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[truth_and_justice]

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[frightening]

Is that so.

It wasn't a yes, either.

[truth_and_justice]

Which is why I won't be making a move until it is.

But I'll remind you that the situation you set up is the situation you control. And you have been more careful than me, but you did train him.

[frightening]

No, I know. And I can't 'make a move' about him. It's Dick. I'm just going to talk to him.

I don't know why I'm telling you this.

[truth_and_justice]

Like you said: no telling what kind of Dick he is.

But I suspect you're telling me because you're worried.

Just remember: it's still Dick. If he's so far removed from who you know, then it doesn't matter. And if he's the Dick you know, he loves you.

[frightening]

[ It's a while before he responds again. ]

I love you. You know that, don't you.

[truth_and_justice]

[he really wishes that didn't worry him as much as it warmed his heart]

I do, Bruce. And I hope you know that I love you as well.

[frightening]

[ And Bruce wishes there was no reason for either of them to worry. ]

I know.

Action

[truth_and_justice]

There's no way that Bruce will be surprised there's a light tap on his window a few moments later.

[frightening]

Not surprised, no, but there's something deeply bittersweet about how he feels seeing him. Bruce knows he's being obvious in his sudden unease, but he doesn't want to risk being too subtle-- he doesn't want to tell Clark what's going on, either.

Outside, Ace woofs at the figure floating in the sky, but it's just as Bruce is opening the window and the dog settles when he pokes his head out. He steps back to let Clark in, quiet; he's wearing a soft t-shirt and pajama pants, and the apartment smells like Chinese food. Equipped for a night in brooding.

[truth_and_justice]

Clark doesn't even pause as he floats in the window and pulls Bruce into a soft, sweet kiss. He's not asking anything, he's not really saying anything, at least not out loud with words. The only things he's saying are being said with his hands (settled on Bruce's hip and Bruce's shoulder) and his kiss.

[frightening]

Goddamnit. He shouldn't have opened the window, or-- something. Anything. Because he raises his hands to rest gently against the sides of Clark's neck and returns that kiss, almost embarrassed at how he sinks into it, into the warmth and security Clark gives him. Everything about him is screaming that he's in an awful mood, and it makes him feel like he should shove Clark away and recoil in isolation. But he doesn't.

[truth_and_justice]

When Bruce starts to sink in, Clark pulls him closer, draws him nearer. He stays there, stays close and his hands squeeze lightly. '

And when he pulls back, he doesn't go far.

"You can either tell me. Or we can leave it alone and settle in to sleep for the night."

Because Clark doesn't want to leave him alone. That isn't entirely negotiable.

[frightening]

Clark can't know just how valuable it is that he won't leave him alone tonight; he can't know that Bruce feels the start of the slow pull of a black hole of non-emotion, the force of suffocating gravity he was drowning in the night he came to Eudio. He doesn't want Clark to know. He doesn't want to go through all this with him just for him to know Bruce is going to end his own life-- it's such a far cry from home where he's shut Kal-El out, where he's had a year to be angry at Bruce and begin to let him go already. He knows factually that it's better he do what he plans, but he's damn well aware of how it will make them all feel emotionally. The impending pressure of those reactions - how the fuck can he fix that, when everything else he's done has ended in ruin - makes him want to leave this place entirely.

"I'm tired," he says in a harsh whisper, his forehead against the other man's. "I'm so fucking tired today."

[truth_and_justice]

His arms slip around Bruce, pull him closer, and he leans his head up to press a kiss to Bruce's temple.

"Then let's go to bed," he says, quiet and simple.

[frightening]

Bruce is so wired from the tense expectation of being trapped he's not sure he can sleep despite the raw tiredness that leeches at his insides. Left to his own decides he certainly wouldn't, but maybe with Clark beside him he'll be able to. His head just needs to shut up.

Eventually, he does fall asleep. It's only when he slips into deeper unconsciousness that the tension finally bleeds out of him.

[truth_and_justice]

Clark doesn't sleep. He doesn't need to, after all, or his needs are so minute that a night missed is nothing a few minutes of sunlight can't cure. Instead, he holds Bruce as he sleeps, meditating, listening intently to make sure that Bruce's sleep is undisturbed. If he starts showing signs of distress, Clark will put a hand in his hair and murmur gently to him and try to settle him out enough to drift off again. But otherwise, he'll just hold him.

Bruce was not a simple man, and the farthest thing from an easy partner there was... Except for how their partnership felt so easy sometime. Right now, it wasn't easy, but it was simple: Bruce needed someone to accept him and love him and watch his back.

Clark could do that. Clark would do that. As long as Bruce needed it. And then as long as he wanted it. And probably a little after that if he was honest.

[frightening]

What Bruce needs is to wrap his contract here up so that he can go home and get on with it, and stop drawing out the torture for everyone. They will move on, Gotham will move on. It has to happen.

That's what he thinks, anyway.

He wakes sometime mid-dawn when it's still mostly gray out. Clark is warm and solid next to him, around him, and he lets his eyes open partway, unfocused. The mood that enveloped him last night still lingers, obvious in how he tucks his head back against him, still drained despite sleeping.

[truth_and_justice]

Clark lets his fingers move once he knows Bruce is awake, not just holding but running in Bruce's hair, drifting down his back and along his shoulders, the curves of his side. Clark knows he's awake and Clark doesn't mind if he wants to hide from the world a little longer in bed.

[frightening]

He's not hiding; the world knows exactly where he is. Too many people behave as though it revolves around him for the case to be otherwise. He's waiting, because he is going to find Dick today. He remembers when he got here, seeing his network posts and finding where he'd been working - left only days before Bruce's arrival. It was a bittersweet blessing, and now he wonders if that young man would even recognize him. All these lives shuffled like a deck of cards thrown into the wind to create all these universes.

Waiting, because he's heading towards something inevitable.

"I've been in therapy," he murmurs eventually, his low voice coiling with the soft morning quiet. "Here, I mean."

[truth_and_justice]

Clark doesn't say anything for a moment, thinking of his discussion with Jason the other day for a split second before nodding.

"Not that it's my business to, but I admit, I approve."

Just as quiet. The morning doesn't need to be broken quite yet.

[frightening]

He figured Clark would. Clark thought his time with a grief counselor after Jason's 'death' had helped him; maybe in his world, it had. Not for Bruce-- just left him with people who could never understand prodding at his open wounds, prolonging anything resembling healing.

It's going better in Eudio. He's not sure if it's helping, but at least it's not hurting.

"Two months now." So, since shortly after his arrival. Since shortly after he'd had that episode when Clark first kissed him, in fact. "There doesn't seem to be a point. I don't know why I keep going."

[truth_and_justice]

"Well," he starts after a moment, wondering what terrible thing is waiting behind this conversation, because something is always waiting behind a blatant admission like this, "that depends. What're you going there for? What's your goal?"

[frightening]

"I needed to know if I'm still being possessed by the Joker or if I just have PTSD."

Bruce adjusts his positioning and pulls Clark's arms more firmly around himself, one of his own arms curling behind his shoulder, holding him in return.

"Turns out I have extreme paranoid tendencies. Who knew."

[truth_and_justice]

"You're not possessed by the Joker," and he doesn't sound angry about it or even frustrated. He sounds firm, as if he could see that down to the atom, he was 100% Bruce Wayne and nothing else. As if the idea wasn't ludicrous, perhaps, but not something he should worry about, so sayeth Superman.

"And yes, you do. I've noticed those. Didn't even take super-vision."

[frightening]

"I know," he says quietly, about not being possessed. He knew before he set out, too, because he won, but what kind of fool would he be to experience these flashbacks and not investigate? He couldn't let it sit. Or maybe he thought it would help him feel better to work through it. Whatever feeling better fucking means.

Also, he says, in some other universe, I'm suicidal.

"Every time a diagnosis is suggested I think, 'That's interesting.' I wonder if there's a name for what happens when you fill up a Bingo card, besides 'occupational hazard.'"