Tim + Conner: do you think there are aliens out there?
"Do you think that somewhere out there, there are aliens?"
Tim held his breath, counted to ten, and slowly tilted his head to the side to meet Conner's eyes. "Please tell me you're kidding."
Conner gave him a blank look. "I'm not."
"Kon," Tim said in a Very Serious voice, "You do know that you're like, half alien, right?"
"Well, yeah, of course," Conner said, and he rolled his eyes, leaning back into the wall. Tim sighed and was just about to turn his attention back to his report when Conner spoke again. "But I meant do you think there are more alien aliens out there."
Tim's head thunked against his keyboard, and on top of dealing with this out of the blue question, now he also had to erase three lines of ldjsgkjd on his keyboard. This was getting ridiculous.
"We deal with aliens all the time, Kon," Tim told him. He was definitely getting pranked right now. He wouldn't even be surprised if Conner and Bart had hidden a camera somewhere. "What was that even supposed to accomplish."
Conner shrugged, a half-smile on his face. He looked kind of guilty, and Tim knew that Conner knew he'd been caught. "Wanted to see you what you'd do."
"I got annoyed, that's what I did."
"You need to relax."
"I was relaxed before you asked that stupid question."
Conner raised an eyebrow. "You've been freaking out over something all morning."
Tim murmured an indignant "have not" under his breath that Conner probably could have caught with or without his super-hearing and turned back to his work. So, he was lying a little bit. So what? Gotham had been a mess the night before and then he'd only been in bed for about ten minutes before Bart had called him to the Tower (nothing had been wrong. Bart just needed some help with his computer and Tim was The Guy).
So yeah, he was a little stressed, and running on like five cups of coffee, but that was pretty normal. He wasn't freaking out.
"You have," Conner said. "Deal with all that stuff later. Bart and I thought it'd be nice to get some lunch, just the three of us, and you could use a break."
"So it was a distraction," Tim corrected. "You were just trying to get my mind off of my report."
"Sure," Conner said easily. "Now come eat with us."
Tim rolled his eyes. Batman was probably expecting this report soon, but he could probably use a break, and going out to lunch with his best friends sounded like heaven. It also meant he could skip an awkward lunch at the manor with just him, Dick, and Damian.
"Fine." Tim pulled out his cellphone. "Just give me a sec to call home."
Conner gave him a mock salute, and disappeared out the door. Tim just sighed and dialed the manor's number, a small smile hidden behind his hand. The things Conner did for him, even if they were unconventional.
