Work Text:
Perry White, Clark Kent, Lois Lane, and Jimmy Olsen's boss, had called the three of them to his office.
"I know you three have been on you Super-wank session lately, with all you exclusive interviews and articles with Superman."
Clark winced at Perry's words. Jimmy and Lois, on the other hand, giggled to each other whilst side eyeing Clark.
"Quiet, Lane and Olsen!" Perry hissed at them through his teeth. After a brief pause he continued as if nothing had happened. "Sense you three love Superman, I thought it would only be fitting if you were to do an article on Gotham city's own 'Superman.'"
Lois perked up at this, her brown eyes growing sharp and darkening to an almost black, Jimmy seemed to share about half her enthusiasm.
"Batman?" Clark asked, "No one has been able to prove he exists. What do we do if we can't find him or he's just some urban legend?"
"Then disprove the myth of The Batman." Perry waved off his question. "You three will leave by tomorrow."
"You will not regret giving us this story!" Lois exclaimed over her shoulder as Perry started to usher them out of his office.
"Yes, I'm sure I won't. You three have never made me regret anything, ever."
With that the three were unceremoniously shoved out of Perry's office and into the hallway outside.
"Clark, is Batman real?" Lois asks almost immediately as the door clicks shut.
"How would I know?" Clark said in indignation, somewhat offended with the implication that Lois would think he'd know who another superhero is just because he's one. He'd barely been a superhero for a year and she was already assuming he'd know everyone else.
"Well… you have super hearing, right?" Lois asked. Clark nodded slowly in response. "We'll use that to locate him then!"
"We don't even know if there is a person to locate." Clark sighed as they began their walk back to their make shift office, the storage room. "And if there is, I don't know what they sound like."
"That is why we do some research first." Jimmy said proudly, pulling out his phone and typing "Batman" in the search bar. "We figure out who has seen him, if they are reliable sources, and where people are mostly seeing him. Easy as that."
Jimmy had finished talking as Clark opened the door to their sad "homemade" office—Perry had yet to find out about the office, or confront them on it—like the gentleman he is. Lois darted inside and pulled out their murder board, Jimmy followed close behind but sat at his usual seat to pull out his laptop to continue his google search on a bigger screen. Clark waited a second before entering behind them, Metropolis had been experiencing a brief moment of peace. No world ending threat had made itself known for a while, it seemed like the perfect time to go to Gotham. He still felt hesitant, like as soon as he leaves the city some horrible plot will make itself known.
"Stop that." Jimmy says, looking up from his laptop. "Stop catastrophizing, nothing's going to happen while we're gone. If anything, trouble will follow us to Gotham."
"I hate how you're probably right." Clark grumbled in reply. At least, Lois seemed happy with the promise of a new story that Perry would approve of off the bat.
"Moving on from Clark's little Superman moment," Jimmy turned his laptop screen to face the rest of the room. "From my very brief, and incredibly rushed, research online, no one reliable has seen Batman. He doesn't have recognisable patterns of movement, he just happened to be at the right place at the right time."
"That tracks with the kids." Lois clarified at the confused looks of her coworkers. "Batman is trending online, so, they've been talking about him and I hear about that from them."
"So, the kids just… tell you what they hear online, and you trust that?" Clark asks, skeptically.
"Have they ever led us astray before?" Lois shrugs. "They're the most reliable source of information we'll ever get, Clark. You know this."
Clark sighed in defeat, she was right as usual.
Gotham was a big city, maybe not as big as Metropolis, but it was still huge in it's own right. Every corner seemed darker than the last. Every alley seemed deadlier that the one before it. Crime hid in those dark places, only coming out into the dik light from the sun every once in a while. That is where Clark, Lois, and Jimmy would find the illusive Batman; in the dark, with the crime.
"This is it, Clark!" Lois was vibrating with excitement. "Once the sun sets, you go do your Superman thing and everything will go according to plan!"
"Right, because everything goes according to plan." Sarcasm was bleeding from Clark's voice as he eyed the stores and bright lights around them.
"Don't be a Debbie-downer, this will be fun." Lois patted Clark on the back.
"We still don't know if he exists," Clark looked to Jimmy to back him up to no avail, he was on Lois' side. "I think we'd have more luck getting an exclusive interview with Bruce Wayne that doesn't end in someone's bed."
"That, my good friend," Jimmy said solemnly, "is even less probable than Batman existing. Playboy's gonna play."
Clark glared at Jimmy but conceded nonetheless as Lois glanced at a shop across the street, specifically the brick wall to its left. Clark followed her gaze to the graffiti on the wall, there were the normal tags in all shapes and sizes—unique to the individual artists—but the graffiti in the center of the wall was of a tall imposing figure. The figure was pitch black, save for the pair of white, glowing eyes. It even had a pair of, what looked like, demon horns atop its head. It must've been…
"Batman." Lois finished Clark's thought. "That's gotta be Batman there, right?"
"It checks out with what's online." Jimmy said pulling out his camera to take a picture. "This means, at least, Batman's more than just a myth."
"We should start interviewing people." Lois said after Jimmy had taken his pictures.
"Why are we interviewing random people? We came here to interview Batman." Clark looked towards Lois.
"You never learn, do you?" Lois shook her head in mock pity. "We need to learn as much from the locals to compare it to the real deal when you find him."
"Yeah, Clark." Jimmy said, like he hasn't been a reporter for as long as Clark has, which isn't long. "Do you not know anything about reporting?"
"You've been doing this for as long as I have." Clark grit his teeth and turned away from his friends. "You can't say anything."
"Guess I just learn faster, no hard feelings." He added the last bit with a wink.
The sun had set a few hours ago which means Superman was flying over Gotham, forcing his ears to pick up the sound of a man he's never met and is almost convinced doesn't exist. When his hearing turned out to be futile, he switched to his vision. Maybe he'd have a better time if he was looking for the figure in the graffiti.
That, of course, proved to be futile.
His earlier assessment of Gotham being big felt like an understatement, he wasn't used to the layout of this city or where the crime was centered. Sure, crime was everywhere in this city—he'd stopped a petty theft while interviewing a civilian—but its pattern illuded him. By the time he had lapped the city for the tenth time, he was tempted to give up and try again tomorrow.
Just as he started to descend, he heard a quiet ruffling sound. It had been so quiet that he'd never have been able to hear it over the wind if he had kept flying. Immediately, Clark looked towards the sound and saw… nothing. No movement, no sound, no nothing.
He drifted closer, debating if he really heard anything after all. It was probably just a cat, although he could hear the lightest cat walking halfway across the world if he tried hard enough—and he was trying hard to hear Batman.
When he was face to face with an open window to an abandoned building, he started to feel nervous. What if Batman was the cold blooded killer who could smell fear the criminals said? What if the randoms online were right and Batman was an ancient cryptid back for vengeance? He hoped the locals were right, that Batman only hurts people deserving of it. God, he hoped they were right.
Clark climbed inside the building through the window, careful to not break anything on his way inside. The room was dark and the light from the moon did nothing to light up any of the corners. The walls had patches of bare brick and mortar. It was an old building, Clark put together, not many buildings were made with bricks anymore.
"Superman." Clark immediately turned toward the voice, the modulator made it sound like two similar sounding people were speaking at the same time to his ears.
"Are you… the Batman?" Clark asked cautiously, backing up further in the room to get a better look at the dark shadow in front of him. The graffiti had been spot on—when Batman was in the shadows—the only thing you could clearly see were his glowing eyes in the dark.
"Why are you here?" Batman took a step forward, further into the light, his real voice mixing with the modulated one on top.
"I'm here for some… friends of mine." Clark started, fake confidence keeping him together. "They are from the Daily Planet and would like an interview with you."
"They got tired of you?" It was hard to tell if Batman was being serious or trying to make a joke. Clark's guts were telling him he was being genuine—if that was true—it was kind of endearing.
"No, they haven't. I believe their boss wanted them out of the office for a day or two." Clark said, "They tend to cause a lot of trouble, so I don't blame him."
Batman nodded in contemplation. Although the action was positive it didn't mean he was going to agree to the interview, Clark knew this. After a moment of silence, Batman stopped his movement.
"How long do your friends have in Gotham?"
"Tomorrow is the last official day, anything after that they'd have to pay out of their own pockets-" Clark stopped talking as a quiet beeping sound came from Batman's cowl in sync with a crime that had popped up halfway across the city. "There's something happening at the bank."
"Gotham Central Bank, to be exact." Batman said, walking towards the window while keeping his eyes on Clark.
"Do you need any help?" Clark asked as he watched Batman move. "I could just take you there if anything."
"No, I'll be fine." Batman paused by the window, if Clark had known him better then, he'd have found it funny that Batman was contemplating the best way to do his disappearing act on him. When Batman couldn't wait any longer, he huffed and jumped out of the window. Clark scrambled to look out the window but Batman had disappeared into the darkness that was Gotham's night.
Just as he was about to head back to the hotel room and tell Lois and Jimmy he couldn't find Batman, although he was sure they'd know he was lying, he got a call from Lois.
"Hello?" Clark picked up the phone.
"Did you get the interview yet?" Her cheerful, but tired, voice carried through the phone speaker.
"Uh, no, not yet." Clark was about to say he hadn't found Batman when he heard the rustling of the hotel bed. Lois had caught on, somehow, and denying would only be futile from this point on.
"So you found him?"
"… For a second." Clark hesitated. "He's busy and doesn't seem too much like a people person, maybe we should just leave him be." By not a people person Clark had meant he wasn't very talkative. Nothing about the interaction pointed towards Batman hating being around people, it simply pointed towards Batman being an introvert and the awkwardness that comes with that.
"We have one more day here, Clark, we need this interview." Lois said, he could hear Jimmy start to wake up from the disturbance. "What is he busy with?"
"A bank heist," Clark said, cautiously. He flew out the window and high into the sky to see as much of Gotham as he could. "Why do you need to know?"
"No reason, bye!" Lois rushed out the words and hung up on Clark. Distantly, he could hear her rushing Jimmy out the door, she was most likely going to find the bank. Clark had half a mind to go and stop them but he'd learned by now that Lois was slippery and nothing he could do would stop her, no matter how hard he tried. The most he could do was warn Batman of their arrival.
It was a rather typical bank heist, Two-Face had sent some of his men to rob a bank without him. It was, most likely, a test to see how well they could do without him.
"Guard the door," a thug yelled across the room to a group of other things by the main entrance, "don't let anyone leave or come in!"
"Don't need to to tell me twice." One grumbled as he shifted on his feet. "Bat's probably just teleports."
"Don't tell me you think he's real." A thug to the right of the main entrance laughed. "There's no shadow half-bat half-human creature out there coming for us."
"Superman exists and I hear there's a crazy strong goddess in DC, too."
"One's an alien and the other is… some hot Greek myth."
"Very funny."
"Hey, Batman?"
That startled Batman. He whipped his head around and saw the brightest worried face in his life. If he wasn't stunned speechless in silent fury at the sudden appearance, he would have been swooning, slightly.
"My friends found out I met with you and are on their way. I thought I'd warn you… Sorry." Superman added on at the end, like he finally unlocked self awareness.
"Hn." Is all Batman could get out as he turned his attention back to the group of thugs talking about different ways to take out an officer. Superman didn't leave like Batman had expected, instead he hovered, awkwardly, next to him in the darkness of Batman's hiding spot. He clearly wanted to ask him something.
"Do you- would you like some help?" Superman finally asked.
Batman sighed and shook his head. "No."
"Right. I'll just… I'll make sure my friends don't try to sneak in." In a second, Superman was gone. The only evidence he'd been there was a slight gust of wind that caused Batman's cape to flutter slightly. He exhaled slightly and looked down at the thugs by the entrance, they'd be easy to take out with a smoke bomb.
Outside of the bank, Clark was trying his hardest to keep Lois from barging into the heist to her, almost certain, demise. Jimmy didn't need much convincing, considering Lois had woken him from his sleep and he was slightly peeved about that.
"Lois, I don't want to use force on you." Clark was wearing a flanel and jeans over his suit to remain inconspicuous, his bunched up cape was one of the worst feelings he'd ever felt in his life.
"This is important, Clark." Lois said as she tried to crawl over Clark towards the bank. "The police haven't gotten here yet and this would let us see the Bat in action! Plus, if anything happens, we have you here to swoop us out of any danger."
"You've gotten too comfortable with me being Superman, Lois." Clark exhaled, he was getting frustrated. "We can try again tomorrow."
"He only comes out at night." Lois stopped her frantic anf futile attempts at getting past Clark. "We have until tomorrow, and we don't have enough money to stay much longer than that. Clark, this might be our only chance for this piece."
Clark thought for a second, really thought. "How much do you want this scoop?"
"As much as I want a Pulitzer, Clark." Lois looked him right in the eye and it was over, he had folded.
"Fine, I'll try to convince him, but you have to promise me you will stay out here." Clark's eyes sharpened as he stared at her. "I'll get you that interview."
"Thank you, Clark." Lois smiled up at him. "Really."
Batman threw the smoke bomb at the group of thugs in the middle of their argument: Who's Hotter, Catwoman or Wonder Woman? It was a continuation of their earlier conversation. Admist the chaos that ignited from the lack of eyesight, Batman jumped down and took the group out with ease. He smashed their heads together, took their guns and cracked their ribs with them, dug the heal of his foot into the still conscious thug's nether regions. The smoke was still thick and concentrated by the time he'd delt with the group. He stuck to the far left wall and used both the thinning smoke and shadows to conceal himself as he walked. The other Two-Face thugs were panicked, pointing their guns every which way, it was kind of funny to Batman.
He managed to take two more out with ease when one spotted him, fear forcing his finger to press down on the trigger. A bullet pierced Batman's side and he lunged out of sight, the thug ran after him like an idiot. Batman grabbed the thug's arm as soon as he was within arm length and thrust his knee right into his nose as hard as he could without killing the man. He went down immediately.
Hiding up high would be risky now, he could drip blood onto the floor below and give away his position to anyone smart enough to look up, not that that would help them if they were directly below him, if they were across the room, that would be another problem. It would be best to go slower.
"Bat-guy, come out and face all of us! Pussy!" A thug across the room yelled in fake confidence. "Hiding in the dark like a girl!"
"Hey, stop provoking him, dipshit!" Another thug said much quieter.
"Well, he's acting like a- is that fucking Superman?!"
Batman halted his slow walk towards a lone thug for a split second. He continued on and pressed his hand to his side and hoped they were talking about seeing him through the window and not inside the bank. It would be unfortunate for Superman if he was inside helping Batman. The small fortune of kryptonite he kept in a vault in the batcave from the illegal shipment he busted last month would finally have a purpose other than as a trophy.
When he was behind the thug he used his bloody hand to muffle the guy and the other to cut blood flow to his brain long enough for him to fall unconscious. Once the thug stopped struggling, Batman set him down and listened in on the altercation happening between the thugs and a… Superman that was currently in the building with them.
Bang, bang, bang, bang!
Clink, click, clack, click.
The thugs had clearly not done their homework on Superman, no human weapon worked on the alien, especially not guns. The bullets crumpled on his skin and fell to the floor. Batman moved to get a better view of the Man of Steel floating in the middle of a bank while lowly Two-Face thugs shot at him. If he weren't bleeding out and Brucie Wayne, he would've made an indecent comment about power dynamics and the bedroom. This was Batman though, so he analyzed as much as he could and he'd analyze more when he got to the batcave and replayed the recording on his contact lense. Superman did look a little worried and slightly rushed.
His friends must be pressuring him for this interview, interesting. Batman thought as he watched Superman float towards he thug who had called him a pussy.
"Please, lower your weapons." Although he did not raise his voice much, it sounded clear over the sound of gun fire. "Can't you see they aren't doing anything?" A gust of wind that only affected Superman's cape passed through the bank that had no entry way for any gust of wind.
The thugs, dumb struck and not much smarter than a senile dog, lowered their weapons and stayed silent.
"I'd rather not fight y'all- er, you all." He corrected with a cough and Batman narrowed his eyes. "It wouldn't be fair, so I'm giving you a choice. Surrender peacfully and com with me or I leave you here with the Bat to deal with. He's much meaner than I am."
Batman had to fight a smile threatening to break his Batman alter-ego, they had barely met and Superman had already determined Batman to be worthy of his praise, even if it seemed a little back handed.
"I'm not leavin' with you!" The thug closest to Batman retorted. "And Batman ain't even real!"
"Yeah! You were just fucking with us!"
"I see…" Superman sighed, his pln hadn't worked too well, get the thugs to leave on their own and try to convince Batman into an interview for the second time that night. "I guess I'll just leave you to Batman then." With that he turned to leave, he was making a show of it, taking his time to really solidify the point and take anyone who got cold feet. Batman had to give it to him, plans like these almost always worked on thugs.
"Wait! I surrender, I'm not taking my chances with the Bat!" That opened the flood gates.
"Me too! I'm not going to end up like the others, no way!"
The thugs started jumping at the chance of an easy escape from Batman, even the ones who weren't so convinced of his existence were surrendering. Batman surmised those ones believed Superman would leave but double back and pick them off one by one as an imitation of the Batman myth.
Superman rounded up all the thugs and destroyed their guns and knives and other various weapon they had on their persons. Batman stayed behind in the bank, listening to the sirens outside and the faint sounds of police officers fawning over Superman himself.
"Superman, send your friends inside. You don't need to be here." He was certain his reporter friends were waiting outside and he wanted to test his hypothesis out as well. "I agree to the interview."
Clark froze for a second.
"Excuse me, one moment." He was with Lois and Jimmy, fastening his tie, in less than a second. "He agreed."
"Who agrees to what?" Jimmy asked, adjusting the aperture on his camera to take a picture of the bank.
"Batman. Interview. He's waiting inside." Clark finished with his tie and motioned at the bank. "We should do this now before he decides we took too long."
"Aw, Clark." Lois smiled, her arms wide like she was giving the biggest air hug. "I knew you could do it."
"Yeah, yeah, you did." Clark sighed. "Let's just sneak inside already."
It didn't take long for them to figure out how to get inside, there was a back door that had been ripped off its hinges. Most likely Batman or someone jacked on venom. The inside of the bank was mostly empty save for some things thrown around and unconscious bodies in a few corners.
"Tells one heck of a story." Jimmy mumbled as he pointed his camera in every which way. "This guy is ruthless."
"Ahem, Batman?" Lois called, braver than Jimmy and Clark, even if he had been interacting with him for a while.
"Lois Lane, Jimmy Olsen, and… Clark Kent." Batman said, directly behind the group. Clark had to fight demons to just jump instead of scream and hide behind Lois who jumped behind Clark with Jimmy.
"Um, hello Batman, sir." Lois stuttered out, "Superman said you agreed to the interview?" She ended her statement as a question, digging her fingertips into Clark's arm as much as she could without cracking her nails.
"You get three questions."
"Yes, sir." Lois said as Jimmy raised his camera like it would shield him from Batman.
"No pictures." Batman took a step back with a slight scowl.
"Understood." Jimmy lowered his camera.
"We should start then," Lois said getting her notebook and phone out to record. "First, what inspired your bat theme?" She started out safe but interesting enough to maybe keep a reader reading.
"I was scared of bats as a kid." Is all Batman said, raising more questions like he knew how to get an interviewer off track. Lois was different though, she got what she wanted.
"Wow, the Bat afraid of bats, who would've guessed?" Maybe he wasn't as different as Clar had thought because Batman's glowing eyes narrowed like he was smiling.
"Many people could've."
"That was a rhetorical question, Batman." Lois glared, "Do you not-"
"Do you kill criminals?" Clark cut Lois off before she sold the last question.
Do you kill criminals? That stuck out to Batman in an annoying thorn-in-my-side way. He knew Clark wasn't asking if he killed people—there was no way he knew he didn't kill by now—he was asking about what he cared about the most: his morals. Still, "kill" rubbed him the wrong way.
"I would never kill anyone, its not my place." Batman started, offence leaking into his tone. "I just apprehend them and leave them wrapped up neat with a bow for the police to do their jobs." The jab at the law enforcement was left unsaid yet louder than most anything else he had said prior.
"Good." The awkward and not confident reporter bled out of Clark's voice for that one word and that was all he confirmation Batman needed. Superman and his friends had been suspicious enough.
"Good." Batman echoed and gave a small smile, too small to be anything other than a twitch, really. "Clark, I bet you'd look good without the glasses."
Lois and Jimmy turned immediately towards Clark, a shit eating grin on Lois' face and a sly smirk on Jimmy's. Cark's eyes widened, locked onto Batman, and the blood drained from his face in shock. Without another word Batman turned and left.
"I think he likes you." Jimmy said, nudging Clark's side with his elbow.
"How'd you get Batman to flirt with you?" Lois nudged Clark's other side with her elbow.
"I think he knows…" Clark said quietly.
Lois and Jimmy both perked up on either side of him.
"He knows… you're Superman?" Lois asked cautiously. Clark nodded.
"He could've just been flirting with you." Jimmy side eyed the direction Batman had left in. "He might be into big, awkward guys."
"I doubt that's what he was trying to do." Clark said a little louder. "We should get out of here, I hear the police getting ready to come in."
With that, the three of them left.