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There was a lot that happened in the past twenty-four hours.
Dick had little warning before portals started opening up in the sky. He’d gotten an alert from the Justice League that they would face a worldwide attack, but he’d had zero time to prepare. Dick remembered running to a nearby port-a-potty to frantically put on his mask, rip his clothes off, and dress in his Nightwing costume. He also remembered barely getting out of the port-a-potty before a flying parademon from Apokalips flew down to grab at it. He’d spent hours fighting after that - teaming up with Spoiler who happened to be in his city at the time - and then Harley Quinn had joined them with a colorful confetti cannon.
They made an odd team.
The portals started closing after a day of fighting. Dick knew that meant that the League had somehow handled it - which had been great news - because Dick hadn’t been sure if he was capable of pushing himself any farther.
Dick wanted nothing more than return home, rest his head on a pillow, and pass out. He sort of gets his wish when Harley Quinn whacks him in the back of his head.
“Harley!” He remembered Stephanie scolding.
“I’m sorry! I guess I was too excited!”
Dick still didn’t know how he got knocked-out, but he assumed it had something to do with Harley messing around with her bat. Getting hit in the head with a bat was a big no-no. Dick hadn’t been surprised to wake up in the batcave in the middle of a medical analysis. His head throbbed angrily - it still did - and Harley Quinn hadn’t been hanging around for him to yell at her. Just because she was a new member of the Bird’s of Prey didn’t mean she had batcave privileges, so it explained why she was conveniently missing. Dick knew he’d find her later to complain, though, if she didn’t decide to vanish on him.
The entire family was in the batcave. Everyone was tired. Bruce was slumped with his cowl off, running a hand down his face, and he hadn’t moved from the batcomputer’s chair since Dick had roused. Jason was sitting on the floor looking absolutely beat, withdrawn, and exhausted. Tim was sitting on a cot next to Dick with Alfred bandaging his arm, Barbara was fiddling with her belt next to the display cabinets, and Cass was standing next to her silently observing. Finally, Stephanie had been the one tending to Dick, running a scanner over him to check for other injuries that might have been inflicted on him. She confirmed that he had a concussion (wasn’t that just absolutely fantastic?) which would explain why Dick was having a hard time with the beaming lights that lit up the cave. It’d also explain why he had difficulty… thinking.
But the concussion hadn’t been enough to stop him from noticing a critical detail.
“Where’s Damian?”
Bruce pulls his hand away from his face. Tim stiffens. Jason looks up from the floor. Barbara stops messing with her belt. Cass presses her lips together. Stephanie pauses in scanning Dick. Alfred inhales sharply.
And, oh, Dick didn’t like that. He didn’t like that at all.
“Where’s Damian?” He repeats. He can feel the tension gather in his shoulders.
The silence from his entire family prevails despite his question. Dick starts to feel worry, anger, and desperation mix in his chest all at once.
Bruce turns in his chair. He starts typing furiously at the bat computer's keyboard.
“I thought he hitched a ride with Bruce,” Jason sounds from the floor looking rather bothered. His jaw was tight.
“He told me he had a ride with someone else,” Bruce deflects.
Dick glances over at the rest of his family. Tim catches his eyes. He shakes his head.
So it wasn’t Tim-
Dick looks over at Cass. Dick knew she would have spoken up if it had been her-
“It was me.”
Barbara’s voice sounds small and guilty.
“He was going to ride with me,” she whispers, “but I guess I had been too caught up in rescuing people because I… I took my bike to a nearby burning building and…”
Stephanie stumbles back as Dick pushes himself off of the cot.
“He told me it was fine when I commed him- I just… forgot…”
“Barbara,” Dick exhales shakily, voice on the verge of fury, “you left my son.”
Barbara averts her eyes. Dick kept his attention on her with an unrelenting strength, never wavering from her figure, because Barbara had left. his. son.
Dick lifts a finger to the comm in his ear.
“Robin? Report.”
Dick waits for a second with anxious anticipation. He knew that Damian was probably okay, but that didn’t mean Dick wasn’t afraid that something might have gone wrong. Anything could have happened to Damian - anything - and Dick was going to go emotionally beserk if Damian didn’t respond.
“Nightwing. This is Robin. The situation is clear.”
The tension in the cave’s atmosphere relaxes. Dick feels a tinge of relief, but it wasn’t enough to push away the anxiety. Now that Dick knew that Damian was okay all he wanted was to see him, and he wouldn’t be fine until he saw Damian in person.
“What is your location?”
Dick is already aware that Bruce had probably pulled up Damian’s tracker on the batcomputer, but that didn’t stop him from asking.
“Sending coordinates.”
“Any injuries?”
“Minor abrasions.”
“Stay there. I’m coming to get you.”
“Affirmative.”
“Dick-” Stephanie protests immediately, lowering the scanner to her side, “you aren’t in any condition to go anywhere.”
“Steph. Move.”
Stephanie stares at him with wide eyes. It must have been because of Dick’s tone because in the next moment she is quietly stepping to the side. Dick knew he was being unreasonable, taking his anger out on the people around him, but he wouldn’t be normal until he made sure Damian was where he belonged.
“Master Dick, you mustn’t leave in your condition,” Alfred insists.
“Sorry, Alfred. I’m leaving. If anybody tries to stop me - I will not hesitate to fight - because there is no way in hell anybody is keeping me from bringing my son home!”
“You have a concussion,” Alfred informs him calmly.
Dick wasn’t feeling too calm. He doesn’t say anything in response. He fears saying something he’d regret. He didn’t want to do that to Alfred. He instead makes his intentions clear by heading straight for his motorcycle.
“Wait!” Barbara calls from the side.
Dick suppresses a growl. He instead turns to look at her over his shoulder with a deep frown.
“Let me take you,” Barbara says, “we can go in my car.”
Barbara jogs over to Dick. She keeps her distance.
“It’s dangerous for you to drive,” she explains, “and I need to apologize to Damian.”
Dick considers Barbara coldly. Dick wasn't sure if he wanted to be in an enclosed space with Barbara, but he also knew this was her way of making up for her mistake. Would he take that away from her?
He relents.
“Fine.”
Barbara looks behind her to nod shortly at the rest of the family, probably communicating that she had it handled, but Dick doesn’t stick around to wait for their reaction. He changes his route from his motorcycle to the manor where he’d have to walk to the car garage.
Barbara follows silently. Dick takes long strides, ignoring the ache in his head, even as each step makes his head throb. He distantly registers that Barbara was struggling to keep up with him, but he didn’t care. He hurt, his boy was out in the middle of Gotham, and Dick was exhausted from literally fighting for almost twenty four hours.
Dick waits by Barbara’s car when he reaches it. He waits impatiently for her to jog to the driver’s side. When she unlocks the car, Dick swings the side door open, and sits himself down in a rush. He pulls his seat-belt over his chest, fumbles with the buckle, and then narrows his eyes on the exit. He’d rather look out the side window than look at Barbara.
You’re being unnecessarily hurtful, the angel on his shoulder says.
She left my baby! Dick replies angrily.
Barbara starts the car up. She buckles her own seatbelt, pulls the car in reverse, and backs up from her parking spot. After she shifts the car back into drive, she presses on the gas, and drives them outside the car garage. Dick watches as the car runs down the manor’s driveway, out the gate, and then on the road.
She had left her phone out on her lap. Dick sees her glance at it every once in a while to narrow in on Damian’s location. They both stay terribly silent as they cut through the city. Dick felt like his breathing was the loudest thing in the car, or maybe even the beat of his heart.
I’m angry.
He was angry at Harley Quinn for knocking him out. He was angry at Barbara for leaving Damian. He was angry at his family for not realizing Damian was missing to begin with. He was angry he had a concussion, and that he couldn’t drive himself. He was angry at himself for not being more situationally aware after fighting parademons.
And - holy crap - why didn’t Damian say anything!?
Why hadn’t he commed anyone?
Was he telling the truth about having ‘minor abrasions?’
“Dick-” Barbara starts.
Dick holds up his hand.
“Not now, Babs.”
Barbara nods reluctantly. She withdraws back into herself again, and Dick feels like a jerk about it. Still. He couldn’t trust himself. If they actually had a conversation - he wasn’t sure he wouldn’t explode on her - and he’d rather not have to build up the tension.
Barbara finally pulls up to a clove of buildings. Dick fumbles with the seatbelt again, trying to get it off of him as quickly as possible, and then he tears it off of his body. He’s hopping out of the car before he even knows where he’s going, and he starts searching the rooftops from the sidewalk with his eyes.
This must look ridiculous.
Nightwing had just hopped out of a civilian car - with Batgirl - but fortunately there didn’t seem to be anybody around. Nightwing would have taken the batmobile instead if he wanted to use a car, but the batmobile only had two seats. Barbara wouldn’t have been able to drive him - Dick would probably end up crashing Batman’s main source of transportation - and that would just have been a whole mess.
Dick raises his fingers to his comm.
“Robin. We are at your location.”
“Understood.”
Dick waits. He waits for a few seconds, with bated breath, while his eyes continue to roam the skies.
Finally, after an eternity (it sure felt like it), Damian pops up on the building to his left. Dick watches as Damian crawls out of a window, waves at the window, and then starts scaling down the fire escape staircase. Damian then lands on the ground with muted feet.
Damian looks up at him with eyes hidden by a green domino mask.
Dick doesn’t stick in the same spot.
“Damian-” He pushes out of his throat. He reaches out for him. Dick forces himself to walk over to him despite the swirling in his brain. He grabs at Damian’s arms with an empty head threatening to knock him off balance with a dizzy whirl.
“It’s Robin,” Damian hisses because they were in public.
Dick couldn’t bother to comment on it. He just felt so, so, so relieved.
He starts to fall.
“Nightwing!” Damian shouts. His hands fly to support Dick’s weight by grabbing an arm, but all that really does is bring them both down on the ground. Damian releases a curse. Dick hears him call for Barbara. Dick is just glad to hear him talking in person.
“I’m sorry, I’m so sorry ,” Dick whispers, grabbing Damian, and capturing him in his arms. Damian releases a startled yelp when he does it. “I should have - I should have made sure you were okay - I -”
“You and your hero complex,” Damian hisses. “I’m fine.”
Dick pulls back slightly to look at his son. His eyes roam Damian’s features, finding the similarities with his own face, and thinks back to when Damian had just been a toddler. Dick remembered his sweet laughter, his baby tooth smile, and he mourns when he remembered the woman who’d taken it all from him. He wanted to make up for all the lost time. He wanted to protect Damian. He wanted him to know - he wanted him to know - that Dick would always be there for him.
“My baby,” Dick whispers. He cups the back of Damian's head, and presses a kiss against his temple.
Damian’s ears go red.
“I - are we really doing this right now?”
“You’ll have to forgive him, Robin. He has a concussion,” Barbara says. Dick hadn’t heard her approach. He hadn’t been focusing on her, “and I also wanted to apologize. I said I’d take you home, but I got caught up with all of the drama. That was a real stupid move on my part.”
Damian gives Barbara a confused look from where his chin was now resting on Dick’s shoulder. Dick still had yet to release him from his embrace.
“It’s fine. I told you that you should focus on the mission.”
Barbara looks regretful. “I forgot to pick you up. You should be angry at me.”
“I assumed someone would come back for me. You did. What is there to be angry about?”
Barbara adopts an equally confused expression.
“Because I left you-”
“Don’t worry, Dami,” Dick interjects. “I’ll make sure things are okay. I’ll make sure you’re safe.”
Dick knew he wasn’t really making any sense, but he was just so disorientated.
“You are mental, Nightwing.”
Dick almost sobs joyfully. “That’s my boy. He’s insulting me. Can’t you see Ba-”
Damian slaps a hand over Dick’s mouth.
“Stop saying our civilian names!” he scolds.
Dick grabs Damian’s hand and presses a kiss against his palm.
“Wha-”
Damian stares wide-eyed.
“We need to get you back to base, pronto,” Damian says.
Dick hums happily. He allows Damian to prop up his weight on one side, and Barbara slides in on the other. He tries to help them drag himself to the car, and doesn’t complain when they deposit him in the back seat.
Damian takes Dick's previous spot at the shotgun. Dick is vaguely aware that Barbara was talking to Damian, but all he could focus on was his baby . His son.
“You are ridiculous, Nightwing,” Dick registers Damian say.
“You are so special,” Dick returns woozily.
He feels satisfied with Damian’s red tinted cheeks.