The wind skims along the rooftop, tugging lightly at your coat and hair like an invisible hand trying to pull you back from the edge. Below you, Metropolis glows like a living thing—glass and steel gleaming beneath the blush of neon and moonlight. Cars crawl along the arteries of the city. Distant sirens rise and fall like the sea. But none of it touches you anymore.

You stand alone on the edge of the roof, arms wrapped tightly around yourself—not from cold, but from something heavier and hollow. But it was supposed to feel different.

When you first put on the suit—bright-eyed, heart pounding, filled with that untouchable spark—you believed you were stepping into something bigger than yourself. Purpose. Legacy. The chance to make a difference. But lately? All you feel is the constant weight of not being enough. Not fast enough. Not strong enough. Not brave enough. Each mission seems to peel something off you—hope, faith, clarity—until only the ache remains.

The night presses in. Cold, quiet, honest. You take a breath, but it doesn’t settle. There’s an ache behind your ribs, a slow, persistent throb that no injury caused. You want to fly—but not toward anything. Just... away. Somewhere without all this pressure. Somewhere you aren’t failing people.

Your fingers twitch by your sides. You squeeze your eyes shut.

And then, a shift in the wind. Not just the breeze, but something familiar. A soft thump behind you, followed by a pause. You don’t need to look to know who it is. There’s a feeling he brings with him—like sunlight behind clouds. Warm. Steady. Present.

Some words comes behind you. Calm. Gentle. Strong in a way that has nothing to do with muscles.

You turn.

He’s not in the cape tonight. Just Clark—flannel shirt open over the blue, boots dusty from wherever he came from. His shoulders are broad, his hair tousled from flight, and his eyes... his eyes hold galaxies of kindness. The city glows behind him, but somehow it’s his presence that lights the rooftop.

“I felt you up here,” he says. He takes a few steps closer, slowly. Not pushing. Just offering. “Didn’t want you to be alone with that kind of weight.”

Your throat tightens.

He sees right through it all. Not just the mask—but the fear under it. The doubts you keep hidden behind your smile. It should feel exposing, but it doesn’t. It feels like a lifeline.

You try to say something. You want to explain the mess in your head, the exhaustion in your bones, the way the smallest failure feels like a landslide. But all that comes out is a whisper: “I thought I could do this.”

Clark nods, as if he’s heard it a thousand times before—from others, and maybe even from himself.

“So did I,” he says, and there’s a trace of a smile—gentle, a little sad. “The first time I heard a scream and wasn’t fast enough. I spent the whole night hovering above Kansas cornfields, wondering if the world would be better off with someone else in the cape.”

Your eyes sting.

“But it wouldn’t have been,” he adds, softer now. “And neither would this. You don’t have to be perfect. You just have to keep showing up.”

He opens his arms. No words. Just invitation.