Work Text:
It was supposed to be a clean sweep.
Dick should’ve known better the moment the comms went fuzzy. Just a crackle of static where Jason’s voice had been a second before. Still, he had pressed forward. The intel was solid. Penguin’s shipment was scheduled to hit the docks at 02:40 sharp. Get in, take the crates, disable the muscle, get out. Standard protocol. The kind of mission they could do in their sleep.
He didn’t expect the ambush.
Didn’t expect the crates to be empty.
Didn’t expect Jason’s panicked bark over the comms, too broken to make sense: “—not Penguin—move, it's a goddamn trap—”
The warehouse exploded in noise.
Automatic fire ripped through the air as Dick rolled behind a crate, heart slamming against his ribs. Somewhere to the left, he heard Damian shout, sharp and furious. Tim’s breathing in his earpiece was ragged.
“Everyone check in,” Dick snapped, ducking low as bullets ricocheted off rusted metal.
“Present,” Tim gasped. “On the catwalk. Took a hit, but I’m mobile—”
“I’m surrounded,” Damian grunted. “Holding position.”
“Jay?” Dick called.
Silence.
Then, finally, “Alive. Pinned down. Got three with rifles, probably more. I’m at the north wall.”
Dick’s blood turned to ice. That wall was wide open. No cover.
“Hold on. I’m coming to you.”
“No,” Jason said quickly, voice tight. “Not worth it. It’s a kill box.”
“Like hell—”
“I can handle it,” Jason barked. Then a pause. “Go to the kid.”
Dick froze. “Damian?”
Jason didn’t answer.
Instead, Dick heard a sound that didn’t belong in his brother’s voice. Something ragged. A cough. Wet. Choking.
“Jason?”
No response.
The next ten minutes were chaos.
Dick moved like lightning, tearing through the warehouse with a kind of focus that bordered on fury. His escrima sticks hummed with electricity as he cracked them against skulls, limbs, rib cages. Every blow calculated. Controlled.
He found Tim first. Pale, shaky, arm pressed to his bleeding side. Dick didn’t have time to do more than toss him a field bandage.
“Stay down. If anyone comes near you, shock them.”
Tim nodded once, teeth gritted.
Dick didn’t look back.
He found Damian next.
The kid was standing over a pile of unconscious bodies, katana dripping, jaw tight with rage. His cape had been slashed clean through, and his lip was split. But he was upright.
“Are you hurt?”
“I’m functional,” Damian snapped.
Dick didn’t ask again. He just grabbed the kid by the arm, shoved him behind a support beam, and turned to head for the north wall.
“Wait—where are you going?” Damian hissed.
“Jay’s hit.”
Damian didn’t argue.
But he did follow.
Jason was barely conscious when they found him.
Slumped against a broken beam, leg twisted at a wrong angle, blood pooling under him. His gun lay at his side, empty. His mask was cracked.
“Fuck,” Dick breathed. “Jay. Hey. Look at me.”
Jason’s eyes fluttered open. “You’re late.”
Dick let out a breath that was almost a sob. “You stupid bastard.”
“Love you too,” Jason rasped.
Damian dropped to one knee beside him, already pulling out a medkit. “He’s lost too much blood.”
“I’m fine,” Jason slurred.
“You’re not fine,” Dick snapped.
He pressed gauze to the wound and tried not to shake. Jason hissed.
“I told you it was a trap,” Jason mumbled, head lolling to the side. “Didn’t listen.”
“Don’t do that.”
“Do what?”
“Don’t say goodbye.”
Jason blinked up at him, eyes a little glassy. “Not yet.”
They made it out.
Barely.
Dick carried Jason out himself, with Damian covering their six and Tim limping behind them, one hand pressed to his ribs.
By the time the Batwing touched down in the manor hangar, the sun was starting to rise.
Alfred was already waiting.
He said nothing at first, just helped Dick lay Jason on the gurney, his gloved hands gentle but swift. He checked vitals, started fluids, murmured something in that calm British tone that had soothed them all from one time or another.
Tim was ushered to the medbay and stitched up.
Damian’s bruises were cleaned.
Jason slept, drugged and bandaged.
And Dick?
Dick just stood there.
Blood on his face, dried along the curve of his neck. Gloves hanging loose at his sides. His suit half-unzipped, dark fabric clinging to sweat-slick skin.
He didn’t move.
Not when Alfred called his name.
Not when Tim touched his arm.
Not even when Damian hovered by the door, watching with a quiet unease that didn’t belong on a child’s face.
Dick stared at the floor.
“I should’ve seen it,” he said.
No one argued.
That was the worst part.
He didn’t sleep.
None of them did.
It was just past 4AM when Dick wandered upstairs, barefoot and aimless.
The manor was quiet in that haunted kind of way. Old wood creaking, wind whispering past the windows. The kind of silence that used to comfort him, back before he realized it was the kind that let your thoughts breathe too loud.
He made it to the kitchen. Opened the fridge. Stared inside.
Milk. Eggs. Leftover pasta.
He closed it.
Opened it again.
Forgot what he was looking for.
He pressed a hand to his face. His skin felt too tight, his brain like a storm.
He hadn’t stopped shaking.
Footsteps behind him.
Jason.
Leaning in the doorway, still half in uniform, bandages peeking from under his sleeve. He looked like shit, and Dick almost said it out loud—some old reflex, a jab to keep things light—but it caught in his throat.
Jason’s eyes were dark.
“You too?” he asked quietly.
Dick swallowed. Nodded. “Couldn’t sleep.”
Jason limped toward the counter, grabbed a mug, filled it with water. Sipped.
“Still hearing the guns?” Jason asked after a moment.
“No,” Dick said.
Jason raised an eyebrow.
“It’s the silence that’s worse.”
Jason didn’t respond, but his jaw tightened.
More footsteps.
Tim, hoodie hanging off one shoulder, eyes glassy and ringed with purple. He looked like he hadn’t slept in days, though the mission had only been hours ago.
He didn’t say anything. Just climbed onto the kitchen island, knees pulled to his chest, and accepted the mug Jason handed him.
Then Damian.
Scowling. Barefoot. Holding a pillow under one arm like a weapon.
He didn’t meet their eyes. Just stood there, tense and twitchy, like a cat in a new home.
No one spoke.
Finally, Dick exhaled.
“I used to wake up every night after the circus.”
Tim looked over. Damian stilled.
“I’d hear ropes creak in my dreams. Thought I was falling.”
Jason’s knuckles went white around his glass.
“I couldn’t sleep for weeks when I first moved here,” Dick said. “Not because it was scary. But because it was quiet.”
He looked up at them, voice soft. “Too quiet.”
Jason leaned back against the counter.
“I used to dream I was still under there,” he said eventually. “Buried. Like I never got out.”
Tim flinched.
“I still don’t sleep deep,” Jason muttered. “Can’t afford to. Never know what’s coming.”
Tim licked his lips. “I used to think… if I fell asleep, no one would remember I was there when they woke up.”
Silence.
Damian was frozen.
They all looked at him.
He shifted, uncomfortable.
“I was not allowed nightmares,” he said, voice sharp. “They were considered weakness.”
Dick stepped forward, slow, careful.
“That’s not true here.”
Damian didn’t respond. But he let Dick place a hand on his shoulder.
They ended up in the living room.
Tim stretched out on the couch, hoodie pulled over his face.
Damian curled up in the corner chair with his pillow, stiff but still.
Jason sat on the rug, back to the fireplace, legs stretched out.
Dick turned off the main light. Left the dim one on.
They didn’t say goodnight.
Didn’t have to.
They didn’t sleep.
Not really.
But they didn’t dream alone either.