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“Honestly, Drake, I could have driven myself to school,” Damian huffed.
Tim rolled his eyes. “This isn’t how I wanted to spend my morning either, Brat, so just shut up and we’ll get through this as painlessly as possible.”
Bruce had practically begged Tim to give Damian a ride on his way to the office so that he could make his meeting with one of Wayne Enterprise’s suppliers. Alfred was in England visiting a family member, and honestly, it was a miracle the manor hadn’t burned down. They were completely lost without their trusty butler. Tim had only agreed when Bruce promised to bring him a coffee from his favorite coffeeshop as a reward.
It was about a twenty-five minute drive to get to Gotham Academy, but it felt much longer than that to Tim. They crossed the bridge that took them over Gotham River and into the city. Gotham was bustling this time of morning, with people rushing to get to or from their jobs.
“I still don’t understand why I am forced to sit through the mundane torture of the American School System while you are not,” Damian tutted.
“It’s because I know how to interact with people my own age with making them cry,” Tim snorted. “Besides, you legally have to stay in school at least until you’re sixteen.”
Damian crossed his arms and stared out the window. “Your schools here are a joke. They teach only half of history, and most of it has been skewed to fit the idealistic Western philosophies that paint Caucasians as the saviors of man. It’s pathetic.”
Tim shrugged. “I can’t argue with you there. You’re in seventh grade, right? Do you have Mrs. Adams for history?”
Damian snorted. “Unfortunately. How that woman managed to get a degree is beyond me. She has zero perspective of any culture that is not European-derivative. I’m fairly certain she couldn’t even find Pakistan on a world map.”
“Yeah, she was a mess when I had her, too,” Tim agreed. “Although I can imagine you have it even worse with her.”
Damian tutted. “You have no idea. She made me read all the names of the hijackers when she taught about 9/11 because she didn’t know how to pronounce them. Like she couldn’t look it up.”
Tim cocked his head as he stopped at a red-light. “Damian, that’s not okay. Does Bruce know that happened?”
His little brother shrugged. “Father need not be bothered with such absurdity. I have grown accustomed to such ignorance.”
He clearly didn’t want to talk about the issue further, so Tim decided to let it go. He made a mental note to say something to Bruce later on, though. The red light turned green, and Tim began pulling forward. They were midway through the intersection when Tim caught something in his peripheral vision. A truck coming from Tim’s left had run the red light and was barreling towards them. Knowing a crash was inevitable, Tim swerved the car to ensure his side took the brunt of the force and threw his right arm over Damian.
There was a loud crash, and his world plummeted into darkness.
***
Damian let out a groan as he reoriented to his surroundings. They had been in a car accident, of that he was certain. He performed a quick self-assessment and was pleased to find he was relatively unharmed. He had several cuts from broken glass, but none of them were deep. He also found himself to have a few bruised ribs and would likely develop a nasty case of whiplash, but all in, all, he was okay.
Then he turned to look at Drake.
It was clear he had not been as fortunate as Damian. The entire driver’s side of the black Range Rover they had been driving had crumpled inwards and seemed to swallow his old brother whole. His left arm seemed to be a point of major injury. It was mostly hidden by the wreckage of the car, but Damian could see blood and deep lacerations that contained white fragments of what he assumed to be bone. Tim’s eyes were closed, his head slumped onto the airbag. There was a deep looking cut on his forehead that coated the side of his face in bright red blood, and another stream that trickled out of Tim’s mouth.
Damian sincerely hoped that was not a sign of internal bleeding.
Tim’s right arm was in his lap. It seemed a bit burned from the airbag, but it didn’t look broken. Damian wondered why Drake’s arm had airbag burns, but then he came to a nauseating realization: Tim had protected him. He had reached his arm out so the airbag didn’t hit Damian as hard, and judging by the angle the truck had come at them and the sharp swerve Damian had felt just before the impact…
“D-Drake?” Damian croaked in a small voice that would have disappointed his mother and grandfather. When Drake didn’t answer, Damian shakily wrapped his hand around his brother’s wrist and felt for a pulse.
He let out a breath in relief when he found one.
“Drake, wake up,” he ordered, trying to sound authoritative. “I’m serious. Wake up!”
Tim didn’t stir.
“Drake, I swear if you die I will personally drag your ass into a Lazarus pit just to kill you myself!” he threatened. The dust from the crash must have been making his eyes water, because Damian Wayne did not cry. Especially over the likes of Timothy Drake. Even if the idiot had sacrificed himself so Damian didn’t get hurt.
Damian took a deep breath, ignoring the throbbing pain of his bruised ribs. Yelling at Drake clearly was a waste of breath. He could hear the screams of people outside their car, so he assumed emergency services had already been called. He thought about getting his phone and pressing his panic button to send out a distress signal but decided against it. They were Tim Drake and Damian Wayne right now, not Red Robin and Robin. The best he could do was sit there and hope Tim didn’t die.
It seemed like hours before the medics arrived. Damian’s door was pried open by firefighters. He looked over at Tim’s side, but the emergency personnel hadn’t been able to remove the totaled door quite yet. Damian just hoped they wouldn’t be too late.
A fireman crouched in front of him and began assessing Damian’s condition. “Hi there, son. My name is Peter, and I’m a fireman. This is my partner, Tom. What’s your name?”
Damian usually hated being addressed as a child, but he couldn’t bring himself to be annoyed at the moment. “Damian. Damian Wayne.”
“Okay, Damian, are you hurting anywhere?”
“I’m fine. I think my brother took the brunt of the crash,” he responded. Normally, calling Drake a brother made him want to vomit, but his usual description of “Father’s charity case” just didn’t feel right for the situation.
The fireman nodded. “We’re gonna get your brother out, but he’s a little harder to get to. They’re working on getting the door open, but I’m going to go ahead and get you out, okay? Just try to stay still.”
Peter the Fireman placed a brace around Damian’s neck to stabilize him while they cut his seat belt off. When he was free, Peter and his partner, Tom, carefully lifted him out of the wreckage and placed him onto a stretcher.
“Okay, Damian, the paramedics are going to look over you while we work on getting your brother out,” Peter explained as they rolled the stretcher into one of the ambulances. A woman in her mid-twenties nodded at the firemen and took over Damian’s care.
“Hi, Damian, I’m Monica. Are you having any pain currently?” she asked as she began hooking him up to monitors to check his vitals.
“Not really,” Damian replied. “I think a couple of my ribs are bruised, and I have a few minor lacerations. Nothing feels broken, though.”
He had to remind himself not to act like he knew too much. After all, normal twelve-year-olds likely did not know the difference between fractured and bruised ribs. The idiots in his classes certainly didn’t.
Monica nodded. “Did you hit your head or ever lose consciousness?”
Damian shook his head. “Like I told the firemen, I believe my brother’s side took the majority of the force. He is much worse off than I am.”
“I promise we will do everything we can to help your brother, but right now my priority is making sure you’re as okay as you feel. So bear with me, alright?”
Damian nodded and allowed Monica to inspect him for hidden injuries. She listened to his heart, lungs, and abdomen, removed the neck brace and felt around his neck and spine, and did several assessments of his neurological status.
“Okay, so luckily you seemed to avoid serious injury,” she relented as she wrapped a thermal blanket around Damian. “The doctors will probably want to take a look at you just to be safe, so you can ride to the hospital with us. We’ll leave as soon as they get your brother in here. Is there someone you can call? Like a parent or guardian?”
“My father,” Damian confirmed. He fished his phone out of his jacket pocket. Fortunately, it didn’t seem to have been broken in the crash. He pressed the button for his father’s speed dial and waited for the answer.
“Damian?” he answered, his tone confused. Because Damian never called him during the day unless it was something important.
Damian took a shaky breath. “Father, Timothy and I have been in an accident.”
There was some panicked shuffling on the other end. Damian assumed his father was packing his stuff to leave the meeting he was in. “Are you both okay? What kind of accident?”
“Some imbecile ran a red light and hit us. I am faring well, but Timothy is not. I am unaware of the full extent of his injuries, but his side was the more affected. From my understanding, the emergency personnel are working to free him from the wreckage. But he was alive last time I checked.”
“Where are you going?”
Damian looked up at the medic, who was now bandaging some of his deeper cuts. “My father wishes to know which hospital we will be going to.”
“Gotham General,” Monica replied. Damian nodded in thanks and relayed the message.
“Okay, I’ll meet you both there,” Father promised before promptly hanging up.
When two medics finally rolled Tim’s stretcher in, Damian had to fight to remain stoic. Drake was even worse than he had previously thought. His position in the car had prevented Damian from seeing the chunk of sheet metal that was protruding from his left side. Damian had always thought Drake was pale, but now he was white as a sheet. One medic was giving his brother oxygen through a mask while the other worked to staunch the blood flowing freely from Tim’s side.
Damian had been right about Drake’s arm. It looked completely mangled, and he could see bone sticking out in several places even through the splint the medics had applied. Monica got IV supplies ready and quickly worked to insert an IV into Drake’s non-mangled hand as soon as the gurney had been secured. The third medic jumped out of the back, presumably to drive.
“Start a 1500mL bolus of NS,” her remaining partner ordered. “BP is 76/48, pulse is 164, respiratory is 25 breaths per minute, O2 desatted to 89 but up to 94 after O2 administration.”
“We need to get a thermal blanket on him,” Monica suggested as she hung the fluids. “He’s probably going into hemorrhagic shock.”
“I’m on it. EKG’s showing sinus tachycardia. I packed the wound in his side. Hopefully it’ll hold until we make it.”
Damian also hoped that.
Loud sirens blared, and the ambulance started moving. Damian wanted to stare at his phone or his hands or anything except his possibly-dying brother next to him, but he couldn’t take his eyes off of what was happening.
Monica caught his eye. “I know this is scary, Damian, but we’re gonna take good care of your brother. Do you know if he has any allergies to medications or if he has any chronic illnesses?”
“No allergies. Blood type is AB+. He doesn’t have any chronic illnesses but had a total splenectomy about eighteen months ago,” Damian reported. He knew everyone he fought with’s basic medical history. It was only natural to know the weaknesses of one’s allies.
“I don’t even have my brother’s phone number memorized,” Monica’s partner snorted as he bundled Tim up in a thermal blanket.
The rest of the ambulance ride seemed like an eternity to Damian. The two medics continued to strive to keep Drake’s condition from deteriorating further, but Damian was beginning to get scared. Timothy had yet to open his eyes, which Damian knew to be a bad sign.
When they finally arrived in the ambulance bay of Gotham General Hospital, Drake was immediately whisked away by an army of personnel. Monica’s partner followed them to give report, but Monica stayed with Damian.
“Do you think he will make it?” Damian asked.
Monica gave him a small but reassuring smile. “I honestly think he has a good chance. His blood loss was severe, not usually fatal in someone as young and healthy as your brother. My biggest concern would be infection down the road, but the doctors and nurses here are really good at catching that kind of stuff. Your brother is in good hands.”
Damian nodded in acceptance. He appreciated the medic’s honesty. A nurse came to get Damian and take him to get checked out. Monica told Damian goodbye then handed him over to the nurse, Sandra. Sandra let him walk by himself, which he greatly appreciated since he hated being rolled around on a stretcher. She took him to an exam room in the emergency department and asked him the same questions he had already been asked twice today. Her physical assessment was a little more in depth, but she reached the same conclusion as everyone else: Damian had miraculously avoided any harm in the accident.
“Well, I’ll let the doctor know, but unless he wants to admit you for testing, you’ll be free to go. Is your father almost here?”
“He should be.”
The nurse nodded and reached for her communicator. “Let me call the nurses’ station. What’s your father’s name?”
“Bruce Wayne.”
Her eyes narrowed, but she didn’t comment further. She called the nurses’ station, and the clerk confirmed that the Bruce Wayne had just come in demanding information on his sons.
“Why don’t we just go out there to meet him?” she suggested. “I don’t think the doc will admit you, but even if he does, I don’t think you’ll be leaving the hospital for a while.”
Damian allowed Sandra to lead him down the hall to the nurses’ station. As soon as Father saw him, he ran towards Damian and enveloped him in a tight hug. Damian was fairly certain his father was playing up the “concerned father” act for the public, but he couldn’t deny the comfort his father’s warm embrace brought him.
“I’m so glad you’re okay, Damian,” he said, planting a kiss in his son’s hair.
“But Timothy…” Damian trailed off. He wasn’t sure how to approach the subject.
“I talked to one of his nurses. He’s been taken into emergency surgery. She said it’ll likely be hours before we hear anything else, but he’s holding on. I called Dick, Cass, Jason, and Steph. I told them it would be a while, but I imagine they’ll all be here soon. Now, are you sure you’re okay?”
He looked to Sandra, who took that as her cue to step in. “He’s got some minor lacerations and a couple of bruised ribs, but nothing that I’m too concerned about. He might develop whiplash in a day or so, in which case I would call your pediatrician so they can prescribe some muscle relaxants. I still have to give report to the attending physician, but I don’t think he’ll want him admitted for anything. He’s very lucky.”
“Or my brother is a self-sacrificing idiot,” Damian muttered bitterly.
Bruce dismissed the nurse and knelt in front of his son. “What do you mean, Damian?”
“That imbecile manipulated the car so that the impact of the crash fell solely on himself. I always knew he had zero self-preservation, but I didn’t think he would actually do something this reckless.”
“Damian,” Father said, laying a hand on his shoulder, “Tim wasn’t just being reckless. He was trying to protect you. Any one of us would have done the same.”
“I wouldn’t,” Damian snorted. His eyes stung with moisture, but he wasn’t crying. He wasn’t. “By my calculations, a crash like that would have resulted in both of us receiving moderate injuries, rather than one walking away scot free and the other… he just shouldn’t have done it!”
He choked out a sob. He would’ve felt mortified, but then his father wrapped him in a tight hug and knocked down the rest of Damian’s walls. He cried into his father’s shoulder. He cried because he was afraid. He cried because he didn’t want Drake – no, Timothy, he had earned the right to be on a first-name basis – to die. He cried because he had thought he and Timothy were enemies, or, at the very least, rivals, yet his brother had potentially sacrificed everything for him. He just cried and cried until finally, he couldn’t cry anymore.
“S-sorry,” he croaked as he pulled away.
Bruce gave him a small smile. “Don’t apologize, kiddo. I’m sure Tim is gonna be fine. Now c’mon, let’s go grab some tea or something in the cafeteria.”
Damian sniffled and, after taking a few breaths to steady himself, followed his father.
***
“C’mon, Timothy, wake up. You’ve slept long enough,” a familiar voice echoed in Tim’s brain.
“Wait, did you just call him Timothy? What happened to ‘Drake’?”
“None of your business, Todd.”
“Oh, I see, so I still get the last-name treatment. You’re a punk, you know that?”
Tim wanted to yell at his brothers to shut up so he could go back to sleep. He didn’t want to wake up. In his sleepy land, he was protected from pain. He could just rest in blissful unawareness and not feel a thing. It seemed much more attractive than the alternative.
“Timmy, it’s Dick. Could you please open your eyes for me?”
Tim groaned internally. It was becoming increasingly clear that his brothers were not going to leave him alone unless he woke up.
He cracked his eyes open experimentally and winced at the harsh lighting. His head was killing him.
“I got it,” Jason jumped out of his chair. He switched the lights off, which made opening his eyes much more tolerable for Tim.
He blinked a couple of times to allow his eyes to adjust. He was in a hospital bed, judging by the ugly white walls and millions of monitors he was attached to. His arm was in a bulky cast that was elevated on a few pillows by his side. There was a throbbing pain in his abdomen, but he didn’t care to look down. He could barely move at all with how sore he was.
“How are you feeling, kiddo?” Bruce asked. He was in the chair closest to Tim’s bed.
“Like I got hit by a truck,” Tim rasped. Jason snorted.
Dick, who was on his other side, grabbed a bottle of water that had a straw in it from the bedside table and held it up to Tim’s lips. He drank from it gratefully. “You were in surgery for almost eleven hours,” he explained. “The girls went down to the cafeteria to get dinner. I’ll text them and let them know you’re awake. It was pretty touch and go for a while, but you’re gonna be just fine as long as you don’t do something stupid like get an infection.”
“I wouldn’t hold your breath,” Damian piped up from his spot at the foot of the bed. “He’s a master in doing stupid things.”
“I’m glad you made it out okay, Damian,” Tim smiled weakly.
Damian crossed his arms. “Just don’t try anything like that again, Timothy. It was stupid and reckless.”
Tim rolled his eyes to hide his amusement. It seems he hadn’t dreamed of Damian’s change of addressing him. “You’re welcome, by the way.”
Damian came around to his side and pushed by Dick so he could get closer to the head of the bed. To Tim’s surprise, Damian leaned over and gave him a gentle yet firm hug.
“I’m serious,” he muttered into Tim’s chest. “Don’t do that again. You are simply not allowed to die.”
Tim wrapped his good arm around his little brother. “No promises, but I will take your complaint into consideration.”
Damian pulled away, a ghost of a smile gracing his face. “You’re insufferable.”
“Yeah, well, you’re a brat,” Tim returned.