Lizzie

cw: suicidal ideation, dry heaving, vomiting.

Leon does not let himself think yet of what he has just done as he lays Nora on her side on the humid planks. His movements are methodical when he takes out two instant cold packs usually meant for blunt force trauma, then cracks them in half to activate their cooling effect. He places each one on the reddened, tingling skin of her bruised-up ass with care, as if he wasn't the cause of her pain in the first place. His fingers twitch as he pulls up her jeans to hold the pouches in place—and to hide the carnage he mercilessly inflicted.

Only when he knows there is nothing else to be done to help, does he sit by her outstretched feet, leaning his back against the fishing shack’s creaking wall. He stares somberly at the now darkened lake, the rising moon in the night sky casting a silver light on his tense features and her sleeping ones.

Leon knows he’s going to hell.

He has known that for a long time. From the moment he had to blow Marvin Branagh’s brains off, to the second he heard Robert Kendo end his and his daughter’s lives before the T-virus could. 

He has paved his road to damnation every time he stood powerless while watching those around him suffer. Every time his mother screamed for help while he hid in the closet under the stairs. He always knew he was cursed.

But even for a damned individual like him, the demonic act he just performed is something beyond his moral standards. He has never done this before, at least not to unwilling participants, and certainly not using a belt. He reaches for the latter, grabbing it with a trembling hand off the floor to examine its weathered dents and creases as if to make sure he isn't in a nightmare—one out of his own doing.

How else was he supposed to turn out when his very own parents told him repeatedly they regretted his birth? Including his abused mother, who in turn abused him. Leon is fully aware he has been a burden since the day he was born. He continued to be one after their death when no family wanted him and he was dumped into the foster system. What better way to make a child feel unwanted than exactly that?

Still, nothing justifies brutalizing a poor soul simply because she dared tell him of an ugly truth. His psyche is not rested enough to know whether to fully believe her yet, but the words she spoke and the things she knew were mind-shattering. 

A game. His whole life, a game.

Not only that, but he is meant to be some kind of protagonist, as if a man as broken as him could ever have a positive impact on the world.

The jokes write themselves if someone like him was ever hailed as a hero. He was never one and never will be. Each life he successfully saves is just a futile attempt at atoning for the ones he didn't. His hands are permanently stained red, and now they’re rotting from the indents of where he held her in place to hurt her.

As he lays his head back against the humid wall, he realizes he just walked the line of no return. No matter what happens, if he completes this mission or doesn't, if he saves Ashley or not, he will always be a man who harmed a woman. It seems he isn't so different from his father after all.

Hot tears brim past his eyes and fall silently down his cheeks, and for once in his life he does nothing to hold them back. 

The minutes pass, and he feels more hollow with each one. In the pit of his stomach lies the feeling that never leaves him: guilt. A bone crushing shame that is now morphing into something far more overbearing as he sits with the sin he just committed. He’s not sure how he's supposed to live with this one. 

Maybe Sherry will be okay without him. Maybe if this world is made up he can wake up in a better one, or better yet, not wake up at all. A single curl of an index, and he never has to deal with himself ever again.

As his hand twitches towards his handgun, he hears the rhythm of his victim’s breathing change. Slowly, her eyes flutter open as she takes in her surroundings. Her face is pressed to the moldy decking and her head hurts terribly, her mind confused. But it’s the heated flesh of her ass  contrasting with cool plastic that brings her back to the present, the cold effect not enough to fully soothe the lingering sting of belt lashes.

When Nora’s consciousness catches up to her reality, her heart lurches in her chest at the memory of what happened, of what was done to her, and by whom. 

She hears him shift, angling his body towards hers, and her muscles coil impossibly tight. He looks like he wants to say something but isn't sure what, his tear stained face sporting a pained frown as if he was the one who got whipped like an animal.

Before he can say or do anything, her fight or flight triggers to a success, and her foot connects with his face before she can calculate if it's even a good idea. On impact, his head hits the wall behind him with a crack, completely caught off guard by her violent kick despite his sharp training. 

By the time he's holding his bleeding nose with an anguished groan, she’s already scrambling to her feet, her sneakers squeaking on the lumber planks beneath them.

“Fuck— Wait—” he curses, pushing himself up to go after her with a stagger. 

He’s not even sure why. What could he possibly have to do or say that won't forsake him further? He should let her go and carry on with his gun-involving-plan. And yet, as she sprints away, his heavy steps thud right behind hers.

Nora’s body runs on pure instinct as she bolts to the still attached motorboat, a single loop of rope keeping it from floating away. She thanks the universe, or her mind, or whoever is responsible for this fucked up reality as she hops onto the boat with a thump. She nearly falls into the water before regaining her balance and immediately undoing the tethering line. 

Leon races despite his dizzying concussion. But right as he reaches the edge, only two feet away from grabbing her, the motor roars when she pulls on the cord with all her frantic might.

“Nora, please—” He falls to his knees, resorting to pathetic begging as she begins to sail away. 

With zero experience navigating a boat, she does her best to cruise as far away from the man she thought she knew and further into the dark lake.

His fingers grip the border of the dock, and he considers if he should dive after her. It wouldn't be the most unhinged thing he’s done, and maybe if he can just get to her, talk to her, then the gnawing feeling inside him won't consume him whole.

But then he looks up and meets her pretty brown eyes. There's fear in them, undoubtedly so, but anger too—betrayal. And when her face contorts into a furious scowl, he doesn't even fault her for cursing him. He welcomes it.

“Go fuck yourself, you fucking psycho!!” she shouts across the murky water, her scream rageful enough to be heard through the sound of the booming engine.

As her figure gets smaller and smaller the further she sails, Leon stays there, on his knees, face wet with tears and blood. Then, when she disappears into the entrance of a cave—one of many lining the lake—he feels an intense churning in his guts.

He attempts to stand, but the nausea only makes him double over further, dry heaving the more the memory of her screams echoes in his mind. Soon enough, he’s emptying what little contents he had in his stomach with a retch directly into the water that reflects his distorted image.

After a final gurgled cough, he wipes his mouth with the back of his shaking hand, and takes deep, shuddering breaths to steady himself. He then looks over to the cavernous opening she eclipsed into, his heart physically hurting from guilt and contrition.

“I’m so sorry…” he whispers to no one but the cold, quiet night. 

The boat crashes loudly when it rams into the wet rock, nearly sending Nora into the water. She was attempting to dock it, but clearly has no idea what she's doing. So, with a whispered prayer, she jumps, landing on a small decaying pier with a tumble. Somehow, she makes t out of the water dry, and then stands upright with a grunt as she watches the motorboat float away before she can even try to tie it.

With labored breathing, her mind reels from the previous incredulous events that have made her day from bad, to worse, to outright horrendous. She doesn't even know what to think anymore, she just knows for certain she needs get the fuck out of here as soon as she can.

The sound of the plastic crinkling of the cold packs makes her pause mid-step, and she reaches under her pants to retrieve the small, palm sized pouches to examine them. 

He hurt her and then had the audacity to try to soothe her. That is unprecedented levels of fucked up she doesn't even begin to try to understand. She knew Leon Kennedy suffered from trauma, it's a big part of his character lore, but this? This isn't a trauma-ridden man. This is a monster. 

Nora’s eyes begin to collect tears again before she can stop them. She throws the ice bags into the lake with a splash, not caring one bit for littering. The shock still thrumming in her has her whole body trembling with each step she takes further into the cave, and soon enough she’s sobbing loudly. 

The air is cold and heavy, her measly t-shirt not enough to keep her warm. And yet, the sting on her bruised flesh is piping hot, making her wince with every movement and only prompting her to cry harder.

Her mind is a blur and her heart is heavy, but her natural instincts that want to survive force her to steady herself. She sniffles and wipes her face with the hem of her top roughly, trying to focus her thoughts on what to do. 

Luis. Luis is her only hope. She rakes her memory to try and remember what he was doing at this point in the story, then recalls he was meant to wait for Ada in the big villa near the windmill.

How she is supposed to get there unscathed, she isn't sure, but she has to try at the very least. Hopefully her knowledge of the area’s layout will help.

Once out of the caverns and back onto the village grounds, Nora weaves her way through the rocky hills of the thick forest, forgoing manmade paths. If she wants to survive, she can by no means be noticed. The moment she is seen, she is certain she is dead.

Passing through jagged trees and thorny bushes in the darkness, she jumps at every noise, every distant voice, and every rustle of leaves. At one point, she startles at her own shadow like a cartoon character, her heart jumping out of her chest. But even that doesn't compare to the paranoia of being bit by a snake amidst the dark foliage. She has never felt more grateful for her sneakers.

Advancing slowly, with many pauses needed just to calm her pounding pulse, she finally sees the windmill standing tall up ahead, and feels herself take a breath of relief. 

The problem arises, however, when she realizes she needs to pass by the stone building to get onto the bridge leading to the villa. Meaning, she can no longer hide in the hills now.

Nora feels her vision blur with tears from the sheer fear of having to sneak around angry cultists. It feels like an insurmountable task that no amount of deep breathing is helping convince her she can do. She crouches into a ball—not that she was walking straight in the first place—and lets herself cry silently for the umpteenth time.

Why is this happening to her? Why is she being punished for simply loving a game a bit too much? Earlier, when she had the blonde man in her arms, it felt like heaven. Now, she wonders if this is her personal hell. To take something she thoroughly enjoyed and turn into a bloodcurdling reality.

There is no one around to answer her questions, so she stays there, waiting for help that will never come, crying every tear in her body. Until, rain droplets begin to splatter on the forest, the air turning colder and making her shiver.

She remembers now. The storm. The heavy downpour and the strong wind that is meant to occur and prevent radio communication. And sure enough, the rainfall is growing ponderous, and lightening cracks in the sky with booming thunder.

This is her chance. The harsh weather will help cover her noises and hopefully keep the villagers distracted while she passes through. 

After a minute spent repeating ‘you can do this’ to herself in a hushed whisper, she starts to move out of the woods and towards the windmill.

As she approaches and begins hearing the crazed zealot’s voices, terror nearly paralyzes her but she perseveres, pushing through her fear. Because she knows for certain, if she wants to survive, she has no choice. 

Nora’s crouched form hides behind a barn where cows and pigs are kept, their legs restless from the loud thunderstorm. She prays that unlike in the game, they don't ram into her unprovoked, because that would be the absolute most ridiculous way to die.

She can see the large open gate leading into the villa, and with uneven breaths, she walks slowly towards it while constantly looking around for any lurking infected. When she passes the opening and holds onto the wet, rope railing of the swaying bridge, she feels immense relief shoot through her. 

She made it. She weaved through the dangerous area without so much as a scratch. Now, all she needs to do is cross the suspended walkway that is heavily swinging from the wind, and hopefully she won't topple over if she just walks steadily enough.

Her plan is quickly intercepted, however, when a loud roar resounding from behind her rocks her to her core. When she turns to look, she finds one of those dreadful things. A large man with a bull’s head replacing his human one—by which horrible experiment? She does not wish to know.  

The good news is this one is not holding a sledgehammer half her size. The bad news is it does not need a sledgehammer to completely obliterate her.

With a choked scream, Nora’s legs move before her mind registers. She runs on the rocking bridge, the storm relentless, and she nearly feels her soul leave her body when the man—the thing—follows her and makes the suspension ropes sway harder.

The villa is right up ahead, all she needs to do is get there. The second she’s inside, she will be okay. She has to be.

Her tennis shoes keep slipping on the wooden slates and she nearly falls at least three times before making it on solid ground. The monster snarls again but she doesn't stop to look this time. She bolts straight for the large double gates of the looming house and pushes to open them, only to sob when she finds them bolted shut.

Her fists connect with the wood with all her might, terror seeping out of every pore of her body as she screams louder than she ever has in her life.

“HELP! OPEN THE DOOR! PLEASE! HELP!!”

The bull-headed abomination is closing on her and the door won’t budge, her already fleeting hope decaying even more.

She then hears a door swing open on the other side and footsteps—multiple footsteps—along with muffled voices she can barely pick on through the loud storm and her heartbeat pounding in her ears.

“Don't open that door, Luis,” a cold female voice orders.

“Someone needs help, I can't just listen to them die!”

“Luis, I swear to—”

The gate opens, revealing the man in question in all his glorious self. The ornate leather jacket on his slender frame is already wet from the pouring rain, his nape-skimming dark waves equally damp. Behind him, stands the woman Nora would recognize anywhere by her sheer presence and beauty—Ada. 

“Get in!” the spaniard exclaims, and she doesn't need to be told twice before bolting inside. She hears him shut the door with force, then slide the large bolt lock in place right before the monster can reach in.

She feels tremors in every muscle of her body as her lungs finally exhale air she never realized she was holding. With a heaving chest, she looks up to find Ada’s disappointed face. The latter then clicks her tongue, before spinning around and heading back inside the villa.

“You’re gonna get us killed,” she mutters to Luis who huffs at her chastising.

“But look, we’re fine! Let’s keep a positive mindset, shall we?” He then turns to Nora with a grin. “Don’t worry about her, she doesn't mean it—”

His words are interrupted by the loud bang of the bull-man at the gate, making them both wince. Luis then gestures for the terrified woman to head inside and away from the noise.

“He can't do much about that door on his own. Let's just hope he doesn't call his friends, eh?” he smiles nervously.

Once inside the villa, he closes the door behind them, drowning out the loud ruckus into muffled noise. Ada, who is still looking displeased, crosses her arms and leans back against a dining table in the scarcely furnished home.

It’s only now that Nora takes a clearer look at her without the blurring rain. She looks stunning, as expected, but the stark difference between the game and the present is her outfit. Long gone is the red bodycon sweater dress and stiletto thigh high boots. Instead, she's sporting a black tactical shirt, pants, and combat boots, with a bulletproof vest and endless straps and pouches for gear storage. She’s shorter than expected, but God, does she somehow look even more badass than her digitalized counterpart.

“I’m Luis Serra, and this is…” he pauses, as if unsure if he should introduce her, but then ultimately decides to go for it. “...Ada. What's your name?”

“Nora,” the latter answers with wide eyes, still struggling to compute this new reality where video game characters simply exist. “Nora Sadik.”

“Well, señorita Nora, encantado,” he smirks with a head tilt. 

Ada straightens with an exasperated sigh. “Alright, Romeo, are you gonna give me what I’m here for or not?” 

The man holds his hands up in defense, putting on a disarming smile in hopes to charm the cold mercenary. “Hey, no need to get upset. I have exactly what you asked for.”

Nora watches as he retrieves a glass tube from his pocket, a golden rock suspended inside it that glimmers in the light of the lanterns on the wall. He shakes it in his hand with a taunting grin, and she recognizes the item immediately: it's the amber.

With a racing mind, she recalls how Luis held onto the resin stone in the game events in order to help Leon and Ashley first. He even made Ada fetch him ingredients needed for a medicine that helps delay the parasite’s effects.

Now, however, there was no Leon or Ashley in sight, which means the events of the night have already changed course from their intended path. It also means the president’s daughter is still being held captive with no savior in view. 

Nora hates to even think of him, but she wonders if he has given up on the mission after what happened… After what he did.

Her attention is brought back to the two individuals before her when the woman is handed the amber, but her body instantly reacts to it with a wince. Ada retrieves her hand like she’s been burned, and dark veins pulse under her skin as she holds onto her head in pain.

Oh. Right. Ada is infected too.

“Mierda… It looks like the plaga is reacting to the amber. I told you you were infected, Ada. Just let me help you.”

“Help me how? Didn't you say I have to kill that thing to get rid of the parasite?” she mutters, the blood vessels on her sclera now black.

“You do. But I can get you medicine that can help delay the symptoms.” Luis pauses for a moment, then turns to observe Nora more carefully, the scientist in him on display. “You’re not infected.”

“I’m not,” she confirms with a headshake.

“So how did you get here?” the woman asks her in suspicion.

Nora begins to feel the same dread from before at being suspected like a criminal. Only this time she won’t make the same mistake. This world, whether imaginary or not, is dangerous, and she can't let her shock stricken brain start to blabber again about the game. So she comes up with a plausible lie right then and there, and hopes they believe her.

“I-I’m a tourist. I was, um, camping with a friend and— and we were kidnapped by these crazy people! I was able to get away when, uh, the church bell rang and they all left to go attend a sermon or something, I guess?”

“I will say, you may have picked the worst possible spot to camp,” Luis chuckles.

“Yeah, you're telling me…”

Ada, seemingly convinced with the answer as she knows she was the one that rang the bell to help Leon earlier, gives Nora a nod before turning her attention back to the smirking man.

“Keep the amber for now. I’ll go deal with that thing once and for all and come back for it.” She moves before Luis can answer, already making her way out through the back door. “Don't lose it.”

“Yeah, yeah, I get it… So long as you get me that chopper ride,” he grumbles in response as he watches her leave.

Once they're left alone, with only the pitter patter of the rain against the windows to fill the silence, Nora feels exhaustion hit her like a truck, and she crouches down to sit on the bare floor.

“Hey, you okay?” the Spaniard asks softly.

“Yeah, I just… I need a minute.”

“Well, just know we can't stay for that long now that they know we’re here. They’ll come looking for us soon enough. But once Ada’s back, we can leave this hellhole—I’ll bargain for a spot for you on that helicopter, no worries.”

“Thank you, seriously,” she nods in relief, then rests her head on the wall, creating a wet puddle underneath her from her soaked clothes. She's shivering, both from cold and adrenaline, but right now she needs a moment to calm her heart enough not to have a heart attack.

“You know, at first I thought you were with the other American.”

Nora knows immediately who he’s talking about, but she feigns ignorance. “What American?”

“The one that has them all acting extra crazy. It would be a lot easier to move around this place if they weren't losing their marbles. But I guess he’s trying to sabotage their plan, and they won't have that.” Luis pauses for a moment, before leaning back against a wooden beam with crossed arms. “Disculpa, I know I’m not making sense.”

“Don't worry about it,” she shakes her head in dismissal, omitting the fact that he’s making perfect sense to her.

His words float around her mind as she thinks of the mission again—of Ashley specifically. If the agent has not made an attempt to save her now that things have gone differently, does that mean she is doomed? Or even worse yet, does it mean Los Illuminados will be able to execute their Machiavellian plan? Will they truly send the infected first daughter back to the U.S to begin their world domination? 

It all sounds like too much, like she shouldn't know all of these things about the past and possible futures of this world. And yet, she does, and the information lays heavy on her conscience. Now, all she can think of is poor Ashley held captive in that church, alone and terrified, with no one coming to save her.

“Hey, Luis?”

The brunette lifts his head with a raised eyebrow, his coffee eyes meeting hers. “Hm?

“Do you think we could help out one more person?”

Next chapter.

It started small enough that you almost dismissed it. A pressure behind your ribs, a faint static beneath your skin, the sudden awareness of your own breathing as if someone had taken a spotlight and aimed it directly at your lungs. You were standing in the kitchen with a mug between your hands, listening to Dick talk from the other side of the counter. He was halfway through a story about Damian refusing to admit he liked a stray cat that had been following him for three blocks, his voice bright with fond exasperation. He was barefoot, hair still damp from the shower, wearing sweatpants low on his hips and one of those old Gotham Academy shirts that had faded soft from years of washing. He looked relaxed in the rare, precious way he only managed when patrol had not chewed him up too badly.

You wanted to smile at him. You wanted to laugh in the right places. You wanted to stay there, in the blue-gold glow of the kitchen, with your fingers wrapped around cooling tea and his voice making something gentle of the night.

Instead, your heart tripped. Not skipped. Not fluttered. Tripped, like it had caught its foot on some invisible wire and gone sprawling. The mug suddenly felt too heavy. The room sharpened at the edges. The hum of the refrigerator grew teeth. The rain was too loud, the lights too bright, the cotton of your shirt too close against your throat. Your breath caught once, then again, and your body decided without asking you that there was danger here. Not a problem. Not stress. Danger.

Dick noticed before you did. His story died mid-sentence, not abruptly enough to startle you, but softly, like he had set it down somewhere. His eyes moved from your face to your hands, then to your shoulders, then back again. Detective eyes, performer eyes, older-brother eyes, vigilante eyes. The terrible tenderness of someone trained by grief to read the room before the room knew it was speaking.

“Hey,” he said, voice lowered, all the brightness stripped out and replaced with velvet. “What’s happening?”

You tried to answer, but your tongue felt wrong in your mouth, too large and numb and useless. The pressure inside your chest expanded, pushing outward until your ribs seemed too small to contain you. Your fingers tightened around the mug. Something hot sloshed over the rim and kissed your skin, but the pain arrived from very far away, delayed and unconvincing. You stared at the spill crawling over your knuckles as if it belonged to someone else.

Dick moved, then stopped himself. You saw it in fragments: the instinctive step forward, the catch in his body, the deliberate stillness that followed. He knew better than to rush you. He had learned that lesson in blood and green fire, in cave floors and safehouses, in Jason’s eyes gone luminous and wrong after some nightmare tore him backwards into the grave. Dick Grayson, who threw himself from rooftops for a living, had learned how to make his own body quiet for someone else.

“Can you put the mug down for me?” he asked. “Just on the counter. You don’t have to do anything else.”

You meant to obey. You really did. But your hands would not open. Your fingers had become claws around ceramic, locked and pale at the knuckles. Your heart was hammering so hard you could feel it in your throat, in your wrists, in your teeth. The kitchen tilted slightly, not enough to fall, but enough that the floor stopped feeling like a promise. The air would not go in properly. Every breath caught at the top of your lungs and broke there, shallow and sharp, useless as paper wings.

“I can’t,” you managed, though the words came out scraped thin. “Dick, I can’t—”

“I know. I’ve got you.” He did not say it like a solution. He said it like a landmark. Like north. Like something that would still be true even if everything else went dark.

He came closer slowly, palms visible, his gaze steady but not trapping yours. “I’m going to touch the mug, okay? Not you yet. Just the mug. You’re safe. It’s just tea.”

Just tea. Just rain. Just Dick. Just the apartment. Just the city breathing outside the window. Your mind understood these things in a clean, sterile way, the way one might understand a language they could read but not speak. Your body rejected all of it. Your body was an animal at the back of a cage, bloody-mouthed and frantic, throwing itself against bars no one else could see.

Dick’s fingers closed gently around the mug. He waited until he felt the smallest loosening in your grip, then guided it down to the counter with both hands, careful, careful, careful. The ceramic landed with a soft click that seemed to echo through your bones. Without the mug anchoring you, your hands began to tremble outright. Not a delicate shaking. A violent, humiliating tremor that ran through your arms and climbed into your shoulders, making your whole body feel breakable.

“There we go,” he murmured. “That was good. That was really good.”

The praise almost undid you. Something inside your chest twisted, and suddenly your eyes were burning. You pressed both hands against your sternum, trying to hold yourself together by force. It felt as if your heart was trying to escape through bone. The pressure became pain, bright and blunt, and your breath hitched into something ugly.

“I’m dying,” you said, though you knew you were not. You knew it in the same distant way you knew your name, the colour of the walls, the shape of Dick’s hands. Knowledge was useless. Panic did not care about facts. Panic was a liar with a megaphone, and it was screaming directly into your nervous system. “I can’t breathe. I can’t breathe.”

“You’re not dying,” Dick said, and there was no impatience in it, no dismissal, no easy little laugh meant to smooth the edges off terror. He knew better than to argue with the storm head-on. “It feels like you are. I know. But your body is scared, not broken. You’re getting air. I can hear it.”

That was the wrong thing and the right thing at once. Because Dick could hear it. Of course he could. He knew the sound of breathing after fights, after falls, after drowning, after fear. He knew Jason’s breath when the Pit dragged him into some place no one could follow, when his lungs worked but his mind was trapped under dark water. He knew how panic could put a person back inside a moment that had already ended. He knew because the people he loved had taught him, brutally and unwillingly, that survival sometimes left the body alarms with no off switch.

You sank against the counter, knees softening. Dick was there without making a show of catching you. One hand hovered near your elbow, not quite touching until you gave a jerky nod you barely felt yourself make. Then he guided you down, slow and controlled, lowering with you as if the floor were somewhere he had always meant to go. The kitchen tiles were cold through your clothes. You pressed your back to the cabinet and tried to disappear into it.

“Okay,” Dick said, settling on the floor across from you, close enough to reach but not crowding. “We’re on the ground. Ground is good. Big fan of ground, personally. Underrated stuff. I spend too much time falling toward it.”

A laugh tried to happen and failed, collapsing into a choked sound that hurt your throat. Dick’s mouth softened, but he did not smile too much. He never made your fear feel like something he was trying to charm out of you. That was one of the things people misunderstood about him. They saw the grin, the easy warmth, the acrobat’s grace, and thought he was all sunlight. They missed the discipline beneath it. The steel cable under silk. Dick knew when humour was a hand offered across a gap, and when it was a door slammed in someone’s face. Tonight, he made it small enough to hold.

Your fingers dug into your own arms. The shaking had spread into your legs, muscles twitching hard enough that your knees knocked together. Sweat prickled cold along your spine. Your stomach rolled. The room seemed to pulse with your heartbeat, the cabinets swelling and shrinking, the overhead light buzzing like an insect trapped inside your skull. You could feel every seam in your clothing, every drop of cooling tea on your hand, every inch of air touching your skin.

“I need you to look at me if you can,” Dick said. “Not my eyes if that’s too much. My shoulder, my shirt, my very tragic hair situation. Dealer’s choice.”

Your gaze snagged on the faded lettering of his shirt. Gotham Academy, cracked and peeling. A thread had come loose near the collar. You stared at it like it was a rope thrown into the ocean.

“Good,” he said. “Stay there. You don’t have to climb the whole mountain. Just that thread. That’s our whole job right now.”

“I don’t know why this is happening,” you whispered. Your voice sounded small, almost childish, and shame flashed hot through you. It made the panic worse, which made the shame worse, a snake eating itself. “Nothing happened. Nothing happened, and I’m freaking out like—”

“Don’t.” Dick’s voice was still gentle, but something firm entered it, a quiet hand closing around the blade before you could turn it inward. “No punishment. Not for this.”

You tried to swallow and found your mouth dry. “I hate it.”

“I know.”

“I hate that you have to—”

“Hey.” He leaned a little closer, not touching, just entering your field of vision more fully. His expression was open in a way that hurt. Not pitying. Never pitying. Just present, painfully present, as if he had taken every scattered piece of his attention and laid it at your feet. “I don’t have to. I get to be here. There’s a difference.”

Rain hit the window harder, a sudden silver assault. Thunder rolled somewhere beyond the city, low and tired, and your body jerked as if the sound had entered through your spine. Dick noticed. Of course he did. His fingers flexed against his knee, then stilled.

“Can I hold your hand?” he asked. “Pressure might help. You can say no.”

You could not say anything, but you pushed one trembling hand toward him. He took it carefully, his palm warm and calloused, his grip firm without trapping. He did not lace your fingers together. He wrapped his hand around yours like a brace, thumb pressing slow, steady weight into the centre of your palm.

“This helped Jason sometimes,” he said, quiet enough that the name felt like a confidence, not a comparison. “Not always. Nothing works always, which is deeply rude of the human brain, by the way. But sometimes, when the Pit had him convinced the room was a coffin and everyone in it was an enemy, pressure helped. Something solid. Something outside the noise.”

You drew a broken breath. The mention of Jason did not scare you. Oddly, it helped. Not because your panic was the same as his, not because your fear could be neatly measured against someone else’s horror and judged worthy or unworthy, but because Dick said it without flinching. He said it like terror was something people survived. Like the body could become a haunted house and still, eventually, learn the shape of morning.

Dick pressed his thumb again into your palm. “Can you feel that?”

You nodded too quickly, dizziness blooming black at the edges of your vision.

“Slower,” he murmured. “Tiny nod. Save your energy.”

You gave him the smallest nod you could manage.

“Perfect. Now, don’t worry about deep breaths yet. I know everyone says deep breaths, but when your body’s in full Batmobile-with-no-brakes mode, that can feel impossible. So we’re going to make the exhale longer first. I’ll do it with you.”

He breathed in softly through his nose, not exaggerated, not theatrical. Then he exhaled in a slow, controlled stream, shoulders lowering with it. You tried to follow and immediately failed. Your inhale snagged, your exhale shattered, and panic surged up again, triumphant and vicious.

“I can’t,” you gasped.

“That’s okay. First pancake.” His thumb moved in a steady rhythm against your palm. “First pancake is always a mess.”

A sob cracked out of you before you could stop it. “This isn’t funny.”

“No,” Dick said at once. “It isn’t.” His eyes held yours for half a second before you looked back to the thread on his collar. “But you’re allowed to be terrified and still hear my dumb pancake opinions. Both can exist.”

That, somehow, worked better than reassurance. The world did not become safe, not suddenly, not beautifully. But it became fractionally less impossible. Dick did not demand that you calm down in order to be comforted. He made room for your fear to sit on the kitchen floor with you, hideous and loud, and then he sat beside it like it was not strong enough to make him leave.

You tried again. In. Out. The exhale trembled apart. Dick nodded as if you had done something extraordinary.

“Good. Again.”

The next one was worse, but he praised it anyway. The one after that lasted a little longer. Your lungs still felt too tight, your chest still ached, and your heart was still racing, but the rhythm of his breathing gave your body something to argue with. Not a command. An invitation. In. Out. In. Out. The rain kept time against the windows. The refrigerator hummed. Somewhere downstairs, a car passed through standing water with a long wet hiss. The apartment began to return in pieces.

Dick changed tactics when your breathing caught again, smooth as shifting grips mid-swing. “Name five things you can see.”

You squeezed your eyes shut, overwhelmed by the thought of looking around. The dark behind your eyelids was worse.

“Or I’ll name them,” he said. “One: that plant I refuse to give up on because I am loyal and handsome. Two: the blue dish towel. Three: the chip in the counter from when Wally visited and said, ‘Catch,’ like that explained anything. Four: your sock has a little moon on it. Five: me.”

Your eyes opened at that. You looked down at your sock because it was easier than looking at him. A little moon. Pale yellow. Stupid. Beloved. You had forgotten you were wearing them.

“Four things you can feel,” he continued.

“Floor,” you whispered.

“Good.”

“Your hand.” Your fingers twitched inside his grip. “My shirt. The cabinet.”

“Three things you can hear.”

“Rain.” Your throat worked. “You. The fridge.”

“Two things you can smell.”

You dragged air in through your nose. It shook, but it entered. “Tea. Your soap.”

“One thing you can taste.”

You swallowed. “Mint.”

“There you are,” he said softly.

The words went through you like warmth through frost. There you are. Not there you go. Not calm down. Not stop scaring me. There you are, as if you had not been ruined or ridiculous or unreachable. As if you had only been far away for a little while, and he had been waiting at the place where the road came back.

Your body did not stop all at once. It came down in ugly increments. The shaking dulled into shivers. The pressure in your chest loosened by degrees, leaving soreness behind, as if your ribs had been pried apart and set back wrong. Your face was wet. You did not know when you had started crying properly, only that tears had cooled along your jaw and gathered beneath your chin. Your hand ached from how tightly you had been gripping Dick’s.

“I’m sorry,” you said, because shame was stubborn, because it crawled out from under every locked door, because even in the aftermath, your mind reached for the easiest weapon and aimed it at yourself.

Dick’s expression changed. Not anger, exactly. Grief with its sleeves rolled up. “Nope,” he said. “We are not doing the apology spiral. That ride is closed for maintenance.”

Despite everything, your mouth twitched. “You can’t just declare that.”

“I absolutely can. I have a badge and a very concerning amount of emotional baggage. That gives me authority.”

“You’re not funny.”

“I’m a little funny.”

You breathed out, and this time it almost resembled a laugh. It hurt, but not badly. Dick’s thumb paused, then resumed its careful pressure.

After a minute, he shifted closer. “Can I sit next to you?”

You nodded. He moved slowly, unfolding those long acrobat limbs with practised control and settling beside you against the cabinets. He left a few inches between your shoulders until you leaned, barely, in his direction. Then his arm came around you, solid and warm, gathering you against his side like something precious but not fragile. That mattered. Dick held you as if you were breakable only in the way all living things were breakable, not uniquely, not shamefully. Like glass, yes, maybe. But stained glass. Something that had survived heat, cutting, assembly. Something that could still catch light.

You pressed your face into his shoulder. The cotton of his shirt was soft against your cheek. His body smelled like citrus soap and rain and the faint medicinal bite of bruise cream. Beneath that was Dick himself, warm skin, clean sweat, a trace of the city clinging to him no matter how long he stood under hot water. His heartbeat was steady under your ear. Not slow, exactly. Dick was never entirely still inside. But steady enough that your body began, reluctantly, to believe in it.

“I didn’t know what to do,” you said after a while. Your voice was muffled against him. “It felt like my body stopped belonging to me.”

His arm tightened slightly. “Yeah.”

“You sound like you know.”

“I do.” He was quiet for a moment, and you felt him choose his words with care. “Not exactly the same. I’m not going to pretend that. But I know what it looks like when fear hijacks the controls. I’ve seen it with Jason. I’ve seen it with Bruce, even if he’d rather fake his own death again than call it panic. I’ve seen it in mirrors, too.”

You turned your face enough to look at him. “You?”

His smile was small and crooked, without performance. “Yeah, me. Turns out growing up in a circus, watching your parents die, becoming a child vigilante, and then building your entire personality around catching everyone else before they fall does, in fact, have consequences. Shocking development. Scientists baffled.”

There was something in your chest then that was not panic, but hurt. Hurt for him, old and tender. “Dick.”

“I’m okay,” he said, and then corrected himself because he loved you enough not to lie badly. “I’m working on it. Better some days than others. But I know the body keeps score, even when the brain misplaces the paperwork.”

You huffed weakly. “That was terrible.”

“It was educational.”

“It was a dad joke.”

“Please never say that to Bruce. He’ll look proud, and I’ll have to move cities.”

You let your eyes close again, but this time the dark was only dark. Your breath still shook at the edges. Every few moments, your body sent up another flare of adrenaline, a ghost wave rolling through your limbs, but Dick stayed through each one. He did not tense when you trembled. He did not make your symptoms into an emergency he had to defeat. That was the part that made you want to cry again, but softer. Dick Grayson, who had been trained from childhood to leap toward danger, sat on the kitchen floor and did nothing loudly. He made stillness into an act of love.

“I hate that you’ve had to learn this,” you admitted.

His fingers brushed your upper arm, up and down, slow enough not to overwhelm. “Me too. But I’m glad I know it right now.”

You swallowed. Your throat felt raw. “Was it like this with Jason?”

“Sometimes.” His voice went quieter around the edges, protective of someone who was not in the room. “Sometimes it was rage first. Sometimes fear. Sometimes he couldn’t stand anyone behind him, or the lights were wrong, or a sound hit too close to something he remembered. The Pit made everything louder. It didn’t create all the pain, but it poured gasoline on it and handed it a match. We learned not to crowd him. Not to grab unless we had to. To give him exits. To keep our voices low. To remind him where he was, what year it was, who was in the room.”

You listened to the rain. “Did it work?”

“Sometimes,” Dick said again, because he would not make survival sound cleaner than it was. “Sometimes it helped. Sometimes he still had to ride it out. But he knew we were there. Even when he hated it. Even when he cursed us out in three languages and threatened to throw Bruce through a wall.”

“That sounds like Jason.”

“Honestly, threatening to throw Bruce through a wall was one of his more emotionally regulated moments.”

A tired laugh escaped you, small but real. Dick’s arm curled a little tighter around your shoulders, as if the sound had warmed him.

“You don’t have to be easy to love when you’re scared,” he said after a moment. “No one in my family is easy to love when they’re scared. We’re all dramatic little Gotham raccoons with trauma and weapons. You sitting on the floor having a panic attack? Not even top ten most difficult things I’ve loved someone through.”

You lifted your head enough to give him a damp, offended look. “Did you just call me a raccoon?”

“A beloved raccoon.”

“I’m breaking up with you.”

“No, you’re not. You love my tragic plant.”

“I tolerate your tragic plant.”

“It told me you two are close.”

“You need sleep.”

“I need many things. Sleep is one of them. A working dishwasher is another. For Bruce to stop texting like a haunted Victorian telegram. But mostly, right now, I need you to drink some water.”

That practical tenderness nearly got you again. He pressed a kiss to your temple before moving, then paused. “I’m going to stand up and get water. I’ll be right here. You can keep watching me. No sudden ninja vanish.”

“Okay,” you said, though the word stuck.

Dick rose with exaggerated slowness, one hand briefly braced on the counter. He kept talking as he filled a glass. Nothing important. Something about how the dishwasher made a sound like a dying pterodactyl, and how he was pretty sure Tim had once fixed it at three in the morning out of spite, and how Barbara had banned him from pretending to understand appliance repair. His voice stitched the room together while he moved through it. Cabinet. Sink. Water. Footsteps. Return.

When he crouched in front of you, he held the glass out but did not force it into your hand. “Small sip?”

You took it with both hands. The water trembled, tiny waves lapping against the glass. Dick steadied the bottom without comment. You drank. Cold slid down your throat, startling and clean, and you realised how exhausted you were. Not sleepy exactly, but wrung out. Hollowed. Like panic had burned through all the fuel in you and left smoke behind.

“Good,” he said. “Another?”

You managed two more sips before handing it back. “I feel stupid.”

“I know you feel that way.” Dick set the glass aside and returned to the floor beside you. “But feelings are not always reliable narrators. Yours just tried to convince you the kitchen was a death trap. No offence to your feelings, but they’re getting two stars on Yelp tonight.”

You leaned back against him because you could, because the option existed, because his body was warm and real and patient. “You’re really committed to being annoying.”

“It’s one of my core skills.”

“I’m sorry I scared you.”

He exhaled slowly. “You did scare me a little. Because I love you, and watching you hurt is awful. But that doesn’t mean you did something wrong. Those are different things.”

You let that sit inside you. It did not fix everything. Nothing did, not instantly. But the words found a place. You could feel them there, small and bright as a match shielded from wind.

Outside, the storm began to soften. The rain no longer battered the window; it traced it. The neon below blurred into gentler colours, and the kitchen light seemed less cruel. Your body was still tender with the aftermath. Your hands still shook when you lifted them. Your chest still hurt. But the apartment had stopped tilting. The floor held. The cabinets were cabinets. The fridge was only humming. Dick was beside you, thumb brushing slow circles over your shoulder.

Eventually, he shifted. “Think you can make it to the couch, or are we becoming kitchen people now?”

“Couch,” you said. “But slowly.”

“Slowly is my middle name.”

“It absolutely is not.”

“Richard Slowly Grayson. Very respected.”

“You’re such a liar.”

“Only about my middle name and how much cereal I’ve eaten straight from the box.”

He helped you up as if you were both defusing a bomb, which was ridiculous and sweet and exactly what you needed. One hand at your elbow, one hovering near your back, giving you space to move under your own power while making it clear he would catch you if your legs changed their minds. The walk to the couch took less than ten steps and felt like crossing a continent. By the time you sank into the cushions, your breath had gone uneven again, but not lost. Just tired.

Dick disappeared only long enough to bring the blanket from the bedroom, the heavy one you liked because it made your nervous system stop trying to fistfight the universe. He draped it over you, then slid onto the couch and opened his arms. You curled into him without ceremony. Your head found the familiar place beneath his jaw. His chin rested lightly against your hair.

“Do you want quiet,” he asked, “or distraction?”

“Quiet. But not alone quiet.”

“Got it.”

So he gave you that. Not silence, exactly, because Dick was alive in a way silence could not contain. He breathed. He shifted. His heart beat. Occasionally, his fingers moved over your back in slow, anchoring lines. The city murmured below. Rain whispered against glass. The tragic plant stood guard in the corner, losing its war with dignity.

After a long time, you said, “Thank you for knowing what to do.”

His hand paused against your back, then continued. “Thank you for letting me be here.”

“I didn’t really give you much choice.”

“You did.” His voice was soft, but certain. “You gave me your hand. You looked at my shirt. You stayed.”

Your throat tightened again, but this time the tears that came were quiet. “I was scared.”

“I know.”

“I might be scared again.”

“Probably,” he said, and somehow that honesty was kinder than any promise could have been. “And if it happens, we’ll do this again. Or something else. We’ll figure out what helps. We’ll make a plan when your body isn’t sounding every alarm in the building. You don’t have to white-knuckle it alone.”

You closed your eyes and listened to his heartbeat, steady beneath the storm-soft night. It seemed impossible that a body could hold so much fear and not split open from it. More impossible still that someone could see it and stay. But Dick stayed like it was the easiest thing in the world, like love was not a rescue mission but a place laid out carefully on the ground, soft enough to collapse into.

A place to land.

When you finally slept, it was not graceful. It came in pieces, dragging you under between one breath and the next, your fingers curled loosely in the fabric of his shirt. Dick did not move for a long time. He watched the rain taper off over Blüdhaven, watched the neon steady itself in the puddles below, watched your face smooth by degrees as sleep carried you somewhere panic could not follow. His own eyes burned with exhaustion, but he only lowered his cheek to the top of your head and held you a little closer.

“Still here,” he whispered, too softly to wake you.