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The air is tense as Damian jumps to another rooftop. He had laid low for a while in Metropolis trying to stay out of the public eye and avoid the league as much as he could.
His mother had given him an opening to run a error on her part that had allowed him to run from the league after years of torture of course his mother had nothing to do with it she could do no wrong in his eyes.
He’s gotten antsy though he’s also never seen the world before so here he is on a high roof top in a metropolis. His league regalia keeps him blended in with the shadows and rooftops; the green and brown of the suit is more made for the forest but he has yet to pull out his stealth outfit from the few pieces of cloth he was allowed to bring with him at the time.
It was a spur of the moment decision but he has done nothing but meticulous planning since. Covering his tracks, breaking trackers, staying out of the public eye, etc. he is nothing if not efficient.
He jumps another roof slamming down and rolling with the crack of his bone in protest as he skids to a stop the gravel of the roof flying as he grips the edge of the roof starting over the street expectantly.
His eyes track the movement of the blue clad buffoon who seems to be relying on his powers more than actual combat as he shoots lasers with his eyes. He glares slightly, pulling his mask around his nose to secure his goggles, recording the situation so he can look over it later and bolack at the fact he could get this creature with his bare hands but is relying on flying away from it.
He glares impossibly worse when he sees the little kid with him.
He looks a few years younger than Damian, shrimply not filled out to his full potential and he’s fighting alongside his father..? That unfortunately men’s he’s learning his dads shit battle strategies. The monster slams into the building he’s hiding in; he stays crouched watching the little boy pull the monster free of the dent and swing it down the block towards his father.
With the boys back turned to him Damian stands and leaps landing on a lamp post closer to street level he relies himself swinging himself in a few circles before launching himself towards the roof of the next building he lands perfectly crouched down and he runs his feet padding quietly against the tar roof..
They seem to be going out of style.. tar roofing that is.
He looks over the edge as ‘Superman’ punches the creature in the eye before slamming it into the ground he finds it angering. This is such a stupid display of strength any creature could-
Wind whips and he dodgeds he exposes his back; the boy probably heard him; he nearly tumbles as he slides into another crouch spotting the smaller ‘super’ floating a few feet away from him.
“Who are you..?”
He asks. His voice is light and polite and he sounds like a squeaker toy Damian wonders if he squeezes him if he’ll make a squeak..?
He decides he doesn’t wanna stick around so he backflips off the building feeling the air russtel his hair the hood he’s wearing falls and he lands on the street below with no broken bones and he runs taking off into the alley way leaving the ‘little super’ in a stupor and Damian disappears into the shadows.
He finds himself in a state of disarray he feels himself thrum with excitement a ‘super’ around his age..? He’s not sure he likes the kid yet but his focus on losing the League in metropolis will come to an end soon and he can scale the underside of the bridge to gotham. To his father.
He decides he’s leaving tonight there has been no League activity in Metropolis and now that the ‘little super’ has seen him he can’t stay so when he makes it back to his hideout he swings his bag over his shoulder and treks on foot to the bridge connecting Metropolis to Gotham.
He walked down the hill towards the sandy beaches that line the ‘main land’ and he climbed the bridge up into the rafters that hold up the under belly.
He discovers quickly that there are walkways under the bridge and he is grateful running across the scaffolding that holds the bridge little feet thumping not as silent as he was before letting go relaxing giggling as his some is so close and in sight he runs.
Runs yards and yards until he’s halfway across the bridge and he comes to a halt looking over the water to look at the rising sun. The coral color of the sky warms Damian’s insides and he laughs genuinely and undisturbed as he feels tears well up.
He clutches his sides wrapping himself in a hug he feels delirious and he drops his bag to the boardwalk spinning in a circle and laughing unabashed and exited he rips the gator off his face and lifts his goggles up to rustle in his hair as he giggles.
‘Like a child’
His brain chides and there are laps in Damian’s laughter and he sinks to sitting back pressed against a beam holding the boardwalk to the bridge and he pulls his bag to sit on his legs appreciating the sunset he eyes the burning ball of flame before looking away blinking a tear pit of his eyes.
And it hits him.. just how far away from home he is. His pride wells in his stomach for a second, the pride that his fight has paid off, his training is obsolete and he’s made it this far. The pride he spotted his mothers opening to escape and he sniffling rugs the tears off his cheeks and chuckles again before standing.
The thoughts pushed to the side as he takes off down the board walk again to push himself as he can see the méauge of gothams skyscrapers in the distance and he’s so.. so excited to finally meet his father to learn from him and finally complete the training his mother had raised him to meet and he will make her proud but first he needs to make it to Gotham.
He runs the last few miles of the bridge with no problem stopping only once he must climb the rocks to finally be in Gotham and he has made it.
His heart swells and he can hear the sounds.. the sounds of Gotham.
The shattering of glass, the cackles of people in the streets, the bustlin sounds of car horns and it feels too much suddenly and he’s overwhelmed and underwhelmed all at the same time so he scales a building and finds some solace on the high ground.
He looks around at the buildings, he eyes the people and he feels.. off put on a short sense everything is so different from metropolis but his mother had warned him of this.
“ ‘the residence of Gotham city are horrible and distrust worthy’ ” he recites as he glances around his eyes covered yet again by his goggles help him find people wandering the streets little warm bodies and the sound of crunching glass under foot has Damian on edge his senses are off the hook it was so silent in metropolis..
He jumps to the next roof and he keeps going until he’s found a shabby rundown building that is suitable for tonight.
He really wants to sleep, really he does but he feels so.. overwhelmed and his hands want to move and he wants to move to find his father tonight but he closes his eyes. His mother has trained him for this. He can sleep one day before doing more sightseeing and then going to Wayne manor.
When he wakes in the morning it’s to a cat on the windowsill that hisses when he moves and Damian is up in an instant checking over his belonging he changes his clothes to his stealth atier and takes off on the roofs the black League regalia is less eye catching then his brown and Green League regalia.
He has made it to Gotham and he finds himself so close to the Manor he is understandably excited.
The way Gotham came to be is tricky; his father told him the story’s of the land splitting and cracking as tectonic plates shifted and in between what is not Metropolis and empty barren land owned by the Wayne’s is the island of Gotham. A city that was created out of spite when Lady Gotham departed from her husband via boat and built Gotham from the ground up with her bare hands.
She is a testament to what all of Gotham believes in though her morals have been skewed.
Gothams crime rate rose very early after the death of the Wayne’s ‘the joker’ ros up and committed his first killing and with the police in compensation the social structure of Gotham fell as people turned to crime and it all made him shudder.
One person's break caused Gotham to spiral and out of its broken ashes formed The BatMan a creature his grandfather called mythical a man his mother called ‘beloved’ he was a man.. and Damian’s father.
Damian drifts to the rooftops observing the town with curious eyes watching people get mugged and spotting many women carrying guns. It was a sight to show how women stayed strong no matter where they were. The women of his grandfather's League were strong and fearless. He had only briefly seen Lois Lane in Metropolis but she took no shit even from ‘Superman’ and here in Gotham the women carried themselves with an elegant fearless grace that held a threat to it, it made..
It made Damian hopeful that the mission his father was hellbent on completing in Gotham could be achieved his fathers hopeless selfless devotion to Gotham and its people confused Damian the City was a wreck the people running around causing crimes never stopped and if they were it wasn’t for long.
Then Damian stopped eyeing the police precinct.
It was large and clearly the base of operations though it was clear they weren’t going for subtlety his mother had said something.. Ah yes “ ‘do not trust police’ ” he mutters, eyes narrowing. His mother said most police in Gotham were corrupt, all but police chief Gordon and his accomplice Harvy bullock. She had mentioned a few more but Damian decided he despised all cops regardless of her opinion on them.
He makes a few more stops like sneaking around Gothams botanical garden to participate in the flowers and people watching.
He moves on making his way slowly towards the manor and as he makes it up to the diamond district of Gotham he becomes more stealthy relying more on his stealth training until he’s made it to the bridge connecting the diamond district to the island the Manor resides on.
He takes firm steps up the driveway, his hands at his sides, he makes it to the gate, eyes the camera before taking off his mask and gator and dropping all of his weapons, falling to a sit outside of the manors gate.
“I can wait for some one to fetch me.. or I can get in myself Father though I would assume you’d want to keep your safety devices intact”
He speaks aloud and stays glaring at the camera until the front door to the manor clicks open and out steps an old gentleman.
“Hello Young sir, what can I do for you..?”
“Hello pennyworth, I request a viewing with my father”
“Your father..?”
Pennyworth asks and Damian narrows his eyes
“I assume my mother did not inform you of my Arrival. I am Damian Al’ Ghul the son of Talia Al’ Ghul and The BatMan heir to the Demon Head''
He announces bowing his head to the older man Alfred eyes him before he approaches the gate opening it and allowing Damian onto the premises.
“Am I allowed to bring my things with me..?”
He asks. he heard Mr. Pennyworth has a strong hand and has rule of the house so he shall be polite and courteous.
“Of cours Master Damian”
Damian gives a curt nod, slipping his bag and katana onto his person and following his ‘grandfather..?’ onto the premises.
Damian makes it to the door and he releases a bit of his stiff posture now wishing the grounds of his fathers home he is more relaxed then he was exploring Gotham and as he traverses the manor with skeptical eyes he can’t help but feel.. shocked..?
The manor is big and gothic. It has many floors and many rooms. He had seen it from the front but it’s so much bigger inside and when his father appears in the grand foyer he’s not surprised he’s dressed in most of his BatMan costume.
“Hello..”
His voice is gruff and hard, he looks tired, he has bags under his eyes and his facial hair isn’t very well taken care of.
“Hello father”
Damian bows low and respectful but the man in front of him stiffens
“He is lady Talia's son, Master Bruce”
Mr. Pennyworth supplies and Damian gives a nod of confirmation.
Damian’s first patrol was a disastrous one, his father had been keeping him in the manor and promised once he deemed Damian’s training fit he could go out into the world..
Damian’s patrolling the rooftops happily jumping and flipping. He doesn’t have the acrobatic grace of Dick or Jason who learned from Dick. But he is fine with that; he has the grace of an assassin though and as he traverses the roofs and he watches for his father is at his side.
“Robin, there”
He points and Damian catches on; it had taken forever for his father to train him to not use his swords unless he was in danger.. so here he swoard less and fought with his fists and his feet he’s punching and cracking his knuckles against drug peddlers faces.
He finds it exhilarating watching the bat take down foe after foe with trained brutality while Damian dances alongside him with trained agility and brutality. They make quite a sight and Damian finds pride in fighting alongside his father.
Something in his gut churns as he punishes him and kicks and uses gadgets his sword is tied to his waist but it’s only for emergencies and this is not one. He can practically feel the blood on his hands through the gloves and he has to wipe them in his tunic before jumping back into the fight.
He feels adrenaline pumping through his veins, his heart thumps rapidly against his ribcage but there is no fear to accompany the feeling and he’s.. proud.. intoxicated.. hopped up..? On the adrenaline coursing through his veins.
He strikes and it is bamboozling how the men just take the hits and don't even bat an eye swinging at him though he is a child. He finds it stupid but the situation is more important than the seemingly excitement running through his veins.
He lands a skilled kick, hears the crack of bone and retracts gasping.. he didn’t mean to kick that hard .. he and father had been practicing to make sure he wouldn’t- so he wouldn’t..
He feels tears well behind his eyes but his father isn’t reprimanding him so he swings at the next asalent with equal force and he hears the man’s chest heave for breath as he kicks and on impact he hears the sound of broken ribs and something in him.. something green loves it..
But the green decides just as quick as it came to leave as he’s left panting standing over three asalinets down for the count his fathers hand on his shoulder. The sound of motorcycles and the revving of the Batmobile’s engine knock him back into reality as he father practically drags him away.
The men on the floor gasp for breath holding their chests and Damian wants to.. apologies..? Help..? He’s not sure but he feels one thing akin to guilt and that is befuddling to the child.
He’s never felt anger like that, Adrenalin like that.. he’s never..
‘I have”
He thinks.. he has hurt to kill, hurt to maim, he has granted people compound fractures for things that not even he understood a touch of skin that tuned every gear in his body up to a hundred and he had strikes and they had been too slow..
He bares his teeth fighting off the tears as he is sat in the back of the Batmobile still too young to ride shotgun. He crumples his hands in his cape and refuses to look at the brown stains on his green Robin tunic he wants to cry.
‘But I won’t”
He chases himself, he doesn't need to be Damian Al’ Ghul-Wayne he refuses to cry over something so insignificant as broken bones he’s done worse he could have done worse.. he could have.. he could have..
He bites his lip until it bleeds and he refuses to cry and then when he gets home he’s un surprised to find two people and two mother cycles parked outside of the manor.
The people's father had seemingly been running from.
They drive into the cave through the tunnel and he gets out of the car he is going to take off the domino until he sees the two people they are standing close together looking at something on the younger laptop and fathers breath hitches.
“Hood”
His father says
“Nah just red right now, and my ride of course”
The man’s voice is deep and Damian stays still behind his fathers cape watching as they talk back and forth..
‘Red’ or ‘Hood’ is talking to his father with all crossed arms and corded muscles. He wears a helmet and he talks through a voice modulator that jumbles his voice, his eyes are just white scouting slits on his mask and the shorter person with his back to his father has long black hair pulled back into a ponytail.
“Father, who are they..?”
He whispers tugging at his fathers cape. He is in the simplest terms confused.. How did they get in the cave? How did they have access..?
“There you go Red changed your code name announcer”
“What is it now”
“Red hed”
“Little bird..!”
He reaches for the laptop and they seem to tussle playfully.. would father do that with him..? Could they interact like a family after patrol..? Damian thinks he’d like that.. he wants to watch a movie with his father and pennyworth and he wants Titus to be there and-
‘Childish..!’
His brain chides and Damian frowns and furrows his brow.. Childish he agrees before he steps around his father to get a better look at the second man with the laptop.
“I didn’t really it says ‘Red Hood’ Now-“
The man promises and then he freezes like he knows Damian is there and suddenly two pairs of eyes are on him.. Red Hood and his sidekick eye him.
“Another one.!?”
Red Hood growls..
“Another one..?”
He asks if it comes out acquisitory instead of a question and the eyes of Red’s mask turn gr e en .
“Af t er me..!? After Grayson..!? Does he even kn ow..! ”
It’s a harsh demanding tone as he approaches Father finger raised and Damian pounces in front of his father sword raised keeping distance.
“Do not lay a hand on my father”
Damian glares and Red looks down at him.
“Sh it Bruce you have out done yourself, another child soldier to the pile.. how is he gonna kick it..? Jokers taken.. what’s next Two Fa ce..?”
It’s a snarl and Damian’s sword falters. His father had other robins he knew were all dead..?
“I’m better than them”
He said firmly and hoods green glowing eyes are on him in seconds
“Ar e y ou..? Do you have your guard up at all times..? Do you plan on staying civilian during the day, getting decent sleep and being able to act like a k id..?”
The man’s voice is grating
“Yo u w anna know somethin g k id”
He reaches up a gloved hand to his mask and pulls a switch dislodges and the front half of his mask slides up and he can see his face.
“I d id just what you did kid, I was the second your the third and you won’t be the la st”
He snarls and Damian sees it now it’s the pit this isn’t red this is the pit .. this is Jason Todd..
“Jason..?”
He asks and the man snickers
“T h at’s m e” He slides the mask back into place he is still glowering as he reaches for the arm of the other person who has his computer pushed to his chest, eyes wide and mouth pushed into a thin line like he wants to steal Damian away.
“He can have this little child soldier. I got the best one any way, come on Little Red let's blow this place” the shorter man ‘little red’ is pulled along by Todd off to the motorcycles where the boy pulls on a black version of Jason’s mask speeding out of the cave with him.
What if he went with them.. he had questions he demands answers for.. Grayson.. that’s Duck Grayson hsi fathers adopted son the first Robin currently nightwing.
He sits legs curled close to his chest blanket over his shoulders as he types away into the bat computer he is doing research he needs to know who they-
Red Hood and Red Robin..
Red Hood, or Jason Todd killed by the joker pronounced legally dead and brought back by Damian’s grandfather he.. he is a crime lord that has been killing traffickers and childmolesterers for ages and..
Red Robin, or ???
The adopted son of red hood, helps and plays a part like Oricel. He is very good at putting codes I place so as to not be tracked. His myth in crime alley, he is a rumor never confirmed and he’s always with Todd. He’s only used for special missions that Jason can’t complete on his own and.. he's a teen sixteen to seventeen he his identity is unconfirmed but it’s rumored to be Timothy Drake..
Damian wonders what life is like.. is it like how it is with father..? He shuffles out of the cave in PJ’s where Titus waits for him.
“Pennyworth..!?”
Damian calls the man walks briskly into the room concern on his face.
“Yes master Damian..?”
“I’d like to watch a movie with you and father if that would be adequate”
He says standing tall as he asks and Pennyworth smiles.
“Certainly my boy, I’ll see what Master Bruce says but I will be here”
He promises and his father doesn’t show up.. it’s just him Titus and Pennyworth in the mansion and he.. he watches some Disney movies he doesn’t care for and gives up halfway through thanking Mr. Pennyworth. He goes to bed dejected, sad, and ‘childish..!”