Chapter Text
The pain was like a stone wall crushing her. She was going to break under its weight soon, she could feel it. But…
“Was any of it real? Was I really Robin?”
“Of course you were.”
Batman’s answer was immediate, effusive.
Stephanie swallowed, tasting blood, wanting to believe him.
“Good. Then I was really part of the legend. Even if it was only for a little while. No matter what, no one can take that away.”
As her vision blurred, she clung to those brief, shining moments—that time she was swinging along with Cass, feeling strong and free, finally feeling like she could really fight alongside her and not be a burden. The first time she’d comforted a victim who was too scared to talk to Batman, how she’d chattered until the guy’s shaking and crying calmed, how she’d even managed to make him laugh. That time when she’d grabbed a little girl out of the way of falling masonry during the Killer Croc fight, how the child had looked at her with wide, wondering eyes. “Robin’s a girl? Cool!”
Even with all the horror and shame, those moments were still hers.
“No matter what,” Batman echoed her.
She tried to smile at him, but she couldn’t even move her lips right. Her throat had been scraped raw from talking, and her neck still felt like a mess of jagged, bloody broken glass, even though they'd supposedly extracted it all.
“I think I’m going to rest now,” Steph forced out. “Just for a little while.”
“You bet. I’ll be here, watching over you.”
She could tell Batman didn’t think she was going to wake up. He was trying so hard to be comforting and upbeat, and he was so bad at it. It was kind of funny. But he was trying, at least, and that meant he cared a little, and that was more than she’d expected from him, after everything.
She wasn’t expecting to wake up either.
She wished she could see her Mom before the end. She wanted to hold her hand so, so badly. To say she was sorry.
Tim and Cass too. She wanted to tell Cass she was sorry she’d let her down. Tell Tim she was sorry she’d hurt him.
Batman had claimed Tim didn’t hate her, and that had to be a lie. But she hoped he hadn’t been lying when he said Tim, Cass and the others were all okay. She hoped they were truly safe.
Her swollen eyelids were too heavy. She let her them close, let hot tears spill out. She was drifting now, in the dark, the icy ocean churning around her.
In the distance, there was a long, unbroken beep. A strangled gasp.
But then, abruptly, the beeping cut off.
“No. No, what am I thinking, I can’t do this. She’s alive, Bruce.”
It was the voice of that doctor, the one with kind eyes, who’d bandaged her and held her hand, softly whispering that she’d save her no matter what it took. There was no softness in her voice now. It had turned harsh and bitter.
“Leslie, what—”
“She’s alive, and hopefully she’ll stay that way. I was considering… but it would be too cruel. To her mother, especially. And even if it kept Stephanie safe, I…I can’t make those choices for her.”
“…You were going to fake her death.” Batman’s voice wasn’t accusatory. It was almost…sad.
“Yes. For a foolish, foolish second, I almost went through with it. She just reminded me so much of…”
There was a choked off sound, and some rustling.
“I just…wish I could help her. Keep her away from this city. She can’t recover here. I’m sure she’s going to blame herself and jump right back in danger again.” The woman’s voice was getting higher, a little frantic. “But I can’t. I can’t just rip her away from the people she loves. I can’t abandon my other patients. God, I wish I could, though! Maybe you’d learn you can’t treat children like this!”
“Leslie, I—”
“But no, you wouldn’t learn anything, would you?” the doctor snarled. "Jason didn’t stop you, after all! And you treated her just like you treated him.”
“I know it’s my fault.” Batman sounded weak. Lost. Almost like a child. Steph had never heard him sound like this before.
A long silence.
“We’re not completely out of the woods with her,” the woman said. “She is badly injured. I wasn’t lying about the internal bleeding, and the head injury is a huge concern as well. I'll have to keep an eye on her skull fracture, she could end up needing surgery. She's got good odds of slipping into a coma. There’s a lot of things that can go wrong.”
“She’ll make it. I know she will. She’s a fighter.” There was something that almost sounded like pride in his voice, and it made Steph’s stomach twist strangely.
“You said that about Jason too,” Leslie said sharply. “That he was strong. And he was. But after a certain point, being strong, being a fighter, it has nothing to do with it. If the body goes through too much, it shuts down and there’s nothing anyone can do.”
“I know that. I was worried about this turning out like Jason the whole time, Leslie—"
“I’m going to try to persuade her mother to take her away from Gotham once she’s stable enough,” Leslie cut him off, in a forcibly detached tone. “In the meantime, the man who hurt her is still out there. Protect her. Send someone to guard her.” Her voice went flat and tired. “I love you, Bruce. I always will. But if anything happens to this girl, Batman won’t be welcome here anymore.”
Batman (Bruce?) said something back, but his words were getting fuzzier. Steph let the current carry her away.
The pain came in waves and torrents now. Sometimes it was like choking on seawater, struggling for air, throat burning, her head barely bobbing above the surface. Sometimes she was dragged down to the depths, her chest caving in as the blackness swallowed her up.
There were visions too, screams and cries and the last gurgles of a dying man, a ghoulish black mask and his laughter, the sound of a gunshot...
But then a familiar voice washed it all away for a moment, and she was so glad to hear it, so glad he was alive, and sounded whole and healthy, even if his voice was cracked and miserable.
“—man didn’t want me to know exactly…that he did to you, but you know me, too nosy for my own good. I can’t stand it if I don’t know, it means I start inventing all these things that could have happened in my head… so, sorry, I stole a look at your medical chart…”
A sharp inhale and his voice shook.
“I thought I was going to throw up. I-it’s a miracle you’re alive. That you even got yourself out of there. But you’ve always been tough. You’re the toughest person I know, Steph. I…wish I had told you that before all this. But that’s how I know get through this. Because you’re not like me. You’re not a quitter.”
No, that’s not right, that’s not what it is, Tim. I don’t listen. I’m too stubborn. Look where it got me. You just know when to step back. I wish I could do that.
Tim’s breathing was uneven and ragged.
Bruce just wanted me to be like you, the entire time I was Robin. But I could never be good enough. You’re the one everyone wants, okay?
“You’ve never given up on anything in your life, Steph,” Tim whispered. ‘Please don’t start now. Please.”
But I want to, Tim. I’m so tired. I’m so tired. Why do you even want me to come back? Everything I did. To Gotham. To you…
And she let herself be dragged into the dark again.
The next voice was soft and deep, words slow and carefully considered. Steph recognized it with a surge of warmth. She was okay too. Of course she was, nothing could beat her.
“I looked for you. Looked everywhere. But I…wasn’t fast enough. Didn’t find you. I’m sorry. Should've gone after you…not just then, but that night you told me…that you were fired. Should have made you stay. Talked to you.”
A wet swallow.
“Would have realized if I knew more about… friends. I never… had a friend before you. You always talk to me like I’m …normal. You were never scared. Not once. It means…a lot. And I never told you. Wake up so I can.”
Cass, you mean everything to me too. But you deserve better friends than me, come on! There are so many people out there who will love you, Cass, you just haven’t met them yet. You’ll be okay. You’re strong.
It’s not your job to save me.
So Steph sank. Down, down, down again.
The next voice made something ache deep inside her. It was the voice she’d known the best and longest, the one that used to sing her to sleep, soothe her when she skinned her knees. It stirred up so much inside her she almost wanted to block it out. But she also found herself reaching for it, like she was a child again, looking to nuzzle in those soft arms, looking for safety that had never existed.
“-that damn costume, but I know it’s my fault. I should have protected you, but instead you spent your childhood worried about protecting me from your father.”
Her Mom was crying. That wasn’t unusual. She cried a lot, she always had. Sometimes it really pissed Steph off, and then she hated herself for that.
“You had to do it all yourself. I made you think it was you job to fix his mistakes, but it’s not, Steph, it…was your job was to be a kid. To be happy. But I never gave that to you.” A horrible, hitching sob. “I‘m trying to be strong like you. I know you’d be frustrated how I’m falling apart right now…but I can’t stop thinking about…what...what if I lose you?”
She sounded small. Broken.
“You’re the reason I get up in the morning, Steph. The only thing in my life I’m proud of. If you—if you—I don’t know if I’ll be able to keep going.”
Something about the way she said it made Steph go cold.
No.
No.
Don’t you dare say that, don’t you dare. None of this is your fault, and if you..if you…
I swear to God, Mom.
She’d finally found it again. Her anger, the one companion she could always count on, the one thing in her life that had never abandoned her. When she’d been a child, alone late at night, cold with fear…the anger had curled up next to her, held her in it's embrace, kept her warm and alive. Whenever she’d wanted to give up, stop moving, the anger had been a friend that pushed her forward. It swelled now, hot and fierce, that feeling that made her want to take on the world, because it wasn’t fair, because her Mom shouldn’t be saying shit like that, shouldn’t be hurting like this, because life should be better than this, and after everything, everything…
For the first time, Steph tried fighting back against the black water. She swam up, arms thrashing and desperate. The pressure bore down on her, and it was almost too much, but she could break the surface, she knew she could.
And her eyes opened.
There was a vague, blurry outline. The shape of her mother. And oh god, it hurt, why did it hurt so much---
“No, Mom. You can’t give up. Don’t you ever scare me like that, don’t you ever—"
She tried to say it, tried to scream it, but all that came out was a “nuh.”
But her Mom heard the little noise.
And then she was the one screaming.
“Stephanie! Stephanie, you’re awake! Oh, my baby girl! Dr. Thompkins, she opened her eyes, she—”
Steph tried to keep them open longer, for her mother, who was clasping her hand and crying. She wanted to tell her…but she was fading already, going back to that dark place.
But at least it didn’t feel like she was drowning anymore.