Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

“Jaaaaayyyyyy!”

He’s half asleep, but even from the borderlands of his dreamscape, he recognizes that tone, and without thinking, he nearly snaps, “Shut the fuck up, dickhead! I’m reading.”

Until his brain catches up and he realizes that, no, he’s certainly not reading. There isn’t even a book in his vicinity, and he’s not sitting in his favorite comfy armchair in the Manor’s library. He’s actually lying on his back on the plush carpet of Mount Justice’s common room, eyes closed, every inch of him itchy with dried sweat and aching from the punishment Black Canary dealt him during their special training session, courtesy of the Big Bad Bat, whose great parenting strategy has everything to do with more intense training and nothing to do with what real parents call ‘grounding.’

He actually is grounded from the field, too, for the mistakes he made during the last mission, but that’s beside the point.

The point is, he’s so out of it he nearly responds to that tone and that voice with a conditioned retort that never does anything to prevent his brother from bugging him but is always worth saying anyway, just to see if it’ll work this time.

In the end, Jason’s so disoriented it takes him a minute to solidify his presence in the here-and-now, to shake off that out-of-body sensation and reassess that not-quite-sure-what’s-real disconnection.

He’s already decided he’s not reading, and he’s not at the Manor. The biggest realization comes last: he’s not Jason Todd. Not right now, anyway. He’s still in uniform, and that means no one has any business calling him Jay. He’s Red here.

A quick blink of his eyes reveals that, yeah, he’s also still surrounded by the Team, who watched him get his ass handed to him not even three minutes ago. Every single one of his teammates has their eyes trained on the Zeta-Tube entrance, heads cocked. Wally, in particular, worries his lip and exchanges a speedy (ha ha) look with Jason, confirming that he hasn’t dreamt up that much.

But it doesn’t make any sense. Dickiebird’s on babysitting duty tonight. He knows he’s not allowed to leave the Manor when it’s his turn to babysit. And no way in hell did he break Bat Rule #2, which fell right between “We Do Not Kill” and “No Supers in Gotham."

No Names in the Field.

“What the fuck?” he mutters, slowly rolling up into a sitting position.

“Language, Redbird,” Kaldur chides.

Jason ignores him. “Was that Robin?”

Artemis’ feet dangle from over the armrest of the couch, and she jabs at his shoulder with her toes. Jason swats at her, striking a solid blow. “At least your reflexes haven’t taken a leave of absence. Unlike your brain,” she says. “The Zeta just announced him.”

“And guest,” M’gann supplements, a curious lilt in her voice.

“Guest,” Jason repeats in a deadpan.

“I’ve never heard of the Zeta system doing that before,” Kaldur says with a frown. “Maybe we should…”

“Guest,” Jason says again, as though savoring the word. A slow grin begins to spread across Jason’s face as he realizes what this means. Golden Boy’s done fucked up, and he gets to see it happen. In real time.

What a glorious day.

Jason rolls to his feet, ignoring every sore muscle’s protest. “Wait here,” he says absently, and without waiting for a response, he sets off down the hallway. Wally zips ahead, as expected, and Jason doesn’t stop when the others call his hero name.

When he reaches the entrance hall, he’s greeted by the sight of Dick stumbling around, the demon baby clinging to his leg like a tree frog, refusing to let go, and babbling a repetitive string of forceful “no!”s.

“Oh, shit,” Wally says as Jason slides into the room. “Hey, um…Rob…”

“Not now, Wally. I need to—Damian, shush! It’s alright! If you don’t let go, we’re both going to fall over, and neither one of us will be happy about it.”

The sight’s so beautiful, Jason takes a second to absorb the moment, to truly appreciate it, and then starts to laugh.

“Jay!” Dick exclaims once he sees him, turning away from Damian, which, honestly, doesn’t do anyone any good because the attention-seeking brat’s demands only increase in volume.  “Thank God.”

“Thank God? God can’t save you now. You’re screwed,” Jason says between gasps, and Wally nods sympathetically. “You’re so, so screwed.”

“I realize that,” Dick says. “Can you just—?” The toddler attached to Dick’s leg tightens his grip, pressing his face into his sweatpants, and Dick cards his hand through Damian’s thick hair. “Dami, c’mon, I’m not going anywhere without you, okay?”

Damian says one more ‘no’ before falling silent, clutching even tighter.

“And this right here is exactly why I never want to be the favorite,” Jason mentions. Damian takes offense to that, somehow, and he unlatches himself from Dick to scowl at Jason, turning on an angry mini-Bruce glare that is more hilarious than it is intimidating, especially considering the pout that follows when Damian sees Jason is unmoved. “The fuck were you thinking?”

Dick frowns at the language but doesn’t comment on it. Instead, he whines, “I was thinking that you weren’t answering your texts and I needed a textbook I left here!”

“So, what?” Jason demands. “You decided to come here yourself?”

“And you realize you could have tried me, too, right?” Wally says. “C’mon, man!”

“You don’t think I exhausted every option I had before I had to come here?”

Jason and Wally give each other long-suffering looks. The two of them have little in common outside of the Team and Dick, but this time, it’s clear they both don’t appreciate the hint of accusation there. They just got out of training. Dick can’t blame them for not checking their texts.

 “Bats is going to skin you alive for trying to leave him alone,” Jason says, crossing his arms.

Once he realizes what he’s doing he immediately drops them, feeling slightly appalled at himself. He’s not meant to be the responsible one. He never was. Never will be. Nope. That’s not what he’s doing here.

“He wasn’t going to be alone!” Dick retorts, regaining Jason’s attention. “Timmy promised me he’d watch over him for just a minute!”

Jason blinks incredulously. For as smart as Dick is, his lack of common sense amazes him at the best of times, and he isn’t afraid to point it out. “You handed the toddler off to an eight-year-old,” he deadpans. “An eight-year-old who was probably so absorbed by Minecraft he had no idea what he was agreeing to?”

Damian starts fussing again. He tugs at Dick’s clothes, attempting to lead him further into the Mountain and demanding, “I wanna go, Grays. Go.”

“No, we can’t go exploring, Dami. We need to go home,” Dick says patiently. “Or Baba will feed me to Titus.”

And Damian, bless his spiteful little soul, rolls his eyes. “No. Titus don’ eat you.”

“‘Doesn’t eat people,’” Dick corrects gently. “Baba will think of something equally creative, then.”

Damian blinks up at his brother and frowns. “No.”

 Sighing, Dick gives Jason a pleading look and says, “I realize now asking Tim was a bad call on my part.”

“No shit, moron.”

“I didn’t think Dami would follow me into the Cave!” Dick exclaims desperately. “Or that he’d take a flying leap at me right when the Zeta booted up!” Adopting a tone that would frighten literally no one, he puts a finger in Damian’s face and scolds, “Which was very dangerous. You don’t do that.”

Damian takes one unamused look at the waving finger and snaps his little jaw.

They’re trying to break him of his biting habit, and Jason sees why it’s a problem, truly, but he can’t help but find it amusing, especially with Tim getting the brunt of it.

Ironically, outside of Bruce and Alfred, Jason is the most successful at reminding Damian that biting is bad, if only because, when the turd tried to bite him for the first time, Jason bit back.

Alfred hadn’t been too pleased with that—he insisted Jason was a gentleman and much too old to be provoked by a toddler—but Jason remembers where he came from. Sometimes, you need to push back to show someone you won’t take their shit, and it’s a little messed up, but the kid obviously understands language of the streets more than he does actual English.

This’s the first time Damian’s tried to bite Dick since his first week at Wayne Manor, and of course, Dick looks butt-hurt about it. With a sigh, Jason crosses the room and flicks Damian’s ear, giving him a harsh look. The kid scowls at him and rubs his ear, but he doesn’t whimper, instead staring at Jason with self-satisfied, intelligent green eyes.

What a little twerp.

“You do realize,” Jason says slowly, “the kid’s the offspring of an assassin and the fucking Batman, right? He's a born ninja. How could you not see this coming?”

“He’s two! He’s—” Dick’s eyes suddenly widen. Panicked, he adjusts his sunglasses and takes Damian’s pudgy hand, tugging the boy behind him. “Crap.”

Whirling around, Jason sees M’gann peeking her head around the corner. It isn’t too much of a stretch to imagine Kaldur, at the very least, isn’t far behind. “Is everything okay in here?” she asks cautiously.

 “You help get me out of this—cover me with B—and I’ll take over your chores in the Cave for a month,” Dick hisses in Jason’s ear.

Jason considers it. There’s no getting this past Bruce. Not a chance in hell. Not alone anyway. And as much as he really enjoys hearing one of his brothers getting lectured, the temptation is real. Getting off bat guano duty? And having this blackmail to hang over Dick’s head? It’s too good to pass up. “Two months,” he bargains.

Dick’s lips twist, but there’s no time to duke it out. The rest of the Team has rounded the corner, equal parts curious and cautious.

Knowing he’s won, Jason smirks and takes a step forward to intercept their team-members, Wally a half-step behind him. “We’re fine,” Jason says smoothly, a plan already forming in his mind’s eye. “Robin’s just—”

But he knows the moment M’gann’s eyes slide behind him that he’s too late.

Whoops.

“Is that a baby?” she squeals, feet lifting from the floor. Before Jason can blink, she has materialized across the entrance hall and is crowding Dick and Damian, who tried to sneak their way to the Zeta Tube unnoticed.

Jason and Dick’s eyes meet across the room, and the most Jason can do is give him a stolid salute. It was nice knowing him.

“Um, M’gann,” Dick says cautiously, trying to fend her off and keep Damian from launching himself at her. “Careful, he’s a bit testy around—”

M’gann pays him no mind and cheerfully says, “I’ve never seen a human baby so close before! I can’t believe how cute they are in person!” Turning to Jason and then Dick, she beams. “Is this another…? No, don’t answer that, of course he must be one of you. Just look at him.”

“Uh,” Jason says, “should I be offended? I feel like I should be offended.”

M’gann ignores him, instead cooing at Damian. “You are darling, little man,” she says, and Jason snorts because Damian is the fucking furthest thing from ‘darling’ he’s ever seen. His prickly behavior around strangers doesn’t do him any favors, either. Even Conner and Kaldur look a little taken aback when the kid bares his teeth at her, says something undoubtedly nasty in Farsi, and pushes her cheek away violently. M’gann, however, giggles and says, “So adorable! What’s your name, sweetie? You—”

She suddenly comes to a dead stop, staring with widening, recognizing eyes. “—are Damian Wayne,” she breathes.

Jason’s cuss slips out before he can censor himself, but the damage is already done: Dick’s hand tightens on Damian’s shoulder, and Damian himself recognizes his name and stills, looking proudly up at M’gann as if to say, “Yeah? And?”

“Oh,” M’gann breathes, backing up. Her eyes are round, shining like coins. “Oh. That makes you two…”

All eyes are on Jason and Dick now, and Jason can see it beginning to click in their teammates’ minds. Their identities are there, right in the open, and for a second, Jason loses the ability to breathe. He and Dick exchange another look, half-panicked, half-resigned (because, really, if there hadn’t been such a fucking huge media fanfare about Bruce’s illegitimate heir showing up out of nowhere, they wouldn’t be in this situation! They could have improvised, at least a little! But no, nope, their lives are never that easy, are they?)

His mind scrambles, but Jason decides there’s no salvaging this. None at all.

Well. Might as well go down with pride.

“Way to go, Big Bird,” Jason says. “Now we’re both screwed.”

“Yup.” Dick takes off his sunglasses and rubs his blue eyes. Wally hisses a warning, but Dick merely gives his best friend a shrug and a weak smile. To Jason, he says, “But if it makes you feel better, I’ll tell the boss it’s all on me.”

“I would expect nothing less,” Jason says. “But we both know B’s going to ignore what you say and shit a brick over both our heads.”

“Colorful description, Little Wing. Truly.”

“Tt. Grays,” Damian says impatiently, pulling at Dick’s sweatpants. He’s blissfully unaware of the layers of tension and shock caking the group before him. “Grays.”

The kid is blinking suddenly heavy eyes, but he’s too stubborn to ask to be picked up. Normally, the family knows better than to assume anything with Damian, especially when he starts getting tired or hungry. Dick, however, is a different story. Having taken the big brother role into stride with Jason, Cass, and then Tim, he has no qualms doting on Damian, who is one-hundred-percent unreceptive to coddling and is unafraid to showcase his displeasure whenever he’s shown the ittiest bit of affection. Perhaps Dick’s complete lack of self-preservation is so pitiful to Damian, he feels like he can do nothing but tolerate it. Maybe the brat secretly likes it. Jason doesn’t really know. Whatever it is, it’s a superpower unique to Dick, and it allows Dick to pick Damian up without invoking a tantrum.

It’s a bit awe-inspiring, actually.

Jason pulls off his domino, wincing as the glue tugs at his skin. “You can stop staring now,” he says to their audience. “It’s rude.”

“Oh,” M’gann stammers, face flushing. “Oh, I’m sorry. It’s just…” She helplessly flutters her hands. “You’re just so cute.” Jason blanches, and even Dick, normally the exhibitionist and attention-hound, raises an eyebrow. “All of you. Your whole family. Batman—Mr. Wayne…a lot makes sense now, you know?” She beams as her star-struck excitement gets the better of her, and she enters their personal space again, grasping both his and Dick’s hands. Damian wiggles and protests her being so close, but M’gann is oblivious. “I mean, it’s an absolute honor to meet you both, truly, face-to-face. Not that it wasn’t an honor to know Robin and Redbird!” she’s quick to exclaim. “But it’s different, knowing you like this. I—um.” Her face becomes a deeper red in her embarrassment, and she looks between them. “I thought I knew—I had a guess, anyway—but now…I am having trouble deciding which of you is Richard and which is Jason.”

There’s a beat of silence, and Jason doesn’t have to cast a sideways glance to know Dick’s horror matches his own.

M’gann seems to realize she said something wrong, and she purses her lips. “I—I’m sorry. I didn’t—”

“We look nothing alike!” Dick explodes at the same time Jason argues, “We’re not even related!”

“I’m infinitely better looking, anyway,” Jason says.

Snorting, Dick bounces Damian on his hip and jibes, “More vain, too.”

“Says the kid who grew up in the circus, where appearances are everything.”

“But that had nothing to do with vanity. That was art.”

“I fart on your fucking art.”

Conner coughs to hide a laugh, but Jason doesn’t have it in him to revel in the fact he made the unflappable Superboy show signs of amusement. He knows he has a habit of saying things before thinking them through, and the moment the words are out of his mouth, his gut pivots and churns. Dick can be sensitive about his circus, and Jason usually tries to respect that, as Dick has always respected his past in turn.

His guilt dissipates the moment Dick wrinkles his nose. “You know…I love you to death, Jason, but sometimes I can’t believe I have to share a family with you,” Dick says. Addressing the Team, he says, “PSA: the disgusting one is Jason.”

“And the boring one is Dick,” Jason rejoins. “Which, now that I think about it, is kinda sad, isn’t i—?” 

“Okayyyyy,” Artemis interrupts, stepping forward. “Hold up. That’s it? You’re seriously going to stand there and drive us insane with your bickering? Act like nothing just happened?”

“Did something just happen?” Dick says, twirling his sunglasses. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“Your identities,” M’gann says helpfully, falling into Dick’s troll trap easy as pie. “Your names.”

“Oh, right. We can’t have that,” Jason says. He slings an arm over Dick’s shoulder and slowly holds his palm up, facing outward. He moves his hand in a circle, lowering his tone as he quotes, “These are not the droids you’re looking for.” He pauses for a second and asks Dick, “Did it work?”

The reference is lost on nearly half of the Team, but Artemis looks like she wants to gouge his eyes out, and Jason counts that as a win. His smirk dissolves into a grimace as Damian takes advantage of the fact Jason’s in reaching distance. He takes a fistful of both his and Dick’s hair, giving a forceful yank and whining, “Brothers.”

“Little gremlin,” Jason mutters, escaping Damian’s hold and rubbing his head.

“He’s tired,” Dick acknowledges with a sheepish smile. “We should go. We should have already been gone.”

“Yeah.” His queen-sized bed does sound pretty damn wonderful right now. “If it’s not too much to ask,” Jason says before he turns to the Zeta, “you saw nothing until Batman says you saw something.”

“So long as you ensure it does not happen again, we’ll keep your silence,” Kaldur says, and though he’s using his Leader Voice, his eyes twinkle. “We wouldn’t want our youngest Bird getting hurt following his big brothers through the Zeta, would we?”

“Oh, trust us,” Dick says. “This is the last thing we want happening again.”

(Spoiler alert: it ends up happening again. But that's another story entirely.)

Later, after Jason keeps his word and helps keep the incident a secret for a record-breaking eleven hours, he throws Dick (and Damian, while he’s at it) under the bus, and Dick still stands up for him, facing Bruce’s wrath head on, because related or not, that’s just what brothers do, isn't it?

Chapter Text

Wally hesitated before rapping his knuckles against the door jam. The sound echoed through the halls, haunting and empty, and he nearly turned heel when he was rewarded with a shatter of glass against the door and a chilling snarl from within. “Nearly” being the key word there.

A normal person might know he was unwelcome, but he was the Flash now, and the Flash didn’t cower from a challenge.

Besides, he’d seen Di…well, let’s just say Wally had seen others brave far more serious and far more colorful threats (against their very lives—their very manhood, even) coming from that room. And all with a smile.

With a laugh, even.

He’d also seen that very same person proceed to dive bomb into bed and attempt to start a tickle fight, too, so mayyyyybe said example wasn’t the best role model. As it happened, said person’s sanity was very often called into question when it concerned the mini monster who lurked within the shadows of this particular bedroom.

But that was Dick for you, wasn’t it?

A bittersweet smirk forced its way onto Wally’s lips, his heart twisting painfully in his chest.

He didn’t want to be here. Not like this.

Cass had asked him to come, though. She’d flown in from Hong Kong, taken one look around at her mess of a family, and zeroed in on him within seconds of stepping into the Bat Cave. Him specifically. Not Steph. Not even Bruce. Him.

(Let the record show he wasn’t even supposed to be there in the first place—he hadn’t been anywhere near Wayne Manor since that day—but he supposed Justice League messenger duty always fell to the rookie of the group. Or so Green Arrow insisted, the old fart).

Wally blew out a breath and closed his eyes. His conscience, sounding far too much like Dick for comfort, poked and prodded at him, demanding why he wasn’t getting a move on.

Hello? Fastest man alive? he imagined Dick teasing. Yeah, you’re up.

Screw you, he wished he could respond. Screw. You.

And Cass too, while he was at it. Screw the entire Bat Clan, for being the assholes who couldn’t get through to one of their own.

If Dick were here, he—

No, no. Wally couldn’t think that. ‘If, then’s and their kindred ‘what if’s never worked out well in this superhero gig of theirs. Too much of that, and they’d all be driven insane.

Instead, Wally found himself recalling the oppressive atmosphere in the Bat Cave, the shadows under Tim’s eyes and the blankness in Bruce’s. He recalled Jason’s surliness and Steph’s raw, red nose. He recalled the weight of overseeing the Team trudge through another training session without their leader, their smiles absent, their chatter nonexistent. The Justice League, the Outsiders, the Titans, the Outlaws…all of them, past and present members, were suffering now.

It had been getting better. It really had, but it was suddenly fresh again. It was inescapable, now that Robin was back. Now that Robin knew.

Wally didn’t know why Cass had singled him out, why she’d taken him aside and asked him to do this. He wasn’t the person for this. He and the current Robin had never gotten along. He didn’t know what to say to the kid. He never did, and they’d avoided each other on principle, even before.

There really was zero obligation. Zero desire. And there were so many other things Wally could be doing right now. He could be snuggling in bed with Artemis. Or continuing the search for Uncle Barry. Or sitting up to watch the news with Aunt Iris. Or literally anything else.

Yet here he stood.

(Maybe because there was one Robin he owed it to. His Robin.)

Wally swallowed over the sudden lump in his throat, a pit of rage and despair, long-ignored, churning deep in his chest.

Fuck it. If worse came to worst, Artemis would know where to find his dead body at the very least.

It couldn’t go on. It couldn’t.

Pushing the door open, Wally took a tentative step into the pitch-black room. He carefully avoided the broken pottery—a lamp?—that lay scattered before him. Wally almost whistled, seeing the sizable gouge the impact had left in the beautiful oak. It appeared the rumors about the kid’s weird Kryptonian-like powers weren’t exaggerated.

Wally hadn’t been able to take a step more before the ten-year-old in question materialized in front of him, his expression a storm cloud of ire and promises of serious bodily harm. It was only thanks to Wally’s familiarity with the Bats’ ways that he didn’t jump out of his skin.

(Visibly, anyway. Take that, Dick).

It always baffled Wally how someone so small could command such an intense presence. He’d seen adult civilians shy away from the kid, eyeing him up as though they innately knew he could lunge for the throat at any given moment. Even now, he looked ready to attack, his lip curling over sharp, white teeth. His fingers twitched into fists at his side, and ordinarily, Wally would know better than to poke the beast.

Dick would poke anyway. He had a talent for it, for sneaking under skins and either irritating the hell out of you or lowering your defenses until they were nonexistent. It was his superpower.

Wally wasn’t Dick. He…he never could be. Never would be.

This was a mistake. He shouldn’t be here. He had nothing to say to Damian Wayne. Nothing at all.

“If you wish to retain the use of both of your legs,” Damian growled, “you will remove yourself from my threshold at once, West.”

Wally found himself rooted to the spot, staring. The last time he’d seen Damian, he’d been lying in a coffin, and he hadn’t exactly realized how much he’d missed that voice, impudence included, until he heard it with his own ears. Damian’s return was a miracle, truly, and it was one that Wally should have never taken for granted.

Dammit, Wally couldn’t even remember the last thing he’d said to Damian before Leviathan descended upon the Bats, before Robin sacrificed himself for the others. All he remembered was the hole Damian had left behind, somehow bigger and far more painful than it was when he’d been kidnapped and presumed dead, years ago.

“Well?” Damian glared up at him, and Wally was struck by how young he was. He was still a child. A child who survived the League of Assassins, who went through hell and back to return home, but a child all the same.

God, and Dick hadn’t even been able to see his baby brother come back to life before he…

“I came to talk to you,” Wally said awkwardly.

Damian’s eyes narrowed. “So whose grand idea was it to make you the sacrificial lamb? Pennyworth? Cassandra?” He scowled, turning away. “It doesn’t matter. Leave.”

Wally sighed. “Damian—”

The boy moved like lightning, nearly as fast as a speedster. A short dagger flashed in his hand, but Wally was not intimidated as the blade came flying within inches of his face, burying into the drywall with a solid schnick.

Oddly enough, Damian’s belligerence didn’t feed into Wally’s Pissed-Off Meter. As he looked dully at the weapon sticking out of the wall, he realized was tired. Exhausted, really. He slowly turned back to Damian, and he finally saw it: the sleepless nights, sunken eyes…and there, Wally’s own pain reflected right back at him.

Wally took a deep breath. “Damian,” he tried again. “Please, I just—”

“By all means, continue talking,” Damian hissed, another dagger slipping from the holster he had strapped to his forearm. “Tempt me to take your tongue as well as your legs.”

“Kid, look—”

“Out, West!”

The disagreeable little— Moment of compassion and empathy over. Pissed-Off Meter officially swinging into red. Wally could hear Dick practically telling him to be patient, telling him to give the kid a chance, but his voice was drowned out by the sudden roaring in his ears.

“No,” Wally said.

Damian’s expression slackened in surprise before twisting into a scowl. “Perhaps I was unclear. Get. Out. Or I will make you.”

“No,” Wally said again, folding his arms. “You know, sometimes I think Dick gave you way too much credit.”

Dick’s name was the magic word, and Damian faltered, just long enough for Wally to see the vast chasm of vulnerability and grief the kid was doing his utmost to pretend didn’t exist. “You know nothing, West.”

There was no real heat in his words. None of the scathing disdain that usually characterized them, anyway, and Wally took his chance to press his momentary advantage. “I know Robin’s been benched for excessive use of force,” he stated bluntly. He caught Damian’s arm as the boy tried to turn away. “I know you’re not eating, not sleeping. I know you’re treating your family and your teammates like shit. I know you’re pushing them away. And I know why.”

Damian’s expression darkened, shrugging off Wally’s hand. “Tt. You know nothing,” he repeated.

Wally shook his head, and he began shooting in the dark, hoping to land on something that’d get through to Damian. “You can’t keep doing this to your friends, Damian. Or yourself, for that matter.”

“I do what I please,” Damian retorted. 

“I’m just saying,” Wally said, unable to keep the impatience from edging his tone. Not for the first time, he wondered how anyone could communicate effectively with this little shit. “We just got you back. Dick wouldn’t want you to—”

That was apparently the wrong thing to say. Damian spun the dagger in his hand and jammed the butt into Wally’s kidney. Wally reflexively sped out of the way of a second incoming blow, deflecting Damian’s arm before his elbow could meet his jaw. The force behind the elbow would have been enough to knock Wally off his feet had it landed.

“You are no better than the rest of them! None of you know a damn thing about what Grayson would want!” Damian shouted, his voice rising in pitch and volume as he yanked out of Wally’s grip. “None of you can so much as assume! Grayson’s gone! He’s—”

It was a slap in the face, and Wally winced at the impact. “You think I don’t understand?” he yelled. “You think I don’t know how you feel? He’s my best friend!”

“And he’s my brother!” Damian shrieked, punching a fist through the wall.

Wally hesitated, the words striking him like the very lightning strike that had given him his powers, every ounce of anger dissipating in the aftermath, and all he could think in that very moment was that Dick would have glowed to hear Damian use the word ‘brother’ like that.

“When my own father wouldn’t look me in the eye, when the rest of my supposed ‘family’ didn’t know what to do with me, he was there! He was always there!”

Wally knew that the bond between Dick and Damian was strong, especially after Dick’s tenure as Batman, and considering how easily Dick bonded with literally everyone, that was saying something. He knew the kid cared, truly, but Dick was so open and Damian, so reserved and prickly, it was hard to see that Dick’s love was ever reciprocated.

It had never been so clear as it was now. And of course it was too late. Much too late.

And Damian knew it. Wally could practically feel the guilt and anguish pouring off the younger boy in waves.

“My father, Todd, Drake, Brown…not a single one of my teammates or mentors will look me in the eye and tell me the truth! I have been home a week, and they treat me like glass. They ask if I am feeling alright, if they can get me anything, if there is anything they can do to help me. They offer to talk about what happened to me. But what about him? What about Grayson?”

Way to go right for the balls, Damian, Wally thought, his stomach rolling. Nausea and remorse threatened to seize his throat, and he suddenly felt as though he was suffocating.

“He was the first of us, Damian,” Wally croaked, trying to find the right words to explain delicately. “The best of us. He inspired a whole generation of super-kids to come out of the woodworks and prove that we could do it just as well as the grown-ups could. Those he didn’t train with, he trained himself. I don’t think a single hero in the multiverse hasn’t been touched by him. We are in mourning, and everyone—”

“I am perfectly aware of how many people Grayson has!” Damian hissed. “The fool would have every last man, woman, and child as his friend, if not for the sheer impossibility of the undertaking.”

Wally huffed a laugh. It sounded more like a sob. “Yeah, that sounds like him.”

“Then you understand this has nothing to do with the grief of our colleagues. I respect their distance and their methods of mourning. I do not begrudge Grayson the recognition and honor he deserves.”

“Okay,” Wally said, not knowing what else to say. He was starting to suspect what Damian was getting at, and it was hitting far too close to home for comfort. “Can you tell me what this is about, then?”

Damian sneered. “This is about what happened when I woke up, surrounded by family, and he was not there!”

“And what happened?” Wally asked.

“I had to assume, West! I had to assume Grayson was—”

Ah. Wally’s chin trembled as he bit down on his lower lip. Hard. He took a stabilizing breath before finishing, “Dead.”

Damian’s inner fire faded, and he stared at Wally with tortured eyes. Now that the floodgates were open, there was no stopping Wally now, and he could have both kissed and decked Cassandra at that moment, for seeing what none of the rest could.

It wasn’t only Damian who needed this.

Wally hadn’t been there when the Crime Syndicate had gotten ahold of Dick. He hadn’t been able to contact him when his identity was blown to the world. He hadn’t done a single damn thing, and no matter how many times Artemis or his parents or his aunt or the Garricks sat him down to talk about how he was holding up, Wally couldn’t shake the belief he could have done more to help.

Lately, the guilt was enough to keep him from so much as thinking Dick’s name. He went out of his way to avoid reminders of him, of the teams they founded, of the original Robin, of Nightwing and the flock of birds who followed in his footsteps.

Problem was, nearly everything reminded Wally of Dick, of what had been and what could have been. His legacy and his memory was everywhere he looked, both in civvies and in uniform. It ached not to talk to him. It hurt just as much to consider talking about him.

But despite all of that, Wally could not deny the near-feral desire to share stories, to share memories of Dick’s laughter and his love, with someone who understood that it was killing all of them not to do so.

Because that’s what Dick was all about. For all the fights he had with Bruce, for all the miscommunication he’d been accused of, Dick loved easily and without restraint. Because of that, he was the most trusted, the most dependable, and the most well-liked of their community. He was the glue that held them together, the peace-keeper and median between those who’d butt heads, the one who people gravitated toward when they needed someone. He’d hate to see them like this, avoiding each other, angry and sad and unable to move on.

Funny, that it would be Damian Wayne, of all people, who would be the one who understood that best. Even funnier still that Damian was the one who would be able to provide exactly what Wally needed.

“But even knowing he’s dead, it’s like you keep expecting him to barge through the door,” Wally continued, closing his eyes. “With that stupid ass grin on his face and that stupid ass skip in his step. I’ve called his cell a few times, you know? On accident. I had some dumb stories I just had to tell him, and it didn’t hit me until after I got that dorky voicemail of his that he’s…he’s not gonna pick up.”

Damian stood frozen, eyes wide, but Wally couldn’t care less if Damian was paying attention or staring straight through him as he babbled. He babbled on. “And you can’t help but think ‘if I can come back, why can’t he? If I’m good enough to be saved, then certainly he is too, right? Because no one deserves a second chance more than he does.’”

Damian didn’t speak for awhile, absorbing Wally’s confession. “I had forgotten you were lost to us for a time,” he eventually murmured.

It was probably as close to an apology as Wally would ever get. Wally shrugged, accepting the olive branch. “You were still with your mother when I was trapped in the Speed Force. It’s old news. I don’t expect you to remember. I hardly remember it.”

“And you still…” Damian trailed off, looking frustrated and embarrassed.

Wally filled in the blanks. “Yeah. I still think it. Every day.”

Damian nodded, and he looked as though some of the weight had been taken from his shoulders. “I do not recall my death either,” he admitted, avoiding Wally’s eyes by turning to look out his window. “It was as though I had awoken from a nap, everything changed.”

“It hasn’t really hit, then, has it?” Wally asked.

“No,” Damian said. “I do not suppose it ever will.”

There was a hint of bitterness underlying the statement, and Wally assumed it was a subtle complaint against his family, for being so stuck in their own heads they couldn’t see that all Damian wanted was to know why.

“I can tell you about Dick,” Wally found himself saying. “About what happened.”

Damian’s eyes shot to Wally, and he quickly backtracked. “I mean, I don’t have all the details, and that’s why I also say you need to pry it out of your father, but I…um, you know…I know enough. Enough to hold you over until you and Bruce can sit down and really talk about it.” Damian continued to stare, his eyes narrowing almost suspiciously, and Wally added, “I can tell you some other stories, too. About Rob. My Robin, I mean. If you want. To kinda…balance out the doom-and-gloom stuff. Dick wouldn’t find it too ‘astrous’ if I didn’t throw in a good story too.”

For a moment, Wally worried that Damian would deny him. Or scoff. Or make fun of him. Or go back to behaving like the brat he really was deep down.

“I believe…I would like that,” Damian said simply.

Wally smiled, and releasing a breath he didn’t know he’d been holding, he said, “You know what? Maybe Dick did give you just the right amount of credit, little chirp.” Damian scowled at the old nickname—one of his least favorites, considering it was Wally and not any of Batman’s brood who had come up with it. Wally still found the pun genius, thank you very much—but considering Damian didn’t growl at him, Wally would call that progress. “He’d be so proud of you, you know that, right?”

“Tt. Naturally,” Damian said, and if his eyes were moist and he had to pretend he had an itch so that he could wipe his face…well, Wally wasn’t there to see it.

He just did what he was best at. He began to talk.

~…~

“Why do we put up with men, Cass?” Artemis grumbled as she labored up the stairs.

Cassandra Cain shrugged and smirked, making no attempt to pretend she wasn’t hovering protectively. Artemis would roll her eyes and tell Cass off, but since she was well into her third trimester, her center of gravity was way off. She would never admit she appreciated the extra help now that she could no longer see her feet over the swell of her belly.

“They stand us up on movie night and then force their very pregnant girlfriends to hunt them down,” Artemis continued to complain, pitifully breathless. “And climb stairs. And not just any stairs, Cass. Wayne manor stairs.”

Cass didn’t point out that both Jason and Alfred had already offered to find her wayward boyfriend for her, only to be told ‘fuck off’ and ‘no, thank you, I could use the exercise,’ respectively. Artemis liked her for that. She was a good friend.

“Bitter enemy, stairs,” Cass agreed with a nod.

Pulling up short (and totally not using it as an excuse to take a break), Artemis gave the younger girl a dark look. Cass was as deadpan as always, not a single hint of mockery in her expression. Considering who she had as brothers, Artemis would have expected some humor dancing in her dark eyes at the very least. And maybe there was. She wouldn’t know. Cass was just as good at preventing others from reading her as she was at reading other people.

(So, yeah, maybe Artemis took it back: Cass was actually an awful friend).

“And men,” Artemis added, beginning to climb again.

“Yes. And men.”

It took them a year and a day, but finally Artemis and Cass made it upstairs. Artemis beelined for Tim’s room—after Dick, Tim was Wally’s favorite Bat—but Cass stopped her with a tap on the shoulder and a shake of her head. She looked delighted, her face alight. Taking a hold of Artemis’s hand, she beamed and lead her in the other direction, coming to a stop before a slightly ajar door.

Damian’s room? What the hell was going on here?

Artemis gave Cass an incredulous look, and Cass’s smile grew. She put a single finger to her lips, and with the grace of a ballerina, she waltzed forward, gently pushing the door open and peeking her head in. After a few moments, she entered entirely, and Artemis was left gaping.

She’d gone in without even knocking. Artemis didn’t take Damian’s shit, but even she knew better than to invade Damian’s privacy without announcing herself. Did Cass have a death wish?

It took a moment before Artemis realized there was no fight occurring within, and curiosity started to overcome her caution. She stepped as lightly as she could, moderated her breathing, and entered.

If she was caught, oh well. She’d make sure Cass got the brunt of the punishment.

(Not that there’d ever be much punishment for Cassandra. Damian always respected her and treated her well, compared to how he treated most others).

The first thing she noticed was the dagger sticking out of Damian’s wall. The dagger was paired with a nice fist-sized hole, and Artemis wondered if it was a little strange to be relieved there was some evidence of violence. That, at least, could be expected.

Artemis was so busy canvassing the room she nearly bumped into Cass. The girl gestured for Artemis to stand next to her, and with a bright smile, she pointed.

The spear of light from the hallway fell upon two sleeping boys. One slept propped against his headboard, curled against a massive decorative pillow. The other sprawled in the armchair by the bed, his head thrown back, chin shiny with drool.

Artemis didn’t know what happened here tonight, but she wasn’t about to question it, not when she couldn’t remember the last time she’d seen Wally so relaxed in sleep. And Damian…had he always looked so young? So peaceful?

They were both so fucking adorable. Affection threatened to overwhelm her, and she bit her lip to keep herself from cooing out loud.

Judging by the way Cassandra’s camera phone snuck out of her pocket, Artemis wasn’t the only one who wanted to remember this. When Cass noticed Artemis’s gaze, she whispered, “Good.”

“Yeah,” Artemis breathed. “Good.” She took one last look at the boys, a soft smile on her face, and began to back out of the room. Cass took a few more pictures and followed, closing the door behind her.

“Guest room?” Cass asked once they were alone in the hallway.

Artemis took note of Cass’s pleased expression and quirked a brow. “You knew this would happen.”

“Not knew,” Cass denied.

“Guessed, then.”

 “Blind. Could not see. I helped.”

She was too modest: the full impact of what Cass had done for Wally—and for Damian, for that matter—was beginning to hit Artemis like a sledgehammer. “Thank you, Cass. Wally, he—I was starting to think…”

Cass shook her head, and with an impish grin, she jostled her phone.

Artemis laughed. No thanks were necessary. The pictures, it would seem, were their own reward.

Cassandra trotted ahead, toward guest rooms in the opposite wing of the manor, and as Artemis passed Dick’s old room, she swiped at her cheeks, felt a melancholy smile to steal across her lips, and allowed herself to think that maybe their Robin would have gotten a kick out of those pictures, too.

Chapter Text

He climbed in through the window.

He could have used the front door. Or the back door. Or even the other door in “the basement.” He knew he could have. No one would have stopped him. But honestly, at this point, entering by any of those doors wasn't an option anymore. Not even now. Not for him.

Considering he just about pissed himself when he saw Dick sitting like a fucking creeper in the dark, though, maybe entering the Manor through one of the doors wouldn't have been such a terrible idea.

Jason hefted two pistols, body wired for an attack, but Dick did not move. He was still dressed in his Nightwing uniform, sitting with his head bowed, elbows on his knees and one of Bruce's cowls—one of the first, with those stupid bat-ears that looked more like baby goat horns than anything—resting limply in his hands. He was staring down at the hollow mask as though it held the answer to the universe, his face rent with such a deep agony that Jason froze in place.

"So it's true," he murmured aloud.

Dick didn't flinch. Jason shouldn't have been surprised Dick had noticed him enter, even if his elder brother hadn't so much as moved a muscle in the last fifteen seconds. Hell, the fucker had probably witnessed his heart nearly burst from his chest and hadn't so much as giggled at him (or lectured him) for the oversight.

But then again...what had he done lately to deserve anything like familiarity from Dick?

Jason was suddenly very conscious of the fact that this was one of the first times he stood face-to-face with his older brother since the Joker had blown him sky-high. A lot had changed. Maybe too much, especially in Jason's case, but Jason had never needed to do anything to earn Dick's love. None of them had. And now, standing before each other as equals and not as rivals, Jason realized that that was exactly why he’d avoided Dick since coming back to Gotham: because he’d known, deep down, he never deserved Dick’s love in the first place.

(But he did very much deserve his disappointment, and facing that was harder than Jason ever thought it would be. Harder than it ever was facing Bruce’s).

Fuck. Bruce…

"It's true," Dick whispered.

Jason released a slow, shaky breath, and as Dick bowed forward again, hiding his face, Jason took a second to close his eyes and…remember.

“The funeral is Tuesday,” Dick said abruptly, his voice dead and hoarse.

Jason refocused on his brother. He'd been yelling, maybe crying, and it suddenly made sense—why Adoring Eldest Brother was sitting alone in the dark, brooding like Bruce when he should have been with the others. This...this was a time for family, and Jason wouldn't be the first to admit that was why he was here—it was professional curiosity, that's all—but...

No, he shouldn't lie to himself. That was why he was here.

No matter his beef with Bruce, which was as raw and bloody and tough as beef could possibly be, no matter how he felt about his place in this family since he'd come back, and no matter how his brothers or any of the girls felt about what he'd done...it was as Alfred always told him, in private: this was still his family.

All of the shit he'd done, all of the points he'd been trying to prove? It felt petty, all of a sudden, and so, so stupid. He was a moron. A bigger moron than the others seemed to think he was.

But...he was here now, so maybe that would count for something. Meaningful gestures and actions were always more powerful than wordy apologies in this family anyway.

Bruce had taught them that.

Jason's eyes burned, and after holstering his guns, he yanked off his helmet in self-disgust, ignoring the rumble and lurch of guilt and regret stirring his gut. Shaking out his hair, he rounded the armchair and crouched in front of Dick. "...What are we going to do?"

Dick ran a thumb over the bat-cowl's brow and very obviously avoided Jason's eyes.

Realization crept up on him with all the subtlety of a speedster in tap-dancing shoes. And struck with all the force of one coming at him in a dead sprint, too.

"You can't be serious," Jason deadpanned.

For the first time, Dick looked him dead in the eye. "Gotham needs Batman," he said, as if it were simple as that.

Jason's stomach rolled in revulsion. "No.”

Dick's lips twitched into a humorless smirk. "Et tu?"

Jason had always hated that smirk. That smirk was all Bruce. It had no business being anywhere on his brother’s face, and Jason suddenly remembered sitting up with Dick at two in the morning, after that disastrous failsafe exercise, telling him—promising him… "I won't let you do this to yourself," he snarled.

"You won't let me?" Dick asked, eyebrows raising.

Dick was baiting him, that much was obvious, even if the strain on his voice totally invalidated the attempt. It was almost pathetic, seeing Dick this lost and vulnerable, which, in it of itself, was another tempting piece of bait.

Jason might have been tempted to bite, once, months ago. Back when he was executing his plan to manipulate the entire family into his plot to kill the Joker, when he used every backhanded tactic he could, including things that had been shared in confidence between brothers. Back when he was bitter and furious, his vision tinged green with Pit Madness and his thoughts warped by Talia Al Ghul.

But that was then. Now, everything had changed. Bruce was gone. And he…he wasn’t coming back.

“Dick,” Jason began.

"You don't know a damn thing!" Dick hissed. "You haven't been here! You don't see Alfred struggling to keep us together! You haven't seen Tim tearing himself apart, in complete denial that Bruce is gone, and Damian! Damian is a mess, Jay. Talia and the League still have a hold over him, and it's one I'm not sure any one of us can shake, not without this." He shook the cowl.

"What do the others have to say about this?" Jason demanded. "Do they agree?"

Dick pursed his lips, eyes flashing angrily. “I don’t need this right now, Jason. I'm done fighting with you.”

That was a loaded sentence, but Jason didn't let that distract him. “Tell me, you turd,” he retorted. “I think you need to hear yourself say it.”

The fire in Dick’s eyes subsided, and after giving Jason a contemplative look, he sighed, turning to stare out the window. "Alfred doesn't say it, but he…he doesn’t want this. Tim...Tim is..." Dick swallowed. "He isn't taking it well. He thinks Bruce is alive. And Damian hasn’t exactly been helping matters. He'd only just found his father again."

Jason read between the lines. We’ve been fighting. He didn't know how to feel about all that, so he decided that was a future-Jason problem. "And what about the Team?” he asked. “Surely they have a few things to say about what you're planning!"

"They don't know. Neither does the Justice League. Yet."

Jason blinked, finding that hard to believe. "Wally doesn't know?"

Dick grimaced and tilted his chin toward the light, displaying a bruised jaw. "Wally...Wally thinks..."

Jason knew exactly what Wally thought. He was thinking it too. "Batman will fucking kill you, Dick."

"I can handle it."

Fury ignited in Jason's chest, bright and almost desperate in its insistence. "It's not a matter of whether you can handle it, dickhead! You're Nightwing. You lead a covert team that does missions across the globe, and you work in Blüdhaven. You were Robin. You can handle anything Gotham throws at you."

Jason realized what he said too late, but he didn't have the time to be embarrassed about revealing just how much he still respected Dick. He didn't even have time to mourn the spontaneous combustion of neither his newfound independence nor the cold-and-distant persona he'd been putting on, if only to keep the family from nosing into his business. In that moment, all he could do was inwardly curse Bruce. If he were here, Jason might have thrown a gun or two at his stupid ass head and admitted that, yeah, the all-mighty Batman won. Again.

Better to own it, then.

"You were right there beside him when most of our rogues spawned,” Jason continued, “and you know the city as well as Bruce—No, don't you dare say a damn word. I'm talking right now." Dick closed his mouth, a muscle in his jaw twitching. "But despite all that shit, Batman will strip away everything you are. And I'm sorry, but I’m with Wally and everyone else on this: that's not going to fucking happen."

I promised you, Jason was trying to say. And I'm here now to keep that promise. 

"What choice do I have?" Dick croaked angrily, and Jason was sure he'd had this argument over and over again with Tim and Wally and maybe even Alfred. "You realize what's going to happen when Gotham realizes Batman is gone, don't you?"

"Yeah, it'll be a fucking shit-show," Jason admitted, "but we're his protégés, we can—”

"We again?" Dick scoffed. "I'm surprised at you, Jason."

Jason gnashed his teeth. "Shut the fuck up. Bruce is dead. He's gone. This is not the time to remind me of what I should and shouldn't have done before..."

Dick's face suddenly crumpled as Jason trailed off. "Jay..."

"This isn't about me," Jason said sternly. "This is about you. Trying to be Batman. You never wanted to be Batman. And we both know Bruce never wanted it for you either."

Sighing, Dick placed the cowl aside and ran his fingers through his hair. He looked totally wiped, as though a single breath could topple him over, and Jason felt a surge of rage at the others—at Dick's supposed friends and allies. Did they not see how Dick was falling apart at the seams?

Hypocrite, his own mind hissed.

"What's your great suggestion then?" Dick demanded. "I can't leave Gotham to the psychos out there. The GCPD would be overrun, and we'd have just as much luck, don't deny it. Batman has always been something more to Gotham, you know that."

Jason got it. He didn't like it, but he did get it.

"And Jason...Damian needs Robin," Dick added. "He needs it more than any one of us ever did."

"Fuck off," Jason said with a roll of his eyes. "I never needed Robin. I had Redbird. Why doesn't Damian need Redbird? Why is it always about Robin?"

Dick raised his eyebrows, a hint of his humor returning to him. "You'd give your name to Damian?"

Jason scowled. "It's the principle of the thing, Goldie."

Dick huffed a laugh. "Fine. Damian needs to spread his wings. He needs to feel as though he has a place in this family, and if he chooses Robin or if he chooses a name for himself, it doesn't matter to me. Happy?"

"I'm never happy," Jason said with a straight face. He crossed his arms. "And I'm not happy about this."

He nodded to the cowl, and the brothers stared at it, its significance and the responsibility that came with it weighing upon them.

Dick was too good to be Batman, and Batman was too dark to be Dick. Besides, Dick had grown beyond Batman, and he'd fought tooth and nail to get to where he is now. Nightwing was Dick's best self, and he'd never be the same if he put that cowl on.

"I can't let you do this," Jason said again. A sudden calm overcame him, and he knew exactly what needed to be done. "I'll do it."

Dick jolted to his feet so fast Jason barely registered the movement. "No," he bit out.

Jason looked up at Dick. "And why not?” When Dick hesitated, Jason snorted. "I'm not going to fuck this up, dickhead.”

“You’ve been erratic in the field,” Dick accused.

“I crawled out of my own grave, a complete vegetable, after six months of death, and then had a dip in a Lazarus Pit,” Jason deadpanned. “I think that gives me at least a bit of a pass.”

Dick winced, but he did not yield. "You've been trying to divide us for months. Babs and I nearly broke up because of you.”

"…Yes."

"You've pitted Damian and Tim against each other."

"Sure did. And it was kinda hilarious."

"You tried to manipulate Bruce into killing the Joker for you. And dragged us all into it.”

"I did."

"You've beheaded people. And then toted their heads around in a duffle bag.”

"They deserved it."

"And what if you're out as Batman and you realize more people 'deserve it?'" Dick snapped. "We don't kill, Jason."

Jason closed his eyes. He knew he deserved that, on a logical level, but damn if he was going to sit down and take that shit. "I'm not perfect," Jason said, struggling to control his tone. "And I won't make excuses. I don't think we've been doing this crime-fighting thing right, and you think otherwise. Fine. Agree to disagree. But do you really think I would put that cowl on and stomp on Bruce's memory like that?"

“You’ve attacked us, played against our weaknesses,” Dick whispered. “Jason, I love you—and I think we’ve all forgiven you—but how can we trust you?”

Jason shrugged, self-loathing humbling him. “I don’t expect you to.”

Dick's blue eyes bored into him like drills, scrutinizing him. He must have found whatever it is he was looking for because he lost the tension in his shoulders and slouched back into the armchair. "You're serious about this," he mused.

It was not a question, but Jason answered it anyway. "Yes."

"And what about Red Hood?"

Jason pursed his lips. He had a newfound responsibility to the Narrows, to Crime Alley, to all the nooks and crannies of Gotham the other members of the family tended to overlook. He faltered for a moment, his heart torn in two, before he centered himself. "Tim can cover for me. He's already been working some of my cases with me."

"What?" Dick asked in surprise. "Really?" He looked a little put out, as though offended for not having been invited.

Jason smirked. "He's the least intolerable right now, so yeah, really. He's asked me for Redbird, you know."

"You're..." Dick suddenly smiled, his face alight. "Did he really?"

"The moment Damian was back," Jason admitted. "But even after I gave him my blessing or whatever, Bruce shut him down." He rolled his eyes. "He didn't trust Damian out there with him. And he didn’t want to give up the memory of his 'good soldier' either."

Dick's eyes hardened, and there was complete silence for several moments. "We're going to do better," Dick suddenly said. “We’re going to be better.”

Jason's eyebrow rose. "We?"

"We. If you can't let me take on the cowl, then I can't let you take it either." 

"So what? We'll share it?" Jason scoffed.

Dick smiled, which was answer enough for Jason. He wanted to automatically scowl and tell Dick that this was a disaster in the making, and that there was no way in hell this would work, but…the longer the idea steeped, the more appealing it became. Neither of them would come away unscathed, of course, but neither of them would have to lose too much of themselves to the cowl either. Dick wouldn't have to sacrifice everything just to play this role, and neither would he. Sure, there'd be an adjustment period. Sure, they’d both have to be responsible for Damian. They'd have to alter their fighting styles to match Bruce's, adjust their way of thinking—give to get—but there was a compromise. Compromise was something that was hard to come by in their world—and even harder to come by in the depths of the Bat Cave—and it was as delectable as Eden's golden fruit.

There was still a lot to talk about, a lot to work through, and there would undoubtedly be a lot of hard times ahead, but it was a start. His gesture had been made…and accepted.

Jason began to grin. "Alright, Dickiebird. I'm listening."

Chapter Text

Conner does not want to be here. In fact, he'd rather be anywhere but here.

In his humble opinion, the Bats are finally cracking. He said so, too, to Clark, much to his mentor's horror. "Don't let Batman ever hear you say that," Clark said before they parted ways. "You might find a sliver of Kryptonite in your fridge."

Conner thinks Clark's speaking from experience, but then again, he did see Lois roll her eyes behind her husband's back, so he can't be sure anymore. He knows the Bats have Kryptonite, of course, but he knows better than to think they'll abuse that power. They can be trusted with it.

Batman and Superman are weird, though, and have an equally weird friendship, so what does he know?

Conner sighs and watches the nearly nonexistent breeze whisper through the trees. The air is heavy, weighing on him like thick wool blanket. Frogs croak in a nearby pond, and he can hear things scuttling in the brush. There are no lightning bugs, which is strange to him. He feels as though there should be.

It's not the worst place to have a stakeout, honestly, but he hates stakeouts as a general rule, regardless of how beautiful the scenery. He really wishes he were anywhere but here.

Beside him, Gar slaps at a mosquito. "Shut up, big guy," he grumbles aloud. Even Conner can sense the severe look M'gann is sending them from her Bio-Ship, and Gar bites his lip, unnaturally long canines digging into his lip. He's taken to favoring a more lupine form lately, much to Conner's relief. He's grown accustomed to the monkey-hybrid Gar typically prefers, but he has always hated monkeys. Even Gar can't change that.

Gar sends a dutiful, almost mocking, wave of annoyance through their mental link and adds, You have nothing to complain about, Kon! Not all of us have invulnerable skin!

Or an immunity to humidity, Wonder Girl whines from the other end of the state park. Why is it so hot? 

I agree, Static chimes in. It's nighttime. It should not be this hot.

We're in Houston. In the middle of summer, M'gann answers patiently. Conner, she says, and Conner can feel a fluctuation of her touch in his mind. She's opened a private channel to speak to him alone. Stop projecting. 

Conner almost argues, but he realizes there's no point. This is an irrelevant mission. He pauses and then says, Hell, it's not even irrelevant. It's complete fluff. It's been fluff, from the moment we started this.

Nightwing seems to think...

Nightwing thinks too much sometimes, Conner retorts. They all do.

M'gann sighs. We cannot undermine the mission for the kids, Conner, no matter how irrelevant we think it is. 

Conner doesn't acknowledge the chastisement. He doesn’t think it will do him any favors to point out that the ‘kids’ aren’t exactly rookies anymore. So you do think this is a waste of time.

There was a pattern, M'gann responds. We all saw what Nightwing found.

Yeah, they all saw a splattering of dots on a world map, mostly conglomerated in Asia and Northern Africa. They were haphazard and random to Conner's eyes, but supposedly there was a pattern there.

Supposedly there were other signs, too. Signs that Batman could not ignore.

Conner knows better than to question the Bats when they reach conclusions that don't make sense to him. He's a Big Gun, not a Brain. But this...this is what even Conner would call "a stretch."

Especially after failing to find confirming evidence in Brazil. And then in Columbia.

And then in Guatemala. And Mexico.

The string of failure is the only pattern Conner sees.

But you still think Batman is overreacting, Conner pushes.

M'gann hesitates. I don't know what to think, she admits. 

Ra's Al Ghul has gone missing. The League of Assassins has disappeared. Conner mentally ticks off the points as he would on his fingers. The Demon's Daughter is dead. Cheshire knows nothing. Even she thinks they killed themselves off in their stupid civil war.

And yet we still find ourselves looking at a trail of blood! M'gann argues, and even though she's hovering over the forest from above, he can tell she's narrowing her eyes. Even if it isn't the League, these are highly trained, and highly dangerous, individuals. And they're moving fast.

That doesn't change the fact that none of it makes sense. These people are doing their utmost to clean up after themselves, flying under the radar as they kill each other—and only each other; no innocents have been caught in the crossfire—all across the world. It's hard to decide where they came from and what they truly want: their infighting, or whatever the hell they are doing, was only noticed by Nightwing when he and Black Bat stumbled upon the evidence while working a completely unrelated case. In London, of all places.

I'm not denying they need to be investigated, Conner admits, but this is excessive. He almost adds "and premature," but he knows that if that ever gets back to Batman, he really will find himself poisoned by Kryptonite. 

Excessive, though, is the word. The entire Team has been deployed, again, just to satisfy the Bats' paranoia. Superboy and Miss Martian have Alpha at a state park on the outskirts of Houston, and Tigress and Aqualad have Beta in some random town in Arizona. As if the two have any sort of connection at all.

But both locations are where Robin's modified algorithm seems to predict the next showdown will occur. A fifty-fifty shot.

Their orders are the same: they are not to engage. They are to observe and report. 

But that never goes well for them, so Conner's expecting that, if (not when) these people do show up, they'll be calling Beta in for backup.

(He knows he's not the only one. Artemis already gave him that Look he hates. That don’t-do-anything-stupid-because-I-know-you look).

And of course, Conner says, not even trying to hide how bitter he sounds, this is their mission, their hunch, and they're nowhere to be found.

There's been something going on in Gotham, M'gann defends. Batman needs all hands on deck.

Conner freezes, and Gar reacts to him, ears perking. Conner realizes what he's done and signals Gar to stand down. The boy relaxes, but his ears still swivel anxiously on the top of his head. It's not another breakout? Conner asks.

I'm not sure, M'gann says, and Conner almost sighs. In relief, because Arkham breakouts were no laughing matter, and in exasperation, because the Gotham vigilantes' secrets and pride grated at him on the best of days. But it felt like it. Something is weighing them down. All of them.  Even Spoiler felt off.

There's a snap of a branch nearby, and Conner slowly cocks his head in the direction of the noise. It is up to him to hear anything out of place, but after listening for several moments in silence, he decides the sound was natural enough.

Even Batman? he says.

Especially Batman.

It's always disconcerting, whenever Batman is noticeably on edge, but Conner has learned to avoid asking questions he'll never receive an answer to. He can even hear Dick's sing-song voice saying, "Need to know, Superboy. Need to know."

He rolls his eyes. It's not nearly as satisfying when Nightwing isn't there to take the brunt of it. 

Can you blame them, though, Conner? M'gann asks softly.

Conner pretends he does not hear. He pretends he doesn't know what this is really about. Shifting on the bough, he nudges Gar. You ready to move on, kid? he asks.

Gar shakes himself and is about to respond when he suddenly stiffens. Conner immediately crouches low, keeping to the shadows, and focuses his super-hearing. Gar's heartbeat pounds in his ears as the boy's nose twitches, catching a scent in off a new breeze. The forest hums its hushed lullaby, but...

There. There's a pocket of dead silence, of footfalls where the forest knows there should be none.

He blinks, incredulous. Well. It seems he owes Dick an apology for his attitude. He's not exactly looking forward to it.

There's someone here, Gar says. I can smell them. He turns northeast, where Conner can hear the shadows racing through the trees.

They're coming straight for us, Conner announces to the others.

Keep on them, M'gann says. I'm en route.

Likewise, Wonder Girl agrees, and she sounds positively gleeful.

Remember Batman's orders, Conner says, though he, too, feels anticipation singing in his very blood. He wonders if any of the younger team members realize how much of a hypocrite he is. Do not engage.

Gotcha, boss, Gar says with a salute. He's already morphing, his body shrinking and fangs receding. His bushy tail flicks as he leaps from their bough and into the adjacent tree. 

Conner is too heavy to follow into the higher boughs, and he's just about to decide whether he should go to ground or not when a small figure, wrapped from head-to-toe in black, bursts through the edge of trees. The figure stumbles, exhausted, and somehow maintains his footing, spinning gracefully on his heel and withdrawing the sword that was strapped to his back in a single fluid motion.

The newcomer just in time to meet those that chase him. Several ninja descend upon him, leaping from the trees and slinging their swords like extensions of their arms.

It isn't until the little ninja weakly meets the sword of another ninja, moonlight shattering across the reflective blades, that Conner recognizes what's really going on down there.

That down there? That is a child. 

Gods, he's as small as Jon is.

Conner can see the boy favoring his side. He can see the old blood crusted on his clothes, on the black scarf he's using to cover his face. He can see how he's unable to catch his breath, how he looks as though he's about to keel over at a moment's notice.

This child has been chased. He's been hunted. Like an animal.

Conner doesn't think. He doesn't ask questions. He leaps.

Superboy! M'gann shouts, and the sound of her voice is lost as he hits the ground with enough force to make the ground tremble.

One of the ninja loses his balance, and Superboy is on him in a second, driving a fist right into his face. Beast Boy swoops in from above, taking advantage of Superboy's distraction to dig his talons into the flesh of another rising his hand against the boy. The boy doesn't hold his strike. The poor ninja slumps over, blood gushing from a fatal wound in his gut.

"No!" Gar screams, regret and pain tearing through Conner's heart.

"Beast Boy!" Conner shouts, but the shapeshifter has morphed into a grizzly, using his massive paws to swipe at anyone in his way, and Conner loses him as another ninja tries to drive his sword into his back. The blade glances off Conner's skin, and he swings around to take the man out. The assassin boy, Conner can see, does not stop to mourn the death...s at his hands. He is already whirling to face his next opponent, a fury and drive in his motions that was absent prior to Conner's arrival. 

The Team's advantage has already been lost. The ninja have taken the surprise ambush in stride, and they fly across the ground as they fight, spinning and darting and approaching him and Beast Boy with equal measures of calm caution and calculated aggression. 

It doesn’t take long for Conner to assess the situation: he and Beast Boy are afterthoughts, nuisances, dog shit on the bottom on their shoes. The boy, though? They are fixated on the boy, and they don't hold back. Not for anything.

Not even when Miss Martian materializes and whacks a good five of them with a dead tree she's uprooted with her telekinesis.

Conner throws a ninja over his shoulder and makes eye-contact with M'gann, immediately pointing out the kid. He's grace incarnate, despite his injuries, and Conner's eyes are drawn to the blood staining the kid's blade. Confusion and distrust war within him, but he can't dwell on how he feels right now. It shouldn't matter that the boy has killed. He's fighting for survival right now, and Conner isn't about to let him die. 

He's just a kid.

"Protect the kid!" Superboy orders. "They're after him!"

M'gann nods in agreement, eyes glowing green.

The ninja continue to crowd them, unflinching as the clearing erupts with lightning, reeking of old pennies; unyielding as Cassie roars a war cry and cracks her lasso like a whip. Seeing these men stand down metas and Amazons and aliens without a single one of them losing their cool, Conner takes a brief moment to think that M'gann was understating things when she called these men "highly dangerous."

They are far more than that.

(Yup, he really owes the Bats an apology now. Still not looking forward to it).

More ninja spawn from Gods know where, and it's a mass of black shadows slithering and striking. Conner presses a hand to his ear. "Tigress!" he shouts into his comm. "We need backup!"

He doesn't wait for an answer. A ninja has slipped by their defenses, and from the corner of his eye, he sees the assassin kid fall to a knee, struggling to break free of his assailant's chokehold. Conner turns his back on the one he's fighting in favor of barreling right over to the kid, who has somehow contorted so that his legs wrap around the guy's neck. He uses his entire core to twist out of the hold, and it's so seamless Conner's sure even Dick would have been impressed.

Conner clonks the guy on the head as the kid scrambles upright and then uses his body to shield a sneaky dagger slash from another attacker. The punch he swings in retaliation may or may not have cracked a few ribs. "Stay behind me!" he hisses at the assassin kid.

Pale eyes of jade, striking against the black scarf, blaze with defiance. The kid is scowling at him, as though he can't be more offended by the suggestion, but the heat behind the sentiment is lost on Conner, especially considering the poor child is swaying on his feet like a drunken sailor.

Damn. This kid is running on pure grit and determination, unwilling to go without seeing this end, refusing to fall now.

Conner can see how capable the kid is. He knows he must be used to facing his foes alone. But he stands before the kid anyway, ready to tackle anything that heads their way.  

When he braces himself for the next attack, though, he sees that the cloud of ninja have begun to thin. The fight is winding down, several of the ninja finally pulling their heads out of their asses long enough to realize they are vastly outmatched: Conner can see the realization in their dark eyes, in their posture. They are going to run.

Beast Boy! Wonder Girl! Conner says, through their mental link. Don't let them get away!

The shapeshifter and Amazon sprint after the remaining ninja, tackling them down as they go. Miss Martian and Static have the idiots who remain to fight covered, and Conner feels a brief flicker of guilt for calling in Artemis and Kaldur's team when there was no real need to. 

Whatever. Better safe than sorry.

He activates his comm, about to report to Artemis what happened, when Conner hears a light thump behind him, and he turns to see the boy kneeling in the blood-slick grass, head bowed and breathing labored.

Panic steals his breath away. "Kid?" he exclaims. "Kid, you okay?"

There's a hissing snarl from the kid, a clear signal to stay back and stay away. Conner ignores it, falling to the boy's side. His muscles lock, trembling with fatigue and the last dregs of adrenaline, and Conner takes his hands back, for just a second. "You're safe now," he murmurs. "It's okay. They're gone."

Well, technically they're not gone. Conner looks up and sees Wonder Girl returning to the clearing. She has two ninja hog-tied with her lasso. M'gann is mentally shoveling unconscious and injured ninja to one side, with Gar standing guard. Static’s run to the Bio-Ship to gather as many restraints as he can find.

The boy looks up, too, eyes glazed. There's old blood smeared across his forehead. "It's over," he slurs, his voice high and clear.

Conner's heart pangs. Even up close, the kid looks no older than Jon, though his skills suggest otherwise. "Yeah, kid." 

The kid doesn't look like he believes him. His eyes scan the forest around them, darting around the trees. He begins to slump, and Conner catches him.

The boy flinches at the contact, turning his face away. His shoulders are shaking now, chest heaving as he struggles with something that sounds almost like laughter and a lot like sobs. 

"Oh no," M'gann whispers, and Conner finds her floating before them. She immediately kneels, taking over the situation. She's a bloodhound for this kind of thing, her compassion drawing her to the hurting and the unfortunate like a moth to flame. "It's alright now. No one is going to hurt you. Will you let us assess you for injuries?"

The boy doesn't move for a few moments and then slowly removes his hands from his side. M'gann takes them in hers, oblivious of the blood staining his palms, and rubs soothing circles with her thumbs. Conner takes the opportunity to survey the damage.

"It's nothing serious," he says. "Flesh wounds. May need stitches." He rips away at the sleeve of his long-sleeved t-shirt and has M'gann lift the kid's arms for him. With an ease that comes with years of practice, he wraps the kid's side. "What's your name?" he asks, because he should have at least the basics before he gets the kid real medical attention.

The boy's red-rimmed eyes sharpen. "Take me to Batman."

Conner's brow furrows, and he exchanges a look with M'gann. "That's not a name."

There's that scowl again, but it has no heat, no real power. "Don't be daft," he snaps. "I need to see Batman."

Now that the fighting has died down and the real threat has been eliminated, Conner has time to think, and he's beginning to put pieces together. Ninja, traveling the world, all for a single child? A child who dances with blades as though he's born for it? A child who's clearly been on the run since this whole thing started, assuming, of course, that he is this organization's only target? It's not forming a pretty picture, and the kid's suspicious demands really aren't helping matters. "Kid, you're in no condition to—”

"Please!" the boy blurts, and he moves to stand, but he can't. He stumbles pathetically, fresh tears welling from his eyes. With stiff hands, he shoves his mask from his face. "Please."

Hang on.

Conner's thrown into a pit of incredulity, the vipers and wraiths of the past few years waiting to take a new chunk out of old wounds. 

He knows this face. He knows this boy.

And he is the spitting image of his father.

“Please.” The word is barely a breath of noise.

M'gann's gasp echoes in Conner’s ears, and as the boy goes boneless, finally submitting to unconsciousness, she catches him and lowers him to the ground. "It can't be," she murmurs, glowing tears streaking down the dirt on her face. "I can't believe..."

"Gar!" Conner shouts. "Start up the Bio-Ship!" He doesn't have to turn to know the shapeshifter is going to ask why, and he barks, "NOW."

The others know better than to argue with that tone, and Conner returns to M'gann, who looks as hopelessly lost as he feels. "Check him," Conner says. "We have to be sure."

Central Asia. Northern Africa. 

"Yeah, yes," she mumbles. "Of course. Of course."

Her eyes glow, and Conner watches. Each heartbeat that passes is a millennium.

Brazil. Columbia. 

He feels a hand on his shoulder and faces Tigress, her blonde hair a mess of knots and twigs. She is out of breath, and he sees her expression contort from fury to violent shock as she notices the unconscious boy behind them.

"That...that's not..." Artemis says.

Guatamala. Mexico. 

The light dies from M'gann's eyes, but Conner knows the truth even before she says it. She's crying, reaching to brush the hair from the boy's brow. "Call the Bats," she whispers. "He's come home."

(They...had missed him. They had missed him. How could they have missed him? Time and time again?)

Conner doesn't waste another second. He taps his comm and tunes to the secret frequency known only to those the Bats trust, a frequency the entire Bat Family knows better than to ignore. It is their channel. Their private and personal channel, only to be used by allies in times of dire need. 

Or in times like this, when one of their own returned from the dead.

"Baby Bird has found the nest," he says, hardly hearing himself speak as he repeats the words he was taught, long ago. M'gann's eyes glow again as she telekinetically immobilizes Damian and begins to move him toward the open door of the Bio-Ship. Artemis is racing ahead, snapping orders at her team to stop gawking and actually contribute. 

"I repeat," Conner says in a stronger voice, so there is no doubt. "Baby Bird has found the nest."

~...~

Conner is both surprised and unsurprised when the first to make it back to the Cave's infirmary is none other than Jason Todd.

Conner is still in his torn uniform, sitting beside the pristine white cot where Damian is half-asleep, when he hears another heartbeat and controlled breathing from somewhere above him. 

Everyone else had been shunted out the moment Damian was rushed into the Cave, but even after Doctor Mid-Nite announced Damian's lacerations would heal without complication and he would make a full recovery after getting a whopping dose of fluids and mandated bed-rest, Conner refused to leave.

Because six years ago, Damian was kidnapped from within Wayne manor itself. No ransom was held. No calls were made. And a toddler’s body was found in the Narrows a week later, burnt to a crisp and unidentifiable but for the note left hanging from a bloody ribbon around the boy's neck, hinting it was an enemy of Wayne Enterprises, of Bruce Wayne, and not of Batman, who had done this.

The evidence was there, but the Bats didn't believe the body they found was Damian's. They scoured Gotham, the U.S., and then the world for Damian's mother, and his grandfather, whose organization had completely vanished after the Reach invasion failed.

Eventually, even Batman was forced to accept that his son was dead.

(Though that never stopped any of them. Conner had caught all of Damian's siblings running searches during downtimes, when they thought no one was watching).

"He's safe here," Doctor Mid-Nite assured, as though that was enough for someone who had to fight his way back to his family. 

Damian made a face but did not comment. He had not spoken much since they made it back to Mount Justice, the only exception being his outright refusal of all sedatives and painkillers. He fidgeted at his sheets anxiously, and Conner decided then and there he would not leave Damian alone to wait in total silence and anticipation. "I'm aware," Conner said coolly. He liked doctors about as much as he liked monkeys. "I just don't want to let him out my sight until he's safely in his family's arms."

I don't want him to feel like he's alone, Conner nearly added, remembering the crowd of heroes that had borne witness to Damian’s arrival at the Cave. I don't want him to feel like an outcast amongst his own.

But that would have embarrassed them both. As it was, Damian was already scowling at Conner's back. At nine (ten?) years old, he didn't think he needed anyone to look after him.

Doctor Mid-Nite surveyed Conner with piercing eyes and finally nodded, reasserting that Damian could only have one non-family member visiting at a time. After telling Damian he'd be back once Batman arrived, he left. 

M'gann, who found it hard to leave Damian as well, lingered a moment longer, standing on her tip-toes to press a quick kiss to Conner's lips. "Jon has been so good for you," she said as she followed the Doctor out.

He shrugged the compliment off. He never expected to be so good with kids, but between Dick's plethora of siblings, the young metas popping up everywhere, and his baby cousin...he's had a lot of practice.

Despite all obvious intentions to wait up for his family, Damian fell into a fitful sleep soon after his company left, and it was only then, when he was sure Damian was asleep, that Conner addressed the eyes he'd felt on them from above.

"You can come out now," he says to the empty air.

A minute passes before Redbird—no, not Redbird—drops from the ceiling. The Red Hood lands, silent as a jungle cat, and after straightening to his full height, he stands awkwardly in the center of the room, gaze fixated on the boy in bed.

This is the first time Conner has seen Jason since his return. He knows there's a lot of tension in Batman's family right now, and a good portion of it has to do with Jason and whatever vendetta he has. Conner doesn't understand it. He doesn't want to. He just knows that Nightwing asked the Team to be vigilant and cautious if they ever ran into Jason in the field.

"He's not the same person you knew," Nightwing said, his words pain-laden. "He's...getting better, but he's volatile, not thinking straight."

None of that matters to Conner now. If anything, the fact Jason came implies there's something more than revenge and madness and darkness in his heart. There's family loyalty and love and maybe it's a little mixed up right now, but at the core of it all... 

He's here. He's responded to the summons.

"You're the first one here," Conner says, his voice cracking the silence like a hammer against an eggshell. When Jason doesn't respond, still drinking up the sight of his younger brother, Conner sighs. "You can go to him. He demanded he be woken up when someone showed up."

Jason shakes his head, and his voice is distorted by the helmet when he says, "No. Don't wake him up." 

Conner frowns, and a part of him wants to argue that Damian wants this, but he holds his tongue. It's not his business.

"I'm not sure I expected you to come," Conner chooses to say instead.

"I'm not sure I expected you to play bodyguard," Jason shoots back with a sneer. Conner blinks, and Jason turns away. "...I had to be sure," he murmurs. "Before the Cuddle Monster and Boy Genius come with our ever-loving dad."

Conner is unimpressed by the undercurrent of resentment in Jason's voice, mostly because he can tell his heart isn't even in it. If anything, that resentment sounds a hell of a lot like longing.

But again. Not his business.

Conner settles back in his chair and gives Jason all the time he needs. Jason, for his part, never removes his helmet, never makes a move to get closer to Damian. After about ten minutes of silence, he suddenly chuckles. "You insane, brilliant kid. You had to go and one-up me, didn't you? Escaping the League like that?" he says, and Conner can tell he's smiling, under the hood. "Fucking badass, demon spawn. Fucking bad. Ass."

Jason makes to go the way he comes, but as he's about to haul himself back into the ventilation system, he pauses. "We owe you, Kon," he says sincerely. "Really."

It isn't until after Jason's disappeared that Conner mutters, just loud enough for Jason to hear from above, "Until next time, Red."

~...~

Nightwing doesn't have any of the reservations his younger brother had. He crashes through the door like a hurricane, causing Damian to jolt upright in bed and scramble for what Conner assumes is any one of the eleven various blades they found on his body while he was unconscious.

He doesn't recognize Dick at first, Conner can tell. He only knows that he's been jolted awake quite abruptly, and there is someone new in the room.

Conner opens his mouth to calm the boy, or maybe berate Nightwing for being a dumbass—he doesn't really know—but he's too late. Nightwing flies across the room like a bird of prey, ripping his mask off as he goes, and without hesitation, he bombards Damian, gathering him into a big embrace and crushing him into his lean chest.

He's crying. Unabashedly. His blue eyes are vibrant with his tears, and he is speaking in Romani, repeating the same phrase over and over again.

Damian holds himself stiffly, overwhelmed and uncertain, but as Dick continues to whisper to him, he begins to relax, and he pushes at Dick's face so that he can get some air.

Dick realizes Damian's holding back. Or maybe he doesn't. Dick can be a bit thick about whether his smothering is being well-received or not. Either way, he pulls away to scan his brother head to toe. "Look at you," he whispers, and he laughs a little, his voice cracking as he reaches out to brush Damian's cheekbone. "Look at you." Conner feels like he's intruding on a special moment, just being in hearing vicinity of the overwhelming pride in Dick's voice. "You've grown so much, Dami."

Damian stares at his older brother, kinda like Jason had been staring before, but to Conner, he looks uncomfortable. Lost. 

He doesn't know what to say. Because, honestly, what is there to say? Damian was three years old when he was taken. Dick was still Robin, Nightwing nothing more than a glimmer of a concept in his weird little mind. And so much has changed.

Dick seems to realize the same, and he is crushed. Crestfallen, his face crumbles, the light dying from his eyes like smothered embers. He doesn't stay down long, and he soldiers through his disappointment with what Conner thinks is supposed to be a reassuring smile. "Oh," Dick says, chuckling a little self-deprecatingly. He releases Damian, giving him some distance, and purses his lips. "I'm sorry. You probably don't remember me very well, do you? And here I am getting all up in your personal space. I'm—”

"Grayson," Damian says, and Dick lights up like a firework. "I remember. The concept of personal space was always a myth to you. I am not particularly glad to discover that has not changed."

Dick laughs incredulously, and he pulls Damian back to his chest, cradling his head. "You remember," he echoes. He holds the words in his mouth like he would a block of rich chocolate, and he says them again. And again.

Damian clutches at the Nightwing suit, and Dick basks for a moment before facing him again and babbling, "I can't believe it's you! I got here as fast as I could, Dami, and I know Dad's right behind—”

Damian goes rim-rod straight, and Conner turns to see Batman standing in the doorway, watching his eldest and his youngest embrace, a near-constipated expression on his face.

Damian and Batman stare at each other, and the room is electric, bottled emotions threatening to explode like a shaken pop can. 

Damian cracks open the can first. "Father," he greets, and he tries to stand (at attention? Conner's eyebrows shoot to his hairline. What the hell did the League do to this kid?), but when he grimaces in pain and is forced back down by Dick, Batman steps into the room and rumbles, "Easy. Don't hurt yourself."

Damian blinks, confused. "I must report," he says cautiously. "There is a lot I must tell you."

Batman pushes the cowl back, leaving Bruce open and vulnerable, and he swoops in, gently taking Damian from Dick's arms. "Later."

"But—”

"Damian," Bruce says, and he buries his face into his son's dark hair. "Son." He says the word like a prayer. "We can talk later. Right now...I just want you here, with us, where you belong." 

Damian melts into his father's arms and flinches again as Tim unexpectedly skids past the door. He corrects just in time to save himself from pitching forward onto his face, and he launches into the room with no less caution than Dick had. Conner, seeing the raw emotion on Bruce's face, and in that of his sons', takes this as his cue to leave.

He's no longer needed here.

He stands, and he's had enough of the Bats' stealth training to sneak out unseen. Despite his attempt, Dick's brilliant blue eyes catch his as he crosses the threshold, and over the top of Damian's head, he mouths, thank you.

Conner shakes his head, lingering guilt stirring in his gut, and with a satisfied smile, he leaves the family to their reunions, their tears, their giddy laughter, and their hushed murmurs of 'welcome home, baby bird. Welcome home.'

Damian will be alright now.   

Chapter Text

"No.”

“But Jason—”

“No.”

There’s an exasperated huff behind him. “If you would just take a second and hear me out…”

Jason stops dead in his tracks and spins around. “You’ve had your second, and I heard what you asked. I still say no.”

Stephanie rolls her eyes, and her dark shadow blinks up at him with big brown eyes. He doesn’t need words to know Cass is asking, far more politely, to agree to their request.

Shit. They’re tag-teaming him, those manipulative little shits. Cass knows that he can’t say no to her when she gives him that face. She learned that early on, and of course Stephanie has caught on to that, too.

“Please, Jason? We are so bored, no thanks to your gimpy brother over here.” Tim, who’s been wisely silent during the loud stomp through the Manor, shifts his crutches and gives Jason a helpless shrug and apologetic smile. Not for the first time, Jason wonders where the hell Tim even picked up this little blonde pain-in-their-asses.

Not that he usually minds. Steph is hilarious, especially when she sasses at Bruce and calls him out on his bullshit. She kicks ass as Spoiler, and she’s tough as nails. To be honest, she has been good for both Cass and Tim, drawing them out of what remains of their shells, and she’s brought some light into the Manor, something that was sorely needed after what happened to Babs. It’s nice, too, that she comes from the same background he does, if only because there are things only a Narrows kid can understand.

He thought Steph was actually really cool—far too cool for a dork like Tim, actually, but that’s neither here nor there.

Note the past tense thought.

“This is the only thing on the Alfred-Approved-Activities list,” Stephanie presses. “And Bruce said—”

“The fuck did Bruce say?” Jason bristles. The traitor.

“To ask you,” Tim is quick to interject. “Because Dick is still in Amsterdam with the Team, you know?”

Of course. “Just because I got my license last week doesn’t mean I’m going to be carting your sorry asses all over Gotham.”

"It’s not like you’re not going to get anything out of it,” Steph says. “There’s gonna be popcorn. And we’ll even buy those disgusting sour gummy worms you like so much.”

Jason pretends to consider the offer. “But, see, that’s not the point. Maybe I should rephrase. I refuse to take you, specifically, to the movies. No way.”

Steph gives him a sour look. “If this is about the last movie night—”

“You picked a fucking awful movie, Stephanie. It was traumatic.”

“Aw, c’mon, Jason! That was one time, and—”

“You also told me that M. Night Shymalan’s The Last Airbender ‘wasn’t that bad.’”

Tim’s face contorts into a real expression of pain. “Stephanie,” he says, and from the tone of his voice, you’d think he was offering his condolences at someone’s wake. “You did not.”

“She did,” Jason says before Steph can defend herself. “So forgive me if I don’t really trust your taste in movies, Brown.”

“You haven’t even let me tell you which one we want to see! It’s actually supposed to be pretty good!”

“No,” Jason says again.

Stephanie is about to round on Tim, probably to ask for backup, but Cass taps on Stephanie’s wrist, stopping her mid-spin. Stephanie immediately looks at her and smiles when Cass makes a loose fist and rubs her thumb over her knuckles.

“Oh, right! Good point, Cass." Steph turns back to Jason. "You’ll like it, I promise. It’s got Hugh Jackman in it!”

“Who?”

“Oh my God, Jason,” Tim says, looking pained again, because apparently it is just criminal not to know every name of every actor in Hollywood. “Hugh Jackman? The guy who played Wolverine?”

“Oh,” Jason says, and damn it all to hell, his interest is piqued. He tries not to showcase it. “Him.”

“You liked Logan, didn’t you?” Tim asks.

“Well, yeah, but—"

Stephanie, the bloodhound she is, can smell him weakening. “It’s a musical too,” she sing-songs.

There were only a handful of people who knew of his weakness for musicals and plays. It used to be a secret shared between him and Alfred, until Jason forgot himself and lost his collective shit when Fox decided to broadcast Grease: Live. There were multiple witnesses, and it was still talked about to this day. Jason knows immediately who would dare to use that as ammo against him. Tim, the little fucker, responds to Jason’s death glare with a smirk. “If you weren’t already injured, kid…” Jason threatens.

Cass tugs on his sleeve, diverting his attention. “Please?” she asks.

Jason considers her and then the other two, who’ve turned on their brightest, most expectant smiles.

He folds. “Fine.”

~…~

Jason has very few expectations going in. He doesn’t even know the name of the movie until Stephanie says it at the ticket window.

“The Greatest Showman?” Jason repeats to Tim, who’s been lagging behind as the girls run ahead to the concession stand. Considering the mildly pinched expression on his face, he’s probably been using the crutches far more than he’s used to. “What the fuck did you drag me to?”

Tim grins at him. “Don’t judge a movie by its title, Jason.”

“…You have no idea what we’re seeing either.”

“Nope,” Tim says cheerfully.

Jason smells a scam—because Little Mr. Trivia Guru should know exactly what he’s seeing—and he grabs Tim’s arm, a little more roughly than he intended. The kid nearly topples over, and Jason has to maneuver him back into balance. “Hang on. You never talked to Bruce, did you? Do you even have Alfie’s permission to be out of the house right now?”

Tim purses his lips, and Jason knows what that means. He begins to laugh. “Well played, kid. You do know I’m probably the last person you need to manipulate into getting you out of the Manor when you're on house arrest, right?”

“Sure,” Tim says easily. “But this way you won’t get into trouble when we get home.”

“Ha,” Jason snorts. “So you think.”

“I’ll make sure of it,” Tim says confidently. “It’s not your fault you believed me when we lied to you and said we had permission.”

Jason knows that’s not going to be Bruce’s argument—because you should know better, Jason; you shouldn’t be so reckless, Jason; you need to be more responsible, Jason; you need to think, Jason—but he nods anyway and tries not think about what’ll happen when they get home. Instead he ruffles Tim’s hair and says, “This better be a fucking fabulous movie.”

The girls find their way back to them, arms overflowing with overpriced snacks and drinks, and Jason dutifully takes a majority of it from them as they giggle and dance ahead, teasing Tim for moving so slow and mocking Jason simply because they think they can get away with it.

Newsflash: they won’t be. Next time he’s overseeing their training, they’ll get what’s coming to them. Or Steph will at least. Cass is already his superior, and he’s not ashamed to admit it. Nothing he throws at her will phase her.

But Jason Todd’s nothing if not creative. He’ll find another way.

They settle into their seats just as the previews start, and Jason has to give the kids credit for planning their escape from the Manor as well as they did. They must’ve had a schedule together from the very get-go.

Tim’s doing, no doubt.

Jason zones out through most of the previews, munching on popcorn and shushing Steph every other breath. Eventually, he gives up, empathizing with her bright eyes and hyperactive excitement, if only because he remembers what it was like. Once upon a time, going to the movies was a luxury, something he never could have done for the simple “hell of it.” He can give her this.

She shuts up the moment the first song of the movie begins, melodic chanting and a driving beat stunning her into silence. A silhouette of Hugh Jackman is highlighted by floodlights and interspersed by title slides. He tips his hat to the stomping feet in the stands, singing voice soft, and Jason knows, within seconds, from the cinematography and building anticipation of the song alone, he’s in for a treat.

He’s not disappointed. The music crescendos, and Jackman flies into the Center Ring (Center Ring?), horses prancing in his wake.

Holy shit. Is this a fucking circus movie?

Jason looks to his right, to grin and nudge at Dick, but when he sees a stranger instead of his older brother, he stops short and feels a rush of guilt, followed swiftly by something that feels a lot like melancholy.

(He doesn’t miss Dickhead. Not at all.)

His mood doesn’t last long. Jason is drawn into the movie immediately. The first scene is grand, imaginative, and visually stunning, and from the corner of his eye, Jason can see Cass watching the dancers with such blatant awe he can’t help but smile fondly.

That’s the last time Jason thinks to look at any of the kids. He’s downright enchanted, even during the cheesier scenes, because he can appreciate just how much coordination, stamina, and strength it takes to pull off some of the choreography. And the music? Screw everyone else, he’s going to be listening to the soundtrack for weeks after this.

And fuck him, that Phillip guy is hot.

The most prevalent thought he has throughout the nearly two-hour-long movie, though, is this one: Dick needs to see this.

The moment the movie is over, Jason turns to Tim. Tim’s already staring at him, and Jason says what they’re both thinking. “We need to bring Dick.”

~…~

So they do.

Tim’s ankle is healed, and Jason’s no longer grounded. Cass has learned to say a few more words, and she’s using them beautifully. It’s been a week since they saw The Greatest Showman, and all they’ve been able to talk about is how they want to surprise Dick.

It’s a bit pathetic, really, but there’s nothing that excites or amuses a Bat more than surprising someone. If that someone is another Bat? Hell, it becomes near orgasmic.   

The moment they hear Dick and the others are back at Mount Justice, already debriefed and resting after their success, they take one look at each other and race to the Cave. They pause just long enough to stick masks onto their faces. If all goes well, they won’t need them for long anyway. Cass is first to the Zeta tube, and they pile in, nearly on top of one another.

Jason’s the first out, and he ignores the other heroes lingering in the common room. He, Tim, and Cass beeline for Dick’s assigned room, where they’re met by Wally’s broad yellow shoulders.

“Move, West,” Jason says, and when Wally nearly jumps out of his skin (ha ha) and gapes dimwittedly at him, he decides to push right by. Cass does one better and ducks around Wally without trouble, Tim following on her heels.

Dick stands in the center of his room, half-dressed in his Nightwing gear, and he blinks incredulously at them. His face is just beginning to light up when Jason grabs his arm and tugs him forward. Tim, always thinking ahead, throws a pair of jeans at Dick, who catches them with his face.

“Get dressed, Bigbird,” Jason demands.

“Wha—?”

“Sh,” Cass hushes. “Dress. Surprise.”

Dick’s grin is blinding. “Sure, Cassie. See you later, Wally?”

Wally gives him a tired salute. “Yeah, we’ll talk later, dude. It looks like you’ve got some Birds to entertain.”

Dick takes advantage of Wally’s leaving by somehow swiping Jason, Tim, and Cass into a big embrace. “Awww, did you guys miss me?” he asks, nuzzling into Tim’s hair.

Jason struggles out of the grip. “In your dreams, Dickiebird.”

“We have something to show you!” Tim adds. “So let’s go.”

“Alright, cool your jets,” Dick says, laughing. “I literally just finished debriefing with Batman.”

Dick herds them outside his room, and within minutes, they’re all heading right back to the Zeta. Tim and Jason are leading, and Cass has Dick by the hand, dragging him as he fights with his last shoe.

Later, Jason would hear Black Canary, M’gann, and Superman mention how adorable it was that all three of them came to snatch Dick the moment they knew he was back, and he’d scowl.

(They didn’t understand just how important this was. They probably never would.)

Dick tries to get them to spill the beans the entire way to the theater, but they distract him by talking about school, about how Tim (moronically) sprained his ankle on patrol, about Cass’s new interest in hip-hop and breakdancing, about Bruce and the most recent scandal that had been “leaked” to the press. Dick, true to form, soaks it all in, and tells them stories about his month-long mission with the Team in Amsterdam’s Red-Light District.

He is halfway through a stupidly, yet conscientiously PG version of a story about Conner’s first experience in a strip club when they pull into the movie theater parking lot. “A movie?” he asks, bemused. His eyes widen, and he whips toward them. “A new Star Wars movie didn’t come out while I was gone, did it?”

Tim laughs. “I love how panicked you sound. We would’ve told you right away if that were the case.”

“Give us some credit,” Jason adds. “We don’t mess around with Star Wars. And Bruce would be here for that shit, too.”

Dick blinks. “Right,” he says slowly. “So what are we seeing?”

They don’t answer him. As planned, Tim corrals Dick toward the popcorn while Cass and Jason purchase the tickets. Dick allows them to manhandle him into a seat right in the center of the second-to-last row, and they flock around him.

Again, Tim has timed it perfectly. They only manage to work themselves into the beginnings of a popcorn fight before the lights dim, and they’re forced to settle down.

Dick is very obviously weirded out by how much attention is on him, which Jason finds kind of hilarious, especially when Dick tries, and fails, to read their expressions and body language like Cass does. He eventually gives up and ignores them in favor of watching the previews, providing a stupid running commentary the entire time.

Finally, the movie starts, and Dick’s eyebrows skyrocket when hears the first few notes of The Greatest Show. “A musical?” he murmurs.

“Sshh,” Jason shushes.

Dick’s expression becomes steadily more and more puzzled until the very moment P.T. Barnum flips his coat tails and signals for lights to hit the Center Ring. He jerks forward, hands whipping out to grip both Tim and Jason’s arms. His blue eyes are wide as he looks between his brothers. “This isn’t…?” he asks.

“Watch the damn movie,” Jason whispers.

Jason doesn’t take his own advice. He watches Dick instead. Dick’s stunned expression morphs into one of pure joy, his smile splitting his face as the rest of the circus comes into the forefront of the scene, and Jason can’t help but smile, too, when Dick sees the single snapshot of the trapeze and starts to laugh in complete wonderment.

When Barnum's flashback starts, Jason settles back, feeling pleased with himself. Behind Dick’s chair, he and Tim bump fists. Cass crawls over Tim’s lap, sitting right on top of him, just to hold Dick’s hand. Tim has to lean around her to watch the movie, but he doesn’t seem to mind.

And in the end, it's probably for the best that Cass knew before any of them did. Jason had assumed that this might be a bit of an emotional movie for Dick, of course, but he never expected the waterworks during A Million Dreams, of all songs.

He supposes he probably should have expected it, considering everything he’s learned about John and Mary Grayson over the years. Dick wipes his face as discreetly as he can, but he’s not really fooling anyone. Jason slides him some napkins and doesn’t comment. He won’t make fun of him for this. Never this.

Dick is just as entranced as Jason was the first time they saw the movie. Perhaps even more so. There is one instance, though, when Dick starts shifting in his chair, distinctly uncomfortable with the content on screen. It’s during the protestor scenes, and it comes to a head when P.T. Barnum shuts the members of the circus out of Jenny Lind’s after-party. Dick stands abruptly, and when Tim makes a noise of discontent, Dick mutters, “I can’t. I’m sorry, I can’t watch…”

Jason grabs his wrist and guides him back down. “Just wait. Trust me.”

The Bearded Lady starts belting out This is Me, and Dick’s predictably spell-bound again, scooting the edge of his seat, elbows on his knees. Jason catches Cass’s gaze behind Dick’s back, and she nods, a soft smile on her face.

He can see it, too. All three of them had known that this song, in particular, would resonate most strongly with their brother.

Dick remains captivated the remainder of the movie, and by the very end, he’s crying silently again, a nostalgic smile quirking at his lips when they show a quick image of kids running toward the Big Top. That smile doesn’t fade all throughout The Greatest Show reprise, and it lingers even after the credits begin to roll.

Jason, Tim, and Cass wait for Dick as the lights brighten and others begin to file out. They let him absorb it all without interruption.

Eventually Dick wipes his face again and slips out of his chair, crouching as he faces all three of them. “Thank you,” he says. “Thank you so much. For taking me to see this.”

Jason nods, fighting a smile, and Cass reaches out to touch Dick's face. “Glorious,” she enunciates slowly, as though tasting each syllable. 

"No apologies," Tim adds.

"Yeah," Dick agrees. "Not a one."

Chapter Text

It isn’t fair.

He doesn’t think as he sketches, his pencil moving of its own accord, the lines heavy and aggressive, his shading even more so.

It isn’t fair.

The music he has playing has long since faded into white noise. In fact, Spotify might very well have stopped playing altogether. He doesn’t know. Nor does he particularly care.

It isn’t fair.

The tip of Damian’s pencil breaks. He mechanically reaches for another, numb. It doesn’t matter that it’s the wrong grade. Or that it’s the wrong color. Father had bought this set for him, as a welcome home present. He still doesn’t know how Father knew. He never told him. In fact, he hasn’t told anyone. Sketching is a feminine art, according to Grandfather, unworthy of any young man’s time or effort.

And Ra’s Al Ghul, according to Grayson, is a sexist and classist pig, unworthy of anyone's consideration or love.

Damian doesn’t know what to think anymore. He doesn’t know what to believe. He doesn’t care. Why should he, when the moment he begins to care, everything falls to pieces? 

It isn’t fair.  

A spot appears on the paper in front of him, and he stares as the tear soaks into the fibers, darkening the graphite. He rubs a hasty fist across his face. Tears won’t help Father now. They won’t bring him back.

Because Father is gone, and there’s no rewinding time, there’s no magical resurrection, no time for regrets.

And yet, Damian does nothing but regret.

Damian had one month with his father. A single month. And what had he done with it? He’d spent a majority of it arguing and pleading and demanding. He’d spent even more of it beginning to resent his siblings, their teammates, and every other hero in the Community, and sometimes, that resent made him so spiteful he almost wished he were back with Mother, who, at least, had some modicum of respect for his abilities. Who didn’t treat him like a child.

He is ashamed now. He’d taken it all for granted. Every last second of it.

It isn’t fair.

The pencil tip breaks again.

He reaches for another, his sketchpad balanced precariously on his lap as he twists at the waist, and his fingers skim over the smooth wood.

“Wow,” comes a soft voice from over his shoulder.

Damian whirls, and he flips the pencil in his grasp, brandishing it like a dagger. He draws his legs up onto the armchair, ready to launch himself at whoever dared...

Drake is admiring his sketch with a soft expression in his eyes. He does not flinch away from Damian’s makeshift weapon.

Damian falters, momentarily shocked by his presence. In the month since he’s returned home, Drake has been awkward and distant at best, nasty and unwelcoming at worst, though that, in large part, is Damian’s own fault. He's the one who continuously needles at all of Drake's insecurities and goes for the throat whenever he discovers a new one. Or so Grayson likes to remind him every time he makes a snide comment about Drake's extended retreats from the Manor. 

“I didn’t know you did art,” Drake says quietly.

It takes a moment for a heated rush of humiliation to catch up to him, and he immediately yanks the sketchbook out of view and flips the cover closed. “Not that it’s any business of yours, Drake,” he snaps.

Drake is unphased. Of course he is. Because Drake is Drake. Drake, who makes it his business to know everyone else's business. Drake, the genius. The prodigy. The current Robin. Drake, so smart, so dependable, so integral to the Mission. 

Drake this. Drake that.

Detective, Grandfather has called him. It is a title of respect usually reserved for Father. None of the others have been held in such high esteem by Grandfather, but Timothy Drake, it seems, is not the others.

The little green monster in Damian’s chest unfurls. Isn’t it enough that Drake already has everything Damian wants? Isn’t it enough that Drake already has the respect, trust, and love of the entire Community, that he is—was—at Father’s right hand? That he is clearly the heir apparent? Does he really need to take that which Damian considers his last refuge? Something so deeply personal that he has not dared to show Father? That he hasn’t even spoken of it to Grayson?

Damian opens his mouth, vitriol and spite blazing at the tip of his tongue.

“I just...I think it’s beautiful, Damian,” Drake says, cutting Damian off entirely. “May I?”

Again, Damian hesitates, and he stares. For the first time, he really sees Drake standing before him. The teenager’s shoulders sag. He’s sickly, pale, with dark, heavy rings under his red-rimmed, puffy eyes. The fact he has pulled his hair back into a tail at the nape, and the fact he is clearly wearing one of Cassandra’s—or possibly Brown’s—thick cloth headbands, does not hide the fact he could do with a shower. 

This...this is his brother, Damian realizes. And he mourns. Just as deeply as Grayson mourns. As Pennyworth mourns. As Damian mourns.

Drake gives him a tentative, weary smile, and Damian, despite himself, relaxes his guard over his sketchbook. Drake's slender hands tenderly run over the book, and he looks at Damian again, asking once again for permission.

A spark of appreciation ignites in Drake's dead blue eyes when Damian does not stop him.

When Drake opens the sketchbook, it feels as though he’s peering straight into Damian’s soul. It is terribly discomfiting, and Damian finds he can’t watch. The fiddles with his music as Drake flips through the pages. It is filled with scenic pieces, with portraits of his family and their friends, animals and monuments and odds and ends. Oddly, Drake lingers on each and every one of them, as though...

Damian’s gaze snaps up, and he wonders.

Drake notices the attention on him and stops on the angry mess of a sketch Damian had been doing earlier. A series of linked rectangles are scattered over the page, bold lines arching over and over the entangled mess, disharmonious colors overlapping, his shading and blending completely illogical. He can see where his pencils have broken, where his hand decided to give out. It is an abstract piece, something Damian rarely cares for at the best of times, and yet, he finds himself transfixed.

“This really is stunning,” Drake murmurs. “And this one.”

Damian watches as Drake flips back a few pages, to a sketch of Father’s profile as he stands before the massive windows of his office, hands clasped behind his back, lips pursed and that crease in his brow prominent.

Damian had drawn it a few days before...before Darkseid.

“This one,” Drake says again, and his breath hitches.

Damian doesn’t know what to say, and he fights the lump rising in his throat.

It isn’t fair.

Drake abruptly stands. “Come with me. I have something to show you.”

He doesn’t wait to see if Damian follows him. Any other day, Damian wouldn’t, but today, he is too tired to fight, too tired to force himself to see it as anything but a genuine request. So he gathers up his sketchbook and follows.

Drake leads him straight to his bedroom, where he kneels at the edge of his bed and begins digging around underneath. Damian hovers in the doorway, only coming in when Drake emerges, dragging several thick tomes out as he does. At Drake's unspoken insistence, he sits beside him on the floor.

For a moment, Drake hesitates, an odd expression on his face, but eventually, he pushes one of the books toward Damian. With just as much care as Drake had shown Damian’s sketchbook, Damian opens the tome.

It’s a photo album, and Damian’s eyes widen as he stares at several breathtaking photographs of Gotham’s skyline.

Within a few pages, Damian is aware that no amateur took these. The urban landscape of Gotham was lovingly catalogued by the artist next to him, captured from rooftops, from what had to be the Bat Plane, from street-level, at angles that no normal person without a distinct lack of fear of heights could ever hope to achieve. Drake has taken pictures of the city, its people, its landmarks, its chaos and its grim beauty, during every phase of the day, and during every season, and they are gorgeous. 

There is one picture, taken in the dead of winter and from the very top of Wayne Tower, that Damian cannot take his eyes off of. The camera is angled just so that it feels as though the viewer is seconds away from stepping right off the edge and into a free fall. It sends a thrill racing down his spine.

Damian looks up at Drake, who smiles sheepishly. “You do art, too,” Damian says, a little stupidly. “I...never knew.”

“I don’t do photography as often as I would like anymore,” Drake admits. “I...used to carry my camera everywhere, but lately there hasn’t been time. I’m not surprised you didn’t know.”

“A shame,” Damian says immediately, and it surprises him the moment it’s out of his mouth. Coming from someone who has hid his own artistic talent, it feels almost cheap. Hypocritical.

He expects Drake to call him out on it, but he does not. Instead, he merely hums, and he flips through a few pages. “Look at this one.”

Damian studies it and recognizes it instantly. He settles his sketchbook on his lap, flipping back to his abstract piece and holding it side-by-side with Drake's picture.

What was once a mess of rectangles and sharp lines suddenly looks a lot like the Diamond District from street-level, Wayne Enterprises and its neighbors rising prominently and proudly out of the page.

“You have a good eye,” Drake compliments. “You should share it with the others.” His tone is fiercely passionate, a spark of justified anger stirring in his eyes. “Talent like this shouldn’t be hidden away.”

“And talent like yours should not be abandoned,” Damian returns.

Drake huffs a little laugh. “Perhaps.”

A vein of mutual respect settles between them, and Drake leaves the photo album open as he pulls the other toward him. “This...this is the Family Album,” he says, and he looks even more embarrassed than he did before, with his first album.

Damian opens it and finds the first page dominated by a picture of what has to be a young Richard Grayson, if that godawful sequined performance leotard and wild grin is anything to go by. He is flanked by two adults in leotards that are the inverse of his, and Damian spends some time soaking in the laughter and love in their eyes before turning his attention to the fourth person in the photo.

“That’s...?”

“Me, yeah,” Drake says. “Before Robin. Before it all.”

Damian flips the page and finds more pictures, clearly taken by a far less proficient hand. The shots are shaky, blurry, oddly framed, but they all capture the same subject.

The Bats and Birds of Gotham.

“How did you...?” Damian asks, incredulous. He flips a few more pages, the shots becoming stronger, steadier, clearer, with every page.

“I followed them when I wasn’t supposed to,” Drake says. “This was before...well. Before everything.” He took the album from Damian and went all the way to the very back. “Here. This one is my favorite.”

It is a shot of Batman, and there’s a smile teasing at his lips. He’s the focus of the picture, but Damian can see two small shadows flitting ahead, where Batman’s gaze is fixed. It is a once in a lifetime shot, and Damian feels a pang deep in his chest.

“I was never meant to be Robin,” Drake admits quietly. “I was the stalker kid from next door, and I was such a big fan of the Flying Graysons I couldn’t help but recognize Dick’s quadruple somersault out there, on the streets. It was easy to figure it all out after that. I never expected—I mean, I really just meant to mind my own business and keep taking my pictures, you know? I was going to take every last one of them with me to the grave, but then...”

“Things changed,” Damian says. He only has a vague recollection of Drake's story, but what he does recall does not flatter Timothy Drake’s parents in the least.

“As things do,” Drake agrees. “Sometimes I wonder if I’m an awful person, because if I had the chance...” He shakes his head. “I had to work hard—to keep up, to live up to Dick’s Robin and Jason’s Redbird—and it hasn’t always been easy, but I don’t think I would go back and change a damn thing. Not for the world.”

Damian fidgets, and he has the sudden revelation that Drake is sharing something he hasn't told many others before. “Why are you telling me this?” Damian asks.

Drake frowns thoughtfully. “I overheard Dick talking with Jason last night.”

Damian’s nose wrinkles in disgust. “Todd?”

Drake hears the antagonism in his voice, but he does not censor Damian, as Grayson or Father might have. “I won’t make excuses for him, but...he’s our brother.”

Drake says it like it’s the easiest thing in the world, and as Damian looks at the rare picture of Batman smiling at his eldest birds, Damian wonders if maybe, despite the lengths Todd has gone to deepen the rift between members of the Family recently, it is as easy as that. Isn't that what Grayson preaches at him, day in and day out?

"And?" Damian asks. "What did they speak of?"

“They are going to share the cowl.”

Whipping his head around, Damian stares. “What?” he chokes out. “That must be some kind of joke.”

Drake returns Damian’s look. He’s dead serious, expression solemn, eyes fierce, calculating, hard.

Not for the first time, Damian thinks of Nightwing taking the cowl and every last cell in him rebels. And Todd? Red Hood? Disregarding the fact Hood has only just recently started repenting for his previous misdeeds—or rather, not actively trying to create unrepairable fissures amongst them—how can any of them hope to work together? Like this? They are fractured. Broken. Father has left a gaping hole, and there is no filling it. Not with false confidence, not with tricks or replacements, and certainly not with whatever this was.

“He cannot,” Damian says. “They cannot.”

He’s heard the arguments. The most memorable one had occurred not even twenty-four hours ago, when Wallace West stormed from the Zeta tube, raging and hollering at Grayson with all that he had. They had gotten into a fist fight over the subject. Pennyworth had to break it up, and West had left with blood streaming from his nose.

I’d die for you, Dick, West had said, before he had left the Cave. And I’d do anything for you. Anything but this. You can’t ask me to do this. I can’t...I can’t watch you destroy yourself.

“So we all told him,” Drake agrees. “But he’s set on this. So’s Jason.”

Damian knows both of his eldest brothers are stubborn to a fault. And together? To hear the others tell it, together they were once unstoppable. He cannot imagine what a renewed alliance will bring, but without the acceptance of the Family, there is every likelihood their eldest brothers will fail, bringing all of Gotham with them.

Timothy has clearly realized the same thing, and Damian sighs. “There will be no convincing them, then?”

“No.”

Damian nods, staring back down at Batman’s smile, frozen in time, and Drake adds, “And that means it will be up to us to watch out for them.”

Us. Heart leaping to his throat, he looks up, incredulous. Drake smiles, and it’s simultaneously playful and encouraging. Damian feels his own lips begin to turn upward, something like a smirk settling onto his features.

“I’m taking Redbird,” Drake says. “Jason agreed already. Or rather, he flipped me off and said something to the effect of 'what do I care,' which is as good as permission." That elicits a snort from Damian, and Drake continues, "And given the circumstances, I think...well, I know your dad isn’t going to be happy that we’re letting you do this, but I’m going to need help, Damian. I have a theory, and screw Dick, but I need to put my all into finding out if I’m right. I won’t rest until I do. And those boneheads need us, too. So Robin is yours, if you—”

“Yes,” Damian says automatically. “Of course.”

Some of Drake's world-weariness disappears, the grin on his face both broad and shrewd. He is clearly amused by Damian’s immediate response, but it isn’t amusement at Damian’s expense. No, it’s...amusement he shares, knowing, down to his core, just what it means to be offered Robin. “You haven’t even heard the conditions yet. There’s bound to be a ton. From everyone.”

“Does it matter?” Damian asks. “All I have ever wanted was...”

He trails off, and Drake gets it. “That’s all I ever wanted, too.”

They are not so different, Damian realizes. How odd. Perhaps...Perhaps he has done Drake a disservice, a misjustice, by judging him so harshly. For letting his envy get in the way of a relationship with him.

Drake's smile becomes sharp, impish, and he offers Damian a hand.  “So truce? For now?”

We’re stronger together, Richard had said a few days ago. We have to stand together. Damian had thought it fanciful and foolish at the time. The sentiment had been far too naïve, especially with Batman gone. Timothy had done nothing but scoff into his coffee mug, too, now that he thinks about it.

But now is a different story. 

Damian accepts the hand. “Truce.”

Chapter Text

“Is...he okay?”

Jason startles and looks up from The Giver. The new kid flinches when Jason makes eye contact, big blue eyes flickering down, away. He gnaws at his lip and bounces a mechanical pencil between his fingers. The math worksheet in front of him is half-complete, mottled with restless doodles.  

In that moment, Jason realizes the kid’s been watching him read for some time now, building up the courage to break their silence, and isn’t that freakin’ weird. No seven-year-old should have that much impulse control, let alone be that quiet.

Then again, no seven-year-old should behave like Tim Drake does. Period.

It’s unnerving, for one. And fucked up, for another. Jason can’t help but wonder...

He shakes the suspicious, prickling sensation. Even after three weeks, Tim is still...his own mystery. One Jason gets anxious and downright furious after considering for any length of time. 

Jason takes too long to respond. Color rushes to Tim’s face without warning, and he ducks lower in his chair, as though to make himself seem even smaller than he is. It’s so pitiful Jason immediately feels like an utter asshole. Tim does this a lot—far too often, actually—and Jason doesn’t know what he’s doing to cause it. He’d stop if he could. 

Gut sour with discomfort, he awkwardly opens his mouth to try to say something—anything— to make it better. 

“I’m sorry,” Tim blurts before Jason can fix things. “It’s just...I couldn’t help but notice...I mean, Dick is—he...he hasn’t been...”

Oh. Shit. 

This was supposed to be an easy gig. That’s how Bruce framed it, anyway. “Keep an eye on Tim,” Bruce had said. “Do your homework,” he’d said. “Make sure he does his work too,” he’d said. “You should be fine,” he’d said.

(It may or may not have been heavily implied somewhere in between the lines that maybe—just maybe—if Jason finished all his work and helped Tim finish his before Alfred set the table for dinner, Bruce would take him out later. As Redbird.)

Quickest deal Jason had ever made. Bruce hadn’t taken him out much since...

Well.

Dammit, Dick, Jason curses helplessly. You should be here. I don’t know how to do this.

It’s a selfish, unfair thought. Dick was there for a bit. Right when Tim arrived. He welcomed Tim in that easy, cheerful way he welcomed everyone, and Jason had seen how Tim looked up at him with stars in his eyes and a shy smile on his face. Though that wasn’t quite Jason’s experience when meeting Dick the first time, Jason cannot deny that...Dick’s become an okay brother in the time since. The weirdo has a tendency to draw people out of their shells, no matter how hard or thick. Jason knows what it's like, to have your layers peeled away without ever realizing they’d been there in the first place. 

He’d already begun to see the signs in Tim. And maybe it was premature and self-gratifying, but Jason thought he was helping Tim, too. He and Dick and Bruce and Alfred, all together.

But now...well, ever since Dick left for that big training exercise, Jason’s noticed Tim’s stars and smiles have become few and far between.

Jason hasn’t seen Dick much either. Since.

No one has. 

A different hue of unease stirs in Jason’s gut, even more pronounced and ugly than it was earlier, and he sets his book aside. The smile he forces on his face is awkward and stiff. “He’ll be okay,” Jason says. He catches a flicker of a disbelieving frown on Tim’s lips, and he casts about for an excuse. “It’s just...the anniversary is coming up, you know?”

Tim’s intense, intelligent gaze flicks up to his for the briefest moment, betraying a flash of defiance and near-exasperation that reads don’t lie to me.

Jason’s hackles rise with suspicion once again, and he raises his chin, daring Tim to push further.

It isn’t necessarily a lie, in all honesty. Jason was around last year. He saw how the weeks leading up to the date drew deeper and darker circles around Dick’s eyes; how Dick forced himself to behave like a normal human being, as though they couldn’t all see exactly how hollow it was making him on the inside. Jason saw how, when the performance became too much, Dick...vanished. Not just physically, but emotionally. 

Dick’s grief was an unnatural thing, so starkly at odds with how he usually behaved Jason hadn’t known what to think at first, much less how to act around him. Its presence was more suffocating than Bruce’s, in some aspect. Louder, too. A deafening void felt by everyone in his vicinity.

And most especially in his distance. 

There’d been one point, back at the very beginning, when Jason believed he would have given anything to get Dick off his back for, like, so much as thirty seconds. But Jason hadn’t understood. He hadn’t understood a damn thing. He’d grown so used to Dick’s incessant chatter and overbearing presence that in the sudden and unexplained absence of all those things, he’d realized what he had to lose. And having lost it without rhyme or reason, he’d...begun to think all sorts of things that weren’t true. 

Exactly the sort of things that Jason suspects Tim is thinking now, too. 

After nearly two years in Wayne Manor, Jason likes to think he knows Dick better now. Likes to think he understands more of the nuances to Dick’s silence and laughter. 

Whatever this is? It isn’t grief. Not in the most traditional sense, in any case. 

So that only means one thing: Bruce hasn’t told Jason what really happened during that exercise—the very same exercise, he feels the need to add, that delayed his own introduction to Team training sessions by another couple weeks. 

(And fuck you very much for that, Dick et al. Jason’s still smarting over that particular disappointment).

But Tim can’t know about any of that. Shouldn’t know about any of that. “Shouldn’t” being the key word there. Tim’s only three weeks into his stay at Wayne Manor. They were all being extraordinarily careful to keep Tim away from their nightlife, but now that his stay is beginning to look more permanent the longer an infuriated Bruce goes without word from the Drakes, Jason doesn’t know how long the secret will last.

If it lasted at all.  Tim’s too clever not to figure it out. To have not already figured it out.

But what does he know? Jason doesn’t know anything. 

No one will tell Jason anything.

Dammit, Dick, Jason thinks again. 

Jason picks his book back up and feigns nonchalance. He ignores the way Tim looks up at him, then, once his attention is diverted. He pretends he can’t feel the weight of the kid’s observant eyes. 

He hates himself for it.

“Dick’ll be alright, Timbo,” Jason reiterates, a little more brashly than he intended. With some effort, he tries (fails) to moderate his tone. “He always is. I promise.”

Tim doesn’t argue. Of course he doesn’t. He shifts uneasily—unhappily —in his seat and returns to his math homework. Jason doesn’t look up. He knows what he’ll see. 

Mind churning, he flips to the next page and stares blankly at the text.

It may as well have been written in Latin. He doesn’t absorb a single word.

Jason finds Dick exactly where he expects him to be.

His brother is star-fished on one of his mats in the Bat Cave, staring up at the gymnastics equipment hanging above. He hasn’t moved in awhile. The lights in this section of the Cave have dimmed to their safety settings, only to burst alight as Jason makes his way toward Dick’s gym. The sweat from his workout has long since dried, too, leaving his hair limp and sticky against his forehead. An empty water bottle and crumpled towel lay discarded at his side.

Dried sweat and lighting aside, Dick looks like the pile of dog crap someone stepped in and attempted to smear back across the sidewalk they found it on.

It ain’t pretty, is what Jason is trying to get at. 

“Hey,” Jason calls. He tosses his peace offering at Dick, whose reflexes, at least, haven’t gone by the wayside since this latest Team debacle. Dick’s hand snaps up to catch the fresh water bottle. He brings it to his chest without lifting his head, acknowledging Jason’s thoughtfulness with a soft hum.

“We missed you at dinner,” Jason presses, after a significant span of silence. “Again.”

Dick rises onto his elbows to prop himself up. “Oh,” he says dully.

“Oh?” Jason repeats, incredulous. “Dick, this is the fifth time this week. It’s also nearly two in the morning. Did you realize that?” 

Jason welcomes the edge of defensiveness in Dick’s tone as he responds, “I was at Mount Justice. I’ve been at Mount Justice.”

“Well, whoop-de-doo for you,” Jason snarks, temper flaring as he crosses his arms. “I haven’t been. Because of reasons.”

Dick winces and pops the cap off the bottle. He fiddles at it without taking a drink. “Yeah,” he says quietly. “I am sorry about that, for the record. I know how excited you were.”

Jason bristles and glares heatedly before recognizing the sincerity in Dick’s voice. With a heavy sigh, he lets it go and toes off his shoes. Dick curls up into a seat and tucks his knees to his chest as Jason steps onto the mat, plopping beside him unceremoniously.

Dick stares unseeingly past Jason, resting his chin on his knees. He’s clearly caught up in his own head, and Jason won’t have it. He nudges his toes against Dick’s calf and kneads them obnoxiously into the muscle.

Dick doesn’t respond like he should. He doesn’t swat or kick back. Doesn’t growl or grimace or roll his eyes or call him gross. He merely shifts out of range, and something about that isn’t right. It isn’t right at all.

“The new kid’s been asking about you, you know,” Jason reveals, drawing his foot back. 

“The ‘new kid’ has a name, Jay,” Dick reminds him, more on reflex than anything. He sounds exhausted, but Jason has found his foothold. He’s not about to give it up.

“I still think there’s something off about that kid.” 

Dick groans and throws his head back. “This again? He’s seven.” 

“Do you want to know what I got up to when I was seven?” Jason demands. When Dick purses his lips, Jason sits back and folds his arms. “Yeah, I thought so.” 

“Look,” Dick sighs. “Odd acquisition from Catwoman and lack of genuine parental supervision notwithstanding, Tim is—” 

“Far, far smarter than he lets on. He’s got these...vibes.” 

Dick gives him a flat look. “Vibes.”

“Shut up,” Jason retorts. “You’d feel it too if you, oh, I don’t know, actually spent more time with him? For some weird reason, he seems to really look up to you.” 

“Ha ha.” 

Jason spins on his ass so that he’s sitting directly across from Dick. “I’m serious,” he says, forcing Dick to look him right in the eye. “Did you even once think about what this looks like? From his perspective?”  

When Dick doesn’t respond, blank-faced, Jason grumbles a creative, half-formed curse under his breath. “Jesus, Dicks-for-brains. Do I have to spell it out for you?” It’s a rhetorical question. A week’s worth of unanswered questions and frustrations boil over, and Jason goes off. “You have to remember what it was like, when you first got to this place! It’s big. It’s intimidating. It’s weird. Bruce and Alfred are great, but...” Jason stutters to a halt, tripping over his tongue and feeling naked with unexpected vulnerability. He alters his course. “You and I spent a lot of the first week helping B and Alfred get this kid acclimated, giving him the attention his parents obviously never gave him, assuring him it’s okay to trust us and actually act like a kid around us, and then what? You do—” He waves his hand haphazardly “—this. You avoid us. You disappear. No warning. No obvious reason.”

Jason allows that to sink in for just a moment. He doesn’t revel in the dawning expression of horror and guilt on Dick’s face, but that’s kind of what he gets for holing himself away and giving mixed signals to a kid already suffering from a plethora of abandonment issues. 

“What do you think he’s thinking right now?” Jason asks to drive the point home.

Dick clutches his knees closer to his chest and buries his face into his knees with a pained groan. “Nothing good,” he mumbles, voice torn and haggard. “Crap.”

“Look, I’m not saying all this just to make you feel like shit,” Jason says. “I’m trying, okay? But Bruce has been busy tracking down the Drakes, working the new serial bank robber case, and doing God knows what else for the JL. Alfie can only do so much, too, keeping up with all four of us. And I’m not you. I don’t know what the fuck I’m doing.” 

Dick twists his head just enough that Jason can see the impish quirk of his lips. “I don’t know, Jay, you seem to be getting the hang of the big brother thing faster than I did.”

Heat rises to Jason’s face, and he scowls, avoiding the single sparkling eye Dick has trained on him. “Yeah, well, don’t go singin’ my praises or anything. I’m not only asking for Tim.”

The small spark of humor in Dick’s eyes brightens, and he draws himself upright again. “Awww, someone worried?” he teases.

Jason shoves a hand at Dick’s face and pushes him away. Dick totters and catches himself with his hands, barking a short laugh that sounds...off.  

Jason recognizes it for what it is. A diversion. A lie.

“Bruce doesn’t take me out as often when you’re not there to help ‘keep an eye out’ or whatever,” Jason argues. Dick’s expression is still too smug for Jason’s tastes, so he gives up the pretense. He honestly should have known better. “And it isn’t like you. Babs finally cornered me at school yesterday. I had to cover for you.”

At the mention of Babs, Dick sobers, and Jason sighs as the mood darkens around them. Not one to be intimidated, he demands, “So come on. What gives? What happened with the Team last week?”

A shutter falls over Dick’s face. It’s guarded and shadowed beyond recognition. But even that doesn’t last long. That last defense slips, leaving Dick wan, afraid, and...

Lost.

Jason’s blood runs cold. Dick’s not exactly arrogant (most of the time), but he’s never been unconfident . Not like this. And never about Robin. 

To his credit, Dick doesn’t try to avoid the question. “Bruce didn’t say?” he asks, tone sardonic.

Jason shakes his head. “Only that something went really wrong.”

Dick mouths the words something went really wrong and snorted darkly. “Yeah, that’s one way to put it.”

“...So?” Jason prompts. 

Dick hesitates, oscillating. The look on his face...Jason almost wishes he didn’t ask. Dick’s usually so open that Jason never had to feel bad asking him anything before. In fact, Dick had told him he could. 

Don’t be afraid to ask, okay, Little Wing? Robin had said to Redbird, on his first night in the new suit. There’s no room for embarrassment out there, and no matter how much you want to make your own way, my mistakes shouldn’t ever be yours too.

Jason had brushed him off, naturally. He’d been ready to go. Ready to test his skills and run the rooftops with the Batman. He hadn’t wanted Dickiebird ruining the entire experience with another last-second platitude presented à la kiddie-gloves. 

And yet...he still remembered what Dick was really offering. Word for word.

“You don’t have to tell me,” Jason back-peddles, beginning to rise. “Forget it. I shouldn’t have asked. I’ll just—”

Dick’s hand catches Jason’s wrist. “No. I—stay.” He looks like he’s about to be sick, and Jason hesitates, raising his eyebrows. Dick grimaces and squeezes Jason’s fingers. “Please.” 

Jason’s gaze dances across Dick’s face and, sensing Dick isn’t just humoring him, he deliberately settles back into a cross-legged seat. 

Dick exhales slowly. “It was a simulation we agreed to beforehand,” he explains. He’s choosing his words carefully, like each one is razor sharp and bristling with thorns. “M’gann—Miss Martian...she accidentally hijacked the exercise with her powers, and we forgot it wasn’t real. All of us.”

“Oh,” Jason murmurs, sensing where this is going and not liking it one bit.

“Bruce didn’t tell us beforehand the entire exercise was designed to be doomed-to-fail,” Dick reveals. “We got trapped in there. As...everything fell apart.”

Jason goes still, growing colder with each silent second that tumbles, clumsy and bulky, between them. Suddenly, he’s thinking about his mom. About the elastic band around her arm and her fingers dangling like icicles over the edge of the tub. Hers was the first corpse he’d ever seen. Jason swallows over a harsh uprising of bile. 

“No one made it?” Jason ventures cautiously. “You didn’t make it?”

Dick’s lack of response is damning. He inhales a shuddering breath. “But...that’s even not the worst part.” 

Jason doesn’t know what can be worse than what he’s imagining now. He closes his eyes, forcing away the mental images. “What was the worst part?” he asks anyway.

“I...already mentioned this to Black Canary. But it’s...it’s not going away.” Dick rakes a hand through his hair, fingers tangling in the locks. “I can’t shake it. I can’t even look at my uniform or think about being the Robin to ‘Batman and Robin’ without...”

“What does Batman have to do with any of it?” Jason asks, uncomprehending. It seems to Jason the death of Dick's teammates—hell, the fact he experienced his own death—is the significantly larger issue here. 

“Everything!” Dick exclaims, throwing up his hands. “Because I had to take charge in that hell, okay? The Justice League was wiped out. Aqualad died, and I had to step up. I had to do what he would do. What he trained me to. And—and I just...” Dick’s voice breaks, and he hunches forward. “I thought I wanted to be him, one day. But I can’t do that again. I can’t be him. It’s not me. It can’t be.”

Jason stares, watching his brother crumple before his eyes, and perhaps he should have taken a second to compose a more graceful response. Perhaps he should have really taken a good look at why his experience is tearing Dick apart; why he felt the need to avoid his family and friends while dealing with this new trauma.

The fact of the matter is, Jason does try to imagine it. Dick as Batman. And like a computer program running and crashing through a chaotic tangle of code…

Jason bluescreens.

“That’s the most idiotic thing I have ever heard come out of your mouth.”

Dick’s red-lined eyes flash up to Jason, indignant and hurt, but it doesn’t register to Jason why that is. He’s so angry at how stupid and ludicrious and hypocritical and friggin’ illogical Dick is being that all he wants to do is smack him around until he gets it through his thick skull just how wrong he is.

“It wasn’t real, Dick. And I’m sorry it felt like it was, but the fact remains it wasn’t. You know the goons and all the others out there will say all sorts of shit,” Jason rants, words clipped and curt, “but we’re not just Batman’s little birds, flitting around at his beck and call.” His fingers twiddle mockingly in the air before he drops them and stares Dick down. “You told me that, remember? You gave me this whole speech about how our job—our real job—isn’t to be the sidekicks. It’s to be whatever we want to be. Do you remember that?”

“Yeah, of course I do,” Dick croaks, “but that’s got nothing to do with—”

“There’s no ‘Batman and Robin’ without you, dumbass,” Jason continues, bypassing Dick’s protest entirely. ”You’re Robin. And you won’t ever be the Batman part of that equation. Neither of us will. Not because we won’t become awesome heroes with or without Bruce’s help, but because he’s doing everything in his power to prevent us from becoming like him. That’s why he took us in in the first place. You also told me that, if you recall.”

Of course Dick recalls. Everyone probably recalls. It had been a bad night, the worst Jason had since Bruce picked him up off the streets. Jason overreacted when Bruce overreacted about something else, and after a blazing shit storm of miscommunication and previously undiscovered triggers, Jason left the argument blindsided and scared. He hadn’t understood why Bruce was so upset. Why he yelled so much. 

Jason convinced himself he was seconds away from getting shipped right back to Crime Alley. He seriously considered leaving on his own terms, cutting his losses and running away that very same night.

Dick was the one who talked him out of it. 

“Yes, fine, valid, but I still sacrificed everything and everyone for that mission, Jay!” Dick explodes. He rockets to his feet, fists clenched. “Just like he would. I did that. No one forced me to. That was all me.”

“Then find a better way,” Jason challenges. “You know better now. So be better. Be. Fucking. Robin.”

Dick’s startled laugh is strangled. It rankles, if only because it sounds pretty condescending to Jason’s ears.  “If only it was that easy.”

“It is,” Jason asserts stubbornly. Is Dick really so short-sighted he doesn’t see just how much Robin changed Gotham? Changed Batman? Hell, the entire Justice League ?

Doesn’t he realize how much he actually changed Jason’s life? Just by existing at all? 

There would have never been a Redbird if there hadn’t already been a Robin. And he’s not even sure there would have been a Jason Todd-Wayne if there hadn’t been a Dick Grayson in Bruce Wayne’s life first, either.

And, ugh, it’s giving Jason indigestion just thinking about it. He rejects the fluffy, disgustingly hero-worshippy feelings and reminds himself who he’s really talking to. This is Dick, after all. Dick, who thrives on waking him up on Saturday mornings by yanking his toes and divebombing him in bed. Who gives Jason noogies and wet willies every time he pins him during their sparring practice. Who leans his elbow on Jason’s head just to lord his height over him. Who sometimes makes his life difficult by being obnoxiously touchy feely at school.

(He doesn’t owe Dick anything).

“I don’t even know who Robin is anymore,” Dick says, morose and full of self-loathing. “Not after what I did.”

The admission cuts in ways Jason never expected it would. The humor and younger-brother resentment he attempted to garner as his shield shatters in a single blow, and he brushes at his abruptly burning eyes. Dick doesn’t see the angry, frustrated tears forming there, and it’s a good thing too. Dick doesn’t need any more doubts that he’s a hero in all the ways that matter.

Words aren’t working, clearly, so Jason rises to his feet and does the only thing he can think to do. 

He gives Dick an awkward hug. It’s...the first he’s ever initiated with Dick, he isn’t unaware. 

Dick stiffens, shocked, and then slumps into Jason’s hug, all of his rage and pain expelling itself in the single moment Jason’s arms wrapped around him. Hot tears soak Jason’s shoulder.

“Be someone else, then. It doesn’t matter,” Jason says bluntly, trying to hold himself still. Touch may be Dick’s love language, but it’s far from his. Though this...he has to admit this isn’t so bad if it means giving Dick something he desperately, desperately needs. 

This time, anyway. Jason hopes Dick won’t get too used to it.

“Because you’re not Batman,” Jason reiterates. “You’re you. And I’ll be there to remind you of that every single time you’re being this fucking stupid.”

Something gives. Jason can’t be sure if it was the talk or the hug or something else, but he thinks maybe he did manage to help fix something today when Dick pulls away with a watery chuckle. “Oh yeah?” he says lightly. He waggles a pinky in front of Jason’s face like a dare and offers a genuine smile. “You promise?” 

Jason scowls at Dick, too disgusted to be baffled by the complete one-eighty his mood had taken. Part of him wants to say, See? Look at yourself, you absolute clown. Batman wouldn’t be caught dead asking for something as childish as a frickin’ pinky promise, but when he looks up at Dick, he sees something that compels him to swallow the snark. 

It's strength. Hope. Trust. That Jason will spot him and catch him when he falls.

He hooks his pinky around Dick's. “Promise,” he vows.