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[not_the_s]

There was absolutely no reason that he should feel like this. None. Just because everyone else was getting all sorts of people from back home and he had Clark and Luthor. Lois, too, but she didn't remember him. He had Bart and Tim and Cassie and things should have been easy, but he still felt like there were things that he was being left out of. He

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[cantstopmoving]

Carrying up a cup of tea from Alfred, Dick heads into Titans Treehouse to find Kon. Bringing Donna to him was smart for Donna's sake and for Dick's, plus he took orders without question. No matter how raw he is, that needs to be reinforced.

He finds Kon...uncharacteristically quiet and still. Sitting on the couch staring into space. Dick pulls up a patch of couch for himself. Pulls up his knees and wraps an arm around them.

"Hey." His eyes are bruised and shadowed, but his voice sounds steady again.

[cantstopmoving]

"No, Kon." Dick sits up straighter, not angry at all, but leaning in for emphasis. "You've told me about what Tim hasn't done, what's wrong with Bart, what Jill and Nita have told you, what Cassie did with someone who isn't you."

There's sympathy in his eyes when he stretches out his hand to rest on Kon's leg. "You define yourself in terms of your relationships because you've never had a life that wasn't what we do. Because you don't know where you fit with them, you don't know who you are."

Thank God he has Tim, Babs, Alfred, and Donna. Without them... without them he would do what he did years ago. Build a family again and ache for the one he lost. He used the model Bruce and Clark gave him and built the Titans. Kon needs a role model, and he and Donna are the obvious choices. But what does he have to offer?

"You feel like, if you can learn who they are again, you'll feel like you again." He tips his head to look at Kon. "Am I close?"

[not_the_s]

Kon flinched and his fingers dug painfully into the material of the couch. "Sure, Dick. I've had a life outside of what we do. I'm Conner Kent, remember? Nephew of Uncle John and Aunt Martha. Cousin to the famous reporter Clark Kent. Clark's wife is even here." Or what would be his wife sometime down the line.

Like you. That wasn't the question. The question was: who was he? He wasn't sure anymore. Not after finding out about Luthor all those months back.

"Did anyone ever tell you that you should be a shrink? You've got all the mumbo jumbo down pat."

[cantstopmoving]

Satisfied he's made the point he does understand, Dick squeezes his knee and sits back again. "I'd make a terrible shrink. Shrinks listen without advising or trying to fix it. Being a hero's kind of the opposite of that."

He picks up his tea, looks into it, then gets up to get himself another cup from the kitchen while he talks. Helping Kon, or at least trying to, makes it safe to move. His own emotions don't need the leash of stillness they did before. When he opens his mouth to ask Kon how he is again, to force the issue, Dick closes it again and keeps walking into the kitchen. Let Kon sit with the idea. It's harder to deflect if he doesn't have a question to answer.

[not_the_s]

"Yeah, well, I don't have to be fixed," Kon muttered under his breath. "Or advised." He tucked his knees to his chest and rested his chin on top of them. Why he wasn't walking out the door, he wasn't sure. Maybe it was that little bit of truth that he hated to hear but which was the truth. Or maybe he just that masochistic enough.

"Not like I can even do anything about it," he said even softer, cursing himself for saying anything. He glanced up to see whether Dick had noticed. The kitchen was far enough away, right?

Sure. It had to be.

[cantstopmoving]

The kitchen's about six steps from where Kon's sitting. Far enough for privacy if the other person's complicit in giving it. In this case, Dick's not. Sue him, he has Bat ears and a good team leader always listens.

He pours hot water for his tea and adds one of the bags Roy fashioned from dress muslin. Roy did a lot of small things that made his life better; he always has. With Donna getting doctored across the way, that doesn't sting as much as it did a few hours ago, but it still keeps his eyes on his tea while it brews and he stirs.

It also gives Kon a few minutes to chase his thoughts around before Dick asks, "Do you know that Barbara and I were engaged, at home?" It seems like a non sequitur, but it isn't. He has a point.

[not_the_s]

"Barbara?" It almost felt like Kon was waking up when Dick started talking to him and he blinked for a minute before answering. "Barbara in a wheelchair Barbara? No. I didn't. I know that she said something about Bart and Cassandra, but that's about it."

He wasn't sure what that had to do with anything and he glanced at the door briefly. Should he or shouldn't he?

He hated making those kinds of decisions.

[cantstopmoving]

He fishes out the teabag and sets it on a small plate before coming back to the sitting room. Deliberately, he trails his hand across Kon's shoulders, going around the couch to sit at his end again

[not_the_s]

He made it a point not to flinch when he felt Dick’s hand. He knew that Dick was trying to help, but it also wasn’t doing any good.

Oh, he got the point. He couldn't help but get the point. Be yourself, Kon. Find yourself. You don't have to be a hero, you can just be a normal kid. Stay with my parents and you’ll soon settle down. But he was good at playing dumb.

“Okay…?”

He shrugged a little and chuckled. “So you almost got married and ended up changing your mind. I’m pretty sure that I’m not going to be next. I mean, c’mon, Dick. Cassie and I just started dating. I’m not planning on going down on one knee any time in the near future.” There. Let Dick thing that he’d confused the point he was trying to make. Let Dick think that Kon thought that this was some kind of ‘big brother’ talk about him dating Cassie.

[cantstopmoving]

For twenty seconds, thirty, Dick almost believes him. But you can't con a con, and Dick's been a Bat longer than Kon's been alive. He smiles, because Kon wouldn't try to fake him out if he didn't get at least part of the message.

"You have choices here you didn't have at home. And chances, too." God, he hopes Donna forgives him for this one. "Maybe Cassie's one of those chances. If you love her, don't wait too long."

He stands and sets his tea on the table, directs a significant look at it, that means pick it up. "Now I need to go check on some other people I love." Yes, Kon, that's right, you're one of them. "I've left them for too long."

[not_the_s]

Kon stared at Dick, wondering if he actually meant that the way it sounded. Wait too long?! He didn't mean that the way it sounded, did he? Marry her...or maybe even more bizarre, sleep with her? No, he had to be mistaking what Dick meant. Had to. Even if he couldn't stop thinking about it, now. And then Dick caught him off guard.

"You..." Love? It baffled him. Why would Dick love him? It almost seemed like they barely knew each other. "...have fun. Don't do anything I wouldn't do. Especially with my best friend." There. That he could grin over. Even if it was weird. "And by that, I mean Bart of course."

[cantstopmoving]

Smirking, Dick glances back over his shoulder when he reaches the mudroom door. "I don't think you have to worry about that," he says, and then he's gone, down the stairs to get to the first level rope bridge between the Treehouses. Back Tim and Donna, in case they need him.