Chapter 3
What had he been _thinking_? It was one thing for a plan to go wrong and say, "It was Superman's idea." It was quite another thing to say, "It was the Flash's idea." Some would say you were doubly to blame for _listening_ to him.
When the Flash had suggested that J'onn come to Talia al-Ghul's hotel room, using his powers of transformation to disguise himself as the Batman, and sleep with her, J'onn's initial reaction had been sane and rational. "Absolutely not! Are you out of your mind?"
But sometimes the Flash's quick tongue could do circles around people. By the time the Martian Manhunter had tentatively said yes, his brain felt dizzied.
Only now did he entertain the notion that besides getting Talia out of Batman's life, the Flash had also been scheming to get J'onn into the arms of another woman. He had brought up the matter of J'onn's status as a widower just the night before, and of course Flash wasn't one to let things drop.
When he saw Flash again, J'onn was going to kill him.
And now it wasn't just about having sexual relations with her, he realized. If he decided to continue with this insane mission, he would have to find some way of simulating an "ejaculation". Obviously, if she was planning to get pregnant, she would know whether he had deposited his seed or not!
"Bruce?" Talia asked, with a trace of annoyance. "Do you want me to face the wall for the entire night?"
Bruce.
If he _didn't_ go through with this, Talia would undoubtedly tell the Batman at some point. Batman would know that an impostor had taken his place, and that only a few people knew of the proposed meeting. Only one of whom could change his shape.
J'onn was quite certain that he did not want Batman to find out about this.
Resigned to his fate, and still trying to think of a solution, J'onn helplessly transformed from Batman in all his regalia, to Bruce Wayne in nothing more than a pair of boxer shorts. "All right," he said to her, trying to mask his increased nervousness. "You can turn around."
Talia turned to face him, and she raised an eyebrow, smiling. "Was there something exactly you didn't want me to see?"
If the room had been lit, she would have noticed that his cape, costume, and utility belt were nowhere to be seen. Fortunately it was dark, but he couldn't assume that she wouldn't turn a light on later. "I needed to put my things in a safe place," he said.
"Why?"
"For all I know," he growled in a reasonable facsimile of Batman's voice, "this is all some scheme arranged by your father to take something from me. Or to plant something on me."
"Well," Talia replied, her smile becoming a frown, "I do hope to take something very precious from you, but my father has nothing to do with tonight."
"Your father has everything to do with tonight," J'onn retorted. "This isn't about your biological clock, Talia. This is about giving your father an heir."
Talia glared at him. "It will be _my_ child, Bruce, and I want it to belong to the man I love. Why are you saying these things?" she asked. "Is this your way of reminding me that tonight isn't about romance, but about business?"
"I don't think you have the right to be upset, Talia. After all, this whole thing was your idea. Your obsession in the face of repeated denials on my part - "
"I am NOT obsessed with you," Talia said hotly. "Or if I am, are not all lovers obsessed with each others to some degree?"
J'onn was slipping easily into the part of Bruce now, because not only was he fully aware of Batman's feelings in this area, but also he was frustrated by her irrationality. "We are _not_ lovers, Talia," he reminded her. "Lovers requires there to be two of us, and as I have told you time and again, I am not in love with you."
"You only say that because _you_ are obsessed with your justice, and your duty, and your parents' death!" Talia fired back. "But because I am as loyal a daughter as you are a _son_, you suppress your feelings!"
"Your refusal to see what is right in front of your face only underlines your obsession," J'onn said, even though he privately admitted that Batman's devotion to his calling prevented him from having much of a personality. Then again, his discovered romantic involvement with the Catwoman suggested that Batman was starting to thaw out. "And let's not gloss over the fact that your father is a criminal megalomaniac who has plotted genocide on a worldwide scale several times over. Or the fact that your sense of loyalty apparently permits you to _betray_ your father, or me, depending on who needs you more!"
Talia crossed her arms stubbornly. "You are the one in denial," she muttered.
"Fine," J'onn grumbled. "Then let's get this over with, so we can end this dance of ours, and you can perhaps move on with your life."
"Fine," Talia agreed, pulling off her shirt. Her breasts bobbed up and down briefly.
J'onn's anger, not entirely manufactured, melted and vanished. It was immediately replaced by anxiety, as Talia walked toward him, slipping her arms around his waist. Her bosom pressed against his chest.
"Since you and I are evidently such masters of denial," Talia murmured, "then perhaps we can both pretend you're enjoying this."
"Are _you_ enjoying this?" J'onn asked.
She closed her eyes. "I never imagined you would be such an unwilling partner when this happened," she whispered, "but I must accept this half of a loaf."
Then Talia stood on her tiptoes and took his lips in a kiss.
J'onn knew more than enough of human sexuality to know what would happen next. The Green Martians were not entirely different. They were both humanoid races, and there were definite similarities. He had kissed his late wife, just as humans kissed on Earth. If he closed his eyes, he could imagine it was her kissing him, not this deluded beauty.
As her body rubbed against his, a dim corner of his brain was surprised at how quickly this had changed from unnerving to pleasurable. She had a fine figure, and he could tell by the way her body was responding that she was feeling real passion.
"My mate, my love," he thought softly, taking his hands and rubbing them up and down her back.
Talia broke off the kiss and looked at him, her eyes shining. "Bruce, belov - my love," she said, her voice hushed. "Come with me to the bed. Make love to me," she pleaded.
He allowed himself to be led by the hand. He blinked - when had she removed her shorts? Why was he reacting in this way? He was not human, he only looked that way. He shouldn't have felt anything.
J'onn kept his eyes firmly shut, but when he felt himself on top of her, her breasts pushed tightly against his chest, this unexpected feeling seeming to permeate his whole body, the cold sheets stoking their ardor instead of cooling it . . . he had to open them.
Her eyes looked back at his, filled with want and need. "Bruce," she whispered, taking one of his hands and bringing it up to touch her cheek.
This was wrong.
It felt right.
But it was wrong. _He_ was wrong.
With a cry, he threw himself off of her, stumbling away from the bed on his hands and knees.
There was a moment when she didn't know what was happening, before she screamed in dismay. "Nooo!!"
He got to his knees. "Talia, I - "
"Why do you do this to me?!" she shrieked at him, her eyes blazing. "Why do you open the door to me, then slam it in my face? Why?!"
"Talia."
"No, you will hear me!" Talia snarled, her face red with anger, where once it had been red with pleasure. "I am sick and tired of you treating me like something you need to wipe from the soles of your boots! When one of your Gotham lunatics is planning something, you are the Detective. You investigate, you interrogate, you solve, you win! But when it's my _father_ . . ." She angrily wrapped a sheet around her body. "Then you come to _me_. There have been a half-dozen times when you came to me for information. I did not go running to you, willing to sacrifice the coin of my father's schemes for the crumbs of your affection. YOU came to ME. And I gave you what you asked for, because I could not refuse my love. I helped YOU, when I would have helped no one else, because I love my father too."
"And still!" she raged, rising from the bed, still clutching the sheets. "You scorn me! Would it kill you to say 'Thank you' once?"
"Thank you," J'onn mumbled.
She tossed her head. "Don't thank me now, Bruce! Apologize! Tell me why I am so repulsive to you! Tell me why I offer you everything, and you give me nothing!"
"First," he said quietly, clearing his head from the fog of passion, "you don't offer everything. If you did, you would have left your father for good. Women in love do not bounce back and forth between their fathers and lovers. They make choices. You have not. Whether that's because you enjoy being fought over, or because you want to have your cake and eat it too, I don't know. But this relationship grows more unworkable every year."
"How dare you," Talia hissed.
"Second," J'onn continued calmly, "tonight isn't love. It's rape."
She stared at him in disbelief. "You arrogant, self-righteous pig," she said. "I have to promise to cut myself out of your life to get you into bed, and now you throw 'rape' in my face?"
"I didn't mean you," J'onn replied. "I meant me."
He stood up. "I have coerced you. I have prevented you from making an informed consent. I have lied to you, to make you have sex with someone I am not."
J'onn slowly took the shape he wore most frequently. "I have made a grave mistake," he told her.
Talia stared at him in horror. "The Martian Manhunter," she whispered, stunned. "It was never Bruce. It was all a lie." Her whole body began to shake as she looked away. "He wouldn't deign to come to me, so he sent a fraud in his place."
"He has no idea I'm here," J'onn said quickly. "He has too much integrity to do something like this - more integrity than I, apparently. This was a bad idea, conceived by someone who I never should have listened to. We thought . . . you both could get what you wanted."
She moved more quickly than he would have guessed, and it was only by becoming intangible that her kick didn't connect with his jaw. "You cruel alien BASTARD!" she shouted. "Your fucking League! You think you have carte blanche to do whatever you like because you're such heroes?! Get out of my room!"
"No," he answered quietly.
"NO?" she repeated. "What more can you do to me?!"
He sighed. "Recently I told someone that I would never look into someone's mind if it wasn't a matter of life and death. But I belied my own words tonight, when I looked into Batman's mind."
"And so now you're going to tell me about how much he really hates me, and never loved me," she said sarcastically. "For my own benefit, of course."
"I'm not going to tell you anything," he said. He approached her.
"What are you doing?" Talia asked, looking nervously at him.
"Showing you," J'onn told her. He grabbed her before she could pull away, and put his hands on her temples.
There was a moment where her eyes grew almost impossibly wide and round. His own eyes glowed like lasers as his touch burned through her mind. A laser, after all, was merely a white-hot light that scorched flesh and burned away walls, leaving only scar tissue behind. And what was truth if not light, the best of disinfectants?
Then Talia began screaming. It was a kind of uninterrupted wail that J'onn gave no evidence of hearing. It was not a cry of horror. It was more a cry of despair.
Her scream became a keen, and it might have gone on forever before J'onn let go. His hands flew apart like magnetic poles repelling each other. Her head rocked back so violently that for a moment it seemed she would surely break her neck, but her entire body swayed backwards and she landed on her seat.
J'onn looked down at her, slowly recovering from what he'd done. The physical drain would last only a little while. His actions - borrowing entire memories from Bruce's mind, coming to Talia under false pretenses, force feeding images into her brain like baby formula into an infant's mouth - those would weigh upon him much longer, he was sure.
But as hastily misconceived as Flash's plan had been, J'onn's intent had always been to help Batman, and even this blinded woman he barely knew, and if he'd managed to do so, then his violation was perhaps not so great.
Talia raised her head, her eyes unfocused. "Lies," she mumbled thickly. "Your - schemes will . . ."
"I only showed you the truth," he said wearily, "of Bruce's feelings. You can choose to believe them or not, just as you have chosen to believe his words or not for all this time. And now, I think I will leave as you asked."
"I will kill you for your crimes, inhuman," she replied, still unable to rise.
He nodded. "Crimes? Perhaps. But you won't punish me."
J'onn walked softly from the room and left as he promised.
Talia didn't bother to get up. She just burst into sobs.
_____________________________________
"Is something the matter, J'onn? You've been quiet."
J'onn looked up and glanced at Superman. "No, thank you, Superman," he said calmly. "I've just been engaging in some self-reflection today."
"Come to any conclusions?" the Kryptonian asked as he piloted the Javelin toward the Watchtower.
"Well . . ."
The Martian Manhunter hesitated. Of course there was much he could not tell anyone, but there was a bond between he and the "last son of Krypton" that allowed him to speak candidly. "We have both lost much, you and I," he said at last.
Superman nodded grimly.
"And yet you've been lucky, Superman. Spending Christmas on the Kent farm was sign enough of that," he continued, finally smiling a little. "Lucky in ways that I felt I could not be."
"You've got a family of your own, J'onn. You know that," Superman replied.
"I do. But I lost my first family, and unlike you, I was old enough to feel the pain of losing them," J'onn said. "A very real part of me died when my family did."
"So what brings those feelings up again?" Superman asked quietly.
J'onn struggled with his words - not because he didn't know how to say them, but because he was still coming to grips with them. "Last night there were a few moments when that part of me was alive again, and now I'm wondering if I want more of those moments," he finally admitted.
Superman looked out through the view screen at the stars. "A woman, you mean," he said.
"Yes. Don't ask."
"I wouldn't. You have your privacy."
J'onn barked a mirthless laugh. "Yes, privacy."
Superman looked back at him doubtfully. "If you're ever ready to tell me the whole story, J'onn, I'll make the time to listen."
"Thank you, Kal-El."
As they docked the spaceship, J'onn looked at him. "I will see you later. But I must find the Flash first." He stood up and passed through the walls of the ship into the station.
Superman sat there for another moment. It was urgent enough that he didn't bother to wait for the doors to open. What conversation with the Flash could possibly create such urgency?
He wondered if it had anything to do with that magazine . . . Diana had contacted him in the middle of the night seeking a break from the Flash's ego.
__________________________________
"Finally," Diana murmured as she passed J'onn in the hallway. She was startled when he turned and put a hand on her shoulder.
"Where is Flash?" he asked.
"Waiting for you, actually," she said, noticing how serious he looked. "What's going on with you two?"
"Too much," he muttered before leaving with a swirl of his cape.
Diana shrugged. Audrey was in Metropolis by now, and they had plans.
Meanwhile, the Flash's face broke out in a wide grin when he saw J'onn enter. "Hey, J'onn!" he greeted him excitedly. "So how did it go? Exorcise any 'demons' last night?"
J'onn stared at him. "How much of last night was about getting me into bed with another woman?" he asked.
Flash blinked, startled. "Last night was about Bats," he said after a pause. "If it did anything else for you, then I just see that as a bonus."
The intensity of the Martian's glare increased dramatically, and while the Flash felt it wasn't quite the same as one of Batman's stares, he began sweating.
"If you are so worried about your own love life," J'onn told him in clipped, angry tones, "then please concentrate on that. Do not concern yourself with mine, or Batman's. By the way, Talia expected to get pregnant last night."
Flash's eyes bulged. "What?! You don't mean she's going to have a little green man in nine months?"
"Could you stop telling jokes for one minute?!"
The world's fastest man finally caught on to the fact that the even-tempered Martian was royally pissed. "Yeah, sure, take it easy, J'onn."
J'onn just jabbed a finger in the Flash's face. "If you ever speak of last night to me again, I will go to Batman and tell him everything, even at the risk of exposing myself, just for the satisfaction of telling him it was entirely your idea," he warned Flash coldly.
Flash tried to swallow, but his mouth had gone dry. "It, uh, didn't go well?" he asked weakly.
"Nothing _happened_," J'onn said angrily, "and if you ever get any more bright ideas, you will leave me out of them!"
He coldly turned on his heel and stormed out, and it was now the dismayed Flash who stood there wondering how he had gotten into a mess like this.
________________________________
"Lois, you have a minute?"
Lois looked up from her computer. When Perry White asked if you had a minute, it generally meant something along the lines of "make a minute if you don't". "What's up, Perry?" she asked, leaning back.
"I'm assigning you an interview," he told her, "so clear a space in your busy social calendar. You've only got two weeks before she leaves."
"She? She who?"
"A European princess visiting our fair, if plebeian, city," Perry replied.
Lois groaned. "Why can't you let one of the society people handle a puff piece like this, Perry? I'm a serious investigative journalist who's faced death for a story many times, and - "
"Well then, you'll appreciate the relaxation of not needing to be saved by Superman," he replied dryly, a twinkle in his eye.
She refused to blush at the suggestion, but the idea made her feel warm inside. Of course, she knew what Perry didn't, that her partner Clark Kent was also Superman, and so she didn't exactly need a crisis to get her fill of the man she loved. But still, there was something special, even erotic, about those times when Superman came to her rescue.
Not that she usually noticed the erotic part until later. She was usually too stoked on adrenaline and fear to feel it at the time.
"Perry," she went on, sticking to her guns, "give it to Smallville. He makes all the ladies melt with that farmboy charm of his."
"It's not all bad, Lois," Perry assured her. "She's Princess Audrey, from Kasnia. I'm sure you remember her?"
Lois looked at him for a moment. "Oh," she finally said.
Perry blinked. "Oh?"
"Fine, I'll do it," she sighed, turning back to her computer. She glanced over her shoulder at the flummoxed Perry. "Is that it? Because I never promised you two minutes, Chief."
He scratched his head but left her to her devices. Certainly the fact that the princess in question had been briefly married to a madman bent on taking over the world made her a more interesting interview, but what had she meant by "oh"? It made him feel like she was suggesting he had an ulterior motive for assigning Lois to the interview. Which he didn't.
Even as she wrote about the news, part of Lois' brain dwelled on the bit of news Perry had given her. Of course Audrey's recent history made her newsworthy. The revelations about Vandal Savage after his capture - an immortal Nazi war criminal, of all things! - had made the story surrounding the tense world crisis all the more intriguing. Lois could get a half-hour of material out of the princess, no question about it.
What made it different for Lois was Clark. Or rather, Superman. Whatever you called him, the man who shared her bed almost every night. And when his fellow League member and superhero Wonder Woman announced at a private meeting that she was in a lesbian relationship with said Princess Audrey, he'd naturally gone to the one woman with whom he shared all his secrets. He did so knowing that no matter how important or salacious it was, she would never put it in an article unless he gave her permission to do so.
Princess Audrey of Kasnia was Diana's lover. Knowing this, there were all kinds of questions Lois could ask her. But she probably wouldn't, and she sighed. Certainly she couldn't expose her relationship without angering Clark, and besides, Lois left that kind of journalism to the tabloids. A trickier matter was whether she could ask them off the record. If Lois let Audrey know that she was in on the secret, was there a slight chance it could possibly threaten Clark's secret in turn? Might Audrey deduce the truth?
Lois shook her head. She was inclined to like the princess. She'd always been slightly envious of the Amazonian princess, and slightly suspicious of her intentions toward a man Diana publicly admired above all others. Audrey had dispelled any stubborn little worries on Lois' part that something might one day happen between the two heroes, and through no action of the princess' own, Lois was grateful to her.
"Clark, Clark," she murmured to herself. "The things you do to a girl."
______________________________
"No one is pointing to us," Audrey said, sighing. "No shouts of recognition."
"Audrey," Diana replied, "if you want us to be noticed, spending two and a half hours in a darkened movie theater is not the way to do it. Besides, I hate to burst your bubble, but your face isn't quite so familiar in America."
Audrey stuck her tongue out at the tall brunette. "Then why don't they recognize _you_?"
Diana shrugged. "Maybe because I'm not Metropolis' hero."
"You are mine," Audrey murmured happily.
The Themiscyran flushed and squeezed Audrey gently. "So did you like the movie?" she asked.
"I did," Audrey responded, "but it was so sad. My country has known civil war too, but it was before my time. I wonder if it was anything like what we saw."
"American's Civil War was a perfect example of what Man's World can create," Diana said darkly. "Men and women forced into slavery, men killing each other over slavery, the damage war causes both on the battlefield and in the homes . . . no one thinks about what happens to the women when they're left to fend for themselves in that environment. Sometimes it seems men only create the means to destroy."
"True," Audrey said. Then she smiled, her eyes gleaming. "Did you perhaps notice anything going on between them?" she asked coyly.
Diana looked at her, puzzled. "Between who?"
"Ada and Ruby," Audrey replied, referring to two of the main characters from _Cold Mountain_.
Diana frowned. "They were best of friends. They were like sisters. What more are you referring to?"
"Well," Audrey mused, "you've told me of how Amazons are friends, sisters, and sometimes more? Like us?"
"Yes," Diana said slowly. Then she understood. "You mean - well, that's just silly! She was in love with Inman!"
"Yes, I know, but Ruby seemed to feel something more," Audrey pointed out. "Wouldn't it be nice if maybe they could have just changed the story? Maybe if Ruby and Ada had . . ."
Diana shook her head. "You can't just change the end of a story because you like your version better, Audrey. You only thought you saw something. Obviously the author saw it differently. Changing the ending just because you got the wrong idea about those two women - what would happen if everyone started rewriting stories because they think one couple is better than another?"
Audrey gasped. "Massive copyright infringement! A matter for the Justice League!"
Diana sighed. "Now you're making fun of me."
"Only because you're so straight-laced! I thought I'd taught you how to have more fun, Diana," Audrey said, smiling.
"Well, maybe you could loosen my laces for me," Diana suggested as they walked. Her fingertip rubbed against Audrey's palm.
Audrey colored. "Every time I think I have you on the ropes, you always surprise me," she admitted.
"That's what my enemies always say."
"But we're not enemies, are we?"
"No," Diana replied lovingly. "Not friends or sisters, either."
"But something more," Audrey said, leaning into Diana's frame.
"Yes," Diana said, running her fingers through Audrey's hair. "Something much more."
To be continued . . .
Deviant Hearts Archive | Back to main index