Work Text:
Halfway Gone
He is uncharacteristically cautious when he approaches her.
Damian has been back, alive, for months and with his super powers now ceased, he is restless. Steph wasn’t sure who told him about the passing of his oldest brother but she knew someone did. At the time, he hadn’t said anything for over a week, no matter how much Bruce tried to pry something out of him. For a bit, someone may have thought he was going to commit patricide with the trembling anger so evident whenever he moved. The boy would stand in front of an old Batman case - glance at Nightwing’s - and back again. The cycle would continue.
Someone had destroyed the headstone.
Everyone knew who did it. No one said a word. Bruce had it redone. It was destroyed again. It happened again and again. Eventually, he stopped and it laid in rubble.
And then one day Damian acted as if nothing happened. As if Dick Grayson wasn’t a person they knew anymore. Like he hadn’t even existed. No one seemed to notice much difference. Or maybe they did and didn’t care.
But Steph knew.
She hadn’t realized she seemed to know him better than the others. It seemed both strange and understandable at the same time.
He may have seemed to have “gone back to normal” but she knew better. He was quieter, angrier in that cold, seething and grieving way that cracked hearts so deep they couldn’t be repaired. Dick meant more to Damian than anyone knew - even Damian himself. Especially Damian.
They talked a little, a bit about life, a bit of insults, a bit about Dick Grayson. It was the only time he ever really mentioned him. No matter how they talked with each other, there was a bit of a kinship. Some kind of one. Dick Grayson was their Batman. No one else could really claim that and they had kind of, somehow, unconsciously bonded over it. Steph had seen Damian when he was at some of his worst and angriest. But she had also seen him at some of his best and kindest. She knew how much he had changed, even if it wasn’t so apparent to others.
Then Bruce lost his memories.
Lost was too good a term, she supposed, grimacing at the thought. He gave them up. He gave them up willingly, leaving his preteen son alone. Like it wasn’t even a concern. It wasn’t like Damian couldn’t take care of himself. Damian would be the first to say that he wasn’t a child and he could survive just fine, but he was a kid, a young kid, and he shouldn’t have too.
But then Bruce was gone and everyone kind of scattered.
Damian was about to flee and disappear.
Until he didn’t.
She shouldn’t say that. He did disappear for a little bit, to the point that no one really knew where he was and honestly, no one was really looking. In her shame, she realized that she hadn’t even thought about him either. Things just kept going on. They still fought crime, they still tried to help the city and, occasionally, one another. It was difficult. There was always something missing. At least, until one night, he approached her, dressed in a dark version of the Robin suit, bearing some resemblance to how the first Robin’s stealth suit was. She knew something was up immediately. And she also realized in that moment, no matter what, she was going to help take care of him now.
Dick would have wanted that.
He was quiet and hesitant and a bit unsure which was practically the opposite of how he normally was, even in their most quiet of moments together. It made her uncomfortable in a lot of ways but it also far deepened her commitment to help him. She didn’t lie to him nor did she pull out any unnecessary observances either. There was no need to upset him when she really didn’t have to. Honesty was one thing, bluntness with no filter was another.
“How ya doin’ there kid?”
Instead of snapping back about how he wasn’t a child, Damian just frowned and shifted, uncomfortably. “I need to run something past you,” he finally let himself say, unable to meet her eyes.
“Why me?”
She stamped down her grimace. That probably came out wrong. Before she could even hope to try and save herself and explain what she meant, he spoke. “You’re the only one who might sort of understand,” he confessed.
She sobered up immediately. No, she wasn’t drunk but she did become more interested in what he had to say. He was serious. In a genuine, actual way. He wasn’t pulling her leg or trying to get a rise out of her. He wasn’t insulting her or being a brat just to be a brat. He did that a lot with her and she knew it. She was used to it. But that meant, although she was used to it and knew it, it also meant that she knew when he was being entirely serious. “What are you thinkin’?”
Damian finally looked at her, his eyes slightly red rimmed but more determined than ever.
****
When he told her, she just stared at him and she knew it was making him increasingly uncomfortable. But no way he came to her with this unless he was sure - and needed help. Needed, at the very least, someone to believe him. Damian didn’t do that unless he felt he had absolutely no other choice, if he didn’t have anyone else. Normally, that would be Dick Grayson but obviously, that had been out of the equation. He wasn’t an option.
Her heart half stopped and started again in the same beat.
But she knew.
She believed him.
She hadn’t put much thought into Dick’s death. She wasn’t around when it happened and it hurt to think about because it just seemed all too impossible. Dick Grayson always seemed a bit more like Superman than the rest of them. And in a lot of ways, he was. But even Superman could be killed by kryptonite. Just because you didn’t see them go down, didn’t mean they couldn’t. And Steph had seen all of them - including Dick Grayson - come back from some of the worst of things imaginable and it was so hard to come to the fact that he was gone. She hated thinking about it because if she thought about it too much, it would make it far too real. If she just kept going like she always did, she could almost imagine that he was just hanging out in Bludhaven, just a bit busy and that he would swing by any time. Pick her and Damian up for ice cream sundaes and a little practice.
She wondered if she did think back on things then, if she had done the research and looked into things further. If she had just acted on her frustration and suspicious nature instead of pushing it away, if she would have come to the same conclusion Damian did. The same belief that Damian believed. Of course, it didn’t matter now. What was done, was done. But still, it was a thought.
She believed him.
And she told him that.
He stared back at her, practically dumb founded and Steph nearly wanted to cry because she knew that he thought she wouldn’t believe him. Maybe because no one else had. Maybe he had gone to someone else to showcase his theory and they laughed him off. Or maybe he thought no one would. It didn’t matter because whether or not he was actually right, she believed him.
And no matter whether or not he was right, she was going to help him find the truth. Her determination only strengthened as she watched the emotions flit across his face. She put her hands on her hips and smiled that signature mischievous smile that sported when she knew something great was going to happen.
“Let’s go find our Batman.”