Fic: Lost Years | DCU | Clark/Bruce | PG-13 | 3/18
Title: Lost Years - Part 3
Fandom: DCU
Pairing: Clark/Bruce
Rating: NC-17 (overall); PG-13 (this section)
Word Count: 3,067 (this section)
Prompt: For the World's Finest Gift Exchange, #F46: Batman and Superman are stranded on a lonely planet and are lost for years before returning home. What happens? Universe is writer's choice.
Summary: (this section) After "Plan A" goes badly, Clark and Bruce institute "Plan B" to try to get off the uninhabited planet. Along the way, things begin to change, in more ways than one.
Disclaimer: DC and WB own it all. I own nothing. Darnit.
Author's Note: I should have had this posted an hour ago, but *someone* decided to come out into the living room and turn the TV on, knowing darned well that I can't work when I'm distracted. *glares* O_o
Index Post
Part 3
It takes the entirety of the next morning for Clark to finish physically recovering from his disastrous flight out beyond the reaches of this solar system, sitting by the fire with his clay mug of coffee. Staring blankly into the low, smoldering flames, he passively absorbs the warming orange rays of sunlight, waiting for the slow healing to mend the starved, ruptured linings of his lungs. It seems to take forever.
And it hurts, even more so now than during the night, with the itch so indicative of cellular repair pulling his fingers up to scratch mindlessly at his chest. He doesn't even realize he's doing it as the memories of the sudden air loss play over and over in his mind, looping the panic and terror that not only might he not make it back, but also that he might not live to see Bruce again. The cold emptiness of space seems to surround him again, as he struggles for breath that simply isn't there, and-
“Stop scratching,” Bruce scolds him late in the morning from across the tiny camp, not even looking back from the wide slate where he's been working in deep concentration since breakfast.
“Oh, right,” Clark sighs distractedly, glad that the itch is at least dying down, managing at last to pull his hand away. He glances at the makeshift chalkboard, the massive stone propped against a tree. “So, plan B?” he asks, finally noticing the intricate plans laid out in tiny, cramped detail.
“Plan B,” his companion echoes. “We build a ship.”
“Bruce...” he starts, a mild, cautionary plea in his tone.
The Bat turns back to him, finally, his expression dark despite the bright daylight. “We have no way of knowing whether the Lanterns or the League picked up your signal, so there's no point in waiting around for rescue.”
Clark narrows his eyes at the other man, his heart conflicted between waiting and hoping, and working that much harder to try to get home. In light of the previous night's outcome, he knows how low the odds are of succeeding. But he also knows Bruce will settle for nothing less than their full effort; the cold fire in the Bat's eyes demand it from him.
He can't find it in himself to argue.
“All right,” he sighs again, ignoring the niggling at the back of his mind that knows the clock is already running. “Where do we start?”
The corner of Bruce's grimly set mouth quirks upward almost imperceptibly. “With more metal ore. And lots of it.”
* * * * *
Bruce is relieved to see Clark throw himself into the work once they discuss the schematics for the little ship; for a while, the Kryptonian was looking like he might actually be contemplating giving up and waiting around for a rescue that might never come. That had only made Bruce want to knock some sense into him with something heavy. And where would they be then?
Lucky for them both that Clark's demeanor seemed to have changed completely since then, and by evening, piles of raw ores are growing down the beach, each one a different resource. More precious metals to be extracted, some iron and even bauxite ore - though that last one might prove a little more complex to refine - are brought to the camp as Clark mines them in turn. Scrutinizing the finds, Bruce hopes they won't need the aluminum that badly, but he knows that if it comes down to an issue of weight to get their ship off the ground, they might have to go with the much lighter metal.
With all the possible scenarios at last considered, the Bat tears his attention away from Clark and the steadily growing mounds of somewhat glistening earth, looking back to his plans for the interior of the ship, the computer and propulsion designs all but finalized. Really, it's the easiest - and possibly least stressing - part of the entire design process. Nothing like simple leather seats to travel on, for which the not-quite deer skins will do nicely. A few weeks working on the ship should give them more than enough hides and plenty of sinew with which sew the pieces together. The animals will also provide them with plenty of rations for the trip, however long it might be, since they can cure the meat to make jerky. Bones and antlers will even be used for some of the smaller details, like handles, knobs, etc. It's a brilliant solution, Bruce thinks to himself at one point, admiring his notes on the chalkboard. Everything used, nothing they touch wasted.
He knows Clark will be pleased at the notion, and as the day wears on and plans become more concrete, he notes that Clark does indeed seem to be more excited to be working on something so technological and yet, so rustic, able to draw upon all of his skills and managing to find ways to minimize their impact upon this pristine planet. Bruce is amused at his companion's demeanor, his farm-bred Boy Scout optimism seeming to override his awareness of the ticking clock.
But the Bat keeps his faint smile hidden. This isn't a time to enjoy themselves.
It's a race for their lives.
* * * * *
At the end of a week, the days starting to blend together so easily that Bruce has taken to keeping a calendar on a separate piece of slate, they both realize the weather is growing noticeably colder. The first rain of their forced stay has fallen on their camp, nearly wiping out the plans on the slate before they could get it covered with capes and skins. Shivering in the night without that protection was a call to even more rapid action.
Beyond the bare, incomplete skeletal frame of the ship, materials have accumulated along the edges of their long sloping beach, even more raw ores, stones and crystals of various types, the precious metals already refined and ready to be formed into components for the ship's computer. Sifting through the various metals on this seventh day of their imposed exile, Bruce is thankful that Clark has microscopic vision. Only he could make a circuit board without specialized equipment.
And already, Clark has begun work on the finer components, heating the various metals to just the right temperature to get them to cooperate. He's using his heat vision and several of Bruce's tools from the utility belt to fashion his own tools from harder minerals as they sit next to the fire on the seventh night, dinner long over and cleaned up, disposed of.
Bruce just watches him from a few yards away, coming to appreciate Clark's skills on a whole new level. The man is a master with his hands, a trait he can easily attribute to years working on a farm and the dexterity born of an alien physiology destined for great things beneath a yellow sun.
But the sun here is orange, Bruce reminds himself bitterly. He's been watching his companion closely, keeping an eye open for any signs of weakening. He hasn't seen anything yet, but he's anxious, far too anxious to keep Clark operating at full capacity.
“You should start sleeping in the sunlight,” he finally says as Clark is switching tools to take on a different task.
The other man brings his head up, focusing on Bruce for the first time in at least an hour. “What?”
“Sleeping. In the sunlight,” he repeats, cradling his roughly-formed mug of coffee in tense hands. “It would probably be a good idea to charge while you sleep, if you can, just to keep up your strength.”
The look on Clark's face is one of slight confusion, then, “Um... all right. I... I'll do that.”
Bruce isn't sure why the Kryptonian acquiesces so easily, but somewhere along the edges of his mind, a warning alarm is flashing red.
* * * * *
That night, Bruce can't sleep. He's alone in the little hut, plenty of room to toss and turn beneath the overlapped skins, plenty of soft cushioning beneath him. It should be a relief from the cramped conditions of the last week.
But it's not.
Shivering, he burrows beneath the skins, seeking warmth and relief from the cold as it tries to seep into him, overwhelm him. Something's missing.
* * * * *
When morning comes, Clark is back in the camp, fixing another hardy breakfast, this time complete with a few exotic fruits resembling mangoes and kiwis he found in the tropical region he spent the night in. Sleeping in the oddly-tinted light had been an exercise in patience, the Kryptonian forcing himself to drift off even as his built-in circadian clock told him the light meant it was time to be awake. But he managed it, uncomfortable on the sand in the new, strange place, having all the room he could hope for and finding himself wanting none of it. Something had been missing.
Otherwise alone on the far-flung world, Clark had found he wanted nothing more than to be near the only other person on the entire planet. He wanted to be lying next to Bruce, curled tightly around the only other person in all of existence.
The revelation is a somewhat hard pill to swallow.
Now, serving up eggs and fruit on a stone plate, his mind spins around the implications. Though he knows it's a simple effect of being stranded, the mind fixating on the familiar, he's concerned. He's been feeling... well, off for days, and hasn't said a word to Bruce about it. He's hated to think of the way the other man might react, knowing their time is steadily running out.
When Bruce takes his breakfast plate from him, his eyes are stormy and dark as he peers at Clark from beneath his ever more disheveled black hair, and the taller man takes in a breath of surprise at his companion's air. He gets the sinking feeling that Bruce has figured out their previous sleeping arrangement, and is none too happy about it.
“Thank you,” Bruce says quietly before turning to retreat to his usual spot close to the small fire, eyes moving to inspect the progress they made to the ship's construction on the previous day, seeming to ignore Clark. For his part, the Kryptonian feels somewhat grateful that Bruce's attention has moved elsewhere, and he turns to examine their progress himself as he sits to dig into his own plate of food and enjoy his not-quite-coffee in the crisp morning air.
They really have accomplished a lot in a single week, he realizes. Metals have been refined by way of some creative processes involving heat vision and his own special brands of strength and compressed, cold breath. Circuit boards have been constructed for the navigation computer, other intricate components built and then assembled by Bruce into a special sort of ion drive that will eliminate the need for liquid fuel sources, in a hybridization of Kryptonian and Tamaranian propulsion technology. Clark is pretty sure that if they keep going at their current rate, they might manage to make it off the planet in less than two more weeks.
“It was pretty cold last night,” Bruce pipes up out of the blue, as he's been wont to do on a fairly regular basis lately. It seems to Clark that the man has no more use for lead-in conversation or small-talk. Maybe it's the quiet of the unfamiliar world, but Clark knows something has changed within Bruce; the abruptness of his entire demeanor has increased seemingly exponentially. This morning, the offside comment is nearly a snap.
“I...” And of course, Clark doesn't really know what to say; his companion isn't giving him much to work with. Finally, he finds his voice, quiet thought it is, “It was pretty cold for me, too.” It's not a lie, not even a half-truth. Clark shivered in the noon-time sun in the tropics, the one hundred percent humidity nothing to him, the absence of a familiar presence everything, leaving him chilled all the way through as he tried to sleep.
Bruce snorts, the sound abrasive and yet... soothing to Clark's ears. “If this takes any longer than another few weeks, I say we move this operation to a warmer location. Avoid the cold altogether.”
The final word strikes a chord in Clark. 'Altogether.' His stomach unwittingly flips.
With absolutely no argument, he agrees, “Yeah, sure.” Then he eyes the piles of resources they've gathered and been working on, and wonders absently how much longer he can hold up before... But the thought is too painful to consider, so he shoves it aside. He isn't allowed to weaken. Not before this job is completed. He just can't.
Instead, his mind wanders back to Bruce, where he finds his stomach doing more strange acrobatics. It must be the isolation. That's it. I'm going nutty and clinging to the only other person in the world.
The insistence is almost enough to convince him.
* * * * *
It takes three more days to get the framework of the ship constructed, with Clark welding the makeshift steel into place with precision blasts of focused heat. At last, it resembles a giant egg, just large enough that they'll be able to move around the cabin, large enough to give them some privacy for when they'll need to use the waste evacuation system. Just large enough to accommodate a simple cot to sleep on in shifts.
Clark smirks to himself when he finally realizes the design resembles something out of Star Trek, a little shuttle craft or some such. Oddly, the resemblance is lost on Bruce.
* * * * *
The afternoon of their fourteenth day on the lonely planet is occupied by more assembly, Clark attaching the second layer of metal sheets to the frame, creating a double hull that they'll add third and fourth layers to later, while Bruce works inside, installing the computer console. Clark has yet to fill the tanks he made that will be connected to the air recirculation system, but once those are ready they'll be able to seal up the floor of the cabin, leaving space for an access hatch, and install the seats and the cot.
It's looking like five, six more days at the most, including the gathering of all the supplies they might need.
Good thing, because Clark is feeling more tired with each passing day.
Not that he'll tell Bruce.
Having to chase the sun to spend nearly every moment, waking and asleep, in the daylight is seeming to be more of a drain, not helping to charge him at all. He feels sluggish, his mind slowed. And worst of all, he can't seem to get enough sleep. Without that constant presence beside him that it only took him a week to get used to, he's lost more hours than he can count at this point.
To him, Bruce looks pretty much the same: weary, exhausted, and cranky. He can only hope that it's just the isolation, and not the lack of a bed-warmer that's bothering his partner. He's not sure he can handle it if it's the latter.
* * * * *
Another morning, another creaking stretch in the otherwise empty hut. Tossing back the pile of not-quite-deer skins, Bruce stares at what's passed for his ceiling for two and a half weeks, light starting to peek through the bundles of reeds and branches. Then the cold air hits him, and he realizes he can see his breath above him. Damn...
He was hoping they'd be almost ready to go by now, hoping to avoid the gradually encroaching cold weather, but progress on the ship has slowed, Clark seeming to take longer and longer each day on what, just three weeks ago, would have been simple, effortless tasks.
Bruce can see it in his eyes. Clark is losing his abilities.
Stretching again, he rises from his bed, grabbing his uniform top to slip it on over his head, wishing he could just get a shower. A nice, steaming hot shower. Bathing in the nearby stream has had to suffice, however, the shockingly cold water at least waking him up on the chillier mornings, and he'll be more than glad to go do just that as soon as he sees Clark, the Kryptonian manning his usual station by the fire.
He wonders what his companion has come up with this morning for breakfast as he emerges from the hut, trying not to think about the last week and a half of not having the man near him at night. Having to hope he's there every morning is simply not convenient. Neither is the cold. No matter that Clark has been there, unfailingly, every morning.
This morning, however, the fire is stone cold, and Bruce stops dead in his tracks, his heart leaping into his throat when he doesn't see the other man in his usual spot. He scans up the beach automatically, eyes wildly searching, until at last, his panicked gaze falls on the familiar patch of red and blue, so far out that he knows it'll take him ten minutes just to walk the distance. What the hell!? he silently curses, anger and fear gripping him as he starts to make his way to Clark.
When his companion makes no move to head back to their camp, Bruce double times it, breaking into a jog to close the distance faster. Clark seems to be curled in upon himself, perched on a rock on a flat stretch of beach, his head bowed and his arms around his knees. The posture is not Clark.
At last, Bruce makes it, nearly skidding to a stop as he reaches the Kryptonian, sending gravel from the beach flying. “Clark...” he breathes heavily, laying a hand on the other man's shoulder. “Wha-what's wrong?”
He can see now that his companion is shivering, cold, and when Clark raises his head at last, Bruce can see tears there, brilliant blue irises clouded with pain and shock.
“I...” Clark starts, then shakes his head, blinking rapidly. “I can't fly, Bruce. I can't fly.”
The world suddenly spinning around him as every plan, every hope is torn away, Bruce crashes to his knees on the ground. His icy breath lingers before him in the cold air like the period at the end of a sentence. They aren't going home.
* * * * *
Fandom: DCU
Pairing: Clark/Bruce
Rating: NC-17 (overall); PG-13 (this section)
Word Count: 3,067 (this section)
Prompt: For the World's Finest Gift Exchange, #F46: Batman and Superman are stranded on a lonely planet and are lost for years before returning home. What happens? Universe is writer's choice.
Summary: (this section) After "Plan A" goes badly, Clark and Bruce institute "Plan B" to try to get off the uninhabited planet. Along the way, things begin to change, in more ways than one.
Disclaimer: DC and WB own it all. I own nothing. Darnit.
Author's Note: I should have had this posted an hour ago, but *someone* decided to come out into the living room and turn the TV on, knowing darned well that I can't work when I'm distracted. *glares* O_o
Index Post
Part 3
It takes the entirety of the next morning for Clark to finish physically recovering from his disastrous flight out beyond the reaches of this solar system, sitting by the fire with his clay mug of coffee. Staring blankly into the low, smoldering flames, he passively absorbs the warming orange rays of sunlight, waiting for the slow healing to mend the starved, ruptured linings of his lungs. It seems to take forever.
And it hurts, even more so now than during the night, with the itch so indicative of cellular repair pulling his fingers up to scratch mindlessly at his chest. He doesn't even realize he's doing it as the memories of the sudden air loss play over and over in his mind, looping the panic and terror that not only might he not make it back, but also that he might not live to see Bruce again. The cold emptiness of space seems to surround him again, as he struggles for breath that simply isn't there, and-
“Stop scratching,” Bruce scolds him late in the morning from across the tiny camp, not even looking back from the wide slate where he's been working in deep concentration since breakfast.
“Oh, right,” Clark sighs distractedly, glad that the itch is at least dying down, managing at last to pull his hand away. He glances at the makeshift chalkboard, the massive stone propped against a tree. “So, plan B?” he asks, finally noticing the intricate plans laid out in tiny, cramped detail.
“Plan B,” his companion echoes. “We build a ship.”
“Bruce...” he starts, a mild, cautionary plea in his tone.
The Bat turns back to him, finally, his expression dark despite the bright daylight. “We have no way of knowing whether the Lanterns or the League picked up your signal, so there's no point in waiting around for rescue.”
Clark narrows his eyes at the other man, his heart conflicted between waiting and hoping, and working that much harder to try to get home. In light of the previous night's outcome, he knows how low the odds are of succeeding. But he also knows Bruce will settle for nothing less than their full effort; the cold fire in the Bat's eyes demand it from him.
He can't find it in himself to argue.
“All right,” he sighs again, ignoring the niggling at the back of his mind that knows the clock is already running. “Where do we start?”
The corner of Bruce's grimly set mouth quirks upward almost imperceptibly. “With more metal ore. And lots of it.”
* * * * *
Bruce is relieved to see Clark throw himself into the work once they discuss the schematics for the little ship; for a while, the Kryptonian was looking like he might actually be contemplating giving up and waiting around for a rescue that might never come. That had only made Bruce want to knock some sense into him with something heavy. And where would they be then?
Lucky for them both that Clark's demeanor seemed to have changed completely since then, and by evening, piles of raw ores are growing down the beach, each one a different resource. More precious metals to be extracted, some iron and even bauxite ore - though that last one might prove a little more complex to refine - are brought to the camp as Clark mines them in turn. Scrutinizing the finds, Bruce hopes they won't need the aluminum that badly, but he knows that if it comes down to an issue of weight to get their ship off the ground, they might have to go with the much lighter metal.
With all the possible scenarios at last considered, the Bat tears his attention away from Clark and the steadily growing mounds of somewhat glistening earth, looking back to his plans for the interior of the ship, the computer and propulsion designs all but finalized. Really, it's the easiest - and possibly least stressing - part of the entire design process. Nothing like simple leather seats to travel on, for which the not-quite deer skins will do nicely. A few weeks working on the ship should give them more than enough hides and plenty of sinew with which sew the pieces together. The animals will also provide them with plenty of rations for the trip, however long it might be, since they can cure the meat to make jerky. Bones and antlers will even be used for some of the smaller details, like handles, knobs, etc. It's a brilliant solution, Bruce thinks to himself at one point, admiring his notes on the chalkboard. Everything used, nothing they touch wasted.
He knows Clark will be pleased at the notion, and as the day wears on and plans become more concrete, he notes that Clark does indeed seem to be more excited to be working on something so technological and yet, so rustic, able to draw upon all of his skills and managing to find ways to minimize their impact upon this pristine planet. Bruce is amused at his companion's demeanor, his farm-bred Boy Scout optimism seeming to override his awareness of the ticking clock.
But the Bat keeps his faint smile hidden. This isn't a time to enjoy themselves.
It's a race for their lives.
* * * * *
At the end of a week, the days starting to blend together so easily that Bruce has taken to keeping a calendar on a separate piece of slate, they both realize the weather is growing noticeably colder. The first rain of their forced stay has fallen on their camp, nearly wiping out the plans on the slate before they could get it covered with capes and skins. Shivering in the night without that protection was a call to even more rapid action.
Beyond the bare, incomplete skeletal frame of the ship, materials have accumulated along the edges of their long sloping beach, even more raw ores, stones and crystals of various types, the precious metals already refined and ready to be formed into components for the ship's computer. Sifting through the various metals on this seventh day of their imposed exile, Bruce is thankful that Clark has microscopic vision. Only he could make a circuit board without specialized equipment.
And already, Clark has begun work on the finer components, heating the various metals to just the right temperature to get them to cooperate. He's using his heat vision and several of Bruce's tools from the utility belt to fashion his own tools from harder minerals as they sit next to the fire on the seventh night, dinner long over and cleaned up, disposed of.
Bruce just watches him from a few yards away, coming to appreciate Clark's skills on a whole new level. The man is a master with his hands, a trait he can easily attribute to years working on a farm and the dexterity born of an alien physiology destined for great things beneath a yellow sun.
But the sun here is orange, Bruce reminds himself bitterly. He's been watching his companion closely, keeping an eye open for any signs of weakening. He hasn't seen anything yet, but he's anxious, far too anxious to keep Clark operating at full capacity.
“You should start sleeping in the sunlight,” he finally says as Clark is switching tools to take on a different task.
The other man brings his head up, focusing on Bruce for the first time in at least an hour. “What?”
“Sleeping. In the sunlight,” he repeats, cradling his roughly-formed mug of coffee in tense hands. “It would probably be a good idea to charge while you sleep, if you can, just to keep up your strength.”
The look on Clark's face is one of slight confusion, then, “Um... all right. I... I'll do that.”
Bruce isn't sure why the Kryptonian acquiesces so easily, but somewhere along the edges of his mind, a warning alarm is flashing red.
* * * * *
That night, Bruce can't sleep. He's alone in the little hut, plenty of room to toss and turn beneath the overlapped skins, plenty of soft cushioning beneath him. It should be a relief from the cramped conditions of the last week.
But it's not.
Shivering, he burrows beneath the skins, seeking warmth and relief from the cold as it tries to seep into him, overwhelm him. Something's missing.
* * * * *
When morning comes, Clark is back in the camp, fixing another hardy breakfast, this time complete with a few exotic fruits resembling mangoes and kiwis he found in the tropical region he spent the night in. Sleeping in the oddly-tinted light had been an exercise in patience, the Kryptonian forcing himself to drift off even as his built-in circadian clock told him the light meant it was time to be awake. But he managed it, uncomfortable on the sand in the new, strange place, having all the room he could hope for and finding himself wanting none of it. Something had been missing.
Otherwise alone on the far-flung world, Clark had found he wanted nothing more than to be near the only other person on the entire planet. He wanted to be lying next to Bruce, curled tightly around the only other person in all of existence.
The revelation is a somewhat hard pill to swallow.
Now, serving up eggs and fruit on a stone plate, his mind spins around the implications. Though he knows it's a simple effect of being stranded, the mind fixating on the familiar, he's concerned. He's been feeling... well, off for days, and hasn't said a word to Bruce about it. He's hated to think of the way the other man might react, knowing their time is steadily running out.
When Bruce takes his breakfast plate from him, his eyes are stormy and dark as he peers at Clark from beneath his ever more disheveled black hair, and the taller man takes in a breath of surprise at his companion's air. He gets the sinking feeling that Bruce has figured out their previous sleeping arrangement, and is none too happy about it.
“Thank you,” Bruce says quietly before turning to retreat to his usual spot close to the small fire, eyes moving to inspect the progress they made to the ship's construction on the previous day, seeming to ignore Clark. For his part, the Kryptonian feels somewhat grateful that Bruce's attention has moved elsewhere, and he turns to examine their progress himself as he sits to dig into his own plate of food and enjoy his not-quite-coffee in the crisp morning air.
They really have accomplished a lot in a single week, he realizes. Metals have been refined by way of some creative processes involving heat vision and his own special brands of strength and compressed, cold breath. Circuit boards have been constructed for the navigation computer, other intricate components built and then assembled by Bruce into a special sort of ion drive that will eliminate the need for liquid fuel sources, in a hybridization of Kryptonian and Tamaranian propulsion technology. Clark is pretty sure that if they keep going at their current rate, they might manage to make it off the planet in less than two more weeks.
“It was pretty cold last night,” Bruce pipes up out of the blue, as he's been wont to do on a fairly regular basis lately. It seems to Clark that the man has no more use for lead-in conversation or small-talk. Maybe it's the quiet of the unfamiliar world, but Clark knows something has changed within Bruce; the abruptness of his entire demeanor has increased seemingly exponentially. This morning, the offside comment is nearly a snap.
“I...” And of course, Clark doesn't really know what to say; his companion isn't giving him much to work with. Finally, he finds his voice, quiet thought it is, “It was pretty cold for me, too.” It's not a lie, not even a half-truth. Clark shivered in the noon-time sun in the tropics, the one hundred percent humidity nothing to him, the absence of a familiar presence everything, leaving him chilled all the way through as he tried to sleep.
Bruce snorts, the sound abrasive and yet... soothing to Clark's ears. “If this takes any longer than another few weeks, I say we move this operation to a warmer location. Avoid the cold altogether.”
The final word strikes a chord in Clark. 'Altogether.' His stomach unwittingly flips.
With absolutely no argument, he agrees, “Yeah, sure.” Then he eyes the piles of resources they've gathered and been working on, and wonders absently how much longer he can hold up before... But the thought is too painful to consider, so he shoves it aside. He isn't allowed to weaken. Not before this job is completed. He just can't.
Instead, his mind wanders back to Bruce, where he finds his stomach doing more strange acrobatics. It must be the isolation. That's it. I'm going nutty and clinging to the only other person in the world.
The insistence is almost enough to convince him.
* * * * *
It takes three more days to get the framework of the ship constructed, with Clark welding the makeshift steel into place with precision blasts of focused heat. At last, it resembles a giant egg, just large enough that they'll be able to move around the cabin, large enough to give them some privacy for when they'll need to use the waste evacuation system. Just large enough to accommodate a simple cot to sleep on in shifts.
Clark smirks to himself when he finally realizes the design resembles something out of Star Trek, a little shuttle craft or some such. Oddly, the resemblance is lost on Bruce.
* * * * *
The afternoon of their fourteenth day on the lonely planet is occupied by more assembly, Clark attaching the second layer of metal sheets to the frame, creating a double hull that they'll add third and fourth layers to later, while Bruce works inside, installing the computer console. Clark has yet to fill the tanks he made that will be connected to the air recirculation system, but once those are ready they'll be able to seal up the floor of the cabin, leaving space for an access hatch, and install the seats and the cot.
It's looking like five, six more days at the most, including the gathering of all the supplies they might need.
Good thing, because Clark is feeling more tired with each passing day.
Not that he'll tell Bruce.
Having to chase the sun to spend nearly every moment, waking and asleep, in the daylight is seeming to be more of a drain, not helping to charge him at all. He feels sluggish, his mind slowed. And worst of all, he can't seem to get enough sleep. Without that constant presence beside him that it only took him a week to get used to, he's lost more hours than he can count at this point.
To him, Bruce looks pretty much the same: weary, exhausted, and cranky. He can only hope that it's just the isolation, and not the lack of a bed-warmer that's bothering his partner. He's not sure he can handle it if it's the latter.
* * * * *
Another morning, another creaking stretch in the otherwise empty hut. Tossing back the pile of not-quite-deer skins, Bruce stares at what's passed for his ceiling for two and a half weeks, light starting to peek through the bundles of reeds and branches. Then the cold air hits him, and he realizes he can see his breath above him. Damn...
He was hoping they'd be almost ready to go by now, hoping to avoid the gradually encroaching cold weather, but progress on the ship has slowed, Clark seeming to take longer and longer each day on what, just three weeks ago, would have been simple, effortless tasks.
Bruce can see it in his eyes. Clark is losing his abilities.
Stretching again, he rises from his bed, grabbing his uniform top to slip it on over his head, wishing he could just get a shower. A nice, steaming hot shower. Bathing in the nearby stream has had to suffice, however, the shockingly cold water at least waking him up on the chillier mornings, and he'll be more than glad to go do just that as soon as he sees Clark, the Kryptonian manning his usual station by the fire.
He wonders what his companion has come up with this morning for breakfast as he emerges from the hut, trying not to think about the last week and a half of not having the man near him at night. Having to hope he's there every morning is simply not convenient. Neither is the cold. No matter that Clark has been there, unfailingly, every morning.
This morning, however, the fire is stone cold, and Bruce stops dead in his tracks, his heart leaping into his throat when he doesn't see the other man in his usual spot. He scans up the beach automatically, eyes wildly searching, until at last, his panicked gaze falls on the familiar patch of red and blue, so far out that he knows it'll take him ten minutes just to walk the distance. What the hell!? he silently curses, anger and fear gripping him as he starts to make his way to Clark.
When his companion makes no move to head back to their camp, Bruce double times it, breaking into a jog to close the distance faster. Clark seems to be curled in upon himself, perched on a rock on a flat stretch of beach, his head bowed and his arms around his knees. The posture is not Clark.
At last, Bruce makes it, nearly skidding to a stop as he reaches the Kryptonian, sending gravel from the beach flying. “Clark...” he breathes heavily, laying a hand on the other man's shoulder. “Wha-what's wrong?”
He can see now that his companion is shivering, cold, and when Clark raises his head at last, Bruce can see tears there, brilliant blue irises clouded with pain and shock.
“I...” Clark starts, then shakes his head, blinking rapidly. “I can't fly, Bruce. I can't fly.”
The world suddenly spinning around him as every plan, every hope is torn away, Bruce crashes to his knees on the ground. His icy breath lingers before him in the cold air like the period at the end of a sentence. They aren't going home.
* * * * *