Chapter Text
Thunder shook the city and lightning lightened up the night sky. The sudden bright lights made the dark skyscrapers of Gotham throw shadows over the rest of the city, making it seem even darker and gloomier than it usually was. But weirdly enough there was no rain. Very unusual for a storm in Gotham City.
But storm or no storm, there was nothing that could keep the vigilantes of Gotham at home. Instead, they were found running across the rooftops, looking for crime to stop, people to save and the kick of adrenaline. Sadly, this night was a slow one. No crime except for a few (attempted) muggings. All the big shots of the city were nowhere to be found. Either locked up in Arkham or hiding and scheming.
That was the reason why the (former) Robins started to gather on the rooftop of a skyscraper.
“Slow night, isn’t it?” Red Robin flopped down onto the rooftop and stretched his legs out.
Nightwing nodded. He leaned across the edge of the roof, looking down onto the streets. The people weren’t even recognizable as people from up there. Nothing more than tiny little dots hushing around the streets. It was a sight to behold. Something Dick would just never get sick of seeing.
“Maybe it’s the upcoming storm?” Dick wondered, not taking his eyes from the streets below him.
“Tt. As if these imbeciles would be scared of a lousy storm.” Robin crossed his arms over his chest and while the white out lenses from his domino mask obscured his eyes, everyone could imagine the look of distaste in his eyes.
Red Hood stretched his arms over his head. Dick was sure he heard something pop when he did that. “I hate to say this, but the brat is right.”
Damian scowled at Jason. “Of course, I am!”
“The weather report hadn’t said anything about a storm tonight either,” interjected Tim. He had pulled his phone out, probably rechecking the weather.
“It’s Gotham, though. A quiet day without rain is like a miracle.” Jason’s voice had a bitter tone, despite the helmet’s voice modifier. He may be complaining, but Dick knew better. The younger loved this city. No matter how much he complained about it.
Thunder shook the city anew. “Does that sound quiet to you?” mocked Dick with a smirk on his face. He couldn’t help but laugh when Jason flipped him off.
Dick wished he could enjoy this night, this very moment with his younger brothers on the rooftop. But he knew… that was nothing but a pipedream. They may get along now, but someone would say the wrong thing to the wrong person (on purpose or on accident … that was not a question anyone would ask), then they would argue and scream at each other, go their separate ways, and not talk for at least a week. Until Alfred grew tired of it and ordered them all to the manor for a family dinner.
“If the night stays as calm as it is, we could retire early tonight,” proposed Tim, slowly getting up.
Jason huffed a laugh. “What? Don’t tell me you’re tired already, replacement.”
“Says the family disappointment,” growled Damian.
“What did you just say?!”
And just like Dick had feared, the next argument broke out. With a sigh and a last longing look at the city below him, he pushed himself away from the edge and turned around. Damian had pulled out a batarang and Jason was aiming his gun at the youngest. It didn’t matter that it was filled with rubber bullets. Had Jason really wanted, he could have killed Damian even with rubber bullets. Tim had positioned himself between the fighting vigilantes and tried to calm them down.
“Come on, guys. Everything was going so well. Why can’t we end the night peacefully as well?” asked Dick and walked up to Damian. Should Damian really decide to start fighting, Dick would be close (and hopefully quick) enough to stop him.
“One bullet between his eyes and I am going to end him peacefully.” But Jason’s finger wasn’t even on the trigger. No matter how mad he was, he would never shoot one of his brothers (at least not anymore). Even if they would deserve it from time to time.
“As much as I would love to see how Robin gets his ass handed to him, how about we do this in a … I don’t know, non-lethal way? Would that be possible? Please?” Tim almost begged. He was tired of this shit. It happened almost everyday and today he hadn’t had nearly enough sleep or coffee to deal with this.
“Watch it, or you will be the next one!” threatened Jason and pushed past Tim, ramming their shoulders together.
The sheer bulk of Jason’s body threw Tim almost off his balance, but he managed to catch himself. “Oh, come on, I said please!” He was so done with tonight. With them. “Seriously, sometimes I wish I was an only child!”
“I am an only child! None of you are worthy of the Wayne name!” snarled Damian.
Dick was about to interfere when bright lightning illuminated the sky, followed by thunder, so loud that it shook the skyscraper. No… that was not thunder.
“What the fuck was that?” screamed Jason. At least he finally stopped pointing his gun at Damian. Instead, he took out his second gun as well and looked around, trying to find an invisible enemy.
“Uhm, guys?” Tim looked up at the sky and pointed with his finger at it. He was gaping and clearly speechless. When the others looked up as well, they understood what had rendered Tim so shocked.
The clouds were moving at an alarming speed in a circular motion, forming a circle right above the city. Looking into the cloud circle, it seemed like a tunnel, but it was not possible to determine where it was leading, as it seemed that it would lead into nothing but the void. Lightning was cracking through the clouds forming the tunnel.
“Wha-?!” Dick was shocked. He had seen a lot of weird stuff in his career as a hero. But something like this? This was new, he had no idea what it was, what was going to happen and what he should do. And that terrified him. His heart thundered in his chest, and he almost didn’t hear the thundering, which probably came from the clouds. A panicked scream ripped Dick out of his thoughts.
Damian’s cape started to flow up and following the cape Damian himself got lifted from the ground. He let out a surprised shout, that he would deny ever doing. Before he could say something, Tim had gripped his ankles, trying to pull him down. It seemed to work for a few seconds, but as Damian got lifted higher into the air, he just dragged Tim with him.
“Guys! A little help!” Tim tightened his grip on Damian’s ankles. He would love to blame everything on him and that the only reason why Tim was rising into the air himself, was because Damian was dragging him up. But that wasn’t true. Tim started to feel weightless and then he felt a pull, not from Damian, but from the cloud tunnel above them.
Dick reacted quickly and jumped into the air to grab Tim’s legs, but his weight didn’t seem to keep them down. Realizing that Dick wasn’t heavy enough to pull the two youngest down, Jason grabbed onto Dick. Hoping that at least his bulk would be enough to keep them down.
Boy had he been wrong. It seemed the pull from the tunnel only got harder, the more they tried to stay down.
“Jason! The grappling gun!” shouted Dick. Jason reacted quickly. He freed one of his hands, the other still holding onto Dick’s leg tightly. Pulling out his grappling gun he pointed it at a pipe on the rooftop.
Sadly, it didn’t seem to work. They boys rose further up into the sky, the rope of the grappling stretched out to the max. Jason grunted, trying his hardest to hold onto the gun and Dick. But in the end his efforts had been pointless as the rope ripped in the middle.
With nothing holding them back the boys flew up into the tunnel at an alarming speed.
“Don’t you dare to let go of me!” screeched Damian.
“I wasn’t planning on it!” answered Tim and tried to pull Damian closer to himself.
“No one is going to let anyone go!” Dick had no idea what was going on, but wherever that tunnel led them, they were better off together.
“Easier said than done!” Jason had let go of the grappling gun, there was no use for it anyway now that it was broken.
When they reached the tunnel, they didn’t fly straight through it. Instead, they were sucked into it like into a hurricane. The suction was so strong that Dick felt himself slipping. He tried his best to fight against the pull, trying to separate them, but he wasn’t strong enough.
His grip wasn’t strong enough and Tim and Damian were ripped away from Jason and him with a panicked scream.
“No!” Dick tried to grab at Tim, but he and Damian were long gone. He saw how Tim and Damian were catapulted away from them. And he also saw how Damian slipped out of Tim’s grip. With an ear-piercing scream, they disappeared in the tunnel wall of clouds between crackling lightning.
“Dick, I can’t hold on any longer!” Jason’s voice was breathless, the pull was too strong, and he really had no more strength left to hold onto Dick.
“I swear to god Jason! If you let go of me, I’ll kick your ass!” Dick twisted his body, so he could grab onto Jason’s jacket. Before his fingers touched the worn-out leather jacket, Jason’s grip loosened slightly.
But it was enough. In mere seconds he was ripped away from the original Robin. And just like Damian and Tim, Dick and Jason were catapulted through the wall of clouds.
He could barely remember what had happened after he fell through the clouds. Except for the blinding lights of the lightning, he remembered the rumbling of the thunder and how it had shaken his bones.
There was a dizzying feeling that made it difficult to comprehend what was going on now.
Where was he?
Where were the others?
What was that cloud thing? A wormhole?
How would they get back home?
Was he even still alive?
Some many questions… he would be able to answer most of them. But for that he needed to open his eyes first.
Remembering that he wasn’t the only one that got sucked through the wormhole and that he needed to find out what had happened to his brothers he opened his eyes.
Dick cracked his eyes open. The domino mask was still intact and firmly on his face. The familiar weight of it felt calming, grounding. He was lying on his back and heard the humming of a motor. Motor? Motors?
Trying to fight off the dizziness he let his eyes wander. All he could see was the sky and the clouds. Bright, white, and fluffy clouds. Nothing like the dark, stormy thing that had brought him here. Wherever here was.
He tried to take a deep breath but realized that it made the dizziness only worse. The air was too thin. Was he high up in the air? On a plane? But he could see the sky and feel the air around him, was it some kind of open plane?
The more the dizziness disappeared the more Dick noticed. He couldn’t only hear the humming of motors, he felt it! It reminded him of sitting in a car.
Finally finding the strength to move, he rolled onto his side with a groan and lifted himself to his knees. He raised his head, trying to look around again and stilled.
He was surrounded by people and every single one of them pointed their gun at him.
Jason’s head was buzzing, and he felt like he was suffocating. With a groan he opened his helmet and took it off while he sat up. He felt like everything was moving but was pretty sure that it was only the dizziness.
He threw the helmet onto the floor next to him and rubbed his temples with his fingers. Hoping, that would help against the upcoming headache. After the dizziness had subdued a bit, he let his gaze wander.
On his left and right side were walls with trash cans lining up. Great, he had landed in an alley. Grunting he pulled himself to his feet and took off his domino mask. Alley meant city and the sun above him meant daylight. He hid his domino mask in one of his pockets, hid his guns and closed his leather jacket. So that the armor with the red bat symbol wouldn’t be visible.
Outside of the alley he could hear laughing, talking and people in general. But they weren’t speaking English? Frowning, Jason picked up his helmet and tucked it under his arm, disguising it as a motorcycle helmet.
Taking a deep breath, he wandered out of the alley, trying to figure out where the hell he was.
Tim woke up to air whipping at his face. Like he was high up in the air. Letting his head roll to the side he noticed that wherever he was… it was quite empty. All around him was nothing but a glass balcony, only on one side seemed to be a part of a building.
Taking a deep breath, he realized that the air was clean. Well, not farm life clean like on the Kent farm, but cleaner than in Gotham for sure. The air still held the distinguished smell of smog, so Tim was sure that he was still in a big city.
Propping himself up he looked around again. He was surrounded by skyscrapers, so he was obviously in a big city, but where exactly? Getting up onto his feet he had to prop himself onto his knees. The dizziness from when he had landed was still there.
As he looked at the floor, he noticed a drawing or a painting. It looked like the letter S in a circle. There was nothing above Tim. The whole thing where he was standing seemed to be an open platform.
Before Tim could think about his next step, he got startled by a loud blaring alarm.
Damian heard the chirping of birds. His eyes were still closed, and he really hoped that those were real birds. And not some cartoon birds flying over his head because he was dizzy. He cursed at Dick for forcing him to watch these cartoons, because apparently, he hadn’t had a real childhood until he saw them.
He opened his eyes and saw crowns of bright green trees above him. The blue sky and the sunlight poking out from behind the leaves. Fighting off the dizziness he got onto his feet, swaying lightly. He realized that he was standing on something soft. When he looked down Damian realized that he was standing on grass.
But the grass seemed to be looked after and there weren’t enough trees and bushes that would make it a forest. Trying to look between the trees he noticed that there was a path leading to a small lake or pond. People were sitting all around, laughing, and enjoying the sunny day. From time to time someone jogged along the path. It looked like a park maybe.
Thankfully no one had noticed the kid in the strange bright costume, hiding between the trees. He had to find a way to get out of this park without being seen in public.