Chapter Text
"Flash! Down!"
The batarang that spins through the air is unexpected.
Barry catches a glimpse of the metal as the sun strikes its serrated edges, spends almost a microsecond too long trying to figure out what it is, and nearly gets slashed across the face before his subconscious mind thankfully overrides his curiosity and sets his molecules vibrating fast enough to allow the weapon to pass through his body harmlessly.
The time he devotes to determining where the object came from earns him a blast to the chest from one of Trickster's gadgets and, as he falls, a wallop to his knee from an unknown source.
Cursing his lack of focus, Barry manages to twist until the fall is less fatal and more simply uncontrolled. He takes the brunt of it across his left forearm, which, although incredibly painful, is still less debilitating than landing on his back.
"What that...?"
The accent lets the speedster know it's Boomerang speaking. The sound of the impact and the way the villain is holding his hand, like something was ripped from his grasp, suggests the batarang hit its target.
Some quick math tells Barry that target had been located directly behind his own head.
As he gathers himself into a runner's crouch, prepared to rejoin the fight, he takes the moments between the blink of his eyes to reassess the situation.
Trickster's fist is curled around what are probably a handful of explosive marbles the speedster will no doubt find underfoot shortly.
Captain Cold is in the process of pivoting toward his left, his cold gun just clearing his chest with an upwards trajectory.
Mirror Master is across the street, his mirror gun already raised and pointed in the desired direction.
Damian hangs above both Snart and McCulloch, the arc of his flight positioning him within the "X" of their combined aim.
Barry doesn't know what he screams, but neither villain spares him a glance.
"Well, look at that, a baby Robin," Snart sneers, the words long and drawn out to Barry's ears as the speedster starts to move. "Should've stayed home, baby bird. This ain't your city."
Cold reaches firing position just as the force of the mini tornado Barry directs at McCulloch hits him in the legs. For a second the speedster doesn't think it's enough, but then, all too slowly, one knee buckles and the shot of reflected light goes high, missing Damian's torso by several inches.
And slicing through the grapple line.
Barry's already in motion, but so are the other Rogues.
He registers the sharp clatter of Axel's marbles across the pavement, braces himself for the skid, and almost breaks his ankle when instead of gliding through the obstacle his boots seem to catch and stick in place.
In the time it takes him to look down and see the spreading puddle of goo under foot, Damian is careening into Cold with a flip that would have been much more elegant and efficient if he'd had the space to correctly execute it. As it is, he's more cannonball than guided missile as he plows into Snart's side.
Unfortunately, Snart sees it coming, and while it's also a far cry from graceful, manages to spin with Damian's force, going to the ground with the young vigilante beneath him.
Barry would help, but it's costing him precious moments to determine whether he needs to generate friction or vibrate to break free of the bubbling mess tugging rubber band-like at his treads.
Thankfully, Captain Cold's skill at hand-to-hand combat is vastly weaker than Robin's, the former used to the distance afforded by his cold gun (and the fact that fighting a speedster in-close is a painful, lost cause). Damian is already rolling with the impact, pulling his knees to his chest before the villain can completely flatten him, then kicking out hard as he hits the ground on his back.
With a howl of rage, the boy sends Cold flying head over heels, finishing the roll with a lift of his shoulders that brings his feet arcing over his head and ready for the handspring that brings him back standing upright.
He doesn't seem to know or care that Snart is flailing straight for the closest lamp post, and by the time it finally registers in Barry's mind that Trickster's mystery substance is slowly crawling up the material of his boots and is mere inches from his legs, it's all he can do to jettison the offending footwear with enough time to send a blast of compressed air between Captain Cold and the metal post to keep the man's spine from shattering on impact.
Snart's right arm and leg take the brunt of the force with a sickening thwang, and the man crumbles to the sidewalk in a heap.
Barry's reward is a blast from Weather Wizard's wand that he just manages to avoid the worst of by going intangible. It still leaves his hands and feet spasming and causes his breath to stutter. He fights through it, tracking the attack back to its source and taking off for the man's position.
"You see that?" Mardon roars indignantly. "Fuckin' bat almost killed Cold! Take 'em down! Hard!"
The dialogue might be woefully cliché, but the threat is real. The combined might of the Rogues is a bad day when they're playing by Central City rules; Barry has no idea what they'll do if they decide to play by Gotham's.
He attempts to clothesline Weather Wizard at the same time Damian takes a running leap at Boomerang. Mardon feints left before trying to take to the sky; Boomerang lets one of his creations fly at the boy's head.
Pounding his bare feet against the pavement, Barry manages to generate a pocket of air dense enough to lift him the inches he needs to catch Mardon by the ankle before he's out of range. Out of the corner of his eye, he sees Robin send some kind of weapon flying that connects with the boomerang and redirects into a nearby trashcan. The contents scatter scant seconds before the can itself explodes.
"Robin," Barry whispers, shock making the word catch in his throat. Damian is already leap-frogging over Harkness, rotating in mid-air to deliver a wicked round-house to the man's head before landing in a crouch to sweep his feet out from under him. Harkness goes down with a loud oomph and a groan.
The speedster, still stuck on the fact that Boomerang lobbed an explosive at a person, nearly looses his grip on Mardon, who's still try to escape into the air. Barry's feet pump harder to keep up as he gets both hands around the man's leg; then, without warning, he stops all motion. Unprepared for the added weight and jarring descent, the man's attention breaks just enough that Barry can pull him back earthward. Cushioning his own fall with another pocket of air, the speedster yanks Mardon just far enough down that the super-speed punch bypasses his stomach and clips his jaw.
Weather Wizard crumbles, and Barry lets him collapse to the pavement, sparing a second to grab the wand and bind his hands.
That leaves Trickster and Mirror Master, who are sharing a glance across the battlefield as if to ask each other whether this is the hill they want to die on. After witnessing what Robin did to Snart, they might very well be meaning the question literally.
Then Axel grins his demented grin and slides a hand into his pocket; a curled fist emerges. McCulloch has a moment of hesitation before he raises his mirror gun. Both are tracking Damian.
The boy is already moving, flying in for the finish.
Barry sees it all play out seconds before the two villains attack.
Mirror Master's finger tightens on the trigger, the beam of light emerging from the barrel of his weapon. Trickster flings his arm out and a cloud of silver projectiles fills the air. Barry knows he can only stop one attack and then it's on to damage control.
He has no idea the entirety of Trickster's arsenal, but if Damian is struck by the mirror gun, his survival rests on either the kindness of McCulloch's heart to let him out of the mirrorverse or Barry's ability to wrest the weapon away before the man can sabotage it and trap the boy inside permanently.
The speedster picks the devil he knows, praying that the Robin suit is as resilient as Batman's and that Damian is even half the acrobat Dick is. And that Axel hasn't cooked up something especially nasty that would give Barry a headache but kill an ordinary person; of the Rogues, he's easily the most unpredictable. Grabbing two sheets of fallen metal, he hurls one vertically, end-over-end, into the path of the light beam and sends the other, frisbee-like, at McCulloch.
Then he peels off to intercept Robin.
The projectiles make contact scant seconds after Mirror Master's deflected attack turns part of the sidewalk to glass and the villain is taken off his feet, body folding in half around the second projectile and flung into the side of a building. Barry can see Damian brace for some kind of blast, and he himself adjusts to ensure he can catch the vigilante with enough space to bleed off the force and prevent broken bones and bruised internal organs.
It's why he's several feet out of position when, instead of sending the boy reeling backwards, whatever substance Axel's created seems to burst from the spheres and create a gelatinous, malleable wall that stretch-bends around Damian's body as he strikes its surface. It's enough like rubber that the boy could still be sent hurtling backwards; however, it encases him like a cast, suddenly going rigid and practically stopping his motion cold.
The speedster pivots and almost skids out trying to course correct.
Robin drops from the sky.
A sideways redirect of compressed air isn't going to help. Getting underneath for a clean catch is out.
With a shower of heat-blasted gravel, Barry keeps himself positioned low, gains as much speed as he can, and then does his best impression of a baseball player stealing home plate. Catching Damian scant inches from the ground, not fighting the added weight as it drags him down, he goes into a slide that carries them along the street in a curtain of debris, Barry's body shielding the boy's from the friction that shreds his own costume and ravages his back and side.
When they finally stop, barely missing a line of parked cars, Barry seriously considers never moving again – or, at the very least, giving up and taking a long nap right there in the street. Then Damian groans, and it's with effort and a painful breath that suggests broken ribs are now part of his night, that the speedster levers himself up on one arm to assess the boy.
"Robin," he croaks, unable to suppress a wince as something grinds painfully somewhere in his body, "are you...?" The boy's eyes go wide, alerting Barry to the danger seconds before he barks out a warning.
"Move!"
Out of the corner of his eye, the speedster registers the gaudy flash of color that marks Trickster's approach. The hysterical cackle reaches his ears as he's gathering himself for a super-speed escape. But his body doesn't want to cooperate. His feet are raw, his back is on fire, every breath feels like a mistake. As Axel prepares for another attack, the best he can do is raise an arm and try to focus on generating another mini tornado to push him back.
The gunfire is like the answer to a prayer (although Barry would never admit it).
"Flash, stay down!"
The CCPD officers approach from the cross streets, trying to pin Trickster in place. The villain retreats several steps, bounding out of the way with the help of his trick shoes. Ever so slowly, Axel is pushed back amid shouts from the police to surrender and drop to the ground.
Barry uses the reprieve to break Damian free of the cocoon, needing to shift through several frequencies before the material finally starts to crack. As the boy all but bursts out of the entrapment, the speedster makes a mental note to study the substance further, feeling a knot of worry in his stomach as he realizes Axel's tricks are consistently getting more sophisticated.
"Fucking clown!"
Barry blinks at the curse, but of course Damian is already in motion before the thought of creating any sort of plan can flit through his brain. With a streak of black, red, and green, the boy is bolting across the street towards the fight, flanking the police as they tighten their formation. Hopping several cars, he lands off Trickster's right with an angry yell.
"Hey! Clown!"
For a split second, Axel actually looks offended. It's enough of a distraction for a bullet to take out a chunk of brick scant inches from his head. He flinches, attempts to duck, and finds himself ensnared in a weighted net that drops from above as a device hurled by Robin breaks apart in mid-air with a loud pop and burst of smoke.
With a cry of outrage, Trickster topples over and hits the ground.
"Not fair, not fair, not fair!" Axel shrieks, struggling in vain against the confines of the netting. "This isn't Gotham! Fuck off back to your own city! We already got our own hero – we don't need no damn bats turning this city into a fucking nightmare! Keep your crazy to yourselves!"
Forcing himself to his feet, Barry laughs wearily as he speed-binds the remaining Rogues and drags them over towards Axel. Snart lets out a moan of pain as he's jostled; the others are still unconscious.
"We could do with less of your crazy, too, Axel," Barry replies, the words abrading his throat and sounding tortured to his own ears. "You're welcome to retire. Or stay in jail."
"Pft. You'd totally miss us," the villain replies, his tone suggesting they're just two old friends who sometimes disagree over minor transgressions such as armed robbery but still play cards on the weekend over beers.
"Uh huh." In the distance, Barry can hear sirens; back-up is on its way, there's nothing more to be done.
One of the officers must read the exhaustion in his body language, because she says, "We got it from here, Flash. Why don't you take off, get patched up?" Like skin is just easily-replaced fabric.
The speedster nods, but doesn't move, watching as several squad cards screech to a stop and their doors fly open. It's only the work of a few more minutes before the Rogues are thoroughly searched, stripped of their remaining weapons, loaded into the backs of the cruisers, secured, and driven away to the station for booking. It's a tired routine; he knows they'll do it all over again in a couple of months, if not sooner.
As the last car pulls away, Barry shoots one final nod at the officers, trying to add a smile that his lips are too tired to actually form. "Thanks, guys," he says quietly, "he had us. Without you...." He lets it hang, because he doesn't know what exactly would have happened, but he knows it wouldn't have been good.
"Anytime," another officer replies. "Happy we could return the favor." There are nods all around. Everyone is pointedly avoiding looking at Robin. Then the group is breaking off back to their cruisers.
Barry sighs, watching as the media prepares to swoop in, microphones already in hand. He can't handle it right now. Ignoring Damian's indignant squawk, he lifts the boy into a bridal carry and dashes off, not stopping until they reach the house.
Vibrating through the backyard fence and in through the door, he deposits Damian on his feet in the middle of the living room and then dashes around pulling the blinds shut before he finally allows himself to come a complete halt, visibly shaking as the last of the speed force energy fades.
He has it all written out in his head what he wants to say to the boy. The words "reckless" and "thoughtless" and "dangerous" are on the tip of tongue. He wants to yell that Damian could have been killed – that he could have gotten others killed.
But mostly, he just wants to cry.
It's stupid and silly and totally unbecoming of an adult, but he's tired and frustrated and angry and in pain and even with his speed healing he really shouldn't be moving right now. Even thinking is getting difficult. He opens his mouth to speak. And then, instead, he looks.
Damian has stripped off his domino mask and flung it on the coffee table. His cape is a wadded mess on the recliner. His gauntlets have been tossed carelessly on the floor. His hands are clenched, his head is bowed, and his breath is coming in sort, rapid bursts.
When he finally meets Barry's eyes, the first thing the speedster sees is arrogance – a cloudy, haughty, high-and-mighty mask of it. The one Damian wraps around himself like the armor of his Robin costume.
But in between the seconds, among the micro-expressions that only someone with his vision could decipher, he reads the challenge, catches a glimpse of the boy bracing for a battle, and finally recognizes the fear that roils beneath all that bluster and defiance.
Whatever Barry was going to say turns to ash on his tongue and acid in his stomach.
"Later," he whispers, the last shred of energy expelled from his body with just that word. "We'll talk later. Go get cleaned up."
The boy can't keep the surprise from his face – parts his lips to fight a fight he no longer has to thinking it's a joke. Makes ready to claim that he had it under control – that he doesn't need to be babied or coddled or rescued. That he's Robin, and if Barry would have just focused on himself they could have taken the Rogues down faster and more efficiently. And it's not his fault The Flash doesn't understand basic tactics. "But...!" he begins.
But Barry turns away, feeling like he's dragging a thousand pound weight across the room and to the steps. "Later."
Then he's gone, one weary step after another carrying him upstairs and away from a conversation he's not yet sure how to have.
Behind him, alone in the center of the living room, Damian gapes at the retreating speedster, his first instinct to call the man back and have it out right now. That's how this goes – how it always goes – back in Gotham.
Then he realizes that there are drops of blood on the carpet that mark Barry's path. That the older man's knee isn't bending quite right, and the hunch of his shoulders and the arms crossed over his chest aren't just from the adrenaline crash. For anyone else, the hitch in his breathing would be hospital worthy.
And Damian thinks that, yeah, he can do "later."