serendipity. [superbat]

wrong.

Clark wakes up alone. 

It's not uncommon. Sometimes Bruce woke up in the wee hours of the morning nauseous and spent a couple of hours crowded around the toilet.  However, there's no light emanating from under the door. There's no sound of water running in the sink. He can hear the man's heartbeat, but it's much farther away, almost underneath Clark's feet. 

Clark shouldn't be surprised. He's not even sure why he'd gotten his hopes up in the first place. Bruce had changed, but he hadn't changed enough to no longer be curious. 

He finds Bruce curled up in his desk chair in front of his monitors, staring up at the screen with a frown on his face. The puppy, loyal as ever, is snoozing near his feet. Clark wants to just turn around, head for the stairs, let Bruce go until he finally found whatever he was looking for. Though, he was knowledgeable enough of the man's habits to know that could be two days from now. 

Instead, he saunters over and stares up at the screen, looking up at whatever had caught the man's attention. He's not sure what he was expecting. Maybe some jumble of information concerning Robin's vitals or something on the baby maybe or most likely something Batman related. What he finds himself looking at are Bruce's vitals. Or more like, Bruce's everything:

A full x-ray, brain scan, blood tests, even Bruce's current diet was on display.

He wasn't down here because he was concerned for Robin, who was still unconcious on the makeshift hospital bed. 

"You feeling alright?" Clark timidly asks.

Maybe something had happened while they were asleep, but Clark's sure he would've noticed. He was tuned in enough to pick up even the smallest of changes. Especially with how worked up Bruce had been before he'd promptly dosed off. 

Bruce lets out a sigh. 

"I'm fine, Clark." he mumbles dismissively, eyes never leaving the screen. 

Though Clark can see the way the man's eyes finally seem to focus on one set of data in particular. He's eyeing his hormone levels, clearly unhappy with what he was seeing.

He wouldn't be surprised if the baby was causing problems with Bruce's hormones. He was sure a baby would cause an imbalance in anyone, but especially a foreign child in a human's body. 

 "Bruce?" Clark tries again, a little softer in order to not startle the man. 

He wasn't going to get anywhere if Bruce felt threatened. He would simply curl in on himself and become unresponsive or start a big fight so that Clark would back down. Clark knew the pattern all too well, knew that the man was like a frightened wild animal when he was vulnerable. 

Bruce doesn't say anything frustratedly clicking away from the document to instead look at what seemed to be a scan of his brain. He'd apparently been checking for tumors according to the text underneath the scan. Nothing. Completely fine. Clark could've told him that. Though, if Bruce's body language and lack of talking is anything to go by, he doesn't want to hear from Clark. It seemed as if he'd wanted to keep whatever this was private. 

Clark had expected this. He expected there to be a moment where Bruce kept something seemingly vital to himself until it proved too obvious to continue to hide. That's just what Bruce did. He kept things close to the chest. It was what they used to almost rip each other's heads off over. He'd get so worked up over Bruce running off to die, furious over the man's inability to ask for help. 

In fact, that's what had gotten them here in the first place. That and Clark's insistence on being the one to provide said help. 

Clark's not expecting answers right away. Hell, he's not sure when and if he would even get any. So, he's a bit surprised when Bruce lets out another sigh before leaning back in his seat and swiping a hand over his forehead.