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Clark sits across from Ma, pine creaking beneath his frame, a splotch of sun cast across his cheek. He tilts his head to the light, a faint smile playing at his lips.
“I miss you in the big city, Clark. But you know what I can always count on?”
He drags his gaze from the window, where he’d been watching Pa mow the back field. “Coffee?” With a smirk, he raises the mug in his hands and takes a sip.
Ma huffs, shaking her head, fingers moving with care over scrap fabric. “The sun. I know that if the sun is shining, someplace in Metropolis, my boy is smiling.”
A gleam overtakes Ma’s face, eyes radiant in their warmth, her own smile bright and pleased. The lines about her cheeks have become more prominent, as have the crevices in her temple. Clark doesn’t know what his lifespan will be. So far, he’s grown right alongside his friends—his family. But that doesn’t mean he’ll remain on a human timeline. A similar-looking biology means little when, years ago, he sneezed and froze an entire harvest.
Despite the uncertainty that sits in his chest, tightening it with apprehension, Clark grins back at the woman who raised him, a flush spreading up his neck. “I smile when I’m here, too, Ma.”
“Oh, I know bubs.” She smooth’s her hand over the fabric. For an instant, a crease folds her brow. It’s not even a full draw, more like a flinch, but Clark catches the flash as easily as he catches a collapsing roof or a runaway train. Ma presses the cloth towards him. “Go on, try this one. Let me know how it fits.”
Clark curls his hand around the fabric, then pads barefoot to his old room. It’s still decorated the same as when he left for university. Same pleated duvet, same participation trophies, same punk rock posters littering the walls, glossy and nostalgic. He strips out of his clothes, then tugs on the suit.
When he first told his parents about his plan to introduce himself to the world as yet another meta, they’d been robotic in their support. Pa said he was proud of Clark. Ma said she loved Clark's kindness. The words were carefully chosen. Polite, but not heartfelt. Honest, but not earnest. Three months and five different suit designs later, and the phrases have started to come a smidge easier.
He gets it.
The three of them have spent Clark’s entire life shielding him from a world that views anything unknown as a threat. A society that categorizes other human beings as sub-species if they don’t look the right way or speak the right language. With the growing population of metas, the governmental cogs of the globe shift. Corporations roll out contracts for control. Terms like weapon, power, and eradicate pop up in the media near daily.
Cruelty where there should be compassion. Capitalism where there should be kindness.
Clark peers through his lashes at an old medal. He was never allowed to be the best at anything. He played junior varsity sports, barely scraped the top 25% in school, adorned glasses to fake poor eyesight. Hell, he wore clothes that fell awkward on his frame because even a human that stood at a height of 6’4 and had a BMI of 28 would be noticed, much less one that has x-ray vision or impenetrable skin. His existence had been about blending in, appearing normal, and living in a way that exposing his Kryptonian heritage would never have allowed.
But he was sent to this world for more than helping Pa rebuild the barn, or taking Ma to the farmer’s market, or laughing around the dinner table while eating homemade cherry pie.
His fingers graze the empty space where his final suit will include his family crest. It’s a symbol he’s always kept close to his heart. An emblem that stands for hope. If he can’t share that with the people, can’t be a beacon of it, then what’s the point? Why is he here?
So, yeah, Clark knows why his announcement threw his parents off balance. It’s simultaneously everything they taught him to uphold, and the opposite. To be the best man he can, except now, he’ll be that man while out in the open and completely transparent in not just who he is, but what he is.
Kal-El of the planet Krypton.
Clark tugs on the pants, then the shirt. He grabs the belt they’d all agreed on a month ago and clips it around his waist. As he turns toward the mirror, his eyes catch on the plaid curtains over his window, fluttering with the autumn breeze. Clark hesitates, then takes one panel down and uses two safety pins to attach it to the shoulders of the suit.
When he stands before the mirror in the odd-ball patchwork of scrap fabrics, made from paisley and checkerboard and a sporadic flock of country hens, a tightness burns behind his eyes. Tension pinches at his nose and clots his throat.
This is the one. This is his suit. This is how he’ll introduce himself to the world. Not as Clark Kent, but as Kal-El.
Not as a farmer boy and investigative journalist illuminating corruption one article at a time, but as a man on the front lines, providing a barricade against harm with unyielding belief in a beautiful, beloved Earth for all.
“Clark, can you—” Ma waves a hand toward the pile of blankets on the floor.
Pa stands at the stove, peering into a steaming pot as he stirs their dinner roast. Clark floats down from where he’d been dusting the tops of the living room cabinets. He strides to the mound and snags one of the blue blankets, holding it up with an inquiring brow.
Ma nods. “I need some more string.”
She has other blankets strewn about, all chalked and needled with the pattern Clark had decided on. He’s learned to control his heat vision. Regardless, something about burning through fabric in the middle of the kitchen feels untoward. Clark sneaks out onto the back porch where he’s hidden from the view of their neighbors, then curls his hands into the blankets the kept him swaddled in his descent from Krypton to Earth.
He returns to the kitchen, unwinding thread from splintered edges, coiling it around a piece of cardboard so it doesn’t get tangled. That same pinch enters Ma’s eyes, but it eases quicker this time. She’s letting go of what once was. They all are.
Ma sniffs. “Are you sure you don’t want any padding? In the shoulders or around the chest?”
Clark can’t help but snort. He rounds the table and gives her a gentle hug from behind, reaching back to take a piece of cornbread Pa snuck out from the basket on the counter. “I’m the padding, Ma.”
She harumphs at that, displeased. But she doesn’t argue, because it’s true.
Clark wipes incriminating flakes from his lips, then taps her shoulder. “Ready to eat?”
Ma sighs, then gathers the materials laid out before her and sets them aside. By the time she turns around, the only indication that she’d been upset by Clark’s words, by his insistence of putting himself before bullets and bombs and worse, is the slight sheen to her eyes. She pats his cheek, narrows her gaze, then stands. “Looks like you started without me.”
Clark sends her a sheepish grin, flushing up to his ears as he brushes more crumbs away.
Three days later, Clark is once more standing in his bedroom, eyes wide as he takes himself in. Shoulders back, chest proud, glasses off, hair un-styled, and adorned in the primary colors—the memory—of the House of El. His fingers shake as he runs them along the billow of his cape, caught in a gentle flutter from the breeze of the open window.
It’s perfect. No, it’s more than perfect. It’s right.
Everything except for—
“Clark, can I come in and—”
Research for his latest article tornados through the room as Clark whirs to the door, nearly splintering the wood as he slams a palm onto the worn oak, ensuring his Ma can’t sneak in. He glances to the mirror again and wheezes. “Uh. No!” A croak strips out his voice, and he clears his throat. “I’m still … adjusting …. ah, some pieces.”
His eyes lower to the very prominent, very salacious, very mortifying bulge at his groin. As it turns out, Kryptonian fabrics mold themselves to the body they cover. He should have known He had curled up in those blankets countless times over the years, comforted by the way he felt completely encased while within them.
It’s … a bit of an issue, now.
Clark twists just enough to get a look at his rear, flipping the cape aside, then makes a distressed keen at the back of his throat.
Another knock comes. Pa, this time. “Clark, why don’t you let me in, son?
Clark's forehead falls to the door with a thunk. He’s got to do something. This is his suit. There aren’t enough blankets left to completely redo the bottoms. “Just you, okay?”
A beat of silence from the other side. “Okay.”
Clark eases back, yanking the cape forward to cover his … problem. His fingers twist into the fabric, fiddling with the hem. When Pa steps inside and slides the door shut, he freezes. His gaze roams over Clark, taking in every inch of his son. A tremble begins in his lips, red a blooming rim around his eyes. “Oh, Clark, you—”
Clark drops the cape.
Pa’s eyes lower. His mouth bobbles. “I, ah—I see. Well …” The man glances around, then pulls open a dresser door and tosses a pair of underwear to Clark. “Tug those on for now, son. Then come show your Ma. She’s worried to high Heaven out there.” He grimaces. “And she’ll know what to do.”
Pa turns to leave, then abruptly spins back to Clark, strides forward, and tugs his son into an embrace. “I’m so proud of you.”
Clark stiffens, heart caught in his throat. Then, wraps his arms around his dad’s back and hunches to bury his head in a shoulder that smells of fresh mulch and wet hay. “I love you, Pa.”
Ma does, in fact, have a solution. She calls it approachability.
Superman touches down atop the cement roof in silence. He’s been meaning to come to Gotham and meet the elusive Batman, but there hasn’t been a single day since his Hero Coming Out, as Pa likes to put it, that didn’t include a life-or-death disaster. Including today. This incident was a building fire at Baker Street, though, and he’d pulled everyone to safety well before the flames had time to do much damage, icing out the blaze soon after.
It was a good day. A relatively calm day, when compared to the others he’s had. And so, he flew to Gotham in the dead of night, coasting over the city in search of a vigilante in a suit made from Kevlar and spite. Now here he stands, hoping to meet the Dark Knight.
A figure steps out from the shadows, cape a hiss over old money and older corruption. As an investigative journalist, Clark had done his due diligence in learning what he could about Gotham’s protector. That doesn’t stop his throat from drying at the sight of the Bat in person.
Despite his nerves, the engrained manners of a midwestern upbringing pull Superman’s shoulders back and summon a lopsided grin to his lips. In his excitement he begins to float, then drops back to the ground with an embarrassed huff.
Batman stares. Impassive. Immoveable. Armored to the teeth. The white lenses of the cowl bore into Superman with an intensity he hadn’t expected. Everything about Batman has Superman’s knees weak, his desire to bond set to maximum need, then tapped by a livewire.
He cocks his head and gives a little wave. “Hi! I’m, uh … Superman.” Gah, he’s still not used to the name. It feels imperious and rolls lopsided off his tongue. But it’s what the people called him, and he’s not about to turn his nose up at such an honor.
Batman says nothing, and, uncertain of what to do, Superman keeps babbling. “I’m from Metropolis. Er, well, I’m protecting Metropolis. Like you protect Gotham. And since we’re both doing … that … uh, I thought I’d come say hi. Introduce myself?”
The last bit tips up in a question. He hadn’t expected the Bat to be friendly, but he also hadn’t expected nothing. Was he introducing himself, or was he just trespassing at this point? Was trespassing on another meta’s city even a thing? It’s not like they could claim territories, right?
Batman’s lips thin, pulling into a scowl. The night settles around them, interrupted by the thumping base of scattered nightclubs and the murmurs of hushed meetings. Just when Superman intends to flee, metaphorical tail tucked between his legs, Batman speaks.
“Nice underwear.”
It takes a moment for Superman to process the statement, taken by surprise at the words. He’d expected something more like: Nice to meet you, Superman. I’m Batman. Or, after the past five minutes of this excruciating encounter: Leave.
Superman flounders. And then he opens his big fat mouth, wholly unprepared for the Bat of Gotham to have talked about the corniest and (depending on who was asked) most necessary part of his suit. He lets out a noise that’s half snort, half giggle. “Oh, believe me, you should see the suit without them.” He gives Batman a conspiratorial wink and flicks his gaze down to inspect the attire of the man across from him, realizing he hadn’t noticed Batman’s own solution to what was probably a similar problem.
So, Superman cocks his head and studies Batman’s crotch.
Then blanches.
He swears the city goes silent. No honking cars. No insidious bribes. No plots or plans. Not even a hiccup of anarchy. Batman stares at Superman. Superman gapes at Batman, a crimson inferno crawling past his cheeks to the tips of his ears.
“Stay in Metropolis. Gotham is mine.”
Then, Batman is racing across the roof. He leaps from the ledge, a grappling hook whirring with release, and disappears deep into the darkness of cement and glass and steel.
“Oh golly, no. No, no, no, no,” Superman bemoans in a horrified whisper. He buries his face in his hands and groans, lifting up into the smog-ridden sky. “I just solicited Batman.”
Green Lantern howls, slamming his fist against the conference room table in the Watchtower. Superman has sunk so far into his seat, he might as well slither to the floor and curl into a ball. Instead, his gaze bores into Batman, who leans back in his own chair, arms crossed and feet planted. A smirk curls beneath the cowl.
“That’s how I met Superman.”