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albatmobile · 1 year

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The Art of Rehabilitating Snowbirds Chapter 6

𓅪 After not hearing from Roy or Jason for five years, you suddenly find yourself taking in extra income as a babysitter for Roy and Jason's child.

𓅪 Rated: M | TW: underage drinking | 11.2k includes: sleepover w Damian (y’all already know there’s bed sharing), dinner and breaky w batfam, sex talk from bruce, Jason throws a party at the manor and you’re invited (shenanigans and dirty dancing w ur boy roy)

fem!Reader x Jason Todd x Roy Harper [masterlist]

Chapter Six: Growing Pains | ao3 - wattpad

THEN

Damian held out the chair for you as you walked up to the overly-stuffed table that was filled to the brim with every type of food imaginable before sitting to your left. Maybe even some foods that weren’t imaginable, considering you couldn’t quite place the fluffed bowl of purple goodness in front of a runny-nosed Jason to the right of you.

Tim sat parallel to Jason with his raw-rubbed Rudolph nose, but you didn’t remember him mentioning anything about being sick.

Weird.

Upon closer inspection, Tim’s eyes appeared to be red, as if stained with tears. You looked around the table to see if anyone else had noticed, but Damian was too busy fiddling with his napkin next to you. Meanwhile, Jason was preoccupied with blowing an excessive amount of snot into his own, leaving both Alfred and Damian to frown in distaste.

“Miss,” Alfred’s soothing voice drew you from your thoughts. You looked up as he set down the last serving plate and then picked up the water pitcher, “I do have a few questions for you."

What questions could the Wayne's most prestigious help have for a nobody like you? Oh, god, you thought. Here come the questions about your home life. You were really hoping to avoid the topic, let alone in front of the entire Wayne family. At the same time, how could you say no to Alfred?

You gulped nervously, “Uh, sure.” You looked around to see them all glancing between you and Alfred warily. Everyone, that is, except Tim. Upon seeing the raven lift his head, you attempted to hold his gaze from across the table, but Tim seemed to purposefully avoid your eyes. “What about?”

“Well," he looked like what he was about to say was rather obvious, "it’s regarding you and the young men at this table.”

“Oh?” you didn’t know what else to say.

Alfred��s poker face remained strong as ever as he began filling everyone’s glasses with great care. “You see, Master Damian has been nothing but complimentary about your art skills,” He poured your water, “and Master Bruce seems quite taken with your baking skills,” you smiled modestly at Bruce, not understanding where Alfred was going with this in the slightest. “Master Timothy can’t seem to stop talking about which comics you like and which ones you don’t,” Tim finally caught your eyes long enough for him to see your worried expression, but the glance was over just as quickly as it'd begun. “You even have Master Jason cooking tirelessly for you nearly every day of the week,” he stopped pouring, tilting his head from in between the empty space between where Damian’s seat met yours. “I’m simply wondering what magical powers you possess, Miss?”

Woah, woah, woah... Hold up. Jason cooked for you? A quick look his way proved he was too busy glaring at Alfred to notice your dumbfounded stare. Even Tim seemed upset with what Alfred said, but you were still caught off guard by all the information you’d just obtained.

“Pennyworth, whose side are you on?” Damian spat, pouting petulantly at his empty plate.

“I’m merely on the side that causes you more embarrassment, it would appear,” the older man said sarcastically as he finally sat down. “Please, do dig in before it gets too cold. I’ve worked too hard for it to go to waste,” he gave you a knowing smile as you blushed down at your plate.

None of them needed to be told twice and they began digging in with such fervor you had to laugh at the barbaric sight.

“Boys, calm down,” came Bruce’s deep, rumbling timbre from the head of the expensive wood table. You could understand his playboy reputation when he looked and talked like that, but now was definitely not the time to be checking out your friend’s dad. “You act like we don’t feed you.”

“Shi-” Jason sneezed into his arm, cutting off his curse before Alfred could claim any swear jar money. “It’s really good,” he shrugged way too innocently, leaving everyone to roll their eyes.

“So,” your name dripped from Bruce’s mouth like honey. “What is your secret?”

You met his dark eyes and with a kind, hopefully unaffected, smile before quickly retreating to look at the much less intimidating Alfred. “I just do my own thing and whoever tags along for long enough, I try to keep them around.”

You really didn’t know how else to answer the question and figured you were at least being truthful with them. You’d never been in a situation like this before, let alone in a situation where you had multiple friends.

“I understand,” you glanced back at him to see his face had softened. You waited for the uncomfortable question about why you were always over here or where your parents were, but it never came. “Guess we’ll have to keep you around too, then,” he flashed you a dazzling smile, causing Damian to mutter something under his breath from beside you.

You gave the beguiling man a weak thumbs up, “Sounds good.”

Damian snorted at your awkwardness, only to sneer and shove at your shoulder when you brought your foot down hard onto his from underneath the table in response.

“Master Damian, no roughhousing at the table.”

He stuck out his tongue at you, “She started it.”

“Woah! Careful, Damian you know what she does with those,” Jason said with a wicked glint in his eyes. Tim, to your surprise, chuckled from across the table around a mouthful of purple fluff. How fitting that they wouldn’t let you live down grabbing Damian’s tongue during Injustice.

“Yes. Please refrain from further tongue-grabbing,” he smirked around your last name, “and stomping like a cow.”

“Damian!” Bruce and Tim reprimanded in unison, but you just laughed. You were growing more accustomed to his jokes, which were honestly more like jabs than anything else. Nonetheless, you could appreciate his prickly humor.

“What?” He looked innocently from Bruce and Tim to you. “At least she has a sense of humor.”

You shook your head in amusement and sipped at your water. “Thick skin is more like it, asshol-” you looked up quickly, first at Alfred, then at Bruce with worried eyes. You weren’t used to censoring yourself for parental figures. “Sorry,” You managed sheepishly.

“We do have a swear jar here in the manor, Miss,” Alfred says your name. “We wouldn’t want you to start adding to it, now would we?”

“What do you guys do when it’s filled up? Go to Disneyland or some-” you’d been about to say shit but corrected yourself before it could squeeze out, “-thing?”

You hoped you'd corrected yourself fast enough that Alfred wouldn't claim any swear jar money from you, but his distasteful gaze seemed to say that you were on thin ice.

“Something like that,” Bruce agreed, shooting a highly amused gaze your way.

Dinner continued somewhat normally, with Tim and Damian talking about their respective days at school until it came down to Jason.

Bruce cleared his throat before saying your name. Your eyes instantly drew from your debate with Damian over which genre ‘Las Meninas’ was to Bruce’s baby blues, but they were more focused on the pathetic sniffling mess next to you. “Was telling me earlier about the strange circumstance under which you got sick, Jason. Care to explain?”

You visibly winced in your seat when he turned to glare at you with his gorgeous green eyes.

Whatever.

It’s not like you’d meant to rat anyone out, anyway.

“Must’ve been something in the air, Bruce,” he pushed his empty plate away. “Speaking of, I better go quarantine myself in my room before I share the love with all of you.”

Tim and Damian also went to stand.

You grabbed your plate, getting up from the table with it until Damian slapped the plate out of your hand. “What are you doing?” you gave him a naive look that he ignored in favor of pulling you upstairs. “Come along.”

“Don’t stay up too late now, you two,” Alfred warned after your retreating forms.

“We won’t,” you promised innocently enough.

“You dare lie to my butler?” Damian smirked at you.

“Please, Damian,” you gestured to his short form. “You look like a kid who goes to bed at eight. I guarantee you’ll be out in the fetal position in another three hours tops.”

He snorted, “I could stay up longer than you could ever imagine.”

You knew he hadn’t meant it to sound so provocative, but that didn’t stop the blush that blossomed crudely across your cheeks. “I guess I’ll just have to take your word on that, then.”

Damian didn’t have time to respond as you smacked dead into Jason’s bare chest.

You scrambled backward and attempted to keep your eyes off his oddly scarred chest. The rise and fall of his chiseled stomach ceased as if he'd stopped breathing upon contact. You steeled your face, forcing yourself to look up at his usual blank expression.

The gym shorts he’d had on at dinner, however, had other ideas on where your attention should be. They hung deliciously loose around his protruding muscular hipbones, leading your eyes right down to…

“What are you looking at?” He scowled at you, though it held no actual malice. He seemed to be testing you or maybe even teasing, but you couldn’t tell in your flustered state. You were more surprised Damian had remained silent through you blatantly checking out his older brother.

You ignored him and chose to keep your eyes on the towel wrapped around his shoulders for the sake of your own sanity, “So, you cooked for me?”

He’d obviously been caught off guard. “Whatever, just the one time.” You thought back to the scones and somehow now doubted that was the only time based on his sudden defensiveness on the topic. He hesitated before hastily adding, “The other shit didn’t come out right, but it wasn’t even for you, so you get that shit out of your head right now.”

He huffed at your growing smirk. After all, you’d just been the one fawning all over him and now you have him flustered?

Time to amp it up.

“The scones you made were so good! I was getting kind of sad you hadn’t made anything else for me since then,” you trailed off, looking up at him through your lashes. Damian tutted somewhere next to you, but you hardly noticed. It was like Jason had you in a trance where everything disappeared until it was just the two of you locked in a heated gaze.

He broke eye contact first, running a sheepish hand through his locks before coughing into the crook of his elbow. “Once I’m better, maybe,” you smiled widely. “That is, if I even remember,” he added with a cool nonchalance you saw right through.

“We should make something together sometime,” he gave you an odd face, knowing the joke Roy would’ve told if he’d been around. “You know what I meant," you said. "Cooking, baking, whatever. Anything’s cool.”

"Cool," he fiddled slightly with the ends of his navy towel. “Now, move so I can hack up mucus in the shower and shit.”

You ooo ’ed, “I’m totally telling Alfred you just said that.”

He glared at you as you waved and left to find Damian, who’d snuck off while you’d been flirting. “I bet you will, snitch,” he called after you.

You ignore his jab. “See you around,” you called back to him, but he was already gone.

•

It was only after you’d beaten Damian three times in a row at Dragon Ball Z that he rage-quit and demanded you get ready for bed.

His new puppy Titus followed him around like a, well, lost puppy and went wherever the two of you went. It would be more endearing if he didn’t come up to your tits and all, but, hey, Damian really seemed to cheer up with the new addition to the Wayne family.

You yawned and sleepily followed him and Titus back to his room where he disappeared swiftly into his attached bathroom. Damian reappeared shortly after to open the door for you in sleep shorts and a cotton crewneck.

“Don’t use my face products,” he warned around the toothbrush that was in his mouth.

You rolled your eyes and joined him at the his-and-her sinks to unload your own products, “As if I need your expensive shit. It’s filled with a whole bunch of alcohol and fragrances, anyway.”

“What does that even mean?”

“It means you’re paying for overpriced shit that’s going to make your face break out all for the sake of having a name brand?” you said it as if it were obvious. You snickered as he continued to stare at you with a vexing glare.

He pulled the toothbrush from his mouth to hiss at you, “You’re so annoying. Do you ever hear yourself talking and want to shut up?”

Damian’s fucking funny. You’d never met someone who could banter with you so well before.

“I can’t wait until I leave and you check the ingredients on your shit because I know you will,” you tilted your head condescendingly. “And you know I’m right.”

He flipped you off in the mirror with his signature slitted, hazel glare, “You know nothing, peasant.”

You snorted at the fitting nickname and began your lengthy skincare process. Damian did the same in silence, only stopping a few times to steal glances at you in the mirror and quickly look away when you stared back. You blamed his weird behavior on the late hour and hurried to put on your moisturizer, brush your teeth and call it.

“I totally forgot about the air mattress,” you walked into his room to see the air mattress set up next to the side it seemed Damian slept on. The whole thing looked decked out enough with all its fluffy pillows and soft-looking blankets adorning it that it didn’t seem like it’d be too bad to sleep on, though Damian’s king-sized bed definitely looked a lot more appealing. “You’re such a spoiled fucking brat.”

He chuckled silently and climbed into bed after making Titus scoot over to the edge of his bed. He positioned himself so he was facing the way you were, but he was slightly higher up on his mattress, considering you were ground-level on your blow-up one.

He reached his hand down and you started at him in confusion, thinking he was handing you something. You brought your hand up to meet his cool one and he clasped them together. “Is this comfortable?”

Your arm was only slightly raised and it wasn’t that bad, so you nodded your head, “It’s good.”

“Okay,” he shifted around a bit before settling down, all while keeping your hand clasped in his. “Goodnight.”

“Night, Damian,” you closed your eyes only to open them a moment later to see his closed as well. You closed them again and drifted off to sleep.

•

When you woke up, it was still dark out.

At some point in the night, Damian slid partially off of his bed and onto yours in just a way that left his legs completely on his bed, but his head and shoulders pressed just slightly into your side on your shorter mattress. Titus had taken up the remaining space on the mattress, leaving nearly no room for Damian.

You winced at the heat on your left hand and noticed it was still encased in Damian’s unrelenting grasp. You pulled it free of the sweaty grip that had accumulated between you and Damian from overnight, trying not to wake him up in the process. Regardless, Damian stirred as soon as you pulled away. Before he could fully wake up, he slumped forward like a slug to completely fall onto your bed with a pained groan into your blanket pile. He shuffled around on the bed so he was facing you with his head on your same pillow.

“My neck is killing,” he rubbed lightly at his neck and pushed at your stomach so you’d make room for him.

You thought back to his uncomfortable-looking position from mere moments ago. “I can’t imagine why,” you teased and giggled softly when he squirmed closer into the newly created space between you.

You could feel the smoothness of his legs as they popped beneath your duvet one at a time. It’s also at that time that he began his assault on you with his cold ass feet.

“DAMIAN!” you jolted across the inflatable mattress, but Damian’s arctic feet followed you relentlessly wherever you tried to escape.

“Quiet, wench,” you huffed at the stupid nickname but remained quiet. All these old-fashioned insults were getting… well, old. “Good,” you blushed pathetically at his praise, thankful it was still dark in the room.

“Whatever, just stop putting your nasty feet on me,” you huffed as you flipped around to snuggle into his chest.

He let out a breathy laugh, “Don’t tell me what to do.” You’d never heard him sound like that before and it was doing all kinds of things to your already raging hormones. You felt the dull ache of simmering arousal heating up. You were so focused on holding in a moan that you couldn’t stop your hips from inadvertently arching into Damian’s front. “Watch it,” he hissed lightly, voice barely above a whisper.

“Sorry, I don’t know what came over me,” you quickly whispered back.

It was somewhat the truth.

Namely, you knew it had mostly been on account of Damian’s sexy, newly deepening voice. You hadn’t realized that your tanned friend was capable of producing the most delicious sounds like the one you just bore witness to.

“Don’t let it happen again.” It was dark and deep and, along with his hushed moan, it did nothing to help the wetness that was accumulating in your underwear.

“Sorry,” you said again, forcing yourself to ignore your urge. You eventually fell back asleep, still wrapped in Damian’s arms.

•

“You look well rested today, Damian,” Bruce said when you and Damian joined Bruce and Alfred for breakfast. Just like last night, Damian is sure to pull out your chair and push it in for you before taking a seat himself. “I trust you were both able to get some sleep last night, then?”

“Of course, father,” Damian kept a calm and even tone as he cut into the slice of quiche on his plate.

“So it wasn’t giggling that awoke me at four in the morning then, Master Damian?” he looked between the two of you with a knowing look before cutting into his eggs with careful precision.

“Purely my fault this time, Pennyworth,” Damian said.

Meanwhile, you looked over to Bruce, who you were startled to see was already looking your way. You blushed, not wanting him to think anything had happened because, well, technically, it hadn’t… but it also hadn’t been completely innocent either with the bed sharing and spooning. Or had it been???

Ugh.

Breakfast returned somewhat normally, though a bit quieter than it’d been previous to Alfred’s question. That was until a flushed, wet Jason appeared behind Bruce, seeming to be fully recovered in his half-naked state of gym shorts and sneakers.

You attempted to hide your gaze, fighting not to rake your eyes down his toned chest, but your eyes had minds of their own. Without permission, they unabashedly flitted across Jason’s dripping abs to his loose-hanging gym shorts that rode down extremely close to his-

“You’re still here?” he asked you haughtily. It was his turn to eye you up, taking in your PJs up and down.

You went to open your mouth to retort, then took note of Alfred’s polite presence and thought better of it.

He rolled his eyes, seeming to realize your predicament. He came closer to lean casually against Damian’s chair, where he then began to assault his younger brother’s face with intense pokes. You winced at the venom behind each jab of Jason’s index finger into Damian’s tanned cheek.

“Fuck off, Todd,” Damian vehemently batted at his hand with irritation.

“I’ll go get the swear jar,” Alfred sighed, elegantly pushing his chair away from the table. “I would like to have just one proper meal around here for once,” he shook his head as he disappeared off to find the elusive jar.

Damian looked at Jason’s dripping wet, rippling abs with disgust. “How long would it have taken you to put on a shirt, ugly?”

“I don’t know. It’s kind of freeing without one. You wouldn’t have the muscles to pull this look off quite yet though there, squirt,” he ruffled Damian’s inky locks and flexed.

You couldn’t understand why he was acting like such an asshole all of a sudden. Not that you could entirely focus on that when the cause of your recent lust was standing directly in front of you exactly how you wanted him: shirtless and wet.

You looked away just as your eyes reached down Jason’s torso to the dark patch of hair that was cut off by a nasty-looking scar. You bit slightly at your lip, all while hoping no one had noticed all of your oogling.

“Jason. Stop instigating,” Bruce warned lightly.

“Sure thing, dad!” he said in an over-exaggerated tone and threw his wet towel over your head before sitting next to you. You’d never heard him refer to Bruce that way and outwardly cringed at how forced it sounded coming from his cracked lips.

You peeked out from under his towel with a deadly gaze. “You’re lucky I didn’t do my hair yet, or I would’ve-”

“You would’ve what?” he snorted. “Done nothing? Right, right,” he nodded petulantly at you, flicking the hanging towel as if to cement his point.

You glanced at Damian, but he seemed more preoccupied with the fact Jason was still shirtless. You completely understood his distracted state, still very much in a state of your own.

“Why are you being such a dick today?”

“I didn’t see him around here today, actually.” He continued his petty tirade.

You gave him an admonishing look as you dumped his wet towel onto his still-soaked head, “You forgot this,” you scurried away from the table before he could throw the damp fabric back onto your PJs, not caring how rude it might’ve looked to Mr. Wayne. You were quickly preoccupied with how ruthless Jason was being and had to pathetically dodge back around toward Damian in hopes he would avenge you, but Bruce materialized out of nowhere before either could react.

“Get back here,” he smirked around your name, but Bruce caught the towel in his hand before he could throw it at you. He glowered at Jason with an intensity that stopped even you in your tracks.

“Enough.” It was enough that Jason did, in fact, stop, but not without letting his annoyance be known.

“What? Let me get this straight. The hellspawn can fuck right under your roof, but I can’t walk around shirtless?”

Bruce tensed, analyzing you and Damian briefly. You looked over at his tired form, noting how resigned he seemed by Jason’s statement, but before you could vouch for yourself, Bruce had already taken control of the situation.

“Enough with the pissing match- both of you,” he looked from a scowling Damian to a seething Jason. Bruce soothed at the crease in between his brows as he said your name, then Damian’s. “Meet me in my office.” Before you could scurry out from under Bruce Wayne’s intense stare, he continued. “Now,” Jason ooo ’ed, leaving Damian to glare at him like he’d reached his limit of patience for the day- no, week. “You can join them if you want to keep instigating.”

“Hey!” Jason threw his hands up in exasperation. Bruce shot him a warning eyebrow, which was enough to shut Jason up. He sulked off to his room, but not before grabbing a piece of toast in a huff.

You looked over at Damian, now recognizing the deep, dark tone he’d used on you last night… He’d been imitating his dad? You wanted to laugh, but the situation was far too tense for it. Instead, you resigned to staring at your feet.

Damian, on the other hand, continued to scowl at his dad, “You’ve got it twisted, old man.” You held in your smile at his insult, figuring it wasn’t the time to be pissing Bruce off any more than he already seemed to be with his sons. You tugged Damian out of his aggressive stance to drag him up the steps to where you guessed his dad’s office might be. Eventually, Damian took charge and led you to where it sat at the end of a short hallway. At the door, he turned to you and offered you simple advice, “Don’t let him intimidate you.”

You snorted, “Easier said than done.”

“You’ll manage just fine. He enjoys your company, it seems,” he sighed as he pushed open the door and sat down in one of the two chairs that faced Bruce’s desk.

“Really?” You raised a dubious brow at him.

“He’s very protective over me and my, erm, well, with fornicating. The Wayne fortune and all,” he looked at you hesitantly, like he didn’t want you to misunderstand what he was saying because it wasn’t about your character at all. He completely trusted you. “He learned this all the hard way,” he added cryptically. You sat down in the other chair and instantly began to wring your hands in the hem of your PJ top. “Stop that,” Damian chided. You returned your hands to your side sheepishly. “I told you, don’t be nervous.”

Bruce arrived a few moments later, shutting the door lightly behind him. There was no need for any aggressive door slams, considering his presence alone held all the intimidation he'd ever need.

“You guys aren’t in any trouble,” he said lightly as he leaned against the front of his desk, facing the two of you, “But I do realize you’re both at a confusing developmental age where you might want to start trying things,” He trailed off, clearing his throat.

You could tell he was trying his best not to make it awkward, but holy fuck was it awkward.

“I’m pretty sure we're both well versed on the sex talk, father,” Damian crossed his arms and looked out the window before he could go any further.

You were grateful for the interruption seeing as, even though your only information had come from school, you felt knowledgeable enough about the topic.

You nodded, but your eyes remained glued to the clock on the wall directly behind his hulking form.

“Are you both sexually active?” you and Damian both laughed at the same time. “Alright then,” he looked from you to his son with gentle eyes. “My best friend when I was your age was a girl named Rachel. I remember what it feels like to be young and in a situation like this. I just want to make sure we were on the same page,” he confided, looking off briefly as if reminiscing before focusing his attention back on the two of you. “Will you be staying over again tonight?”

You thought about your empty apartment absentmindedly and nodded. “If that’s alright, that is!” you were quick to add, seeing as you didn’t want to intrude or overstay your welcome.

“Of course. As I said, you’re welcome over any time. Just be safe,” he looked at his watch and sighed. “I’ll be headed out soon with Tim and Alfred on our trip, but Dick should be around to hold things down while I’m away.”

It was a thinly veiled warning not to do anything stupid and you understood completely.

“We will be respectful of your wishes, Father,” you hummed in agreement.

Bruce walked forward and placed a gentle hand on Damian’s shoulder. “I know you will,” he looked over at you, causing you to flush under his attention. “And I know you will, too.”

God, this shit was so fucking awkward. You thought, no, knew that this was probably the first and only time you were glad not to have parents to discuss you the birds and the bees.

You nodded for what seemed like the billionth time, “For sure.”

“Good. You can shut my door on the way out,” Damian got up and you went to follow, but Bruce stopped you before you could leave. “Just be careful,” he looked to Damian at that point, leaving you to wonder what exactly had happened between Bruce and Rachel. “Both of you.”

“Father,” Damian nodded in acknowledgment.

As soon as you were out of his father’s office, he ushered you in the direction of the game room and loaded up GTA V. All the while, you had Bruce’s last words replaying eerily in your head.

“What do you want, Todd?” Damian’s voice drew you from your thoughts.

You looked up and over to the doorway to see Jason draped against it in a way that accentuated every muscle on his body without even trying.

“Bruce told me to come apologize.”

“Okay,” Damian paused your game to give Jason his undivided attention. “Get on with it then.”

“Don’t make me regret doing this, fuckface,” Jason said, shaking his head.

Damian pinched his face together at the nickname, “Doing what, Todd? For fucks sake, just say something.”

You giggled. One stern look from Jason through the slits of his eyes causes you to cease under the intensity of his green glare.

“Whatever. Don’t be lame about it, but me and Roy-”

“Roy and I,” you and Damian corrected in unison.

“Yup, already regretting this. Nevermind. Bye,” Jason spun around to leave, but you got up and grabbed his pale arm before he could.

“Please tell us?”

He looked down into your sincere eyes and sighed like he regretted ever stepping foot in the room.

It was weird how he could go from sitting with you at lunch and skipping with you and helping you through the whole... incident to being embarrassed to be seen with you. And by weird, you meant hurtful.

You didn’t have time to mull it over before he divulged your curiosity.

“Fine,” he flicked your hand off of him with ease. “There’s a party here tonight, so stay out of the way or come. I really don’t care as long as neither of you snitches,” he shot you a pointed look.

“I didn’t even snitch!” you said to no avail. He merely rolled his eyes, clearly not believing you in the slightest.

He gave you both a stern look as he pointed to both of you and backed out of the room. “Keep it quiet and don’t make me regret inviting you lame freshmen.”

You ignored his jab, thinking back to how lucky you were to have randomly packed a dress in your haste. You lamented, however, when you came to the realization that you’d only packed a single pair of PJs. You’d have to get a shirt or something from one of these Wayne’s, but definitely not from Damian’s twig-ass.

•

It was your and Damian’s first high school party, so you guys got ready together. Downstairs, you could hear the commotion from Roy and Jason obnoxiously setting shit up for the party. It seriously sounded like they had a gang of thirty-some people breaking in or something, though you hardly doubted anyone could get past the extensive security system Wayne Manor had.

“This one,” he held up a green plaid shirt, “or this one?” he switched hangers to show off a white dress shirt and an argyle sweater vest.

“Damian, you’re 14 not 40,” you stopped doing your makeup to go over and look through his closet. “Don’t you have a plain v-neck or something? Seriously it’s like a closet for a miniature businessman.”

“You don’t have to insult my height, or lack thereof, every time,” he scowled your name.

You peered back at him mirthfully, “If your increase in voice crack frequency is anything like lightning and thunder, I’m pretty sure you won’t have to worry about your shortness for too long,” you go back to looking through his excessive sweater vest collection. “Plus, your dad’s pretty tall, so you at least have that going for you too. He is your dad- right?”

“Whatever. And yes, biologically,” he seemed hesitant to say more, but you were used to it after how Jason acted around the subject, too. Damian seemed a lot more proud of being a Wayne than Jason ever did though, that was for sure.

“Here!” you throw him a black faux-turtle neck shirt and a pair of jeans to ease the awkwardness. “Do you have any tennis shoes?”

“You mean sneakers?” he snorted.

"Same shit," you rolled your eyes. “Do you have them or not?” he left for a bit and you took the chance to slip into your forest green long sleeve mock-neck dress with a sweetheart cutout on the chest, revealing a generous amount of your cleavage.

“I have red and oh-” Damian stopped in his tracks at the sight of you in your outfit before clearing his throat like he hadn’t completely just malfunctioned at the sight of you. “Red or blue.”

You shrugged, thinking either would look good, “You choose.”

“Fine then,” he then went about putting the red ones on whilst perched on the end of his bed.

You rolled your eyes, thinking back to his go-to color choice for painting. “Typical,” you went into the bathroom to finish your smoked-out, dark brown eye with a sharp cat eye and nude lip just as the party was getting started. “You think we should wait an hour and then go down?”

“Why would we be late for a party that’s being thrown right here?”

“Ever heard of fashionably late, Damian?”

“It’s what father says every time he’s running behind schedule.”

“No, that’s a pathetic excuse for tardiness,” you clasped at his shoulders, “this is a statement. A cool statement.”

Damian looked at you with boredom, “I don’t see the difference.”

“Because you’re not cool yet, it’s okay,” you patted his shoulder condescendingly. “Listen, we’ll wait thirty minutes and go down.”

“15.”

“20.”

“Deal,” he shook your hand with stormy, unreadable eyes. You could’ve sworn he was pissed off, but you could never be too sure with Damian. “In the meantime, what do you suggest we do?” His tone was somewhat teasing, leaving you to believe that, perhaps, you’d read his ‘annoyance’ completely wrong.

“We could always pregame?”

“Yes, gaming would be good.”

You snickered when he led you to the game room. You stayed and played Lego Batman until two seniors burst in whilst attacking each other with their tongues while you guys were five rounds in.

“This is our cue to head down.”

Damian nodded as he hid his favorite controller, “Jason’s a dumbass if he thinks these plebs aren’t going to steal.”

“I didn’t even think about that.”

“You wouldn’t, would you?” you giggled and pushed at him as he came to your side.

Together, you walked down the main staircase and witnessed the wreckage below for the first time. Sweaty, already drunk bodies twisted together in a mangled mass around every square inch of the place. Smoke, whether from cigarettes or what, you didn’t know, covered the air in a blanket of fog over the foyer where the main action was happening.

There was even a DJ. Well, DJ was a bit of an exaggeration, considering it was just some kid with a laptop and Spotify Premium next to a makeshift dance floor.

You were quickly enveloped in the madness as soon as you reached the ground, only finding relief at the familiar reddish bob of Roy’s head. He caught sight of you, then Damian’s signature scowl and waved you over, only to be left speechless by your revealing dress.

“Eyes up, creep,” Jason joked to a completely distracted Roy.

“Yeah, yeah," Roy said, waving him off.

"Anyway,” Jason said, addressing you and Damian again, “get some beer, don’t make fools of yourselves and,” Jason leaned in close enough for you to smell that he’d way overdone it on the cologne, “Try to stay out of the way. Got it? Awesome,” Jason half-heartedly saluted you and Damian before stalking off to where Roy was busy hitting on a group of senior girls.

You bristled, turning to Damian, who also looked just as put off.

“It’s not too late to just play video games, you know,” you offered.

He glared at you for even thinking to say so, especially after the disgusting sight you both beared witness to in the game room. You definitely didn’t want to walk in on anyone or, worse, sit where anyone had been… well.

“This is our first party and we will stay. We’re already late enough as it is.”

“20 minutes isn’t even that bad! Plus, look,” you pointed to the doorway where the rest of the seniors were just now filing in. “See. The cool, older kids are just getting here now too.”

“Alright,” he looked at them, nodding. “I suppose we’ve done well for ourselves, then.”

“I told you I wouldn’t lead us wrong.”

It was getting harder and harder to hear each other of the roar of the crowd and the obnoxious bass system Roy had hacked into in order to play his Spotify setlist for the night. Not to mention how crowded and hot the room was already getting.

“Are parties supposed to be this hot and claustrophobic?”

You shrugged, grabbing his hand to lead him over to where the beer was being handed out by two guys you’d never seen.

“ID’s?”

“ID’s?” Damian mocked them, hands landing squarely on the fold-up table with enough force to make it cave in a bit. “This is my fucking house. Now, hand over the refreshments or face my wrath.”

They cackled at Damian’s vengeful eyes but did end up handing you each two cans of some piss-tasting beer.

“Okay, beer acquired,” you laughed lightly as Damian nearly spit out his first sip.

“Holy shit, this is fucking terrible,” he downed the first can in seconds and didn’t hesitate to chuck it at the back of Elliot’s blonde head. It landed with a loud thump that you could hear from over the blasting bass, causing you to cover your mouth in disbelief.

“HEY!”

You and Damian quickly ducked behind the ping pong table and snickered.

“There’s something seriously wrong with you, but I think I love it,” you playfully pushed his shoulder.

Once the coast was clear of Elliot, he helped you to stand.

“Glad to hear it,” he cheers’ed you again and downed the second one.

“You might wanna slow down there, buddy.” Two beers in less than ten minutes? Not a good start for the rules Jason had just laid out.

“Please, I’ve been drinking since I was six,” he waved off your concern easily as he finished the remains of his can.

You thought back to how strict Bruce seemed and doubted the validity of his statement. The last thing you wanted to do was upset the man who’d given you shelter and food when all he’d asked for in return was respect.

“Sure,” you sipped carefully at your own as you watched him go back and get more.

The majority of the night was spent with you and Damian chatting about random shit once it was settled that Damian refused to dance and you refused to dance alone.

True to their word, Jason and Roy really had ditched you to be with Damian all night. You couldn’t deny it made your heart hurt at what you interpreted as rejection. You weren’t cool enough to hang out with them in front of others, or maybe they didn’t want people to know they actually hung out with you in the first place. Was that acid reflux or your heart exploding into your throat? No, it was definitely acid reflux from the shitty ass beer.

Tipsy Damian truly was the only thing getting you through the night.

“You wanna play beer ping pong?” he said randomly to you, motioning to the table you’d been ducking under two hours earlier.

“Beer pong?” you gently corrected him. “Sure,” you got up and walked over to where a game was ending between two groups of senior guys. Meanwhile, the trashed senior girls mainly stood around the table to watch and cheer.

When you approached you heard the whispers and snickers start, but you were buzzed enough to able to ignore most of it. You were three beers deep and they weren’t going to ruin your good time, especially when Damian was loosening up as much as he was. It was as if he was finally acting his age for once and you were having a blast.

“Who wants some of this?” Damian shouted at the snickering group of seniors, but eventually, two of them agreed.

“This is gonna be funny,” he nudged his friends as they gathered around the table to watch.

“We’ll see about that,” Damian egged them on. “My drunk aim is better than your sober one any day, fool.”

“This kid’s weird. Mad respect,” he snorted and missed his first shot. You were up and dunked it on your first and second try. “Damnnn,” the senior drank both cups and winced. “I’m gonna feel that later for sure.”

His friend went next and sunk both shots, leaving Damian to drink two more that he probably shouldn’t have. Regardless, your friend was still able to make his next two shots, so he couldn’t be that drunk yet… right?

At this point, people at the party had begun to crowd around and place bets.

“GUYS! CLASH OF THE CLASSES!” someone to your right screamed causing a loud cheer to ripple throughout the room. More and more people joined around the small table and you were definitely feeling the pressure.

Damian, on the other hand? He was loving it.

He nudged you in your side lightly, “Told you we would’ve had a blast together at last year's party.”

You could see it in his eyes he was definitely feeling it and laughed with ease, “Anything we do together is fun, Damian.”

He blushed, “Of course.”

“Six left for freshman, eight left for seniors!” someone called out the score for the room.

You were met with loud boo’s that Damian ate up. He was way too into it, but it made it all the more fun for your now slightly tipsy self.

It was at this point that you saw Roy and Jason break away from their small group. You watched as they tore through to the front of the crowd that surrounded you and Damian with anxious looks adorning their faces.

Jason came right up behind you with an audible huff.

“I thought I told you guys to lay low,” he hissed mainly at you since Damian clearly wasn't the soberest out of the two of you.

You didn’t know what to say, electing to give him an apologetic, somewhat awkward smile as you dunked your other two balls without ever looking away from him.

“YOO, NO WAY!” the opposing senior lamented, causing everyone to lose their shit in a ferocious roar that left you to cover your ears.

Man, could drunk kids cheer.

Damian was swept into the chaotic energy of the boisterous room and lifted you up into a spin before forcing you into an aggressive chest bump. You rubbed tenderly at the point of impact after he finally released you, nearly doubling over in laughter at the ridiculousness of the situation. What made the whole thing better was Jason’s constipated face behind Damian’s beet red shit-eatting grin.

Damian, true to his earlier word about not being drunk, landed both shots even in his not-so-sober state. He yelled out your last name with an excitement that had Jason rubbing at his temples.

Roy came up from behind Jason to see what all the ruckus was and chuckled, “Oh, this is good.” Roy soon joined in on the cheers and you blushed at his and Jason’s attention that was now fully on you.

The seniors missed theirs and someone yelled out the updated score.

Two more rounds like you’d been performing and this shit would be over with you only having to drink one.

“We play next!” Roy jostled a deadpan Jason, who looked like he would rather shoot himself in the foot.

You finished up your first game after only having to drink two more cups, but you guys had ultimately won. Jason reluctantly let Roy drag him into a game as the crowd was still hyper from the last match. He looked from a stoned Roy next to him, then across the table to you and a highly energetic drunk Damian, who was acting more like a kid on a sugar high. Jason was completely over the situation and completely over his dumb friends, you could tell amusedly. Good. It was about time he acknowledged your presence.

Roy took the first shot and it bounced straight into your cleavage.

“Sorry. Guess I have a habit of aiming where I’m looking at, princess,” he winked at you with a tipsy smirk.

Your heart skipped a beat, but you hoped it didn’t show.

You retrieved the ball from its precarious position with an abashed expression, shooting him a glare while motioning for him to hurry it up. After all, you didn’t want to be stuck playing ping pong for another 20 minutes. If you could even last another ten, you’d be content. At the rate you’d been drinking over such a short period of time, you were definitely starting to feel the effects of the piss-tasting beer you’d had the displeasure of drinking all night.

It was a fairly close game, proving it hadn’t been sheer drunk luck that you and Damian ended up being beer pong fiends, but, being as close as it was, your shots were getting sloppier and sloppier. When it came down to your turn, you looked across the table at the last cup and sighed as the one cup spun into two, three- ugh.

You winced, throwing your first ball at the third, most focused cup in your spinning vision, but you’d chosen wrong and ultimately threw it at Jason’s crotch instead. Hey, maybe you had the same problem Roy had. The redhead seemed to think so, too, as he nudged Jason with a resounding snicker that you could hear even over the crowd.

You were surprised the game had been able to hold everyone’s attention for as long as it had, considering everyone was still gathered shoulder to shoulder to try and catch a glimpse of the action.

“Trick shot for the last one,” the dude you’d just played warned you as you set up your last shoo-in shot.

Jason came to your defense with a quick ease that shut down any further arguments, “That’s not a real rule.”

You could tell that they hadn't wanted either of you drinking anymore just to win, even though you'd assured them you were fine. Aside from the slight buzz and heat that has settled across your skin, you could still see and think somewhat straight.

Without a second thought, you turned around and threw your last ball over your shoulder, figuring it was probably better that you couldn’t see. It sank with a resounding ‘plop’ into Jason’s cup mere seconds later.

“Fuck my life,” Jason said, rubbing his hands pathetically down his face.

Not only had he lost the match in front of the entire his entire grade, but you and Damian were breaking the only other rule he’d given you: don’t make fools of yourselves.

Your celebration dance with Damian seemed straight out of The Parent Trap and Jason begged for Roy’s help in hiding you two for the rest of the night.

Luckily, he told Jason to knock it off and that you guys were just having fun. “How many times have you seen them let loose?”

“Yeah, Jason,” you stuck out your tongue, becoming surprised when Damian grabbed it with a loud snort. “Hey!”

“Now we’re even,” he laughed as he said your last name. He looked unsteady with a blaring red ringing his face, “We should sit.” Which was Damian code for he wanted to sit.

Another group of teens had already taken over playing, so you guys wandered back towards the makeshift bar, where there were a few seats scattered around the bustling dance floor. Damian uneasily plopped down into one of the fold-up chairs while Jason sat down with more grace and draped his arm around the back of Damian’s.

Roy crossed his arms, “You guys are lame. It’s barely even one in the morning.”

“Pathetic,” you drunkenly nodded, causing an odd rush to ripple across your brain. You shook the odd feeling and glanced enviously at the groups of people dancing. It was then you realized that, yes, you’d been to your first party, but you hadn’t even gotten to dance because of Damian’s blatant refusal.

Roy, catching your line of sight, took the opportunity to steer you away from Jason and out onto the dance floor without saying a word. Somewhere behind you, Damian protested even as drunk as he was, but you ignored him and quickly fell into a drunken rhythm with Roy in the sea of sweaty, hormonal bodies.

You were glad for the confidence boost the beer had given you because, normally, you’d be running for the hills. The contact was intoxicating, even maybe more so than the alcohol currently thrumming across your warm skin.

Roy quickly took the lead, twirling you around while holding your back against his front as he trapped you with your intertwined hands. You released your hold on his grip to drag them lazily up your chest and under your chin, where he lightly nudged at the side of your face with his own

His breath was directly against your ear, causing you to stumble slightly into him. He ate this up with a ferocious intensity you weren’t used to being directed your way.

He brought his hands to your hips, where they gripped down as if to avoid the temptation of wandering elsewhere.

To reward him, you ground back into him but quickly doubted yourself. You found yourself faltering, even after you’d felt his sharp exhale against the gentle skin of your ear. You shifted your head slightly, bumping your nose against his own, which continued to hover lowly near the side of your face.

“Just like the motorcycle!” you turned around to face him before he could react, nearly brushing your lips against his own in the process. You couldn't help but giggle at the missed contact.

You took your close proximity and prime position of your chest against his own as an opportunity to throw your arms around his neck and draw him closer. You felt the music coursing through you as you swayed your hips against his front as you slowly sank down his body with your hands unlatching from behind his neck to trail down his front lightly as you went.

He snorted and pulled you up before your mouth could get any closer to his crotch before bringing you upright again to spin you into a twirl. He then dipped you down, where he held you for a moment.

“Yeah,” he drawled deeply, “just like it.” His voice was raspy, like he’d been smoking. Based on the underlying scent that lingered beneath his suffocating cologne and his glowing verdancy against the reds of his eyes, it seemed like he very may well have been.

You squealed, clasping your hands together in sheer delight at the action while still in the dip. No one had ever danced with you, let alone dipped you like this. It left you in a whirlwind of butterflies and pure, confused arousal.

Roy brought you back up and pointed over to the corner with a smirk and spun you around so you could see Jason and Damian sitting hunched over with matching scowls. You waved, still within his grasp, leaving them to quickly sit up and correct themselves nonchalantly.

“Since neither of ‘em dance, should we should give ‘em a show, darlin’?” he joked in a horrible southern drawl.

You tipped a fake cowboy hat at him, “Sure thing, pardner.”

He threw his head back and laughed. “You’re funny,” he said your name as he placed his hands on your waist. He pulled you onto his knee, which was slightly bent to accommodate your height difference. “Ever seen Dirty Dancing?”

You gasped drunkenly, “Of course, it’s iconic.” His eyes held a devilish glint you couldn't place. “Why?”

“Come on, be my baby tonight. I already got you out of the corner and everything, princess.”

You stiffened in his grasp, stumbling to find an intelligent response, but he was already there, guiding your upper body to spur movement. You gave in willingly, still trapped in the hypnotizing gaze of his half-opened emerald eyes.

“Roy.” Is all you managed to gasp as you brought your arms back around his neck to begin grinding into his movements.

You then proceeded to replicate as much as you could remember about the scene from the movie in your drunken state. Halfway through the song, you felt your dress riding up with each grind into his muscular thighs. You’d attempted to unwrap one arm from around him to pull it down before your bare ass could be exposed to the entire party, but Roy was already way ahead of you.

“I got you, princess,” he yelled over the thumping bass.

You inadvertently arched against his chest as he moved a hand tantalizingly slow down the side of your thigh. His sweaty, freckled hands pulled down at the offending fabric before sliding them back up just as slowly to rest again at your waist.

Your head was already spinning, but Roy's presence alone was making you dizzy.

“Thanks,” you responded breathlessly.

He pulled you back to him to wrap your arms back around his neck as he leaned your torso backward with his to do a sultry half dip. Meanwhile, your thighs remained interwoven with his own thick ones. It was just like the movie.

You snorted suddenly, finally reaching your limit and pushed him away just as the friction from his thigh was getting to be too good. You were feeling way too drunk and way too entranced by Roy’s body heat to be this close to him right now, especially when you were already confused by your feelings for, well, everyone around you, essentially.

“Alright, I think I’m all danced out. I’m gonna go join the grumps.”

Surprisingly, Roy smacked at your arm and motioned for you to lead the way.

You shot him a confused glance considering he’d ditched you earlier to hang with the senior girls, but in your drunken state, all you could focus on was the electricity that still remained where he’d been touching you.

He ended up leading you over to where Jason and Damian were talking about a book you couldn’t focus on over the pounding of the bass, or, wait- was that your head? Ugh.

You brought a palm up to your head to stop the head rush, but it was pointless. Your brain felt like it was on a rollercoaster.

Jason called your name, “You should sit down.”

You nodded.

Sitting.

That sounded good.

Yes.

All the seats were taken, so without a second thought, you dropped clumsily into Jason’s lap. You only stopped to second guess yourself when you felt him stiffen underneath your touch.

Fuck it, you were too drunk to care.

You wrapped your arms around his neck and nestled into it no matter how much he protested. His cologne, mixed with his sweat from the night, quickly became your favorite scent. Definitely a step up from the overbearing shit from earlier.

“Mmm,” you mumbled into his slightly damp skin.

Damian seemed slightly more sober, while you seemed slightly more intoxicated than before you went dancing. You didn't see it, but Damian eyed you with an unreadable, hazy gaze.

“Careful, now, Jay,” Roy gestured to Jason’s beet-red face, “she’s my dancing partner.”

You lazily smiled at his wink before burying your head in the crook of Jason’s neck again.

Jason and Roy stuck around you and Damian a bit longer and thought you’d both been handling your alcohol well enough to leave the two of you on your own while, so they went to get refills. They came back to see you being lifted onto the ping pong table by the crowd to dance and quickly sprung into action. They glared at a sleeping Damian and were on you in an instant, pulling you down without hesitation before you could embarrass yourself.

Roy was quick to pull down your dress, which had ridden up again, at the same time Jason lifted you off the table. Once you were on the ground again, you used him as your primary support as you stumbled to regain your balance.

“But wait!” You tried to plead with them as you stumbled and slurred in their grasp.

“Release my ping pong beer partner!” Damian, now awake, stumbled after the three of you toward the blocked-off service stairs in the kitchen.

“Close,” you snorted into Roy’s shoulder at Damian’s inability to grasp the name beer pong, “so close.”

“What’s going on here?”

Hey, you knew that sexy voice…

“Speedo!” you greeted the raven-haired man with a drunken grin, attempting to shake his hand. “You’re dressed this time,” your head snapped up and down erratically as you took in his tight-fitting police academy uniform. “Still good, though. You look-” Roy swiftly covered your mouth with his hand while Jason attempted to cover you and Damian from his line of sight.

You hiccuped lightly, which Roy attempted to cough in order to cover the offending noise.

“She’s just messing around,” he reassured a skeptical Dick. “Right?” Jason said your name and turned around to give you a ‘don’t blow this’ type of look that, in your drunken state, you took to mean continue rambling about how hot his older brother was.

“Dick,” you snorted and forgot what you’d been about to say due to the obvious, funny nature of his name. “We’re just cool over here, just chillin’,” you leaned further onto Roy’s shoulder as your legs began to wobble due to the lack of Jason’s support on your other side. “Keeping it a scorching 100 over here, playaaa,” you shot a bemused Dick the ‘okay’ symbol with your hand and attempted to close your eyes as Damian had moments earlier.

“Alright,” he sounded extremely entertained.

That was good. Right?

“Guys, he believes us,” You tried to whisper, keyword tried, thinking you had it made, but Jason’s quick glare that met your own when your eyes finally reopened seemed to say otherwise.

“Do we need to pay the toll, or can the troll fuckin’,” Damian belched loudly, “moooove.”

“I know Bruce sent you, but please don’t tell him about this.”

You peaked over at Jason to see him busy reasoning with Dick while you were more preoccupied with nuzzling your nose into Roy’s sticky neck. You were feeling very cuddly tonight for some reason.

“Princess, chill out with that,” he muttered quietly to you and you nodded up and down against the skin of his neck. “Can you keep it chill?” he asked under his breath, looking directly into your slitted eyes from the corner of his own.

“For sure,” you nodded seriously before turning to Dick to correct your previous statement. “Hey, Dick. Quick update.”

“No, no, no,” Jason attempted to shush you, but Dick mirthfully motioned for you to continue.

“I’m listening.”

“Just wanted to let you know that now we’re actually keeping it a chill 100 over here,” you snorted and completely lost balance. “Playaaa!” Jason rushed to your side before you could fall in order to relieve Roy of some of your dead weight.

“Dick, seriously. I’ll pay you,” Jason had resorted to bartering with the older man, who appeared extremely amused.

He waved his hands in front of him dismissively, “As long as no one gets hurt, we’re all good here.”

“Seriously?” Jason and Roy said in unison.

Dick nodded, “I just happened to look at the cameras, but I don’t think Bruce has, so it should be all good on that front.” Dick looked to Damian, who was attempting to fight both Jason and Dick off at the same time, then over to you, who was slowly falling asleep in Jason and Roy’s arms. “Kids gotta have fun at some point. Besides, I have a date to get back to, but you really should shut this down before Bruce decides to check in for himself,” he finally moved, allowing you guys to pass up the stairs.

“Think you could help me out with that, Officer Grayson?” Jason asked as he looked back to the raging party that showed no signs of slowing any time soon.

Dick grinned wickedly, tipping his police cap, “With pleasure.”

•

You woke up in the wee hours of the morning with a rude awakening that splattered all over Damian’s toilet.

“Ughhhh.”

Damian sighed from behind you, coming over to hold your hair throughout the ordeal. He only slightly made fun of you for missing the bowl but, for the most part, ended up comforting you. He rubbed at your back as you dry heaved and only left to get you some water and a new toothbrush.

“What happened to my one from earlier?” you asked as he handed you the new one.

“You said my bathtub was dirty and started cleaning it with it.” His eyes were too jocular for it being five in the morning.

You wrinkled your nose, “Oh.”

“Yeah.”

“Ew,” you said, still grossed out.

“Yeah.”

You both laughed before noticing that you were still in your party dress. Without thinking, you took it off under the false pretense that you had shorts and a bra on underneath, but quickly and all too late, remembered you’d foregone them.

Damian’s eyes widened and you were quick to cover yourself up, not that it stopped the er, rising problem Damian had acquired at the sight. Bruce’s words from a few days ago forcibly sprang to mind as your heart confusedly raced at the thought of what lay beneath. ‘Be careful.’

Damian, without another word, turned around to give you some privacy.

“Sorry, I forgot,” you said, feeling completely embarrassed as you searched around single-handedly for your sleep shirt but remembered all you had were the ones from the previous night. “Do you have something I could wear?”

He looked over at you, “No.”

You'd already realized earlier that nothing he had would fit your frame and sighed.

“Look away.”

He obliged again easily as you looked around for a loose blanket or clothes but ultimately found nothing.

“This never happened,” he whispered your first name, catching you off guard as you searched for clothes.

“Okay,” you nodded in the darkness, not knowing what else to say.

Your face felt warm when Damian patted the spot next to him on his bed and you obliged, curling into his chest where you felt the remnants of his arousal. You controlled yourself in your still slightly buzzed state and instead focused on steadying your breathing.

Titus whimpered lightly from where his heavy form had been forced to the edge of the bed, but eventually, he was able to find a comfortable position.

Your pounding head and arousal eventually quelled and you were able to finally drift off, though the heat remained on your cheeks longer after you both fell back asleep.

•

You awoke again with a start as Damian’s door was thrown open by Jason, who looked like an absolute zombie. He hadn’t seemed to notice you yet because he avoided the air mattress that was deceivingly fluffed up by the bedding. At first glance, the pillows hidden beneath the blankets appeared to be your sleeping form.

Titus barked, jumping up from the bed to run past Jason. The Great Dane disappeared down the hallway in a rush, most likely in search of breakfast.

“Wake up, you annoying little fuck,” Jason smacked a hard fist down on Damian’s side that was curled around you. “We got busted.”

“Todd!” Damian growled with enough venom to have you hastily escaping from his arms.

"Woah," Jason’s eyes blew open at the sight of you naked in Damian’s bed and backed away instantly. “You guys know I was just joking about the fucking part yesterday.”

Damian wore a satisfied smirk that you quickly smacked at with a pillow.

“Nothing happened. Now, both of you look away,” you clutched at your chest, realizing you had just exposed it to both Jason and Damian.

You rubbed at your pounding temple as you remembered the fact that you had no clean clothes with you and none of Damian’s would fit. So, did that leave you to wear this blanket around until you got home? God, you hoped not.

Damian sensed your problem with ease, “Todd. Fetch her some clothes.”

“Why the fuck do I have to do it?” But he started looking around on the floor anyway, like the gentleman he was.

“No, I meant your clothes, you annoying fat fuck,” Damian gave a devilish grin as he spat Jason’s earlier insult back at him. “Nothing I have will fit.”

He looked at you and shrugged, coming back with red cotton gym shorts and a soft, white short sleeve v-neck before leaving without a word. Damian quickly followed after him, giving you the chance to change.

It’s only after you looked in Damian’s mirror that you noticed the shirt was somewhat see-through due to its lightweight nature and color. Better than something dirty, though, you thought with a shrug and scoured around the floor for your things to pack back up into your bag.

Once you’d collected everything, you scurried downstairs to where Jason and Damian were already at each other’s throats.

“Woah, what happened? I only took two minutes,” you went to break them apart, but Bruce beat you to it. You startled away from the older man to let him handle it.

To your surprise and amusement, you noticed Roy still lingering about, though he was too busy groaning and hiding from the light to acknowledge you or the tense situation.

“BOYS!” Bruce’s demanding voice echoed throughout the manor with a reverberating force.

Roy winced and smacked his hands over his ears, no doubt still feeling the lingering effects of last night as much as you were.

Boys? Well, that didn’t include you!

You attempted to sneak forward toward the front door with your bag in tow before anyone could notice, but you were quickly spotted and reprimanded.

“You. Stay.”

You winced, shamefully retreating back to where the boys were lined up, including Roy, with your tail between your legs. After the conversation you'd had in his office, you knew you’d betrayed his trust.

“Why does she need to be here for this?” Jason complained. “The whole thing was my idea anyway. This is between you and me, Bruce.”

He glanced down at your outfit with a barely quirked brow, “She’s here because she’s family. As much as Roy and Stephanie are, at least.”

Family?

Bruce Wayne was calling you family?

You'd never even heard your parents say the word.

You gleamed inwardly at the acceptance, but it was soured by the fact that you’d already gone and let him down. The first chance you got at an actual family and you’d fucked it up.

Maybe that’s why your parents never hung around.

Whether it was the remnants of the alcohol, the weight of the past few days, or even just the disappointed look in Bruce’s eye, you couldn’t help the sniffles that trickled from you. They started off slow, then erupted all at once. Heavy tears soon poured from your eyes, cascading down your quivering lips before splattering against the ruined carpet below.

You’d never been reprimanded before, only ever having been ignored. This being so, you had no idea what to say other than ‘sorry’ over and over again until Bruce finally put a hand on your shoulder just as he had previously. It was meant to comfort, but you still shrunk away from his touch.

"It's okay," he sensed your hesitancy and withdrew his hand immediately. Hey, it’s not that serious,” he switched up his tone to be more jovial. Do you know how many parties I threw here back in the day?” You shook your head ‘no,’ and he sighed, seeming to think back on all the trouble he’d got into. Well, it was a lot.”

Your tear-stained eyes met his sincere blue ones.

“Okay,” you pouted, wiping at your cheeks.

He couldn't help but laugh a bit at your lackluster response. "Alright," Bruce’s eyebrows creased together as he pondered a fitting punishment. “Just get this cleaned up. Alfred's on vacation for the next two days,” he glanced pointedly at the four of you before walking off, leaving you all to the piles of empty cups and trash.

Jason was on you in an instant.

“Fucking crybaby,” Jason teased you. You quickly wiped at the remaining tears on your face with vigor as if it would somehow hide what they’d already bore witness to.

“Please,” Damian was quick to come to your defense. “You’re lucky she spouted so many tears. Father went easy on us,” he pointed out what you’d all been thinking.

Jason instantly quieted without further insults, realizing it was true. He gave you one last unreadable look before silently going back to picking up the copious amounts of red solo cups that littered the floor.

Roy sidled up behind you, tapping you on the opposite shoulder of where he was and flicked your nose when you finally turned the other way.

“I think I know whose clothes those are. And I can see why he gave them to you,” you attempted to whack your broom at him in retaliation, but he just laughed and slid out of the way. “You dancin’ with Jay over there now?” he wiggled his brows as he easily dodged another one of your broom attacks.

Even Damian couldn’t seem to keep his eyes off of your chest, which was tenting salaciously against the thin fabric.

“Whatever. My head hurts too much to deal with your shit right now, Roy.”

He left you alone with a knowing smile that you ignored in favor of starting to clean.

You knew this break from reality would have to come crashing back down on you sooner rather than later. You also knew that this meant that you’d eventually have to face your sketchy apartment. All this being said, you knew you'd be able to take anything on with your newfound system of support.

[next] || masterlist || pinned || my ko-fi / tip jar

#jayroy #jason todd x reader #reader x jason todd x roy harper #damian wayne x reader #reader x roy harper #reader x jason todd #my fic: the art of rehabilitating snowbirds #my fic:ars

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ao3feed-brucewayne · 2 years

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It'll All End in a Funeral

read it on the AO3 at https://ift.tt/FmqkCaJ

by TJ_The_Kind

Things were bad. And it had all started the day they lost everything. The day Kon and Bart died. But if they just kept going, just kept trying to forget, maybe things wouldn't feel so bad anymore. Maybe they could just go until they stopped. Because the question really was; If things started there, where would it end?

A few things to note! I am Australian. I will not be adjusting the characters to act or talk like Americans because I do not care. I mention no American place names either, so picture them wherever you want. Also, I know so little about Bart or Kon's death and what happened before or after. I am a fan of these characters in which I read fanfiction about them and occasionally will engage in a comic. Also also, while there is sex in this fic, this is not smut. Reading this sex will not be enjoyable and will not feel great. And the characters are more times than not, having a shitty time. Also also also, there will be warnings before each chapter. Please read them and take care of yourself.

Words: 995, Chapters: 1/20, Language: English

Fandoms: Young Justice - All Media Types, Batman - All Media Types, Superman - All Media Types

Rating: Explicit

Warnings: Major Character Death, Rape/Non-Con

Categories: F/F, F/M, M/M

Characters: Tim Drake, Cassie Sandsmark, Kon-El | Conner Kent, Bart Allen, Dick Grayson, Jason Todd, Bruce Wayne, Barbara Gordon, Alfred Pennyworth, Cassandra Cain, Damian Wayne, Clark Kent, Lois Lane, Jon Lane Kent

Relationships: Tim Drake & Cassie Sandsmark, Bart Allen & Tim Drake & Kon-El | Conner Kent & Cassie Sandsmark, Tim Drake & Kon-El | Conner Kent, Bart Allen & Tim Drake, Kon-El | Conner Kent & Cassie Sandsmark, Bart Allen & Cassie Sandsmark

Additional Tags: brief Tim drake/Cassie Sandsmark - Freeform, past Cassie Sandsmark/Kon-El | Conner Kent - Freeform, background willy, background Dick Grayson/Wally West, Get it? Willy, Rape/Non-con Elements, there will be warnings in the notes before those chapters, Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Drug Use, Canonical Character Death, Suicidal Thoughts, Implied/Referenced Self-Harm, Suicide Attempt, Grief/Mourning, things get pretty bad y'all, so like be prepared, I will list warnings for the specific chapters at the beginning of the chapters, Bisexual Tim Drake, Lesbian Cassie Sandsmark, Coming Out, Coming out in the middle of being fingered, coming out in the middle of fingering, Tim Drake is Not Okay, Tim Drake Needs a Hug, Tim Drake asks for a Hug, Tim Drake Gets a Hug, Everyone Needs A Hug, Hurt Tim Drake, Tim Drake-centric, Hurt/Comfort, Angst, Bruce Wayne Tries to Be a Good Parent, Dick Grayson Tries to Be a Good Older Sibling, Jason Todd Tries to Be a Good Older Sibling, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, canon? i don't know her, Tim Drake Whump, Tim Drake Has a Bad Time, Depression, Vomiting, Cassie Sandsmark is Not Okay, Cassie Sandsmark Needs a Hug, Cassie Sandsmark Gets a Hug, Hurt Cassie Sandsmark, Cassie Sandsmark whump, Cassie Sandsmark Has a Bad Time, No Beta we Die like Kon-El | Conner Kent and Bart Allen

read it on the AO3 at https://ift.tt/FmqkCaJ

#IFTTT #bruce wayne #batman #the dark knight #the cape crusader #gotham #dc universe #ao3 #ao3feed

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harveywritings92 · 2 years

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Bloodlines *Rewrite* : Vampire! Dick Grayson x reader.

The following is a non profit fan based story Batman, Red hood, Nightwing etc. belongs to DC Comics please support the official release.

I gain no profit from this nor do I own anything other then OCs and whatever sprouts from my imagination. Thanks for reading!

[ I was not happy with the first one and decided to re-write the whole fic this time it'll be less cringy and more longer than the original, along with some deeper background on Dick and the reader's relationship. ]

First line: Prologue.

Prologue:

"Alfred! my old friend it's been too long how is everything?" [Grandpa/n] asked hugging his old friend, as he happily invited him into his home, "Quite alright Gp/n, I trust you've been well?" Alfred smiled as he set foot in the old bungalow style house, it seemed to have a new found energy these days...something that's been lacking in last couple months. It was a breath of fresh air considering the tragedy that struck his old friend's life just a year prior.

"How's Y/n? is she doing alright...after the accident." the butler asked as he looked around the l/n's kitchen for their tea supplies as his friend limped to the couch, Gp/n learned a long time ago to never get in the way of Alfred and tea time. "She's doing better...But, she's been having trouble making friends." the graying h/c explained with a frown, his British friend cocked a brow a he set a cup down in front of him. "That's actually why I came." the former air pilot looked at his friend a little confused.

"I'm sure you've heard about the flying Graysons, yes?"

"Ah yes, They have a son about my Y/n's age, the poor boy, I can imagine what he's going through..."

" Young Richard is the reason why I'm here, Master Bruce and I have been trying to get him to open up..."

"Say no more Alfred, I understand he's a child who's lost too much in a short time and could use someone his own age to talk to."

Alfred sighed in relief that the thing with [Gp/n] he always had a spark about him, it would always drive him him to stand up and help others in need. Alfred could see that same spark in Y/n and knew she'd be perfect to help Dick out of his despair. "I'll talk to her see if she'll be up for it." and like that the old men went onto banter about how their lives have been and complain what's changed about the world.

Later that week...

Y/n fidgeted with helm of her t-shirt, her eyes warily averted to the window watching trees and fancy houses pass by, maybe this was a bad idea... she doesn't know this boy, what if he doesn't want to be friends? what if he's snobby and rude? he's rich after all! The h/c grimaced as her grandfather patted her head "stop worrying dear, Richard is a nice boy, he'll like you just give him time." the old man assured as they turned into a large driveway.

Y/n gawked up at the large house that could probably fit her house in it and then some! The nine year old was brought out of her shock by a soccer ball hitting her foot, she stared down a it then followed where it could've possibly came from in the large yard and thought she saw someone duck behind a giraffe shaped hedge. "Y/n! come say hello to Mr. Wayne!" her grandfather called her e/c eyes went from the garden to the front of the manor entrance to see her grandpa with a very tall man with raven hair and icy blue eyes.

Y/n already knew who he was Bruce Wayne, She vaguely recalled Bruce babysitting her, she would sit on his lap when she was really little, while he looked at a big screen in a big black room, a home theater perhaps? the manor certainly looked big enough to hold one... She hummed walked over to them as Bruce crouch down to get a better look at her. "Hi Y/n, you probably don't remember me...very well, but I used to be good friends with your parents." he smiled sadly the last time he saw her was when she was two, sad he had to meet her again at her parents funeral, killed in a bombing caused by Anarky they weren't even targets just at the wrong place and the wrong time.

"How have you been?"

"I'm okay mister Wayne..."

"You call me Bruce if you want, it's okay."

"Ok, Mr. Bruce."

Bruce chuckled and patted her head then looked around the yard "Now are you ready to meet Dick?" the little girl nodded as the raven haired man stood up and scanned the yard "He was out here a second ago..." Bruce frowned trying to locate his foster son, he must be wearing sage, the dhampire couldn't smell the boy anywhere. the raven haired man felt a tug on his pant leg and looked down and saw Y/n pointing out towards the hedge maze.

"He's hiding in the elephant." she whispered and sure enough a startled yelp came from the elephant shaped hedge and a little boy with raven hair fell out of the hedge and stared up awkwardly at his foster father, Y/n, her grandfather. after a few seconds Dick blushed waved at them, Y/n and [Gp/n] waved back. Bruce broke the silence "Don't just lay there Dick come say hello!" he did a come here gesture with his hand. the boy sheepishly got up from the ground and walked over to them. He stopped next to Bruce and examined the girl standing across from him curiously, she was kind of odd looking, with her calculating eyes, long/short h/t h/c hair, then he took in her f/c t-shirt, skirt and the capris she was wearing which gave Dick the impression that she must be a tomboy.

Y/n was examining Dick too he wasn't at all what she was picturing, she assumed he was gonna be a snobby rich brat in some fancy suit, not a boy in a black and blue hoodie with grass stained jeans, the two locked eyes and Y/n felt her stomach flop he had pretty eyes a nice cobalt blue...and something else. she thought for the briefest second she saw red glow in them, neither kid seemed to be really listening to what the adults were saying. till Bruce voice broke through their little staring contest.

"I think that's good Idea right Dick?"

"...muh? I'm sorry?" the boy and looked up at his foster father.

"I'd ask if you'd like to show Y/n around the manor, while her grandfather and I discuss some things?"

"I...uh, Okay."

Dick led Y/n up the stairs of the manor neither noticing the grim expression Bruce suddenly wore as looked back a [Gp/n], The two kids walked around the front lobby the little girl was stunned by the shear size of it, the place could fit like five of her living rooms in here, and they just stepped inside! Y/n heard Dick snickering next to her. "You have the same look I did when I first got here." he teased Y/n cheeks felt hot. "Well can you blame me? This place is huge! I'll get lost!" That caused the boy laugh more. "Don't worry you got me to guide you!" Somehow that didn't calm Y/n's nerves, but before she could say anything Dick grabbed her hand and enthusiastically talking about the large gaming room and dragged Y/n down one of the large hallways.

Meanwhile.

"How long have you been sick Gp/n?" Bruce asked warily as he eyed the old man sitting across from him, Gp/n kept his face neutral as he nursed his coffee. "Goin' on five years now..." he stated calmly trying not to wince in pain as he felt a coughing fit coming, Bruce winced he knew something was up the second Gp/n scent reached his nose, the old man smelt off... Like he was rotting away. "Does she know about it?" the grim look Gp/n sent him told Bruce enough Y/n had no idea. "How long do you have?" the old man sighed leaning back in his chair.

"No Idea... Everyone keeps saying different death dates, my favorite doctor was the one that said I had 2 months to live....That was three years ago."

"Have you sorted out anything, looked for other options?"

"Yep, and all the outcomes are looking grim."

"Have you decided what'll happen to Y/-..."

Bruce suddenly froze and shot up to his feet, Gp/n name noticed the younger man's eyes had red tint to them, before he could ask what was wrong? Bruce shot off like a rocket with inhuman speed towards the gaming room, where he found Y/n with a scraped up knee trying to dodge a blood starved Dick! Y/n was good job to! until, Dick realized he could jump over the pool table to get at her! Luckily Bruce jumped in between the kid's where Dick proceeded to sink his fangs into Bruce's arm and started drinking, while the fledgling was feeding his adoptive father quickly turned his attention towards Y/n, who watching them stunned.

"Get Alfred to have that knee taken care of." he said calmly Y/n didn't need to be told twice, luckily Alfred wasn't far behind Bruce when he ran out the kitchen like a mad bat out of hell! The butler saw Y/n bloody knee and realized what was up. "Oh dear, did master Dick?" he asked warily the little girl shook her head.

Alfred relaxed and brought Y/n to the kitchen where her grandpa was waiting anxiously. "What's going on?" he asked eyeing Y/n. "The children had a bit of a accident, Master Bruce is helping Master Dick." Gp/n noticed Y/n's knee and figured out what happened. "So the boy's a vamp. eh?" he hummed as he helped Alfred get the first-aid kit out.

"Is he half-blood like Bruce?" Gp/n inquired Alfred shoo his head. "Pure blood from an Elder bloodline." That caused the old man to gawk at his friend stunned, a pure blood was one thing, But, An Elder blood? that was like royalty among the vampires! Well at least that explains Bruce's reaction... "Bruce is going to have his hands full with that boy!" Gp/n chortled Alfred hummed in agreement, Y/n just looked between the two old men bemused. and spoke up.

"Uh... I think my Knee has enough band-aids!" she said pointing down at her knee were the saw their handiwork which consisted of about 15 band-aids. "op, sorry dear!" Gp/n chuckled as he started peeling the extra band-aids off, a few seconds later Bruce and a teary eyed Dick came into the kitchen, the little boy was sniffling as Bruce tried to reassure him that you were fine and not angry with him. "No, she hates me now!" Dick sobbed hiding behind Bruce's leg, Y/n blink and hopped off the counter and poked Dick on the shoulder. "Hey.." the little vampire looked up from Bruce's leg he was shaking.

Y/n silently opened her arms after a few seconds of tense silence Dick unglued himself from his adoptive father and hugged Y/n. "I'm sorry...I didn't want to!" he sobbed into her shoulder Y/n just patted him on the back. "It's okay, your ok..." she cooed the adults relaxed.

Alfred and Bruce were worried Y/n start screaming up a storm after what happened upstairs, but were astounded at how quickly she was to forgive and forget. "You two do realize I've been a fairy doctor for over 40 years now, right?" Gp/n spoke up both Bruce and Alfred looked at him sheepishly, that fact had actually slipped their minds... From then on and new friendship was made and Wayne manor became more lively for the days to come.

#dick grayson x reader #batman vampire au #vampire! dick grayson #batman #nightwing x reader #Alfred Pennyworth #bruce wayne #creatures of gotham au #tw: blood

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forestlingincorporated · 3 years

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Teen Titans #29

So, one of my favorite types of fics to read is Different First Meeting fics between Jason and Tim. I looooove reading Enemies To Caretaker, of which I fed handsomely on fairly recently. Big Brother Jason fics give me warm fuzzies, and Tim Drake needs a hug, and I feel like if these two actually got to know each other and worked past their preconceptions, they’d get along surprisingly well. And Still A Jason!Robin Fanboy Tim Drake is just a fun concept.

Also, it just FEELS right for the middle siblings to band together after Damian comes along, lets get those abandonment issues in the party.

So, for mysterious and very secret TimKon Week 2021 reasons, I was rereading some Teen Titans, and I stumbled over the Original Tim+Jason First Meeting, and I just sort of wanted to talk about some interesting things I found in there rereading it after several years.

First thing right off the bat, when reading fics, normally it’s either the Core Four at the tower that Jason puts to sleep, or it’s Tim alone for the night. In the comic, none of Tim’s close friends are even at the tower, Jason waits for Bart and Cassie to leave, and Conner actually hasn’t come around for an in-universe month, because this is after the Superboy’s Birthright arc where Lex mind controls Conner.

The people Jason knocks out were his own teammates when he was a Titan. He specifically says he never got to work with Beast Boy or Cyborg directly, so he doesn’t feel bad electrocuting them, but he feels bad putting Raven under much more gently because she used to worry for him.

Tim has just gotten off the phone with Bruce when Jason shows up. It seems like Bruce might’ve been picking Tim up, but something’s come up with Martian Manhunter going missing, so Tim tells him he’ll catch a ride with Cyborg.

This is actually really interesting to me, because it’s a small moment of Bruce letting Tim down. It’s a conversation he’s probably had with his biological father many times when Jack’s canceled on him.

Gonna acknowledge this abomination real quick. This is So Stupid, and I’m glad as a fandom we just all agreed Jason didn’t do this. It makes me ask so many questions. Where did he get that oversized Robin costume? Why’d he tear off his perfectly good clothes? Why did he do this? Why the yellow tights? WHY?

A lot of things are actually happening here that are actually Really Interesting if you just look past the stupid fucking outfit. Because this comic actually flew really close to greatness, they just ended up dropping the ball by not continuing to do more with it.

First off, Jason doesn’t beat around the bush. He’s immediately like “yeah, yeah, yeah, Red Hood, whatever, I’m Jason Todd, bitch! Fight me.”

Secondly, Jason’s done his homework. He knows A LOT about Tim. He knows his name, he knows he has a dad, he knows he went to prep school, and he knows the story of how Tim became Robin. How he GOT that last bit of information, I’d honestly like to know. But even HAVING the information isn’t enough; he’s still letting his preconceived ideas get in the way. The surface level information about Tim’s life only served to fuel his jealousy and anger (thanks, Lazerus Pitt!). He’s so focused on Tim’s privilege that he’s looked past evidence of hardship; if he’s done this much research on Tim, he’s no doubt seen records of multiple boarding schools, lengthy travel records, news reports, a death certificate.... He can’t even bring himself to BELIEVE parts of Tim’s story that aren’t lining up with his world view, like HOW he became Robin.

Jason has convinced himself that what he’s discovered about Tim and the period of time when Jason was dead - the fact that Bruce was spiraling after his death, that his family mourned him, that Tim had to step up to the plate at a weird suicide prevention buddy system - is all a lie. Despite the fact that he’s beating Tim’s ass, he speaks to him with the assumption that Tim’s a child who’s been manipulated and lied to.

Meanwhile, it must be SO PAINFUL for Tim to hear Jason say these things: I bet he said the same thing to you he said to me, didn’t he? That you have the talent to make a difference in Gotham. That he needed someone he could trust in his war on crime. That you were one of a kind. The light in his darkness.

Bruce never said any of that to Tim. Bruce rejected Tim, he didn’t want Tim, and begrudgingly accepted Tim.

Going back to Jason waiting for Tim’s other young teen friends to leave the tower before going in, only drugging his own former teammates, is much of his anger seems directed at THEM, not just Bruce. To Jason, it looks like they didn’t mourn him either, he has no statue. I find it interesting that he smashes Donna Troy’s statue, who died after him, and I believe she came back before he did.

Unless he was keeping track of the news from the League of Assassins, to Jason, Donna never died.

And most importantly? Tim shuts Jason down. Tim “Bitch, Please” Drake out here like: you’re a fucking idiot, he loved you to death, he barely let me audition for the role.

Tim shows some deep resentment towards Jason in this scene. I mean... earned, Jason literally came into his house and starting hitting him, but Tim’s relationship towards the Idea Of Jason has gone through a few changes. At first Jason was ROBIN! THE BOY WONDER! And if maybe Tim thought Bruce wasn’t AS happy with Jason as he was with Dick, there was still SOME hero worship early on. But it only takes Bruce and Alfred and Dick using Jason’s death as a cautionary tale a few times to get Tim to see Jason AS a cautionary tale - the kind of Robin NOT to be. But the more Tim craved Bruce’s paternal attention and approval, and the more Bruce withheld it or made Tim work for it, knowing that Bruce did that, in part, because of his love and grief for his dead son (Tim having an actual living breathing father plays a part, too), and those feelings towards Jason have started to fester.

Jason can’t let it go, though, he thinks the concept of Robin was a mistake and had always been a mistake, and if he can hurt Tim, so can Scarecrow, Penguin, The Joker.

This is a good time to bring up that one thing I think Jason probably doesn’t know is Tim is injured. It is a little over a month since since Conner shattered Tim’s right arm. Tim is still healing from a comminuted fracture in his forearm. And looking at this picture that is - ah, yes, that is the injured arm Jason is swinging Tim by. Tim is probably healed by now, the cast IS off and he’s a child, but bones don’t fully return to full strength for 3-6 months.

Jason is conflicted. This is clearly, in part, a fucked up way of “protecting” what he sees as a manipulated child, to convince him to leave Bruce. But there’s also clearly some deep, deep jealousy thrown into the mix to complicate matters and cloud his judgement. Ultimately, Jason isn’t there to kill Tim. Tim would be dead if he was. He’s there to “beat some sense into him,” and he ultimately fails, and fails badly.

Tim is found by the older Titans, awake by now, though it seems Jason knocked him out to, uh, fuck with the memorial chamber, and Tim... does not beat around the bush. No secret identities here just “yeah, Jason Todd beat the shit out of me.”

And their reactions are HILARIOUS.

One more little sidebar, in the comic, Jason gets in with a D.N.A. check that never removed him from its permissions. Usually in fic this is a unique pass code. I’m not sure which version I like better, honestly. There’s something about Jason physically inputting a code that accepts him even though he’s supposedly dead that I really like, and just feels better than a dna scan. A dna scan sounds SAFER, sure, but there’s something about the Titans leaving in an honest SECURITY RISK out of sentiment that I like.

Lastly, I really like how it ends. Jason honestly thinks Tim IS a good Robin, and it seems like Jason’s done some research on the core four, mentioning Tim’s “real friends” again while the “camera” is on Conner and Cassie, suggesting that Jason KNOWS about them and possibly that targeting the tower while they were gone maybe wasn’t an accident or out of convenience, but fully intentional. And again, Jason’s real problem is highlighted: he feels alone, forgotten, unmemorable, no family, no friends.

Thank you for coming to my TedTalk.

#Jason Todd #Tim Drake #Teen Titans #Teen Titans (2003-2011)

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maxwell-grant · 3 years

Note

If you were asked to write a GREY GHOST back-up for some BATMAN THE ANIMATED SERIES comic (framed as old episodes from the tv show that Bruce is watching to cheer himself up and/or introduce the kids to Bat-dad's favourite), might I please ask what sort of tone & setting you'd run with for the character?

I'd be against having additional Grey Ghost stories, but if I was offered to do it of course I'd take the job and make the best of it I could, so I think the way you could go on about it would be to stick to the core of what the Grey Ghost is: He's Adam West as The Shadow. So you take this old pulp serial world, you transport a lot of the pulp hero traits or benchmarks, you set him on suitably grim and dramatic urban adventures, BUT: It's Adam West. The soul is Adam West, The Bright Knight.

We all know where Bruce's story is going in the world outside of his childhood, we all know The Grey Ghost isn't real, we all know Simon Trent is going to end up washed out, and we all know Batman is going to help him pick himself back up, and will prove that the Grey Ghost was real all along. So the Grey Ghost stories themselves should exist in light of that, in light of where we know it's all leading up to, and in light that we should understand why he inspires Bruce so strongly.

Grey Ghost is a full-on good guy and defender of justice, with no cynicism or moral ambiguity in said stories. He doesn't fight a rogues gallery of murderous terrorists, he fights costumed criminals who act like afterschool special villains, maybe patterned after the careers of the Batman 66 villains if you wanna get meta, like one of them is a crooked boxing coach who's had to work for the mob after getting chased off his ranch, or Vincent Price. He gets into death traps, but he always comes out. People get shot, but it's always flesh wounds and nobody dies, and the Grey Ghost uses "mercy bullets" like Doc Savage, he mostly waves a gun around for intimidation. He knows how to give the bad guys a good scare, but he never really injures them.

Grey Ghost mainly uses fistcuffs and gadgets, but instead of always having a gadget for everything, the Grey Ghost always has some secret skill he picked up in his travels that helps him. A bad guy throws a knife at him while he's blinded, but surprise!, he throws it back and pins the guy to the wall, because a Javanese circus performer in Singapore taught him to listen to a blade's sounds through the air. He's dissappeared in plain sight, why, they don't know about a hypnotic trick he was taught by Indian fakirs he's old friends with. He stops an episode to teach the viewers what to do should they fall on a lake of ice, because one time he had to learn that when he got trapped in Alaska. He's always got something and his backstory accomplishments are excessive to the point of parody, but they have to be.

You use Grey Ghost to tell the earnest, hokey and lighthearted stories you can't really tell with Batman anymore. Stories like the 1940s Green Lama issue where he lectures a private about racism, or the Mexican Fantomas stories that are all about him just being nice and understanding and helpful and standing up for others, even his villains.

One episode he hears about young artists across the city reporting their work stolen, and he thinks it's that fiend Claude Monstre again, but nope, Claude Monstre's paintings have been stolen too, and it's a shyster named Mr Cain who's been robbing artists everywhere and taking credit for it, so The Grey Ghost pays him a visit and scares him straight, and they all get their dues and then some, with an explicit tribute to Bill Finger at the end. Grey Ghost takes the time to look after a stray cat and her litter until he can find a proper owner, and it turns out his old enemy, the temptress Helen Zaroni, has been committing robberies to get enough money to open an animal shelter, so The Grey Ghost agrees to give her the cats and help her out if she promises to be good from now on.

The bad guys are never going to be as bad as the one Bruce faces, the conflicts will never spiral into something that can't be solved with a clever solution and a moral lesson, The Grey Ghost will always know the right thing to do and do it, and everything is going to be okay. That statement is what's gonna give the stories a potency of it's own and has to be the number one thing at the center of it: Everything is going to be okay. The Grey Ghost is here. He's got this. Everything's going to be okay, everyone. Everything's going to be okay, Bruce. Everything's going to be okay, son.

Sure, you can fill out details by adding in veiled references to bits of pulp hero or Batman's history, there's some fun to be had with the idea that the Grey Ghost is (or was) the fictional hero of Batman's world and that he's got stuff like Lego Grey Ghost and Innsmouth Sanatorium games, but the potency of The Grey Ghost that's unique to him as a character always comes back to what he means to Batman, and what Adam West means to people that remember him fondly. The wistful humility and compassionate affection that West brought to the role made the character come across as endearing to us as he would have been to Bruce, and that's something that needs to be preserved.

Grey Ghost stories should be like gettng a reassuring hug from a family member, like looking at a family picture and being hit with some sadness over how things turned out and some happiness over the good memories it brings to you. These should be stories that Bruce looks back on and thinks "this isn't really how the world works, but that's how I wish it did back then, and that's what I'm fighting for now". Stories that he shows the Batfamily because sometimes they could use a shot of optimism themselves, and yeah sometimes they chuckle because the special effects are really dated and the Grey Ghost says some really corny things, but they get what it means to Bruce, and so do we.

Last christmas Alfred gave Bruce a set of pillows stitched from the fabric of Thomas Wayne's old Grey Ghost costume, which Bruce thought he'd thrown away and Alfred saved all these years. Alfred likes to sneak them into the Batcave everytime Bruce falls asleep on the Batmobile or looking over files.

#replies tag #pulp heroes #comic books #batman #batman tas #the grey ghost #adam west

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batarangsoundsdumb · 3 years

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yet another ask dump yeehaw!

do you ever think that jay's mother was one of those bitch who believes in horoscope and tarots and things like that and so he believes in these things too, or it is just me projecting?

sheila haywood took one look at jason's birthchart said 'nah this won't do' and left.

Wait, but what happens when the justice league does find out that Bruce and John fucked? Lmao it sounds like it would be hilarious, really, I don’t want a justice league that doesn’t make fun of Bruce for like his entire life.

barry runs out of the meeting immediately and comes back with an entire sti testing kit. diana fully seriously wants bruce to get tested while bruce is sitting there like 'come on guys, you're being ridiculous, i already checked twice'

john is standing in the corner clearly offended while bruce is just like 'don't even say anything, constantine, you fucked a shark'

tim was like "i'm drake now" and everyone was like ahh so your fursona is a dragon and tim was like pffffft no. ducks.

on the one hand, good for him, on the other hand, bro, how do you still have a secret identity when your superhero name is just your last name,,,,

Your fic on ao3 was GOLD PLEASE CONTINUE I loved Dinah's cameo btw ( @purple-vixen

thanks so much! i already continued but this ask is like 10 years old because i'm a notorious procrastinator (also yes! i love dinah so much aahhhhhhhhhhhh)

I've FINALLY been watching the Batman animated series and I gotta say, after watching "the gray ghost" I am CONVINCED that Batman is a closeted super hero geek who was 100% freaking out the first time he met Superman and is just REALLY good at hiding it.

bruce internally: holy fuck holy shit holy fuck holy shit holy fuck holy shit holy fuck holy shit holy fuck holy shit bruce externally: get out of my city, alien

AHHH ur multimedia fic is the only thing that brings me happiness anymore continue it forever pls

uhh thanks, but can't continue it forever because my attention span is that of a toddler on crack on a good day and i can't function without at least 10 things going on at the same time and music in the background

Oi, so I'm getting into dc and watching batman the animated series, and they use fruitcake a lot. Which I thought was very funny and wanted to share w you - Denilla

wait like fruitcake (food) or fruitcake (derogatory) ?

young justice 🤝 teen titans slut shaming batman

tim drake and dick grayson to their respective teams 'you guys stop it, that's my dad'

Happyhoganon: If an eighty year old Batman had fought crime in Gotham City for decades and the only threats to him and the city lately are a wheel chair bounded Penguin, your usual purse snatchers and a few con artists popping up every now and then, how well could the Dark Knight do in maintaining the peace in Gotham despite him being just somewhat fit to do that as an elderly man (which says A LOT given how old he is)

uhh he'll probably do what my grandpa does and that is ruthlessly prank them until they die of shame.

in the death in the family interactive movie there's an ending where Jason is tasked with raising Damian and he decides he's gonna raise Damian to take down the waynes and al ghuls which uh maybe isn't great BUT the idea of Jason raising Damian... PRICELESS. CHAOTIC. I just need more people to know about this :)

yes i saw that wow holy shit but jason would accidentally drop damian on his head one (1) hour in and jason just yeets him into the lazarus pit.

Headcanon: The Penguin has a really hard time fighting any of the Robins because of his avian obsession means there's always a small part of his mind that's like "Birb. Child. Protect" ( @subspacecadet )

as soon as dick becomes nightwing the penguin is like 'you know what, fuck this dude' and shoots at him.

Y'all talking about King Shark dating Constantine, let's not forget about John literally hooking up with Satan

listen there's a clear difference between monsterfucker and satanfucker in that king shark is literally a shark and satan still looks like a normal dude

Does everyone in Gotham think Batman is a teen dad?

everyone in gotham thinks batman has been around since gotham was founded, but they do think that bruce wayne is actually a teen father and dick grayson's biological dad.

why. why would you do that fancast when you know it will only hurt people

what? i loved my fancast it was really well done. i did it with good representation in mind and i really managed that with alfred pennyworth being ✨italian✨

Seeing james charles a jason gave me psychic damage how dare you i need to wash my eyes

well that's a you problem isn't it?

do you think dick grayson thirst tweets about nightwing just to annoy his family/cause problems on purpose in general?

he thinks nightwing is hot, next question.

holy jiminy cricket batman, its as cold as the good lords ass crack in here!!

i- what? this is why i don't fuck with english expressions it's way too goddamn weird

Brooooooo, your teen dad!Bruce au is soooo good. I've got brainrot.

Honestly if you ever write anymore, I'd read that shit twice. Sign me the fuck up. Good stuff, Good Stuff.

uh yeah i'm thinking about writing a fic, but i have exams coming up and i don't wanna fail because that would suck. but after i'll certainly be writing more tho

your teen dad AU is so great! bruce acting like a big brother for all of like a week before he's telling everyone about his son. what if in the AU dick meets the JL because they need to rescue him? maybe he's in trouble/kidnapped at a gala and bruce starts calling for JL. clark finds him and has to fly with dick to bring him home - that's how dick and clark meet and superman becomes dick's fave hero. he goes around the manor thinking he can fly with a red blanket draped around him like a cape.

actually- if you want a young dad! bruce fic with like that kinda stuff(just with damian) go check uhh- in for a penny by cdelphiki. it's really good and bruce is like 24/25-ish. (and dick's there!!!)

This account has solely convinced me that Tim is a trash goblin ( @hamilcat-and-magic-turtle )

because he is. that boy has slept in dumpsters on multiple occasions even if he is the son of a billionaire.

Okay but when you said victory dance I did think of the whole justice league defeating the big bad and then they all start flossing

well that's exactly what hal jordan does and that's why batman uses a gun now. no but the victory dance in my opinion is like the 'we're all in this together' dance from high school musical.

The horrors in Invincible s1 was nothing compared to the comics, I cant wait for s2

oh well okay, i mean i personally react to horror and violence by laughing awkwardly so i can't wait to be called a monster for accidentally laughing at a mass murder.

I'm currently watching Batman: The Brave and The Bold and- Bruce is just talking about Oliver like he's an old love (@nightwings-kid)

okay im going to watch that lmao that's totally and completely in character for him tho.

The invincible comic is like super gratuitous with its violence so much so I'm shocked the show was able to adapt it in a faithful way! Anyway had the show been live action it absolutely wouldn't have the same impact as it does as an animated show and I'm so glad so many people agree with me on that

also because a live action casting would've been like uhh amanda stenberg for amber, the dude- the guy from the supernatural but with a mustache for omni-man, and scarlet johanssen for debbie grayson

Debbie grayson is a milf, yes. You're welcome for the invincible propoganda, now you can questions your life. Bruce def seems like the perfect father next to Omni-man. Like they really took a rip off justice league and I was like well, now I'm attached even tho I was like hah I know who they're supposed to be. And then bam- death gore death gore gore gore sad Mark grayson just had to have daddy issues. Why does every character have daddy issues. I'm sick of the attacks

because daddy issues make a person arguably funnier, that's why i'm not even remotely funny (haha good dad flex). i liked that it was dark contextually, but not in the colouring, bc i hate when it's like 'uh yeah graphic murder and now a shot so dark you have to sit in a dark room and squint at the screen to faintly see the characters. (like dcau ugh)

About the Wayne insurance, for a moment I thought you would put the video with moans over the waves.

i mean- i could've done that, but rick rolling seemed more family friendly.

Its the first time in forever that im surpise rickrolled, i usually expect it. Congratulations (i really should know better this is tumblr)

i get rickrolled so often but i actually like the song so i dont really give a fuck

Actually, my information about Damian and John's kids is outdated because it was revealed that the old men telling the kids stories about the Supersons were actually Jon and Damian the whole time. I was blinded by my thirst for Grandpa!Bruce Wayne but I was wrong... I liked my version better, tbh (@artemisa97)

fair enough. but i'd honestly like to see damian and jon getting together, just because it's a really fun dynamic and their friendship was really cute when they were kids. (also idk maybe it would be nice to have one (1) main batfam/superfam character that's not cishet)

How am i JUST finding your blog skdskfkd you're so fucking funny and ur takes are hot

i thought u were calling me hot :( but youre not :( crime detected (but lmao thanks)

So I have depression and I swear that your memes are one of the few things that have made me laugh so thank you 💛🥺 (@katekanebadass)

aw you're welcome, and i hope you're doing okay!

The metropolis memes are so funny, I love them 💀😌

i think metropolis is also so fucking funny it deserves more attention imagine having your entire police force being upstaged by an alien from kansas and his kids

as an american i feel your complete lack of knowledge of us geography is just so sexy (platonic) ❤️

thanks so much (i also don't know any other geography, i'm not kidding, like you can tell me you're from hungary and it will just blank, there will be nothing that comes to mind)

In the DC universe they don't say "Can't have shit in Detroit" they say "Can't have shit in Gotham"

this just reminds me of that guy whose porch got stolen like the steps to his door, and i'm thinking of people living in gotham and waking up without a front door and going "can't have shit in gotham"

honestly all i know about chicago is the bean, so. what would gotham's famous sculpture be?

gigantic gargoyle statue in front of one of the police precincts because a villain thought it was a smart way to keep the police inside, but it's too heavy to move.

why tf do people go on about how batman "works alone" or how he's the "lone wolf" when he like 38290202 members in his family

bc people think it's cool that a grown man in his 30s has no friends or family instead of calling it what it is (sad)

Bruce is gotham's sugar daddy

why would say something so controversial yet so brave.

my favorite batfamily fanfictions are the ones where they use their shitty codenames, unironically, in any context

dick: gerard way are you in position, gerard way are you in position

tim: for the last fucking time, my codename is 'totally not count olaf' this week, abbafan 3000

dick: shut up my codename isn't 'abbafan 3000'

dick: it's 'abbafan number 1' and you know it

I have a feeling Tim drake is ur favourite batfamily member but okay u don't have favs if u say so ok

i mean he is, i won't deny it. but i love each and every one of the batfam just the same, i just have a weak spot for short dumbass nerds, because i'm a short dumbass nerd.

Omg i fuckin love boy meets world too fam shsjkfk

bro boy meets world was the shit!!! it was just fire and awesome and so fucking great like bro. it was so good im not even going to be accepting criticism

you know I find the whole "joker completes batman" thing a bit disgusting considering the horrendous stuff the batfamily went through because of the joker and let's not get started on the "joker has a point" thing like yeah he's this cool complex villain but he's absolutely batshit crazy

like yes! i get what you mean the joker just fucking sucks man he doesn't do shit for batman's character or the batfam he's literally just annoying as fuck. like the joker has a point' shit is so stupid. i will accept 'magneto was right' because he fucking was and i think he didn't do anything wrong, but joker? he's just like that. he's not even cool and complex he's just a weirdo with a bleach kink at this point.

ALSO YOUR RACISM POST- SO TRUE BESTIE

thanks bestie, i'm glad you agree.

in today's essay of why I think cass should become batman- I was thinking Tim would probably be the most efficient batman in many ways but I also think he wouldn't want to be batman tbh none of the batfamily members would want to be batman because they're trying to outgrow him but cass is the one who wants to represent the symbol that is batman

absofuckinglutely i will say it again and again that cass represents the batsymbol more than anyone in the batfam, in batgirl (2000) she literally didn't care about anything else than bruce's oath to not kill, she thought the batsymbol was more important than anything in gotham. she's just an excellent character because her motivation to not kill is not 'i'm scared i can't come back from it' or 'well my dad says no murder so i'll go along with it' but that she's killed somebody as a young child and she never wants to kill a human ever again and that's so fucking beautiful for a new batman like yes.

need more cass, duke and tim inclusion in gothamite memes

yes yes, a tall order of cass, duke and tim coming up in 1-14 business days

oldest to youngest batfam members cus I'm confused as shit

okay order of being taken in: dick, jason, tim, cass, damian, duke order of age: alfred, bruce, dick, cass, jason, tim, duke, damian (though cass and jason are around the same age general consensus is that cass is a little older)

I'm so confused Steph is a redhead?? like how was it that hard to get this right? the source material is literally right there and free

cw is jared, 19

do you receive anon hate? if so, how do you deal with it

uh no, i'm not remotely popular enough to get anon hate and i also don't say a lot of things that would attract anon hate, but i do send anon hate to @the-real-peter-parker because he forgot about the specialists from winx club

Wait how many languages do you speak??

uhh- 5 if you include latin, but that's a dead language and i'm really bad at it. but english, my native language, german, and french also, tho german and french not fluently.

You can mix aguaepanela with aguardiente 😈 and is tasty

okay but now i'm curious if the liquor deserves the 😈 emoji or if that's a you problem. but i googled it and it looks like something you'd take one sip of and then not remember the rest of your evening.

#i love all of you guys so much thanks for all these asks #some of these are literally from march but fuck it #the day tumblr puts dates next to anon messages is the day i close my inbox crawl into a hole and die #it's such a basic task to answer asks but i don't want to bother anyone with asks clogging up their timeline #and if i don't have a funny or good answer i'm like 'uhh okay won't answer it now then'#so this is for you #also i deleted a few asks because it gives me mental pain to see my inbox go over 50 and it's almost at 100 #i was complaining about having too many asks to the-real-peter-parker like months ago and then i had 45 asks in my inbox #now it's amassed to going over 100 twice #but no i love all of you and you're great and you're all fantastic and i lvoe you #muchos kiss kiss #kiss kiss for my kiddies lvoe you #invincible spoilers #dc #dcu #dc comics #ask #anon #bataranswers #i really wanna try aguapanela now i'm gonna see if i can find panela somewhere and review it for you babes #uh yeah that's it #muchos gracias for all your questions babes

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afewnovelideas · 3 years

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Chapters: 1/1 Fandom: Mahou Shoujo Madoka Magika | Puella Magi Madoka Magica, Magia Record: Puella Magi Madoka Magica Side Story, DCU (Comics), Batman (Comics), Young Justice (Comics), Robin (Comics), Red Robin (Comics), Teen Titans (Comics) Rating: Teen And Up Audiences Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply Characters: Kyubey (PMMM), Tim Drake, Bruce Wayne, Alfred Pennyworth, Selina Kyle Additional Tags: Tim Drake-centric, Tim Drake is Robin, Tim Drake is Not Okay, Tim Drake Needs a Hug, Tim Drake Gets a Hug, Alternate Universe - Madoka Magica Fusion, Soul Gems (Madoka Magica), Crossovers & Fandom Fusions, Alternate Universe - Fusion, Magical Boys, Origin Story, No Beta We Die Like Mami, Don't Have to Know Madoka Magica Canon, Bruce Wayne Tries to Be a Good Parent Series: Part 1 of Eques Magi: Originem - Magicka Knights: Origin Summary:

"The Labyrinths of Gotham City are so tightly concentrated, no human born here can escape the influence of at least one or two Witches, if not more. Despite the aura of despair and the constant work of the Witches' various Familiars, there are still those souls who persist in clinging to hope and will do whatever they can to try and make this city a better place, even though all their efforts will ultimately fail in the end.

"It's the perfect environment to find a new Magicka Knight."

---

"Have you ever seen an albino cat?"

Catwoman, aka Selina Kyle, glanced over at Batman's newest Robin curiously. She hadn't been expecting to cross paths with him, but since it was obvious the Big Bad Bat was out of town and Nightwing hadn't shown up at all in the past week, she decided to keep an eye on the new kid for at least the evening. He certainly wasn't like the previous Robin. This thirteen-year-old boy was quiet and thoughtful, which had been quite a change from the previous brash impulsive kid Batman had been mentoring a little over a year ago before they were murdered by the Joker.

She also noticed that this Robin was glancing over his shoulder at something on the rooftop on the other side of the street. "An albino, huh?" she said as she tried to follow his gaze. However, despite using her binoculars to zoom in on the far rooftop, she couldn't see any sign of any animal, feline, albino, or otherwise. "I've heard of them, but never seen one in person," Selina admitted casually as she put away her binoculars. "They are extremely rare." She smiled at Robin. "Have you seen one around town?"

Robin leaned against his bo staff thoughtfully. "I think so, but I'm not really sure."

"Not sure?"

The boy looked up at Selina earnestly. "Y'know how a cat has two pointed ears about here?" Amusingly to the professional cat burglar, Robin made a vague pair of cat-ear shapes with his hand at the top of his head. She smiled affectionately.

"Yeah. It's kind of a defining cat trait, having pointy ears."

Robin pouted slightly at the teasing tone he caught in Catwoman's voice. Then he continued. "Well... This cat I've been seeing... It looks like they have a second set of ears too."

"A second set?"

He nodded. He made a motion with his hands that seemed to make another vague shape that started at the base of where the cat's ears ought to be and downward along either side of its head. "Yeah. They kinda start out here and go all the way down there."

"Are you sure what you're looking at is an albino 'cat'? That kinda sounds more like a white rabbit to me."

"But it has pointy ears like a cat," Robin argued. "And its got a long fluffy tail, and its legs are like a cat's." The young teenager frowned slightly. "It's really weird looking."

"Well it does sound like a unique creature, whatever it is," Selina said thoughtfully. "Maybe it's some sort of cryptid or mutant? This is Gotham after all." She smiled at Robin. "Tell ya what. If you can catch a photo of the critter, I promise I'll take a good hard look and let you know if it's a cat, a rabbit, or something completely different." Then she gave him an almost stern maternal look. "But be careful. Don't get too close. If it does turn out to be something 'not normal', it could be dangerous."

"Okay."

---

It was two nights later and Tim Drake, fully decked out as Robin for another solo patrol, had just finished trussing up a pair of would-be carjackers. As soon as he placed the anon call to the Gotham PD for pickup, he glanced up to fire his grapple gun and froze.

There, on the rooftop above him, was a familiar white shape with two sets of ears and red eyes. The "cat" was peering down. He could see the animal's long fluffy tail swishing this way and that. Tim's breath caught in his throat. This was the closest he'd ever seen the animal come to him before. Rather than risk his grapple gun startling the animal and scaring it away, the young vigilante quickly indulged in some impromptu parkour up a garbage bin and a chain link fence to reach the metal fire escape attached to the side of the building.

When he pulled himself on the rooftop, Tim was disappointed to find that it appeared to be empty. Not a trace of red eyes or white fur anywhere. He walked across the roof slowly, scanning the area for any sign of the small creature as he pulled out a small portable camera from his utility belt. "Hey there," he whispered softly. "Here kitty, kitty, kitty. I'm not going to hurt you. C'mon out please. I just wanna take a picture."

When no one came out of hiding, Tim tried a different tactic. He reached into another pouch on his belt and pulled out a small package of beef jerky. He shook the bag temptingly before opening it and setting it on the ground before stepping away from it. "Got some food here if you want. All for you."

"Thank you, but no. I'm not hungry."

Tim froze. Then he glanced around himself as quickly as he could before zeroing in on the form of the albino "cat" sitting on top of a large A/C unit just a few yards away from him, its white body practically glowing against the cloudy night sky of Gotham City. This close, Tim could see this was not a normal "cat". It did appear to have two sets of ears, but the two longer rabbit-like ones had golden rings attached to them and were tipped in pink with red spots. Its tail also appeared to be unnaturally long as it swished back and forth casually.

"Did you... just... talk?"

The cat-like creature flicked its smaller pointy ears. "Of course I did!" it said in a childlike voice without moving its mouth at all. Its long white tail finally stopped swishing and settled into a question mark shape behind it. "How else am I supposed to introduce myself?"

---

Tim Drake gave up caffeine for the rest of the week. When the boy returned to the Cave from patrol and declared that he was quitting cold turkey, Alfred asked about it curiously. All the old butler got from the thirteen year old was a confusingly vague answer about talking albino cats with pink ears and clearly not enough sleep with too much stress before marching himself into the showers before he would make his eventual way back to his bedroom.

---

Unfortunately for Tim, giving up his favorite sodas, teas, and coffee did not stop the appearances of the strange cat-like hallucination that had introduced itself as "Kyubey" and seemed hell bent on following him and talking to him both day and night, in and out of uniform.

"You think I'm a figment of your imagination?"

Tim sighed as he reached over the creature sitting in his high school locker in order to grab his workbooks for math and english. "I'm not talking to you here," he whispered as he slammed the locker door in hopes of locking the hallucination behind it.

"It's probably better that you don't, at least not out loud," Kyubey agreed, after reappearing on the top of the locker to look down on Tim. "If people catch you talking to something they can't see, they might think you're losing your mind."

Somehow, Tim managed to choke down the near hysterical giggle that wanted to bubble up at that matter-of-fact remark. Kyubey had made it quite clear that night on the rooftop that no one else could see them except Tim.

"Besides, why waste your breath?" Kyubey said as they trotted along the top of the lockers, keeping pace with Tim as he walked to his next class. "We can speak telepathically just fine."

Tim paused at the end of the lockers and glanced at Kyubey. "Telepathically?" he asked experimentally without voicing the word.

"See! Easy!"

"Oh my god, I AM losing my mind," he thought with a grimace before sighing and stepping into the classroom and tried to ignore Kyubey as best he could for the rest of his school day.

---

"So why are you here?" Tim finally asked Kyubey after tossing down his pencil and finally giving up on trying to concentrate on his homework. "What is my subconscious trying to tell me?"

"I'm not your subconscious, and I'm not a hallucination. I'm a messenger of magic."

Tim raised his eyebrows at Kyubey as he echoed incredulously, "A messenger of magic?"

The cat-like creature made themself comfortable on Tim's bed. "That's right."

The teen noted with a slight measure of concern that he could see the disturbance Kyubey's form made on his pillow and blanket, proving that, at least right now, they had a solid physical state. Still, he was not about to reach out and try to touch the creature. "I'm probably going to regret asking this, but why is a 'messenger of magic' in Gotham City, and why am I the only one who can see and speak with you?"

"I'm on a mission to find people with the potential to become Magicka Knights to fight Witches and save the Universe, and you have that potential."

"Seriously? Magical knights? Actual witches?" Tim shook his head as he scoffed lightly. "This sounds like the plot of some generic magical girl anime."

Kyubey titled their head to one side. "And you and your mentor go out at night in masks to fight criminals who can control plants, have freeze guns, are living clay, and are occasionally half reptiles. How is that more believable than Magicka Knights and Witches?"

Tim snickered awkwardly. "I guess I'm in no position to throw stones in glass houses."

"You really aren't."

---

Finally! Bruce was back from his Justice League mission and he was going to go out on patrol with Tim. Batman and Robin flying through Gotham City for the first time in over two weeks.

At least that was the plan until a call came through from Oracle barely an hour into their patrol.

"A report of potential Joker gas exposure has been put out by the GCPD in Chinatown near the Dragon's Den."

Batman and Robin paused on the roof of St. Peter's Cathedral. Tim felt a weight settle in the pit of his stomach as he took in the tightness of his mentor's jawline. He knew what was coming next.

"Go home, Robin."

"But B--"

"It's the Joker. I need to handle this alone."

"You don't have to. I can stay out of the way and watch your back. Make sure no one gets the drop on you."

Batman shook his head. "Head back to the Cave, Robin."

The leather of Robin's gloves creaked a little as he clenched his hand into a fist and turned away from his mentor. "Fine."

Without even looking, Tim could tell when he was left alone on the cathedral's roof with just the gargoyles for company.

Then, he wasn't alone.

"He doesn't trust you?"

Tim looked up to see Kyubey sitting on the head of a nearby gargoyle. He sighed. "It's not like that," he said telepathically. No need to risk Oracle or Agent A overhearing him talking to Kyubey. Not like the mic would pick up the magical creature's voice anyways. Still, better safe than sorry. "The Joker is really dangerous. He killed the Robin who came before me. B just doesn't want to risk me being anywhere near him."

Suddenly, Tim heard a pinging from his comm link, a sign that Oracle was attempting to signal him. "Yes O?"

"I know B ordered you home, but do you think you could swing by Amusement Mile along the way? I got a report on a Mad Hatter sighting there."

Tim brightened visibly at the prospect. "Sure!" He reached for his grapple gun and loaded a cartridge. "Any idea what he's up to?"

"There have been earlier reports over the last few months of missing girls fitting the Hatter's preferred victim profile. Children with long blond hair under the age of twelve. But since the children are usually street kids or runaways, most attempts to investigate by the police have been half-hearted at best. Those that have tried haven't found anything but dead ends."

"Well, that's going to come to a stop tonight." Tim declared confidently.

"Be careful Robin," Oracle warned. "Focus on recon tonight. Don't engage Hatter unless absolutely necessary."

"Understood!"

---

"What's this?"

At Amusement Mile, Tim was just in time to stop a kidnapping in progress. While the sudden appearance of Robin was enough to send the Mad Hatter scurrying away into the shadows, the young vigilante reluctantly let him go in favor of caring for the victim, a child of eight or nine who appeared to be in a catatonic state.

However, nothing Tim did seemed to be able to wake her up. He was about to notify O to call an ambulance when he noticed a small red mark, like a tattoo, on the girl's neck, right above her pulse point. It was about the size of a quarter and looked like the symbol used in chess to designate the Queen piece.

"Hey O. I found a weird tattoo on the girl. Sending you a pic now." Tim quickly snapped a photo and sent it electronically to Oracle. A moment later, he got a response.

"Are you sure you sent me the right photo?"

"What do you mean?"

"There's no tattoo in the pic. All I see is a bare neck."

Tim opened the monitor of his camera and his eyes went wide. Even on the camera, the girl's neck had no tattoo. He took several more pics to be sure, but despite being able to see the crown icon with his own eyes, they defied being photographed.

"Not sure what's going on, but I can't take a pic of it," he told Oracle. "Maybe it's some sort of weird ink that comes up invisible on cameras?"

"That's not it."

Tim glanced at Kyubey, who was sitting beside the girl. The white creature sniffed at the tattoo. "That's a Witch's Kiss."

He felt his chest tighten a bit at Kyubey's words. Tim carefully masked the sudden nervousness he felt in his voice. "Can you call an ambulance to pick up the girl? I'm going to investigate the area and try to find out where Hatter ran off to."

"Will do. Be careful."

Once the comm was silenced again and after the EMTs came to pick up the rescued child, Robin backed into a secluded alleyway and hid within the shadows before addressing Kyubey telepathically.

"What's a Witch's Kiss?"

"It's a mark used by Witches and familiars to control the minds of their prey."

Tim felt a shiver run down his spine. Still he continued. "Is... the Mad Hatter a Witch?"

Kyubey tilted their head thoughtfully before shaking in the negative. "No. I think he's just a familiar being used to bring humans to a Witch's Labyrinth."

"Why? Why would a Witch want a human child?"

Kyubey sighed. "A Witch is a creature that feeds on misery and sadness," they said very matter-of-factly. "What could be more delicious to a Witch than the grief and fear of a kidnapped child? At least this one seems to prefer the despair of children in particular."

A sudden sensation of dread settled over Tim. "That's.... That's horrible! We can't let this continue!"

"But you can't stop them."

"Why not?" Tim's righteous indignation flared up. "Batman's stopped the Mad Hatter dozens of times. Why can't I?"

"Most likely it's because your mentor has never captured him near his Witch, and never within an actual Labyrinth." Kyubey stared at Tim with their round red eyes, their stoic tone never wavering. "You're just a human being, and so is he under all that armor. Even with all your training, there's no way your frail human bodies can endure the strain of fighting a Witch and their familiars in their own Labyrinth. If you get trapped in a Labyrinth, there's no way out until either the Witch is dead or you are."

Tim watched the retreating lights of the ambulance carrying the nearly kidnapped child away. Then he took a deep breath and released it slowly.

"Can you help me find the Witch's Labyrinth?"

"I can."

---

He was going to die.

Tim leaned against the wall and watched helplessly as his blood flowed freely from beneath and between his fingers to pool on the floor under him despite the pressure he tried to keep on the wound in his stomach. The Witch's familiars, not just the Mad Hatter, but a March Hare and other fictional characters pulled straight from the story Alice in Wonderland, had been too numerous and too merciless for him to fight off alone.

The Witch herself, in the guise of a twisted Queen of Hearts, shrieked for his head through the twists and turns of her Labyrinth.

͙̹̫ͪ̆̏͝ "̶͚̜̪̣̬͇ͭ͑ͅOͩͫ̄͏̬͖̳ Ḟ̖̝̟̜͖̭͑͢ F̡̜̼̰͓͍̟͎͇̆̾̐ ̨͚̫̗ͮ̚ͅ W̐ͧ̑͏͍͎͍̖̤̥ͅI͓͙̤͔̺̦͌̓̌̍͠T̖͍͒͛͢H̡̳̪̭̹̺̒̓̿ ̹̥͉̟͙̝͓̅ͫ͝H̸̝̬̘͕̩͙̤͇̾ͥ͂Į̯͔̦͖̳̣ͥ̌͆̂S͆̑ͪ͏̦̥̭̺̞̳̪͔ ͙̪̯͗̑͞Hͧ͏̤̯̪̩ E̶̯̣̰͌̆ͨͯ A̬̦̻͍͒͝ͅD̖̹͂͒͟ !ͫͯ́͆҉̺̦̩̹̺

̠͓͈͎ͧͨ͡Ō̵̪̻̭̩̯F̣͙̲̖̈́̋͝ F̌̅̾̓͏̭̺̰͉̹̖̯ ̡̮͔͇͚̬͎̝͊̆ͪͅŴ͙̠̽ I̘̬͇̖͑͂̏̂͞ T̨̗̫̜͙̩̖̮͒ H̴̙̝̀ͥͣ̚ ̘̯̮̺̥ͣ̑̄H̻̭͇̮̮͕͗͗ͬ̊͠ͅ Iͮͪ͋͏̬̺̖̝̥̭̘ͅ S̵̝̖̙̿ ̛̬̳̠̪̰̑͗̽ H̸͙̟̱̝̳̰̄͑̃̊ Ě̳͓̝̗͎͟ A̴̤͖̬̖͓͇̖͗̆ͫ́Ḋ̜͚̬̐̋͟!̨͇͚̞̩͚̗̣̿

Ơ͚̹̜̥ͮͥ͑̏F̴̯̤̮͉̰ͫF͈̱͍̌ͩͥ̍̕ͅ ̧͎͕̱͚͍̥͔̐W̩̦̯̹̏͊̏̌̕I͐҉͕̪͔̥̞̭͈̲T̖̝̖̪̑̿̓͢Hͧ̍��̤̠͍̣̻̠͚̿͢ ̴̲̖̫̫̺ͭH̗̤̒̆͆͡Î̤͓̭̻̝Ș̵͉͔͙̗̝̌̍̍ͬͅ ͎̫͉̞̲͆͡Ḫ̨̪̅ͧ̏E̵̮̲̩̤͓̱̙ͦÁ̻̦̘̜̂ͩ͝D̸̯͖̦͔̲͕̠̜̓̓̆̚!̨͖̓̐̈́ͪ̏ͅ҉̬͉̰̫"̙̺̬̯̹̦͖͛͗͘

Her magic.. too powerful.

His… everything... too weak.

Trapped in this magical Labyrinth that resembled a scene from Wonderland, he couldn't even get a signal out to call for a rescue. He'd tried early on to call Oracle... Nightwing... Agent A... Batman... But the only thing he got for his troubles was static.

Tim felt tears flow down his cheeks as his vision became dark and hazy around the edges and his limbs began to grow numb. He could hear the sounds of his pursuers coming closer, searching for him, and he just didn't have the strength anymore to run. All he could do was hide and wait for the inevitable.

Batman was going to lose another Robin.

Dick was going to lose another little brother.

Jack Drake was going to lose his only son.

He was going to die.

"Oh dear. I was almost too late."

A set of dainty white paws walked into his sight line, contrasting starkly against the pool of crimson blood on the floor. Weakly, Tim lifted his gaze.

"Kyubey?"

The magical creature stepped closer to the fallen teenager and took a seat in front of him. They tilted their head slightly. "I tried to warn you. A normal human isn't able to fight a Witch. Only a Magicka Knight has the power to defend against a Witch's curses and attack them in kind."

"I know," Tim whispered. "I should've listened to you."

Kyubey titled their head to the other side. "It's not too late. You can still listen to me."

Despite the cold feeling in his limbs and the shadows in his vision, Tim did his level best to keep his gaze locked on Kyubey, on the one bright spot in his dying world.

"If you enter a contract with me, you can become a Magicka Knight." Kyubey explained. "You'd be duty bound to fight Witches, but in return I can grant you one wish. Anything in the world your heart desires."

"If I become a Magicka Knight, I'll have to fight this Witch right away, right?"

"I'm afraid so. It's the only way to escape her Labyrinth."

"And there's no guarantee I'll win?"

"I won't lie to you. Turning you into a Magicka Knight is not a promise of victory. But at least you'll have a fighting chance."

Tim closed his eyes and smiled sadly. "Then I want to make a wish that can outlive me, in case I die." When he opened his eyes, tears slipped down his cheeks again. "I wish Bruce Wayne's son, Jason Todd, was alive."

Kyubey's round red eyes seemed to shimmer in the darkness, and the twin gold rings that encircled their longer set of ears started to glow brightly even as Tim's vision finally faded into blackness. As his consciousness slipped away, he heard Kyubey's voice, as if it was very far away.

"As you wish."

---

"Dinner was great, Alfred. Thank you." Tim set down his fork and watched as the kind old butler retrieved his dirty dishes.

"Will you be heading out with Master Bruce this evening?"

Tim got to his feet and placed the cloth napkin that had been on his lap onto the table, though he fidgeted with it a little before finally letting it go. "'Fraid not. B wants me to stay in and 'do my homework'."

Alfred gave him a knowing compassionate look. "I see. Well, if you want to take your dessert upstairs to have while you work on your homework, I'll allow it for tonight. If you need anything else, I'll be in the Cave on comms tonight..

"Thanks Alfred," Tim said with a smile and a quick side-hug. "You're the best!"

Tim made his way upstairs with a small plate of cheesecake topped with strawberries. Once in his bedroom, he closed the door behind him with a sigh.

"Bruce isn't letting you patrol again tonight?"

The teenager glanced over and watched as Kyubey unwound itself from the fluffy white ball it normally curled into while it napped on Tim's pillow. Tim couldn't help the fond smile as his little friend stretched leisurely and indulged in a wide mouthed yawn.

"Nope. He's still got his cape in a twist over Jason's whole empty grave thing." Tim shook his head before making his way to the window seat and making himself comfortable. "I think he just wants to make sure I don't wander off either, but it's still annoying! It's been nearly a month and B still won't let me go on any solo patrols."

"Well, look at the bright side. Now you can get a full night of sleep and wake up early to go Witch hunting before school."

"I suppose."

Tim and his sullen mood weren't alone for long at the window before Kyubey leapt gracefully from the bed to his shoulder. The startled expression on Tim's face lasted only a second before it melted into one of amusement as Kyubey headbutted him affectionately against the cheek. Once they'd managed to wring a chuckle out of the boy, Kyubey hopped down to the window seat where Tim had placed the cheesecake and began sniffing at the selection. Tim watched as his friend picked up the reddest strawberry it could find and popped that into its mouth first, eating it with obvious relish. Then he looked out the window and thought back about the night he became a Magicka Knight, about the moment he set foot back in the cave after defeating his first Witch and claiming his first Grief Seed.

---

"Where have you been?!"

Batman had stormed up to him the moment Robin pulled up on his motorcycle into the Cave. Tim froze the moment he saw his mentor barrelling toward him. "You're back already?"

"The Joker gas was a false alarm," Bruce said as he pushed back his cowl and grabbed Tim by his upper arms, Tim was startled by the frantic way Bruce's eyes were darting over him. "Where were you?! Barbara sent you to investigate a Hatter sighting, then you didn't check in for hours! It's nearly sunrise. Where have you been?!"

Tim swallowed hard. "I... I got lured into a maze trap by Hatter," he admitted quietly. "The place had some weird interference so my comms were scrambled. Hatter got away and it took me forever to find my way out. I'm sorry."

"Are you hurt?"

Tim shook his head. "I'm fine B. Just... tired. It... was a really long night."

After another long moment of Bruce looking over him, the older man finally seemed to relax. He released his hold on Tim's arms and raked his fingers through his cowl-mussed hair. "Please don't go running off like that ever again, Tim. If anything had happened to you--"

"I know," Tim murmured, his eyes focused on the floor even as he wrapped his arms about himself tightly. "I'm sorry. It won't happen again."

"Master Bruce?"

Both Bruce and TIm turned to see a shaken Alfred coming toward them with a phone in hand.

"What's wrong?"

"Commissioner Gordon is on the line."

Bruce and Tim shared a confused look. "Why is he calling at this hour?"

Alfred swallowed hard. "He needs 'Bruce Wayne' to come to the precinct as soon as possible. There's been a robbery."

"I don't under--"

"Someone broke into Gotham Cemetery tonight. They stole Master Jason's body."

As Bruce immediately went after Alfred as the old man gave him the phone, Tim stood in the Cave in shock before daring to glance at Kyubey, who had materialized at his heels.

"My wish... It really came true?"

Kyubey curled their tail around Tim's legs in a comforting gesture. "Of course it did. We made a contract."

---

"I wonder where Jason is," Tim mused aloud as he continued to stare out the window. "I thought he would've come straight home. Bruce has looked everywhere. I've looked everywhere..." He looked at Kyubey who had taken a delicate bite of the cheesecake itself. "Do you have any idea where he went after I made my wish?"

Kyubey looked up at Tim, a curious tilt to their head as they stared back at him with their round red eyes. "I was with you in the Labyrinth when the wish was made," they said matter-of-factly.

Tim shrugged. "Yeah. I know... I guess I was just hoping... Well, I hope he's alright, wherever he is."

Quietly, Tim studied the new silver ring encircling the ring finger of his right hand as well as the green alchemical symbol of Mercury that was now on his fingernail. The small emerald gem inlaid within the ring itself shimmered with magic. With a smooth motion, Tim turned his palm up and the ring morphed before his eyes into a brilliant green gem encased in an intricate cage of gold, just like a faberge egg.

His Soul Gem. The source of his power as a Magicka Knight.

For several minutes there was nothing but a comfortable silence as Tim watched the swirling glow of his Soul Gem and Kyubey ate their fill. Once the plate was empty and their paws and muzzle were thoroughly cleaned, Kyubey trotted onto Tim's lap and laid down comfortably. Unconsciously, Tim began to stroke Kyubey's soft whilte fur with his free hand.

"I just hope Jason comes home soon," Tim said as he finally put his Soul Gem away, turning it back into his ring. "That way, he and Bruce can reunite, they can be a family again, and I can step away from being Robin so I can devote myself to being a Magicka Knight instead."

"In the meantime, it's not so bad for you to be both Robin and a Magicka Knight," Kyubey mused. When Tim glanced down at them, they continued. "You have to admit that nearly every night you go out on patrol as Robin, you stumble upon one or two Labyrinths. Even if we can't get to them immediately to flush out the Witch, at least we know where they are for later!"

Tim grinned. "Yeah. I guess there is a silver lining there." Impulsively, he picked up Kyubey and gathered them into a gentle hug. "Thanks for staying with me."

Kyubey nuzzled the underside of Tim's jawline. "Of course I'm staying with you. You're my Magicka Knight. We're in this together." Kyubey flicked their short pointy ears cutely. "Besides, it's not like Bruce or anyone else can separate us. You're the only one here that can see and hear me."

"I'm glad," Tim said. "It's nice to not be alone all the time." He smiled gratefully at Kyubey. "And it makes being grounded by Bruce easier to swallow when I've got you for company."

Then he glanced back out the window at the dark outlines of Gotham City's skyline when the appearance of the Bat-signal lit up the night sky above it. "Still--" he mused. "I really hope Jason shows up soon. I can't wait to meet him."

#au: kcmk #kyubey cursed magicka knights AU #fanfiction #crossover/fusion #pmmm au #dcu au #tim drake #kyubey #batfamily #batfam #batfam fanfic

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heyitsani · 3 years

Text

Pretend You Know This Song

Word Count: 2265

Rating: Teen and Up

Warnings: General Batfam chaos, Reverse Robins (not really a warning but eh)

Pairing: Damian Wayne/Jon Kent and brief hints of one-sided-ish Jason Todd/Dick Grayson

Notes: As I told @mlim8, this comic has been living in my brain rent-free since she posted it and I couldn’t resist. Go shower it with the most affection you possibly can because it’s adorable and I love it. And Mel.

This is also kind of just a shit post because I needed to get it out of my head. So I wrote and edited in less than two hours. Don’t judge.

You can also read this on AO3 here

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Damian and his father were already seated at the table in the small dining room the family used for regular meals when the others started filtering in. It had been a particularly rough night on patrol, both Jason and Richard getting a little more roughed up than usual, so it was unsurprising that everyone was slow to wake. Though, had it been a working day, he was certain his father would have managed to pull himself out of bed long before he actually did.

“Tim, I was unaware you stayed the night,” his father greeted his second eldest son as he entered the room. Damian was unsurprised by the raised eyebrow and silence from his younger brother was he took the seat just to the left of the eldest of the Wayne kids. It was as far away as he could get from the man he still struggled to be around. Not that Damian blamed him.

There was a soft scuffing sound of socked feet being dragged on a Persian rug as Jason entered the room and slumped in the seat next to Tim. Damian knew that if either of them had been more aware, they would be on opposite sides of the table as well.

“Good Morning, Master Jason,” Alfred greeted as he set a plate in front of the teenager before he set one down in front of Tim as well.

“Morning, Alfie,” Jason intoned before diving headfirst into the plate of food without greeting any of the others around him. It was all very mundane and ordinary for each of them. After years of being a family, however mismatched they were, they had become terribly predictable.

More unsurprising than all of the other entrances to the dining room was Richard’s. Despite having only been with them for a little over a year and still suffering the loss of his parents, Damian couldn’t help but compare the boy to a literal ray of sunshine. He had no idea how the thirteen-year-old managed it, but he always managed to seem so cheerful. Despite the various bandages and bruises that could be seen over what bits of skin were exposed, he still bounded into the room with a bright smile.

Damian watched him greet each family member over the top of the newspaper he was reading, grudgingly accepting the hug he gave the eldest so freely, before the teen bounced over to his seat by Bruce.

“Morning everyone,” the boy greeted with a warm smile before turning that smile upward to Alfred as the man set a plate in front of him. “Thanks, Alfred.” The older man smiled and patted his head before heading back to the kitchen. “I have an announcement,” Richard’s voice sounded from his chair, and Damian glanced up to see him smiling that smile with his hands clasped in front of him.

He could see the others at the table look over at Richard and regard him carefully. Rarely ever did Richard not command the attention of whatever room or crowd he was in. The acrobatic nature of him wanted the attention. In a small, family setting it was no different.

“So I’ve decided! When I grow up, I’m going to marry Jon,” he offered up freely, and Damian felt his eyes roll immediately before dropping them back down to the paper in front of him. He heard his father let out a chuckle, something only Richard could pull from the head of the household, and he noticed Tim regarding Jason, who was frozen looking at the youngest. “He’s kind, and smart, and handsome,” he listed but Damian found himself more interested in the growing smirk on Tim’s face as he continued to watch Jason for some reason.

A quick glance at the teen showed he was still frozen watching the youngest.

“And he can fly!” Richard finished his list off with a bright smile on his face, seemingly proud of the list of reasons he had made in Jon’s favor. And though Damian couldn’t exactly fault the younger for seeing Jon’s better qualities, he was a little disturbed given the age difference between his best friend and his younger brother.

“WHAT?!” Jason’s outburst seemed to catch everyone but Tim off guard and Damian made a mental note to ask the other man about that. “EW!! NO!!! You can’t marry Jon! He’s already so old!” Damian glanced over at Richard as Jason ranted, clenching the paper a little tighter at Jon being deemed “old” when Damian was two years his senior. He decidedly ignored the smirk Tim sent his way despite seeing it out of the corner of his eye. Bastard. “If you marry him when you’re older, he’ll be like 1,000!!” Damian watched Richard’s face turn confused, brows pulling together as Jason spoke.

While Damian didn’t see the harm in Richard’s little crush, he was still young after all, Jason seemed to be completely outraged by the idea. A glance at the other two adult at the table told him his father was simply exasperated and trying to ignore the situation but Tim looked almost…amused as he typed into his phone. He really needed to get to the bottom of that.

“Besides, you can’t even date him!” Damian grabbed his tea as Jason continued and tried to go back to reading the paper. “He’s gonna marry Dami!” The words caught him off guard enough to cause him to spit out the tea he had just taken a sip of.

“Wh-what?!?”

“W-we are not, Todd!” Damian found himself exclaiming, eyes wide as he took in the determined look on Jason’s face and the tears welling in Richard’s eyes. Damn it all to hell, he grumbled mentally. The last thing he wanted was a crying Richard.

“Liar!” Jason turned an accusing finger on Damian. “I saw you smile at him during patrol!” Damian sat there for a moment, stunned, before he noticed a movement out of the corner of his eye and looked over at Tim.

“Drake! Are you recoding?!”

That damn smirk slid back onto his face. “No.”

The sigh his father heaved from his end of the table was loud enough to draw Damian’s wide eyes. He could see Richard with his face buried in his hands and buried in his father’s chest. “You boys are lovely this morning,” the man said flatly, an arm wrapped around Richard’s shoulders.

“Father…!” Damian gestured over to the other two, one who still hadn’t put down his phone and the other who was no glaring at the food in front of him. But his father simply raised an eyebrow and started to rub circles on Richard’s back.

“That is certainly enough of this conversation,” Alfred stepped into the room and immediately took Tim’s phone out of his hand. Despite the protests from Tim, Damian knew Alfred would most likely delete the video. “Can you boys please finish up your meal without another incident? Master Richard, you have yet to touch your food.” His tone went from hard to soft as he reached the youngest who was still clinging to his adoptive father. “Why don’t we put this behind us for the time being and enjoy the rest of our meal?” There was a muffled sniffle before Damian saw Richard’s head nod and him slowly sit up. But he kept his eyes downcast as he moved back to his chair and refused to look at anyone as he started to slowly eat.

Damian found himself clenching his fist to keep from getting up to comfort the boy. He knew that after the year of practically being his father, he would always struggle not to be the one the teen turned to when he was upset. But this time, it was Damian he was upset with. So he pushed the instinct down and stood from his seat.

“Titus come,” he called for the dog who had been laying at his feet the entire debacle as he stepped away from the table. “It is time for your walk.” He didn’t bother to look at anyone other than Richard as he left the room, but not even a glance was sent his way. It bothered him more than he wanted to admit.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

The evenings patrol had been quiet, and Damian found himself thankful for that given his mind kept going back to what had transpired at breakfast earlier in the day. He could tell Richard was still upset about the events, but Damian had no idea how to make the situation better. He didn’t want to encourage Richard’s crush given that yeah…maybe him and Jon were something to one another. But he also didn’t want to stop him from behaving as a young teenager should. The only thing he could think of to do was request that Robin join Nightwing on patrol instead of Batman.

And though the teen was a vigilant as ever, Damian knew him well enough to notice that he was always just on the edge of saying something. It wasn’t until they took a moment to just observe the city below them that he seemed to have gained the courage.

“D…” he started, and Damian bit his tongue at the reprimand that wanted to surface at the nickname. “I’m sorry I said I was gonna marry Jon,” the teen said quietly, latching onto Damian’s wrist. The apology was definitely not what the elder had expected. “I didn’t know you were dating.” And though the almost heartbroken sound of Richard’s voice made his chest ache, Damian wasn’t sure what to say.

“N-No names in the field, Robin,” he chastised him carefully. What was he supposed to say to Richard? He didn’t want to lie but he also didn’t want to explain something he wasn’t even quite sure of himself. The fact that Jason had picked up on it was enough to show that perhaps Damian wasn’t keeping his feelings as under wraps as he thought. “Let’s head back. I do not think there is any reason for us to remain out tonight. We can have some hot chocolate before bed,” he offered as an acceptance of the apology.

And when Richard’s smile went from sad to it’s usual brilliance, Damian knew he had made the right call. What the consequences of his lack of denial would be, he’d have to deal with them later.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

It had been a few days since the incident that shall not be named took place and Damian found himself letting Jon into his Bludhaven apartment after having just handed Richard over to Alfred to take home after he had stayed over for the weekend. He hadn’t been expecting his best friend, but he didn’t find it an unpleasant surprise so he didn’t complain.

“Dick already gone?” Jon questioned, glancing around to see the chaos the teen had left behind but not the teen himself. Damian only hummed with a nod as he picked up various items the teen had upended or left behind. He made a pile of things to wash and things to return the next time he was in Gotham, which likely would be in the next day or so. “So….”

Damian looked at Jon over his shoulder and raised an eyebrow, noticing he was rubbing the back of his neck. The bashful act immediately put Damian on edge. “What?”

“Why did Dick tell me that he approves of our relationship?” Damian froze in mid reach for an item and instead stood up, arms crossed over his chest. He knew he looked as annoyed as he felt. Damnit Richard. “Are we in a relationship?”

Damian huffed a breath. “Ignore him. It was Jason who put the thought in his head the other morning,” he waved a hand at the other man and went back to picking up the items strewn about his apartment.

“But now I’m very curious as to what exactly happened,” Jon teased, and Damian sent him an annoyed look before entering his room and depositing the laundry into his dirty clothes hamper. He knew that Jon would follow him, but he still rolled his eyes when he turned and found the taller man leaning on the frame of the doorway. “And maybe I don’t want to ignore what Dick said.” That caused Damian freeze for the second time in a matter of minutes.

“What exactly are you implying here, Kent?” He let the laundry basket drop the few inches he had picked it up back to the floor, turning to find the man standing just behind him. “Jon?”

Jon’s blue eyes traced over Damian’s face and the older man found himself holding his breath as the man searched for whatever it was he was hoping to find. “Maybe I’ve just been waiting for some kind of hint and Dick finally gave it to me…” Whatever Jon had been looking for he must have found because his warm hands rose to cup Damian’s face as Jon stepped a bit closer.

“A hint toward what?” Damian whispered, focusing all his strength at resisting the urge to look down to Jon’s lips that were moving closer with each passing moment.

“That this would be a welcomed gesture,” the man muttered, leaning forward and effectively closing the space between their mouths. And though shock reverberated through his body, Damian allowed his eyes to slip shut so he could enjoy the moment for however long Jon allowed it to take place. If he was going to offer this side of him so freely to Damian, who was Damian to deny him something he himself had been yearning for for years?

#reverse robins #DamiJon #jaydick #sort of #damian wayne #jon kent #dick grayson #jason todd #tim drake #anikah writes #blame mel for alllllllll of this

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danny-chase · 3 years

Link

Chapters: 1/1 Fandom: Titans (Comics), Nightwing - Fandom Rating: Teen And Up Audiences Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply Relationships: Donna Troy & Dick Grayson Characters: Donna Troy, Dick Grayson, Roy Harper (mentioned), Garth (mentioned), Joey Wilson (mentioned) Additional Tags: non-graphic injury, Stitches, Donna and Dick are plutonic soulmates, Dick is emotionally repressed, mention of vomiting, Bruce is a good dad, POV Donna Troy, childhood best friends to adult best friends, Whipped Cream, a little fluff at the end, Teen Titans as Family, technically they're adults though, no beta we die like DONNA SORRY HONEY, Dick Grayson is Bad at Feelings, Donna Troy is slightly better at feelings Summary:

The one where Dick gives Donna stitches as she reflects on how he's changed throughout the years.

“Donna, sweetheart, I love you, now hold still.” Dick carefully positioned her forearm on an examination table. A deep gash left blood steadily trickling down, squeezing out through his iron grasp. He wiped down the area with disinfectant, smiling at her fondly and projecting the perfect image of calm.

Donna marveled for a moment. He was a well-oiled machine, moving with explicit confidence and practiced precision. She could easily believe him to be a paramedic, or even a doctor, if she didn’t know he’d dropped out of college. She remained stony face as he injected the local anesthetic, acutely aware of his eyes flicking from the gash to her face. Despite the painful stinging radiating through her arm, she was proud to say she didn’t flinch.

She was tired of hurting her best friend. She was the one who wasn’t careful enough, hadn’t dodged in time. But none of that ever mattered to Dick, perhaps it wasn’t fair, but if she flinched, he’d feel even worse.

She still remembered the look on his face the first time he gave Roy stitches.

There’d been tears welling in his eyes, his brow furrowed in determination and his skin lacking any color; he’d bit his lip so hard it bled. The instant he was finished, he raced out of the room, faster than she’d ever seen. Garth had followed, only to have the bathroom door slammed in his face; Dick had sobbed and vomited until he was left dry heaving.

And here he stood, expressionless before her. “Can you feel it?” He gently pressed a finger near the wound. <em>Can you?</em> She wondered, trying to read past the blank haze in his eyes. “Donna?” He asked more firmly, voice even and unrevealing.

“Nope.” She popped the p and kept the tone light, watching as suspicion flashed behind his eyes. He knew she wouldn’t complain, even if she could feel her arm. “Dick, I really can’t feel it, I promise.”

Dick’s eyes always reminded her of a hawk. He inspected her face, and finding it clear from deceit, he turned his eyes to the wound, flicking on a bright lamp, and began wordlessly cleaning it.

That first time, Dick hadn’t come out of the bathroom for hours and when he finally opened the door, he announced he was quitting the team. He was back the next day with a medical textbook, refusing to do anything until he finished memorizing it. They had to call Bruce in the middle of their sleepover because he wouldn’t sleep.

He’d been grounded from Robin; they hadn’t seen him for a week. She’d been angry at the time, but now she realized Bruce was probably just trying to give him a break. The day he came back the book was memorized, and he had a little fake pad to practice stitching on. Bruce bought him his own surgical tools and gave him extra lessons. He had a small, jagged scar where he’d let Dick give him his first set of sutures.

Dick was thirteen when he’d frantically given Roy stitches (later she realized he only knew how from watching Alfred), fourteen the first time he’d practice on Bruce, and sixteen by the time he began doing it apathetically. He did a lot of things seemingly apathetic these days, but if she was careful, she could spot the crinkle at the corner of his eyes, or the downward twitch of his lip.

Slowly, Dick’s tweezers found and picked out the last metal shard. He was twenty-two now, and as he was readying their x-ray machine, the equipment was purchased by Victor’s father and not his own. The Titan’s Tower had been destroyed several times over, but by some miracle of engineering, the medical bay’s equipment always survived. He wrapped the wound, and draped lead over her, hesitating briefly before speaking.

“I’ll be back in a second, it won’t take long.” He promised. She nodded; not like she was going anywhere. They’d done this before; Dick always doubled checked. But she couldn’t recall a single time he’d found something more.

One time, he’d skipped the double check, and she’d heard Roy yelling at 3am, having been woken up when Dick’s worry got too intense to wait. But Roy had given in, the x-ray done a few minutes later. Sometimes, it was just easier to give into Dick’s paranoid behavior. One of these days, she liked to joke, they’d just put lead in their sheets or MRI equipment in the walls.

Dick strode back in, evidently pleased with the results, and they began their silent tradition. Well almost silent; he turned on some ambient music, the same kind he listened to when studying. She let her mind wander, and his fingers never wavered as he removed the bandage and began the first stitch.

She closed her eyes, thinking about times when things were simpler. When they went on picnics in the park and played frisbee together, how Dick would braid her hair and paint her nails before dates with Roy, had laughed loud, cried hard, and loved freely. He was the same as before but could flip on a dime and shut away who he used to be. She found herself missing the little boy who cried after giving stitches.

“Done.” She opened her eyes to an apologetic smile. He began wrapping the wound once again. “Lay off it for a while.” It was an order and a request, sometime long ago the distinction had faded away. She rolled her eyes to finish the routine.

Her arm stung, but the weight in her chest was heavier and more distracting than the steady throb of pain. She wasn’t thirteen anymore, and neither was Dick, but she could pretend for the rest of the night that they were young and invincible (despite having physical evidence contradicting her).

So, she grabbed his hand tight and before he realized what was happening, began dragging him across the room.

“Donna, I have work tomorrow.” He protested. Well, that would be easy enough to deal with.

“Call in sick.” She suggested, not slackening her grip, lest Dick escape and fly off somewhere far away.

“I’m out of sick days.” He stumbled along, doing his best to protest without causing harm. “And I have to patrol tonight.” Donna laughed, but not unkindly.

“Let the city watch itself. Take a day without pay. Honey, you’re rich.” She suggested.

“Doooonnnnnaaaaaaaaaa.” He groaned, as they made it into the hall. “I have a life, I can’t just…”

“Drop everything to spend time with me?” She asked sweetly. “Sweetie, you have before. What makes tonight any different.” Dick opened his mouth and closed it. She steered them into the kitchen, finally releasing him. “We’re going to make hot fudge sundaes, and watch Scooby Doo, and fall asleep on the couch talking about boys.” Dick wrinkled his nose.

“You hate Scooby Doo, and only <em>you</em> talk about boys.” She gave him an unimpressed look. She saw the way he used to look at Joey. “Donna, I know what you’re trying to do, and it’s great but I-”

“Need to take time to take care of yourself?” She asked incredulously. “Wow, me too.” She held up her arm. “What a coincidence, less talking, more cartoons.” Dick stared at her. She counted the seconds as she stared back.

He sighed, breaking first. She’d won this battle, though she had no idea where she stood in the war.

“I’m going to lose my job.” He muttered. A bonus in her eyes, it would do him good to sleep more than three hours a night. She rummaged around for ingredients in the fridge.

“Cry me a river.” An empty demand, he never would, not anymore.

“Why are you so mean to me?” He pouted. She grabbed a can of whip cream and pointed it at him threateningly.

“Because you have terrible bedside manners.” He stuck out his tongue and stole the can, dangling it over her face as she laughed and opened her mouth. He accidentally squirted some up her nose, but she didn’t mind.

And as he pulled out the bowls, they fell into familiar conversation; the space gained through the years seeming to slip away as she was reacquainted with the man who gives her stitches.

#my writing #Dick Grayson #Donna Troy #Titans #DC give us more fab five content please #tw: injury #tw: blood #tw: vomiting #it isn't graphic i promise #Nightwing #Wonder Girl #Troia

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ao3feed-brucewayne · 2 years

Text

It'll All End in a Funeral

by TJ_The_Kind

Words: 995, Chapters: 1/20, Language: English

Fandoms: Young Justice - All Media Types, Batman - All Media Types, Superman - All Media Types

Rating: Explicit

Warnings: Major Character Death, Rape/Non-Con

Categories: F/F, F/M, M/M

source https://archiveofourown.org/works/42467772

#IFTTT #bruce wayne #batman #the dark knight #the cape crusader #gotham #dc universe #ao3 #ao3feed

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fancyfade · 3 years

Text

so ive been debating editing chapter 3 on my fanfic to make 1 scene line up more from canon. (chapter 3 is this one, where the characters deal with the aftermath of battle for the cowl, Tim finds out Damian’s Robin, and Dick and Damian move to the penthouse)

I’m debating making the Tim finding out Damian’s Robin scene a little more canon compliant along what happened in Red Robin (link) for a few reasons, the main of which is in the scenes that I’m writing next (like... chapter 47 lol), Tim and Dick do have to talk about what transpired when Dick made Damian Robin. Potential reasons for change

In my fic Tim kind of just left on his own without a push, but I’m not sure if Tim would have left on such bad terms if there wasn’t the complication of Damian antagonizing him and him feeling as if Dick was picking Damian over him (even though in the comic we saw Dick trying to de-escalate and get Tim’s back, it still felt that way to Tim)

I dislike the way some of this was handled in the comic and I can’t really comment on it in my fic if I just retcon it out

it seems fair-er I guess if Tim is allowed to have flaws just like Cass and Damian and Dick all have flaws in this fic. i know many tim stans think otherwise, but punching a ten-year-old victim of child abuse in the face out of anger is wrong.

the con side is obviously this involves Damian getting hit and that kid has been through so much already. I’m really trying to figure out how it works with character dynamics vs like. give the poor kid a break-ness.

anyway if I did decide to replace the current chapter 3, this is what it would be replaced with (only the first scene, the second would be the same). If you are a reader of the fic feel free to leave your comments. I would do an “oh and I edited chapter 3″ note before the relevant stuff was mentioned if I go through with this, I wouldn’t like expect everyone to know what happened. Some of the dialogue is not like exactly like in canon (cuz thats boring and also to match with what I wrote the first time) but the feeling/ beats should be similar

Gotham’s finally had a bit of lull in the violence, and Dick is just wondering how he’s going to do this.

He’s accepted that Damian’s his responsibility – seeing the kid shot in the chest made that perfectly clear, as much as he would’ve liked it to be otherwise. He felt like he was way too young to be watching out for a kid in any capacity other than cool older brother, especially a kid who’s as difficult to get along with as Damian. He was a great fighter, of course, and he knew it – Dick’s not sure he’s ever heard the kid be humble about anything. To make things worse, Dick feels like he’s constantly stuck in the middle between Damian and the kid he actually views as his younger brother – Tim, who Damian tried to kill. Evidence in point:

“Robin?!” Tim asks once he’s gotten back on his feet and Dick's explained his plan – away from Damian, who's still recovering from surgery.

“You made Damian Robin?!” Tim asks again.

Dick sighs. He’s in the cave, in a Batman costume he feels doesn’t fit right at all with the cowl off, and Tim’s still in his regular clothes. He has no idea how to explain this to Tim – no idea how to make him feel like he’s not being replaced. Dick never wanted to be the one doing the replacing – he remembers how much it hurt to find out that Jason was Robin from the papers, and that was after he officially stopped being Robin. Tim never quit – and Dick’s not about to make him – but he has to come home to the guy who tried to kill him getting his name.

“Tim, I know this looks bad, but Damian needs this.”

“Remember when we thought Bruce was going to retire after Crisis?” Tim asks. “Batman and Robin was supposed to be us. You and me. Not you and the psychopath that tried to kill me.”

“Tim, you’re not my sidekick, you’re my partner – ” Dick takes a step towards Tim with his hand out, prepared to offer sympathy, but Tim shakes him off angrily.

“Obviously not!”

“And Damian needs me way more than you do. If we don’t keep an eye on him, he’s going to kill again.”

Tim scowls intensely. “That should really not be an endorsement for being Robin, Dick! He’s a killer! He belongs in jail!” Tim swallows a little and then lowers his voice out of shouting range. “Dick, he didn’t try to kill me because he for some reason thought it was the only way to stop me from doing something bad, as far as I can tell he just wanted to replace me. We’re talking about someone with absolutely no sense of right or wrong.”

“Of course he doesn’t have a sense of right or wrong. He’s a ten-year-old child who was raised as an assassin from birth!”

“Lots of our villains have really sad or sympathetic reasons for doing crime, that doesn’t mean we team up with them.”

“Are you serious?” Dick asks. “This isn’t the same, Tim.”

“How not?”

“Well for one,” calls Damian's voice from the stairs, and Dick can't help but cringe and think not now – “I'm a lot better than them.”

Dick's cringe only intensifies when he turns around to see what Damian is wearing. His new Robin costume.

Tim's hands clench into fists the instant he sees Damian. Dick knows he has to de-escalate things quick before Tim and Damian have another fight.

“Damian,” Dick says, trying to keep himself carefully neutral-sounding. “Shouldn't you be resting?”

Damian lifts his head up slightly so his nose is in the air, and walks down the stairs almost normally. There's only a little hesitation in the twist of his torso, a little stiffness of his right arm.

Either he's zoned out of his mind on painkillers or depressingly good at masking his pain for a ten-year-old.

“Please,” Damian says. “I was trained in the League of Shadows. Do you really think an over-the-hill ex-Robin could put me down?”

Tim's fist clenches further, and so Dick says, letting a bit more urgency slip into his voice, “Damian, shut up. Now.”

Damian puts his left hand on his hips and looks intentionally at Tim. He adds, “I'm not Drake – ”

He's barely got the word out before Tim leaps forward and punches him in the face. Dick's out of his seat, grabbing Tim to hold him back, who is still distressingly struggling against him, like he wants to keep up the assault despite the fact that Damian fell to the floor.

“My name is Tim Wayne!” Tim shouts as Dick is still holding him back.

Damian gingerly sits up. Dick prepares to release Tim, prepares to stop Damian if he has to, if he decides to get revenge. But he doesn't. He just briefly braces his right side with his left hand before wiping the blood off his face.

“I let you get that shot in, Drake,” Damian says, again dropping intentional emphasis on Tim's original last name.

As he does, Tim struggles forward.

“Tim, back off!” Dick says, because Tim still isn't cooling down –

“I want you to feel good about yourself,” Damian continues.

Tim seems to relax his stance slightly, so Dick, possibly in an error of judgment, lets Tim go. But Tim doesn't try to attack Damian again, he just shakes Dick off and starts stomping away. “You want me to back off? Fine.”

He's going for the exit.

If he leaves –

Dick can't chase him. He's not sure that he can leave Damian alone –

“Tim, wait!” Dick says, taking a step forward. “Bruce is gone. But I still need you.”

“For what?” asks Damian and damn it is there anything this kid isn't going to try to ruin?

“Shut up, Damian,” Dick says again, even though as far as he knows he's just going to wind up pushing Damian away too –

And Tim leaves.

Dick turns to look at Damian. The kid's already back to his feet, like nothing happened, and Dick takes a step forward to inspect the injury – though he's really more worried about the gunshot wound than Tim's punch. Both Tim and Damian had wound up injured pretty badly during the chaos that gripped Gotham in the rumors of Batman’s death. As his new and not-improved version of Batman, Jason had tried to kill them both, which Dick is way less than pleased about. He’d been kind of hoping that they could talk Jason down, but this seems like a line he doesn’t know if Jason can ever un-cross. He shot a ten year old in the chest.

Damian grabs Dick's wrist as he reaches out.

“Are you all right?” Dick asks.

Damian scoffs. “You're worried about Drake? I've been hit harder sparring my mother.”

“I was thinking about the gunshot.” Alfred had said the primary damage was blood loss and a punctured lung (well, traumatic pneumothorax, but Dick knew what he meant) and given the kid a minimum of four weeks downtime to heal.

It's hard to tell due to the domino mask, but Damian adopts the position of a kid who's rolling their eyes, head slightly tilted to the side with a loll. “It's not enough to impersonate Batman, now you want to impersonate my mother?”

Dick doesn't know how to approach the mother thing, so he doesn't even try. He just explains the logic for being Batman – (and there is logic behind it. It's not like he wanted this). “Someone has to step up and convince Gotham things can get back to normal,” Dick says. “And serial killer Batman wasn't going to cut it.”

“Did you at least take care of him?” Damian asks.

Dick knows that Damian isn't actually worried about Jason's wellbeing, so he says, “Do you mean 'did I kill him'?”

“Tt. Obviously.”

“Obviously not.”

Damian presses his lips together in a thin line.

Dick might as well get this out of the way now. He's going to have to sometime. “Alfred wants you out of the field for four weeks.”

“That's preposterous!” Damian shouts, and as he shouts, he coughs. He rubs his chest quickly and then glowers at Dick when he sees him staring.

“Damian, you could have died.”

“I didn’t.”

Jeez, doesn’t this kid have any sense of his own mortality? Though, Dick supposes, growing up around Lazarus Pits and a centuries old grandfather might make that impossible.

“I’m not a fool, Grayson, I know I’m not capable of healing instantaneously. I’ll take a break for one week,” he offers, like it’s a huge concession on his part.

“Four weeks,” Dick says.

“What about you?” Damian asks. “Didn’t you get injured?”

“Not as badly.”

“Are you taking a break?”

“Someone needs to convince Gotham that Batman’s not dead,” Dick says. Also, he doesn’t want to take a break. He doesn’t want to be alone with his thoughts. Losing Bruce. Failing Tim.

“Tt. Then I don’t need one either. I’m younger. I heal faster.”

Dick actually has no clue whether that’s true, because he’s not a doctor, but he knows that people usually say kids heal faster.

Dick swings his arms a little, trying to feel them out. They’re still stiff, and as they move, a jolt of pain shoots through him. Even when he’s not moving, his shoulder is still sore. He knows that he might get injured going into the field like this and that it’s not a smart decision – last time he went into the field while still healing, he wound up blowing his secret identity to Blockbuster.

He decides that at least if he’s going into the field, he won’t tell Barbara and Alfred about it. Okay, so that’s probably not the smartest of his plans. Most plans that you have to hide from people who care about you aren't smart.

“I’ll take a week long break with you,” Dick concedes. “And we can see how fast you’re healing.” The second part is a lie, of course. He's not going to supersede Alfred's orders on medical matters.

Dick sighs a little. He figures that while they’re both on bed-rest duty, though, he can try to figure out how to set things up so they can operate effectively once they get a clean bill of health.

“How do you feel about not living in the manor?” Dick asks.

“Kicking me out already?”

“Don’t be ridiculous, I wouldn’t be living here either,” Dick says. It’s true. He’d rather not feel like he’s living in all of Bruce’s old places, wearing Bruce’s old costume, … replacing him, essentially. He needs a place he can clear his head.

“Where would you live then?” Damian asks skeptically.

Dick shrugs. “The penthouse, maybe. Bruce already made a bunker nearby, so we could operate out of there pretty easily.”

Damian narrows his eyes. “Why do you keep saying ‘we’?”

Because you are ten and not ready to live on your own. But Dick just says, “Well, you’re Robin now, right? That means you’re pretty much obligated to team up with Batman.”

“Batman isn’t here, Grayson. He never will be again, no matter how much you play dress-up.”

Charming kid. Like Dick didn’t already know that.

“You know I operate effectively alone, right?” Damian continues. “I don’t need to be hand-held and babysat like all of Father’s previous partners.”

Dick figures that it’d be a jerk move to remind Damian he just almost died and therefore really shouldn’t be on his own. Instead, he says, “Well, Alfred’s staying with me, so unless you want to get all your food and clean the house by yourself, you have to put up with me.”

“Tt . I don’t need a servant. I’ll just eat at restaurants.”

“On who’s money?”

“In the event of his death, my father’s assets should have transferred to me. His blood son.”

Oh boy. Dick rubs his face. “Does this have to be a thing, Damian? No one’s doubting your capacity to take care of yourself but I think it’d really be easier if we were operating out of the same building. “

A long silence on Damian’s part. “Fine,” he says eventually. “I’ll allow you to stay at my penthouse.”

My penthouse. Of course. But Dick takes it. “All right,” he says. “Let’s move in.”

#idk even #to my followers #my fanfic #dc comics #dc fanfic #tim drake #damian wayne #dick grayson

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