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damian-dreamz8442 · 4 years

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Missing in Action Part II

Hola, back with the second half of the fic. Should I link Part I here?

Psych, I already did.

BTW this is NOT canon compliant and I do not even try to be accurate at all, just in character.

Basic re-cap (spoilers) Damian is missing, kidnapped by a pack of goons in clown makeup, right out from under Dick’s nose. Afterwards he got a call from the Joker saying he has Damian, and gave Dick a bit of a clue as to where.

Meanwhile, the Joker is very angry over the fact that he doesn’t actually have Damian, and the little punk is, in fact, nowhere to be found.

Dick called the batmobile to his location, putting it on autopilot as he was in no condition to drive. His pounding head was only a minor distraction compared to the all-encompassing worry over Damian. He needed back-up if he was going to find Damian.

Stephanie was, unsurprisingly, the first to answer. “Batman?” She questioned, no doubt noticing Dick initiated a group call with her, Cass, Tim and Jason.

“I hope this is quick, Batman,” Tim added, keys clacking audibly in the background, “I’m in the middle of a case with the titans and-”

“Damian is missing.” Dick blurted, abandoning code names.

“What?” Jason barked. Dick could hear Cass narrow her eyes.

“He was kidnapped on patrol,” Dick explained, “a pack of goons took him, wearing clown makeup.”

“Oh my god.” Stephanie breathed, at the same time as Tim’s “the Joker? He’s back?”

“We don’t know that.” Jason reasoned, voice tight. “There are copy cats of the Joker all over Gotham.”

“I got a call.” Dick cut his brother off, trying to focus his eyes on the road despite not being in control of the car. “A payphone, somehow he knew I would still be in the area. He gave me a clue.” A really messed up, useless clue. Dick hated even remembering the words as they came along with that familiar nasal voice. He’d written down the message, scrawled hastily on a sticky note in his belt, but somehow he’d dropped it in his panic.

“He said he took Robin to ‘the place little robins go to... die’.” Dick ignored his voice crack, hoping the others would as well.

Tim’s typing stopped, “like actual birds or-”

“The warehouse.” Jason growled, eliciting a curse from Dick. “You don’t think...” Jason’s only response was a grunt.

Jason’s constant death jokes insured that at least they all knew which warehouse he was referring to. It did nothing to instill confidence in Dick.

“How long do we have?” Tim asked as Dick went about changing the coordinates in his GPS.

“It’s the Joker,” Jason grumbled, emotion lost from his voice in a transparent way of blocking out old memories, “we’ll be lucky if Damian’s even recognizable when we get there.”

The line went silent, the implications heavy on the group of siblings. Dick wished for the thousandth time that Bruce was there. He could’ve stopped all this, surely. Dick didn’t have time to think about the irony; losing his first robin the same way the first Batman lost his robin. Dick wouldn’t let his brain go there. He couldn’t.

Damian finally made it back to the street Dick was supposed to be on. Between limping and sticking to the shadows as much as possible in red and green, it had taken him nearly another hour. Quite the pathetic display, Damian told himself. No doubt if his father had been alive, he would’ve been disappointed.

Despite it being two hours, Damian was at a loss when he found the alleyway deserted. There was a creepy box, mostly broken, and a stuffed clown face that laid decimated not far away, but no Batman. Damian did not like the idea of limping all the way back to the manor. His ankle pulsed with constant pain, it was getting harder to breathe around his ribs, and the cuts littered all of his limbs had yet to stop bleeding. It was tempting to just sit against the wall and wait for someone to come along and put him out of his misery.

Instead, Damian limped over to a phone booth across the street. The receiver was unhooked, emitting the most sound, second only to Drake speaking. Damian hung it up with a grimace. He was surprised it worked at all, considering no one used phone booths anymore. Unless they were desperate. Which Damian was.

He was about to try to remember the number for Wayne manor, when Damian noticed something yellow discarded haphazardly outside the phone booth. It wouldn’t have been of much interest to him, except the handwriting was unmistakable.

Dick had used the phone booth and carelessly left behind a note. No doubt he was over reacting to Damian being missing, but at least it ensured he was alive. The note made little sense.

‘Where little robins go to die’, who would even come up with that? Damian made a face at the sickening notion.

Sluggishly, Damian’s brain aligned the clues. Dick thought he was missing, already on a scale of six of worry. He and Tim categorized a scale of worry for their family. Dick was almost always a five, Damian had never seen Jason rise above a two.

Someone had called him on the phone booth, obviously. It was unlikely Dick’s communicator was broken in the skirmish and even if it was he wouldn’t think to use a phone booth. For what purpose? He could just call the batmobile.

So some sicko had called the phone booth and given Dick the message. A clue perhaps? Damian read it again, allowed his mushy, bruised brain to comprehend the words. Wished he was as good a detective as Drake. Bashed the intrusive thought with a mental crowbar.

Crowbar! Damian would’ve smacked his head if it didn’t already hurt so much. Finally Jason’s fatalistic sense of humor came in handy; his cause of death ingrained in the back of Damian’s mind. A rather dark turn of thought, but Damian was more results oriented.

The Joker had beaten Jason with a crowbar, then killed him, in a warehouse on the other side of Gotham. It never did get rebuilt, but the Joker had erroneously threatened to do the same thing to Damian. Despite it being a lie, Dick would believe it. He didn’t know Damian escaped.

Great, just great. How unbelievably fantastic. What an amazing turn of events, now Damian would get the absolute privilege of walking all the way across Gotham, trying to catch up with Dick who was probably a hair shy of a ten. If Damian was wrong well... that would really suck.

Damian was really starting to understand why Joker was the most disliked criminal in the batfamily. (There was a vote. Ironically, they all like Harley Quinn the most.)

With no other options, Damian began limping in the vague direction of the infamous warehouse. A street later, he passed a marooned motorcycle. After that, his night got much better.

Dick ran across the grounds of the warehouse district to find the rest of his siblings not far from the remains of the blown up warehouse. Cass had a hand on Jason’s shoulder, while he quietly muttered about not letting Damian die the same way he had. It was cruelty on another level, this scheme of the Joker’s. Dick just wanted his robin back.

Tim and Steph were formulating a strategy. Well, Tim was, having pulled up an overhead view of the warehouse rubble. Steph kept suggesting they go in fighting, get Damian, and set Joker on fire. Tim pointed out eight reasons that would not work.

Dick stood next to Jason, taking a deep breath. “I don’t think we have time to wait, or make a plan.” He shot an apologetic look at Tim, “we just need to go in, canvas it, find Damian-”

“That’s what Joker wants!” Tim insisted, gesturing lamely to the building. “He probably has some game set up, or the entrance rigged, and we’ll all get blown up!” Jason bristled at the prospect of being blown up again, noticeable only to Cass. She squeezed his shoulder.

Suddenly, a sharp disc cut through the group, lodging in the tree behind them. They all looked at it in shock, Joker’s logo laughing at them. It blinked to life, emitting a hollow cackle.

“You’re too late!” Came a raspy voice. It hissed, a pathetic amount of laughing gas bubbling out of its edges. The frisbee was not meant to do damage, the real threat...

Dick spun around just as ruins of the warehouse let out a sickening crackle and exploded. Again.

“No!” Dick screamed, lurching forward. Cass jumped in front of him to hold him back, eyes trained on the building. Jason couldn’t tear his eyes from the flames, memories and horror clutching him.

“No, no, no, that can’t be it!” Tim insisted, burying his hands in his hair. “It’s... it’s the Joker! Where are the mind games? The... the...”

Stephanie crashed to her knees, gaping at the scene. “What just-what just happened?”

“Damian...” Dick’s voice cracked painfully, throat raw. He could feel the heat, there were debris floating down. Cass hugged him tightly.

Jason spun around and punched a tree, it was unclear if the following crack came from the wood or his knuckles. He let out a furious growl, which morphed into an anguished roar. “I’m. Going. To. Kill. That son of a b-- !”

Damian nearly stopped his stolen motorcycle as he saw the warehouse rubble go up in flames. What the... who would go through the trouble of blowing up that heap of cement? He could only hope Dick wasn’t in there, it would be just like him to do something stupid without Damian.

Finally making it over the grassy hill - one of the few greenspaces in this area of Gotham - Damian ditched the bike. He was about to hobble forward when he heard a haunted wail from none other than Jason Todd. Damian broke into a run, despite his bodies protests.

Had Dick gone into that building? Was one of them hurt? Damian could see his whole family gathered not far from the explosion. He could barely breathe, thanks to his ribs, and tripped on his ankle. He was panting by the time he got close enough to call out to them.

Are you ok?” He straightened to talk to Jason, the only one looking at him, “what happened? Sorry I’m late, but someone ditched me in central Gotham and-”

His whole family spun to look at him. Jason looked close to tears. Dick was crying. Stephanie was on the ground. Maybe she was hurt? Before Damian could ask, Dick was running full speed at him.

“Robin!” His voice was thick with relief as he swept Damian into a hug. Normally such contact was unwarranted but not uncomfortable. This time, could Damian just say, ow.

“Batman, release me!” Damian managed through gritted teeth, his ribs screaming at the pressure. There were definitely a few broken.

“Robin, I can’t believe... you were... and then we!”

“Batman! My ribs!” Dick let go immediately at the pained sound of Damian’s voice, supporting the boy as he doubled over painfully. He looked up to find his whole family gathered around him in concern.

There were hands all over him, noting his injuries, bracing his ankle, rubbing his back. Someone - Todd, probably - even took advantage of the situation to mess up his hair. It was too much to keep track of, making him dizzy.

“What happened?” He asked, batting the hand away from his hair.

“We thought you... you were in there.” Stephanie finally explained, pointing at the burning cement foundation.

“Joker, he... I saw you?” Dick was still unable to formulate a proper sentence.

Damian scoffed, which cost him dearly as pain seared through him. It took him another second to get enough breath back in his lungs to explain. “I got away from those buffoons in like... five minutes.” Two hours, but who was counting.

“Your ankle. Ribs. Head.” Cass countered. Ah, her hands were bracing his ankle.

“Well, I didn’t get away entirely unscathed.”

“We were really worried about you.” Tim’s voice was choked with emotion. He was rubbing Damian’s back. Damian couldn’t help but look at him in shock.”

“So you all rushed here... to try and save me?”

“Obviously!” Jason scoffed loudly. “Always.” He finished, locking eyes with Damian.

Damian cleared his throat - another act that rendered him speechless in pain for a few seconds. “Thank you for coming. As you can see, I’m fine.” The siblings shared an incredulous look.

“Is that Damian for ‘my body frigging hurts and I want to go home’?” Steph asked, leaning down to Damian’s level. He glared at her. “No, I’m-” he was about to say ‘not even that hurt’ but then Cass let go of his ankle to stand and Damian nearly fainted. To his utter mortification, a pained whimper left him.

“Oh, lil’D, c’mere.” Dick cooed sympathetically, slowly gathering him up. This time he was mindful of Damian’s ribs. Damian would not admit that a huge wave of relief washed over him as soon as he was being carried, weight off his ankle and head cradled on Dick’s shoulder.

“Put me down. I can... I can walk.” Damian’s protest held no heat, it was basically a whine. Dick leaned his cheek on Damian’s head softly. That was all it took for Damian’s body to finally give into the darkness.

When Damian came to, he was in the batcave on a bed next to Dick. Dick was holding his hand, half asleep, pristine bandages wrapped around his head. Despite the calm scene next to him, the batcave was anything but.

Tim and Cass were playing a video game on the huge monitor - correction, Tim was losing against Cass in a video game on the huge monitor - while Jason and Steph cheered them on. Alfred was cleaning up medical supplies when he noticed Damian’s attempt at awareness.

“Master Damian,” Alfred greeted with a soft smile. Dick jerked awake, already grinning. “Dami! You’re awake!” The game was paused as four more people came rushing to his bedside.

Damian hated being on pain meds. The sight of his family being so worries about him was enough to make him want to hug them. Humiliating.

“How are you feeling?” Tim asked. Before Damian could bite back with a harsh ‘fine’, his emotions betrayed him.

“Thank you,” he muttered, surprising no one more than himself. “Thank you for always coming for me.” Damian bit back the rest of his words, and the tears. He refused to be as pathetic and young as they expected of him.

Dick saw right through him, he always did. He reached over and hugged Damian - something that was quickly becoming a normal action, not that Damian could bring himself to mind. “We love you.”

#batfam #damian wayne #dick grayson #jason todd #tim drake #stephanie brown #cassandra cain #robin #batman #red hood #red robin #spoiler #orphan #au #hurt/comfort #misunderstanding #tricks #gotham #the joker

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