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Father is a mountain of a man, but still a man.
It’s something Damian wasn’t quite expecting. In his mind’s eye, Batman loomed larger than life, an unattainable goal. The legacy he had to live up to.
But Batman’s hand on his shoulder is warmer than a legend’s has any right to be. It folds over his shoulder blade, so much strength resting on the fragile, thin bones that protect his most vital organs.
He’s starkly aware of the difference in training between them. Damian may be a genetically perfect child, but he’s still a child. His years of experience will never match his Father’s. He could never get away, not if Batman didn’t want him to.
So he curls his hands into fists to hide how badly they shake, tilting his chin up the way Talia always taught him to. He’s obediently still while father peels off the blindfold, wincing slightly at the sting of fluorescents against his eyes.
He gasps, takes an involuntary step back from the ledge he finds himself on. Batman doesn’t let go of him.
The Cave is vast, multiple stories of shiny, sleek equipment, trophies of battles won and lost. A draft rustles the hair on his head, and the rushing of water below them almost drowns out the chittering of bats.
Somehow, he wasn't expecting this.
Not the legions of stairs leading up, up, up. Not the dinosaur, or the penny, or the giant Joker card propped up against the wall.
“This is your new home, Damian,” Father says, and he feels his breath catch in his throat.
He’s pulled away from the cliff ledge, limbs stiff with shock. Batman turns him around, kneels before him, expression hidden by the harsh lines of his cowl. It’s… it’s scary, even in the brightness of the cave. The mask is meant to inspire fear, and it does. Damian fights the urge to hunch his shoulders, stomach sinking at the expectation in the words.
“I don’t know what Talia’s taught you thus far, but things work differently here. We use our skills to fight crime, not perpetuate it.”
Damian tilts his head, sneers, allows the bravado to overpower the fear. He sucks his teeth, shrugs off the hands on his shoulders, waiting for the man to retaliate.
But Batman just frowns, mouth creasing with displeasure, and rises to his full height. It’s the only sign that he’s mad at all.
So… Damian decides to push it.
He paces away from his father, spinning in a broad circle, taking in the cave, the distant flap of tiny wings, the craggy rock formations and the shadows that promise something treacherous. He wants to explore it, wants to claim this place as his own, wants to accept the offer his father is making.
He just doesn’t know if he can afford to pay whatever price Batman will exact for it.
Damian approaches a vehicle covered by a tarp, the only other thing on this platform, although there’s a cart with various parts shoved up against the wall. He runs a hand over it, curiosity itching at him, urging him to lift the tarp. There’s something hulking and metallic underneath, he can smell it.
“Damian,” Bruce says, following him step for step. Hovering. “Listen to me.”
“Do you suddenly have something interesting to say?” Damian mutters, not quite bold enough to say it to the man’s face.
Batman grumbles, and Damian is incredibly glad his back is turned, glad that the man can’t see the way he flinches.
“Talia said you came here to learn—”
It’s ill-advised, it goes against all the self-preservation in him, begging him to submit to the greater power, but Damian scoffs, cutting off his father.
It’s just… they both know why Talia sent Damian here. He’s to be a distraction while she toils at her plot, while she sets her trap. Damian is a pawn, maneuvered however his mother pleases. She’ll collect him as soon as she’s good and ready, and he will wait here and sit pretty until she calls.
Like a dog.
He turns on his heel, knocks back his head and glowers up at the man Talia called his father. Looking him over pointedly, Damian lets his lip curl, allowing the sort of insolence Mother would scold him for seep into his voice. “You think you would make a suitable mentor?”
There’s a high-pitched, amused laugh, coming from distinctly above their heads. Damian stiffens, eyes going wide, uncertain of when another presence joined their’s.
He cranes his neck to look up, barely able to make out a flash of teeth and white-out lenses from the shadows. The figure moves with the drafts, warping, a trick of the light, no doubt.
“Well,” The figure says, voice too high to be a man’s and pitched wrong for a woman’s. A boy then, pubescent, if Damian had to guess. “I think you’re a pretty good teach, B.”
Damian watches, admittedly balking, as the boy tumbles from his perch into the air.
He falls like a bird, cape catching the wind behind him, fluttering in the air. The arc he takes is slower than Damian thinks is possible, until he sees the outstretched arm and the wire attaching him to the cliff face.
The boy— teenager, really— lands nimbly, knees bending to absorb the impact, his feet silent against the cold stone. Batman turns to him fully, gives his back to Damian. He can see the man’s lip twitch upward.
“The mountains were nice,” The boy says, still smirking. Damian can’t track his eyes from behind the domino, but the teen’s head is tilted toward him. “Picturesque. I see I missed something here.”
“Robin,” Batman greets, voice a hundred degrees warmer than anything Damian’s heard thus far. “This is Damian. He’ll be staying for a while.”
Robin falters a little, stooped forward, hand outstretched. Something crosses his face, but it’s gone as soon as it came, replaced by polite affability. “Hey there. How are you?”
Damian stares, affronted, and Robin goes on before he can collect himself, filling the silence, ending the awkward moment before it can stretch.
“Uh. Here on my world, we call this a handshake.”
Damian learned about the history of the handshake. A gesture developed long ago, in part to prove neither party concealed weapons on their person, that their meeting would be peaceful.
Seeing as this Robin person clearly has weapons on him, the gesture is meaningless. Damian wonders if the boy is mocking him, laughing in his face. “Don’t patronize me.”
Robin recoils, blinking dramatically at the snarl in the boy’s voice. “Woah. Okay then.”
“Damian,” Batman snaps. He pulls the assassin away from Robin, places himself between his son and the teenager. “That’s enough. Alfred will take you into the manor to unpack.”
Robin doesn’t break eye-contact, though, peering from around Batman, putting a hand on the man’s back, and Damian can only glare back as he realizes what the other boy’s presence means.
The familiarity, the warmth Batman affords this teenager, the cape and suit. Robin said that Batman is a good teacher, because Batman is his teacher.
And maybe more than that.
Father is saying something. Something about long journeys, about settling in, a speech about how this home will be different , how he’ll have to unlearn what the league taught him. Righteous bullshit like that.
Damian isn’t listening though.
Mother is wrong . Batman clearly doesn’t want him here, doesn’t want to teach him. He never stood a chance, not when Father had his chosen warrior at his side, a pupil already trained in the art, primed to succeed him. Without all the damage, all the darkness inside Damian.
Abruptly, and with seething passion, Damian hates Robin.
He’s dragged away eventually by the servant, up the steep, steep stairway that leads who knows where.
Not once does he look away from the boy that took his place.
The butler introduces himself as Alfred Pennyworth, sits him down in a bed ten times his size, and starts explaining things to him.
He says things like, “Your father is a powerful man, his name is Bruce Wayne.” And it’s the first time Damian’s heard his name, the name he’s supposed to be taking. He rolls it on his tongue, combines it with his own, reads it over and over in his mind’s eye.
Pennyworth doesn’t stop. He keeps shaking the foundations of Damian’s world with his calm, quiet voice. Elderly frame perched at the edge of the bed while he selects articles of clothing, folds them into piles, and sets them aside to be put into drawers.
Damian is not his father’s only son, he’s not even the first. Before he was ever conceived, a man named Dick Grayson won that title. A never-ending list of names spills from the servant’s mouth, Barbara, Jason, Timothy, Stephanie, Cassandra.
Pennyworth tells him about a mission born of tragedy, a legacy of honor and justice. He talks until he sees the way Damian’s hands tremble, and then he falls silent. Without his voice, low and soft with age, there’s nothing to cover the fast, sharp inhales coming from him.
“Damian,” The servant says, and he’s just that. A servant. He has no right to abandon his task, to take the boy by the shoulders and kneel before him just the way Bruce did half an hour before.
But when Bruce did it, Damian wanted to snarl and fight, wanted to protest the suffocating pressure. When Bruce did it, he was scared.
Pennyworth isn’t scary. Pennyworth is wrinkled with decades of smile lines, his hands are bare and warm, and they cradle more than hold. Like Damian is fragile, like he’s precious.
“Breathe, lad.”
Mortification burns him, forces him to hide his face, even as his eyes sting. He can’t follow the simple instruction, not even to spite the man commanding him, and it’s humiliating. This loss of composure is unbefitting an Al-Ghul.
From what he’s seen of the Waynes, of Bruce’s stoicism and Timothy’s unending smirk, it’s not befitting one of their ranks either.
He digs his nails into the skin of his cheeks, pulling at it until it hurts, punishing himself for the tears that threaten to fall from his eyes. His face is hot, throat tight. He wants to cry.
Pennyworth sighs, a barely-there thing, and pries Damian’s hands off his face. He tuts softly at the crescent indents in the soft skin there, gathers up the offending weapons, and pries off the gloves one by one.
His hands are sweaty, he knows that, warm and grimy. They’ve been trapped in thick, armored knuckles for more than a few hours. The fresh air against his palms is a relief, a distracting sensation against the overwhelming torrent of emotion.
Pennyworth sets aside the gloves, looks up into Damian’s tear-filled eyes.
“I know this is quite a bit to take in, lad,” He says quietly. “But you should know that you have a place here, in these walls. You always will.”
He says that with so much surety, like it’s nothing but fact, but what kind of authority is he? A servant, who should, no doubt, be punished for his presumptuousness.
“You should bathe,” Pennyworth says, once Damian’s managed to collect himself. “I’m sure you can select your own clothes?” He motions at the options folded neatly on the bed. Damian nods mutely, feeling suddenly drained, lacking the energy to snap back the way he wants to. “If you leave your dirty clothes outside the washroom, I'll collect them and bring your food.”
He nods numbly. The old man frowns, lingers, watching Damian closely as he climbs out of the cushioned bed, collecting a towel from the pile of clothes. He only leaves when Damian starts undressing, clearly suspicious that the boy won’t follow his instructions.
But Damian does, to a T. He folds his combat clothes neatly, places them in front of the bathroom door before shutting, and locking it behind him. There’s no doubt that the servant has the key, and even if he didn’t, Damian imagines anyone in his father’s household would be able to pick the lock, but he doesn’t neglect the gesture, if only for the routine of it.
The bathroom is as opulent as the rest of his father’s house. Thick, plush area rugs under the sink, a cover over the toilet seat. There’s an endless array of bath washes and shampoos in the cabinets, but Damian grabs a bar of soap and a rag.
In the league, especially when living nomadically, he never had the luxury of liquid soaps and long-running water. Not to mention how dangerous it could be to be wet and clean in the cold.
He turns the faucet as far to the left as it goes, stepping into the spray of icy water, gasping as it hits his face. The threat of tears is washed away, swirling down the drain. He shivers, but his hands steady, heart slowing gradually.
Damian lets himself pause, lets the tension drain from his body, breathing as deeply as he can, and then he gets to work.
Traveling with Talia is always an ordeal, and this time was no different. Despite the extravagant hotels they frequented in England, despite the state-of-the-art equipment she commanded, his mother didn’t allow for much time to rest or bathe. It feels like weeks of grime are washed off him as he scrubs at his skin. His hair is simultaneously oily and brittle from lack of proper maintenance. Talia made an off-handed comment about cutting it all off last time it got this bad, and he wonders if Bruce Wayne has such preoccupation with appearances. If he’ll find Damian’s state of disarray shameful as well.
He makes sure to wash it thoroughly, until the strands feel dead and lacking moisture, stripped of the oil and smell it’s been collecting.
He’s done in under seven minutes, still not his best time, but acceptable given what he was working with. He spends another minute washing off the soap, sure that his father’s budget can afford it, and then turns off the water.
The mirror isn’t fogged up, of course, and Damian winces at the sight of himself as he wraps the towel around his waist. He towels off efficiently, until he’s not dripping at least, and leaves the bathroom as quickly as he can, still shivering despite the efficiency of the manor’s heating system.
The combat clothes are gone, he notes. The servant works fast, a steaming plate of food left on the desk, a sealed water bottle next to it.
Damian delays dressing a little longer to pick over the food, stomach uncomfortably empty.
It’s chicken, he thinks, far larger than the chickens served at the league compounds. Almost the size of a turkey.
The novelty has him smiling, even as he rips the seasoned skin off to get at the meat underneath. He’s heard off-handed comments about everything being bigger in America, somehow he didn’t think it included the produce.
Damian tries to imagine chickens as large as this running around in coops on the manor’s grounds somewhere, waiting for the slaughter, but the image evades him. He’ll have to explore this place at some point.
He rips delicately at the cabbage, forgoing cutlery to use his hands, licking his fingers once he’s done.
It’s good, very good, so much so that Damian gets distracted with the food, almost forgetting that he’s vulnerable, that the door will open to anyone but him. That, at any time, there is a legion of his father’s disciples ready to ambush him.
He’s licking oils off his fingers, ravenous to the point of liability, when the locks in the door start tumbling.
Damian freezes.
He could still fight, if he needed to. The servant has taken his armor and his brass knuckles, and he’s lacking even a stitch of clothing beyond the towel wrapped around his waist. His scars— his weaknesses — are on display, from the long surgeries that replaced his organs and the various battles he came too close to losing
He’s so stupid, stuffing his face instead of attending to a more pressing matter. It doesn’t matter how hungry he is, he can’t eat until he’s mitigated any threats. Talia has tried drilling that lesson in, but it always seems to evade him.
Damian barely has time to take a step back from the desk, pushing away the silver platter. All the work he did in the shower is undone, adrenaline ramping his heart back up, stress making him sweat. Damian almost relaxes when it’s his father standing in the doorway, still masked, looming.
Almost.
Instead, he scowls, crosses his arms over his chest and bracing for an evaluation from the stranger he calls father.
It’s not forthcoming, Damian itches, chafed by the silence and the blankness of Bruce’s expression, unused to the wordless disapproval that radiates from the man. If Talia ever had something to say, she made it known, loudly and often with a rebuke to follow. Damian can see Bruce won’t be as transparent as his mother.
“What?” He snaps. “Come to take more than just my sword, old man?”
Neither of them point out how little Damian has left to take, and he’s grateful for that, if only because it keeps him from spiraling further.
“Dress yourself, Damian,” Bruce says, tightly. He turns his shoulder, a peace offering. Putting his back to Damian to give him privacy and to demonstrate that he won’t attack while the boy is vulnerable.
Damian finds the gesture demeaning. Too close to coddling and too far from genuine respect. If Bruce had any real care for Damian’s modesty he’d leave the room.
But he doesn’t, and Damian stands there, too stubborn to do as he’s told.
“How long do you plan on keeping me here?” He snaps, pushing away from the table. “Locked in this stupid, fucking—” He throws the food, for emphasis, a sharp spike of rage feuling him. He regrets the action almost immediately, stomach loudly reminding him of the last time he got anything to eat. An for no reason, apparently, because Batman doesn’t even blink. “Room!”
Batman pauses, and for a moment Damian thinks that he’s done it. That he’s earned the beating the league would have given him long ago, that he’s finally stumbled upon the terms and conditions of this relationship.
But Batman doesn’t approach, and he doesn’t lift a hand to Damian. No, instead, he unclasps his cape, letting it fall from his shoulders, revealing his figure.
He’s broad in the shoulders, undoubtedly muscled, but somehow still thinner and lankier than Damian expected. Bruce Wayne is smaller than Batman, he supposes.
Bruce doesn’t stop there, a large hand covering his face, shifting the cowl before taking it off entirely.
Damian stares up into the face of his father for the first time, and all he feels is bitterness and fear.
He peers down at the boy with icy blue eyes, so different from Damian’s green ones, so much colder. His mouth is twisted in intense disapproval, like the very sight of Damian is displeasing to him. It hurts, and it shouldn’t. He shouldn’t care about the opinion of a man who’s practically a stranger to him.
“You’ll be staying in the Manor while I figure out what Talia is up to,” He says, which doesn’t answer Damian’s question. “And you’ll get your sword back when I decide it’s safe.” Something spasms in his face. “I don’t know you very well, Damian.”
“I don’t want to be here,” The boy says, and to his horror, it doesn’t come out nearly as furious as he was hoping for. There’s not enough volume, his voice drops into a mumble, and there’s a persistent lump in his throat.
Bruce sighs. It’s the most emotive Damian’s seen him yet. He half expects the man to revert to his go-to strategy, to bend down and grab Damian, to force him to meet his eyes, but he doesn’t. Bruce stays where he is, almost impotently, hands at his sides and the most infuriating, constipated expression on his face.
Damian is abruptly reminded that he’s still naked.
“Get dressed, lad,” His father says, mouth curving around the word the same way Alfred’s did. “And try to sleep. If you need anything, there’s a bell on the door.”
And then he leaves. Just like that. Turns on his heel and lets the lock slide behind him, shutting Damian in.
Damian is woken to a peculiar sound.
He’s long since learned how to listen for approaching footsteps, has honed his senses so well that he can tell the approximate size of a person by the sound of their gait. He knows what human feet sound like.
He doesn’t recognize the tap-tap-scritch that grows closer by the second.
His face is pressed to the hardwood floor, a small puddle of drool collecting under his cheek. Sleep crusts his eyes, and his chest hurts going from dead asleep to alert and… concerned.
Not scared. Weird noises in a strange house are nothing to be frightened about. His heart is beating twice as fast because he’s curious.
He pushes himself up off the floor, ribs aching from his heavy sleep, shivering. He gives himself a second to adjust, before getting to his feet.
The noise doesn’t stop, growing steadily louder. He rubs at his eyes, inching over to the door on silent feet, straining to try and hear what the hell is out there.
The sound stops outside his door, and Damian can hear faint breathing.
Suddenly, he wishes he still had his sword.
He’s in sleepwear, reflexes slower, grogginess prolonging his reaction time. He’s woefully unprepared for the handle to start turning after only a brief courtesy knock.
Damian takes a few cautious steps back, shoulders rising. He musters his fiercest glare, hoping his hair isn’t too mussed from sleep, hoping that his father won’t notice the drying puddle of drool on the ground.
But it’s not his father that opens the door.
In the light of morning, without the harsh contrast of light and shadow in the cave, Robin looks softer. Smaller. Timothy Drake, his father’s chosen successor, smiles a little more sincerely when he’s not in the mask. His eyes are blue, piercing and perpetually wide-set into his face. There’s a black headset around his neck, but he’s in plaid flannel pants and a plain t-shirt, hair uncombed.
“Morning,” Damian’s mortal enemy says. “I didn’t wake you, did I?”
He opens his mouth, intending to snap back, make it known that he won’t put up with some usurper trying to snatch away his birthright, but closes it just as quickly when he catches sight of the creature that lurks behind Drake.
In the compounds Damian grew up in, dogs were kept in kennels and used for hunting. Some villagers kept them chained to the fronts of their houses at night for protection. He wasn’t expecting to find one prowling around his father’s manor.
It’s a big one too, brown and black, it’s ears brushing Drake’s hip. It scents the air, wiggling between Drake and the doorframe to get a look at Damian.
There’s an awkward pause where Drake is clearly waiting for him to say something, and Damian is a bit distracted by the hound he has in heel. Drake follows his gaze, wincing in realization.
The older boy puts a hand on the dog’s head, pushing it back slightly. “Sorry, I didn’t think…” He trails off, and Damian’s not sure what has him looking so guilty. “He’s friendly, I swear.”
“He?” Damian says, faintly.
“Um, yeah, this is Ace.” Drake steps to the side, pushing the door open and leaving it that way. Suddenly, Damian realizes what the dog is for.
Drake’s posture is open, expression unguarded, as if he trusts that Damian won’t be able to go through him to leave this gilded prison. He’s unarmed and unarmoured, but that doesn’t matter, because the dog is his weapon. Half Damian’s size with a bite-force that could shatter bone.
Father’s ward is a cunning one, getting animals to do his bidding.
“Damian?”
He looks up, has to tilt his head back to meet Drake’s gaze. The older boy is frowning, brow furrowed. He shifts his leg to hide Ace.
“Alfred asked me to get you up; breakfast is ready.”
Damian licks his lips, starts. He hesitates, wrong-footed, and before he can figure out an adequate response, Drake is pushing open the door a little wider, stepping to the side and gesturing meaningfully to the hallway.
“Don’t worry about getting dressed,” He says. “We’re eating in the kitchen today.”
“You want me to follow you,” Damian says slowly, just to be sure he’s understanding correctly. “To eat breakfast. With your hound.”
Drake pauses, his head cocks to the side, eyes flicking up and to the right. He nods to himself. “Yes.”
Damian scoffs, and it feels more like a performance than anything else. He has no real objections, though the presence of the mutt forces him to stay his hand. It’s just… he thought he was stuck here. The locks implied he was stuck here.
So he turns on his heel, takes a few perfunctory steps back into his room, and dismisses Drake with a wave of his hand. The way the compound masters order about their slaves. “What authority do you have, to boss me around? Leave.”
He crosses his arms behind his back, listens intently for the door to shut and Drake to retreat. Every second spent with his back to the older boy and that dog sends prickles down his spine.
Drake is silent for a beat, then two, and then he’s making a strange little sound, a puff of air escaping his pursed lips. “Yeah, okay, kid,” He says. “C’mon, don’t make me wake up Bruce. Leave the hunger strike for when Alfred isn’t making crepes.”
He delivers the threat casually, and when Damian looks back at him, the teenager is leaned up against the doorframe, as if he couldn’t be bothered to present himself properly. He’s got a hand on that dog of his, petting idly at his ears.
His eyes get stuck there again. Embarrassingly. On the wagging tail, the happy squint to Drake’s eyes, the way the dog sits patiently at his feet, waiting.
Damian doesn’t realize he’s staring until he looks up, and by then it’s too late. Drake is watching him, expression openly curious, darting discerning little glances between Damian and Ace.
Then, absurdly, he says, “Do you want to pet him?”
And Damian, even more absurdly, nods.
Timothy leads Ace into the room, one hand on his collar, though the dog doesn’t seem to need the direction. “Hold out your hand,” He says, and Damian does. Timothy laughs at him.
A flush rises to his face as the older boy grabs his wrist—gently— and lowers it, so that his hand is mere inches from Ace’s parted mouth.
“He’s friendly.”
“You said that already.” Damian’s fingers spasm, and the only thing that keeps him from jerking away violently when Ace touches him is Timothy’s grip on his arm.
He doesn’t let go, crouching down next to Ace, looking up at Damian, angling his head to see his face. “He’s a Great Dane. They’re hunting dogs, or they used to be. Germans used ‘em to catch wild boar.”
“His nose is wet.”
Timothy chuckles again, and Damian knows it’s at his expense, but he also can’t read any malice in it. It’s easy to forget, especially when Timothy drags his hand from Ace’s snout to the top of the dog’s head, and guides it down his back.
The fur is soft, well groomed, and the body beneath Damian’s hands thrums with warmth and life. He can feel it as Ace breathes, as his heart pounds in his narrow chest.
“You know,” Timothy says, and Damian can hear the smirk in his voice. “Ace could probably go for some of Alfie’s sausages, if you wanted to try feeding him.”
“Yes,” Damian blurts, and, to cover up for how quickly he said it, he adds, “Battling boar sounds strenuous. He will need his strength.”
Timothy slaps a hand over his mouth, rolls his eyes skyward like he’s looking for divine intervention, and makes that strange puffing noise again. Damian kindly pretends not to notice him having a moment, petting Ace again, this time without Timothy’s help.
He does it once, twice, quickly growing confident. Ace is indulgent, patiently sitting through Damian’s clumsy ministrations. His tail never stops wagging.
After a while, Damian straightens, squaring his shoulders and turning back to Timothy. “Take me to the kitchens,” He instructs the older boy. “Quickly. Ace is hungry.”
“Oh, yes. Right away, little prince.”
He thinks he’s missing something, that Drake is using words that Damian doesn’t have the context or connotations to understand. He says prince like it’s something he wouldn’t want to be, but he smiles while he says it, and obligingly leads Damian through the twisted hallways of Wayne Manor.
Crepes, Damian learns, are commonly served with bananas. And, had he known that earlier, he would not have let himself be lured away by a cute dog and the promise of food.
“You know,” Tim says, after watching Damian feed six slices to Ace consecutively. “If you want, I could probably cut up a strawberry for you. Or something.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Damian says, scraping whip cream off with his fork. He flicks the banana slice away from him, and glances up to see Tim, eyebrow arched high and unimpressed. “I dropped that. It was an accident.”
“Right.”
Ace snuffles along the floor, finds the banana slice, obligingly cleaning up after Damian. When he’s finished, he sits back on his haunches, regal, waiting for his next morsel.
“What’s not to like about bananas?” Tim cuts into his half-eaten crepe, scooping up a forkful of pancake and whip cream. “They’re like. The most neutral fruit.”
“Neutral is not a winning quality in a fruit, Drake.”
“Tim,” He says, for the third time. “Tim Drake. You’ve got the second part down, now try the whole thing.”
“We’re not that close.”
That startles a snort out of him. Tim motions with his fork, something expressive and snarky. “Oh, you’re gonna love Dick.”
Damian forgets himself, a little. The kitchen is warm, smells like fruit and vanilla. Clean, but every surface is cluttered with cooking utensils. He sits at the island counter with Drake, an excess of crepes, and bananas, and whip cream on a serving plate between them. Though Alfred had, ostensibly, summoned them here, he’s nowhere in sight, and hasn’t been since they arrived.
There’s no one around but Tim to see Damian toss his food to the dog, and he finds it hard to hold on to his anger now that he’s not being put in time-out, cast aside like some unwanted bastard child.
He still plans to rid Drake of his title as his father’s successor, and then usurp this Dick Grayson person as well, but he thinks that won’t be so hard to do, if they’re all as soft and complacent as Timothy is.
So Damian forgets himself. Lets himself relax, and forgets that the people in this house move like ghosts.
Tim twitches, and Damian ignores it, spearing another banana, glaring at it disdainfully before he flicks it across the room. He doesn’t bother to watch its trajectory, or to turn and see where it lands.
That is, until someone clears his throat behind him.
Damian freezes. Tim bursts into laughter, and Damian finally, finally realizes what’s had him so endlessly amused this whole time.
Father towers over them both, scowling, eyes blood-shot and brows furrowed deeply. He crosses his arms over his chest. There’s a single banana slice resting between his feet.
“What,” He says, sounding so, so tired. “Are you doing?”
It all makes sense, suddenly. The way Tim goaded him, insisted he join him for breakfast. The small, personalized selection of toppings, the two plates, only two, and the untouched coffee mug that was closer to Damian’s seat than Tim’s, with cream already mixed in. The distinct absence of their father’s servant. Of course Damian wasn’t to be let out. Father made his opinion on that clear last night. Drake was tricking him.
And he fell for it.
To Drake’s credit, though underhanded, it’s genius. Get him in trouble, cast him as disobedient and misbehaved, call punishment down on him, on his terms instead of Damian’s. And Damian played into it, allowed himself to be manipulated, and now he’s vulnerable and unprepared.
Bruce’s eyes stray from the banana Damian threw, and a new wave of horror dawns, because it’s abruptly clear that this food isn’t Damian’s It’s his father’s, and not only has Damian been eating off his plate, but he’s been throwing it away as well.
And it’s different, somehow, from when he did the same thing last night. Last night he wanted it, was itching for a fight. Last night, he wanted Bruce to feel as angry and frustrated as he did.
“Morning, Bruce,” Drake says, and all Damian can hear is the smugness, the conniving triumph that layers his voice. He’s still smirking, and Damian suddenly, keenly wants to hit him for it.
Bruce opens his mouth, shuts it, takes a fumbling step backward to avoid Ace’s bulk. The dog has found the banana, and he doesn’t seem to mind nudging Father out of the way to get to it. It takes up some of the man’s attention, and gives Damian time to square his shoulders, and push the plate away from him.
“Tim,” Bruce says. “Tim, I said—”
“I was doing research last night.” Drake puts down his fork, turns to face Bruce. “Did you know the CDC recommends one minute of time-out per age-year?”
“This is not a timeout.”
“Nope,” Drake agrees, and only then does Damian notice how brittle his smile’s gotten. How chastened father looks under his stare. “In fact, I’m sure it’s fine. My parents ignored recommended disciplinary measures too, and look how well-adjusted I am.”
Damian realizes, then, that he’s lost the thread of the conversation. Timothy and his father speak in half-sentences, filling in the silences with pointed looks and years of familiarity. He’s not sure who’s reprimanding who, and it’s dangerous. It’s dangerous to not know. To be unprepared for the next blow.
“Point taken,” Bruce nods, and Tim's eyebrows fly up, only for the man to continue arguing. “Was I just supposed to let him wander around unattended? He’s an—”
“A child. He’s a kid, B. What is he gonna do?”
His voice goes high and incredulous, truly disbelieving, like he can’t imagine a world where Damian would be capable of harming anyone, let alone two vigilantes in their own house. It drives home how naive Tim is, how easily someone could manipulate that soft spot, use it against him.
He’s starting to doubt that Drake had any ulterior motives at all. He seems to be arguing for Damian, for Bruce to trust him.
He’s just not sure why.
“If you want him to trust you,” Tim says, low and heated, like it’s personal. His smile is gone. “Try giving him a reason to.”
They sit in the ensuing silence, breathe it in like it’s tangible. Salient. Bruce’s face closes off, going blank, just the slightest tension in his jaw. Like he knows he’s wrong but he wants to argue anyway.
It’s strange to watch, strange to see the legend he built up in his head come tumbling down, as it becomes abundantly clear that his father is a man.
A man that, apparently, allows his subordinates to disrespect him as casually as Tim does without retaliation.
After just a handful of seconds, Bruce nods his acquiescence. Caves. Right in front of Damian.
“You’re right,” Batman admits. Tim relaxes, and only then does Damian notice how stiffly he’s been holding himself. “I should have found a better solution. I’m sorry.”
He shifts his gaze downward, looks Damian right in the eye, and says again, “I’m sorry. That was probably uncomfortable for you. Forgive me.”
Damian recoils, physically, from the request. His eyes dart over to Tim before he can stop himself, taking cues from the boy, trying to understand the strange— maybe nonexistent— hierarchy he’s stumbled upon.
Tim just frowns at him. Not unhappily. Just… pensive.
“It’s fine.” Damain says.
“Now that that’s settled,” Tim says, lips twitching, eyes wrinkling again with that ever present mirth. He picks up the mug of coffee that had clearly been meant for Father, drains the last of it. “If you start another pot, Bruce, you might be able to convince me to help find the kid’s mom.”