The sun peaked through the thick gray clouds creating streams of light that shone down on the Earth. The trees were splashed with colors of red, yellow and orange making it appear to be stained glass against the sun's rays. It was a peaceful and quiet day.
A young boy walked down the side walk along a wrought iron fence, looking at the scenery around him. He was dressed in casual wear; jeans, a hoodie, and a pair of dark sunglasses obscuring his eyes. He carried a backpack on one shoulder. The boy came up to the main gate of the fence, and walked through the entrance of Gotham City Cemetery.
He continued up the sidewalk and to the top of a small hill. Two headstones rested at the top. The boy took off his back pack and kneeled down on his knees in front of the graves. He brushed some of the leaves away, and then pulled a slim box out of his bag. Inside were two red roses. He delicately picked the roses out of the box, and rested one under each headstone; the headstones of Mary and John Grayson.
"Hi Mom, Hi Dad," Dick muttered. "I'm sorry I haven't visited you in a while. I've been really busy with school, and…other extracurricular activities."
He didn't want to say the words out loud. That he was the vigilante Batman's partner, or that he joined up with a new group of teens like him to fight against criminals. "I wonder what you would think about what I'm doing if you were here right now. I can only hope that I'm making you proud. Maybe you wouldn't approve, but I'm happy. I get to help people and I've made a lot of great friends through my…job. "
Dick sat there for a while talking to his parents about school life, and his friends. He discussed his life at the Wayne mansion, and how Alfred made the best deserts. "Wally loves it when I bring him some of Alfred's cake, but I still love your cookies the best, Mom," Dick smiled softly. He could still remember coming back to his circus trailer and smell the warm, rich cooked dough filling up the entire space.
Dick was taken from his reverie of past memories when he heard leaves crunching underfoot. At first he paid no mind to it. He thought it was just another person come to pay respect to a loved one. That was until they got closer, and the sound of the footsteps seemed to multiply.
Dick looked behind him to see three guys coming up to him. They were definitely in some kind of gang, considering the baggy clothing, multiple piercings, and unkempt appearance. Dick gathered his bag, and stood to leave.
"Aw would you look at this. The kid came to visit some old stiffs," one of the guys said. His friends laughed.
Dick clenched his fists. He watched them warily as they came closer. And then soon enough they were on each side of him, Dick's back facing the tombstones. "What do you want?" Dick asked.
"Eh, we've been following you for a couple blocks now, kid. We saw ya get out of that fancy limo, and decided we wanted to have some fun with ya," the supposed leader of the gang said. He looked as if he had been in one too many fights. There were scars all over his face and hands.
"Well I'm not interested, thanks," Dick said, he tried to shove past them, but they blocked his way.
"Not so fast," the leader said, grabbing Dick by the shoulder.
Dick looked at him, and smirked bitterly. Dick then grabbed the guy's arm and flipped him over his shoulder. The man sat on the ground, dazed for a second, and then he realized what had happened.
"Get him," the man shouted. His cronies lunged forward at Dick but he stood his ground. As one of the guys came closer he turned into a spin kick, knocking the man out with a hit to the face. The other one tried to grab Dick from behind, but Dick bent down and swept the other's legs out from underneath him. He landed ungracefully on his back.
"Had enough?" Dick quipped.
"Not quite," the leader answered. Dick turned to him, and was immediately starring down the barrel of a pistol. "You fight pretty well for a small kid," the leader said, with an amused face. "Did these stiffs here teach ya how to fight?"
Dick glared at the man as he began to circle him. Dick was trapped like a caged bird being stalked by a hungry cat. The man walked up to the headstones, and read the names. "John and Mary Grayson, hm. They you're folks or something? How'd they die?"
Dick didn't answer him, and chose to stare defiantly at the roses on the ground instead. The man angrily walked over to Dick. "Punk, I asked you a question. Or could you not hear me with those glasses on?"
"That makes no sense," Dick retorted.
"Shut up," the guy said, and knocked Dick's sunglasses off with barrel of his gun. The barrel created a small scratch next to Dick's eye. Dick glared at the guy, but otherwise didn't move. "How'd they die?" the man asked again.
"They fell," Dick answered quietly.
"Well, that's stupid. How'd they fall?"
Dick gritted his teeth together. He didn't want to say. He didn't want to remember how they fell, or how could hear the loud snap of the cable. He didn't want to remember how his parent's plummeted so fast they didn't even have time to scream. He didn't want to remember the sight of how their bodies looked on the ground as the severed cable lay around their motionless forms, taunting Dick from his safe place on the tower.
"Come on, I wanna know," the man huffed. He tapped the barrel of the gun against Dick's shoulder, and Dick could smell alcohol on his breath.
"They fell…from a circus trapeze," Dick answered him.
The man whistled. "Oh man, wait these stiffs were those circus performers from four years back. The Flying Grayson's, right? I saw that show. It was awesome, haha a once in a life time chance," The man grinned.
Dick couldn't take listening to this man anymore, even if he did have a gun. He didn't have the right to know any of this stuff. He shouldn't be mocking his dead parents, especially in front of him. Dick let out a feral growl, and shoved the guy as hard as he could. The man stumbled backwards, tripping over the headstones. He landed on the ground, the gun knocked from his hand.
Dick jumped at the man, and began to punch him anywhere he could land a hit. The man got a hold of his weapon again though, and backhanded Dick across the face. It knocked Dick to the ground against the back of the tombstones. The man pulled the hammer back on the gun, preparing to shoot.
"Now you can go see your Mom and Dad again, brat," The man laughed. His finger inched to the trigger, and just as he was about to pull it the familiar sound of metal slicing through air could be heard. The gun was knocked from the man's hand and landed on the ground a few feet away, lodged there by a metal shaped bat.
"Ah, no!" The man screamed as the dark clad man with cape and cowl moved forth from the shadows of a nearby tree. The gang leader tried to scramble away, but he was no match for the Dark Knight. Batman descended down upon him with an unbridled rage, and punched the man as hard as he could. In less than a minute the gang leader was tied up, and unconscious with the rest of his group.
Batman walked over to Dick, who was still lying on the ground. His hand dug into the ground, he was breathing deeply. A bruise started to appear on his cheek next to the small trail of blood from the scratch by his eye.
"Are you okay?" Batman asked quietly.
Dick just stared at the grass and whispered. "He almost shot me."
"You're safe now," Batman replied as he helped Dick to his feet.
Dick looked down at the ground trying to avoid Batman's worried gaze. Then Dick's eyes widened in shock. "Oh no," he said. He walked around to the front of the headstones and leaned down in front of them. The two roses he had placed were now crushed. Their stems cracked in the middle, making them lie crooked, and petals scattered about like… drops of blood.
Dick gathered the two flowers in his hands carefully, not wanting to damage them further. "I brought these as a gift. It was an anniversary gift for their wedding. They would have been married fifteen years today. Dad always brought Mom red roses on their anniversary, and I wanted to do the same for them," Dick explained.
His eyes began to sting with unshed tears, and his vision became watery. He didn't want to cry though, his eyes were exposed, and Batman would see. Batman placed a hand on Dick's shoulder in an attempt to comfort him.
"It will be alright, Dick."
"He laughed at them," Dick said, angrily. "He was insulting them, and kept asking how they died. He said he saw the show that night…and said it was a stupid way to die."
"Dick…"
"But it wasn't their fault. How could he say such a thing? He doesn't know. They didn't ask to die, they didn't deserve to die," Dick laid the roses back on the ground, and sat down pulling his knees up to his chest.
Batman didn't say anything or rather he couldn't. Not like this. He walked over to the crooks and began to drag them down the hill. He called the cops, and left the three unconscious men at the gate. Batman watched Dick's unmoving form from the bottom of the hill. He would go make sure he was okay once the men were in custody.
Commissioner Gordon arrived in ten minutes. Batman briefly explained what happened to Dick.
"Poor kid," the commissioner had said after hearing everything. The police left soon after, and Batman returned to Dick's side, only in the form of Bruce Wayne.
Dick had buried his head in his knees. Bruce could hear the faint sounds of sniffling and bent down next to Dick wrapping his arm about his shoulders. Dick leaned into his embrace.
"I know it's wrong," Dick said after a minute. "But for a split second I had almost accepted that I would be able to see my parents again." Dick tilted his head to the side so he could look at Bruce from the corner of his eye. "It still hurts," he said, choking on a small sob.
"What hurts?" Bruce asked calmly.
"My heart still hurts from losing them. You told me once that it would get easier to deal with the pain over time, but right now it feels worse than ever." Dick moved closer to Bruce. "I miss them so much."
Bruce gripped Dick's shoulder reassuringly. "It does get easier to bear, Dick. For you the wounds have been reopened, but they will heal again. You just have to give it time. Trust me, I know and I will help ease the pain in any way possible. Your parents may be gone, but their love for you will always exist, you just have to remember that."
The two of them were silent for a while. They sat in front of the two graves until the sun dipped below the horizon. The only remnant of its rays left the sky stained with pale pinks and oranges, and the trees faded into darker shades. Dick finally raised his head, and wiped stray tears from his eyes. He looked up at Bruce. "Thanks…for being here."
I wrote this oneshot over the weekend as a response to FrankandJoe3's fanfic challenge. I hope you like it!