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Clark's flying over the city.
One could call it patrolling. He overlooks the alleyways and the main streets. He listens for raised voices, lingering when the fights escalate, sighing with relief when they don't. Every interaction with a cop catches his attention until it ends. Each person on the ground who meets his eye all the way up in the sky is met with a wave and a smile. He watches kids fall off their bikes and jump back on, persevering and Superman beams with pride even though he doesn't know them.
That's a new feeling. The pride. Ever since Jonathan and Jordan were born, it's been amazing. When they first learned to walked, it was like they had set the sun in the sky. When they first spoke, it was poetry. They tell Clark about their days and it could be as simple as a sunflower drawing with a crayon but it's going to be framed and placed onto Clark's desk.
They're six years old now. They're running, playing. Jonathan's into soccer and football and every sport he can join. He's an active boy, and each day he has seven new friends. His favorite thing to do is to try and climb Clark's back while he's doing practically anything. Lois finds it adorable, especially when Clark turns it into a piggyback ride around the entire house and back. Jordan is less extroverted, and he has his tantrums, but he's always reading a new book and his small smiles brighten up the entire city, or at least they brighten up Clark's life.
He loves his sons. He loves them more than life itself. He cherishes life. He saves it in a way that other people can't. Other people haven't seen what Clark has seen. He busted a trafficking ring that had branched out into Gotham. And he remembers going into that bleak warehouse, eyes glowing, and rounding up the traffickers. He remembers that in a blind rage, he hardly heard the whimpers. The whimpers of small children.
One was Clark's kids' age. So small, so scared, and the eyes ranged from terrified to helpless to pleading and to a sickening lifeless. Clark snapped the bars off of the damn cage, gathered the child into his arms, and didn't let go until the police and the ambulance arrived. Since then, Clark has been listening to the heartbeats of his family.
Right now, it's a steady thump, thump, thump for Lois. She must be working at home. The familiar brush of her nails over the keyboards fills his ear like the breeze of the wind. Jordan's heartbeat has been faster lately, although right now it's a little faster. Clark's nose scrunches, but nothing's quite wrong. Jon's heartbeat is a little quicker, and they're whispering in hushed tones. Clark breaks out into a smile and he shakes his head.
Jordan's heartbeat is the fastest. It's disconcerting. He's always on edge and his frowns are becoming too usual. He doesn't have to be like his brother, but Clark wants him to at least be happy. Every time he cries it shatters Clark's. Lois tries to be strong, but it seems that Clark's strength fails him sometimes. But still, after everything, Clark's strong son's heart beats steadily with the rest of his family.
Their heartbeats are his lullabies. He listens to them now, a smile gracing his face, his arms outstretched as he flies above the city while the wind gently beats at his face, the lights and the sounds and the life of the city below, and it's so peaceful, too peaceful, and he could fall asleep right here . . . right now . . . just a moment more and—
"Superman!" Lois's indescribably horrified shriek fills Clark's ears. His eyes snap open and he snaps across the city, faster than lightning and light and speed and sound, shattering windows and breaking the sound barrier in one fell swoop of desperation.
In a flash he's at his apartment, smashing through the window and landing at the base of the kitchen. The couches are familiar to Clark, so is the tiled kitchen floor, the paint on the walls and each chip tells a story of it's own. But to Superman, they're the new battlefield and he hates that he's scanning the windows with his x-ray vision in a search of a perpetrator. This was supposed to be a safe place.
"Superman!" Clar — Superman whips around and zooms to the kitchen. Jordan is screaming and sobbing into his knees under the table, rocking back and forth as he's curled up with his hands clenched tightly over his ears. Glass has flown across the kitchen, landing on the rug of the connecting dining room. An entire wooden cabinet is splintered, the wooden planks and splinters scattered across the floor. And there, laying in Lois's lap, is Jonathan, unconscious, limp, and bleeding profusely.
Clark wants to throw up.
Clark collapses to his knees beside his son. He scans him from head to toe, able to see the skeleton and the places where it's been damaged. Specifically his head. The blood's coming from a place below Jonathan's hair that Clark runs his hand through when he tucks him into bed and night and —
"What happened?" Superman asks his wi — Lois. He asks Lois, and her bottom lip is trembling. She's curling around him, tears boiling in her eyes. If his heart was still in his chest, it would've shattered. "Lo — ma'am, what happened?" Please, tell me.
She doesn't take her eyes off their son. "He — he fell from the cabinet and — and Jordan just screamed and I ran and Jon was on the floor and — and he's not waking up . . ." She trails off. She looks up to Clark, pleading with her eyes, screaming out the agony and the terror rushing through her veins. He stares into those eyes every morning and every morning he has something to say but he's speechless.
He grabs his son, the squelch of blood when he's transferred making the hero cringe. He stands up, holding his son from the world he couldn't protect him from. He nods to his wife, turning to the window. He buries his nose into Jonathan's hair, listening to a crying heartbeat for a moment. He apologizes but he'll be doing that for years. And then he takes off, speeding towards the hospital, all the while curling his arms around the son he'd failed.
It was a simple head injury. Head injuries always look worse than they are, said the doctor. There wasn't any bleeding in the brain and it's a concussion that is most easily treatable. Superman brought Jon to the hospital and in a second of bringing him there, he flew out and spun into his Clark-clothes. He stumbled in as a worried father, begging for his son, waiting in the hospital lobby for Lois and Jordan to arrive.
When they arrived, Clark was holding his head in his hands. His shoulders were hunched and he looked shameful because he was. Here he is, Superman, the most powerful man on the Earth. He can hold up entire buildings with a hand, freeze tidal waves in a few good breaths, for goodness sake he could walk into gunfire and the bullets would affect him as much as snowflakes would.
And yet somehow, because of Clark's own arrogance, his son fell and Clark wasn't there to catch him. His son is now in a head CT because he could've died and this could've been so, so much worse. The universe was grateful and it forgave Clark and Jon will be okay. But he still got hurt in the first place. And the kitchen is still a mess, Lois was still on the verge of tears, Jordan had a meltdown and rightfully so, and Clark still had to wash off his own son's blood off of his hands.
"Clark?" Clark looks up, seeing Lois standing just a few feet away. She hasn't changed, and even though she's wearing black, the blood is visible enough. Some of it splattered onto her purple blouse. She hasn't cried yet, her voice is strained.
Jordan is by her side, holding her hand like it's his only lifeline. He's squished up against her leg, head down. He sniffs, hand wiping at blotchy eyes and a stuffy nose. He looks defeated, tiny body still shaking with sobs.
Clark blinks slowly, sitting up straighter. He opens his arms. His jaw rolls with a hitched sob. "Oh, buddy," he says and faster than the man ever could move, Jordan springs and throws himself at his dad. He clings to his dad's neck, burying his face into a broad shoulder and curling his small body into someone who will protect him. Jordan begins to sob, the tears and snot soaking the shirt but Clark couldn't care less about that.
He throws his arms around his son, clutching him as tightly as he can without using his strength because God forbid he hurts his other kid. He holds his son. His knees jump to press against Jordan, to fully envelop him because nothing will ever be safe enough.
"It's okay," he hears himself whispering. One of his hands pets over Jordan's curls. "It's okay, buddy. It's okay. You're going to be okay."
"He — he fell and — and I'm sorry I — he's going to die and — and—"
Clark pulls away, cupping Jordan's face, wiping away the tears as they fall with the tender touch of the pad of his thumb. He smiles through his own tears, shaking his head. "Jon's going to be just fine. You have nothing to apologize for, okay?"
Jordan shakes his head. "But we — we were trying to get the stuff on the top of the — the kitchen and — and he fell and — and I'm sorry, dad! I'm sorry!" He bursts into violent sobs, burrowing his head into his dad's chest. He hugs Clark again, somehow even tighter.
Clark looks at Lois, who looks back. She crosses her arms, closing her eyes for a moment and looking to the sky. She looks back down, opens her eyes. She walks over, kneeling down in front of Clark. She rubs Jordan's back up and down, pressing a kiss to the back of his head and holding two of her boys tightly. She rests her head against Jordan's back, her eyes meeting Clark's as she sends of reassurances of her own.
He peels a hand off of Jordan. Slowly, he outcurls it to Lois. And for a moment, he wonders if she'll take it. He was listening in and yet it still happened. He was listening for their heartbeats. He's the world's protector. He's this family's protector. He's supposed to be able to save them, dad or not. He should've been able to save them. He could've been there and he should've been there. He couldn't save their son. Their son was bleeding and unconscious and it's all Clark's fault and—
Lois takes his hand.
And Clark holds it tightly.