Chapter Text
EARTH 27
I.
Dick’s first thought upon waking is that the air is different. Not in any articulable way — it’s not the smell, the density, the texture. Whatever machinery in his body that is detecting the difference must be ancient. It triggers an instinct. An intuition.
“He’s awake.”
A voice. A surprised one. Dick blinks his eyes, clearing the stickiness from sleep, and sees stalactites.
“Dickie?”
He turns his head, and it’s Jason. Jason in the cave, which isn’t a rare sight anymore, not like it used to be, but still an unexpected one. Last Dick heard, Jason was deep undercover, not willing to share the when, whys, and hows in order to prevent anyone from interfering.
“Aren’t you—” Dick begins, but then he notices the shadows beneath Jason’s eyes, and how he seems far older than when Dick last saw him. There’s also a strange look in his eye. Desperate. Like a hungry dog.
“You’re awake,” Jason says, like he can’t believe it. Dick sits up a little, realizing he’s on a medical cot in the cave. There’s a pulse ox clamped to his finger, a blood pressure cuff wrapped around his left arm. “You’re actually awake,” Jason says again. Then he lunges.
Dick startles, so much so to make the cot frame rattle, but then, once Jason’s arms wrap around him and simply settle there, Dick realizes it’s not an attack. It’s a hug. A very un-Jason hug. Dick would know. He steals Jason hugs whenever possible. Jason hugs are brisk. Bony. The younger boy always drew his body concave, leaving only arms and shoulders for contact.
But now, their chests are pressed together, and Dick feels warm. Cigarette smoke lingers in Jason’s hair, which is pressed against his nose. Jason hasn’t hugged him like that since he was little. Dick’s arms lag in reaction.
“You’re freaking him out.”
Dick looks up, and it’s Tim. Immediately, Dick frowns. Tim looks sickly — pale, too skinny, Dick notices, even before Tim rounds the cot. His hair is long, far longer than the newly trimmed cut Tim had been sporting the last Dick saw him.
Jason pulls away.
“Fuck, sorry,” Jason mutters, quickly turning his head away. Dick knows that movement. It means he’s trying not to cry. Alarm bells ring in his head.
“What happened?” Dick demands. Tim glances at Jason, but Jason is still turned away. “How long was I out?”
A beat of silence. Dick could hear the hum of a computer monitor. Behind Tim and Jason, the batcomputer is open, projecting sterile, blue light onto the cave floor. Dick sees the date in the top corner.
“I was out for a week?” Dick asks. Tim tugs at his ear.
“A long week,” Tim says, not looking at him. Jason isn’t looking at him either. “Do you remember anything… before?”
Dick thinks. He remembers it being a lax week. Some game came out. Damian wanted him to buy it. He was out of milk. The news kept talking about a Bludhaven government official who had a scandal. It rained a lot.
“No,” Dick says slowly, watching his brothers glance at each other. They seem to be debating something. Tim speaks first.
“Two-Face got to you,” Tim says. “You decided to patrol in Gotham with us that night, remember?”
Dick doesn’t, but apparently he doesn’t remember anything.
“He got you real good,” Jason says. “Cracked you over the head with a baseball bat.”
Dick winces, instinctively reaching his arm up to touch the back of his head. Surprisingly, it’s only a little tender. He feels stitches.
“That took me out for a week?” Dick asks.
“Yeah,” Tim says quietly. Dick looks at his brothers. They look tired. Beyond tired. More fragile than Dick has seen them in a while. He wants to hold them in his arms, protect them from being hurt ever again.
“Come here,” Dick says, beckoning at Tim. Jason had gotten his hug, but Tim kept a distance away from the cot. An unsure, wary distance. Tim’s eyes shift at that, and he steps closer. Dick closes the last distance, grabbing Tim’s arm to pull him close. He tucks Tim’s head under his chin, feeling the boy soften against him, his arms slowly wrapping around him, clinging tightly. Dick cards his fingers through Tim’s hair.
Tim’s hair is very long.
They help him upstairs. Dick’s legs feel wobbly, the aftermath of lying in bed all week. Nonetheless, he can walk just fine on his own. Tim and Jason still stick close to him, Tim’s fist not letting go of the hem of his shirt.
“Is Bruce home?” Dick asks. “I want to say hi.”
“He’s out,” Tim says. “Work.”
They lead him up the stairs to his bedroom. Dick’s door is already ajar, and inside, there’s a figure on the bed.
“Damian,” Tim sighs.
Damian is lounged on the covers, a sketchpad in hand. He snaps shut the sketchpad immediately, face curling into a scowl. His eyes settle on Tim, then Jason, then Dick. His face falls slack.
“You,” Damian says. His eyes narrow.
“You?” Dick questions, breaking away from his brothers. Tim’s grip on his shirt doesn’t give until the last minute. He gives Damian a wide smile. “Not even a Grayson?”
Dick jumps on the bed, wrapping Damian up into a hug. Only after a second does he realize Damian isn’t resisting like usual. Instead, he’s oddly pliant. Dick lets go.
“You alright, Dami?” Dick asks, concerned. Damian’s not looking at him, which means something is bothering him. His lips are clamped together. Dick smooths down a cowlick at the back of his head, and Damian wriggles his head away. “Did you miss me?” Dick asks.
Damian doesn’t answer. Not even a stubborn no. A creak in the doorway reminds Dick that Tim and Jason are both there. Both there and staring at the two of them, as though they were specimens to be observed. Tim clears his throat.
“I’m gonna go,” Tim says. “Gonna… take a nap.”
He leaves, and it’s just Jason.
“I’m going to head out too. Before the old man gets back,” Jason says. Dick sits up.
“No, no, stay,” Dick says. Jason hesitates in the doorway. “At least for dinner. Come on, Jay. I haven’t seen you since you went undercover.”
Jason gives him an odd look, but his shoulders relax.
“Fine. Whatever,” Jason says. “I’ll stay for dinner. But then I’m gone.”
Jason leaves them too. And it’s just him and Damian. Damian, who still won’t meet his eyes. Dick sighs.
“Tim tells me it was a real bad week, huh?”
Damian’s arms are crossed. He stares resolutely at Dick’s bedcovers. It seems Alfred has replaced his usual blue sheets with something new and stripey.
“Sorry, kiddo,” Dick says gently, pulling Damian back into a hug. Damian gives only a little resistance. “I didn’t mean to worry you.”
Damian suddenly jerks out of Dick’s grasp.
“I wasn’t worried for you,” Damian snaps, clambering off the bed. He snatches his sketchpad off Dick’s bed then storms out of the room, slamming the door behind him. Dick stares at the door, then falls back onto the bed with a sigh.
“Bruce!” Dick shouts, leaping two steps at a time down the stairs, nose nearly slamming into Bruce’s chest. “Guess who’s awake!”
Bruce is dressed in a suit, which means he just returned from a board meeting. His eyes are tired, face set like stone as he stares down at Dick uncomprehending. Dick’s wide grin falters.
“Uh—”
“Dick,” Bruce says, sounding a bit breathless. There’s a clatter, and Dick realizes he’s dropped his briefcase onto the tile floor. “You’re awake.”
Dick rolls his eyes.
“That’s what everybody has been saying, yes.”
Dick hardly registers as Bruce crushes him into a hug. His ribs ache a little — perhaps they were bruised — and he smells coffee on Bruce’s shirt. Dick lets out a laugh.
“First Jason and now you, huh?” Dick jokes. He feels Bruce stiffen.
“Jason’s here?” Bruce asks, pulling away. His eyes still linger on Dick, tracing him up and down, scanning for injuries.
“What, did you guys get into another fight?” Dick asks. Last Dick knew, Bruce and Jason were getting along fine. Of course, Dick had been unconscious for a week. For all he knew, they could have started a new row. “Come on, B,” Dick says. “I told him to stay for dinner. Just… be okay with that.”
Bruce looks like he wants to argue. Dick expects him to argue — but then Bruce just sighs and collapses a little. A hint at a wan smile curves the edges of his lips.
“You shouldn’t be up, not after what you’ve been through,” Bruce says, picking back up his suitcase and guiding Dick out of the foyer.
“I can take a bump to the head,” Dick says. Bruce stops then, turning to look at Dick seriously. Bruce is a tall man. Seemingly infinitely taller, no matter how much Dick tries to catch up. Insurmountable shoulders, an inmobile face… Wally once asked him what it was like to have Batman as a father. How Dick managed to not be afraid of him. Truth is, Dick is always a little afraid. He knows Bruce loves him, will protect him, but it’s a gut reaction to shudder just a bit when Bruce stares him down.
“It’s more than a bump to the head and you know it,” Bruce says. His eyes scan Dick up and down again, one last search for injuries. He nods, satisfied. “If you’ve had enough with bed rest, go help Alfred in the kitchen. I’m sure he’ll be happy to see you up.”
Alfred has Dick dicing green apples for a pie. The man gives Dick a polite hug upon greeting him, which throws Dick off. Then there was the silence. Alfred always knew Dick liked to talk, and the elderly man would fill the kitchen with mentions from the day’s newspaper, or share old knowledge, like the best way to peel and apple. But Alfred says nothing. Just proceeds with preparing dinner. Dick’s knife thunks again and again against the cutting board. The fruit’s acid itches his nose.
“You know Bruce and Jason hugged me?” Dick says, starting on a new apple. In the corner of his eye, Alfred drops pasta shells into a pot to boil. The pasta shells hit the bottom of the pot heavily. “Amazing what a week can do, huh?”
Alfred slides a lid over the pot.
“You gave them quite a scare,” Alfred says, and nothing more. Dick suddenly feels guilty for joking about his injury. His arm drifts unconsciously toward the back of his head, but he flinches away before he can touch the stitches with his juice covered fingers.
“I feel pretty good, actually, all things considered,” Dick says, slicing into the apple. His knife hits the cutting board with a satisfactory thud. He glances at Alfred. “All thanks to you, Alfred.”
Dick expects a smile. Not a big one, but one of Alfred’s little smiles. He gets nothing.
“I try my best, Master Dick.”
Dick frowns and finishes chopping his apples.
At dinner, the smell of apple pie floats in the air, doing nothing to soften the tension as Jason takes his seat next to Dick, his eyes avoiding Bruce. Bruce does the same. Dick shoots Tim a look, hoping to catch his gaze, but Tim is too focused on the pasta.
“You haven’t made this in forever, Alfred,” Tim praises, sliding a hefty helping onto his plate. Alfred smiles at the boy, and Dick feels a strange twist in his gut.
Damian wanders into the dining room last, a scowl carved onto his face. He takes his usual seat across from Dick, not bothering to acknowledge anyone. After Tim’s brief outburst, it is quiet. Only the scrapes of silverware against porcelain. Dick feels eyes drift to him time to time, senses Jason’s nervous shifting beside him.
“Guys,” Dick says, “it’s too quiet.”
There’s a pause. Then Tim lets out a snort. It disrupts his chewing, and the boy coughs. Damian rolls his eyes.
“Pathetic,” Damian says, but it’s lighthearted. Jason nods at the bit of tomato sauce that had gotten onto Damian’s shirt.
“Speak for yourself, kid.”
Damian huffs at that, and Dick sees Bruce duck his head down a little, trying to hide a smile. Damian catches the motion.
“Father?” Damian cries, sounding outraged. “Are you laughing at me?”
Dick laughs as Bruce tries to defend himself. He’s all too aware of Tim’s tired eyes, the apple pie cooling on the table, the air that still seems to fill his lungs differently. But he must be tired. It’s been a long week.
Everything’s returning back to normal.
II.
At Bruce’s insistence, Dick stays at the manor for three more days. Bruce keeps looking at him like he’s going to fall dead any moment. Each time Bruce looks at him like that, Dick unconsciously touches his stitches. Thing is, Dick has been hit in the head with a baseball bat before. He knows how it hurts. He knows it should hurt more.
But he’s not going to take Bruce’s concern for granted. Admittedly, it’s kind of nice having Bruce go easy on him. Tim gives him similar treatment, and it’s less nice. Not because Dick doesn’t appreciate it, rather Dick feel guilty having the younger boy look out for him. Dick doesn’t know what that week he was unconscious for was like, but if he had to guess, Bruce and Jason argued, leaving Tim as the mediator. No wonder the boy looked exhausted.
On day four, Bruce reluctantly lets Dick head back to Bludhaven — so long as he lets Alfred drive him there. Dick agrees and says goodbye to Tim, who has trouble letting go of their hug, and Damian, who shrugs out of his hug and simply storms off.
The drive over is quiet. Alfred doesn’t say a word.
Upon stepping into his apartment, Dick can’t help but feel… off. He’s aware he’s messy. Each one of his siblings declares such every time they step into his apartment. Even so, there’s order to his messiness. The kitchen counter is for mail. The bedroom armchair for clothes that aren’t quite clean but aren’t quite dirty. His fridge is out of milk. He likes to tack Damian’s sketches and Tim’s odd doodles to the fridge.
But all of that is different.
He picks through the living room carefully. There’s a box next to the doorway now. Filled with mail. His neither clean and neither dirty clothes sit in a laundry basket on the floor of his bedroom. His fridge is stocked with milk. Damian’s drawings and Tim’s doodles have been taped to the kitchen wall.
Dick carefully takes out his phone and calls Bruce. Bruce picks up after three rings.
“Dick?” Bruce asks, sounding alert. “Is everything alright?”
Dick looks around his apartment. It’s his apartment, that’s for sure. But everything is just a little off. He looks down at the phone for a moment, feeling embarrassed for calling Bruce because his already messy apartment got even more confusing.
“Everything’s fine,” Dick says. “But… did any of you come by my apartment while I was gone? Alfred, maybe?”
There’s a pause.
“I believe Tim dropped by. Alfred might have. Why?”
Dick stares at Damian’s wall of drawings.
“Nothing. It’s just some things are out of place.” Dick pauses. “I think Alfred bought me milk.”
There’s a shuffling sound on the other end. Dick imagines Bruce in his office, a mountain of paperwork in front of him.
“Dick, are you okay?” Bruce asks. And Dick gets it. He’s been out for a week, should probably be getting more bed rest, and is now randomly calling to inquire about the organization of his apartment.
“Yeah, I think I just need sleep,” Dick says, walking toward the bedroom. “Sorry for calling.”
Bruce grunts.
“Don’t patrol tonight. Just get some rest,” Bruce says. He hangs up.
Dick can’t sleep, being not accustomed to afternoon naps, and instead opts for an early dinner and orders a pizza. After the pizza, he showers, careful of his stitches, then browses his phone in bed. His eyes ache at the bright light.
It’s sometime around four when Dick hears his living room window creak open. He’s on the top floor of the complex, so he’s not particularly afraid of intruders. The heavy footsteps are also familiar. Only Jason insists on wearing the heaviest, bulkiest boots on the market.
He listens as Jason fumbles around the kitchen for a bit. From the sounds of it, he’s stolen a slice of Dick’s pizza. Dick’s not sure what Jason’s doing here. He sets his phone onto the nightstand then curls over, pretending to be asleep. After a few more minutes, Dick’s bedroom door creaks open.
It’s quiet for a few moments, as though Jason is just watching him. The thought disturbs Dick slightly. This isn’t part of Jason’s usual habits. Unless, of course, Dick has simply never noticed him sneaking into his apartment late at night before.
He’s just about to get up and confront Jason when his brother walks over to the bed, kicks off his shoes, and sits down at the side of the bed. The bed creaks, which should be enough to wake him, so Dick takes it as an invitation to pretend to stir.
“Jason?” he asks, thickening his voice with sleep. He rubs his eyes a little, turns over to face Jason. “What are you doing here?”
Jason doesn’t reply immediately. Instead, he looks down at his hands. He’s out of his gear, which surprises Dick. All he has on are sweatpants and a hoodie. Dick’s hoodie, upon closer glance. The grey one from Hudson University. Dick always saved it for sick days. The hoodie was baggy on him, and he liked curling up on the couch in it.
He’s not sure how Jason got his hands on it.
“You okay?” Dick asks when Jason still hasn’t answered. He sets a palm on Jason’s shoulder. “Did you come all the way from Gotham?”
Jason nods.
“Is it… is it a bad night?” Dick asks. They all have trouble sleeping. Jason particularly. But it’s been a while since Jason came to him because of it. In fact, Dick was sure Jason had been getting better.
“Come on,” Dick says, pulling aside his covers. He pulls on Jason’s arm, and Jason doesn’t resist. He slides into the bed, curling up beneath the covers. Despite Jason’s strange hug four days ago, Dick keeps a bit of distance between them. He knows Jason prefers space. Always has, since he was little. But Dick lets their shoulders brush. A slight, minimal contact. A reassurance that he’s there.
He falls asleep after that.
He goes back to Gotham for the weekend, still unsettled by how he left things with Damian. Alfred, too. He can’t believe things are somehow weird with Alfred.
Before he leaves, he drops by the store, hoping to find that new game Damian wanted. He doesn’t find it. He even asks the store attendant, only to get a blank look.
Dick figures he’ll just buy it online sometime, then.
He sends a quick text to Jason, telling him he’ll be in Gotham that night, in case his brother wants to patrol together. He’s still not sure what went down between Jason and Bruce the other week, but he’s sure Jason feels more distanced than usual.
Jason doesn’t respond.
He arrives in Gotham just a little before dinner. Tim greets him excitedly in the foyer. He holds back on a hug, though, pulling anxiously on his ear lobe instead, until Dick drags him into one. Tim melts into it. Dick ruffles his hair.
“I swore you just got it cut,” Dicks says. “I thought you wanted to go for a shorter look for the summer.”
Tim pauses, and for a moment, they each stare at each other blankly. Tim paws Dick’s hand away.
“Yeah, well, longer suits me better,” Tim says, leading him into the house.
They lounge in the living room watching a movie. At some point, Dick senses a shadow in the doorway.
“Dami,” Dick says, patting the spot on the couch beside him. “Join us.”
The pause that follows is long enough that Dick thinks Damian has left. Then the boy climbs over the back of the couch, plopping down into the seat beside him. Tim glances back at the boy from his sprawl on the floor curiously, but turns back to the movie. Damian gives Tim a scoff. He brushes off Dick’s arm when he tries to hug him, and maintains a foot of distance between them throughout the movie.
Dinner is a quiet affair. Dick bounces with energy, excited to patrol after several days of rest. Bruce is reluctant still, asking Dick if he would not prefer to give it another week. Even Damian looks somewhat enthused that Dick would be joining them after dinner.
“Oh, and Cassandra’s visiting next week,” Bruce says. Tim stills suddenly, looking pale. Dick frowns.
“She’s not here?” Dick asks, keeping an eye on Tim. Tim recovers quickly, diving back into his mashed potatoes.
“No,” Bruce says, eye brows furrowed a bit. “She… well, she—”
“Hong Kong,” Tim supplies. “We called her a few days ago to tell her you were okay, so she’s visiting.”
Tim tugs on his earlobe.
After dinner, they give themselves two hours before heading down to the cave. Dick suits up, the suit hugging him a bit oddly. It was an older suit — he left his usual one back at his apartment — and he figured that was the cause.
Truthfully, Dick had been hoping to patrol with Damian. The boy had been avoiding him like the plague, whether that be eye contact or physical contact. It unsettles Dick because, frankly, he thought Damian had already reached a level where he felt comfortable telling Dick what was wrong. But it seems Dick’s brush with Two-Face knocked them back a step or two.
In the end, Robin goes with Batman, and Red Robin with Nightwing. Tim looks a little better than he did the week before, but Dick figures he could still use some destressing, so he takes Tim to a convenience store and buys him a slushie.
There’s something about walking into a 7/11 at four in the morning, fully decked out in costume, that never fails to make Tim crack up. Dick breaks into a smile at his brother’s giggles, taking a plastic cup and browsing the wall of flavors. The slushies all spin behind their little plastic windows. All bright, neon colors.
“What do you think?” Dick asks. Tim sidles up to him, still giddy.
“Blue orange,” Tim says, and Dick takes a step toward the machines only to pause.
“Blue orange?” Dick repeats. It hits him suddenly how oddly yellow the lighting is, more jaundice than it feels like lights usually are. The difference in the air, again, registers.
“Yeah, blue orange,” Tim says, sounding just as confused. He points to the dispenser toward the far left.
Sure enough, in bold, electric font, the words Blue Orange glow above a spinning circle of bright, acidic blue. Huh, Dick thinks, pressing down on the dispenser and watching the syrup saturated ice churn out. Beneath the lights, the color almost looks chartreuse.
“You sure this stuff is edible?” Dick asks, capping the cup and stuffing in two straws. They make their way to the counter.
“You think this is too sugary?” Tim jokes, and Dick gives him a playful shove.
They sit on an apartment rooftop in a quiet neighborhood, trading the cup back and forth. Their lips are already blue. The ice sits nicely on Dick’s tongue, considering the summer heat. When an alley cat screeches suddenly below, Tim jumps, and Dick laughs. Tim tugs on his ear.
“You keep doing that,” Dick says, reaching over to tug at Tim’s earlobe himself. Tim swats his hand away, blush visible even in the dim blue night. “Since when did that become a habit?”
Tim doesn’t respond. Instead, he takes a long draw of the slushie, gazing out toward the distance, where a hazy, yellow glow surrounds the downtown skyscrapers. Dick follows his gaze. It’s a familiar sight, one that makes him feel at home, no matter which cold, dark corner of Gotham he is in. Because it’s so familiar, Dick frowns at the tall, pointed skyscraper just left of the SunTrust building. The building is mostly indiscernible, save for the green lights that circle it’s pyramidal top.
He glances at Tim, wondering if the boy sees what he sees, but Tim looks content, lips growing bluer by the second. Dick looks back at the building, gut churning sour. He knows for certain the skyscraper was not there before, and even if construction had started the moment Two-Face cracked him over the head with a baseball bat, it couldn't have been built within a week.
III.
Dick does some googling. He jots down an address, calls Jason, and convinces him to get lunch together.
Jason agrees, but begrudgingly so. He shows up twenty minutes late to the brunch place Dick finds, hands deep in the pocket of his jeans. Dick hasn’t seen Jason since that night Jason snuck into his apartment. Dick still isn't sure what that was all about. Jason was gone by morning.
“So, why are we here?” Jason asks, pulling open the menu and idly scanning its contents.
“I wanted to check in on you,” Dick says, and Jason gives an adolescent eye-roll.
When the waiter drops by, Dick orders a water and Jason a sweet tea. The waiter returns, drinks in hand. Dick watches as Jason sips from his tea, completely ignoring the slice of lime that bobs among the ice.
They wind up both ordering waffles and chicken, arguing only a little bit beforehand that they couldn’t both order the same thing. As soon as the waiter sets down their plates, Jason does a quick scan, then swaps their dishes. “He gave you more chicken,” Jason explains.
They don’t really talk about things. That’s just how their relationship is. Instead, they make fun of each other relentlessly, Dick jabbing at the leather jacket Jason has worn despite the heat, and Jason at the designer sunglasses sitting on Dick’s head. It feels good, so much so that Dick nearly forgot his purpose for this brunch until Jason stands up to leave.
“Wait,” Dick says, latching his arm out to clasp over Jason’s wrist. “I need to show you something.”
Jason digs his heels in a little, but lets Dick drag him through the summer heat down three blocks until they’re firmly downtown. The traffic is louder there, the sun seemly brighter, having been deflected off multiple glass surfaces and onto the street. Dick keeps a fist clamped around the sleeve of Jason’s jacket the entire time, and they look odd, but Dick doesn’t mind. He can’t let Jason run off.
He stops in front of the glass Shasha C. Walker building, just an address number up from the SunTrust building. Jason looks at him in confusion as they stop in front of the building. Dick gestures up at it.
“What is this?” Dick demands. He expects Jason to give in, to crumble, but Jason’s confusion doesn’t falter.
“It’s, uh, a building,” Jason says. He squints at the sign. “The Sasha C. Walker building, apparently.”
People are weaving past them on the street.
“Dick,” Jason asks cautiously, as if dealing with a wild animal. “Is something wrong?”
And it’s the unsureness in Jason’s voice that almost brings Dick down. He looks back up at the building. It’s so ordinary, so easy to miss, considering all the other skyscrapers that crowd downtown. For any other Gothamite, even one that has lived in the city all their life, it wouldn’t be crazy to have glimpsed past this one building for so long. But Dick isn’t any Gothamite. He knows the city front and back.
“It’s just,” Dick begins, “this building is new. It wasn’t here before.”
He doesn’t clarify to Jason what ‘before’ constitutes, but he sees the way Jason stiffens, and pounces on that immediately.
“Jason,” Dick says, stepping closer to his brother. “This wasn’t here before.”
“Before what,” Jason says, sounding annoyed. His shoulders are tense. “Come on, Dickie. We’re in the way.”
A man’s shoulder hits Dick’s as he passes, but Dick ignores it.
“This wasn’t here before,” Dick states again. Whatever flash of truth Jason showed earlier is gone. Hidden. “Jason, just—” he isn’t sure what he’s begging for. He tugs on Jason’s arm, and whatever face he must be making softens Jason’s.
“Dickie,” he says gently. “Let’s go. You need to sit down.”
Jason’s hand curls around his arm, and Dick’s feet stumble along as Jason pulls him forward.
Instead of the manor, Jason takes him back to a safe house. He sits Dick down on his dust covered couch, pushing a bottle of water into Dick’s hands. They sit in silence, even though there are several things Dick wants to say, like it wasn’t there before, or a skyscraper can’t be built in a week, not in Gotham.
Dick settles with just one question.
“How long was I out?”
Jason glances at him. He’s taken a seat on the coffee table in front of him, which looked like it could hardly support the books Jason had piled on top of it, much less Jason himself. Jason plays with a fraying patch in his jeans.
“Jason,” Dick says. Jason lets out a heavy breath.
“Fine, okay. You were out longer.”
Dick holds his breath.
“How much longer?”
Jason’s eyes drift up to meet his own, and they’re sad. Unbelievably sad, holding a weight which crushes the breath out of Dick’s chest.
“Close to four months,” Jason says. There’s a quiet between them. The old air conditioning unit that cools Jason’s apartment huffs by the window.
“Four months,” Dick repeats. Jason nods. “Why did you lie?”
Jason flinches at that.
“We didn’t want to freak you out,” Jason says. He looks down at his lap. “Two-Face really got you good, and… we really didn’t think you’d make it.”
Dick’s hand drifts up to the stitches. They hardly hurt. Then again, four months is a long time to heal. Suddenly, Jason’s hug makes sense. Tim’s hair. Damian’s distance.
Jason ducks his head down.
“Hey,” Dick says, standing up. He kneels in front of Jason, pulling him close until the younger boy’s head hides in the crook of his neck. He knows Jason won’t cry. Nothing makes Jason cry these days — but he wants Jason to know he can if he wants to, and that, if he does, Dick won’t let anyone see.
He rubs Jason’s back and smells cigarette smoke thick in his hair. Vaguely, Dick recalls Jason telling him he was trying to quit, but if Dick had been out for four months, Dick wouldn’t be surprised if Jason started again.
It’s only later that night, once he’s driven back to his Bludhaven apartment, that Dick wonders about that date he’d seen on the Batcomputer and how, four months earlier, it would have still been spring, despite Dick’s clear memory of summer rain drenching the Bludhaven streets. In bed, Dick googles the length of time it takes to build a skyscraper. It takes four years.
EARTH 32
IV.
Jason scratches at his nicotine patch. He looks down at the three kids standing in the doorway of his safehouse, waiting to be let in.
“You see,” Jason says, gesturing, “when you stand in a row together like that, you look like gremlins.”
Damian scowls and pushes past him. The other two teenagers follow.
“Hey,” Jason says, eyeing Cass’s expensive looking boots. “Shoes off, all of you.”
They all ignore him. Jason collapses back onto his dust covered couch, thumbing open his book where he left it. He figures that if his siblings are here, they have something to say. Their current rummaging through Jason’s kitchen for junk food is merely their attempt to buy time. Toughen up. If he were Dick, he’d probably join them in the kitchen and nicely pry out their secrets with candy and hugs, but he’s Jason, and Jason plans to let them figure themselves out.
Finally, it’s Cass that emerges from the kitchen, a honey bun he hadn’t even known existed unwrapped in her hands. She takes a bite.
“Dick’s not here,” she says. Tim and Damian pop out of the doorway as well, looking back and forth between them.
“Did you think he’d be here?” Jason asks. Cass shrugs. She plops down on the end of the couch, where a throw blanket has been crammed into the cushions. Cass takes it out, holding it in front of her. The fabric is light pink and decorated with small, blue robins.
“He’s nowhere else,” she says.
“His apartment?” Jason asks, frowning when Cass elects to stuff the blanket back into the cushions. Sometimes, he doesn’t understand her.
“We checked,” Tim chimes in. “He’s not there either.”
“Huh,” Jason says, flipping a page of his book. He blinks when the book is ripped out of his hands.
“Pay attention, Todd. Have you seen Grayson or not?” Damian demands.
“That’s a vintage copy, you know,” Jason lies. Damian hesitates, setting Jason’s book onto the coffee table, which wobbles precariously under the sheer number of books scattered across it. Then Damian crosses his arms.
“Where is Grayson,” Damian demands. Jason sneers up at the kid.
“I don’t know, running away from you, perhaps.”
Tim snorts.
“I am serious, Todd,” Damian says. He unsheathes a throwing knife out of thin air, holding it in front of Jason’s face. Jason raises an eyebrow. “Where is he?”
“Okay, first of all,” Jason says, “don’t point that thing at me. Secondly, I don’t know. I keep a healthy distance from him, unlike some people.”
Damian growls.
“Come on,” Cass says, eyeing Jason. “He doesn’t know.”
Damian stares at him a bit longer, but tears away, convinced by his sister.
“I’ll be back, Todd,” Damian says, Tim dragging him out of the apartment. Jason sighs, flopping back down onto his couch.
“Sure thing, kid.”
It’s not that Jason cares about going to ‘family dinner’, as everyone calls it. It’s just that, every week, Dick sends Jason a text asking if he wants to go. On the occasions Jason says yes, Dick drops by and picks him up, and they enter the house together, relieving Jason of the awkwardness he gets whenever he’s at the manor on his own.
But this week, there’s no text. As much as Jason hates to admit, he’s checked his phone throughout the entire day. But nothing. Briefly, he wonders if he’s done something to piss Dick off. Even so, Dick still invites him after a fight, even though Jason always turns him down then.
Suddenly, the gremlins’ visit becomes a lot more concerning.
He tells himself to chill out, then takes his bike and heads to Wayne Manor. It’s summer, the sky beyond the house a late evening pink. From outside the gates, Jason can just make out a few lights on: Cass’s room, the library, and the dining room. In the driveway, Dick’s car is missing.
There are, of course, several explanations as to why. Dick could’ve been driven by Alfred. Dick could’ve spent the weekend there and moved his car to the garage. For all Jason knows, Dick could’ve totaled his car.
He stands there on his bike for a second, lulled by the heavy, humid air and steady croak of crickets. The manor almost appears normal. Just any family’s house.
Jason turns away, kicking back up his bike. He zooms off onto the road back toward his safehouse.