tushanshu_logs

Current Mood: careful

Entry tags:

Open

Characters: Damian and Bruce Wayne, Robin (

demon_brat) and Robin (

hackingyoursensors), and also Robin (

demon_brat) and anyone!
Location: Here, there, and everywhere. Mostly rooftops, probably a lot in the Metal and Fire sections.
Situation: Meet Robin, if you wish!
Warnings/Rating: TW for child abuse. Because it's Damian.
A/N: Prose or actionspam welcome. Thread headers for Bruce and Dick, anyone else who wants to meet or talk with Robin, welcome after that!

It took Damian a couple of days after Grayson showed up to return to his, ah, usual levels of visibility. After that first conversation, he did his best to vanish out of sight, making sure not to fall into his usual patterns of anger at circumstances he did not welcome. Because neither Father nor Grayson would approve - his Grayson, this one had no reason to care - and the urge to not fail his Batman was suddenly double strong. Or, at least, more explicit.

Eventually, almost a full day later, he found his way to his Father's suite.

And the next night, and the one after that, he was cautiously back to patrol.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

"I'm not upset!" Not exactly, at least. It's a lot more complicated than that.

Plus, admitting to being upset would be admitting to a weakness. No way.

"It's... where we are from, you are so much older. Gone through a lot of experiences nobody who respects you, let alone... more, wouldn't want to think of you going through again. But you've learned from them, from everything. You not knowing, or understanding, is... jarring."

And, because he is definitely getting into tho Robin gig...

"Which questions?"

He looks over at Damian. It's clear Damian wasn't entirely convincing.

Dick listens thoughtfully. It makes sense, sure, but the idea that things that bad happen to him (no, not him, the other him) is a little sobering.

"I'm from a completely different world. Those things might not happen to me."

Part of him is trying to ease Damian's concerns. Part of him is trying to ingrain that into himself. At Damian's next question, he pauses. If he's offering information, he must be okay to talk about it, right?

"How he became Robin. How he died."

"Maybe."

The questions which basically would kill any father, right.

"The general agreement is that it turned out that Batman needed Robin, to stay sane, and you... outgrew that." Actually, that conclusion wasn't reached until the Robin after that, but Damian's a bit hazy.

Or, you know, nobody but Alfred has ever explained any of it to him, and Damian didn't start listening to the butler until later.

"And it was the Joker. Beat him with a crowbar, then blew the building up, timed so that Batman would just not be able to reach him in time... but barely." That was in the file. "And he came back wrong."

Now Damian does cross his arms in front of him. "Not that anyone lets go." His tone goes a little skewed, a little unhappy... yet not nearly as much as he would have resented this all, months ago. "Family."

Dick listens carefully, though parts of it are a bit strange to him. Batman needs a Robin to stay sane? What does that even mean?

His eyes narrow when Damian mentions the Joker. Safe to say? Not a fan. And stabbing at Bruce right where he knows it would hurt? Killing a child? He wouldn't put it past the Joker but it was sick. In fact, it made him feel sick and angry.

"Why would they? Just because someone dies or... changes doesn't mean they're not family."

"Why?"

Damian's head whips around to look at the other ... boy.

"What are the things that make Batman Batman?"

Dick leans back on his arms and looks up at the sky. He has to think about it, because Batman goes waay beyond the suit and the gadgets and the growl.

"I guess... a drive to do whatever it takes to protect people. He doesn't want rewards or adulation. I think he wants what I want: for nobody to go through what we had to go through."

But they were so, so different and he knew it. They might want the same thing, but they aren't interchangeable people.

"And not killing, Grayson. Batman doesn't kill.

"Todd does, and he doesn't care about anyone getting in his way."

Damian's watching him, and, yes, the names are said quietly enough to be only picked up by the person he's talking to. And superhearing, but there isn't much to do about that.

His expression changes immediately. A former Robin who kills? Who totally abandoned the most important teaching Batman passed down, the one he never compromised?

"Why? He was... He took my title. He should know what that means."

It might be childish to focus on that but, honestly, he is still young. Still prone to fits of childishness.

I may have still the greater count of corpses in my wake than him, Damian doesn't say. Yet. The words are at the tip of his tongue, but... he doesn't trust this Robin enough to share them.

He also swallows down the comment that what he says, he learned from Grayson himself.

"He was murdered by the Joker. And then he came back, and, since Arkham never holds the clown very long, and other facilities are even less capable of doing so, the Joker was back to murdering others. What he saw was that the Batman didn't make sure Todd was, at least, the last one. He couldn't accept that rule, after it.

"He also never called himself Robin, after, either. The name was already taken up by another."

But he did take up another of Grayson's identities. And Father's, too.

"He didn't take your title, either. It was given to him. If I have the story right, what he did was try to steal the tires." Beat. "Of the Batmobile."

He can see Damian holding back but, of course, couldn't even guess what it is. But Damian's explanation makes a little more sense. Maybe this Jason isn't as attached to reality as he should be. But the next statement causes Dick's anger to flare.

"How fast does he replace us?"

All of this is making him feel rather disposable, on top of being irritated on the other Robins' behalf. But it's clear that his anger isn't directed at Damian.

Edited 2012-09-30 23:46 (UTC)

Damian just stares at him, again. If anything, this makes him think of Drake's fit of anger when he was told he was no longer a Robin.

"Does the name Robin actually matter more to you right now than the fact that you still keep on doing what needs to be done, both on your own and with Batman, and you get brothers and a sister out of the whole process? Not that she was Robin, the fourth one was blonde."

With as angry as Grayson sounds, maybe it's better to let Brown choose her time for informing him herself.

"And as regards your question, he doesn't, necessarily. He's not the Batman who made me Robin. He was lost in time and presumed dead, at that point."

"It matters to me that we're apparently disposable."

But he catches himself. Even if this Bruce is different, it's still Bruce. And he has a hard time believing that they're really disposable or interchangeable. It just feels that way right now. He sighs and slumps a little. "Okay, maybe that's a little unfair."

Upon hearing the multiple Batman thing, Dick gives Damian a confused look.

"Now there's more than one Batman?"

"Whatever gave you that idea? Do you think that is why all but one of the Robins are legally his sons? And the one he didn't adopt has her mother to go home to.

"Being Robin, being the second, the secondary part of a team - is that what you really want for the rest of your life? There are times when birds have to fly, or however that cliche goes. But he never lets go of any of you. Any."

Because that accusation? Damian may not understand what Father does, or why, but he knows the facts.

He shrugs at the latter part. "Not then. There are, now. Father's idea. My Batman is the Batman of Gotham. Father is Batman of the world. There are others associated with the initiative, in other parts of the globe."

That my Batman? May just be said with the same kind of subconscious, possessive pride with which Batman usually says Robin.

What Damian said and, more importantly, the conviction in his voice is the final shot that brings his anger and confusion and childish streak crashing down. (He's still a little sad, sure, but that's Dick Grayson is far from home and stuck in a weird place with no immediate way of getting out. Naturally, he misses his friends and family that he left behind.)

So he smiles. Sheepishly and without any sort of happiness behind it.

"So do you hand out an annual Jerk of the Year award? I think I just nominated myself."

There's a pause before he reacts to Damian's other statement. Oh no the pieces are starting to come together.

"... you mean me, don't you?"

... Damian wanted Grayson to stop saying that, but the deflating? The way anger just gives way to a sort of ache that he's only seen in others and can't relate to, but can't deny seeing? That's not he wanted. It's also so very Grayson that Damian hunches a little, sliding back into sullen for a bit. No way to get this thing with talking with people right, is there?

"Why would there be such an award?" Also, welcome to the world of easily-confused-by-social-references-youngest-Wayne. Who is also generally way more of a jerk than you.

"...maybe."

He won't lie to him. Lies are for the weak. But he really isn't sure if this Grayson and the one he knows are the same person. Or can be, no matter how much time elapses.

Unfortunately that's the nature of his anger. It bubbles and rages before giving way to quiet defeat. Sometimes, like now, it leaves a twinge of guilt behind.

"To remind people not to be jerks?"

Damian's answer is suspiciously cryptic.

"Maybe? I don't think anyone can be maybe Batman."

"... does that actually work?" There is nothing fake about the question, the curiosity. Damian doesn't know; but he is aware it wouldn't work on him.

But that eased off as he shrugged. "You'd be surprised. But somebody can be maybe you."

He smiles a little.

"Probably not. It would just set them off more."

His smile widens and now he seems to understand properly.

"But I can't be maybe me. Too many maybe differences, huh?"

">Tt.< You are, actually, very maybe you. So far, nearly to the point of not you."

He's not laughing, or joking. Because he can't quite see his Batman, his mentor, the brother he knows in this child.

But it's not sharp or insulting, either. Merely a statement of fact. Maybe a little dark (Damian doesn't do sad, the way proper people do), but overall calm. He already saw him wilting once, right? No need for a repeat performance.

"And what would not-me be?"

He doesn't feel bothered, particularly. Thinking about what he must be like somewhere else is weird, though. They must be quite different, which explains all of the little clashes and misunderstandings. They have to re-learn how to deal with him.

But he does wonder how different he is.

Oh... that question is just not fair. Not when he has spent the nearly two months since he showed up here trying very, very hard not to think of Grayson.

"He's..." Damian's throat tightens, at he scowls in the distance at that, at himself, forcing himself to swallow, to force words out. "He's one of the most unexpected fighters I have seen. He makes situations work for him that shouldn't. He's got the kind of network for information and, if needed, support that he can, in fact, handle any situation. He adapts to any situation, no matter what it costs him. And he pays attention in such a way that he hears what people mean, not what they actually say. He makes terrible jokes, talking all the time, he says it helps him stay loose, and is way more touchy and sentimental than anyone else I have met, but somehow that doesn't make him weak, or meek. He's..."

Somewhere along the way, the words started tumbling out almost without Damian checking them. He's had to describe people before... but never before has he had to describe Grayson. Words are not enough, they aren't right, yet there are so many of them...

Just not the right ones.

"He's a good man."

He listens to what must be the equivalent to gushing for Damian. It doesn't take a detective to realize that Damian is 1) very close to the Dick in his world and 2) has borderline hero worship for him. For Damian, it must be almost the same as it was for Dick when he met the Bruce here. Almost but not quite. So many similarities but the differences were glaring and just ended up making you feel uncomfortably homesick.

"You're right: my jokes are actually funny."

But he stops teasing and looks more understanding.

"Meeting me must be like me meeting B. Meeting someone you're close to who's almost but not quite. Makes you a little homesick, doesn't it?"

Dick Grayson was the first person to earn Damian's respect and trust in his life. One of the very few, still. And talking about it all is not easy. And yet - nobody has ever taught Damian Wayne to take the easy way out of a situation. Or even really suggested that he is allowed to.

"I rather doubt that." ... he has an odd sense of humor. It usually involves much too much violence and death for a Grayson's taste.

He cants his head slightly, then shakes his head. "Not homesick. I do not get that. But it is making me keenly aware of his absence."

Not enough times to any 'home' he's had to be homesick. But this all? Has made him aware of missing Grayson, little as he's willing to call it that.

"Hey, I'm just a little off my game. Being tossed onto a giant bioluminescent turtle will do that."

Dick looks puzzled. Someone who never gets homesick? Then again, Dick's idea of "homesick" is a little unorthodox-- he gets homesick for people, not so much for locations. He spent a good chunk of his childhood traveling, after all.

"You never get homesick? Because you can be homesick for people too."

"That is not why. I don't... find the same things humorous as most people." Beat. "One gets used to the place. It seems those who have died before coming here have more difficulty adjusting, but everybody appears to find a way. Or... almost everybody."

He looks up (not much) and over.

"I suppose you could. If you ever got to know anybody for more than a year or two or so."

Fact. His longest acquaintance is, technically, his mother. It dates, also technically, a little over three years back, and a good third of that time has been spent away from her, part of that as an enemy, as per her own choice, of hers. He barely has a home, even as far as people go (Grayson and Pennyworth, and possibly Wilkes) - there is nothing to get homesick for.

"But why would you want to be that weak?"

Because it is a weakness. Isn't it.

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