutes later, his boots touch down on the soft glow of lights streaming from the venue. A cold, marbled face rolls a velvet tongue along its entrance. In the dim light of the moon, the marble resembles dark cracks shooting along the stone like veins. Everything in Gotham looks like it’s crumbling, even here.
A quick scan of the interior briefs him. A tri-level venue, roughly five hundred guests in the main hall. At least a hundred more scattered on the other floors milling about. No Bruce, at least at first glance. Not good, but not surprising, either. With all these bodies packed so close together, it’s hard enough to differentiate one from another. An extra push of his x-ray vision reveals nothing more than a jumbled mass of bones, each twisting and swaying to the classical music drifting faintly through the doors.
This was going to take some investigation. In other words, it would take Clark.
Frankly, though, he'd expected recon for the Batman to involve a lot more busting through walls and a little less sneaking through crowds. That was more the detective's speed, after all.
It was times like these that he wishes he'd asked Ma for pockets in the suit.
…
Coat check is nestled in the corner of the lobby, its wired gates pulled back to rows of hung suit coats and shawls discarded by the attendees. A single person sits behind the counter mindlessly tugging at his collar in the warm air of the dance hall. Staff, definitely, but nowhere near security. It makes Clark feel slightly better about what he’s about to do.
No more than a minute passes before a new group of guests struts in through the front doors. They busy themselves with their coats, the men helping the women shrug off their furs as they make light conversation. Clark blends seamlessly into their group and tails behind them as they head toward the front desk. He darts into the back of the coatroom as they hold the staff’s attention, using just enough speed to render himself a hazy blur among the other lights on the street.
There has to be something remotely his size. He sifts through the racks, giving each hangar a passing glance before finally catching sight of something promising. Clark snags the tawny overcoat and draws it over his shoulders, letting it dwarf his suit in swaths of itchy wool. It works, for now, and Clark's about to sneak out unseen before he glimpses the motherlode out of the corner of his eye. A stack of extra staff uniforms sits in a back nook of the room. It's almost too good to be true.
“Sir? Can I…help you?”
Well. His luck had to run out sometime.
The boy from coat check is peeking in from the front desk, shuffling awkwardly between the racks. To check on the man taking a disturbingly long time rifling through wealthy people’s coats, probably.
“Oh, not at all. I just…”
Clark waves the empty coat hanger at the boy.
“Just wanted to grab my coat.”
“...Sure. Did you have your ticket?”
Oh, right.
“Of course. It was right…” Clark reaches into his pockets before feigning surprise. “...Here? My God, I must have tossed it out with a napkin or something. Listen, I can look for it, but my date just spilled her drink on a rented dress and I really ought to be getting this back to her. You know how it is, she’ll be so embarrassed if anyone sees. So really…” He passes a hand worriedly over the back of his neck, cocking his head toward the main hall. “I should get going, if that’s alright with you.”
“Sure, sir, I understand.” The boy nods absently, already turning back toward the counter. “Let me know if you need further assistance, then.” He stops. “And, uh, sorry about your lady.”
“Trust me, me too.” Clark chuckles and gives a halfhearted wave, watching the kid shuffle back to his post before sighing and pocketing the paper ticket on the coat. Too close. Anyone else might have given him a harder time. Lucky that this kid was probably just part-time.
The uniform he snagged was a bit small for his size in the end, the buttons straining to close the gap over his suit. The cuffs leapt halfway to his elbows when he raised his arms to adjust them. Seemed an expensive piece to stretch out to boot, but it would have to do. The coat layered over top made him out to be, if not a convincing partygoer, at least like a staff member on break. He just hoped the owner could afford another. Which, judging by the crowd, they could probably afford a few dozen more than that.
…
Inside, the commotion flooded his mind. Hundreds of hearts beat on their own time to the music flooding the hall. Heels clacked sharply against marble in rhythm with the scrape of polished oxfords, stumbling half-drunk as they led their partners across the floor.
Clark sucks in a breath, letting the thudding of his own heart melt into the cacophony. Focus. One body among hundreds, one heartbeat among thousands. Easy.
Well, theoretically.
The moment Clark lets the noise in, the babble of a hundred bodies rushes through his head. Heaving lungs, simmering stomachs, dry chuckles as alcohol burns in throats. He stumbles backward in quiet shock. Hopefully he just looks drunk.
It’s all too much. Listening for one man is like playing Where’s Waldo with Bruce’s biology. Possible, sure, but he doesn’t have time for games. Not tonight.
It takes Clark several laps of the gala floor to finally spot him. He catches him leaning against a nearby table, elbow propped up beside an array of empty glasses as he mutters something to the group forming around him. A low chuckle reverberates through the crowd. One of the women pitches forward, one hand fanning her face as the other sends her glass of wine sloshing onto the suit of the man in front of her. Bruce looks down at the dark stain spreading across his front and laughs, sending another giggle rippling across the room.
Clark makes his way toward them, conscious of how his borrowed suit protests as he bends and weaves between the tables. Bruce doesn’t even look up as he slips inside their clique.
“Mister Wayne, right? Bruce Wayne?”
Bruce glances hazily up at Clark. One hand still dots at the creeping stain on his shirt.
“And you are...?”
“Kent, Clark Kent. Reporting on the gala, but I couldn't help but notice the little, uh, accident over here. Can I get you a napkin or something?” He raises his eyebrows, silently begging Bruce to acknowledge the signal, but the other man’s face is blank, if not flushed from the booze.
“Really, it's fine. I've got a dozen others like it,” Bruce slurs. “This one's not even my favorite.” He winks at the woman and her now-empty glass, sending another giggle rippling through the crowd.
“I insist.” Clark hooks an arm around Bruce's. The other man starts to protest, but Clark’s already begun dragging him across the dance floor. They make an odd duo, Clark weaving the two of them between couples cradled in each other’s arms.
They finally find an empty hall after bumping into more than a few of said couples occupying the others. Bruce still lags behind him, his elbow entwined with Clark’s. As soon as Clark begins to slow down he yanks his arm free, making a show of massaging his wrist.
“What the hell was that?” Bruce hisses. Another question tumbles half-formed from his lips before Clark steers them both against the nearest wall.
“Where have you been, Bruce?” Clark snaps.
“Where does it look like?” Bruce gestures flippantly at the ballroom.
Clark's jaw tightens.
“I don’t get it. I thought—I've been trying to reach you for days!”
“That so.” Bruce pouts, inspecting his nails. And, God help him, the man actually yawns .
“Am I boring you?” Clark hisses. “Listen, I know you’ve got your responsibilities in Gotham, but you cannot go dark like this. What if something had happened?” He reaches for Bruce’s shoulder, seconds away from physically shaking some sense into the man, when Bruce suddenly recoils. A flicker of disgust passes over his face, his piercing eyes gone dark. They flit back and forth across Clark’s body, sizing him up, as if they’d just met one another for the first time.
“Do you have business with Wayne?” Bruce sneers.
“I...”
Clark's breath catches in his chest.
Do you have business with Wayne?
One second. For one second, Clark resigns himself from this impossible conversation, from the strange, soft give of the skin beneath his grip. A wave of noise rushes over him, breaking over his mind as hundreds of conversations drone on in the other room. The steady sound of voices rushes like a river beneath the din of clinking glass and rustling skirts, the squeak of waxed shoes on waxed floors. The noise is intense, deafening, and that's exactly why Clark has shut it out. Until now. If he'd taken one second for the sounds, he would have heard the silence.
Bruce has no heartbeat.
“You. You're not...Who are you? Where’s Wayne?”
Clark's grasp digs into the other man's arm hard enough to feel the uncanny way his fingers sink into flesh. Clark recoils, his stomach lurching.
“So it’s Wayne now.”
The man—a man, not Bruce —pulls away, his arm sliding out of Clark’s grip like butter. “What’s wrong? I thought you two might be close.”
Clark’s fingers flex in the empty space. Before he can think, his other hand is latching itself onto the collar of the man’s shirt. The fabric wrinkles in his grip.
“Where is Wayne?”
“Mm.” The man grins lazily. Pearly teeth glint in the lights overhead. “I’m sure he’s very busy. You know him, with all his callers . Maybe he finally answered. But while I have you…”
He reaches into the breast pocket of his suit and plucks out a slip of paper. Pinched between two long, pale fingers is a press photo of Bruce Wayne.
“...I’m actually a big fan of your work.”
Clark knows that photo. He’s the one who helped publish it to the Planet.
“Every great artist needs a reference.” A laugh like water in a gutter spills from the man’s lips. “This was as good as any. But since you seem so interested in Mister Wayne, I figured you were here to whisk him away for another interview. So I’ll give you one.”
He leans close, his breath damp against Clark’s neck, reeking of alcohol and earth. A clammy cheek presses against his own.
“Forty-eight hours. If you want it in his words, we’ll be happy to send him to you to follow up after we get our deposit.”
A pinprick of heat burns behind Clark’s eyes.
“Deposit?”
The other man feigns surprise.
“Of course. I’m sure Wayne’s got cash to burn. Really, it’s hardly a dent.” A cold hand slides a folded note into the side of Clark’s borrowed coat. “This little soundbite I’m giving will cost extra, though. Twenty grand, at least. You can discuss with your friends in the press when you run our demands in tomorrow’s paper.”
“When I run them?” The pinprick broils to a burn. “He’ll be found before then, I’ll tell you that. You’re out of your mind.”
Clark’s knuckles whiten around the man’s shirt as he lifts him off the ground. The toes of his shoes skim the floor as he dangles there, gazing dreamily down at Clark’s tightening face.
“Hm. No more than Wayne will be.”
In an instant the body goes limp in Clark’s arms, sagging against his hold. His face— its face—glistens in the dim light with something not quite sweat. The thing grins, the upward pull of its lips struggling against sagging flesh, and a second later Clark is watching Bruce’s face dissolve in front of him.
Skin melts off of bone like a popsicle off a stick, sloughing off in wet sheets and hitting the floor with a sickening splat. It runs between Clark’s fingers, streaming down his arms and seeping into the lines of his skin. The stench of rotting earth fills his lungs.
As much as this isn’t Bruce, can’t be Bruce, Clark still has to gulp back the bile rising in his throat as a cold trickle of flesh runs down his forearm. The double’s body gushes inside his fist with every squeeze. Bruce is literally slipping through his fingers, and he’s standing in a puddle of the only evidence. He bites back a strangled scream—out of fear, of frustration, anything to make sense of the horror in his hands.
The clay pulls at his fingertips, pooling from his arms onto the floor. It runs along the caulk of the tiles like a current through a wire. Its trail shrinks, dries up, and before Clark can scramble to catch it the last drop has disappeared. Nothing but a flesh-colored streak stains the ground.
For all the good his hearing has done him tonight, Clark swears a wet chuckle bubbles up beneath the floor.