Chapter Text
Damian's mind was numb. He was seated on a bench in a room off of the main office. He knew he had run out of the Gymnasium. He knew he had gotten caught, brought back here, and lectured. He had seen one of the secretaries dial the number of the manor, he knew that Alfred or perhaps even Father himself was on their way to collect him for his childish behavior, but his brain refused to register. All the details his brain usually latched on to were gone, leaving only a vague memory in its place. It was like he had read an incident report written by someone incompetent instead of experienced it himself. He was disconnected from it in the same way he was when he read the patrol summaries his father's adopted children had wrote. The final outcome mattered to him, he would memorize the injuries that were sustained and the rouges that were sent away, but he himself had no ties to the events.
Where he had been running to, what he had planned on happening was nothing more than a vague memory. When he asked his brain how unfit teachers and a security guard he could have knocked out in his sleep had detired him he was met with no response. He couldn't remember anything specific that had been said in the lecture either, only that he had done something wrong again and that her perspective hadn't matched his, it hadn't made sense.
He was currently alone but he knew there were multiple walking and talking bodies in the next room over. He could hear them. In the past minute he had heard a new voice join them as well as footsteps that were sure and light in their movement. The voice was light too but sounded concerned. Both sounds sounded familiar but Damian couldn't place them to any one individual. Well, until the door opened that is
It was Todd
The white of his hair now matched the rest and was pushed back wind struck
He was in a cleanly pressed suit that hid the bulk of his muscle
His movement and facial expression was lighter, kinder than his daily charade
But there was no doubt that that was Jason Peter Todd standing behind the principal, talking to the secretary in an impression of Dick Grayson… at least to Damian-who was trained to spot details and targets and, unlike most of the world, had seen the supposedly dead son of Bruce Wayne in the past half-decade
“Mr. Wayne, your brother is here to get you. I expect you to be back behaving yourself tomorrow and for you to stop in and give me these before class. Your father will need to sign them of course. I hope you've had time to think about your actions”
She was holding out what, if her ink stained fingertips were anything to go by, were freshly printed forms expectantly. She dropped them into his hands and retreated to her office, eyes never quite leaving him, as he stood and walked till he was inches outside of what he knew to be Todd's reach. If Todd was here for malicious reasons then it would take a couple of seconds for him to close the gap or pull out a weapon and as Father always said “it's better to be prepared and not need to be than to have never been prepared at all”
“Ready to go Dami?” The voice and tone was unsettling coming from Todd. It wasn't quite Grayson's, but it was close enough to fool someone who only heard his voice once or twice on the news. Damian just walked towards the exit and adjusted the backpack over his shoulders. One of the office staff had gone to his locker and homeroom and grabbed all his stuff. He could tell just from the weight distribution that the school supplies inside was out of their correct places
Todd, a full foot taller than Damian*, had no problem catching up with what he was sure was supposed to look like the graceful movements one might expect from the gymnast that Grayson was. Todd lessened his pace once he reached his side and Damian increased the speed of his typical speed walk to meet the difference, the only grace Todd would be getting.
Todd smiled down at him with a smile so Grayson it had to have been practiced as they left the building. He tried to make horrendous small talk in the same Grayson impression he had used inside as they crossed the parking lot. As they rounded the corner and left the view of Gotham's Prep Academy’s cameras and windows behind the voice instantly dropped with Todd's posture and his hands rose to wipe the color from his hair and undo the top few buttons of his shirt. It seemed Todd followed Father's message as well
“Demon spawn”
“Todd”
They continued walking in silence in what Damian recognized to be the direction of Todd's apartment. He had been there for the first time only a week ago as Robin when he had been searching for blackmail on the man beside him. Unfortunately Todd seemed to have no shame, well perhaps for the results of a lost bet like having to wear Grayson's old costume but even that was iffy and everyone he could reasonably reveal it to already knew about it.
He could feel Todd's eyes bearing into the back of his skull. Damian refused to give in though. He was stronger than Todd, if not physically(which he would never formally say out loud) then in will. If he wanted information he would have to ask for it. Demand for it. Fight for it. He would not get Damian Wayne of all people confessing out his secrets with nothing more than a stare. If Damian ignored it instead of leveling it back with a glare as intense as he usually would however then it was nobody's business. Their side of the street was empty after all, and Todd never told anyone anything until it was needed. It was one of the many ways Todd was like Father, something that would get your bones broken if you mentioned in front of the Hood. But then again Todd seems to have a decimal worthy soft spot for his siblings- really just traumatized children in general- since their reunification and the only ones who knew him well enough to make such comments would be them.
Perhaps his bones would be safe, but that still wouldn’t push him to make the comment. He didn’t need Todd to be added to the list of people that surly currently spoke bad words of him. The principal hated him for reasons just out of his reach. He had had to be chased and restrained by teachers in a place where sound would surely have traveled within minutes. He had run out of the assembly crying like some toddler for everyone to see. He had bolted right next to the biggest bully in the school, who no doubt would make it his personal job to make sure everyone knew the worst version of events. He was going to have to tell Father everything that had happened. He was going to have to get his signature and every piece of writing the public got of Bruce Wayne's was a security risk. Damian’s existence in Gotham was a risk to Father’s identity and business, a risk to everyth- a hand was above his shoulder
A hand was coming down on his skin like a bullet, a hot skillet, and his body was no longer his own. His legs had stopped moving. His fist collided with something hard. Wind billowed against his face as all feeling of the body beneath him was lost, all feeling except for where the hand had touched. Someone was behind him, their run heavy and full of haste and- his name had been called out, in the exact same way his mother had intended
Damian turned around to see the unmistakable green of Jason Todd’s eyes darting towards him. Fuck. He had run again, needed to be chased down again, overreacted like an imbecile ag-
“Hey! Get out of your fuckin head, kid, and tell me what’s going on!”
Damian tried to reply, he really did, but the words got lodged in the back of his throat. His larynx simply wasn’t functioning. Even if he could make words form he wasn’t sure what he would say anyway. How could he possibly explain his actions? For once in his life Damian Wayne was at a lack of words
“You choking on spit or some shit?”
…
“Seriously kid, you good?”
Damian nodded and Todd scoffed in exasperation
“Yeah, like I'd believe that. Look, I'll admit, I have no fucking clue what's going on. But I do know that you would probably prefer B never finds out about this. I also know that you had to leave before you could finish Pride and Prejudice last time. So you can come with me and read while I forge Bruce's signature, or you can do literally anything else and have the big old bat all up in your business. Up to you shorty”
And with that Todd turned the corner with a quick snap of his heels, blazer thrown over his shoulder
Damian knew he was right. His father wouldn't rest until he found out what happened, that is if he knew anything was out of the mix at all of course. If he didn’t know that anything had been wrong in the first place then he couldn't question what it had been. He may be known as the world's greatest detective, but Damian was his blood son, he could hide it. And his chances of hiding it successfully went up greatly if he went with the man who managed to hide the fact he was even alive from their father for years so, Damian followed
“Alright so let's just skip the chit chat, demon spawn,” Damian took a sharp inhale as the sound of the door slamming, locks clicking into place, echoed across the lethal apartment. It looked the same as it had only a week ago, minus various bits of neatly placed clutter. Things such as dishes left to be washed later or socks that had been discarded. The things that transformed it from an old apartment to a home. The fact that it was Todd's home was made clear by the multiple cases of perfectly polished firearms and blades on the wall
“You, and I quote, ‘disrupted an important assembly and, when staff tried to get you back in your seat, sent a teacher to the hospital. As well as gave multiple other staff members less severe injuries with an animalistic aggression**’. Now I have no doubt that you could and would do that, however why the fuck did you do that?”
And how could Damian possibly explain it? He-
“I swear to fucking God if you start hyperventilating again I will punch you in the face… or call Bruce, equally effective”
Damian braced himself into a fighting stance at that, eyeing the familiar Al Ghul swords locked up just feet away. He wouldn't have time to pick it but he could perhaps bre-
“Woah, kid, calm down, I was just jokin. What the fuck has got you so tense today?”
…
“K, have you actually been choking on spit this whole time and just got insane lungs or somethin?”
No, it just felt like trying to pick the toughest lock in the world with a fork whenever he went to let coherent words out of his mouth. He wanted to, but for some reason or another he lacked the ability right now…but he could still move
Todd’s face barely let slip a flicker of confusion and surprise when Damian’s hands danced to form American Sign Language, a language in which all of the bats were fluent. The bats were also fluent in adapting, so if Damian could only communicate visually right now, then Todd could work with him
(Author’s Note: From now on italics=translated American Sign Languages)
I’m not choking
Uh huh. Then why we signing instead of speakin
…
Do you want my help or not shortcake
I just… verbalizing is too much right now
Okay…why…?
…
I’m calling Alfred
NO!
Then start talkin
It's jus- in the assembly it felt like a volcano was preparing to erupt. Then it did and now the magma is still hardening
Yeah I'm not even going to pretend that made sense
Damian deflated. If he couldn't explain it to Todd, one of the most symbolic and by far the most well read out of any of the bats, then he probably wouldn't be able to explain it to anyone. Perhaps going with Todd was a mistake. As he turned to hightail it out the window however, his attention was captured by a heavy stomp behind his figure. A vibrational way of making your presence known
Hey! It not makin much sense to me dosen't mean nothin! You're not one for attention grabs Damian, and you wouldn't be all that dramatic in this context. So when you say that an assembly felt like a volcano, I believe you, whether it makes sense or not. Things don't gotta make sense to be real
And maybe it didn't matter. Maybe it didn't have to make sense to Todd, to anyone, even to Damian himself. Maybe he could just…be? Maybe, just maybe, Jason wouldn't mind if he left his mask at the door