Chapter Text
Dick doesn't even know how he got back to his apartment. One second he'd been rushing to the manor to question Bruce about what happened to Jason—which he had had to learn from Danny, of all people—and the next he's holding a frozen vegetable bag to his cheek while staring at a kids' cartoon playing on his TV.
"Bruce, I heard what happened. I'm so sorry," Dick got up from the chair by the Batcomputer and leaned on the table.
"You weren't here. You didn't go to his funeral," Bruce responded calmly. But Dick knew better after so many years of being Bruce's ward; of being the Robin to Batman, the light to Batman's darkness. He was angry. Frustrated.
They had been arguing often since Bruce had taken Robin from him, and it had only gotten worse since Jason became Robin. It wasn't his fault, and Dick had tried to keep the fighting away from him but no one trained by Bruce Wayne—by The Batman—would just turn a blind eye to yelling. "B…I didn't know. I didn't come here to fight. Please don't shut me out like this."
"At least when you were Robin, when you didn't listen to me this never happened to you. You're lucky. But even then you never followed my orders. You did the exact opposite." Bruce took the cowl off and set it on the table. His face was impassive—but he was clenching and unclenching his fists throughout the entire conversation. Tension, bitterness, rage.
Dick blanched. Was he blaming him? "B, there's no way you're blaming me right now. I left, Jason replaced me, so since I left he died?" Dick didn't leave, not really, anyways. Dick shook his head to clear his memories from reminding him. "Jason wasn't like me. I was a trained acrobat. I could think quickly in high-tension situations, I was trained for this. You? You let him become Robin before he was ready," Dick fumed. This was a time where they should be grieving together, but truly he didn't know why he expected more from Bruce.
Bruce was quiet for a few moments, his anger rising quickly after Dick had said that. It was hurtful, he knew it was but he couldn't help himself. It's not fair.
Before he knew it, Bruce moved swiftly and threw a punch at his cheek. "Don't you dare blame me for Jason's death!" he yelled.
Dick was frozen, sprawled on the ground half-sitting up. This wasn't a punch Bruce got in while sparring, this wasn't a lucky hit from a mugger. This was Bruce, Batman, his guardian, his father. The same person who would comfort him with shoulder pats and stories at night when he'd get nightmares, the same person who would subtly check-in on him every week, the same person who told Jason so many stories about Dick's time as Robin so that he could learn about his brother.
"I shouldn't have had a partner. He was just like you! He wouldn't listen! I would have had to fire him just like you." Bruce—no, Batman spat.
Dick opened his mouth to respond, to say something in retaliation. "I—"
"You shouldn't even be acting like you care. You resented me adopting Jason," he said.
Dick's eyes widened and then quickly narrowed. "I only asked why you adopted him!" He can't believe him. He had come to have a real conversation with Bruce, make amends, to grieve Jason together, but instead Batman punched him and blamed him for his little brother's death.
"I'm not having this conversation right now, Dick. I suggest you leave and give your key to Alfred on your way out. I will never have a partner again." Bruce walked past him, not even sparing him a glance.
Dick felt his eyes well up with tears. They had fought before, giving their vigilantism, but he has never seen Bruce like this before. He supposed death changed people—it had changed him, too—but aren't they a family? Is Bruce that scared of having a family again?
It didn't matter. He wouldn't let himself cry here. Batman had already humiliated him enough to also have Batcave footage of him crying.
And so Dick had left the Batcave, not even stopping for a moment to let Alfred communicate for Bruce.
Dick sat in the darkness of his living room and sighed. Should he have approached that conversation differently? Bruce was hurt, he was angry, and most of all, he was sad. Dick knew Bruce wasn't even going to let himself mourn. After all these years living together and working together (and being raised by a man he now considers his father) Dick knew that Bruce was pushing him away. He can't help but think that he made the conversation worse.
In reality, Dick knew that Bruce would not be ready for a conversation surrounding Jason for a long time. But, he contemplated, I deserved to be at Jason's funeral. I gave Jason my suit, he donned my family colors. God, Jason, Little Wing, I'm so sorry I wasn't there. I'm so—
Dick thoughts were cut off as he caught something in the corner of his eye. What? He quickly re-positioned the frozen vegetable bag on his face to grasp it in his hand and threw it at whatever was able to break through his security in his admittedly not-very-secure apartment.
It didn't hit anything—it flew right through the figure by his door and flopped on the ground, leaving a small puddle.
"You didn' have to throw that, y'know, I thought you said I could come over anytime!"
Was that? "Little Wing?" Dick scrambled to turn the lights on.
No fucking way. I must be losing it.
A semi-translucent 12-year-old Jason was standing by the shoe rack at the entrance of his apartment. He is way too emotionally exhausted to deal with the fact that along with processing the falling out with his father, he's now also hallucinating Jason. Great, just what he needed.
"So, whatcha' doin'? Working on a case? Secret mission? Seems like they ripped you a new one," Jason smirked. He was doing that thing he did when he was trying to hide just how nervous he was. That is, averting his gaze after acting like he doesn't actually care.
(Dick knows he cares; Jason is was the sweetest kid ever).
He remembered that time he had to go after Jason trying to do a drug bust on his own.
**
Nightwing rolled his eyes as he rushed towards the very conveniently placed warehouse. It's always a stupid warehouse in the middle of many other warehouses on the outskirts of Gotham. Really, Gotham criminals have got to step up their game.
He watched as Jason as Robin burst right through the windows, not even giving himself a chance to gauge his surroundings and approach with caution. Who trained this kid? Did Bruce even try?
As Nightwing finally caught up, he jumped right into what looked like Robin fighting 6 guys at once. He wasn't doing too bad, but Nightwing spotted one of the guys that was knocked down reaching for the gun Robin had managed to kick away.
"Robin, watch out!" Nightwing yelled as he swooped in to help him out. Robin ducked right as he heard him shout. What Nightwing didn't account for was that he had flipped in right behind Jason.
Nightwing bit back a yelp as the bullet grazed him on the opposite shoulder of where the Joker got him when he was 17. Funny, now he'd have matching scars on both shoulders.
"Nightwing!" Robin shouted.
"I'm good, I'm okay, Little Wing, but we need to finish this pretty soon," he grimaced as he dodged a few attacks from one of the guys they were fighting. He did a couple one-handed back handsprings to evade any hits and hopefully distract the guys from his injury.
"Got it!" As if inspired by his sentence (he was worried about him), Robin finished up the guys he was dealing with as Nightwing did the same. They zip-tied them all and went to collect the information Robin needed to shut it down.
"C'mon, we've gotta get you back to Agent A to patch that up - 'least you only got grazed." Jason mused.
Dick was, frankly, not having a great time. Apparently, being shot in the same spot—even if it's on the other side of the original oneis —bringing up some not-so-fun memories of when the Joker had shot him and he'd almost died after falling off the side of a building. He would have fallen just like the rest of the Flying Graysons, thus sealing their fate.
"Wing? We gotta go man, cops'll be here any second and I don't think they wanna see that horrendous suit in person," Jason poked at him worriedly.
Dick snapped out of the daze he was in, scolding himself internally for losing it that easily. "Aw, are you worried about me, Little Wing?" He said to distract Jason from the small moment he wasn't present.
Jason scowled at him, blushing. "Psh, obviously not! I just don't want to fill the report out myself. That's on you for joining in!"
Dick chuckled as he and Jason approached his motorcycle, hidden in the shadows of the alley. This kid was so caring and he didn't even know it. How could he have ever let his anger towards Bruce get in the way of hanging out with him? Things were going to change.
**
"Hellooooo! Dickie? I know you can see me!" Jason, just like in the memory he was reliving moments ago, tried to poke at him. It went straight through him—he felt nothing. His little brother really was gone.
"You looked right at me! Don't try to ignore your way out of seeing me 'cause I just heard you call me 'Little Wing'! You can hear me!" Jason was now pacing in his living room. The hallucination of Jason that his mind conjured up (because of course he couldn't grieve his brother normally) was now pacing in his living room.
"Hi, Jason. What're you doing here," Dick rubbed at his temple, sniffling a little. At least now he could cry openly—not like Jason was actually here anyways.
"I heard you and B arguing again! Dickie it's getting so annoying at this point, you guys gotta stop fighting in front of me." Jason rocked on his heels while exclaiming, "He didn't look at me so I followed you back here!"
The confirmation that Dick was actually hallucinating Jason and that it wasn't Jason as a ghost was both worrying and relieving at the same time. He never had hallucinated his parents. Sure, he's dreamed of them and could still imagine the scent of his mother's perfume, but he never saw or smelled any of that outside of his dreams. Maybe it's the guilt he feels about Jason dying from the mantle he created. Maybe Bruce was right to blame him—if he hadn't been Robin, Bruce wouldn't have kicked him out twice (would Bruce even have kept him if he hadn't been Robin? Maybe that's why he 'left'). If he hadn't been Robin, Bruce wouldn't have had to miss him and therefore replace him with Jason, who'd died in the mantle created to honor his family.
He's getting ahead of himself. Logistically, Jason dying wasn't his fault and it wasn't Bruce's either. Neither of them were there for Jason when he needed them most, and now his little brother is gone. Jason hadn't even made it to his junior year of high school. He remembers the last conversation they had; Jason was ranting about the book his English teacher had assigned to the class—Animal Farm, by George Orwell—something he'd also had to read at that age. Jason ranted for the entire hangout about how obvious the themes were, and how the rich kids in his class hadn't even looked like they understood the references to their society.
Dick snorted at the memory. Jason always was so passionate about the books he read. He was truly the only kid he knew that could finish a 300-400 page book in one sitting and then go on to ramble about it at dinner, according to Alfred.
"Sorry you had to hear all of that, Jay," Dick might as well interact with the last figments of imagination he has of Jason, considering he really will never see his little brother again. He's determined to be a good brother now so that at least some version of Jason out there will feel confident in how much Dick loves his little brother. "How'd you even get here?" Dick honestly doesn't know why he asked, but hey, might as well humor the kid and distract the both of them from thinking about the elephant in the room.
"You won't believe it, it's so cool! I was waiting for you guys to stop arguing so that B and I could go patrol, and then when I saw him walk back up to the manor I was like 'Ugh B is so boring!' And so I decided to follow you out but you were going so fast on the motorcycle so I just thought really hard and then poof I'm here!" Jason was rambling. Dick probably wasn't successful at ignoring the elephant in the room.
Jason walked over to him and gestured with his hands around Dick's cheek. "Dude, go get that frozen bag back it's just melting over there! If you're gonna defrost them then at least put them to good use," Jason exclaimed.
Dick sighed and walked to the front door to grab the bag. After placing and holding it back on his cheek, he trudged over to his couch and plopped down, Jason still awkwardly standing. Dick patted the couch "Hey, wanna watch Dora with me? I gotta keep my Spanish up to par and Dora's great with teaching vocab." Jason scrunched his nose and sat at the other end of the couch. "Dick you know I speak Spanish fluently right? Ugh and it's not even that helpful she speaks Spanish like one word per sentence! It's better if you play the Spanish to English version," Jason tried to snatch the remote on the coffee table to change it, but, well, he wasn't corporeal enough for that.
Dick frowned at the reminder of Jason being a hallucination and grabbed the remote to change it to the version Jason wanted; he was right, anyway, immersion was the best way. "I got it Jay, don't worry."
Jason sighed and sat back, holding his knees up to his chest and looking almost as small as the day he met him. "Whatever," Jason muttered.
After successfully changing it to the Spanish speakers learning English version, he tried his best at trying to mentally note which words he recognized and which he had completely forgotten after not using Spanish for a couple years. Jason, every few minutes or so, would talk under his breath about how Dora used the wrong word for something. Adorable, really (and if Dick was watching something from his native languages, he probably would get like that too, but sue him, the generic neutral Spanish was helpful!).
About an hour later, Dick went to put the frozen vegetable bag down on the coffee table, planning to throw it away probably. He then noticed Jason was nodding off. He was also getting sleepy, if he was being honest. When Jason finally fell asleep, Dick figured a hallucination wouldn't need a blanket. He lowered the volume a bit on the TV and turned slightly to watch Jason sleep, saving this memory of the boy—even if he wasn't real—in his mind to remember what he could get of his little brother.
He was starting to blink heavily, and after repositioning himself more comfortably on the couch, he dozed off into a dreamless sleep.
The next morning, Jason wasn't in his apartment. Figures.