Bruce had been out of it for days now, groaning and mumbling incoherently in his fitful sleep, sweat practically pouring off his skin. He remembered bringing the strange green shard, presumably from Krypton, to his prince, Kal-El. The two of them soaring into the sky, an excruciating pain in his chest, freefall, and then...nothing.

His mind played his traumas over and over. His parents, dead in an ambush when he was only a boy. Finding out King Jor-El was his father, only for an arrow to claim the man's life moments later. Confessing to Kal that they were brothers, only to be stabbed. Nightmare upon nightmare of the Els turning on him as he pleaded weakly for help plagued his ailing brain.

"Why," he mumbled in his sleep, his lips pale and his damp hair clinging to his burning cheeks. He thrashed feebly, his arms grabbing at the empty air around him. "Why is everyone I love taken from me?"

A cool cloth was pressed to his forehead, and a soft hand took his. Something strange overtook him, a sensation he couldn't describe. The searing pain that had been coursing through him eased, and his body relaxed.

Magic. This was magic. The very thing he'd spent much of his life fighting against.

Bruce woke with a start, practically jumping off the simple bed he'd been asleep in, away from the person standing beside him. "D-Demon," he croaked, his voice weak. "Don't... Do not..."

He collapsed, too weak to stand. Whatever had afflicted him was gone, but every inch of him was still sore, and his head was still a swirling maelstrom of disjointed thoughts and emotions. This demon—this magic user had just saved him, but he was in no condition to trust anyone.

"Brother," he murmured. "Where are you? I am so alone. I am always...I..." His consciousness slipped away once more, his feverish ramblings dying on his lips. Words he would have never said aloud, were he of sound mind.