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The glass had already been broken before he got there.
It crunches under Dick’s boots as he moves—sharp, brittle pieces scattered across the tile like frost. The fluorescent lights overhead flicker in uneven pulses, casting the lab in a stuttering wash of white and shadow.
One of the panels buzzes loud enough to grate, the kind of sound that settles behind your eyes if you listen to it too long.
Blühaven in general never smells clean, per say, but inside the clinic it’s worse—bleach and alcohol layered over something sour. Open cabinets hang crooked off their hinges. Drawers have been yanked out and dumped across the floor. Vials—some intact, some shattered—glint among the mess.
“—grab the rest—”
“—rget it, we’ve got enough—”
“Shut up and move—”
The voices all overlap, tight and frantic. Not organized and certainly not careful.
Dick drops from the ceiling beam without a sound, practice makes his steps nearly imperceivable as he approaches the group of men.
The first one doesn’t even register him before he’s on the ground—arm twisted, shoulder pinned, breath knocked out of him in a sharp, surprised wheeze.
Dick pivots off him, momentum carrying him forward into the next man, catching a wrist mid-swing and redirecting it cleanly into the metal counter.
Something clatters—tray, tools, maybe both.
“It’s Nightwi—”
Too late.
Dick moves through the rest of them the way he always does—controlled and efficient. No wasted motion.
The men he’s been tailing all night are idiots but not trained fighters so Dick’s hits are carefully placed—carefully pulled.
A kick to the ribs, a duck under a wild swing, the crack of his escrima stick against a forearm hard enough to disarm, not break.
The rhythm is familiar. Predictable. He knows exactly how this ends.
The last guy by the storage shelves panics as Dick lunges forward.
He sees it a half-second too late—the shift in stance, the scramble backward, the hand fumbling through his jacket pocket.
It doesn’t seem like a gun or any kind of weapon.
Maybe a bomb?
Dick opens his mouth to try and talk him down, but in the next second the man throws it.
A small object bursts against Dick’s face in a soft, papery pop.
Grayish powder blooms.
It hits his eyes, nose, the inside of his mouth—fine and dry and everywhere all at once.
Instinct kicks in before thought does—he jerks back, arm coming up too late, breath catching as the dust goes airborne around him.
“Shit—” Dick curses, blinking hard.
Once.
Twice.
The guy who threw it bolts.
Dick moves anyway despite the haze in his vision.
He closes the distance in three steps, catching the back of the man’s jacket, and hauling him into the nearest cabinet hard enough to rattle the shelves.
The man crumples, hands coming up too slow to defend himself, and Dick drops him to the floor followed with a practiced kick that knocks him out cold.
Where he expects quiet to settle, the lights buzzing take its place.
Something drips steadily from a cracked IV back hanging off the edge of the counter.
One of the men groans somewhere behind him, low and disoriented.
Dick doesn’t turn to look at them; he's already wiping his face.
The powder doesn’t brush off clean. It clings, fine—almost chalky—but with a strange weight to it, like it wants to stay where it landed. It drags across his skin when he wipes, catching along the edge of his mask, the corner of his mouth.
There’s a smell too—sharp and sterile, chemical in a way that doesn’t belong in something thrown like that.
Dick inhales through his nose—and immediately regrets it.
Don’t breathe it in
He tells himself, too late.
Dick turns in place, eyes quick and scanning.
The clinic is a wreck. Open containers. Split packaging. Labels he doesn’t recognize at a glance. Prescription bins overturned and mixed together on the floor—antibiotics, sedatives, god knows what else.
A rolling cart is tipped on its side spilling syringes across a tile already littered with glass.
There are too many options to know exactly what hit him.
Too many variables to narrow down.
Calm down. Calm down. Calm down.
He wipes at his eyes again with a cleaner part of his glove, harder this time, blinking against the sting.
Nothing burns.
Nothing blurs.
No dizziness, not immediate drop in balance. His lungs don’t seize. His heart doesn’t spike.
Dick waits for it.
One second.
Two.
Three.
Nothing.
No rush of heat. No cold sweat. No sudden vertigo or loss of coordination. His fingers flex around the grip of his escrima sticks—steady. Controlled.
Strange… that doesn’t seem right.
Dick goes still in the middle of the wrecked clinic, head tilted just slightly as he listens—not to the room, but to himself.
It takes another minute maybe two or three before—
There.
A pressure settles behind his eyes, but it’s not sharp. Not sudden. Just… there. Like something pressing from the inside, slow and deliberate, building without urgency.
“Great…” Dick breaths out, slow and controlled.
The lights above him stutter again, buzzing louder now that nothing’s competing with it. Somewhere to the left, there’s a faucet running on an uneven drip—metal sink, hollow echo.
The man below him coughs, wet and pained, then goes still again.
There are sirens wailing in the distance, far enough away that they aren’t for Dick. Not yet at least.
He rolls his shoulders once, testing the range.
Flexes his fingers, shifting his weight from heel to toe, grounding himself in the grit of glass under his boots.
Everything feels… okay still, except for the steadily increasing pressure behind his eyes, like the start of a migraine. Which it very well could just be one starting, but Dick knows better than to brush off something like potential contagion exposure.
He reaches his fingers up and taps his comm.
“Nightwing to cave.”
There’s a brief crackle—static slipping through the line—then Steph’s voice cuts in quick. “Hey Wing you—christ on a cracker—” there’s a sudden intake of breath, “—hold on—” A muffled shuffle comes next followed by a hiss of pain. “Damn I hate stitches,” Steph grumbles out, there’s another shuffle of what sounds like fabric before she comes back to the mic. “Okay, go. What’s up?”
Dick glances down at the powder smeared across the back of his glove. It’s caught in the groove of the material, pale gray against black.
“Well, define good,” he says dryly. “I got tagged with something. A powder. No label, and too many variables to determine what it is.”
“I’m gonna go with definitely not good then dude.” Steph jokes then shouts away from the mic for Alfred.
There’s a pause on the other end before the butler's voice fills Dick’s ear.
“Master Richard, are you experiencing any immediate symptoms?”
Dick leans his hip against the edge of a counter, careful of the litter beneath him. The metal is cold even through his suit.
“Not really,” he starts. “No dizziness. No breathing issues. No—” he trails off, squinting slightly as the overhead light flickers again. “Headache. Just a mild one. It started almost right after.”
“Define mild?” Steph cuts in.
Dick huffs out a quiet laugh, “I supposed that’s fair—it’s similar to the start of a migraine, so manageable.”
“Uh-huh,” Steph says, clearly not buying it.
“I just don’t know what it is. That’s why I’m calling. If I could have identified it I could take care of it but since I don’t know…” Dick lets his voice trail.
There’s more movement on the other end—Dick can almost picture it. Steph leaning forward in the chair, casted leg propped up awkwardly, Alfred somewhere just off to the side with that look he gets when things shift from routine to concern.
“Okay,” Steph says, more focused now. “You said powder. Inhaled?”
“Some of it,” Dick admits with a grimace, the silky powder still feels gritty against the inside of his mouth. “Got it pretty much everywhere. Mouth, eyes, the works.
“Love that for you—”
“Miss Brown,” Alfred’s chides.
Steph grumbles something Dick can’t make out before the butler continues.
“We would strongly advise against you returning on your own, Master RIchard.”
Dick straightens against the counter, “I’m fine to drive Al. It’s not hitting fast. Whatever it is I can be at the cave in—”
“Nope,” Steph doesn’t even let him finish. “Absolutely not.”
Dick almost tries to argue but she cuts in again.
“There’s no ‘I’m fine’ if you don’t know what hit you.”
“I’ve certainly handled worse,” Dick reminds.
And on my own no less, he thinks bitterly reaching for the window.
“Unknown chemical exposure warrants caution. Please remain where you are. We will dispatch someone to retrieve you.”
Dick presses his lips together, jaw tightening just slightly.
He looks around the room again—the mess, the scattered vials, the powder he still hasn’t fully gotten off his skin.
“...fine,” he concedes, though it comes out more like a reluctant breath than agreement. “I’ll wait.”
“Good,” Steph says immediately, like she expected that to be harder. “Stay put. Don’t touch anything else. And—hey—”
DIck pauses, finger resting near the comm.
“What?”
“Start tracking,” she explains. “Breathing, heart rate, vision, coordination. Anything changes, you call back.”
Dick nods once, even though she can’t see it.
“On it.”
He pushes himself through the broken window, stepping carefully through the debris.
The night air hits muggy and hot, cutting through the chemical tang of the clinic. He pulls himself up onto the ledge, then out onto the fire escape, metal groaning under his weight.
Blüdhaven stretches out below him—streetlights flickering in uneven lines, traffic rolling steady despite the hour. A car horn blares somewhere down the block. Someone shouts. Life goes on like nothing’s wrong.
Dick makes it to the roof across the street without any changes aside from the pressure behind his eyes growing steadily.
The tar of the roof has softened under the intense heat of summer, still holding onto it even this late into the night, the surface faintly tacky under Dick’s boots.
The air sits heavy—thick with humidity, exhaust, and the lingering smell of Gotham everywhere.
It clings to his skin, presses into his lungs when he breathes in too deep.
He moves anyway.
Not pacing—he hasn’t gotten to that point yet—but he doesn’t stay still either. A slow loop from one end of the roof to the other, stepping over a loose cable, skirting around a rusted vent that rattles every time the wind shifts just enough to catch it.
In for four.
Hold for four.
Out for four.
Dick lets his thoughts chant while he breathes through the anxiety slowly.
Calm down.
He chides himself.
Do it again.
The city stretches out below him in uneven lines of light—streetlamps buzzing, storefront signs flickering in tired neon. A car idles too long at the corner before someone leans on the horn.
The sound cuts sharper than it should.
His jaw tightens hard enough it aches, fingers twitch once at his sides before he forces them still, flexing them out like he’s checking for tremor.
There isn’t one.
That almost makes it worse.
It’s just noise.
He tells himself., cracking his neck to the side in an attempt to work the tension out before it settles.
It doesn’t quite dissipate. It lingers in his neck, his back, the base of his skull like something wound too tight.
The pressure behind his eyes has changed. It’s not just there anymore—it pulses. Slow and steady. A quiet, insistent throb that builds if he focuses on it too long, so he doesn’t.
Dick’s attention shifts outward instead, down to the street, tracking movement automatically. A car turning the corner. A flicker of motion in a second-story window. The uneven blink of a broken streetlight.
His vision is still clear.
He rocks forward onto the balls of his feet, then back.
Tests his balance without thinking about it.
Stable.
Breathing hasn’t changed either judging by the lack of tightness in his chest.
“Okay,” he steels himself. “Okay, you’re fine.”
Dick crouches near the edge of the roof, forearms braced against his knees.
The heat rises off the tar in waves, clinging to him, making the air feel thicker than it should. Sweat gathers at the back of his neck, slides slowly under the collar of his suit.
If it was something fast-acting…
I’d be down already.
Dick exhales through his nose.
“Not a hallucinogen or a stimulant then,” he mutters, more to ground the thought than anything else.
He would’ve dropped. Respiratory, neurological—something immediate. This isn’t that.
This is—
Nothing.
Which is so so much worse, because that means it could be anything.
He pushes back to his feet again before the stillness can settle too deep. Moves without thinking—two steps, turn, three steps back. The roof creaks faintly under the shift. There’s a restlessness under his skin now, subtle but growing. Not energy—he’s not jittery—but something tighter, like his muscles don’t quite want to relax all the way.
Like they’re waiting.
For what, he doesn’t know.
The rusted vent beside him rattles again. Metal tapping against itself in an uneven, irritating rhythm.
He shoots it a glare like it personally offended him, then exhales sharply through his nose.
Get. A. Grip.
Dick plants his feet again, deliberately this time. Forces himself to stop moving. Focuses on something solid—the feel of the roof beneath him, the grit under his boots, the edge of the building just a few feet away.
In for four.
Hold for four.
Out for four.
On his tenth round of the breathing a sharp thwip cuts through the air.
Dick’s head snaps up instinctively, eyes tracking the sound to the edge of the building—
A grapple line, taut and anchored, slicing clean across the gap.
A shadow follows it a second later.
A blur of black, red, and brown drops into the space between buildings, boots catching the edge of the roof with a solid, practiced ease.
Jason doesn’t rush as he settles his weight.
“Nice of you to pick a rooftop sauna,” he mutters, glancing once at the skyline once before his attention lands fully on Dick. “ Couldn't've waited somewhere with air conditioning. Or a fan?”
Dick huffs out a laugh, “Yeah, I’ll keep that in mind next time I get dosed with mystery powder.”
Jason snorts, the modulator in his helmet makes it sound more menacing than it is. He tilts his head as he steps closer. The heat clings to him too—sweat already darkening the collar of his shirt under the jacket.
He stops a few feet away, and gives Dick a once over.
“Alright,” Jason says, tone shifting just enough to matter. “What’d you get hit with?”
Dick shrugs, a small, controlled movement.
“Powder. No label. The lab was already trashed, so—” he gestures vaguely toward the direction of the clinic, “—pick your poison.”
If Dick could see his brother’s face he’d assume he just got hit with an eye roll as Jason mutters out, “Helpful.”
“Working with what I’ve got, brother.”
Jason closes the distance anyway, stepping into his space like he always does when he’s assessing something without making it a whole production.
His gaze tracks over Dick’s face, posture, stance—quick, efficient.
“Symptoms?”
“Headache,” Dick replies. “Started right after. Getting worse, but not—” he waves his hand in front of him searching for the word, “—debilitating.”
“Anything else?”
Dick shakes his head, “No dizziness. No motor issues. Breathing’s fine.”
Jason studies him another second, then exhales.
“Great,” he mutters. “So either it’s nothing or it’s something slow and horrible."
“Those are looking to be the options right now.”
Jason’s head tilts again, subtle.
He shifts a half-step to the side, angling Dick toward one of the brighter rooftop lights. It flickers once overhead, then steadies—harsh and white.
“Look at me—take off your domino—I need to check your eyes,” Jason orders.
Dick drags his gaze to his brother before pulling his mask off, the adhesive tugs painfully at his skin.
Jason watches—really watches this time. Dick assumes for any changes in his pupils.
“...yeah definitely blown,” he says after a beat. “You honestly just look really high.”
Jason’s voice hits wrong.
Too loud. Too close—like it’s pressing into his skull instead of coming from in front of him.
For no apparent reason being accused of it rubs Dick the wrong way, his chest tightens.
“Can you stop talking for five seconds?” Dick snaps, the words come out sharper than intended—too sharp, cutting in a way that makes something in his chest twist immediately after.
Jason stills in front of him.
The helmet hides most of it, but the shift is there in a way he goes just a fraction more stiff. He pauses. Then—
“...okay?” He replies, voice carefully pitched.
Dick’s head pounds again at the sound of his voice jamming into his skull.
“I feel fine,” he adds, like that fixes it, like it smooths over the edge that shouldn’t have been there.
A car horn blares somewhere below.
Another answers it, sharper, more impatient.
The rusted vent rattles again beside them, metal tapping in that same uneven rhythm.
The sounds were starting to grind against Dick’s nerves, the pressure behind his eyes pulsing again. Sharper this time.
The lights overhead flare far too bright as he winces against them.
His teeth ache from how tightly his jaw is clamped shut, each itchy seam of his suit is lighting every nerve ending on fire.
“Come on,” Jason says, jerking his head toward the edge of the roof. “Let’s just get you back to the cave before whatever that is decides to get more interesting.”
Dick nods once, pushing off the spot on the vent he’d been leaning against.
He makes it one step—then the world tilts. It’s subtle at first—not a full drop, not a loss of balance—just a delay, like everything lags half a second behind where it should be. The edges of Jason’s silhouette blur, the rooftop light bleeding into it in a way that makes his eyes sting.
Dick stumbles.
Jason's hand catches his forearm, the contact burns like a brand.
“Hey—”
He blinks hard, forcing the world back into place. It snaps into focus a second later, but the pressure behind his eyes snaps with it—sharp enough now that it almost pulls a reaction out of him.
“Whoa—Wing you good?” Jason asks, his voice pitching with worry.
Dick exhales slowly, forcing his tense muscles to loosen.
He’s fine…
He’s fine. Right..?
The headache pulses again.
Sharp and insistent worse than just another headache.
Dick hisses through his teeth as the city noise presses in—too many horns, voices, the skid of rubber tires against asphalt—all of it is too much, like every sound around him has tripled in decibels.
Jason shifts slightly in front of him, a small movement—
—and something in Dick’s chest misfires at it.
His vision tunnels
Something is very wrong.
Dick swallows the thought as best he can because something can’t be wrong. He can’t be dying right now from some freaked out thug raiding a clinic.
He pushes his legs forward again and this time—
The world doesn’t quite follow right.
It lags.
Smearing lights, shapes lacking form. The heat presses in harder, thick and suffocating, like the air itself has weight now.
“Wing—”
Jason’s raspy voice cuts through, it sounds like someone put an air horn to Dick’s head.
“I said I’m fine,” he starts, the words automatic—but they don’t come out right.
They feel… off. Thinner. Strained at the edges.
The pressure behind his eyes climbs even higher, no longer the steady pulse and instead like a tidal wave of pain.
Dick’s hand comes up instinctively, pressing hard against his temple like he can physically hold it back.
It doesn’t help. If anything, the contact of his itchy glove on skin makes it worse—like something pushing outward from the inside.
“Nightwing.”
Jason’s voice is so loud.
Why is it so loud?
Dick blinks hard, as the world pulls inward, everything outside of Jason is being dragged to the edges of his vision and flattened there.
The rooftop, the skyline, the flickering lights—all of it blurs and dims until there’s just—
Movement.
A muddle of brown, black, and red.
Dick’s chest snaps like a taunt rubberband.
It isn’t pain.
It’s not even a thought.
It’s a reaction.
Fast, violent, and immediate.
His body tightens all at once—muscles locking, shoulders pulling back, spine straightening like he’s bracing for impact.
His breath stutters, then comes sharper, quicker, dragging heat into his lungs that feels too thick, too hot.
He knows the feeling. It’s the same feeling he has staring down Deathstroke, Ra’s, or a rouge.
Which means…
No—
The feeling hits, clear and terrifyingly desperate through the haze.
“—hey—look at—” Jason's voice cuts in again, fractured this time.
Chopped into pieces by the noise pressing around them.
Dick recoils from it, head turning slightly like he can physically get away from the sound.
His pulse spikes—hard enough now that he can feel it in his throat, in his hands, in the base of his skull where the pressure has turned into something sharper, something angrier.
Not just tension or irritation it’s—rage.
There’s no build, no warning—just a sudden, overwhelming surge that drowns everything else out. It burns through his chest, down his arms, tightens his grip before he even realizes his hands have clenched into fists.
Stop—don’t do this.
His fingers curl tighter before he tells them to.
The movement is wrong—automatic, detached—like his body is skipping ahead of him.
He knows what he’s about to do.
He just can’t stop it.
The familiar weight of his escrima sticks snaps into his hands with a practiced twirl, muscle memory taking over where conscious thought has failed.
Everything is wrong.
The light halos at the edges of his vision, bleeding into shapes that don’t hold. Sounds spike, then suddenly muffle, like his head's been dunked underwater.
Jason steps forward—and Dick’s body reacts before his mind can catch up.
He straightens fully, shoulders squaring, feet setting under him in a stance he didn’t choose.
Don’t—
His breath is faster now, the air too thick in his lungs, on his tongue.
Jason closes the distance—and Dick’s mind flags it.
Threat. Immediate. Close.
Dick can’t comprehend the world around him as the rage surges harder, swallowing his pleas whole.
There’s no room for anything else. No space for recognition, for reason, for the instinct that should override everything else.
Just… a target—and the ability to kill.
Dick’s grips tighten on his sticks.
When his body moves toward his brother—
He’s not the one in control anymore.
***
Jason gets zero warning.
One second Dick is standing in front of him—tight, off, but still there—and the next—
—crack.
The strike lands with a violent snap that rattles through his skull—white noise bursting behind his eyes as the impact vibrates through the helmet and into bone.
His brother's escrima stick connects full-force with the side of his helmet.
The impact rings through his skull, sharp and loud, a burst of white noise that drowns everything else out for half a second.
His head snaps to the side with it, boots scraping hard against the softened tar as he stumbles to catch himself.
What the—
His thought is cut off when the second strike comes fast.
Jason barely gets his arm up in time, the reinforced plating in his gauntlet catching the blow with a jarring thud that still rattles through bone.
The force behind it isn’t pulled. Not even close.
He recoils on instinct, pivoting back to put space between them.
“Wh—”
Another hit.
Jason ducks under—the escrima stick cutting through the air where his head had been a split second before.
It whistles past, close enough that he feels the displacement of it against his neck.
He moves again—back, to the side—re-centering.
Jason doesn’t understand, of all the people to throw him a punch Dick doesn’t usually come first on the list.
“Would you snap the hell out of it!” He shouts, voice sharper now, edged with irritation and disbelief.
His brother doesn’t answer nor does he hesitate. His next hit is quick and direct without a single wasted movement. The kind of efficiency that makes him a strong ally and a terrifying enemy.
Jason blocks it, bracing for it means he feels when it lands.
The impact travels straight down this arm, heavy enough to force his elbow back a fraction.
Strong enough that if he wasn't wearing plating he might’ve broken an arm.
“Cut it out, Nightwing!”
Dick doesn’t slow down.
If anything he picks up the pace. The rooftop feels smaller now—the air is thick, hard to pull in cleanly when he’s moving like this, when every breath has to come fast and sharp.
Another low swing comes at him.
Jason jumps over the escrima stick, boots landing heavy.
He adjusts mid-motion, turning it into a pivot that puts him off Dick’s centerline.
Dick’s head whips to face him, still lacking the domino he had taken off just before.
Jason catches his eyes in the split second between movements.
Wide. Empty. So very far from right.
It’s the drug, Jason realizes. Fucking hell.
Dick comes at him again.
No warning. No shift in weight to telegraph it. Just movement—fast and immediate and aimed to injure.
Jason blocks high, then low, then twists out of the next strike entirely, boots scraping as he slides back across the roof. The vent to his left rattles violently as his shoulder clips it, metal clanging loud enough to echo across the building.
Dick’s escrima stick glances off the edge of his helmet, enough to snap his head back.
Jason’s stance shifts, the ringing in his ears picks up the impact.
Putrid acid green flickers in the edges of his vision. His breathing ratchets up a level.
The pit stirs low in the base of his skull while he dodges another strike, feet skidding backwards against the roof.
No… no no. Not him—
Jason pleads with his own mind.
Dick presses again—nearing relentless.
Strike after strike, each one precise, efficient.
Jason has sparred and fought Dick before each time there were always openings. He’s trained himself to find them. He knows his brothers rhythm, but—
There aren’t any. No openings, no chances of attack.
It hits Jason hard just as another crack of the escrima sticks lands against his shoulder that Dick doesn’t fight like this against him.
He never has.
The pit continues to flare.
It’s not just anger, it’s recognition. Predator to predator—something deep and instinctive that doesn’t care who’s underneath it, only that the thing in front of him is a threat that needs to be put down.
Attack, defend, survive.
It pushes at the edges of his wavering control, a familiar, dangerous pressure that wants him to stop holding back. Wants him to end it.
Jason clamps down on the green as much as he can.
He catches Dick’s wrist mid-swing, twisting just enough to redirect the force away from his head—
—and for a split second, they’re close.
Close enough to see it clearly.
Dicks blue eyes are black, the pupil blown so wide there’s only a sliver of blue around the edges—they’re glassy and not at all seeing.
Jason’s breath hitches, his grip faltering.
“—shit,” he breathes as Dick rips himself free.
His brother's arm snaps back into motion the second Jason’s grip slides away.
Half a second later—before Jason can even process the hit—the escrima stick slams into the side of his helmet again, even harder than before.
This time he feels it crack under the force.
A sharp, splintering sound cuts through the air—thin metal and reinforced composite giving just enough under the force to spiderweb along the surface. The hit rattles through Jason’s skull, vision flashing as his balance staggers with it.
If he wasn’t wearing the helmet… that—that could’ve killed him.
Jason stumbles back a step, realization starts settling in hard and fast.
Dick isn’t pulling anything.
Not even instinctively. He’s completely out of it. Lost to whatever drug is dampening his senses and making Jason the enemy.
Jason barely brings his arm up in time to block the next strike, the blow slamming into his gauntlet again hard enough to force him back. The impact hurts—deep, bone-deep, even through the armor.
The pain forces the remaining hesitation to bleed out of him.
He stops giving Dick ground and starts focusing on the threat in front of him.
His brother steps in again.
“How often you fight like this,” Jason breathes out, ducking under another swing, pivoting to the side just enough to keep out of range. “You’re a bastard for holding back on me!”
The city noise feels distant now, muffled under the rhythm of it—the crack of wood against armor.
Sweat stings at Jason’s eyes beneath the helmet padding, salt and heat mixing until everything feels just a little too raw.
Jason counters the next hit—redirects—catching the angle of the blow before shoving it off, stepping inside—
—and gets clipped anyway.
A sharp hit to his ribs that drives the air halfway out his lungs.
The hits send the acid green flaring violently under his skin, curling hot in his chest—hotter than the humid air—and back up his neck.
End it.
Kill him.
Jason locks his jaw against the instinctively pull to respond.
He shoves forward instead, closing the distance before Dick can reset. It’s risky—but too close for the sticks to be as effective—but it’s the only way to get control.
He hooks an arm around Dick’s torso, drives his weight forward—
They go down hard.
The impact knocks the breath out of both of them, the rooftop surface unforgiving beneath them—gritty, hot, smelling like old rain baked into it.
Jason rolls through it, using the momentum to come up on top, knee braced across Dick’s midsection, pinning him.
Dick bucks under him immediately, muscles coiling tight, snarling at the unyielding pressure on his chest—but if there’s one thing Jason has on his brother—it’s his strength, so he plants his weight, and holds firm.
“Hey—HEY—” Jason barks, one hand shoving Dick’s shoulder flat while the other reaches for his gun. “Knock it the hell off! This isn’t you—”
Jason presses the muzzle hard against Dick’s chest.
His finger tightens on the trigger—just a fraction too far—one more ounce of pressure against the slack and it would fire.
The pit is screaming for him to do it.
End it.
KILL.
His grip tightens, the rubber of his gloves dragging against the metal of the grip.
Jason’s breath stutters his muscles losing some tension because—
It’s Dick.
A shock hits him before his thought finishes.
White-hot electricity tears through his system—violent, immediate.
Every muscle locks at once, back arching involuntarily as the current floods through him. His grip spasms, the gun jerking uselessly to the side as his body betrays him.
Jason moves to stand to get away from the current, crying out as the pain rakes over his body.
The charge is familiar—Dick’s escrima sticks.
His body convulses under it, nerves firing all at once, the pit roaring in response—rage, pain, kill it—all of it crashing together into something overwhelming.
Then—
A kick, directly to his sternum, sends him flying.
Jason hits the rooftop hard, skidding across the rough surface, armor plates scraping, breath knocked clean out of him as his back slams into a low vent. Metal rattles violently under the impact, the sound echoing out across the building.
He can’t breathe.
The world tilts, vision swimming, the taste of copper tang sharp at the back of his throat.
He drags in air on instinct, chest protesting, ribs screaming where the hit landed.
Then—movement.
Jason’s head snaps up.
Dick is already on his feet, stalking toward him.
His movement slow and controlled, face fully visible in the low sodium lights around them—sweat-slicked, flushed from heat and exertion.
His eyes are still empty, no show that the drug's effects are wearing off.
I don’t know how much longer I can do this.
Jason thinks, pushing himself up on one arm, the other braced tight against his ribs.
This is not good.
As if the universe heard him, his comm crackles in his helmet.
“Red Hood.”
Bruce’s Batman voice is in full swing.
Jason huffs out something that might be a laugh, hitting the button on the side of his helmet to speak.
“I’m a little busy—” he mutters, forcing himself upright.
“What’s your status? Is Nightwing okay?”
Jason’s gaze doesn’t leave Dick, as his brother gets closer, still moving slowly like a predator that is relishing in caught prey.
“Define okay—” Jason swallows, adjusting his stance, and pointedly ignoring the way his chest protests, “—he got dosed—attacking—not pulling punches.”
He keeps his explanation short, there’s no time for an indepth conversation as Dick closes the distance by another step.
The pit coils tighter.
Kill him.
“No,” Jason breathes to himself, quieter this time.
“Jason,” Bruce says, sharper now. “Hold your position. We’re en route.”
Jason lets out a short, humorless sound.
“Yeah—hurry.”
It’s all he has time to say before Dick is pouncing again.
Jason barely gets his arms up before the next one lands.
It hurts.
Everything hurts.
The heat, the impact, the way his body is starting to lag just a fraction behind where it needs to be.
“I can’t keep this up, B,” Jason says into the air, knowing his comm is still on, fear is starting to give way to anger. “He’s going to—”
Jason is cut off by another hit he half blocks and rolls out of.
“He’s going to kill me,” Jason finishes, more blunt this time.
No time for theatrics or easy words.
Dick will kill him, because the person in front of him is not Nightwing, it's an amped up feral animal intent to kill, and without his mask Jason can’t run and risk him unleashing this fury, or his identity.
“Hold on Jay,” Bruce says firmly, there’s a sound of a car starting that Jason hardly registers before shifting his stance as Dick comes at him again.
“Yeah… that’s kinda the problem.”
His brothers hit glances off his wrist, stinging through the armor, the follow up comes immediately—low and fast, meant to take his legs out.
Jason jumps at the last second, landing heavily making the roof swim.
“Wing—!” He tries shouting again.
Dick doesn’t slow. Doesn’t react. He doesn’t even seem to hear him.
Jason shifts, pivots, blocks—keeps it defensive, keeps it contained.
Every movement is calculated to redirect, to stall, to buy time. He’s not striking unless he has to, not putting weight behind anything that might actually hurt.
Ironic that it’s usually Dick’s job.
Talking someone down. Finding the angle. Keeping it from getting this far.
Jason’s never been that guy.
“C’mon, you’re smarter than this—” he tries anyway, breath coming harsher now, sticking in his throat with the heat.
A strike catches him in the ribs again, same spot as before, and this time it sticks.
He might have felt something crack, but right now all he feels is the flaring sharp pain that drags a grunt out of him.
KILL HIM.
The acid green pit screams making his vision pulse around the edges.
“No!” Jason shouts back like he can actually control the constant water that swirls within him.
He dodges again—losing ground quickly.
Sweats soaking through his leather jacket, his armor, his gauntlets, his gloves. Each inhale dragging muggy heat and the blood down his throat.
Jason blocks another, shoves it off-line, but before he can, his back heel hits the raised lip of the roof access door and for half a second—maybe even less—his balance shifts wrong.
That's all it takes.
Dick’s next strike comes in angeled—fucking prefect—driving straight into his guard hard enough to force him down.
I can’t stop him.
Another hit—blocked. Another—dodged. Another—barely redirected.
Jason makes a split second call—his hand drops to his holster mid-movement, fluid even under pressure. The gun is in his hand before the next strike finishes, brought up and aimed in one clean motion.
This time he doesn’t hesitate.
He fires.
The shot cracks through the night, louder than anything else up here, echoing off nearby buildings.
Dick jerks—
the bullet slams into his right shoulder.
That should slow him down. Jason thinks, but to his horror Dick barely flinches.
Jason’s stomach drops.
His brother is still moving like there isn’t a hollow point buried under his skin. Jason aimed specifically for the spot on his suit that didn’t have plating.
Jason fires again—adjusting, aiming for muscle, for anything that might limit movement without doing real damage. Each shot is precise, measured, controlled.
Each one does nothing.
Not the graze to his ear. Not the shot to his bicep. Nothing.
“Batman,” Jason snaps into the comm, “I need a sedative. Now!”
Jason rolls under the next swing of the escrima sticks.
“Something strong enough to drop him—he’s not—he’s not stopping—”
Dick closes the gap between them again.
Jason holsters mid-motion, grabbing for Dick’s wrist instead, trying to leverage, to twist, to control—
His brother slips it like water.
He’s too fast. Too flexible.
Dick counters immediately—hand snapping to Jason’s wrist, turning it, wrenching it hard enough that Jason’s grip falters—
—and the gun is gone.
Jason doesn’t think before his own hand comes up, catching the escrima stick mid-swing and ripping it free with a sharp twist, using the same motion to knock the second one loose,
Now that they’re so close the hits come faster.
Dicks fist lands hard—Jason blocks high, the impact rattling through his arms.
The second catches him in the stomach before he can fully reset, driving air out of him in a sharp, painful rush.
He absorbs it, pushes back—this time with force.
His counter lands.
A solid hit to Dick’s ribs—felt. There’s weight behind it, power Jason doesn’t usually let loose around them.
A kick lands to Jason’s stomach—hard enough to fold him slightly. Another glances off his shoulder. A third catches his forearm where he brings it up to protect his face, the impact numbing his fingers for a split second.
His helmet takes most of the head hits.
Thank God.
Because Dick is aiming for them.
As if he understood his brother flips over him, his hand resting on the back of Jason’s helmet and he wrenches it off.
The world opens up all at once—noise, heat, air hitting his face raw and immediate. Sweat cools too fast against his skin, the sudden exposure making everything feel sharper, harsher.
And then—the first punch lands.
Bare across his face.
His head snaps to the side, copper floods his mouth instantly.
Second hit.
His nose cracks.
Jason feels it—sharp and wet and immediate as blood spills down over his lip.
Third.
A glancing blow that splits skin along his cheekbone.
He tries to bring his arms up—block, deflect—but Dick is too fast, too close, his movements tight and controlled in a way that leaves no room to breathe.
Fourth.
He feels a tooth snap.
The pit is roaring, green flooding everything in Jason’s mind.
KILL HIM. KILL HIM. KILL HIM.
Jason staggers back half a step, barely managing to get his guard up again, forearms taking the next hit instead of his face.
Everything hurts.
Everything is loud.
But through it, one thought cuts clean and cold through the noise.
I’m not going to kill him.
Even if it means—
Dick comes at him again.
Jason sets his stance.
And takes the hit.
It drives him back.
Not far—but enough. Enough that his heel slips on something slick—sweat, grime, something spilled earlier—and his balance goes just slightly off-center. His arms come up on instinct, forearms taking the brunt of the next strike, then the next, each one jarring up through bone and already bruised muscle.
He can’t keep it up. He knows he can’t.
Jason can feel it in the way his reactions are slower now. In the way his lungs burn when he tries to pull in air that feels too thick, too hot.
His vision blurs at the edges as another hit lands—this one catching him across the jaw, snapping his head sideways. Blood sprays from his mouth, dark against the rooftop, already tacky underfoot.
Copper and heat fill his mouth.
Dick closes in.
Jason’s driven down—back hitting the roof hard enough to rattle through him the back of his head smacking the pavement, Dick’s weight coming with it, pinning him.
Knees lock against his sides, hips centered—perfect control.
A fist wrenches into the front of his shirt—then the hits come.
One.
Two.
Three.
Four.
Each one lands clean, brutal, without restraint. Jason’s head whips with each impact, teeth blacking together, vision stuttering. His arms come up too late, catching the fourth on his jaw—everything fucking hurts.
The pit is screaming.
Roaring as it tears up his spine, claws at his ribs, demands—loud and violent and right there—that he end it. That he stops it before it kills him.
Jason chokes it down, vision flickering green.
He can’t fight it much longer.
He’s pinned.
He can’t—
A sharp thwip cuts through the air.
Metal sings—high and tight—and Dick’s arms are yanked back, pinned hard to his sides by a cable that snaps taut with a mechanical whine.
The sudden restraint jerks him off-balance, just enough—
Just enough.
Jason reacts on instinct. He plants his feet, twists his core, and drives upward with everything he has left—
and throws.
Dick is lifted clean off him, dragged back with the line, body skidding hard across the rooftop.
Jason collapses back the second the weight is gone.
Air lags.
His chest jerks, ribs screaming—but breath the catches halfway in, stuttering like something’s blocking it.
Jason’s lung seizure, pain flares sharp and deep, wrapping tight around his ribs like something’s cinched too far.
A shadow crosses over head—followed by another thwip.
A projectile flings out.
A dart—sedative likely.
Dick jerks against the restraints once—twice—then his entire body locks, muscles seizing violently before going slack all at once.
The rage drops out of him like a switch flipped.
And the silence that follows is worse.
Not real silence—the city is still there, cars still moving, horns blaring somewhere too far away—but after everything, it feels hollow.
Wrong.
Jason doesn't move.
He isn’t sure he even can.
His back is still pressed to the heat-soaked roof, the tar sticking slightly to his skin where his shirt is gone, sweat cooling too fast now that he’s not moving.
His hands are shaking as tries to flex his fingers—nothing listens right. The movement lags, like his body isn’t fully connected anymore.
But finally Jason’s chest drags in a full breath—
It’s sharp and shallow making everything hurt two times over.
The pit has subsided for now but the effort to keep it at bay was more taxing than the fight itself.
Footsteps sound next—light and fast.
“Nightwing—” Damian's voice echos.
Jason turns his head—slow, heavy—just enough to see him drop beside Dick, already moving, already checking.
“He’s alive,” Damian says quickly into his comm, voice tight but controlled. “Pulse steady. Respiration… elevated, but stable.”
Jason lets out a choked laugh, it scrapes on the way out.
Heavy footsteps hit next, fast and uneven.
Jason doesn’t even need to look. He knows who they belong to.
Bruce drops beside him hard enough the movement shakes through the ground.Hands are on him immediately—checking his face, his ribs, pressing in ways that make everything flare white-hot again.
“Hood—” Bruce cuts himself off, voice pitched higher than Batman usually is.
“I’m—” Jason starts, then winces as he tries to push himself up on his elbows, before collapsing back. “I’m good.”
It’s a lie—a bad one.
“Can you move?” Bruce asks.
Jason blinks at him, the question feels… complicated. But he tries anyway but his legs don’t cooperate right.
“…yeah,” he says finally, voice dragging. “Probably.”
Bruce’s grips his shoulder tighter, helping haul him up into something resembling seated.
Jasons vision dips hard at the movement. Black spots flicker at the edges.
“We need to get you to the cave.”
“Yeahh… probably,” Jason’s words slur at the end. Everything feels heavy now.
It leaves him hollowed out in a way that goes deeper than just physical.
Another set of twips cut through the hot air.
Two more sets of footsteps follow.
Cass comes into his view seconds later. Moving like she always does—quiet, precise—but there’s urgency in it as she drops beside him, her hands steading against his other shoulder.
Jason lifts his head weakly, he thinks he ought to stand up.
Get his feet underneath him.
His leg shifts under him and with it his focus tanks hard—tilt, spins, the edges going dark all at once.
“Bad—” Jason mutters, “Bad idea.”
“Why?” Another voice asks—Tim’s.
Jason blinks his eyes open, the world tilts again black spots dancing across his vision.
“...because,” he says slowly, words dragging like he’s pulling them through something thick, “I’m definitely gonna—”
His hand lifts, finding Cass’s sleeve, his finger curl weakly into it.
“—defin—definitely gonna—”
Jasons head dips.
The pit finally—
Finally—let's go.
“...pass out.”
Tim starts to say something.
Jason doesn’t hear it.
The world cuts.
***
Consciousness comes back fragmented.
Not all at once—never clean either. It leaks around the edges, slow and uneven. Sound comes in first, low electrical humming followed by the rhythmic beep of something monitoring. Fabric shifting, breathing coming from nearby.
Dick inhales a breath—regret hits immediately.
Pain blooms—deep in his right shoulder, heavy and throbbing, radiating down his arm in a dull, nauseating pulse. There’s a sharper sting along his ear, tight and irritated, and his ribs feel… wrong. Not broken he doesn’t think, but every breath drags across them like a bruise being pressed too hard.
It feels like his body was dropped from a height and then put back together purposefully out of order.
Dick tries to move his hand, desperate to rub his throbbing temple.
But he can’t?
There’s pressure on his wrists.
He tests his ankles—also immobilized.
Dick’s eyes snap open before he can think better of it. Light assaults him—far too bright for the headache currently jamming into his skull.
It floods in all at once, harsh and clinical, bleaching everything into sharp edges that don’t make sense yet. He squints hard, breath catching as his vision struggles to catch up—blurred shapes, indistinct movement, white and gray and shadows that shift wrong.
I’m strapped down.
No.
That doesn’t make sense.
They wouldn’t—
Unless I’m still dangerous.
Realization of danger hits too fast and too hard. Adrenaline spikes through the fog, jagged and painful.
He jerks his limbs against the restraint. The motion pulls at his shoulder—
Pain explodes.
His body jerks before he can stop it—too fast, too sharp—and for a split second he doesn’t know if that was him… or something else still pulling the strings.
White-hot and vicious, tearing a sharp sound out of him before he can stop it. His back arches slightly off the surface beneath him—cold, smooth, too clean to be anything but—
I’m in a cot, but wasn't I just in that lab?
No the roof.
Wait—
There’s a gap.
A full gap.
He can’t remember how he got here—and that feels worse than the pain.
“Easy, Dick.”
A voice cuts through his panic. The deep timber is familiar, grounding.
Dick freezes against the restraints. It takes a second for his vision to catch up—to pull the shape into focus at his side. Dark suit. Cape. A face he knows too well, even through the lingering blur.
“B—” His throat is dry. The word scrapes. “Bruce—?”
“Stay still,” Bruce says, calm but firm, one hand already settling against Dick’s shoulder—not pressing, just there, steady. “You’re in the medbay, you’re still injured.”
Dick swallows hard.
The room sharpens in pieces.
The medbay.
Oh, the cave. I’m in the batcave.
The overhead lights are dimmer than they first felt—focused, angled toward him. Screens flicker in the periphery. The hum is the machinery around him. The smell—antiseptic, metal, something faintly burnt under it all.
Memories follow in quick succession, not gently and certainly not clear.
He remembers heat—humid heat. Noise—the ringing of a gun shot—crackle of his escrima sticks—
—Jason.
Dick’s breath stutters.
His head turns too fast.
Pain lances through his skull again, sharper this time, but he pushes through it anyway—eyes scanning, frantic now, breath catching as it lands on—
Jason.
No—
No, that—that can’t be right.
Dick’s stomach turns at the memories.
He’s sitting sideways on an adjacent cot, back slightly hunched, one leg still braced on the floor like he didn’t fully commit to lying down.
He’s shirtless, a mess of armor and clothes on the ground next to him, and he looks absolutely… wrecked.
Bruising spreads across his torso in deep, ugly patches—dark red already turning at the edges, purple-ish black bleeding into them. It climbs up over his ribs, across his sternum, fingerprints of impact layered over each other. There’s swelling along his side where a kick must’ve connected clean, the skin there tight and angry.
Alfred is behind him, wrapping his ribs with steady, practiced hands, the white bandage stark against the damage underneath.
Jason’s breathing is shallow—not dramatic, not labored—but careful. Controlled in that way that says it hurts.
His arms aren’t much better. One forearm is already turning a deep, ugly shade—purple and red blooming under the skin, the kind of bruise that runs deep into muscle. Cass’s hand is wrapped around it, small compared to him, her fingers resting lightly like she’s grounding him there.
Jason dwarfs her in size even sitting—broad shoulders, solid frame—but right now there’s something quieter in the way she’s clinging to him, knees angled, presence steady and unmoving.
Dick’s eyes land on his face and his stomach plummets.
One eye is already swelling shut, the skin around it darkening into that deep, sickening purple-black you only see after a brutal fight. The other isn’t much better, red-rimmed and swollen, barely open enough to see through.
His nose is definitely broken—crooked, blood dried dark along the split in the bridge and smeared down over his upper lip. His lip is split open, swollen enough to distort the shape of his mouth when he breathes through it.
“Oh—shit I—” the words fall out of Dick, broken and quiet and full of something he can’t even begin to sort through yet.
Jason’s head tilts up at the sound, slow, like even that cost him something to do.
“Hey,” he says, voice rough, thick through the damage, words a little slurred around the swelling. “You’re up.”
There’s a moment as Dick is staring at his brother that he wonders who did this to him—who did they need to hunt down, and then he feels the restraints again and his chest feels like it is torn in two.
“I—Jason I—Did I?” Dick’s voice breaks as he tries to speak, to get the words out.
He can barely even remember—he doesn’t remember. Everything after the clinic is muggy.
“What did I do?” He finally gets out.
Jason opens his swollen mouth to respond, but Alfred's voice cuts in quicker.
“I suggest not to worry about that at the moment, you are both well and that is all—”
“What did I do!?” Dick snaps, pulling against the restraints instinctively, panic flaring sharp in his chest, but the movement yanks at his shoulder and he hisses, dropping back hard against the table.
Anger. That’s anger—I remember that.
Dick latches onto the memory until he can understand it.
Why do I feel so on edge still? Is this—
That powder.
Realization hits like a brick.
The powder he got hit with must have made him angry. He can remember that much, before everything faded out.
“You got dosed with a neurochemical compound derived from a mix of one of Ivy’s pollens and a strand of Joker toxin,” Tim explains from his seat across from both cots Dick hadn’t even seen him till he spoke. “We’ve never seen it before, but we’re working on an antidote now in case it comes back.”
Dick’s skin crawls, like some of that chalky powder is still under it.
He can barely comprehend as Tim explains, arms crossed tight across his chest, gaze flicking between them.
He looks tired—very tired.
Steph is leaning against one of the nearby consoles, braced against her crutches, her expression somewhere between concern and I-will-absolutely-yell-at-you-later.
Dick swallows hard.
“I’m sorry,” he says, quieter now. “I didn’t— I couldn’t—”
Jason shifts again, jaw tightening slightly as Alfred pulls the bandage snug around his ribs.
“In all fairness,” Jason mutters, mouth twitching—something like a smirk trying to form through the swelling, “I did shoot you.”
It takes a second for the words to land then, Dicks shoulder throbs harder, like it heard him.
“Grazed your ear, too,” he adds. “And your arm. So. Team effort.”
Steph snorts from across the room.
“Yeahh, real balanced fight,” she teases. “Yet you’re the one that looks like an inflated balloon.”
Jason rolls his swollen eyes, but he makes no move to debate it.
Cass’s fingers shift slightly against his arm—like they’re afraid to grasp as harshly as she wants to. His brother looks down at her with a tight lipped smile.
Dick shakes his head, breath uneven.
“I’m sorry—I—it wasn’t me,” he chokes out.
“I know,” Jason replies with a swollen smile, “of course I know, Dick.”
Damian steps into view near Dick’s side, arms crossed, posture rigid but present. As much as his little brother may try he can’t hide the concern pitching between his brows it’s obvious.
Dick tugs against the restraints again, suddenly itching to give Damian a hug, and turns toward Bruce hovering nearby.
“Can we please get these off now?” He pleads to his dad, desperate for some sort of control.
Bruce’s eyes narrow, then flick toward Jason in front of them. Whatever Jason does seems to relent their dad into undoing the straps around Dicks wrists and ankles.
The minute he is free Damian is helping him sit up against the cot, mindful of the way his ribs and shoulder protest.
The next minute his little brother is climbing into the bed with him and tucking himself against Dick’s chest, hands wrapped around but not tight.
Dick stills—just for a second. Not because he doesn’t want Damian there, but because he’s afraid of what might happen.
“I’m okay, D,” Dick mumbles into his brother's hair.
It smells like sweat which tells him it hasn’t been long since whatever happened… happened.
When he looks back up Jason is staring down at himself, good eye flicking across his arms and ribs after Alfred finishes wrapping them.
He must have felt Dick’s stare because his head lifts up to meet his gaze.
“...for the record,” Jason says, voice dry but a slight smile still resting against his features, “when you’re not holding back you fight like an absolute psychopath.”
Steph snorts.
Tim chokes on a laugh he tries and fails to hide.
Dick just stares at his brother—stunned.
His confusion must have been more obvious than he thought because Jason continues.
“I’m serious,” he gestures vaguely with one hand before immediately wincing and dropping it again. “Like—no warm-up, no warning—just straight to attempted murder. No notes. Zero out of ten. Horrible experience. I do not recommend it."
Steph practically doubles over in laughter now, Tim rushes to hold her up before she topples over on her crutches.
“I’m right,” Jason shoots towards them.
“You got your face rearranged,” Tim says dryly, gripping Steph's shaking shoulders.
Jason shrugs, tilting his head slightly.
“I’ve broken my nose before—” he jokes, “—never hurt my good looks.”
“You’re unbelievable,” Steph shoots back after finally finding her footing from laughing so hard.
“Also,” Jason adds, like an afterthought as he pulls his teal eyes back towards Dick, “you owe me a helmet.”
Dick’s mind short circuits and he decides that he’s not coherent enough to be dealing with his family's antics.
How Jason is even finding both the energy and the gall to joke about the entire shitshow is beyond him.
“...I owe you—”
“You obliterated it,” Jason cuts in. “Do you know how hard it is to get one of those custom fit? I liked that one.”
Steph has proceeded to double over again, Bruce’s half-hearted chuckle sounds from Dick’s other side.
Tim is shaking his head, smiling despite himself.
Dick lets out a weak, disbelieving breath.
“You’re worried about your helmet?” He asks, wincing slightly as Damian squeezes him a bit tighter.
“I’m worried about a lot of things,” Jason explains, gesturing towards his injuries. “That’s just the one I’m choosing to focus on right now.”
There’s a beat of silence, Jason leans his head back slightly, squinting one eye toward Dick.
“Anyway,” he says, voice it’s familiar rasp, “pretty sure I still win.”
He’s smirking, and it hits Dick in that moment that despite being in so much pain he’s joking because he doesn’t want Dick to worry about him.
“That is incorrect,” Damian's mumbled protest sounds against Dick’s shirt.
Jason groans immediately, but their little brother continues.
“You only ‘won’ because Father intervened,” Damian explains, completely serious. “Without his arrival, the probability of your survival—”
“—was great,” Jason cuts in. “Amazing, even. I was doing fantastic.”
“You were losing… badly,” Damian replies flatly, still not looking up from Dicks shirt.
“That’s called strategy."
“It is most definitely not.”
Jason snorts—and immediately winces at the motion.
“God—I’m too hilarious—laughing hurts—”
Tim finally cracks up with Steph at his side. Bruce has joined the two of them to keep them from toppling over each other.
Cass mumbles something with a smile on her face as she squeezes Jason’s forearm again. While Damian nuzzles himself further into Dick’s shirt like he isn’t already half on top of him.
Jason catches his eye from his spot on his cot and smiles despite his fucked face.
It’s small—crooked. Careful in a way that says he’s choosing it—choosing joy instead of everything else that almost happened.
The action makes Dick huff a small laugh through his nose—pain shoots behind his eyes and he sighs into the air.
He exhales slowly, letting his head fall back.
Everything hurts. From his hands, his ribs, shoulder, knees.
His skull most of all.
He’s going to feel this tomorrow… and probably the next day.
And probably even longer than that.