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He's seen it before. Seen the empty stares, the limp fingers that turned stiff so quickly. He knew what it was, could give you the definition in his sleep. He'd spent long enough thinking about it. He knew it could happen to him. Knew it could happen to anyone. He knew that a person's life could be over and nothing came after that because after that there was nothing. He knew.

Knowing wasn't the same.

He'd had it touch close to him before. Didn't it shape his life? Control his destiny? He was nine then. Somehow it was different now. Colder. He'd known it before.

Knowing wasn't the same.

Because kneeling here, in a room that wasn't his own, dark hair falling onto a pillow that wasn't his, something was gone inside of him. Something that, to some extent, he hadn't known was there. It was cold. But it wasn't. It was hollow, but full of pain. It was an emptiness that reached outward and expanded. There was no good in trying to contain it because it attached itself to everything it met.

When you met an enemy like that the best option was to put it in a status field. Then it was unable to assimilate itself with… no. Not like that. He was distracting himself. He knew he needed something, anything to focus on. To hold onto, because he was falling down a hole that always widened and it was dark but he needed dark but now the dark was consuming him. It wasn't a good dark, even if he knew it was natural, that this happened to all things.

Knowing wasn't the same.

Because Dick was dead, and as he pressed his forehead deeper into the pillow still faint with that familiar sawdust smell, Bruce wished he could say he felt his heart shatter. He wished he could feel anything. But he didn't wish that, because then it would hurt. But it hurt anyway, right? There must be some reason these tears were falling down his face. When his parents had died his heart had shattered. Why couldn't that happen again?

Bruce decided he did hurt. It wasn't a normal hurt, or a hurt like when his parents were murdered. This was… this was behind normal emotions. There was a shining layer of nothing where his emotions should be, where he was holding them back. But underneath that, in a removed way that reached into his soul, he was screaming. He didn't understand how it could tear him apart like this.

He decided to call it secondary emotions. When he was to hurt to feel like a normal person. The feeling behind the feeling. How messed up was he that he couldn't even feel right? Failure. Pathetic. This wouldn't have happened to Dick. He should be alive instead of you. He knew there was nothing he could have done to save him.

Knowing wasn't the same.

It was his fault. It was his fault for not teaching Dick the most important lesson of all. The lesson he'd failed to teach all the Robins, all the Batgirls. The one he could never hammer in. That they were worth more than him. That his life didn't matter, that theirs did, why didn't Dick understand that? Why?

He didn't know how to describe what it felt like now. He'd known that when a person died they were over. But… but this was wrong. Because one moment Dick had been alive and the next he hadn't. Because one moment he was a person and the next he was a shell. It was to fast. Because Dick was there. Dick was part of the universe. Part of something connected to everything. You can't just take part of the universe like that. He knew that everyone was part of the universe. Knew that people had been dying since the beginning of time.

Knowing wasn't the same.

Because Dick had done things. And he knew that doing things didn't mean you got out of dying, but it should! Because… he knew he didn't have a reason. You couldn't just say that someone wouldn't die. But… didn't anyone understand that Dick wasn't supposed to? He'd done things, he was somebody, there were memories. If he was gone… it was like they didn't exist. The memories were there… but if Dick was gone… it was like they didn't count. Like every impact the smiling, gentle, loving, acrobat had had on the world were suddenly rendered null and void. Because if they weren't… Dick would be here. Warm. Alive. Eyes shining with the joy he'd never been able to contain.

It didn't make sense but it was true. Somehow. But Dick couldn't be gone. Because he was a part of Bruce. Because everything had been darkness and shadows until Dick was there, and then… it wasn't. And when Dick was there, shining in the blackness… when he'd heard Bruce wake up crying out from a nightmare, the newly taken in eight year old had appointed himself Bruce's night watchman. And every night he'd curled up beside Bruce. He'd even gotten Bruce to hold his small body in Bruce's own arms. He'd reasoned that Bruce didn't want Dick to have nightmares the rest of his life, did he? Bruce knew Dick's real motivation was to ease Bruce's nights.

And even when he's moved to Bludhaven… part of him had still been there. Part of Bruce. And if he was part of Bruce he couldn't be gone, right? He had to walk in the door and smile and pull Bruce to his chest and gently smile and run his fingers through Bruce's hair. Bruce never could get Dick to swallow the 'I am the untouchable Dark Knight and require no physical affection so keep of at a distance of at least 5 feet' mentality. Dick had instead to be completely opposite, and try to 'cuddle' and 'give hugs' as much as physically possible. How Bruce had raised such an excessive cuddler he would never know.

So he couldn't leave. It was that simple and Bruce refused to acknowledge otherwise so everything was fine so why wouldn't he stop crying? Why… It was going to be okay because Dick made everything okay, that was the way he worked… but there were no comforting arms about him now, and no gentle fingers and that meant Dick wasn't here… Maybe Bruce would be okay later. He didn't think so. When his parents died, things hadn't been okay. Until Dick. There would never be another Dick. He knew Dick would want him to move on, to heal, but he couldn't.

Knowing wasn't the same.