Work Text:
The eighteenth floor of S.T.A.R. labs wasn’t supposed to be a hospital, but through the years of partnering with the Titans, the wing of labs and cubicles has been slowly taken over and converted into a fully equipped functioning medical facility. What used to be advanced cybernetic laboratories are now highly equipped operating rooms, an old hallway filled with cubicles has been converted into recovery rooms, and the filing rooms are full of patients requiring twenty-four hour critical care.
Bruce sits just outside the door of one such room. He visited this floor when he was a mere child, marveling at new technologies alongside his father. Thomas was a doctor, and a doting father, who loved to share his interests with his son. “This is the future of medicine.” He’d said. Their tour guide smiled brightly, eager to please (eager for donation pledges, he understands now), and hurried them along. He’d forgotten all about it.
Years later, Dick responded to a crisis at S.T.A.R. - an extremist group holding a group of scientists hostage, demanding their members to be released from prison. By then he knew S.T.A.R. labs had studied them and could list their products alphabetically, but didn’t make the connection - it’s different not being inside a place and either way he was more concerned about Dick’s mysterious hallucinations he reported taking place after entering the building. “I’m fine though.” Dick had said. “I just need sleep.” The nightmares continued. Days later, Dick left home, pursuing a new group of Titans.
And deep down he knows the nightmares weren’t the only thing driving Dick away. “You’re wasting your life, you can’t do this forever! You have so much potential, Dick!” Another slammed door after another. “I don’t need a partner, I need you to focus on school!” Another failed exam after another. Dick trying to split time between school and vigilantism wasn’t working. “I don’t get it.” Bruce had said, tight lipped after Dick bombed his finals. “You know the material better than your professors! You could be teaching these classes, you could answer these questions in your sleep! What’s going on with you?!” Dick shrugged. Then dropped out.
And Bruce was pissed. And he made it known. And Dick moved out. And Bruce… was alone. Again. With mistakes and regrets. Dick visited, but never stayed, all too soon the little kid he’d taken in ten years ago became his own man. With his own life. And Bruce was only a limited part of it. For the most part, he was alone.
He wasn’t sure what about the little twelve year old with a tire iron calling him a ‘big boob’ made him think it was the time for adoption. Maybe it was the black hair. Or the blue eyes. Or the massive chip on his shoulder and unimpressed nature. Either way, he’d learned one lesson with Dick - don’t let your family slip away. And so he’d signed the adoption papers as soon as he possibly could. And Jason was ecstatic. And then he died.
Bruce held his tiny broken body in his arms. His son. Pulled him from the rubble. He lashed out at the world and himself, striking down anything in his path in a fit of rage and fury. He wanted desperately to die, but didn’t have the courage to kill himself or didn’t think he deserved to end the pain. He doesn’t remember much of the time. Cases blended together like the faces of those he pursued. He destroyed anyone and everything that stood in his way.
Then there was Tim. And Tim had a dad already. And the responsibility wasn’t the same. But the damage was already done and he snapped under the pressure, leaving Jean Paul Valley in charge and manufacturing his own disaster because he didn’t know how to pick up a telephone and call the one person suited for the job. The one person he didn’t deserve to call, couldn’t face, after how he acted following Jason’s death.
And still, Dick came back to Gotham, took on the Batman mantle at his whim, and bent over backwards trying to help at every opportunity, angry that he hadn’t been called in sooner. He can’t remember ever saying ‘thanks’. He can’t remember telling Dick what it meant to him. Just that that’s the way things are between “fathers and sons”.
He remembers the way Dick’s face lit up when he called him his son. A hope sparked deep in the back of his mind, one no amount of denial could squash out. It took him years to build up the courage. Years of the paperwork sitting in the top drawer of his desk. Years to trust that he could have a family again, of Jason’s ghost sitting over his shoulder, sending shivers up his spine at the thought of adopting another son.
But Dick was already his son. Just not officially. So he justified it; he asked. And now all he can remember are the words that Dick said, just before he called him his son. “I’d die for you, Bruce.” He’d said, with conviction. Until then it was unspoken. But Bruce had known since Dick was young that he would. “I’d die for you, Bruce.” Dick had said in all earnesty. With the cowl pulled down, staring him in the eye. Bangs falling haphazardly in his face, the room silent around them.
Bruce sits outside the makeshift hospital room. Doctors and nurses change shifts, taking over for one another, monitoring Dick’s condition. The Titans file in and out, looking at him with a mix of pity and blame. “I’d die for you, Bruce.” The words ring in his ears. He sees Dick jump in slow motion, as he turns, too late to stop the laser from cratering into Nightwing’s chest. The shot was aimed at him. Dick was always too fast.
“He would have done the same for anyone.” Clark reassures. He’s not sure when Clark showed up. He’s not sure how long he’s been here. He feels like vomiting. “You should go in. He likes the company.”
“You don’t know that.” Dick was unconscious before he hit the ground. A mess of charred flesh and blood tangled in black and blue. He looked dead. He wasn’t breathing. He looked like Jason. He looked like his parents.
“They say sometimes people can hear you when you’re in a coma.” Tim was sobbing as Diana took Dick away. Bruce couldn’t bear to look. Somehow, he followed along, and made it up to the eighteenth floor and stopped just outside the elevator. The hours Dick spent in surgery were agonizing. Tim fell asleep on the floor next to him, mask and all, and Bruce just stared at the ceiling. The last of the Waynes. Again and again.
“I can’t.” Not again. “Not like…” Jason. If he doesn’t hold a broken body in his arms, if he doesn’t look, if he doesn’t see it happen, then maybe it won’t.
Clark stares at him sympathetically. He doesn’t deserve sympathy, and they both know it. “You need to be strong. For him.”
When Dick was twelve, Two-Face beat him within an inch of his life, the moment he handed Dick over to Leslie he left to track him down, and avoided him for the next month. When Dick was sixteen he got shot and Bruce screamed at him for it and Alfred kicked him out of the room. When Dick was twenty-two Bruce broke his back and nearly died and no one bothered to pick up the phone to call him. When Dick was twenty-three, Bruce sent him to Blüdhaven and watched him take on too much and flounder and didn’t step in because he didn’t know how. Two weeks ago, Clark told Dick he would die if he went back to Blüdhaven, and Dick went anyway. Bruce pulled him out of a radioactive wasteland and dragged him back to the world of the living. And then yelled at Dick. For forgetting the value of his own life. Because that’s all he knows how to do. He’s made so many mistakes.
“Go.” Clark says, more forcefully, pulling him to his feet. Bruce’s mouth goes dry. Clark half drags him forward, through rubble and sand. It’s hotter than it should be, hotter than it is, and Bruce digs what’s left of his chewed-off fingernails into his palms, trying desperately to stay in the now.
“Not again.” He grunts out. Never again.
“Dick’s strong.” So was Jason. “He’ll pull through.” Jason didn’t.
The door opens, and Bruce looks. Long enough to catch a glimpse of the mass of wires and tubes keeping his son alive. And his son, with black hair, blue eyes, and a massive chip on his shoulder, too-still and too-small in the center of a hospital bed. “No.” He squeezes his eyes shut. If he can’t see it, it’s not happening. The machines whir and beep, piercing through his mind. He turns and runs, disappointed angry eyes burning on the back of his neck. Clark doesn’t stop him.
It didn’t take Dick long to catch on. When he was twelve, he didn’t understand. He thought Bruce hated him for failing. Thought Bruce didn’t care about him anymore. The instant that he wasn’t perfect, he was broken, and thrown away like a child’s plaything. The thoughts were only reaffirmed when he was sixteen. But as he matured, spending time with the Titans - he came to terms with Bruce’s fucked up way of showing affection. Affection buried under layers of anxiety and fear. At least… he told himself that’s what it was. Maybe he’s kidding himself. Bruce hasn’t visited. Maybe it’s better that way.
“You can leave.” He tells Roy, once he’s able. He knows it’s hard to be here. Roy shakes his head and scoots his chair closer. “I’m fine.” He tells Donna, when he wakes after a nightmare. She raises a single eyebrow in disbelief, then moves to hold his hand. “If you have more important things-”
“Shut up.” Wally says. “You’re important things. I’m not leaving you here by yourself. We’re not- we’re your friends and we care about you and-” He cuts himself off, then starts rambling about the reconstruction, slipping in little bits of outside information rationed oh so carefully out so that he can’t get a full picture of what’s going on. No one’s told him how bad things are, but from fragmented memories… he can guess.
“Who?” He asks, when Tim comes to visit. Tight lipped the kid blinks back tears and shakes his head. Someone died. “I was there.” He crawled out of wreckage and approached someone kneeling on the ground. The memory ends there. “I’m sorry.”
Tim wipes his eyes. “Wasn’t your fault.” Dick struggles to sit up - whatever hit him fucked with his nervous system - his limbs aren’t listening to him. Tim pushes him back down. “Don’t.”
It’s something he’s considered. A vague possibility in his mind, but one he doesn’t really believe. But he needs the possibility ruled out. “Where’s Bruce?” Tim bites his lip.
“Tracking down Joker. Staying busy.” Dammit to hell, the clown got out in the chaos. “He’d be going after Alex but well uh-” Tim quiets down before saying anymore.
“Vic?” Dick prompts. He hasn’t seen him, but Donna and the Titans would be more upset if he was dead. He needs confirmation.
“Don’t make me.” His hands are shaking, fidgeting wildly with the end of the shirt. That doesn’t bode well. “I don’t wanna talk about it.”
“Okay.” He’ll have to press someone else. “But I’m here if you need to talk.” It’s not like there’s much else he can do. Tim nods, his gaze boring a hole in the space above Dick’s head. “Tell me something good.” He suggests. Tim sobs through a memory about the time Jack took him fishing. A trip he complained about endlessly leading up to it, but holds close to his heart now.
Dick swears he only blinked, but the lights different and Tim is gone, and Roy’s dozing off in the chair beside the bed. He can’t tell how long it’s been. “Roy?”
“Hm.” Roy snaps to attention. “Hang on.” He walks to the door. “Lian! He’s up!” She comes bursting into frame and leaps into her father’s arms. Roy grins apologetically and carries her in. “She wanted to see you.”
Dick looks at Lian, and watches her shyly bury her head in Roy's chest, sending him the tiniest peaks out from his side. Dick remembers being ten years old, and watching Bruce come out of surgery. “No.” She’s just a kid. He was just a kid. “Roy why-”
“Dick.” He levels his gaze. “She was worried.” And Dick remembers being nine, and the bedroom door being locked so he couldn’t see Bruce in such a state, and crying until Alfred let him in.
Roy sets Lian on the ground, and she reaches out. Dick’s hands shake as he raises them, but he meets her halfway in a very careful hug. “Thanks.” He mumbles. Then rolls his eyes. “Everyone else is afraid to touch me.” He whispers, and winks. She giggles a little, and it’s more out of nervousness than anything else, but he’ll take it.
“We are not.” Roy drawls, proving his point by ruffling Dick’s hair. His hands betray him; Dick can feel them tremble.
“I’m sorry I made you worry.” He says, looking at Lian, but directing it to them both. “I promise I’ll be fine.” He takes Lian by the pinky, and they shake on it. Roy can’t look him in the eye. Dick tries sticking his pinky out to him, but his arm uselessly flops on the bed as the muscles in his arm seize up.
“Shit.” Dick hisses. He’s on a fuckload of medications, but the muscle spasms still hurt like hell.
“I got you.” Roy’s calloused thumbs press into his forearm, kneading out the muscle. “Lian, go back to Uncle Ollie, Uncle Dick’s fine, he’s just being a baby.”
“Think I’ve earned the right to be a bit of one.” Dick grunts as Lian leaves.
“Not after the stunt you pulled.” Roy tenses. “Do you even remember?” Dick grits his teeth. It’s hazy. And his head hurts when he thinks too hard about things. Which hasn’t stopped him from trying, but to date he’s had little success. “Relax.” Roy chides gently. His hands move up to his bicep, and Dick tries not to think about how obvious the loss of muscle mass is.
“How long?” He looks at Roy pleadingly. Roy refuses to meet his eye. “No one tells me anything. You always give it straight, come on Roy. You of all people know-”
“How important the truth is. Yeah Dick, I know.” He finishes calmly. Roy looks at him. Studies his face. “You almost died.” His voice is small. “You were out for three weeks. We don’t know what hit you… but you… you… goddammit Dick, you’re really gonna make me say it?” Roy swallows.
“Please.” He needs to know.
“It’s not fair.” Roy starts. “I know you’d do it for anyone but-”
“What?”
“You almost threw your life away for him. Dick-” Roy swipes at his eyes. “It’s not fair. Not when he treats you like-” He puts his hands back in his lap. “Not when he hasn’t shown his face around here since the day you came in it’s-”
“Bruce.” Dick pieces together. A bright purple flash streaking towards him. He hadn’t even thought before he jumped. “I jumped in front of him.” He recalls.
“It’s not fair.” Roy holds his hand. “I almost lost you because-”
“You didn’t.”
“Shut up. Just. Don’t. Say anything.” Roy takes another swipe at his eyes. “It’s been hell, Dick. Never do that again.”
“I can’t-”
“Pretend you can.” Roy begs. “I know you can’t but just tell me you won’t. You’re worth so much more.”
“I won’t.” Dick doesn’t feel like fighting. And neither does Roy, so he lets that be good enough and presses a kiss to the crown of his head with a tenderness Dick hasn’t felt in years. Something he’d thought was lost after too many rounds of pointless arguments escalating into fistfights that paled in comparison to the insults slung between them. He’s made so many mistakes. He just hopes he has enough borrowed time to make things right.
“I know it’s not a lot.” Tim’s skin crawls as he steps into Dick’s room. Dick’s been looking better, getting ready for discharge, but it still hurts seeing him this way. He carries a cardboard box carefully. “Bruce had some stuff you left after you filled in for him.” It’s a lie, and Dick immediately catches it. They both know Dick wouldn’t leave any of his stuff lying around the manor, he spent half the time there cleaning obsessively and making the floors sparkle.
“Tell him thanks.” And that’s that.
“Okay?” No questions about what Bruce thinks? No interrogations on if Bruce sent him here? No getting weirdly defensive over accepting help?
Dick sighs, and shrugs. “Yeah.” He opens his arms and accepts the box. “I’m not exactly in a position to look a gift horse in the mouth.” He starts listlessly rifling through it, then looks up with a wry half smile. “I don’t have anything left.”
“Oh.” Open mouth, insert foot. “Uh. Sorry.”
“It’s okay.” Dick pulls out a pair of pajamas. “It was just stuff. Stuff’s replaceable.” For the most part. There are things that Tim would miss if his house blew up. Things he can’t replace. He pictures the Flying Graysons poster that used to hang in the center of the apartment, just above the sofa. Stuff. Just stuff. He’s shaken from his thoughts by a whistle. “What he’d do? Go through my credit card records?” Dick holds up a t-shirt that matches one he wore a couple months ago to a Knight’s game they went to together.
“He talked with Barbara.” She’s about the only one of Dick’s friends that’s still on speaking terms with him. Dick snorts.
“And she recommended him this?” He pulls out a Crocky plushie.
“I might have made a few suggestions.” Tim adds innocently. “It’s just stuff.”
“Brat.” Dick tosses it at him and misses by a mile. Tim’s heart sinks. Dick roles his eyes. “Tim, I’m fine. I wasn’t trying to hit you.”
Tim blinks. A mess of twisted charred flesh and blood mixed with black and blue covers the ground. Dick looked dead. His nose wasn’t in the right place. He wasn’t breathing. His pulse was- Tim fixes his eyes on the heart monitor. It beeps steadily, the pattern’s normal. Dick follows his gaze and thrusts out his arm. “Here.” It feels stupid and he’s glad no one but Dick’s here to see him take his pulse. It’s not weak and thready. It’s not so light he can hardly feel it. It’s real and it’s firm and things are fine. His brother isn’t dead.
But Conner is. And Dick still doesn’t know. And Steph is too. And Jack. And he can’t be thinking about this right now because it’s not fair for him to be upset in front of Dick because Dick needs to focus on recovering and that means not bothering him with stuff that he’s fully capable of handling on his own. He needs to be happy right now. So he smiles. And feels like death.
He wishes he could talk to Steph about this, he used to be able to tell her anything. Maybe she and Conner will get along better in the next world than they did in this one. Maybe Jack will take them fishing. Maybe there’s nothing out there. Maybe they’re all laughing at him. Maybe he needs to get it together and say something because Dick is staring at him and-
“You okay?” The question means Dick knows he’s not. His face is getting hot and he tries to breathe and it’s just making things worse and- “Take a minute.” Dick squeezes his hand and Tim lets his wrist go, not realizing he still had hold of it. Tim slumps to the floor, curling up by the side of the bed. “You’ve been through a lot.” Dick ruffles the top of his hair. This isn’t how this was supposed to go.
“‘M fine.” His voice cracks and he pulls his legs in tighter to his chest, trying to sink into the floor. He can’t be doing this right now. It isn’t fair.
“I’m sorry about Conner.” Dick says quietly. Tim cries harder.
“You know?”
“World’s second greatest detective or something like that. Process of elimination.” It was stupid to think they could hide it. “He was a good kid.” Dick says simply. Tim laughs and sniffs.
“He was an asshole.” Who hated Kansas and highschool. Who thought being a Titan was lame. Who never followed orders and lept in without thinking… which is half the reason Donna got killed. “You never liked him.”
“He saved me. I half remember that. He was a hero.” Dick likes to remember the best in people. And all Tim remembers is pointless arguing over who should lead Young Justice and beefing over stupid things. And all the mean-spirited things he said to Steph. And all the secrets he kept from his dad. All the fights. He has so many regrets. He’s made so many mistakes.
“It’s just a lot.” All at once.
“I get that.” And he means it. Dick gets it more than most people do. There’s about a zillion statues in the Titan’s memorial to prove it. And half of those people have come back to life. There’s always hope. But somehow that makes it hurt more. Everytime he sees a blond ponytail in the corner of his eye, or a black shirt, he hopes. And immediately it’s wrenched away from him as he tumbles back to reality. “I’m here if you need to talk.” Dick offers.
So Tim pulls himself off the floor and into a chair and talks. And Dick listens. And it feels like old times but everything’s worse. “It gets better.” Dick says at one point.
“Do you really believe that?” After everyone that’s died. After Blüdhaven was blown to bits. It doesn’t seem like anything in their lives is getting better.
“I have to. I need to keep moving. I have people I need to live for.” Tim nods, and is silent for a bit and stares out the window of the eighteenth floor of S.T.A.R. labs. He knows the building’s history. Knows what started here. And what started before that. And what continues with him.
“I get that.” Cassie’s been calling him. Bruce is twisted up in knots over everything. And Cass is all mixed up over everything that’s happened. “I’m here if you need to talk.” He parrots, with realization.
Dick laughs. “With you, I’d rather listen.” Tim half smiles, then goes on and talks until his throat goes dry and feels a little bit less like death for it.