#robiin

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Stressed was a good word for how Dick was feeling. So was defeated; exhausted and drained were good ones too.

His ankle was in a brace since he’d nearly broken it the night before dealing with a team up between Bane, Croc, and Zsasz, his torso was taped to help with cracked ribs, and his wrist was wrapped up since a cut he’d gotten had turned out to be a laceration that needed stitches.

It pained him to say he wasn’t the worst off.

Killer Croc had gotten his teeth into Jason’s left shoulder, biting deep before anyone could get him off, Bane had broken Jason’s elbow, he had a concussion, and his leg was broken in two places. Which wasn’t to mention the stitches he’d needed for a laceration in his cheek and the cracked jaw Jason’d sustained thanks to Croc’s tail.

Now that he thought back on it, Dick had no idea how he and Jason had managed alone for so long.

Tim had shown up with his friends Conner and Bart, and their powers helped tip the odds in their favor, letting Jason and Dick retreat to get some medical attention. Bruce was upset about Superboy and Impulse’s presences in Gotham, but he’d tolerated it since they had essentially saved his sons lives.

Barely in time.

Normally Jason wouldn’t be unconscious by now—he’d probably have woken up about an hour or so ago, actually. The only reason he was still unconscious was that he was on meds so strong they’d knock out an elephant.

At this point, Dick had been sitting with Jason for about… Five hours, give or take, and he’d fallen asleep three times.

Bruce had tried to get him to at least lay in the bed with Jason, but he wouldn’t budge. Jason liked his personal space. Jason’s comfort came first. Dick could sacrifice a few aches for his little brother.

He was just waiting for him to wake up and prove he was going to be okay as he stewed in a bit of self-loathing.

Jason shouldn’t have gotten this hurt, the wind entering from the open bedroom window hissed. This is your fault.

Worrying his bottom lip between his teeth, Dick made a small noise and buried his face in his hands.

All your fault, Gotham whispered in his ears. All your fault.

Like he sensed Dick’s rapid decline and was ready to go a few rounds with Dick’s subconscious, Jason groaned, eyes fluttering open to squint at the window with sunlight streaming through it.

Dick’s head snapped up at the sound and he stared in stunned silence at Jason’s newfound awareness.

Knowing someone is going to be okay and witnessing it are two very, very different things, and offer two very, very different emotions.

The window was to Jason’s left. Dick was sitting to Jason’s right.

Meaning Jason hadn’t noticed him yet, and Dick could leave the way the air compelled him to.

But, since his body was locked in place, stuck from the shock of Jason’s consciousness, he couldn’t move. He could just stare, heart stuttering.

Jason turned his head and squinted to see Dick.

Escape aborted.

“Hey, Jason,” Dick greeted with a strained smile that he prayed looked genuine.

Squeezing his eyes shut, Jason rasped, “My leg hurts ‘n’ my shoulder’s sore.”

Dick huffed a laugh, the smile becoming more genuine as he held out a glass of water with a hot pink bendy straw in it for Jason. “Yeah, I hear that’s what happens when a cannibalistic human crocodile takes a chomp at your shoulder.”

He paused.

“Can it be called cannibalism if he’s not technically a human? Isn’t he some weird mix of a human and a crocodile? There should be a word for it. We need to update the dictionary.”

Jason was sitting up to drink and he snorted at Dick’s decision.

“You’d need to add more than just one word if you’re gonna update the dictionary. Gotham’s bullshit can make an entire dictionary by itself,” he commented after taking a sip of the water.

“True. When should we start making it?”

Jason shook his head as Dick chuckled.

It went quiet and Dick’s smile slipped as he realized that he could leave; he should leave. Him being there wasn’t helpful, not at all. Maybe he could go get Alfred or Bruce—they’d know how to help. They’d do a better job of it.

Dick never really was a good brother, was he?

“I’m gonna go get Alfred.”

Pained, Dick stood to walk out, reaching out to ruffle Jason’s hair a little before he left.

Jason’s brow furrowed as Dick turned to leave and when he spoke Dick tripped at the quiet, vulnerable tone to his voice.

“You’re leaving?”

Dick hesitated, pausing and turning to face Jason. “Yeah, Jay. I’m getting Alfred.”

“Are you coming back?”

“I…” He couldn’t lie. He couldn’t, not with Jason giving him that look. “I don’t know, Little Wing.”

Maybe lying would have been kinder.

Dick managed to see Jason’s watering eyes before his little brother shut them and turned his head to face the roof.

“I’m all alone,” Jason said, voice trembling, “all the time.”

Hand on the doorknob, Dick froze, eyes wide as he stared at Jason.

And his little brother wasn’t done, apparently.

“I don’t want to be alone anymore,” he whispered. “Please don’t go, Dick, please.”

The words sent Dick back to a time when he and Bruce were at odds and the new kid was wearing his colors. They sent him to a day when he’d just finished a shouting match with Bruce, both parties in the argument unaware of their audience of a boy who’d witnessed too many fights, and he’d been just about to walk out the door, hand on the knob, when a small hand grabbed the sleeve of his jacket and gasped out a quick, “Wait!”

Dick remembered pausing and scowling down at Jason’s hand, which was quickly removed when he was sure he had his brother’s attention.

“What?” Dick remembered hissing, all his anger with Bruce shortening his temper and patience smaller than an ant’s head.

“Ya can’t jus’ go n’leave things like that,” Jason had tried to convince, earnestness and fear making his voice strain.

His response had been a scoff, hand tightening around the doorknob, and a sharp, “Watch me.”

Jason’s cry of, “Please!” had Dick hesitate, but only for a second before he was out of the Manor.

That moment was one of Dick’s strongest memories. He hated the way it made him feel, hated his past self for the way he’d treated Jason, hated that he hadn’t tried. 

Jason wasn’t going to ask again, this time. Dick could feel it.

Each inhale felt like someone was injecting his heart with lead, weighing it down, and Dick could only stare at his broken brother and see a younger child in his place.

Dick’s hand dropped away from the door.

He was back beside Jason’s bed in seconds, slipping his hand into one of Jason’s and holding it tight.

“I’m right here Little Wing,” he said, giving Jason’s hand a little squeeze. “I won’t leave.”

Not again.

--

Jason didn’t bother looking up from his book when he saw Dick starting to move out of the corner of his eye. Instead, he very calmly and patiently waited to finish the page he was on before memorizing the page he was on, closing the book, and turning his attention to Dick.

“How you?” he signs when Dick opens his eyes.

Dick blinks and squints at Jason’s hands, and Jason mentally kicks himself for forgetting about his brother’s concussion.

Leaving the book on the nightstand beside the bed Dick’s in, Jason scoots a little forward in his chair and holds his hands up to wait for Dick to focus on them. Dick squints a little at first but his eyes do eventually focus.

He says something but Jason can’t hear him, so he shakes his head and signs again, as a reminder to Dick.

Jason doesn’t need to read Dick’s lips to know that he says a simple “oh yeah”.

Dick lifts a trembling hand and signs, “Sorry.”

Jason shrugs and lifts his hands to repeat his question. This time Dick’s hands follow his and understand the question, and he leans back into the bed, pressing his hands to his face.

Patiently, Jason waits.

Dick moves his hands to sign, “So-so,” then he looks back to Jason, ready to read his response.

Nodding, Jason signs back, “Remember?”

His brother frowns and looks away to think.

Again, Jason waits, eyes focused somewhere to the right of Dick’s face as he thinks a little to keep his mind distracted, and only when he notices Dick’s hands start to move again does he return his attention to his brother.

“Maybe?”

Jason just nods and stands, signing a quick, “Wait here,” and only sticks around long enough to read Dick’s upset “Where I supposed go?”

Somehow Dick finds something to throw at him and Jason laughs quietly as he retreats out of the room to grab some ice packs for Dick’s injuries.

Everything is quiet as he opens the door to the freezer. It’s still quiet when he closes it. It’s quiet when he grabs a water bottle out of the pack he has.

It’s always quiet.

But that’s Jason’s fault.

He shakes his head and heads back to Dick’s bedside, tossing the ice packs at Dick’s chest and holding out the water bottle once Dick can reach it.

Jason sits down again while Dick opens the water bottle--silence, complete and utter silence--and he reaches out to grab the ice packs to arrange them where they go. One on Dick’s ankle, one on his shoulder, and one pressed to his cheek.

When Dick holds the ice pack to his face, Jason sits back and closes his eyes with his face tilted toward the ceiling.

He’s... tired.

Dick taps his knee, though, to draw Jason’s attention, so he sighs and cracks his eyes open.

Tilting his head, Dick signs, “Talk?”

Jason snorts.

“Deaf,” he replies with a smirk.

Dick rolls his eyes. “You understand what I mean.”

Which he does. It’s just fun to tease.

Jason nods and shrugs. “Talk.”

So Dick does. He starts asking questions about what happened, they swap a few stories, then Dick’s obviously getting tired so Jason tells him to sleep and promises he’ll be there when Dick wakes up again.

But, Dick being Dick, he isn’t satisfied with the simple answer and asks Jason to at least sit closer to the bed.

Rolling his eyes, Jason agrees and stands to take the now-melted ice packs back to the freezer for later. When he gets back, Dick is fighting sleep off and losing terribly, so Jason makes sure to scoot the chair closer right as Dick’s finally knocking out again.

In true Dick Grayson form, though, Dick doesn’t fall asleep until he has a hand off the bed and holding tight to Jason’s forearm.

Surprised but not really, Jason slips the hand from his wrist to his hand and holds it as Dick sleeps.

Eventually he falls asleep too.

The next morning Jason manages to fight an ankle brace on his brother and they spend Dick’s time conscious coloring, reading, and watching as much TV as Dick can before complaining about a headache.

It’s nice.

---

---

Tim knew something was wrong when he called Dick twice and was sent to voicemail both times. Normally that was fine; Dick was a pretty busy person, so Tim could understand that; he just texted his brother instead, telling him to call when he got the chance, and didn’t give it much more thought until after patrol when he checked his phone and still didn’t have a response.

Frowning, Tim turned his phone off and looked over at Bruce. Normally whenever Dick didn’t answer text messages it meant he was either undercover or isolating himself.

If this was the first option, Tim would check with Barbara first then let Bruce know just in case he tried contacting Dick and couldn’t reach him. Bruce got overprotective.

Normally he'd be getting ready for patrol--rainy weather be damned. Tonight was his night off, though.

So he sat there doing... Nothing. Breathing. Blinking.

Existing.

Outside the rain continued to fall, drops of water hitting the glass of his window with little 'tap-tap's.

Jason sat there and looked out the window at the rain.

He had many memories to associate with rain.

The first one he could dredge up was one from when his dad came home late one night, water dripping off his clothes to the floor, blood streaked on his arm and cheek. Jason had been playing with a broken toy the neighbors had given him, sitting on the floor as his mom watched tv sitting on the couch behind him.

He remembered looking up to see Willis, and the man ignoring him and his mom as he shed the jacket he was wearing and went off to the room.

Jason remembered wondering where the blood had come from.

Another memory with the rain wasn't until many years later, when Jason was homeless. He remembered his first night alone on the streets, huddled up tight in the corner of an alley, sitting on a dirty and thin shirt he grabbed out of a trash bin in a wasted effort to keep his jeans dry.

He remembered the desperate hope for the rain to stop; remembered hating the rain for ruining what felt like everything. Jason remembered the painful despair that came with being forced to face what was his reality.

His next memory was him on a rainy patrol with Bruce, cursing Dick for the scaly underwear, short sleeves, pixie boots, and next to useless cape. He remembered being crouched on a rooftop, miserable as a wet ronin and sulking to himself, when the rain stopped hitting him all of a sudden and someone was crouched beside him, pulling him to their side and making sure he was covered. Jason remembered his surprise and looking to his left.

He remembered the glowing warmth that struck up inside his chest when he realized that Bruce was the one covering him. Bruce had stopped the rain. Not literally, of course, but it still made Jason's heart skip a beat to know that Bruce would do his best keep him healthy and safe.

One of him at a gala followed.

Galas, where judgements are dropped like apples on Isaac Newton's head; where cruel words and rumors fall like raindrops.

Yeah, he remembered his first gala. He remembered Bruce making sure Jason was always just a little behind him, a little hidden and out of sight, and he remembered feigning indignance to mask his appreciation and relief.

That was one of the better memories.

Really, aside from those... Jason didn't have many others. Nothing exactly recent and missing the green taint of the lazarus pit until present moment, where he was busy reflecting on past memories associated with some form of rain, and maybe that was him making a memory thinking about memories.

But he didn't think about it anymore. He didn't think about anything at all, really.

Slade Wilson: