Chapter Text
The city sprawled beneath them, all steel ribs and sodium-orange veins, Gotham breathing its usual sickly lullaby. Sirens wailed somewhere far below, distant enough to be irrelevant. Damian Wayne crouched at the edge of the rooftop, boots balanced precisely where the concrete fractured, cape snapping sharply behind him as the wind cut across the skyline.
Still. Quiet. Controlled.
He counted his breaths without realizing he was doing it. In for four. Hold. Out for six. The way Father had taught him. The way he still taught him, even if he didn’t say it out loud anymore.
“Okay,” Dick’s voice crackled through the comms, light and irritatingly cheerful. “Joker hit three pharmacies in Burnside. Laughing gas, nerve agents, some experimental junk that Tim is currently having an aneurysm over. We go in quiet, snag the clown, and get out before he decides to redecorate with explosives.”
Damian scoffed, adjusting his grip on his grapnel. The line sat wrong in his palm twisted half a degree off. He fixed it. “Your optimism is misplaced, Grayson. The Joker does not do ‘quiet.’”
Dick landed beside him in a smooth arc, boots barely making a sound. Perfect form. Of course. Damian clocked it anyway, cataloging the angle, the timing, the ease. Dick made it look effortless. That was the problem.
He glanced over, mask tilted slightly. “Still, we try. That’s the plan.”
Plans were meant to be executed flawlessly. Failure was wasteful. Embarrassing.
Damian shot him a look. “Plans are flexible.”
“Mm,” Dick hummed. “That’s what Tim says right before he starts threatening bodily harm.”
As if summoned by name, Tim’s voice cut in, crisp and unimpressed. “Damian, if you deviate from the plan again, I swear I will personally reprogram your gauntlets to tase you every time you get cocky.”
Jason laughed over the channel. “Please do. I’d pay to see that.”
Damian’s jaw tightened. Cocky. Brat. Problem child. He knew the words even when they weren’t spoken. He knew the tone that came before them.
“Focus,” Duke added, calmer but firm. “Joker’s already unpredictable. We don’t need internal chaos.”
Internal chaos. As if Damian were doing this on purpose.
He rolled his eyes but didn’t respond. Responding would only make it worse. He had learned that much. Silence was safer. Silence was acceptable.
He was Robin. He was the Robin. Trained by the League of Assassins, sharpened by blood and discipline, refined by Batman himself. He had memorized the manuals, the tactics, the unspoken rules. He followed them. Mostly.
More capable than any of them had been at his age. He knew that. They knew that too even if they refused to say it.
What they did say was that he was difficult. That he had an attitude. That he needed to “lighten up.”
As if that were a switch he could flip.
Dick nudged his shoulder lightly.
“Hey. Dami.”
The nickname made Damian bristle on instinct then settle, reluctantly. He hated that it worked that way. Hated that Dick could say his name like that and make something unclench in his chest before he could stop it.
“What,” he snapped, because snapping was easier than admitting that.
Dick grinned beneath the mask; Damian could hear it in his voice. “Just stick with me on this one, okay? We do it clean.”
Clean meant perfect. Perfect meant no mistakes. No missteps. No moments where someone looked at him the way Father sometimes did calculating, weighing, wondering if Damian was worth the effort it took to keep him here.
Damian turned back to the city, fingers curling around the grapnel until the metal bit into his gloves.
He would do this perfectly.
He would follow the plan. He would not rush ahead. He would not say the wrong thing, would not react too sharply, would not let his irritation show. He would not be a brat. He would not be that version of himself the one they expected.
If he did everything right, maybe Father would notice. Maybe Tim would stop treating him like a live grenade. Maybe Jason would stop laughing at him. Maybe Duke wouldn’t sound so careful when he spoke.
Dick already liked him. Damian knew that. Dick always did.
But liking wasn’t the same as belonging.
The wind tugged at his cape again, insistent. The city waited.
“I will not deviate,” Damian said finally, voice clipped and precise. “I am capable of restraint.”
Dick’s pause was brief—but Damian heard it anyway.
“Good,” Dick said gently. “Then let’s go show Gotham we’ve got this.”
Damian fired the grapnel and leapt into the dark, heart hammering not with fear but with the desperate, aching hope that this time, this time, he would do everything exactly right.
Damian hesitated, just for a fraction of a second.
The grapnel line sang as it pulled Damian forward, the city blurring beneath him in streaks of orange and shadow. Gotham rushed past in a rush of wind and height and vertigo, rooftops snapping into view and vanishing again as he released, recalculated, fired.
Swing. Release. Fire.
He kept pace with Dick easily. Of course he did. His arcs were tighter, more controlled less wasted movement. Efficiency mattered. Every second mattered.
Dick moved beside him like he belonged to the sky itself, easy and fluid, cape catching air in a way that looked almost playful.
“Robin,” Dick said over the comms, voice close now, shared channel only. “I handed this to you for a reason. You don’t have to be so tense about everything.”
Robin.
The word hit harder than it should have.
The mantle had not been inherited it had been given. Handed to him by Dick Grayson himself, the first Robin, the standard by which all others were judged. Damian had accepted it with bloodied knuckles and sharp teeth, determined to prove that it belonged to him.
To prove it to Bruce.
His father hadn’t said it aloud, but Damian could feel the weight of expectation every time he stepped into the suit. Every mistake echoed louder. Every success felt… temporary. Like it could be taken back. Like he was always one misstep away from being corrected. Replaced. Sent back to the margins.
“I am not tense,” Damian snapped, firing another line. “I am focused.”
Dick chuckled softly, riding the next swing with infuriating ease. “See? That right there. You can ease up a little.”
Damian’s stomach dropped.
Ease up.
What did that mean? He ran the last few seconds back in his head automatically his posture, his tone, the speed of his response. He adjusted his grip mid-swing without meaning to, tightening it.
“I am easing up,” he said, sharper than intended. “What precisely do you mean?”
Internally, something spiraled.
Damn it. He had done something wrong. He must have. Dick wouldn’t have said anything otherwise. He never did, not unless it mattered. Not unless Damian needed correcting.
There was a brief pause on the line just long enough for Damian to fill it with every possible failure.
Then Dick spoke, quieter now.
“Hey. No, listen. I personally picked you to be Robin. I trust you, okay?”
The words landed and slid right past where Dick intended them to go.
Trust. Picked. For a reason.
That meant responsibility. That meant expectation. That meant do not fail me.
Damian’s chest tightened, his next swing a fraction too rigid. “I will not let you down,” he said immediately. Firm. Absolute. A vow. “I swear it. I will uphold the title. I will not embarrass you. Or Father.”
“That’s—” Dick started, then stopped himself. “That’s not what I meant, Damian.”
The correction came gently.
It still felt like a blade.
Damian’s mind snagged on it, replaying the phrase over and over. Not what I meant. Which meant his response had been wrong. Which meant he had misunderstood. Again.
He swallowed, jaw setting. His next movement was flawless, technically perfect, even as something in his chest pulled tight and small.
“Understood,” he said, voice clipped. Controlled. Professional.
If Dick was disappointed, Damian would fix it. He always did. He just needed to know how but no one ever explained that part.
They flew on in silence for a few seconds, Gotham yawning wide beneath them.
Damian focused on the math of the city, on angles and distances and trajectories anything but the quiet ache settling behind his ribs.
He had disappointed Dick.
His favorite.
And worse he didn’t even understand how.
Below them, a distant explosion rattled the street. Purple smoke bloomed between buildings, laughter echoing faintly through the air.
Tim sighed. “And there it is. Everyone in position. Robin—”
“I am already moving,” Damian interrupted, firing his grapnel and launching himself forward without waiting for confirmation.
“Damian,” Dick warned, already following. “The plan—”
“Yes, yes, yes,” Damian muttered, cape flaring as he sailed into the chaos. “I am aware. Try to keep up.”
Jason snorted. “Kid’s gonna get himself killed.”
The warehouse interior was dark, cavernous, and smelled faintly of oil, old wood, and something chemical enough to make Damian wrinkle his nose.
He landed silently knees bending just enough to absorb the impact, boots kissing concrete without a sound. For a split second, he felt grounded again. Mission parameters. Clear objective. Find Joker. Neutralize threat.
Simple.
He moved immediately.
Too immediately.
Damian darted forward between stacked crates, blades already sliding into his hands. His heartbeat was fast, sharp, irritatingly loud in his ears. He hated that. He hated feeling off. He hated not knowing why.
“Damian,” Dick’s voice came over comms, lower now. Careful. “Slow it down. We don’t need to rush this.”
“I am not rushing,” Damian snapped, vaulting over a pallet without breaking stride. “I am proceeding efficiently.”
There was a pause just long enough to feel intentional.
“…Okay,” Dick said. “I’m just saying, you can take a second. Breathe.”
Damian’s jaw tightened. There it was again. That tone. Like he was fragile. Like he was doing something wrong.
“I want to get this done,” Damian replied flatly. “That is all.”
Another pause. “Are you upset?”
The question hit him sideways.
“No,” Damian said instantly. Too fast. “Why would I be upset? Nothing has happened.”
“Uh-huh,” Dick murmured, unconvinced but not pushing.
Damian opened his mouth to retort and slammed shoulder-first into something solid.
“—What the hell—”
“Watch it, demon spawn!”
Damian stumbled back half a step, already bristling, blade half-raised—
Only to be hit from the side by another body, momentum jarring enough to knock the breath from his lungs.
“Seriously?” came Jason’s voice, sharp and annoyed. “You trying to tackle me or audition for a demolition crew?”
Another figure stepped out of the shadows, staff tapping once against the floor, followed by a very familiar, long-suffering sigh.
Damian straightened immediately, spine stiffening. “Brown. Todd. Your lack of spatial awareness is—”
“Excuse you,” Jason cut in, bracing a hand on a crate. “I was standing still. You two came flying in like homicidal bats out of hell.”
Tim adjusted his staff, eyes flicking over Damian in a rapid, clinical sweep posture, breathing, grip. Damian noticed. He always noticed.
“We were already inside,” Tim said evenly. “Stealthily. You know the plan.”
Damian’s irritation flared hot and sharp, embarrassment curling underneath it in a way he refused to acknowledge.
“I was following the plan,” he said. “Advancing toward the target.”
“You were advancing toward us,” Jason shot back. “With your shoulder.”
Dick landed behind them a second later, light on his feet but expression tight. “Okay. Everyone pause.”
Damian turned on him instantly. “I did nothing wrong.”
Dick blinked, clearly taken aback not by the words, but by the intensity behind them.
“I didn’t say you did,” Dick replied carefully.
“You implied it,” Damian snapped. “Repeatedly.”
Jason looked between them, brows lifting. “Wow. Somebody woke up on the wrong gargoyle.”
Tim shot Jason a look, then turned back to Damian, voice quieter. “You’re usually more aware of your surroundings.”
Usually.
The word stuck.
Damian’s fingers curled into fists at his sides. He felt too hot, too tight in his own skin, every sound in the warehouse suddenly too loud the distant hum of machinery, Joker’s laughter echoing from somewhere deeper inside, the scrape of boots on concrete.
“I am aware,” Damian said through clenched teeth. “I am simply prioritizing the objective.”
Dick stepped closer, lowering his voice. “Damian. I’m not criticizing you. I just need you to slow down a notch, okay? We’re a team.”
Team. Right.
A team that kept correcting him. Watching him. Waiting for him to mess up.
“I understand,” Damian said stiffly. “It will not happen again.”
That wasn’t what Dick had meant but Damian didn’t wait for clarification this time.
Jason barked a laugh. “Oh, I like him tonight. Real charming.”
“Focus,” Tim said sharply, then looked directly at Damian. “You were supposed to wait for confirmation before entering.”
There it was. The correction. The flat tone that never softened for him, never had not once in three years.
“I confirmed my own success,” Damian shot back. “Something you should attempt more often.”
He didn’t mean it like that. Not entirely. He meant I can do this too. He meant I belong here. But with Tim, it always came out wrong.
“Oh my god,” Jason muttered. “They’re gonna kill each other.”
Damian turned toward him immediately, relief flickering before he could stop it. “Grayson, Todd’s presence is unnecessary.”
Jason placed a hand dramatically over his chest. “Wow. Hurtful. I came all this way for you.”
Dick ignored both of them and pulled up the schematic on his wrist. “Warehouse splits into two main sections. Joker’s either staging theatrics up front or hiding in the back with something explosive and stupid.”
Tim nodded, already shifting into command mode. “We split. Jason, you’re with—”
“With Dick,” Jason said instantly. “Non-negotiable.”
Dick blinked. “What?”
Jason clapped a hand on Dick’s shoulder. “You and me have the same Joker trauma flavor. Plus, I don’t trust B with explosives and feelings.”
Damian scowled. “I am standing right here.”
Tim didn’t even look at him.
Tim exhaled slowly, already regretting his life choices. “Fine. Jason and Dick sweep the west wing. Damian—”
“No,” Damian interrupted. “I am going with Grayson.”
The words were out before he could stop them. Reflexive. Instinctual. Dick was safe. Dick explained things. Dick didn’t look at him like he was a hostile variable.
Tim’s eyebrow twitched. Just once. “Absolutely not.”
Dick raised his hands. “Guys—”
“You are impulsive when unsupervised,” Tim continued flatly, eyes fixed on Damian like a problem to be managed. “And you refuse to listen to me.”
Damian stepped closer, pulse pounding in his ears. “You are condescending and slow.”
“Methodical,” Tim corrected. “And alive.”
Jason snickered. “This is better than cable.”
Damian’s fingers curled at his sides.
Three years.
Three years in this family, and Tim still spoke to him like he was an intruder. Like a mistake that refused to leave. Damian had tried to mirror Tim’s strategies, memorized his protocols, even adjusted his fighting style once to match Tim’s preferences. None of it mattered.
With Jason, at least, there was noise. Jason yelled, mocked, threatened but Jason had raised him. Jason had fed him, trained him, watched him bleed and still come back. Jason didn’t like him, but Jason knew him.
Dick was kind. Dick always tried.
Father was… Father. Damian loved him because he had to. Because there was no other option.
But Tim?
Tim had lost Robin, and Damian had taken it. That was the sin Damian could never undo. Tim had become Red Robin because Damian existed and Tim had never forgiven him for it.
Damian didn’t even know how you were supposed to fix something like that.
Dick glanced between them, then sighed, weary but gentle. “Tim’s right, Dami. You two cover east. I’ll take the west.”
Damian stiffened.
The rejection landed sharp and cold, right between his ribs.
“…Very well,” he said after a moment, voice tight and precise. “Try not to disappoint me.”
The words were defensive. He knew that. He didn’t know how else to protect himself.
Tim smirked faintly. “Same to you, Robin.”
Robin.
Not Damian. Never Damian.
Damian turned away without another word, moving toward the east corridor with clipped, efficient strides. He didn’t look back. There was no point.
He had tried to be Tim’s equal. Tried to be his partner. Tried, once, to be his friend.
He had given up.
But the frustration still burned anyway, hot and useless, because some part of him small and stubborn and deeply stupid had never stopped wishing Tim would just see him.
Tim tapped his comm, jaw tight. “Okay. We clear aisle by aisle. No rushing. No heroics.”
Damian’s blade slid a fraction free with a soft, dangerous hiss. “You mistake efficiency for recklessness.”
“And you mistake recklessness for confidence,” Tim shot back immediately.
Damian scoffed. “I was trained to kill by age eight.”
Tim spun on him, temper flaring. “Good for you. I was trained to think by twelve. Which is why I’m still alive.”
The air between them went sharp.
They moved forward anyway, boots crunching softly over debris, but the rhythm was wrong too fast, too tense, shoulders brushing and pulling away again. Damian felt every sound too loudly: Tim’s breathing, the scrape of his staff, the hum of the lights overhead. It crawled under his skin.
Tim stopped so abruptly Damian nearly ran into him.
“You know what?” Tim snapped. “I’m sick of this. I’m sick of you acting like you’re better than everyone because you were raised by murderers.”
Damian’s spine went rigid. “Choose your words carefully.”
“Oh, no,” Tim fired back, voice rising. “I’m done choosing carefully. You’re a spoiled little brat who was handed everything training, money, the name, the suit and you still act like the world owes you blood.”
Something in Damian cracked, sharp and hot.
“You earned nothing,” Damian snarled, stepping forward. “You cling to relevance like a parasite because you know you were replaced.”
Tim shoved him back a step. “Say that again.”
“You heard me.”
“At least I’m not a homicidal maniac,” Tim snapped. “At least I didn’t grow up enjoying killing people.”
Damian’s breath stuttered. “I haven’t killed in over two years.”
Tim laughed, harsh and disbelieving. “Oh, that’s adorable. You want a parade?”
“I stopped,” Damian snapped. “I followed the rules. I restrained myself. I changed.”
“You still killed,” Tim shouted. “I’ve never killed anyone!”
“That wasn’t my fault!” Damian yelled back. “I was raised to be that way. I was made into a weapon before I could read before I even knew what choice was!”
“And that’s supposed to excuse it?” Tim screamed. “It’s not my fault you were raised to be a psycho!”
The word hit Damian like a physical blow.
Psycho.
His hands shook. He hated that they shook.
“I am trying,” Damian said, voice cracking despite everything he did to hold it together. “Every day I try. I follow your plans. I obey rules that make no sense to me-.”
Tim paced once, wild and furious. “You don’t get it. You never will.”
“I have been here three years,” Damian shouted. “Three years, and you still look at me like I don’t belong. Like I’m waiting to snap.”
“Because you are!” Tim fired back. “You took Robin from me and acted like you deserved it!”
“I never asked for it!” Damian screamed. “It was given to me! And I took it because I was told it was my duty because I thought if I did everything right, you would stop hating me!”
Tim froze for half a second.
Then something in his face twisted, ugly and unfiltered.
“You kill because you like it,” Tim said viciously. “You don’t even try to be better.”
“That is a lie!”
“You enjoy it!”
“I try every day!” Damian shouted, voice breaking wide open now.
Tim’s hands clenched into fists.
“You’re not a hero,” he spat. “You’re not one of us. You never will be.”
The words tumbled out faster, louder, unchecked.
“You should just—” Tim choked, breath ragged, fury blinding him. “—go off yourself. You’d be better off dead.”
Silence slammed down.
The warehouse seemed to shrink around them.
Damian froze completely.
His sword slipped an inch back into its sheath without him realizing it. His ears rang. His vision tunneled. For a horrifying moment, he couldn’t feel his legs at all.
So this was it.
This was the truth underneath everything.
No matter how hard he tried. No matter how perfect he was. No matter how long he stayed.
He would never fit. He would never be forgiven. He would never be wanted.
Tim’s face drained of color.
“Wait—no, that’s not—Damian, I didn’t mean—”
The apology came too late, tangled and frantic, tripping over itself the way Tim never usually did. Damian registered it distantly, like sound underwater. His chest still felt hollow, scooped out by the words that had landed and stayed.
Better off dead.
Then—
Movement.
From the corner of Damian’s eye, something wrong bloomed into focus.
Purple-gloved fingers.
A grin stretched too wide, too pleased, peeking from the shadows of the rafters like a child caught mid-prank.
The Joker.
His thumb pressed down on the detonator with theatrical delight, like he was ringing a bell to announce the punchline.
Time fractured.
Damian didn’t think.
He didn’t weigh outcomes or calculate blast radius or consider strategy.
All he knew—suddenly, painfully clear was that Tim was right there. That Tim was exposed. That Tim was still looking at him with horror and regret and something like fear.
I can take it, Damian thought, sharp and absolute. I always can.
Pain was familiar. Pain was manageable. Pain was something he understood.
Tim hurt differently.
Damian surged forward and slammed both hands into Tim’s chest, shoving him backward with everything he had.
“What the hell ar- DAMIAN!”
Tim stumbled, eyes wide, and for a fraction of a second their gazes locked, Tim realizing what Damian was doing, Damian refusing to let himself think about it.
The ceiling screamed.
Metal warped with a shriek that scraped straight down Damian’s spine. Concrete cracked, fissures racing outward like lightning.
Tim hit the ground hard, breath knocked from his lungs as he rolled, training kicking in just in time.
“Damian—!”
The explosion swallowed the sound.
The warehouse roof collapsed in a violent roar steel beams shearing loose, crates splintering, half the structure giving way as gravity claimed everything at once. The blast of air threw Damian backward, his cape snapping like a living thing as debris tore through it.
He felt the impact…not all at once, but in layers.
A beam slammed into his shoulder.
Something sharp tore across his side.
The floor vanished beneath his feet.
Dust filled his mouth, his nose, his lungs. The world turned white, then black, then painfully bright again.
As he fell, Damian had one last, stupidly clear thought:
I just didn’t want him hurt.
Even though Tim hated him. Even though Tim had just said the worst thing anyone had ever said to him. Even though Damian’s chest still ached with it.
I didn’t want him hurt. I can handle it. I always have.
The rubble came down in a crushing wave.
The last thing Tim saw was Damian’s cape…red and gold disappearing beneath the falling debris, swallowed whole as the roof collapsed.
Then the world went silent.
Too silent.
Dust settled in thick, choking clouds. The ringing in Tim’s ears was deafening in the absence of everything else. He pushed himself up on shaking arms, coughing hard, heart slamming against his ribs.
“Damian?” he croaked.
No answer.
Just wreckage.
And the sickening certainty that Damian had chosen him anyway.