As requested by Becky Blue Eyes, an "all three of 'em" fic, as referenced in Failure to Thrive. For those of you who don't actually want to go find that one and figure out just what I'm talking about for yourselves:
"Wally watched him brood for a long, silent minute before asking, 'You're wondering if Bruce hadn't been in the audience that night, if you would've made it.'
'Not exactly an if, but a when,' Dick sighed. 'You know what happened.'
'All three of 'em,' Wally confirmed unhappily. He glanced at Dick suspiciously. 'If you're thinking of trying again, I'd like to know now so I can tattle on you, asshat.'
Dick laughed hollowly, a breathy, half-hearted chuckle. 'You'll be the first person I call,' he said, looking up at Wally through a fringe of dark hair. 'Promise.'"
So, this is going to be one of those "Five + One" things, except modified, because there's only three of them, and I'm not retconning in an extra two just for word count.
And on that note, on with the fic!
Save You
The First Time: Age 11
The small alcove Dick had scraped out in the Batcave-"the Nest," Bruce called it sometimes-was starting to feel claustrophobic. Normally, the small corner closet was cozy, lined with newspaper clippings and pillows filched from the rest of the manor when Alfred wasn't looking, a few blankets and a large box of electronics components for fixing or building equipment. But tonight, Dick didn't feel comfortable anywhere-he felt like the walls were closing in on him, and he would do anything to make them stop.
The newspaper clippings on the walls were all happy, upbeat stories-people saved, crises averted, lives returned to some semblance of normal. But the clippings in the box on the floor next to him were heavier-failures, help come too late, accusations of helplessness and incompetency screaming up at him. The top-most article, dropped there seconds earlier, told of a group of young children, just younger than himself, and Gotham's heroes come too late to save them all from an overdose of Scarecrow's fear toxin. The one on the bottom of the pile, periodically shuffled to the top on nights like tonight, screamed "Flying Graysons killed in tragic accident-son left behind"!
Son left behind.
Dick felt his back press into the back corner of the room, rustling some of the clippings taped behind him. His throat was closing up, choking him as the sobs he'd been holding back for most of the night shoved forward, pressing against his lungs.
Batman had been away for days since their-his-failure, nearly a week of going over what he'd done wrong. He kept coming back to the same question, regardless of what avenue he kicked himself down: How is Bruce ever going to be able to keep me around when he knows I'm such a failure?
A half-empty pill bottle, filched from the first aid table in the Batcave, sat on the other side of the clipping box from him on the floor of his closet-turned-hideout. The pain medication was still good, and there were more than thirty in the bottle-enough to kill him before anyone bothered to come looking for him.
Not that anyone would for quite a while, not for an inept kid trying to play superheroes on too big a scale, and failing miserably.
He reached for the bottle and his water bottle, unsure of what he was doing. He didn't want to die necessarily, there were things he'd like to do with his life, but he could only see rejection when Bruce returned, and dying here of his own hand sounded a lot gentler than dying out in the street due to some random accident or twist of fate. Not that he'd have to wait long, if his incompetence in the realm of crime-fighting was anything to judge by.
Dick fumbled with the cap for a long, frustrating minute, before finally beating the childproof lock with a choked sob. His face was wet and itchy, and his chest and head hurt like hell from crying.
I'm sorry, Bruce. I'm really sorry.
He shook a handful of pills into his palm, and missed. His trembling sent tiny blue capsules skittering everywhere across the concrete floor, rolling under pillows and behind the small bookcase in the opposite corner. A strangled, hiccuping sound ricocheted around the room, and it took Dick a minute to realize it came from him. He sat up on his knees, still shaking like a baby leaf in a hurricane, and pressed the heels of his hands into his eyes to dry off his eyelashes so he could see enough to start gathering the pills again.
His cell phone rang, insistent and loud in the small space. Dick jumped, dropping his handful of retrieved pills to the ground again.
The screen lit up with the name Wally West, and a Keystone City area code. He squinted at it and tried to think for the space of another shrill ring-oh, right. That Wally West, the Flash's protege. They'd exchanged numbers (in relative secrecy, for Dick) a few weeks before, but this was the first time Wally had called.
Dick didn't particularly want to answer, but what if something was wrong? What if he needed to contact the League, and didn't know how, so he called Dick instead? Hesitantly, he answered. "Yeah?"
"Dude, Flash's home again!"
Dick stilled, the occasional tremor sending shockwaves through his skinny frame. "...He is?"
"Yeah, the League's finally out of the Hall! Is Batman back yet?"
"I... I don't know. Haven't seen him yet, but he could be." Please don't be home, please don't be home, please don't be home.
Wally paused, and the silence sounded both concerned and disapproving. "You okay? You sound weird, man."
Dick sat back on his heels and switched the phone to his other ear. "Yeah, I'm fine," he muttered impatiently. If Bruce was going to be home soon, Dick was going to be homeless soon, unless he got off the phone and acted fast.
"You sure?"
"Yes, I'm just...coming down with something. Wet patrol night, it's probably just a cold."
Wally made a sympathetic sound in the back of his throat. "Augh, that sucks. Chicken soup and Blade Runner for the weekend?"
Dick choked on a lump in his throat. I don't think chicken soup is going to help any, he thought. "Yeah. Sure. Chicken soup."
"Or, my mom makes this really good veggie soup when I'm sick. I could run a thing of it over, if you wanted? I'm sure she wouldn't mind, I mean, it takes literally fifteen minutes to make and I could be...wherever you are in probably thirty or forty, I mean, I can get to either coast within an hour. So it's really not a problem if you want me to bring you some-"
"Wally," Dick said, curling into a hunched position to relieve some of the pressure on his lower back. "You really don't have to bring me anything. I'm fine, it's just a cold. I get them all the time."
"Mm. Well, okay, if you're sure. But if you need anything, just gimme a call, okay? Hey, are you sure Batman isn't back yet? Unc- Flash said Batman left before him, said something about making sure you weren't feeling any adverse affects from... Shoot, what'd he say- Cowardly Lion's something-or-other."
"Scarecrow's fear toxin," Dick said, struggling to keep his tone neutral. He started picking up pills again with his free hand and dropping them back in the bottle to keep them from rolling away again. "I got a little bit before I got my mask on, yeah. Not much."
"Well, maybe that's why you're feeling sick. Weirdo side effects or whatever."
"Maybe," Dick muttered.
Wally paused, and put his hand over the phone to yell something. "Sorry, my mom's calling me down for dinner. You take care of yourself, okay? Sleep. Take a day. It's good for you."
"Yeah," Dick said, unable to keep himself from choking up. He cleared his throat and tried to make it sound like a hacking cough as best he could. "Yeah, thanks. You...too, I guess."
"Kay. You wanna get together and hang out sometime? I have this crazy awesome new video game that just came in the mail today, if you wanted to come over sometime and help me break it in?"
"I... I'll see what Batman says," Dick stammered.
A faint thumping from Wally's end of the conversation interrupted him. "Coming! Sorry, gotta go. I'll call you later, okay?"
"Yeah," Dick said quietly. I'm not going to be here to answer, but you can call all you want.
"Cool. Later." The phone clicked, and Dick had just enough time to close it and set it down behind a stack of pillows before a gentle knock on his door brought him scrambling around, trying to find all the pills he'd dropped. "What?"
"Hey, kiddo, it's me," Bruce said through the door. "Am I allowed?"
Heart pounding, Dick reached up and twisted the doorknob, letting it fall free of the door frame. Bruce pulled it open the rest of the way, and sank into a crouch in the space the door left. "Sorry I was gone so long, the Green Lanterns were having one of their married-couple arguments and the entire League was needed to mediate." He shook his head. "Sometimes I question our membership roster. Most of the time, I question our membership roster."
Dick forced a tiny, nervous laugh. He did his best to push the still-open pill bottle behind a pillow to hide it, but Bruce caught the movement anyway. He reached over Dick's arm and grabbed the bottle.
"Dick, what's this?"
"I... I have a headache."
Bruce frowned. "Dick. These aren't aspirin. They're for extreme pain only, they're addictive. You shouldn't have even been able to get to these."
"They were out on top of the box, and it's a bad headache."
With one surprisingly fluid motion, Bruce re-situated himself so he was sitting with his back leaning against the door frame and pulled Dick closer with one large, gentle hand. His other palm stretched out and slid across Dick's face, wiping at the residual moisture on the boy's cheekbones. He glanced around, and found the box of newspaper clippings, with the three-year-old headline announcing the Graysons' death sitting on top.
"Well, for starters," Bruce said, reaching out for the lid of the shoebox, "emotional stress doesn't help with headaches at all." He reached around Dick and gathered up the few stray pills hiding under the nest of pillows, dropping them neatly into the bottle again. He kept one in his palm, and held it out to Dick. "So how about one of these, and we head upstairs and find a movie to watch before bed?"
Dick took the lone pill and swallowed it with a sip from his water bottle before nodding. "Sounds good," he said, trying not to let the uncertainty hanging on him unbalance his fragile standing with Bruce. He didn't...act like he was going to kick him out, but...
Bruce helped him stand before maneuvering himself to his knees in front of him. "Hey," he said gently, "I don't think I got a chance to tell you before I had to leave. You handled yourself really well with that Scarecrow rescue. That really didn't go the way it was supposed to, but neither of us could've expected that. You handled it very well, and I want you to know I'm proud of you, okay?"
Dick sniffled and pressed his luck by ducking in close for a clingy, rather damp hug. Bruce wrapped his arms around him and squeezed, tight and warm and safe.
"Do you just want to go to bed," Bruce asked into his hair after a long, silent minute.
He nodded-he felt exhausted in ways he didn't know he could be exhausted, and Wally had suggested sleeping it off. The single painkiller already felt heavy in his system, and he yawned widely against Bruce's grey training t-shirt. Bruce's arms shifted, and suddenly he was airborn, held up against Bruce's shoulder as he walked for the elevator.
He was asleep before they got halfway across the training floor.
So, part one of four, the next will be up...whenever I feel like it. Which could be soon, I do have Thanksgiving break this week and the family I'm spending it with is nuts. But I digress.
