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 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.

So Bruce really didn't give Dick a very good run-down when it came to the other Batkids, so you'll have to forgive his confusion a little. Because he does look rather confused and concerned. A kid who can't feel homesick, not even for people?

"You haven't?"

Damian's next statement just makes him feel even more concerned.

"It's not weak to miss someone."

Right.

"How much did Father tell you?"

"About you? Not much. All I know is that your mother is Talia."

Which, realistically, isn't that hard for him to wrap his head around. Bruce and Talia did have a thing once upon a time. Maybe it just went farther in another dimension. Though he can't see Bruce and Talia settling down, not with Bruce still suiting up as Batman. Meaning the relationship is very, very complicated and Damian is caught in the middle. Kind of sad.

Damian nods, slightly - that is the question he meant Grayson to answer.

"Father - or the family he created - did not know about my existence until I was ten. And I have been trained by the League since I was three." Trained. Not raised. "I was not introduced to Mother until my eighth birthday... and my connection with her is now severed. So, no. I have not known anyone all that long."

And also, that is where his standards on weak and strong have been established. But he doesn't address that issue directly... yet.

That's... rather sad. He didn't entirely understand Talia's motives but, then again, he didn't know her particularly well. He'd been pretty early into his career as Robin when they broke it off and he's only met her since then when he and Bruce have gone up against her dad.

Damian grew up away from his parents, without even meeting his mother until what must be relatively recently (and then losing her not long after to... something) and knowing his father until even more recently. Dick may have lost his parents, but at least he'd had them for nine years. Damian had even less than that.

But if he's figured out anything about Damian so far, it's that he probably doesn't want Dick's pity. He was a lot like his father, after all.

"Knowing B, you'll have time to get to know people now. But, you know, you can miss people you haven't known very long. I've only known some of my friends for a few months and I..." It feels weird to admit this, but he's trying to prove a point "...already sort of miss them."

"I've talked with him more here than I ever did, back home." Beat. "Though part of that was by fault of my own anger." And Bruce's confusion, but Damian hasn't thought that far.

And his eyebrow arches over the mask (the mask that is more Nightwing than Robin, if he's fair, but he's not thinking about that). "I'm positive you can. You are accustomed to knowing people, to letting them close, to - to caring and being cared for. I was... taught," trained, "not to."

His eyes wander towards the Metal sector. Mother probably thought that people are expendable. Or that Father just went on after any loss, so he must not really care. Which... if not for Grayson's talks, Damian wouldn't know better.

Then again. If not for Grayson's talks, and later Brown's, he wouldn't know the difference all that much.

"And I was taught to strive for strength, not weakness. Such as sentimentality."

Again, he listens carefully. Maybe it's his so-called sentimentality at work, but he suspects that Damian might have this "weakness" more than he realizes. Maybe Damian did miss the Dick he knew and just didn't understand what missing someone felt like. He's never had the chance, and any sense of attachment or affection was evidently discouraged (maybe even punished) during his childhood.

"I never understood why people see sentimentality or kindness as weaknesses. Caring about other people instead of just wanting to conquer-- that can be pretty powerful. Maybe even more powerful."

He considers.

"But... do you understand what it feels like to be cared for now?"

Damian stares at him at the first part, then looks away, crossing his arms before his body in a gesture that's just this side of hugging himself.

"Why? Other than the facts that it's a distraction when you should be focused, a vulnerability - both to the people you care for and through them - a weight when you need to be agile and flexible, and all sorts of complications? It makes you act illogically, less than optimally. Maybe that's why."

Beat.

"The opposite doesn't have to be wanting to conquer." Crossly. Because, no, he doesn't. And it has nothing to do with caring, but what is needed... as he sees it.

The question, on the other hand? Gets silence, for a stretch.

"Maybe."

Yes. He does. Not because of his own flesh and blood, though. Because of people who shouldn't have, in the first place. And yet... they somehow did. Or faked it better than his Mother, anyway.

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