"Girls! They wanna-"
"Ooh!"
"They wanna have fun!"
"They just wanna! They just wannaa!"
"Girls!"
"They just wanna, they just wanna!"
"Girls-"
A knock on the bathroom door has both boys frozen in place.
Batman- -Mr. Wayne? Bruce?- peeks into the room and immediately, his face falls.
Kon chances a glance towards Tim through the bathroom mirror. His face is painted a stark white with deep wrinkles carefully brushed all across his skin. He has Kon's jacket draped over his head like a hood, making him the perfect image of Darth Sidious.
And Kon? Well, his face is entirely painted red and black with Darth Maul's patterns. He was just touching up some thinner layers before he was going to make some horns to glue onto his forehead, before Bruce came in.
After a painfully long moment of silence, Mr. Wayne sighs into his hands. "Do I want to know?" His voice is muffled.
"Hi, Batman!" Bart calls from the video call they pulled up on Tim's phone. He's green with long, paper ears and just as many wrinkles. An actually impressive Yoda.
"Bart." Mr. Wayne greets dryly. "Sorry to cut your bonding time short, but dinner's ready."
Kon pales as he meets Tim's eyes.
Oh no.
"And I'm going to assume the Kent don't was Sith lords at their dinner table. Then again, you could ask them yourselves." With that, Mr. Wayne is closing the door with a smug but tired look.
"We'll be right there!" Tim calls. Seconds later, they're both frantically trying to wash the paint from their faces.
"It's gonna wash off-"
"It's not washing off," Tim says. He stares at himself in horror as Kon rubs and rubs and rubs against his cheeks.
Kon himself with water, then looks up as well, only to see that the faint red and black lines remain. His skin is stained and there's probably some metaphor in there about the evil in him he'll never wash away, but he doesn't have the mind for that right now.
"Shit, do they not make washable face paint?!" Bart screeches as if he's the one late for dinner. "We're going to look like this for weeks!"
They better not be! He can't fight killer robots like this! He'll look like a clown!
"It's been Eight minutes. They're waiting for us." Despite his calm tone, Kon can hear the panic beginning to edge into Tim's voice. It's starting to waver and the teen still hasn't looked away from his paint-wrinkled face. He's starting to breathe quicker and his hands are getting shaky where they're fisted in his own shirt.
Kon pulls him away from the mirror.
"Hey, hey, it's fine!" He reassures. "It's just a little makeup! Pa and Ma will probably just laugh it off and forget it's even there!"
But Tim's still breathing quickly.
Before Kon knew him as anyone other than Robin, he thought Tim was fearless. Always quick to find solutions, to figure out what exactly they need to do. He could stay calm in any wacky or dangerous situation. He was Robin, a boy trusted by Batman himself. Batman doesn't even trust grown adults the way he does Robin.
Tim has a sleep problem, Kon eventually learned. He gets hyper-focused and even if they drag him away to bed after the second day staring at his computer, Tim still won't sleep a wink until his mind can finally let him rest. He's brilliant, but Tim would never fully know it.
More recently, Kon has learned that Tim hates getting embarrassed. Humiliation strikes him like lightning where anyone else would simply laugh and move on. Things like this, walking downstairs to his friend's parents covered in paint, sets him off.
So, Kon does what he can to fight back the demons in Tim's mind telling him it's embarrassing.
"Tim, my face is way worse than yours! I can barely see your paint at all!" And it's true. Tim's natural skin tone has only been slightly paled and the lines of wrinkles are just faint enough to look like shadows. Kon still looks like he's covered in the stuff.
"But your parents!" Tim argues, his teeth clenching. "I can't look like this-"
"What if I go down first?"
Tim shakes his head quickly. "No, it'll be more obvious when I come in!"
Fair enough. "Okay, then we'll go together, but I can sit closer to them. I'm sure your dad saved a spot closer to him." He's counting on it. No way would Mr. Wayne, knowing Tim's anxiety, have him sit right next to Ma and Pa. "You can hide your face because they'll expect that, and I'll talk them through it until they say grace and we eat like it's normal. I promise, no one's gonna care!"
"Damian might."
Kon huffs a laugh. "Damian's a butt. And you never care about his opinion."
Tim groans, still trying to curl in on himself, but he does breathe deeper again. "We should've just gone with the bath bombs..."
"Yeah, probably, but we were gonna get some sick videos out of this." A shame they had to shut it down early. They were almost ready.
After another minute or so, Tim sucks in until his lungs are full, then nods. "Alright. Let's go." He sounds like he's going to his public execution.
To Tim, this probably isn't too far off.
"Okay." He picks up the phone and waves to Bart, who's still dabbing green under his eyes. "We'll call back after dinner."
"Cool! Tel Ma and Pa I said 'hi'! And Superman! And Jon too!"
Kon rolls his eyes fondly. "I will. Gotta go."
"Okay, bye!"
"Bye." Kon's finger hesitates over the end call button.
"Bye!"
"Bye."
"...Okay, bye!"
The call ends.
Kon takes Tim's hand into his, squeezing just enough to hopefully be comforting, then he guides the two of them down the stairs and into the dining room.
The kitchen table is filled to its max capacity with the six already sitting, but two chairs have been set up just for them. Like Kon thought, they're set between Clark and Mr. Wayne. A safe distance from Ma and Pa, who get to deal with the kids.
When they come into view, Mr. Wayne has that smug look again but he doesn't say anything, thankfully. Clark runs a hand down his tired face while Jon covers his mouth to hold back his laughter. Damian looks no different from his usual moody self.
Ma and Pa openly laugh, but it's more a surprised giggle than anything. Kon braces their reactions with his chest puffed out, Tim still held behind him for cover.
"Hey, Ma! Hi, Pa." He greets them as they round the table, a kiss landing on both of their cheeks. He helps Tim sink beside Mr. Wayne while Kon plops down next to Clark.
"Oh, goodness!" Ma laughs. "What are you supposed to be?"
Tim's hand, which hasn't let go of his, squeezes tighter.
"I'm Darth Maul and he's Sidious," Kon answers naturally. "It's from the Star Wars show, remember? It was playing in the old theater last week."
"I see." Pa looks at them with an increasingly worried expression. "Is that gonna stain?"
Kon sniffs. "It already did." He admits. "But, Bart's way worse! He's completely green, down to his shoulders!" Hopefully taking the pressure off of them will help.
After a sigh, Clark looks down at him with a passive yet fond smile. "At least you had fun. Now, let's get dinner started. I'm starving."
"Yes, right." Pa nods and takes his wife's hand into his. Clark does the same, but the line ends with them.
Religion has always been a funny thing for Kon. Kryptonians worshiped someone named Rao, apparently. Clark doesn't really worship him, since the planets gone and all. He asked Tim about religion once and Tim had just shrugged, saying each of them had different beliefs but most fell into a massive grey area of "magic sure exists and they know literal gods, so what does that mean for worship practices?"
And according to Jon, Damian was raised to worship his own grandfather, so...
Personally, Kon's spent months agonizing over it. It stemmed less from a deity ruling over mankind and more his own place in existence. If he's a clone, born of two genetic strands in a lab, then how can he be sure he's even a real person? How can he know he isn't some sick fusion of Clark and Luthor's personality? Is his every thought the same Clark has? Are his choices his, or are they dictated by what Luthor engineered for him?
Is there really a him at all?
He's not quite sure he really has an answer. The topic gets shoved away more often than not.
Once the prayer is gone, Ma and Pa go about dishing everyone else up. Ma gives Kon his plate with a sparkle in her eyes and whispers, "Here you go, Space Ranger." He takes it with a grin.
The dinner's good. Mac and cheese with a side of green beans, honeydew, and strawberry lemonade. It's a perfect blend of savory and sweet. Kon always loves Ma's mac and cheese.
"How do you like it?" Ma asks, all too eager to get their feedback.
"It's lovely. Thank you, Martha." Mr. Wayne says. Tim nods along quietly.
"Alfred's is better." Damian frowns.
Kon stares at him. This is really the kid Jon chose as his best friend...
"Damian," Mr. Wayne's voice holds a warning, but Ma waves her hands to dismiss it.
"No, no, I like honesty." True to her word, she looks completely unbothered by Damian's comment. In fact, she leans closer. "How does Alfred make it?"
The boy picks up a spoonful of mac and cheese and eyes it the way Tim studies a crime scene. "He makes the sauce separately, and with more of a cheese blend. This is just Cheddar and Colby Jack. He also torches the top layer." Damian takes a bite, considering. "I like the spice of this, however."
Ma settles back. "I'll have to ask your butler for his recipe, then. Maybe you can help me fix up my cinnamon rolls too."
"Possibly."
The kid kind of a brat, but Kon can't quite dislike him. Even if he tried to kill Tim -something they had a very long and hard conversation about. He kind of reminds Kon of...of Bizarro. They're not very good at communicating and sometimes, Bizarro gets mad and he acts out, but he's still kind on the inside.
He also was born to the same expectations as Kon and failed just as miserably.
Dinner wraps up smoothly. Jon talks all about the weird kid stuff he and Damian were doing all day and Clark laughs about the cute baby pictures they looked at.
Kon helps clear the table as Mr. Wayne and Tim talk about something with Clark. If he had Kryptonian ears, he would listen in, but that's not the case. He'll need to pester the answers out of Tim later.
Ma pulls Damian and Jon back to help her roll cinnamon rolls. Jon leans over the kitchen island to reach for Kon with slimy hands. "Kon, shake my hand!"
"Really?" Does Jon think he'll fall for that?
Jon waves his hand insistently. "Come on, just shake it!"
"I can see the butter, Jonner." Kon rolls his eyes.
"Ugh, fine. Hey, Dad! Shake my hand!"
Clark answers without looking up. "Not now, Jon."
Jon deflates with a sigh, then lets Ma direct him to wash his hands off.
Rascle. Kon can't imagine having more than one sibling. Jon's enough excitement on his own.
Once the table is cleaned up and dinner has been packed away into take-home containers for the Waynes, Kon leans impatiently against the staircase for Tim to finish.
It takes a few more agonizingly long and boring minutes until Tim's let free. He turns to Kon and marches up the stairs with him.
"What was that?" Kon asks immediately.
Tim holds up a solution of powder and oil. "This will take the paint stains off." He says. "Clark also said he had actual face paint and suggested we ask next time we attempt to paint our faces."
Oh. Kon wishes he knew that earlier.
"Ha! Then we can still make the videos with Bart?" He was actually pretty excited to do it. He memorized his lines and everything.
Tim levels him with a smirk. "Back to business."
"Sick!"
Sorry this isn't in Tim's POV. I'm not confident enough with his characterization to do that just yet. I also may post a final chapter to this whenever I find the will and time, so look out for that.