This plot bunny is more angst and features a cheating Clark (I’ll leave it up to you if it’s just emotional cheating or what). It’s probably OCC but I’m here for a good time, not a canon accurate time.
Also I don’t hate Clark or SuperBat I just like the drama. Sue me.
(That was a joke please don’t sue me 🥺)
Early days of the Justice League where the only members are Wonder Woman, Superman, Batman, Green Lantern (Hal Jorden), The Flash, and Martian Manhunter and they all know each others secret identities.
Superman and Batman have been dating outside the public eye however unbeknownst to Bruce, due to Bruce’s playboy persona Clark treats Bruce like a dirty little secret.
At first Bruce is okay staying quiet about their relationship. Alfred knows and that’s all Bruce needs. However Bruce slowly starts getting hints that something isn’t quite right in their relationship when Clark even refuses to acknowledge Bruce’s existence during the few public events they do happen to attend as Bruce the billionaire playboy and Clark the reporter. Things reach their climax when Bruce keeps hearing about Clark’s closeness to Lois Lane in both personas.
Bruce confronts Clark about his behavior and the rumors but Clark is able to convince (gaslight?) Bruce that there’s nothing going on. Bruce still feels wrong footed so he tries to push Clark to make their relationship public. Clark gives logical excuses which Bruce reluctantly accepts. But Bruce does become more paranoid about their relationship, becoming more touchy with Clark culminating in Clark and Bruce caught kissing in the Watchtower by Barry.
Bruce is embarrassed at being caught in such an intimate position “at work” but before he can say anything Barry flashes away. Unbeknownst to Bruce, Clark is panicking.
Again this is early days so the incident spreads like wildfire in the small group of heroes and Bruce starts getting dirty looks, conversations that stop mid conversation when he walks in etc, from the other members. At first Bruce attributes it to people feeling jealous of Bruce for bagging The Superman and decides that since the secret is out now he can make his relationship public, at least amongst their team. Except when Bruce tries to show his boyfriend affection in the cafeteria Diana scolds Bruce, accusing him of trying to mess around with a taken man. Diana scolds Bruce, telling him that she tried to defend Bruce and other such things only to be disappointed by Bruce’s shamelessness and lack of remorse.
Bruce is stunned because he has now idea what she’s talking about? Of course Clark is taken, he’s taken by Bruce!
Bruce gives Clark a look silently asking for both help and an explanation except Clark is cringing and trying to make himself look smaller. Bruce tries to interrupt the tirade, saying that he and Clark have been together for some time, except that instead of helping his case that just makes people more disgusted because Louis and Clark had been a thing for a year.
A year.
Bruce is just standing there, disassociating, getting reamed on all sides for definitely being a home wrecker and having the audacity to admit it. Clark finally jumps in, trying to smooth things over, tries to explain that it’s all a misunderstanding, that no one is a home wrecker, it’s just Batman playing a bad joke, etc. But the team is genuinely mad at Bruce.
Finally though Bruce snaps out of it and calmly walks up to Superman only to punch him. Full strength straight to the face (with kryptonite of course). The room pauses. Clark his the floor and his nose is definitely broken. Bruce demands Clark to explain.
Finally realizing he has nowhere left to hide Clark confesses to his affair (again which type is up to you) with Lois. Batman wasn’t the home wrecker it was Lois who’d unintentionally had pursued a taken man. Clark admits to being in love with Lois and Bruce and not being able to choose specially since Lois loves Superman and while Bruce does loves Clark, he’s also a man whore. He tries to say that last part real fast and quietly but it’s definitely caught by Bruce.
This is the revelation that kills Bruce, Bruce could have justified the cheating it loving a man that didn’t even like him much less respect him? He is shocked, humiliated, and absolutely heartbroken.
Finally Bruce gets his emotions under control and forced his face back into the cowl and tells Clark that if Bruce so much as sees an inch of Superman’s cape in Gotham, Clark will find out exactly how much kryptonite Bruce has.
Walking away Bruce tells Clark that they’re over.
In the aftermath Bruce returns to the watchtower as normal while everyone is on tip toes around him. They all think Bruce is going to explode on Clark but Bruce acts like nothing happened. Trust has been irreparably broken with Clark but Batman is nothing if not a professional. He’ll pull his weight and throw around his seniority to get things done but any semblance of camaraderie is firmly gone. Bruce trusts Clark with the planet, he just doesn’t trust him with him heart.
Years pass, and canon happens. No one outside of the founding members of the JL forgets that Superman cheated on the Bat but it just doesn’t get brought up.
That is until the Young Justice, (Tim’s team) discovers footage of Bruce and Clark kissing in the watchtower years ago. Once again the news spread like wildfire across this expanded version of the superhero community (because of course it does) until it reaches everyone but the founding members who are on an off-world mission.
The general consensus is that Batman fumbled a “baddie” (Clark) though it’s also seen as a good thing since now they have Jon. Tim and Kon also have a chance now to make up for the lost opportunity. It also obviously wasn’t the worst thing since Batman and Superman are still the World’s Finest and their teamwork is the community’s standard.
When the founding members come back to earth they all hear about the news/rumors and as they’re collectively deciding why to do, a younger hero asks Bruce how he feels about the son that’s most like Bruce (Tim) dating Kon aka Superman’s clone.
Bruce thinks about it for a moment, Kon despite his physical appearance and being the product of a megalomaniac and Superman, has grown to be a good man. Bruce could keep quiet about his true feelings and the past but honestly Bruce hadn’t kept his mouth shut when it happened all those years ago, he wasn’t going to be quiet now.
So he say it out loud. “I hate it.”
Of course the other heroes in the area (minus the founding members who are stone faced but kinda panicking) are give Bruce flack about being an overprotective father.
Tim complains that just because Bruce wasn’t good enough for Superman doesn’t mean Tim isn’t good enough for Kon.
And again Bruce considers keeping the peace but, there are more heroes now than ever before. There are multiple teams all over the world and the universe. Bruce had nothing to worry about if one hero was shown to be less than the paragon of good. Most importantly, he was Bruce Goddamned Wayne. He didn’t need to be good enough for anyone, people had to be good enough for him.
So Bruce says: “You’re right, I wasn’t good enough for Superman,” Tim smiles but Bruce continues, “but neither was Lois seeing as Superman had to fuck us both to feel like a man.”
After that bombshell the Watchtower is dead silence as younger heroes process the fact that the Batman just admitted to having been cheated on by The Superman, paragon of hope.
Cue denials and arguing because there’s no way that happened and Bruce just stands there looking at Superman, the once upon a time love of his love, trying to hide once again from the consequences of his actions.
“He’s right there just ask him.” Bruce tells his audience.
And Superman is bombarded by questions from all sides and seeing Batman and the rest of the founders doing nothing, finally he admits that yes he fucked up in his youth but he’s a changed man he swears.
Amongst all the gathered heroes Dick is the most disillusioned. He grew up seeing his adopted father (Bruce) and his pseudo uncle (Clark) as great partners and remembers all the times he tried to get the two together when Clark and Lois had been on a break. Then feels even more despair because of all the times he had said he would have preferred to have Superman as a father and even ran off to him when he and Bruce had a fight.
Then he does the math on the video, the math on when Lois and Clark got married, and when he himself came into the picture as Bruce’s ward and he pales. Dick realizes that Superman used Dick as the key to still be involved in Bruce’s life like a toxic ex.
Dick, hand to his mouth: Oh my god I idolized you.
Clark: Dick-
Dick: All those times I joked about you being better than B. When I complained about being the child of divorce.
Clark: Dick please I can explain
Dick: Did you get some sort of sick pleasure seeing me become verbal because of you? How much did you enjoy forcing B to let you into Gotham just so that I would agree to eat something!
Clark now crying: Please it wasn’t like that. I just wanted to help you.
Dick: You used me to stay in B’s life, you used all of us! Oh my god I think I’m going to be sick.
Dick runs off and instead of chasing after him Superman turns to Batman, pleading for help: Batman please, you know I’m not that kind of man.
Batman blank faced: I know.
People are expecting Bruce to rip into Superman but Bruce let go of his anger a long time ago. He tells everyone to go cool their heads and then follows after Dick.
The story spreads and it shakes the hero world. Superman paragon of hope and justice, a cheater. Batman the cold emotionless bastard a victim. Now no one can blame him for discouraging inter team dating. Bruce knows what it’s like when a relationship turns sour and it’s not like other people are like him and can put the mission before feelings. If anything the incident is what everyone agrees on is what turned Batman into a soldier. And this is even before people realized that Superman didn’t even like Bruce. Old videos are even unsurfaced of old team ups between Batman and Superman before the break up that shows that the current iteration of the duo is just a pale comparison of what it was before.
It’s a really heartbreaking time for the younger heroes to realize that their seniors do in fact have feet of clay.
As for the ending maybe Bruce stays single and happy, maybe Khan sweeps him off his feet, maybe Hal slips into his bed for hate sed then never leaves. Reader’s choice.
