Precautions
"Bruce, I really don't see why this is an issue. Just because you're going to have to act like a human being doesn't mean you get to be angry about it," Dick chastised his father with humor.
"You're enjoying this," Bruce pouted.
"Sure, I'm enjoying you acting like an eight year old," Dick rolled his eyes and made it sound as if he was an overprotective mother for his next words,"Now you better behave when your friend Clark gets here, young man."
"I am not eight." Bruce crossed his arms. Dick raised his eyebrow at him and mimicked his pose, crossing his arms and putting a fake scowl on his face.
"You're just as bad as Damian."
"I am not eight either, Grayson," Damian spoke up from where he was playing games on his phone.
"Regardless, you are both going to behave when Clark gets here." Dick almost laughed at the nearly identical scowls he was recieving.
"I don't see why he has to come over all the time," Bruce pouted again.
"Oh stop pouting. He's your friend even if you won't admit it."
"I am not pouting." The sound of the doorbell kept Dick from replying. They let Alfred get the door. Bruce made a noise that could be described as a cross between a sigh and a moan of dispair. Alfred walked in with Clark trailing shortly behind and then left after their guest was in the room.
"Hello, Bruce," Clark nodded cheerily to the man, Bruce gave him a deadpan look back,"Damian,"Clark nodded to the boy just as cheerily and recieved another deadpan look,"And Dick." This time he recieved a smile.
"Hey, Uncle Clark! Bruce was just going to the kitchen to make us coffee! He'll make you one too!" Dick gave his Uncle a hug and shot a look to his father.
'Don't push it.' Bruce mouthed to Dick.
'Be nice.' Dick mouthed back. Bruce huffed and left the room to get Alfred to make coffee, he was no longer allowed to attempt to make anything in the kitchen. Anything. Even pouring his own cereal was banned, Dick didn't ask what event had caused that, but he could only imagine.
"How have you been, Damian? I know you started a new school recently," Clark turned to the boy, who had gone back to the game on his phone.
"Fantastic. School is a thrilling experiance that every child enjoys and looks forward to," Damian replied sarcastically without looking up from his game. Dick rolled his eyes.
"Excuse him, he has the social skills of Bruce, the angst of Jason, and the humor of a rock. Just let him play his Cooking Mania game and he shouldn't glare daggers at you."
"It is not Cooking Mania! I assure you, it is a violent, bloody war game, and I am currently murdering people." Damian quickly exited his game of Cooking Mania and went to a Call of Duty game that he had no idea how to play, but downloaded so he wouldn't be caught playing Cooking Mania.
"Sure, Dami, sure," Dick laughed,"Come on, we can go to the kitchen to make sure Bruce didn't run away." He led an amused looking Kryptonian to the kitchen, where Bruce was missing.
"Hmmm," Dick put his hand on his chin and pondered where he could've gone. He decided to give Bruce the benifit of the doubt and assume he went to get Alfred, rather than running away to get away from social interactions. Clark sat down at the table, where papers with sticky notes on top were spread out.
"He brings his work home?" Clark asked, although he was not the least bit surprised. He couldn't really imagine Bruce not working.
"Ya, he's been making sticky notes with corrections, they just got a new secretary and I don't think she knows what she's doing yet." Dick sat down across from Clark at the table.
"This isn't Bruce's handwriting though..." Dick frowned. He had seen Bruce writing them earlier. He slid one of the files over and looked at the note.
"Ya, it is." He looked at the distinct curvy letters that was a mixture of cursive and print: not quite cursive, but not quite print either.
"Hmm. I guess you're right," Clark agreed. That was strange. He had just been going over a file that Batman had given him. He had seen hundreds of documents written by Batman, but his handwriting was always in meticulous cursive. Maybe Bruce was just writing fast on the sticky notes? It was then that Alfred walked in.
"Hey, is Bruce with you?" Dick asked.
"He retreated to the cave, sir. I thought that perhaps Mister Kent had left." Dick rolled his eyes again.
"Come on Clark, let's go bother him." Clark laughed. Bruce could be so immature. They made their way down to the cave and found Bruce writing on two different files.
"Bruuuuce," Dick called. He shot his mentor a chastising look. Clark looked over at the files Bruce was writing on. One was a case file, the other had a Wayne Enterprises logo at the top. The one with the Wayne Enterprises logo had sticky notes with the same half cursive-half print he had seen upstairs, but the case file held the cursive he was used to seeing.
"Bruce, do you... do you change your handwriting when you're Batman?" Clark asked suddenly. Dick raised an eyebrow.
"Bruce Wayne and Batman have to be as far from each other as possible. It would be easy to draw conclusions if someone saw that their handwriting matched exactly," Bruce defended.
"Are... are you serious? How did I not notice that before..." Dick wondered out loud. Bruce raised an eyebrow at his son.
"You do it too, don't act like you don't. I've seen Nightwing's handwriting and it's much cleaner than yours." Dick froze.
"Nuh-uh. That's not..." He stopped to think,"I don't do it on purpose, it's just... actually I don't know why I do it..."
"Subconsiously maybe?" Clark suggested. "That's pretty crazy, even for you two." He laughed out loud at the two Bats in front of him.
"No, it's a precaution," Bruce defended again. He was in the middle of giving Clark a glare, even though he knew Clark was part of the very small group of people that was immune to the Batglare, when Dick interrupted.
"Whatever, it doesn't matter. Bruce you promised us coffee."
"I never promised you coffee."
"Well you're going to sit down with us and have coffee." Dick gave him a look. He was just as stubborn as his mentor, he was just a lot nicer about things. Bruce rolled his eyes.
"Fine."
As they made the short walk back up to the kitchen, Clark mused on his discovery. He wrote often, he was a journalist after all, and he knew for a fact that he didn't change his handwriting even when he was Superman. It never even occured to him. He was never as paranoid as the Batfamily members. But he had to admit that Bruce was at least creative with his paranoia. But it got him thinking. Maybe I should work on my handwriting... He nearly laughed out loud at his thought. Now I'm being paranoid. Maybe Bruce is rubbing off on me.