Work Text:
Dick thumbed the tungsten band on his ring finger, smiling. It was black, with a row of tiny bones carved from orange sapphires. It was engraved on the inside- yours is the love that lives in my hollow bones. Slade had a matching band, his with blue sapphires. Yours is the love that hollows out my bones. Above his wedding band was the engagement ring. It was shaped like a bone, with an orange sapphire stone in the center and two smaller ones to the side of that.
Wedding rings. Wedding rings, because Dick was married. He was married to Slade.
Even days after they’d gotten married, it didn’t seem real.
It’d been something Dick had been wanting for- a while. He hadn’t thought he would actually get it, though. After what happened to Slade the last time he got married- Dick wouldn’t have thought he’d particularly want to try again.
Dick would have been content with what they had. Sleeping together that had turned to staying together, to waking up to breakfast and making dinner before he left for patrol, to goodbye kisses when Slade was going for groceries or had a contract that would leave Dick missing him so hard it hurt.
Years of messing with each other, of messing up cases and contracts, of something that went undefined and unnamed because they were both terrified to break it, until they finally bit the bullet and it was better than Dick ever could have dreamed. They had a mutual respect that had turned to romance, and even that was more than Dick ever thought he would get.
Dick would have been content.
Then one night they’d crashed in one of Dick’s more unused safehouses- a cute little colonial house at the edge of the suburbs- and they’d started slowly working on it, making it a little less like a safehouse and a little more like a home. They hadn’t meant it as a permanent place, just a little project they could do together.
But Dick had found himself wanting to move in with Slade. Move into the house with him. They both had their own apartments, and while they stayed together more often than not… Dick wanted more.
He had always been greedy.
It wasn’t until months later, when the house was finished and Slade was on his fire escape presenting him with a ring- the exact ring Dick had described in a drunken confession- that he remembered that Slade was greedy, too.
They’d decided to elope that same night, dressing in their best suits and dragging a couple of Dick’s neighbors to the courthouse as witnesses. A few pages of paperwork and a ring exchange later, they were married.
They were married, and moving in together.
After they had moved all their things to the house, Slade had booked them a flight to… somewhere in the Caribbean. For three days, they had been staying in a private beach house. They still had a week and a half of this- of sun and sand and the most colorful drinks Dick could make in the home bar.
And defiling every surface in the house… and some not in the house. It was a private beach, after all.
And they were on their honeymoon. Their honeymoon.
Dick smiled giddily as he admired his wedding ring.
~~~
“Hey, Barbie,” Jason said, looking through the latest reports from his people (some really, really strange things had been going down at the docks), “do you think you could yell at Dick for me? He’s not answering his phone.”
“Yeah, sure.” He heard the click clacking of her on her keyboard for a minute. “...He’s not answering me either.”
Jason set down his notes, frowning. For Dick to not answer him was one thing, but to not answer Barbara? That was a sure sign something was wrong. It was still a little early, but- “he out on patrol or somethin’?”
“Not that I can tell. The last time Nightwing was seen on patrol was… three nights ago.”
That was an even surer sign something was wrong. Wing liked running on rooftops as much as any Bat- probably more so, really- but he also liked swinging down and patrolling on the streets, at least in Blud. He stuck to the skies when he was in Gotham, but in his city he liked to be with his people. He was always getting pulled into street fairs and festivals. If not one person had seen him in three nights, that meant he hadn’t been out in three nights.
“Should we worry?”
“Let’s ask around first. If Steph and Damian don’t know where he is, then we worry.”
~~~
Dick had first learned to surf in Jump City, when he was with the Teen Titans.
He’d taught Jason how to surf, before he died- they drove to Keansburg Beach, spending three days on the waves. It had since become a sort of tradition. A few times a year, Dick would drag one of his siblings to the beach for a weekend.
It had been a long time since Dick had gotten this, though. Catching the early morning waves, having what felt like the entire ocean to himself. Wind in his hair, salt on his tongue, seafoam at his feet.
He stumbled back onto the beach, grinning. He’d had a good few hours of gorgeous waves, but the sea was calming now. And besides, he had something else that was gorgeous waiting for him on the beach.
Slade was sitting on a towel, his bare feet on the warm sand. He had a book open in his lap, but his eyes were firmly on Dick.
He set the book aside as Dick seated himself in Slade’s lap, grinning up at him. “Hi, husband,” he breathed.
“Hi there.” Slade ran his hand over Dick’s bare thigh, fingers slipping under the hem of his baby blue wetsuit. “You looked good out there.”
Dick pouted. “Don’t I look good everywhere?”
“‘Course you do,” Slade said, rolling his eye. “You don’t need me to tell you that.”
“I like it when you tell me that, though.”
“You’re gorgeous everywhere,” Slade drawled, just a little too fondly to be sarcastic.
Dick giggled. “Damn right I am.”
Slade took his hand, sliding the wedding bands he’d taken off back onto his ring finger.
Dick smiled, pressing a kiss to his husband’s lips.
~~~
Steph sat perfectly still while Damian carefully brushed facepaint over her eyelid. He had a pallet filled with purple, and those cute mermaid makeup brushes that he’d stolen from her room. She’d stolen them from Dick’s room, anyways, so she wasn’t all that annoyed about it.
She’d still take something of his, though. It was the principle of the thing.
Suddenly, her phone started ringing. Damian glared at her before she could even think of moving, picking up her phone and unlocking it easily. “It’s Barbara.”
“Put her on speaker, then,” Steph said.
“Hi, Steph.”
“Hi Babs!” Steph said cheerfully. “You’re on speaker. Dami is doing mermaid face paint on me!”
“I expect lots of pictures,” she said seriously. “Actually, I need to talk to him too, so it’s good that he’s here. Have either of you seen Dick in the last three days?”
The two of them exchanged a glance. “I haven’t seen him,” Steph said hesitantly.
“Nor have I.”
“What’s going on?” Steph asked.
“He hasn’t been seen on patrol in three nights,” Barbara said. “He isn’t answering me or Jason, and all of his trackers are down. I can’t find him. I figured if he’d gone somewhere, he would have told you two where he was going.”
That was a fair assumption. Dick, like all of the Bats, would sometimes just… drop off the grid without telling anyone where he was going and what he was doing. But Dick almost always told at least the two of them where he was headed. He was their Batman, and they were his Batgirl and his Robin. He wouldn’t disappear on them if he could help it.
“He didn’t say anything to me,” Steph said, and Damian tutted in agreement. “We’ll head to the Cave. Talk to B.”
“I’ll send Jason over after he checks Dick’s apartment.”
Steph hung up the phone, then she and Damian raced down to the study.
~~~
Dick sat on one of the patio chairs, Slade sitting on the floor in front of him.
Dick ran his fingers through silvery white hair. He took a section from the front, braiding it to the back, weaving in blue ribbon as he went. He did the same to the other side of Slade’s head, braiding in a string of pearls, securing the two braids as a small ponytail.
The afternoon sun was warm on his skin, making the world seem a little lighter. The ocean breeze kept everything from burning up, and the crashing waves made a sort of music in the background.
Dick made several smaller braids, secured with his tiniest elastics. He pinned in more pearls and ribbons in half a dozen different shades of blue.
Slade’s eyes were closed, basking in the warmth of the afternoon. He tilted his head this way and that as Dick directed him, content to let his husband work.
Dick carefully clipped in about a dozen hair clips, all shaped like seashells. He pressed a soft kiss to the crown of Slade’s head to let him know he was done.
“You look so pretty, Babe,” he said, admiring his work.
“Ain’t I always pretty?” Slade twisted around to look up at him, smiling.
“‘Course you are,” Dick said, rolling his eyes. “You don’t need me to tell you.”
Slade shrugged. “I like it when you tell me.”
Dick laughed. “You’re always pretty,” he said, kissing Slade’s forehead.
“Damn right, Birdie.”
~~~
Bruce was in the Cave, working on a case. People had been reporting strange sights at the docks for the past week- colorful flashes seen under the water, ropes of pearls and fish bones left on empty barrels, symbols carved on the bottoms of ships.
Tim had rolled his chair over to help him, but Bruce was pretty sure he was asleep, his head on Bruce’s shoulder.
Bruce hadn’t moved for the past hour to avoid waking him.
All of that was wasted, however, when two people came racing down the stairs. Tim startled awake when Stephanie- with what looked like half-finished face paint- and Damian- two makeup brushes tucked behind his ear- ran up to them.
Bruce opened his mouth to say something, but Steph beat him to it. “Dick’s missing,” she said hurriedly. “Babs can’t find him, she said he was last on patrol three nights ago and now she can’t find him.”
“And he did not tell either of us that he intended to be somewhere,” Damian added.
Bruce felt his heart stop for a second, the way it always did when one of his children was in danger. Tim’s fingers tangled with his, and Bruce took a moment to breathe before settling into Batman.
He called Barbara, and got all of the information out of her, which admittedly wasn’t much. Jason came in an hour later, as they were looking over all of Nightwing’s recent cases.
“I checked his apartment,” he said, coming up to stand behind them, resting his arms on the top of Bruce’s chair. “No signs of a struggle. It was… weirdly clean, actually. And a lot of his stuff was missing.”
“What stuff?” Tim asked.
“Clothes, casefiles, books. His suit and his sticks, too. It felt… more like a well-used safehouse than his home, y’know?”
“That is weird,” Steph said. “I’m gonna run upstairs and get Cass and Duke. Be back in a minute.”
When the three of them came downstairs, they went over everything again and again, talking themselves in circles. They did have to go on patrol eventually; Jason went back to Bludhaven to see if he could find anything else.
Batman was distracted all of patrol, but no one called him out on it. They were distracted too, after all.
No matter what, Bruce would not be losing another child.
~~~
Dick stood at the bar, half his attention on the drinks he was mixing and the other half on watching his husband make dinner.
Slade was making green goddess salmon, seared scallops, and an avocado salad- he’d even made those croutons that Dick loved.
He liked watching Slade do those sorts of domestic things. He liked watching Slade do the more dangerous things, too; he looked hot when he was in armor, of course he did, but something about him in plain sweats, cooking and cleaning and the like… it did something for him.
Slade looked up from where he was slicing avocados. “Something the matter?”
“What? No, nothing. Can’t I appreciate my man sometimes?”
“‘Course you can.” Dick giggled as he set down the knife and flexed his arm. “What’re you making?”
Dick pulled out the rum. “For me? Mai tai. For you? Sex on the Beach.”
Slade grinned. “Sex on the beach? Forward, ain’tcha?”
“Maybe after dinner, you insatiable man.”
“I’m perfectly satiable,” Slade protested. Dick gave him a look, and he laughed. “Maybe not. But you know you love it, darlin’.”
Dick rolled his eyes. “Go back to your salad, darlin’.”
They ate dinner on the beach, a blanket spread over the sand. The food was good- Slade was nothing if not an excellent chef.
He had definitely earned that sex on the beach.
~~~
Duke was in Cass’s room, helping her with a new collage.
She had picked up the hobby while helping Steph and Tim with some pages for the Bat Scrapbook. She had a lot of them hung up on her walls; Duke also had several that she had made for him, and he’d seen some in the others’ rooms.
The one she was working on was mermaid themed. There were newspapers and magazines and pictures spread over the floor, a kind of chaos so well organized that it could only be found with the Bats.
Cass was cutting out all the pictures she liked, and she was having Duke cut out parts of the articles he thought were interesting. She wanted to try adding words to her collages, but she’d gotten frustrated with reading. He was having fun, though, so he couldn’t complain about having to do the things she didn’t want to. He liked words, anyway.
They had the piece half planned out when Steph came in. “Dick’s missing.”
Cass was on her feet the moment Steph spoke, Duke a second later. The three of them ran down to the Cave as Steph quickly told them everything they knew, which wasn’t much.
Duke shared a look with Cass as they got down to the Cave. They were going to find their big brother.
~~~
Dick had spent a thousand mornings watching the sunrise.
When he was small, he’d slip out of the trailer most mornings to see the sun come up. Sometimes, one or both of his parents would come out with him. He could still remember that first Gotham sunrise- his tati smiling softly as Dick pointed at all the shapes he could see in the clouds.
In the manor, sometimes when everything got to be too much, he’d climb onto the roof to watch the dawn. Sometimes Bruce would come up too, sitting with him silently. Sometimes patrol would go a little longer than normal, or the rogues would hit a little harder than they normally would, and they’d sit on whatever rooftop they found themselves on and watch the dawn from there.
In the tower, Dick had gotten to watch the sunrise most mornings. The Titans weren’t strictly nighttime heroes, like the Bats were, and there was almost always someone awake no matter the time. He’d often watch the sun rise with one or more of his teammates and a cup of tea from Raven’s collection or music from Cyborg’s speakers.
He still loved to see the sun rise. He’d spent a thousand mornings sitting with his friends and his family and all the people in between, watching the sun come over the horizon. Most of those mornings, though, were in the aftermath of bad nights and nightmares and missions gone bad.
It wasn’t often that the sunrise was just… a quiet moment, before everything began, like it had been when he was small.
Like it was on that beach.
They had spread out their blanket on the sand. Dick had his head in Slade’s lap, warm fingers running through his hair.
The sky was painted with pinks and purples, yellows and golds that bled into oranges, the midnight blues making way for morning. The ocean met the shore in gentle waves, a quiet sort of music.
Dick looked up at his husband. Slade’s hair was down, falling and flowing in waves, rosy gold in the light. His cool blue eye looked down at Dick, his face so loving Dick felt it in his bones.
Dick reached his hand up, tracing Slade’s lips and his faint smile lines, the edge of his jaw. He touched his right cheek, fingers trailing over where his eyepatch met scarred skin.
Not for the first time, Dick marveled at the sight of him, at the feel of his hands, of his face. At the fact that he got to have this, that he got to have that loving look and gentle touch from one of the most dangerous men he knew. That he got to give back, to look at him lovingly and to touch him gently.
This was the lap of Deathstroke the Terminator he was lying in. The world’s deadliest mercenary, a man who had killed and tortured and torn apart almost every relationship he’d had in favor of his work. The hands in his hair were bloody and bruising. Dick knew that firsthand.
But it was also Slade’s lap. His husband. The man who danced with him in the kitchen and kissed him stupid and loved him more than any contract or case, who stayed with him on bad days and sat up with him on bad nights and bandaged his wounds with military precision. The man that liked having his hair done and laughed at Dick’s dirtiest jokes and flirted just enough to drive him crazy.
The man that was trying, with Joey and Rose and even Adeline, even though most people couldn’t see it. Who cooked and cleaned and dragged Dick to bed when he got caught up in his work. Who cared very much about very few people.
The man that Dick loved.
Slade Wilson, his husband, the love of his goddamn life.
~~~
“There’s a private jet scheduled to land at the Bludhaven airport in half an hour,” Barbara said, frowning at her screens, like if she just stared hard enough they would start doing what she wanted.
Duke blinked up at her from where he was lying on the floor of the Clocktower. “And?”
“And it’s Deathstroke’s.”
Dick had been missing for two weeks now. They’d exhausted every single lead they’d managed to find, and even several they hadn’t found. They were exhausted.
Cass, who had been sitting upside down in the chair next to Barbara’s, studied her. “You want to ask him for help.”
Barbara nodded. Deathstroke had access to an underground network even more extensive than their own, and he’d always had a strange sort of fondness for Nightwing. He might be willing to help them look for him- and if he wasn’t willing on fondness alone, she was sure they could come up with enough money to hire him.
“Someone should go out to meet him, then,” Duke said, pushing up from the floor. Cass flipped herself right side up, helping him to his feet.
Barbara frowned again. “He’s dangerous.”
“So are we,” Cass said cheerfully.
She sighed. “Just be careful.”
“Yes chef!” They both said, running off to the extra suits she kept for everyone.
“And don’t call me that!”
~~~
When Dick got off the private jet, Slade was talking with two people with Bat ears, one in yellow and one in black. Signal and Black Bat.
For a moment, he was confused- did they have a case they needed his help with?
Then he remembered how many people that he’d told his whereabouts the past two weeks. Which was no people at all.
The second they spotted him, they were both throwing themselves at him. Dick dropped the suitcases he was carrying so he could catch his siblings.
“Where have you been?” Signal demanded when Dick set him down. Black Bat was still holding onto his arm, but she nodded empathetically. “If you ran off on a mission with Deathstroke and didn’t tell anyone, I swear-”
“It, ah, wasn’t a mission,” Dick told them, shooting a glare at an annoyingly amused Slade, “we were- on our honeymoon.”
Black Bat let go of his arm, frantically signing married? over and over again.
“Your honeymoon,” Signal repeated. “Your- you and Deathstroke?”
Dick held up his hand, showing off his ring finger. “Me and Deathstroke.”
Both of them looked to Slade, then back at Dick.
“You married him,” Signal said, sounding bewildered. “Why did you marry him?”
Black Bat’s hands were still, held up in front of her chest, like she wanted to say something but couldn’t think of a single thing to say.
Dick shrugged, taking Slade’s hand in his. “I love him,” he said simply. “And also he makes really good croutons.”
Slade snorted. “Right, you married me for my croutons. Not at all for my co-”
“Don’t you dare, Soldier Boy.”
Slade laughed, dipping his head down to press a kiss to the edge of Dick’s mouth. “Sorry, Sugar.”
Dick rolled his eyes, tugging his husband into a proper kiss.
“You married him,” Signal said again, sounding more bemused than bewildered this time. “Congratulations, I think.”
Congratulations, Black Bat signed, then turned to Slade. If you hurt him…
She didn’t finish the threat, but she didn’t need to. Slade nodded, and something she saw in his body language must have reassured her, because she nodded back.
Signal yawned. It was late- definitely later than he usually went to bed. “We’ll give you the night, since you just got back, but we’d better see you tomorrow at brunch. Jason might not kill you if you come on time. Don’t think we can save you from Bruce, though. Or from Babs.”
She will be angry that you didn’t invite her to the wedding, Black Bat signed. I am already angry.
Dick groaned. “We eloped!”
They shared a look, then burst into giggles.
After a little more teasing, Cass gave him a kiss on the cheek and Duke hugged him tightly before they ran off to their bikes. Dick and Slade finished moving all their suitcases to the car, and slid into their seats.
Before they could start the drive home, though, Slade’s phone rang.
He checked the caller, sighed, and answered. “Hi, Addie.”
Dick smiled at the half annoyed, half loving look on his face. There was a lot of bad blood between him and his ex-wife, but that didn’t mean the love had left entirely.
“Yes, I’m back in the states. Is-” he paused as Addeline spoke. “...When and where?”
Slade looked over at Dick, considering. “Yeah, okay. I’ll be there.”
He hung up, then looked back to Dick. “Joey wants me at family dinner tomorrow in New York.”
Dick sighed, resting his head on Slade’s shoulder. “We’ll go to New York after brunch, then. Tomorrow’s gonna be… something.”
“It’s gonna be something,” Slade agreed. “Tonight ain’t gonna be anything, though. Tonight is just gonna be us, husband.”
Dick grinned, tugging his husband into another kiss by the collar.