This one might be a bit darker, but I've been meaning to write it for a while. There's no way a thirteen year old going through what Robin does doesn't have ridiculously bad nightmares. Kids aren't meant to see this kind of stuff.
Disclaimer: I don't own the mentioned characters.
The young team of heroes all believed that it was Batman who had forbade the Boy Wonder from telling anyone his real name, but in actuality, he had made the decision himself.
Batman had warned against it, but he had only done it once, back when Dick first became Robin. Even then, it hadn't been much of a warning, let alone 'forbidding' it. It was just before their first real mission together, while Alfred was helping to make some finishing touches to his costume.
"Telling someone your secret identity will only put them at risk," Batman had said, pulling his cowl down over his eyes to hide even the slightest trace of their warmth. "If the villains we're up against find out that someone knows who you really are, there isn't a place on this earth safe enough to protect them."
It had been so many years ago, and never once had they approached the topic again, but Dick never forgot about it. He had gained the secret identity by risking the people he loved already, and the world had proved to him that even the place he had felt safest in wasn't enough. He wasn't going to make the same mistake again.
That being said, Bruce let him go hang out with kids from school, and even the team outside of missions. In fact, he often encouraged it. Dick deserved a normal life, and while that was entirely impossible at this point, he did his best to try and provide him with some normalcy. They had even worked out a list of codewords and excuses for when they were needed up at Mt. Justice or the Bat Signal was active and the job would be better assisted with two heads.
Dick couldn't tell his friends the full extent of his life, but he certainly didn't lie about what he didn't have to. They knew he had a busy life and that it came with a lot of trauma. He was the ward of one of the most well-known people in the states and there were a lot of people who wanted him dead, or wanted to harm him for leverage. They knew that he was almost always bruised and scarred from people who had assaulted him, or from a mishap in a training session meant to better prepare him for those people, which wasn't an exact lie. They knew what had happened to his parents, too.
The one thing in his life that he never lied about especially, the thing that he would go out of his way to warn about before doing most anything overnight with a friend, was his nightmares.
The first time he warned his friends, they would always brush it off and tell him it was alright; everyone had nightmares from time-to-time, they knew what it was like. That would change when they experienced it.
It would start slow.
His friend would be fast asleep beside him, caught up in their own dreams when Dick would lash out abruptly. Usually, it was the kicking that started first. It was slow kicking, and then it got faster, and then it was like he was trying to dig his feet into the mattress.
Next to come would be his fists. They would grasp at the mattress, grasp at the pillow, grasp at the friend- anything he could get his fingers around, and then he would hold and pull.
Some nights he wouldn't so much as breathe. Some, he'd give the most excruciating cries and grunts of pain, chest heaving and tears falling relentlessly. Others, he would tip back his head and scream like no one had ever heard, like no one could even imagine, and it would sound so very, very lonely. He would sob, and gasp, and call for someone specific. Some of the names his friends knew, like Bruce, Mom, Dad, and Alfred. Others, they hadn't the slightest clue to, like Wally, Artemis, Megan, Conner, and Kaldur.
The first time most of his friends experienced his nightmares, they would panic. Some would scream with him, thinking something was wrong. Some would rush and get their parents. One had called Bruce, and another had gone so far as to call 911.
When they had managed to wake him up, whether it by themselves, the work of parents, or a very concerned paramedic, the first thing Dick would do was apologize. He would hold his pounding head and wipe his tears if there were any, and he'd shake as he begged them to forgive him. Then he would sit frozen, eyes wide and hollow all at once, and he would look so much older than he was as he remembered every last detail.
The first time, he never told them about the dream. He would just say it was bad, and that he'd rather not talk about it. Any time after that, any time after his friend had asked him to stay even knowing that he had nightmares to that extent, he would tell them anything they asked, no matter how bad the dream.
After that first time, his friends figured out how to wake him up, too. Each one had their own methods. Some would shake him and call out his name. A few would play an alarm near his ear. There were even some who would hold him and tell him that it's alright until he woke up, and then would keep holding him until he had collected himself.
Tonight, he was staying with one of his closest friends- someone who had put up with plenty of his nightmares. They had stayed up half the night doing god knows what and having a blast with it, too, and then they had gone to bed. Dick had apologized beforehand, as he always did, and his friend promised that it would be alright, like it always was.
His friend had just about fallen asleep when he felt the bed shake with the first kick. The kicks weren't as many tonight, but as few as they were, they were powerful enough to rouse him with a disoriented yawn. He looked around the room in utter confusion as Dick started to whimper, whispering pleas that never seemed to do him any good.
The clock on the bedside, finally found after the friend had realized that the blurry world was due to his glasses being off, read a little after four. Adjusting his glasses over his nose, the friend looked over at Dick and seemed to realize what was going on. He shook his friend gently, squeezing his shoulder, and the kicking subsided.
The boy sighed in relief and folded his glasses over on the dresser again before going back to bed. He managed to fall asleep pretty quickly and he managed to stay like that for a good hour. The second round began when Dick curled in on himself into the tightest ball a human his stature could manage. It started as a shriek, desperate and agonized, until his own shuddering drowned it into a sob.
"No," he whispered, and then he frantically flipped over to the other side, hands reaching for something he couldn't quite reach, fisting the covers instead.
He pulled at them until they were forced off of his friend, and when he had managed to pull them closer to himself, he gave a scream that had him pushing down on the bed until he managed to lift a good portion of his back up from the mattress by his elbows.
"No! Christ- please!" he sobbed, and then his elbows collapsed beneath him.
He thrashed for a good long while, sobs desperate and horrified, before his friend managed to escape the fury of his limbs and get a hold of his arms. He pinned him down tightly, and called his name, over and over, as loud as he could get it from his throat, before Dick opened his eyes.
Blue eyes, red and tear filled, went wide when they met his own, and then they squeezed shut as they seemed to realize what was going on. His friend released him and Dick's hands immediately went over his face.
"I'm sorry, I'm so, so sorry," he whispered, and his friend sat back on his knees patiently.
Dick laid there, shuddering and catching back the breath he seemed to have forgotten to take, until he managed to calm down enough to wipe back his tears.
"Are you alright?" his friend asked softly when he seemed to have calmed down.
The ebony sat up carefully, putting his back to the wall and curling his knees in towards his chest. He hugged them loosely and gave a limp nod, looking to meet the other's eyes before he dropped his gaze again.
"Which one was it tonight?"
Dick bit his lip hard enough for it to sting and wished more than anything for his headache to lessen, but he knew it wouldn't for as long as his nightmare stayed in mind.
"New one," his voice caught and he cleared his throat to level it back. "I was in a meat shop and I... the owner was helping Bruce, and I heard a noise in the back, so I went... to go check. There were... meat hooks... and... people were... there were people hung on them. They were... they were still alive. I walked in and they tried to scream, but... the hooks... they just... gurgled... There was so... much blood... A little girl was... was up there... and... I tried to... take her down... but she just... her skin... it came off in my hands... so much.."
His friend put a comforting hand to his calf and the ebony managed a smile in appreciation, rubbing at his cheek roughly.
"It's not real, Dick. It's just you and me in here. No skin, no blood," the boy assured him.
Dick nodded, hugging his legs a little tighter, and thanked him.
"You get back to bed. I'm gonna go to the bathroom," he dismissed himself with a weak sigh, and his friend accepted the invitation with no protest.
He was almost snoring before Dick had even made it to the door. The bathroom was down the hall and he found it easily, quietly shutting the door behind him. He turned the light on and ran the sink lightly, leaning his face over it and splashing water up onto his face a few times until the unbearable pressure eventually lightened. When he lifted his head back to the mirror, he met his own empty eyes, and he saw those people again.
This time, he saw the real ones. He saw the people from the team's last mission. He saw the hostages strung up on the meat hooks, bodies claimed by hypothermia and blood loss, eyes still frozen wide in fear. He saw the little girl's fingers still trembling from where she hung, and he remembered pulling off his glove and feeling her wrist desperately for a pulse of any kind. They had been too late, and all of those innocent people... all of those innocent lives...
He knew that his friends would never understand the nightmares that had him screaming at night, but staring now at his reflection, he wondered if he'd ever understand the one staring back at him.
-F.J. III