It's been a long time since I've updated and I'm really sorry. Just have been rather busy at school. So without further ado, please read (and hopefully enjoy) this peace offering *ahem* I mean, chapter 3 of this story. (Oh, and pardon any spelling errors or grammar errors as I beta-ed this myself rather quickly. I shall endeavour to do a more thorough check after I get chapter 4 done)

"Is he awake?" a male voice. Strong, powerful, probably commanded attention. It sounded familiar, but oddly enough, seemed to make a strong wave of anger sweep through his bleary mind. Hmm, and a thirst for... Revenge?

"I'm not sure." a female voice, soothing but strong.

"Eh, he seems pretty much dead to the world. What happened anyway?" immediately, he was bombarded with a rapid slew of words he could barely comprehend.

Batman felt his eyebrows crease as he struggled to swim his way through the thick viscous sea of darkness that was his current state of consciousness. His eyelids fluttered as he wrestled with unwilling eyes to *just open up already*!

That annoying, super-fast voice again, "Hey, did you see that? His eyes are opening!"

You don't say, he thought sarcastically. He could definitely do without the blinding headache though. It felt as if he had been grabbed by his head and smashed repeatedly into something hard. What I would do for some coffee right now, he mused to himself wistfully. But that train of thought soon brought him to some unhappy memories that had led up to his current miserable state in the first place.

Decaf.

"Damnit. Kent!"

His eyes sprang open and he shot up from what was presumably one of the beds in the Watchtower medical bay as if someone had shot him full of lightning. He winced slightly at the harsh, bright lights in the medical bay, blinking a few times to refocus his vision. But it did nothing to deter him from reaching his current target as in a few moments' time, he lunged towards the huge blue and red S symbol hovering nearby. The symbol swerved just out of reach at the last second and he almost toppled off the bed.

"Woah, woah, easy there, Bats. You just passed out or something. No need to get all worked up and stuff, could be bad for your heart... Or something. Uh, I mean... Eh what I meant to say was... Um..."

At this point, Flash was more or less trailing off into nervous muttering as he was impaled with a Batglare. Well, a Batglare sans the cowl. But somehow, it made it all the more scarier. How a pair of blue eyes could give you a stare so icy that it made the temperature of the room drop by a few degree Celsius was beyond him.

Batman glared for a few moments longer for good measure before turning his attention to matters of greater importance. Like, the many different ways to incapacitate Superman.

Superman was casting a worried, nervous look in his direction. Clearing his throat, he asked, "Uh, how are you feeling, Bruce?"

The temperature of the room seemed to drop a few more degrees. Diana cast a warning look at Superman, her expression somewhere along the lines of, "if you want to keep your head intact, it's probably best not to aggravate this man when he's in such a state".

"Peachy. Just peachy," Batman deadpanned.

Batman then proceeded to grab his cowl off the bedside table, pulled it over his head and swung his legs off the bed. He stood up in one swift motion but very nearly collapsed back onto the bed again as all the blood suddenly rushed up to his head. Still wobbling rather unsteadily, he shrugged off Diana's hands that suddenly appeared on his shoulders in an attempt to aid him. Instead, he stormed all the way up to Superman, such that they were almost nose to nose and he could actually count how many eyelashes the Man of Steel had (not that he would ever want or need to).

"Never pegged you as someone who played dirty, Boy Scout," Batman remarked casually, as though he was discussing the weather, although the dangerous edge to his voice clearly showed otherwise.

Before the astonished Superman could conjure up a suitable retort, he was faced with a swirling mass of black cape as Batman turned to exit the Medical Bay.

"Next time you want to thank me for bringing you coffee, try not to switch mine with decaf. The consequences for you won't be exactly pleasant. It won't just be a piece of glowing rock this time." a growled threat thrown over his shoulder and then he was gone, padding noiselessly out of the door.

Superman stood there, dumbfounded while his other two teammates exchanged puzzled glances, still digesting the bits and pieces of information tossed to them in the form of Batman's cryptic words.

Eyebrows furrowed, Superman murmured, "Was it that obvious I was the one who switched his coffee with decaf?"

"Wait, you what?!" Flash all but shouted with glee as he stared at Superman in a mixture of shock and awe at the same time that Diana exclaimed, "Hera, why would you do such a thing?"

"What? He laced my coffee with blue kryptonite first!" Superman shot back defensively.

Flash's eyes grew as big as saucers but he snapped out of his shock-induced trance soon enough to shout, "Oh gosh, this is priceless! It's like one big coffee showdown or something."

Diana shot him a look that clearly said that he shouldn't be stoking the fire and encouraging this "coffee showdown" (for lack of better terms). She then turned to Superman, who was rubbing his neck rather sheepishly.

Sighing, she said, "I thought you two were more mature than this, and you of all people should know that you shouldn't do anything that might endanger your teammate and causing them to fall asleep while on the job is something that could be potentially dangerous."

Superman sighed, "I know, but I just couldn't resist giving him a taste of his own medicine."

A pregnant pause, then "I'll uhh just be going to talk things out with him then" though the tone he spoke in suggested he would much rather be locked in a fight to the death with Doomsday than apologising to someone he thought deserved having revenge exacted on. The "someone" in question being a certain dark, pointy-eared Gothamite who was no doubt, still cranky from being caffeine-deprived and nursing one hell of a headache. He felt a tiny trickle of guilt worm its way into his heart but quickly quashed it with thoughts of the blue kryptonite laced coffee he had unwittingly drunk.

Diana watched Superman float out of the Medical Bay, her eyebrows furrowed. She wasn't really sure what sparked this whole chain of vengeful events (somehow all using coffee as some sort of tool for revenge) but she was certain this would not be the last of it. After all, Superman was anything but someone who yielded easily. And Batman, stubborn and obstinate man that he was, she thought with a touch of fondness, would definitely not apologise first.

Flash seemed to be thinking along the same lines, for he had ceased his laughter and exclamations. He was currently staring somewhat worriedly at the doorway where both the Man of Steel and the Dark Knight had disappeared through moments before, as if expecting to hear raised voices and the sound of objects shattering.

Then, seemingly realising that this would not be the last of all the coffee-revenge madness that was to come, Flash sighed, a hint of despair in his voice.

"Big Blue didn't actually agree to resolve the matter, did he?"

The silence and Diana's pursed lips were all the answer he needed.

Images of Batman and Superman wrecking the Watchtower in a bid to come out tops in what started off as a simple disagreement over who got the coffee flashed through his mind.

For all his rapid speech and fast onslaught of words, he only managed to voice one word to describe his current sense of foreboding.

"Crap."

Then, "We're screwed, aren't we?"

Hmm... Not much action in this chapter. Sorry about that, but I promise there'll be more action, excitement, explosions and interesting things next chapter. (I can't really promise there'll be explosions though, but there will be more action at the very least) Now... How about a review? Just one, pretty please? =)