thinkmarkthink

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my dear friend just looked up from the hat she's crocheting for a very large spherical rock we found in the river and said, in a slightly haunted tone that revealed this was the first time she was having this thought, "i should make something for my cousin's real human baby"

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When Clark said “he’s not even a very good dog but he’s all alone and he’s probably scared so i have to go get him” I was so happy because someone in that writers room truly understands superman better than we’ve seen in a long time. This is the essence of superman - that every living being deserves kindness and empathy and love simply because they are alive. Clark is the kind of guy who’d cry when he got stung by a bee not because it hurt but because the bee died when it stung him and someone in the writers room knew that and made sure it came through.

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It’s 3:26 a.m. when they limp into the kitchen like survivors of a small war.

Bruce has a black eye and the kind of quiet, shell-shocked silence that means something exploded too close to his ribs.

Jason’s bleeding from the ear. Steph smells like ozone. Tim’s limping. Damian is half-hissing, half-muttering at Duke, who has a taser burn through his cape.

Cass, somehow unbothered, makes a beeline for the freezer.

Opens it. Pauses. Pulls out the cake.

The cake has been there for weeks. No one knows who started it.

It is labeled, in Tim’s handwriting, with a sticky note that reads:

DO NOT EAT unless one of us dies or Alfred says we can.

There’s only one clean fork. Steph finds it in the drawer with a victorious noise.

They pass it around like a chalice.

No plates. No dignity. Just bite, pass, bite, pass. It’s stale, but chocolate.

Alfred enters the kitchen with a dishrag and a first-aid kit. Stops short.

He stares.

“I see the apocalypse has come at last.”

Jason, mid-bite, shrugs. “Emergency protocol.”

Alfred sighs. Picks up the hydrogen peroxide. Begins dabbing at Bruce’s temple with all the gentleness of a battlefield medic who’s done this too many times.

“I could have made a fresh one,” he mutters.

“No time,” says Steph, licking chocolate off her knuckles. “Urgent morale crisis.”

Cass hands Damian the fork. He takes a cautious bite. Says nothing.

Then passes it to Duke.

Alfred finishes cleaning up Bruce, turns to Jason, and raises a brow.

“You are dripping gateau on the tile.”

“Worth it,” Jason says.

There is no arguing with them when they’re like this.

So Alfred merely shakes his head, pours himself a cup of tea, and sits.

Watches them devour cake and blood and silence and each other’s company like something holy.

Later, when they’re all bandaged and yawning, Alfred tucks the empty box away.

Just in case they need another one.

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The lesson was Alfred’s idea, naturally.

“One cannot evade galas forever, Master Damian,” he said, laying out the polished oak ballroom floor with the same clinical exactness he applied to bullet wounds and broken ribs. “The League may have taught you ten ways to strangle a man with piano wire, but I very much doubt you know how to lead in 3/4 time.”

So: the Batkids are being taught to waltz.

Dick is overly enthusiastic, as always, spinning Stephanie in exaggerated circles that make Cass laugh from the sidelines. Tim pretends to be above it all but corrects people’s posture anyway. Damian glares at every hand extended in his direction, as if touch were a personal insult, and Jason tries to dip Alfred, who laughs loudly.

Bruce is not participating. Which is expected.

Clark is present. Which is not.

He’s just there. Quiet in the corner in a black sweater, sipping coffee with the manner of someone who’s been invited but not necessarily welcomed, though no one’s asked him to leave. He’s watching, not in the way Bruce watches—calculating, hypervigilant—but like he’s collecting a moment he wants to remember. Which is, in some ways, worse.

Bruce doesn’t dance. Not with them. Not in public. Not when he can help it.

He did once, long ago. Cotillions, charity balls, UN receptions. The first time Clark saw him waltz was in Vienna—Bruce in a tailored suit, whispering into the ear of a war criminal’s daughter while pulling intel off a blood diamond broker. It was surgical. Elegant. Seduction as espionage.

So Clark knows Bruce can dance. He also knows he chooses not to. Especially now.

So when Alfred turns to him and says, “Master Bruce, you are hardly exempt,” it is a test, not a suggestion.

Bruce says nothing. His mouth draws into that tight, unreadable line he always uses when something hurts.

Clark watches him.

And—maybe it’s habit, or pity, or the particular brand of grief that attaches itself to old friendships—but Clark steps forward, sets down the mug, and says, without bravado:

“I’ll lead.”

It’s half-offer, half-olive branch.

Bruce does not move.

Not at first.

But then: a breath. A shift. And slowly, as if surrendering to something inevitable, he places his hand in Clark’s.

The music restarts. Something slow, formal. Chopin or Strauss, probably. Clark doesn’t know. It doesn’t matter.

What matters is Bruce’s hand in his—warm, calloused, very still. His shoulder under Clark’s palm, tense like a coiled spring. His chest barely moving, like he’s not breathing.

Clark leads cautiously. He’s terrified of stepping wrong, of pressing too hard. Bruce is the one person he can’t afford to misstep with. But Bruce doesn’t flinch. He lets Clark steer. One step, then another. Slowly, they begin to move. Despite Clark’s slight clumsiness.

The children go quiet.

Not mockingly—just watching.

Even Damian says nothing.

Around them, the manor hums. Rain taps the windows. The grandfather clock ticks, unrelenting. The ballroom is warm.

Clark thinks: this is the most contact Bruce has allowed in weeks.

Bruce thinks: this is the most I’ve wanted to be touched in years.

They complete one turn around the floor. Then another. Neither speaks.

Then, at last, Bruce pulls away. Carefully. The moment ends.

He leaves the room without a word.

Clark exhales, still holding the shape of him.

And Alfred—who has seen wars, weddings, and every kind of grief known to man—clears his throat, dusts his lapel, and says simply:

“Begin again, please. From the top. Miss Stephanie, lead Richard.”

[thinkmarkthink]

Screaming crying throwing up at your batfam/superbat nibbles. They're so precious 😭😭💚

Thank you very much! 😇

[thinkmarkthink]

who's viktor and why do you keep saying you want to peg him?

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also can you do a jeremiah fisher/Theodore (from the chipmunks) fic?

Sure!!!! 😝

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Damian has labeled every plant in the manor.

Latin name, care instructions, feeding schedule. If one dies, he grieves it quietly and Alfred replaces it within 48 hours. There’s a small memorial in the garden labeled “Alfred the Fern.”

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Cass uses body language to lie for fun.

She’s perfectly fluent in deception. If someone asks her if she saw Jason steal the Batmobile, she’ll blink innocently, tilt her head just so, and Bruce will be like “Clearly not. Case closed.”

Jason owes her five movie nights and a milkshake per false alibi.

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Clark Kent has no idea how many kids Bruce has.

He asks once and Bruce goes “A few.” Dick says “Seven.” Tim says “Don’t worry about it.” Jason says “Too many.”

Clark just starts sending Christmas presents to “Wayne, assorted.”

(Alfred makes sure everyone gets one. Even the Batcow.)

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Tim finds it first. A file labeled Kal-El buried in the Batcomputer.

Photos. Flight patterns. Heat vision signatures. Public vulnerabilities. Private ones.

And a second file. Encrypted.

Tim opens it. Inside:

• Clark’s Earth wedding vows (transcribed from memory)

• A picture from the Watchtower of Clark laughing, backlit by stars

• A single audio clip labeled Heartbeat

Tim blinks. Frowns.

Doesn’t tell anyone.

But when he passes Clark next, he says, “He cares. A lot. Even if he catalogues it like a psychopath.”

Clark smiles. Just a little.

[thinkmarkthink]

what the hey dude!

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kryptonite that gives you a breeding kink

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I really wanna write a little fic about Alfred teaching all the Bats how to waltz but I do not have enough brain power 😖

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Bruce wears exactly one brand of suit: handmade, shadow-black, armor-lined.

Clark wears… flannel. Bright primary colors. Sometimes jeans with embroidered suns.

It was never going to work. Except now Clark is in charge of laundry day.

And now, the League is seeing Batman in a hoodie with a sunflower on it.

Jason takes one look and yells, “WHO DRESSED HIM, I JUST WANNA TALK.”

Clark, proudly: “Me.”

Bruce: “It’s soft.”

Tim stares at Bruce wearing what is clearly Clark’s old Kansas State hoodie and quietly re-evaluates his entire life.

Diana thinks it’s sweet. Barry thinks Bruce has been body-snatched. Hal just keeps zooming in on photos and muttering, “No way.”

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Bruce is sick.

Actually sick.

Not “poisoned by Ivy and still making spreadsheets,” not “limping on a broken rib and snarling at Alfred for trying to feed him soup.” No. This is honest-to-God, flu-ridden, nose-stuffed, too-tired-to-growl sick. And it is terrifying.

The Batkids notice immediately. Dick calls it “a rare atmospheric pressure drop.” Tim just quietly locks down Wayne Enterprises before Bruce can try to remote in. Jason hovers. Damian tries to poison him into health. Cass brings tissues.

But it’s Clark who panics.

“You… get colds?” he asks from the doorway, voice unsteady like he’s watching a tiger die. “You can?”

Bruce, buried in a mountain of blankets with an ice pack sliding off his forehead, gives him a look that could ignite steel. “I am a human being, Clark.”

Clark looks genuinely shaken by this. He nods solemnly, then disappears into the air with a gust of wind and returns ten minutes later holding… ten gallons of chicken soup, a humidifier, four weighted blankets, and what might be a live goat. For a “nurturing atmosphere.”

Bruce: “What the hell is that.”

Clark, hopeful: “Emotional support livestock?”

The Batkids are already filming.

Within the next two hours:

• Clark panics when Bruce starts coughing in his sleep and insists on monitoring his pulse every ten minutes.

• Tim wakes up with a wet towel on his forehead and a post-it note that says “feel better, champ :)” despite not being sick.

• Jason walks into the kitchen to find Clark baking homemade protein muffins. No one knows why. No one has ever seen him bake before.

• Damian tries to stab Clark for calling him “sport.” Clark lifts him up one-handed and gives him a forehead kiss like a lion carrying a feral cub. Damian short-circuits.

• Dick is forcibly tucked into a blanket burrito on the couch “for bonding.”

Bruce emerges, raspy and dead-eyed, sometime around 3 p.m., finds the kitchen immaculate, the children weirdly calm, and Clark in his apron stirring herbal tea like a mother of five in Vermont.

“…What happened here?” Bruce asks.

Clark looks up, proud and bright. “Just keeping the family alive.”

Bruce stares at him. At the children. At the goat.

Then, slowly, like a man resigned to something far greater than himself, he says, “Fine. But if I wake up to a family yoga session again, I’m calling Waller.”

Clark beams. “Noted.”

Jason: “Too late. We already signed up for goat therapy.”

The goat bleats. Bruce sneezes. Cass hands him tea.

It’s domestic hell. It’s peace. It’s home.

And Bruce, despite everything, doesn’t really mind.

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It’s day two of Alfred’s well-earned vacation, and the Manor has already descended into what Bruce clinically classifies as ‘a barely contained natural disaster.’

Dick is trying to mediate a screaming match between Damian and Jason. Stephanie is live-tweeting it under her burner account, username @CasseroleWayne, with captions like “live footage of child soldier war crimes” and “who gave jason a machete.” Tim is asleep under the kitchen island, half-covered in cheese slices. Duke is attempting to cook breakfast with a blowtorch.

Bruce stares at the chaos, still wearing his robe. His coffee is untouched. He has been awake for three minutes.

Clark floats in through the kitchen window, glowing with sunlight and good cheer, and says, “Hey, babe! Want pancakes?”

Bruce takes exactly one second to process this.

Then he says, without blinking: “If you say one more cheerful word, I’m putting you on laundry duty. Forever.”

Clark lands gently. Kisses Bruce’s temple. “Okay. Miserable silence it is.”

There’s a loud clang from upstairs.

Cass appears in the doorway, holding a crowbar and looking unbothered. “Don’t worry. I fixed it.”

Bruce doesn’t ask what “it” was.

Instead, he sips his coffee. Finally. Then mutters, “I used to be the night.”

“You still are,” Clark says cheerfully, already reaching to take over the stove. “Just, you know… with PTA meetings and six feral roommates.”

Jason storms past with a fork in each hand. “Tell them it wasn’t a machete! It was a decorative sword!”

Damian chases after him, shouting, “It was unsanctioned! Treachery!”

Bruce closes his eyes. “Alfred, come back. They need you. I need you. I’m begging.”

Clark hums. “You say that, but you’re smiling.”

“I’m smiling because I’m picturing locking them all in the cave.”

“And yet—”

“Don’t finish that sentence, Clark.”