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This is hardly the first time Dick has woken up tied to a chair. It’s not even the first time he’s woken up tied to a chair as Dick Grayson, rich son of Bruce Wayne, instead of Nightwing, annoying vigilante of Bludhaven.
It is the first time in a long time anyone has gotten the jump on him like this.
He groans as he lets his head tip back; his skull feels like it’s splitting open but he can’t tell if it's from drugs or blunt force trauma (or both - both would really suck). His headache throbs in time with his pulse and his mouth floods with saliva that he forces himself to swallow. Dick knows from experience that vomiting with a headache like his only makes things worse and he needs to stay awake for now. He needs to figure out who took him and the best way to escape. Babs has to know he’s gone - she’s been spending more time at his place than hers recently - and she’ll send in the calvary soon enough. He just has to do his best to stay conscious and not antagonize his captors too much until they get here.
…It’s a tall order.
Dick closes his eyes and tries taking deep breaths to settle his roiling stomach. The room is nearly pitch black around him which is actually working in his favor right now but he can hear movement in the distance so it surely won’t last. He has a few minutes, at most, before he’s likely to be accosted so Dick centers himself - it gets hard to separate the Nightwing snark from the Dick Grayson snark when he’s not completely lucid. He needs to focus.
The door hitting the wall and the dim lights flickering on make him flinch and he squints his eyes open against the light and then grits his teeth. “I feel like this is a bit of an overreaction to me getting your corrupt cops arrested,” Dick says, doing his best to keep the slur out of his voice. “That’s what this whole thing is about, right Blockbuster?”
Roland Desmond smiles with teeth as he steps into the room. “Now Richard - or do you prefer Dick?”
“Mr. Grayson is fine actually.”
“Dick,” Desmond continues. “You’ve been quite the thorn in my side for far too long. Do you know how hard it was to get you alone without any of those fucking Titans dogging your every step?”
Since Dick was Nightwing he did have a pretty good idea about how difficult it probably was, yes. “I’d apologize for making it so hard for you,” Dick says with a shrug, “but I really don’t feel all that bad about it. I won’t feel bad when they inevitably find me either - you’re not really known for your subtlety.”
Blockbuster grits his teeth and Dick forces himself to stay relaxed when the man clenches his fists. Dick Grayson is a charmer, he’s sarcastic and fearless and firm. He hasn’t backed down from any of Roland’s threats and he isn’t going to start now. “I’d say it’s a pity KGBeast didn’t fulfill the hit I put out on you but it would be a lie,” he sneers. “I’m really looking forward to teaching you some respect before I crush your skull.”
Ominous but Dick’s not one to back down from a challenge. “Better men than you have tried,” he offers sympathetically. “I hope that you aren’t betting on it, wouldn’t want you to lose money or anything.”
“I’m really going to enjoy this,” Desmond tells him with a smirk right before he sinks his fist into Dick’s abdomen.
He can’t hold back the vomit after that.
Dick wouldn’t say that he’s been trained to withstand torture but, through his tenure as Robin and then Nightwing and sometimes Batman, he’s learned how to compartmentalize most pain and work through it. But this.
This.
This is all encompassing. It takes up his every waking thought in a way nothing has since his migraines after taking a headshot. It’s worse than dying and being revived. It gnaws on his bones and burrows into his flesh and tears at him until he feels like he’s an empty shell - Dick Grayson and Nightwing no longer.
“Pathetic,” Blockbuster spits, grabbing Dick’s sagging head by the hair and pulling it up until it flops over the back of the chair, too heavy to hold up. Roland’s fingers trail over his exposed throat and Dick can’t even focus enough to care. “You sure do talk a big game Grayson but when push comes to shove you fold like everyone else.” Does he? Dick doesn’t feel like he’s one to give up but his mind is scattered and it’s hard to pull all the little broken pieces back together. “What would Blüdhaven think if they could see their idealistic little savior now? It was foolish of you to ever challenge me for my town.”
“It’s not yours,” Dick slurs out, leaning his head to the side to let the blood clots and drool slip out instead of down his throat. “It was never yours.”
Roland growls and tightens his hand around Dick’s throat - enough to make him wheeze but not enough to completely cut off the flow of oxygen. “Do you think you can take it from me Richard?”
“Not mine either,” Dick forces out thinly. “The citizens know that they can stand up for themselves now - it doesn’t matter what you do to me.” Dick gasps a breath as his throat is released.
“No one will think that once I hang your corpse from the bridge,” Roland promises. “Yours and Nightwing’s right next to it once I can get the little bird in my grasp.”
Ironic - he’ll never kill Nightwing once Dick is gone. It soothes a little something inside him that, if this really is the end, he’ll at least win in that respect. But Dick isn’t one to give up hope - he just has to last a little longer for Babs and Kori and Wally and his team to find him. He’s made it through much worse than this before.
“Good luck with that,” Dick can’t help but taunt, forcing his head back forward until he's looking into his lap again. Strangely the only thing he can think about is how Damian had gotten him this button down for Christmas last year and how it’s unlikely to be salvageable after this. He can only hope that Damian will forgive him for ruining it. He hopes Bruce and Tim and Jason will forgive him if he dies on them right after Alfred. When they’re all still in a state of shock and mourning.
He’s left them too much - first for Spryal then when he was shot and lost his memories. He can’t do it a third time.
Blockbuster grits his teeth hard enough that it nearly echoes in the stone room and Dick smirks a little even though it can’t be seen. “It’s a shame,” Roland snarls, “that there won’t be enough of you left after the vultures pick you clean for your family to have a proper burial. I suppose the least I can do is send them something.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?” Dick mutters, what’s left of his consciousness slipping through his fingers like water.
Roland doesn’t answer, gripping Dick’s restrained right wrist with one hand and gripping his pinky with the other. “You’re about to find out,” he says and then rips Dick’s finger clean off his hand in one fell swoop.
The pain doesn’t hit for a second, he can only stare in shock, but then it cascades over him in waves that have him curling in on himself as much as his bonds will allow mouth open in a silent scream.
“Now that’s more like it,” Blockbuster says, pleased, as he twirls Dick’s finger around his own like one would a pen. Dick’s nausea is back tenfold looking at the ragged edges and the white of bone and sinew stick out the end; he doesn’t dare look at the damage done to his hand. “What’s wrong Richie? Cat got your tongue?”
Dick let’s saliva gather in his mouth and he spits the bloody mess at Roland. “Fuck you,” he seethes, sinking into his anger to keep him from falling apart - it’s always been his trick to keep it together. Roland’s eye twitches as he pulls out a handkerchief to wipe the smear off his bare chest before he calmly reaches down and flicks the bloody end of Dick’s missing finger making him gasp and choke.
“That’s not very civilized of you,” he says through clenched teeth. “And to think I planned to wrap this up nicely to send to Wayne; guess I’ll be feeding it to the rats instead. Wouldn’t want to deprive them of a good meal.”
Dick pants, vision spotty at best, and he flinches hard when Roland pats him condescendingly on the cheek. He’s still talking but Dick’s too far gone to hear any more, clear ringing filling his ears. He strains weakly against his bonds once more, wrists and ankles chaffing on the rough texture of the ropes. He doesn’t know what he would do if he actually was able to slip them - it’s not like he has the energy to fight through Blockbuster and whatever goons he’s got waiting. Even if he did, most of the police force is still corrupt - they’d intercept him before he could make it more than a few blocks.
‘Come on Babs,’ he thinks, picturing his girlfriend cuddling up with Haly the way he had left them before he was taken. ‘Find me, find me, find me.’
But it isn’t Babs who swoops in moments later. It isn’t Tim who's been spending more and more time in Blud recently. It isn’t even Wally or Kori or any of the other Titans.
The cold scrap of metal against wood is deadly music to his ears as is the snarling voice that says, “Remove your hands from Richard or I will take them off at the wrist.”
If Dick had any energy left he would be gloating right now. His beautiful, unhinged, feral little Damian is not one to be toyed with - pity Blockbuster didn’t know that.
“Robin,” Blockbuster hums. “Not the birdie I was expecting but I suppose you’ll do.”
Damian’s voice is ice when he says, “Your fate was sealed the moment you touched him.”
The fight, Dick’s sure, is brutal, not that he’s really aware of it. Damian has more than proved that he can handle himself during Dick’s time as Batman but his heart still beats faster as he thinks of his littlest brother fighting with the enhanced behemoth. Anger has always given Damian the ability to focus though and, in short order, he has his katana wedged through Blockbusters gut, a fractious grin on his face.
“Pathetic,” he growls, the whiteout lenses of his domino narrowed and his nose wrinkled in disdain as he stares into Roland’s surprised face, whipping his sword out of flesh with a wet sucking sound before flicking the blood off. “You are hardly a worthy opponent.” He takes the butt of the hilt and smashes it against Roland’s temple multiple times, knocking the man out and jumping out of the way as he topples to the floor with a loud thud.
Once he’s sure the coast is clear, Damian rushes to Dick and hastily starts undoing his bonds.
“You didn’t kill him,” Dick says with a smile, head rocking to the side so he can see Damian better out of the corner of his eye.
“Tt. I wanted to. I still can if you prefer,” Damian sneers, carefully taking Dick’s freed hand and pressing gauze against his bloody stump firmly, grimacing but not pausing when Dick violently flinches and moans as his hand is wrapped up tight and his vision fades in and out. “Don’t pass out,” he orders, setting Dick’s hand in his lap and working on the other ropes that are keeping Dick upright in the chair.
“But you didn’t,” Dick mumbles. “Kill him. Proud of you Dami.”
Damian sniffs and presses his warm forehead against Dick’s clammy one, his next exhale coming out shaky and wet. “No names in the field,” Damian orders, his firm words undermined by the thickness of his voice. “You must save your strength.”
Dick hums, slumping further as the last of the ropes fall free, his body throbbing and vision darkening. “You’ve got me,” he tells his Robin. “Trust you.”
Feeling more safe than he has in weeks, Dick finally lets go and allows himself to sink under.
Awareness, as it tends to do after he suffers heavy injuries, comes back in waves and Dick allows himself to coast on them. He’s learned the hard way that it doesn’t benefit his body to force it so he lets things filter back in slowly. He can tell already that he’s warm and comfortable and he can feel the dizzy haziness that comes with heavy pain killers. His memory is spotty right now but he feels a deep relief to have them.
“He’ll be fine Damian,” Bruce's deep voice says, cutting through the fog. “Leslie says the surgery went well - he’ll be down for a few weeks but he’ll be back to his usual self quicker than you’d expect.”
“I am not worried,” Damian says, voice cracking a little - oh the joys of puberty - and he clears his throat like that will help.
Dick can almost hear the grin in Bruce’s voice when he says, “Of course you’re not, but you wouldn’t need to be if you were.” Damian grumbles something that has Bruce huffing something that’s as close to a laugh as he gets. “I’m going to go grab a couple things - a change of clothes for Dick and some gentle snacks for when he wakes up. Do you need anything?”
“I am adequately fulfilled,” Damian says in the superior way he does when he’s trying to tamp down his feelings. It had taken Dick a while to figure out how insecure the kid was - now that he knows all he wants to do is pull Damian into a hug. If only his body would cooperate with him.
“Okay,” Bruce says and Dick can hear the smile in his voice. “I’ll be back soon.”
Damian scoffs and Dick sinks back a little as the room quietens again. His reprieve doesn’t last for long as his awareness continues to trickle in slowly bringing with it dull aches and pains and a burning in his hand. He groans, the sound catching in his dry throat, and he coughs as he squints blurry eyes open. A slim hand presses to his chest and the soft bed under him tilts up until he’s reclined but upright and a straw pokes against his lips.
“Slowly,” Damian orders and Dick closes his eyes in relief when the cool water washes the fuzzy feeling out of his mouth. It’s pulled away far too soon and he sighs as he rests back against his pillow. “How are you feeling?”
“Sore,” Dick answers honestly, his voice rough. “You okay?” Damian tuts, fussing with the sheets pulled up to Dick’s chest and adjusting his pillow.
“What an asinine question Richard,” he grunts. “I’m not the one in a hospital bed.”
“You’re just the one who saved me,” Dick says fondly. “Thanks Damian.”
“I wasn’t fast enough,” the boy argues, dusting careful fingers over the back of Dick’s heavily bandaged right hand. Dick is pleased to see that he has five fingers on that hand again and he wiggles them despite the pain and tingling just to feel them move. His little brother frowns disapprovingly and covers them with his own to make him stop. “I couldn’t prevent your injuries.”
Dick frowns and reaches out with his good hand to tangle his fingers in Damian’s shirt, tugging until the boy rolls his eyes and clambers into the bed with a put upon sigh. He curls into Dick’s throbbing left side but it doesn’t stop Dick from maneuvering Damian around until his head rests in the crook of Dick’s neck, fingers curled into Damian’s thick hair.
“You saved me,” Dick repeats with a yawn. “And you taught Blockbuster a lesson I don’t think he’ll be forgetting anytime soon.”
Damian stiffens against his side, a tense line unlike the malleable warmth he was seconds before. “Roland Desmond is dead. The police found him a few hours after I collected you, his heart was missing.”
Well that’s not good. What a terrible time for Dick to be laid up.
“Heartless,” he grumbles, doing his best to blink himself awake so he can try to sit up. “I need to get back-”
Damian’s hands are steel when they force Dick back flat. “You will do no such thing,” he grits out forcefully. “You will stay here and recover and let the peons you call a team handle Blüdhaven for now. I can step in to lead them if necessary - it’s unlikely they will be able to accomplish much without my assistance anyway. I have deployed Drake to get the police file for you to look at later.”
Oh he’s sure Tim just loved being ordered around by Damian; he’d probably only taken the order so that he could get a head start on the case himself. Dick snorts a laugh and lets his muscles untense; he’s dizzy from that little bit of movement so, though he hates to admit it, Damian is likely correct - he won’t be doing much investigating any time soon. At least not much that requires him to be flipping between rooftops. Dick’s eyes flutter closed and Damian settles back in next to him, warm breath puffing onto Dick’s shoulder.
“Sleep Richard,” Damian says, curling tighter and fisting his small hand into the front of Dick’s patient gown. “I will keep watch.”
“Couldn’t ask for anyone better,” Dick mutters, pressing a sleepy kiss to Damian’s hair. He has work to do but for now he can rest easily under the watchful eye of his brother.