First Trauma

I have spent the last nine months delving into the Batcannon. I love all the Batfamily, but Tim Drake is my favorite character; I bought and read all the Robin and Red Robin issues and it was totally worth it. I can't really decide from the comics when Tim received his first serious injury, so I thought I would speculate about that. This is set somewhere after Knightfall and before Contagion as far as comic stories go. (Updated July 26- I noticed some typos and formatting errors).

Batman and associated characters belong to DC. I own nothing but I like borrowing them.

Tim was blinking sluggishly but he really wasn't seeing anything yet, just basically getting the impression that it was dark. Bedroom? Not unless he had begun decorating his room with moldy food and dead animals: wherever he was, it reeked. His stomach turned, but the nausea seemed to come from more than just the smell—he felt quite dizzy. He remembered Bruce's cure for nausea: close your eyes and take a deep breath. He started to inhale deeply, but instead gave out a gasping cry of pain. His chest felt like it had just exploded. He tried to lift his head up out of the puddle that was matting his hair, wanting to get a look at the damage to his chest, but he didn't get far before sharp pain in the back of his head and neck had him seeing stars.

Unintentional tears were welling behind his mask as he squeezed his eyes shut, and he felt his heart thumping much faster than he knew it should be. He must be panicking. He would force himself to snap out of it, just like he was trained to. He WOULD take control of his body so he could process the situation in his mind, come up with a logical plan, and get back into action.

He took inventory of himself. He could tell he was in his Robin suit by the snuggly-fitted, heavy feel of the Kevlar, which at the moment just made breathing deeply more difficult. Steady, shallow breaths might give him the most oxygen. He forced his eyes open again. He couldn't get them to focus for a few seconds, Dark shapes turned blurry and doubled, then resolved into a narrow alley way. The buildings above him looked like they were almost touching at the tops, silhouetted against a very dim evening light. He could just make out a darker shape beside him out of the corner of his eye, big, bulky and smelly—probably a dumpster. Had he fallen? Maybe, but not off the buildings, he figured he would have to be in a lot more pain if that were true, plus the angle he was at would make more sense with the dumpster. That shorter fall didn't explain all his pain though. The idea of getting up flitted through his mind but his inner voice of reason gave a hysterical laugh at that. The voice of reason more helpfully added that if he was Robin, Batman would not be far off, so he should call for help.

He was about to argue with himself that calling for help could end up as calling-for-half-a-dozen-more-thugs-to-beat-up-on-me, when he was saved from having to make that choice by the sound of Nightwing's worried voice saying "Batman, by the dumpster, I found him."

Footsteps crunched over something in the alley and a moment later Nightwing was in his view, lighter skin and the reflective lenses of his mask easy to pick out among the darker shapes surrounding him. Nightwing crouched down quickly and reached out a hand to Tim's neck, his fingers resting on Tim's pulse point and his thumb on Tim's jawline. He moved his thumb, gently tapping on Tim's face as he said, clearly and with a calm that sounded forced, "Tim, can you hear me? What happened?"

Tim started to take a deeper breath, trying to assure Dick he was awake behind the mask, but he stopped with a gasp with caused Dick to startle slightly. Tim had to get it through his head: breathing deeply=bad idea. After a second or two he started to get words out, but his shallow breaths made his speech faint and choppy. "I can hear you. I-I don't really remember what happened. I think I fell?" The last part came out sounding more pitiful than he had intended. Way to show them you can handle yourself, Robin, he thought.

Dick's face tightened, not bothering to hide his concern. He leaned in to examine Tim more closely. "We heard a gun go off, a yell, and something falling, and we lost sight of you. Are you sure that shot didn't hit you? Where does it—oh, man, your bleeding." Tim heard Dick's hands splash in the puddle under soaking his hair. "What happened to your head?" Dick's voice was getting higher and slightly panicked and Tim could feel Dick's fingers carefully prodding the back of his head.

At that moment Batman loomed over them, shining a flashlight that made Tim squeeze his eyes shut in pain. He wasn't sure, but he could have sworn he heard Batman's breath catch when he saw them. When Tim blinked his eyes open again, Bruce was kneeling beside him, taking charge of the situation.

"Nightwing, go to the end of the alley. The Batmobile will be there in 45 seconds." Dick got up and left with one very light, reassuring pat on Tim's shoulder and one worried backwards glance.

Bruce settled more fully into Tim's view as he continued to bark orders at Nightwing. "Bring a collar, a backboard, and the first aid kit." Bruce continued the inspection Dick had begun, lightly using his hands check for injuries. His voice was calm and even as he asked, "Robin, tell me what hurts."

Tim was familiar with this tone; Batman tended to use it when he wanted Tim to slow down and think. It snapped Tim into soldier mode, and he assessed himself quickly. "Head, neck, chest, back, and , uh, left elbow." He added as an afterthought, just noticing that his elbow was in a puddle similar to the one under his head. "My head and my chest are the worst. It's hard to breathe." The last sentence came out with a note of pleading, despite his best efforts to keep his voice neutral. He knew it was foolish to deny to Batman the extent of his injuries, but he didn't want to seem like a whiner either.

Batman nodded and leaned in for a closer look at Tim's head. Tim once again tried to lift his head but was restrained by Bruce's hand resting firmly on his forehead. "Tim, lie still."

Tim obeyed, though even in the midst of his pain he was feeling a bit self-conscious to be the object of this much scrutiny. He heard the door on the Batmobile slam and Nightwing's quick, soft footsteps heading back. Out of the corner of his eye Tim saw him kneel down, his arms full of medical equipment. Tim's heart gave a jump as he saw the collar and backboard, remembering the time he'd helped Alfred and Jean-Paul transport Batman home after Bane had broken Bruce's back. Tim had been so scared it he had barely kept his voice and hands steady; he had never been responsible for dealing with such a serious injury before. Were his current injures really that dire? Surely a short fall from the dumpster couldn't have broken anything that serious? Unfortunately, as he thought back to Batman's rigorously thorough first aid training, Tim couldn't actually prove that theory to himself. He thought if he had broken something serious it would hurt worse than it did currently, but he didn't really have extensive experience with being injured yet. Bruce had been quite cautious with him. He hoped this experience wouldn't be too traumatizing for Bruce—he didn't want to be benched indefinitely. He felt his pulse pounding as he began to think of Bruce's possible reaction, combined with thoughts about how serious his injuries might be.

He was just being panicky. He should calm down. He was starting to shake slightly, to feel cold despite the mild summer night. Dick and Bruce must have felt it as they put on the collar, strapped him in and lifted him up on the board (Tim felt several gauze pads placed under his head). He heard Bruce say quietly and firmly. "It's okay Robin. You're safe now." Dick quickly chimed in, keeping his tone light and cheerful. "Yeah, you're going to be fine, we'll be at the cave in no time, Alfred's fixed us up hundreds of times, this won't be any problem for him." Despite his encouragement, when Tim briefly caught sight of Dick's face his expression was strained.

They maneuvered Tim into the car, putting him across the backseat, Dick reclining the passenger seat and grabbing medical equipment. Tim was starting to get lightheaded and tried to take a deeper breath, but once again it wasn't a smart move and just caused him to start gasping and Dick to fumble slightly with the equipment. Tim needed more air desperately, but he really didn't think he could manage to breathe any deeper. Thankfully Dick took out a mask and put it on his face, and the extra oxygen soon eased the light headedness a bit; his shallow but steady breathing pattern resumed.

Tim had been proud of acing Bruce's demanding first aid tests, but right now he wished his brain would just shut up about the knowledge because he kept thinking of all sorts of nasty possibilities for what could be causing his symptoms. Dick's worry as he checked Tim's pulse and breathing were bad enough. At least Tim could count on Dick to try to keep him distracted.

"Hey buddy, let me take off your mask, make you more comfortable, take a little look at your eyes. There you go, easy does it. Ok, I'm going to shine a light into your eyes real quick, check your pupils, sorry about this, I always hate this test too. Just keep your eyes open for a bit… There. Nothing to worry about, your pupils look fine. Equal and reactive to light." he said a little louder, in Bruce's direction. Bruce seemed to be having a quiet conversation with Alfred; Tim couldn't concentrate enough to hear exactly what was said.

"Follow my finger with your eyes." Dick continued. That was trickier. Tim felt woozy. Dick seemed to notice his difficulty and asked "Are you having any trouble seeing?"

"Just a little trouble focusing, things look a little blurry around the edges. Might be just because I feel kinda dizzy, like I'm gonna pass out."

Dick moved so Tim could see his face more easily—it wasn't like Tim had much range of motion with the collar on. Dick gave one of his patented reassuring, brotherly smiles. "Ok, don't pass out, you don't want to sleep yet, not till you get a chance to have Alfred scold you, then try to feed you." Tim made a face. "Ok, no food right now." Dick continued. "If you feel like throwing up, please try not to, it's a pain to get that out of the costume, let alone the Batmobile. If you do feel like doing that anyway, you need to let me know right away, ok?" he said a bit more seriously. "I'll need to move you if you do. It's okay though, you can make it, I believe in you."

Dick checked the gauze he had placed under Tim's head and then checked his pulse, all the time applying pressure to Tim's bleeding elbow. He kept up a steady stream of encouraging chatter, while Batman kept up a steady stream of silent driving, interrupted every now and then with short sentences like—"How's the bleeding?" ,"Pulse and respiration?" or "ETA 3 minutes."

Tim thought about saying something to Bruce to reassure him—Bruce was never much of a talker, but Tim sensed the concern behind the focused, business-like statements. However, Tim couldn't get much volume right now; he'd have to try again in the cave. They'd be there soon.

This will be 3 parts. Please review.