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Dick smiley bouncy baby boy. He's clutching the bar of the trapeze, he's smiling happily and he does the flip. He's nervous sure this is the first time he’s done the jump without the net and he clutches the second bar he feels his left hand s;ips but his right hand grabs on tight and he gasps.
He did it, he made it..! He nearly fell but he did it.
He stumbles, feet padding against the ground as he trips into his mothers arms. He's excited and gasping for air and his mother clutches his head and kisses him on the crown of his head.
“He nearly fell..!”
His mother yells at his laughing dad
“Yes he did”
“But I made it..!”
Dick says but his mother starts laughing with his dad and he's confused why are they laughing..? He can't help it though he smiles he smiles big and wide and he laughs until he's crying happy tears and he clutches his mom laughing into her bosom.
“I did it..!”
He yells happily as he clutches his fathers wrist pulling his father close behind him they all clutch each other laughing and crying and happily..
That day Dick learned even through the fear and the sadness you have to laugh.
And he did. Until his parents died.
He was the light of the circus. He would laugh and smile, shake hands and break apart fights with just his appearance. He suddenly found out that he can’t be happy all the time..
He makes it into Bruce Wayne’s arms crying before he starts laughing in pain and that's not anything he'd been able to do before. Usually laughing makes him happy but right now it just hurts. He doesn't know why he's doing it, his cheeks hurt from how long he does it and he didn’t even realize he passed out until he woke in the Wayne manor.
He's clutching a blanket close to his chest he's nestled into the couch. He sits up and cries he’s in so much pain he's never been in this much pain before. He's been sad, he’s been mad, He’s been disgusted.. But this hurts worse than that so he does the only thing he can do.. He falls back head hitting the armrest he smiles crying and smiling..
Eventually it won't hurt anymore.. He thinks and then he laughs.. ‘No it won't”
He thinks again..
He opens his eyes again and looks at the person who entered the room. It's Bruce Waynes..he's not quite sure.
“Hello..?’
He smiles though there are still tears rolling down his face. The older gentleman walks over and sits at his feet on the couch.
“My name is Alfred Pennyworth. I am Master Bruce's butler and I will be supervising you when he's not here”
He offers a smile and Dick looks at the Older gentleman confused.
“Why am I here..?”
“Well Master Bruce adopted you”
“Adopted me..? My parents are dead..?” He asks he laughs again “I mean i knew already but now I know for sure”
Alfred looks at him worried and Dick has to keep smiling and laughing to get happy again because otherwise the tear will never stop but it hurts it hurts to smile.
“Master Grayson, why don’t you ease up on the smiling..?”
Alfred asks
“If I smile, maybe I'll get happy again and I can.. I can ignore the hurt”
“Ignoring the hurt doesn't make it go away”
Alfred says and Dick shifts sitting up and Alfred moves to sit next to him wrapping an arm around his shoulders.
“It's okay Master Dick I’m here..”
“Are you Just Mr. Waynes Butler..?”
“No, I helped his parents raise him.. I’m Technically his father”
“So does that mean I can call you grandpa..?”
DIck asked Alfred a small smile as the chipper crying boy looked up at him with big doe eyes.
“Yes of course Master Grayson”
“Dicks just fine grandpa”
He says and he curls into his grandfather's side and he lets his smile slip and he cries and cries and cries.. And he took what Alfred said to heart ‘ Ignoring the hurt doesn't make it go away ’
When Dick turned thirteen he started the teen titans. It had been something he had pitched to Bruce on a whim at twelve, he had brought it to The Justice League and a year later he had done it. Dick Grayson the Robin of Teen titans..
But that wouldn't work.. Bruce would need a new robin and he'd have to become Nightwing and he did. He smiles as he hands down his costume to the new little spitfire, his little brother.
Jason had taken to Robin like a duck to water. He seemed to have skewed morals but he had spirit so Bruce kept training him and when Dick was home on weekends he'd teach Jason some acrobatics.
They would move together in fluid motions in the cave. They would balance on one arm together and then they would do a backflip into a handstand nearly in sync then they were doing the splits and stretches in the morning and he'd tell Jason to keep it up while he went off to do another Titans mission.
He came home one weekend Jason and Bruce were out on patrol and Dick didn’t mind he had Alfred and he had the cave so he sat and used the cameras in their masks to monitor the mission.
He dozed off at one point and when he woke Jason was bloody and his heart level was raised he was heaving breaths and angry and Bruce was appalled and shocked.
“Jason you can't just-”
“It's too loathe old man his arms already broken”
Jason sased and Dicks heart plummeted into the floor he couldn't breath. His brother just gave a man a compound fracture and dick just had to smile and he did. He laughed and smiled and when the batmobile drove into he cae dick was smiling and stretching and he scolded.
Oh boy did he scold.
Bruce was fine practically unscathed except for a bullet wound that had just gotten his side cutting clean through missing any arteries he might need and Alfred patched him up while Jason wheezed holding his side and shaking.
Poor little Jason rattled like a leaf, hands holding his shoulders as he heaved breaths and the adrenalin wore off.
“Jason we dont hurt people” Dick said with a pleasant smile on his face, of course it didn’t meet his eyes but the smile was there all the same. “And Bruce he wouldnt of had to if you adjust- Bruce if you had been paying attention and stopped the guy before he grabbed jason like that he would have reacted instinctively”
Dick says before he crouches down still that kind smile and Jason looks so small cowing in his cape and he reaches for Dick when he opens his arms and he dives. His shaky little form hugged against dicks chest.
“Hey, I got you baby bird. I got you” He promised and he petted Jason's hair “I know it must have been so scary but we can't do something like that again okay..?”
Dick asks as he slips a stray hair behind Jason's ear.
Jason shakes his head slips pulled into a small quivering frown..
“Dick it was so scary”
He says and his voice cracks and dick softly takes the boys domino off releasing the flood of tears
“He grabbed me and I didn’t know what to do and then he didn't- I didn’t want him to touch me there..!”
Jason cried, stuffing his face in the crook of Dick’s neck.
“I know baby bird i know”
He said.. And he didn't stop smiling.
Dick stopped smiling when he heard of his brother's death.
He returned from a week-long trip and he was confronted by Alfred and Dicks heart stopped. His smile faltered and the tears came and it hurt too much to smile all over again and then he was just angry he was angry at everyone.
He locked himself away digging research and he did it he found the lay out arkham. And a direct route to the Joker's cell. Dressed to the nines he decided he'd avenge his brother and as he made it out to the cave on his motorcycle he made it to the gates of Arkham only to be met with the Batmobile.
“Dick”
Bruce greeted and Dick gave a nod approaching the gate.
“There are no visiting hours today” Bruce says firm and Dick sneers “I’m not visiting”
“Dick you can’t kill him”
“You can’t stop me”
And dick hefted himself over the gate running across the grounds and using a grappling hook to get up onto the second floor.
He trudged down the route with the knowledge of the layout he made it to the Joker's cell to see him, his hair had grown out he was denied his makeup so his lips were white like the rest of his skin but the scars kept the constant smile.
“Nightwing..!”
He practically rejoiced jumping up and placing his palms against the protective glass of the cell.
“Have you come to see me, wanna know how the little bird screemed.!?”
The maniac had the gall to laugh in his face and it caused dicks frown to deepen and the joker shook his head.
“You're supposed to smile, you always smile..?”
The man’s face darkened
“Oh no, I broke you didn’t I..?”
He laughed again and dick disappeared from his point of view. Joker looked at the glass pressing his smiling face against it looking for him but he was already in the pen.
It’s too late. This little piggy was gonna die and dick was going to enjoy it.
“Really joker, taunting a man while you look like that..?”
Joker saw him for a second before the lights cut out and the alarms went off his red emblem seeming to shine as the red emergency lights flashed throughout the room.
“What have you done..?”
He almost sounded impressed if he wasn’t so confused.
“Made a distracting some extra time to end you”
Dick sneered teeth bared and he attacked.
When he left Arkham with blood seeping through his costume he made his way back to the manor passed Alfred and went straight for the shower stripping out of his costume and started a shower.
And he laughed and he cried while the warm sprayed down his back, he laughed until he turned the water to cold and he stood there laughing until he finally turned the knob and left the bathtub and grabbed a towel.
He toweled off his hair with a smile, he rubbed the blood away and then he wrapped it around his waist leaving a bloody uniform for Alfred or Bruce to find when he returned from his god for saken patrol.
And he smiles the rest of the day.
When Hood arrived in Gotham dick had been training at the police academy. He had gotten a call from Bruce, a specifically slippery villain taking over the criminal drug trade and he needed help catching him and Dick is ‘so efficient at recon’ he had scoffed but told him he’d be there.
And he was.
He showed up at the manor and offered Alfred a kiss on the cheek and a hug saying a warm ‘hello grandpa’ before giving Bruce a nod and walking down into the cave to change and get to work.
Dick is in his new Nightwing costume, it’s blue no longer his ‘killing’ red and he starts using every camera the bat computer has access to to locate the description Bruce gave him and he comes up with nothing.. but he keeps smiling.
He’s out with Bruce when they spot him. The man in the red mask fires a sniper rifle killing the man they are questioning and they track him across the rooftops until they launch out of the Batwing onto the rooftops and he runs.
He ran with Adrenalin and it felt good working with the bat again until they made it to a stand still..
“How’s Robin..?”
“Robins dead”
Dick snarled and he frowned brows furrowed he could almost hear the sick satisfaction in his voice
“Don't be so sure Di-”
Then water splashed into his face, a passing car blocking his view of Hood; they had lost the Bat a while ago and Hood was gone; he let out a scream of frustration.
“Nightwing status report”
“He’s good B, he’s got training good training”
Dick mutters peering into the alleyway with a glare on his face and then his mask slips back up and he’s smiling again.
“He said something I couldn’t here it but my mask should have recorded it”
He says chipper and cheery all over again and he disappears onto the rooftops heading back for the manor.
“I’m going to see if I can catch it back at the cave”
He says and he turns off comms to angrily ride on his bike home.
When he bumps into Hood again a kid is with him and they have the joker captive.
He’s stuck on the bridge between Metropolis and Gotham; he's hanging from the bridge and the kid with him sits perched on the highest point of the bridge crouched at Red Hood's side.
They are talking through their own com system and by the time they hack into it they're gone.
‘Come on little red lets go home”
‘We got him..!”
The kid says happily and something in his gut churns it sounds like Jason to him..
‘Yeah but your staying home for this”
Red Hood says and Dick feels his heart thump unnaturally at the sentiment that hoods are trying to keep ‘little red’ safe.
‘Hood they hacked the com system”
‘Go od work Red Robin, kill it”
And the coms go dead he puts up an encoded firewall that Oricel would have to break through and his brain reminds him of when the bat computer was hacked into..
This kid has been here a while. He’s obviously older now and Hood knows him. It doesn’t explain why he was- why he hacked into the bat computer from Jason’s apartment..
Who the hell is Red Hood..?
He and Bruce find Red Hood in Jason’s old apartment.
“You figure it out old man..?”
“Jason”
Bruce glares and Dick's eyes widen as he takes off the red mask to reveal his fluffy black hair with white streaks and his single gr e en glowing eye and his furrowed brow and his smirk hidden under a domino that leaves enough space to show off his scars.
“He y N ightwing, hey Ba ts”
He says as his singular blue eye floods with green and he swings the crowbar in his hand.
“Jason..?”
It’s a whisper as his stance lessens and his smile drops to a concerned frown, his brows furrowing before the smile is right back in place.
“Jason..!”
Dick runs over hugging him tight but he hears the click of a gun and he backs up. Jason’s got a gun pointed at Bruce, both his eyes deep green. Pit green . the color of the joker's eyes.
“Di d y ou bring him ba ck..?”
Jason gestures to the joker.
“Yes”
“Wh o k ille d h im..?”
He demands
“I did”
Dick chokes his for when back and his hands shaking and his costume glitches and his blue emblem becomes that red again and he glares at Joker he’s not remorseful the man deserved it.
“I did”
Joker kackles
“I broke the bird”
“I’m not broken”
Dick snapped and Jason kicked him to shut him up.
“Ma yb e I should gag you a ga in”
Jason growls.
The room is silent as Jason yells at Bruce and Dick. the anger jason feels the hatred the displeasure. Then mid sentence Batman turns to leave and Jason screams firing his gun and the bullet meets batarang and the batarang flies at Jason’s neck and it hits and he gasps.
Dick jumps into action catching Jason and putting pressure on the wound. And he watches the bat leave, taking Joker with him and dick growls and screams his own scream as he clutches Jason close to his chest.
The bat has been gone for seconds when the door bursts open a teen holding a med kit..
“Lit tl e r ed”
Jason wheezes with a smal grace of a smile
“I told you hood I told you he’d kill you..!”
He’s crying small tears not crocodile so he can work opening the med kit angrily
“He can’t feel the pain kid don’t give me pills just get to the”
He spits up some blood gesturing to his neck and the boy's little hands shake but he knods his head removing items from his med kit and performing surgery.
“Sh ou ld have listened to yo u r ed”
Hood chuckles
“Stop laughing your gonna-“
“Re -op en it I kn ow ”
He places a hand on the boy's head ruffling his hair and closing his eyes.
“No. no. no, you said you wouldn't leave me..!”
The kid cries and crawls closer to Jason’s body and curls into his side.
“Don’t leave me again, you just adopted me..!”
He cries and Dicks heart seizes his nephew.. he has a nephew.
“Hey kid, I’m Nightwing”
He says placing a hand on the kids shoulder trying not to jostle Jason.
“Or dick Grayson, fist Robin, and first adopted son of Bruce Wayne, or Batman”
The kid snaps and Grayson eyes widen before Jason’s whispering out a pained little
“Smar t li t tle bird”
A ghost of a smile on his face. As he eases into dicks hold.
“Can you carry him..?”
“Yeah I got him”
Dick says following the little determined kid out the door. They walk a few blocks the kid having him follow while he rides a motorcycle and leads Dick to a ‘safe house’
It’s an open plan apartment that’s been reinforced with steel so a super couldn’t hear through it and the kid leads him to a bedroom.
“Lay him down I gotta- I gotta get some pillows”
He stumbles off this strong kid reminds him so much of Jason.
“The wound on Jason’s neck is healing unatrally fast as he sleeps the green glowing through his eyelids and lashes almost makes him look serine as the kid walks in placing some pillows under his head.
“He should wake soon.. he- he heals fast because of the pit..”
The kid says
“You can leave now uncle Richard”
And Dicks heart breaks as he hugs the kid.
“Okay but you can-” he hands the kid a com “-use this to get ahold of me if you need okay..?”
The kid shakes his head and dick smiles again.