"Grayson, you hear me?" Tony asked over the coms once everyone was in place staking out the motel
"Loud and clear, Tony," Dick replied. "Alex and I are watching the back, as ordered."
"Good. Gibbs and Tim are inside, I'm covering the front, and Ziva's doing some interviewing."
"Alright. Call when you need us," Dick said, and signed off. Sighing, he turned to look at Alex, who was staring intently at the empty warehouse behind the motel. "What is it Alex?"
"That warehouse is pretty desolate," Alex muttered, "and strategically placed. You could hide lots of things in it or on it…" he trailed off, deep in thought. "Be right back," he called to Dick as he leaped out of the car and ran over to the warehouse.
"Alex! Crap! Kid I—" Dick began but was cut off by the ringing of his phone. Glancing down at the caller ID, he picked it up when he saw that it was Jason Todd. His younger brother, the second Robin and current Red Hood so-called "black sheep of the family", was with his friend in New York trying to find legal ways to keep Damian with Bruce instead of Talia. Hoping it was good news, Dick picked up the phone.
"Jason I—hang on—" he began but cut himself off when he saw Alex had used the fire ladder to scale the side of the building. Dick grabbed the binoculars and looked at Alex's hand. He was standing on the roof and lit what appeared to be a match. "Alex! If you blow up that building I swear to god I will not stop Gibbs from kicking your ass." Dick called frantically, wondering what the hell Alex was doing with a burning match on the top of an empty and unstable looking building.
"This will only take a second!" Alex called back, a grin on his face visible through the binoculars. He dropped the match and Dick almost had a heart attack as he saw the flames.
"I don't care! Get your spy butt in the car right now before someone sees and shoots you!" Dick was panicking. Gibbs would have his head if anything happened to the kid considering they were both supposed to "stay in the car and don't do anything stupid". Alex sure wasn't paying attention to Gibbs when he said that.
"Hey, calm down," Alex called back. "I've got something. And I've escaped a burning building before if that helps," he causally shouted down. Dick flipped—he had been in a burning building and escaped. Somehow, Dick didn't think the fire he was talking about had been accidental, which only added to his anger.
"I don't care if you've escaped a burning building before! Get down here this instant!" Dick yelled angrily. Alex nodded and began to make his way to the fire escape. Dick turned his attention back to his younger brother "—Sorry Jay, what's the problem?" he asked, tiredly.
"Well," a voice that wasn't Jason began, Dick placed it as the guy from a few nights ago—Mike something or other.
"Bruce and the lawyer are being a bunch of high-school assholes," Jason interrupted angrily. Dick sighed, he so was not in the mood for this.
"Jason, language," Dick absently said he caught sight of Alex crouching by the side on the roof. "Alex! You have 10 seconds or I send Ziva after you!"
"Dick!" Jason yelled through the phone and Dick almost jumped in surprise. The anger and fury in Jason's voice was overwhelming. "Bruce and Harvey don't get along and Bruce wants to walk out, but I did my research and so did Mike and Harvey's the best there is, so can you please just tell the both to get over it and do something! The more time they waste, the more of a head start Talia could get on this!" Jason ranted in one long breath, and Dick silently thanked his brother for calling him and not doing anything rash. However, Dick was furious that Bruce could not swallow his pride, just this once, and that Harvey Specter couldn't do his job correctly.
"Jason, you are absolutely right," Dick seriously said keeping himself calm for the moment. He closed his eyes and counted to 10, praying for patience. "Harvey and Bruce, step closer to the phone please." Dick didn't hear a sound, so he knew neither of them did anything. Fine, then, he thought, we'll do it the hard way. "Now, I know you didn't do it, so I'll just be really loud, alright?" Dick decided to screw patience and get the message across as best as he could—there was no other way the two "big-shots" would listen.
"Will you two please pull your heads out of your asses!" Dick screamed at the top of his lungs, his voice filling the car. Alex, up on the roof heard and stood, nervous and curious; seeing Dick on the phone, he smiled and crouched down again. Dick rolled his eyes; he'd deal with the kid not following his orders later, if Gibbs didn't get to him first. "This is a very serious matter, I would expect the two of you to quit acting like the womanizers you are and begin to act like the grown men two are supposed to be! I do not care about the past, what the girl's name was, or anything like that, do you understand me? All I care about is finding Damian and making sure Talia doesn't hurt him ever again! You may not care about your son all that much Bruce, but I sure as hell do! So stop screwing around, both of you make peace, and do something goddamnit! Or so help me god, I will be on the next flight back to New York! Specter, deflate your ego, just this once, and focus solely on the case. Bruce, deflate your ego and help him! Am I understood?" Dick finished, not really realizing that he had been yelling the entire time. He had no idea how worked up he was about all of this. He waited for an answer, possibly an apology from Bruce and the man's promises that he would do everything to find Damian. Instead, there was nothing but silence on the other end of the line.
"I said—am I understood!" Dick yelled, angry beyond belief that Bruce wasn't doing all he could to help his son. He heard Harvey and Bruce mumbled a yes to his question, and sighed in annoyance. This was an extremely horrible day; Dick really needed peace and his headache to stop pounding. But it looked like that wasn't going to happen.
"Good, because I—" Dick began, a little calmer but he soon panicked as he caught sight of someone sneaking up behind Alex on the roof. "Alex! Behind you!" Dick called in warning, already out of the car and climbing up the ladder. "—I need to go," Dick quickly told Jason and he rapidly went up the rungs. "Mike, keep up the good work. Jason, keep everyone in line. Call me or Alfred if things get out of hand, okay?" Dick ordered, knowing that Alfred could always manage to get Bruce to do things he didn't want to.
"Yes sir," Jason replied. Dick nodded absently, forgetting Jason couldn't see him.
"Good. Gotta go, bye—Alex!" Dick hung up the cell phone as he called for his partner, hauling himself up onto the roof. He looked around frantically for the boy, but couldn't see him.
"Looking for this, Mr. Grayson," a cruel voice called. Dick whipped his head around to see Slade Wilson, also known as the villain Deathstroke, holding Alex in a perfect position to snap his neck. The teenager had a large bruise forming on the side of his face, and his lip was bleeding. Dick noticed some tears in Slade's shirt and jeans, and he knew that Alex at least got some hits in before he was caught.
"Let the boy go Slade," Dick ordered, mentally going through all of the possible options he had in his head.
"This is one clever lad," Slade Wilson told Dick, ruffling Alex's hair. Dick saw the teen's jaw clench as he flinched away from the contact. "He figured out my message."
"He has nothing to do with this," Dick told Slade. "Let him go."
Slade gave a cold laugh. "Nothing to do with it, Dick? He's as involved in this as the NCIS agents downstairs are. More so, even. Your little Robin cares about this boy. I can break Damian like I tried to break you if I kill this teenager. When will you learn that friends hold you back?
"Don't you dare, Slade!" Dick shouted. "Alex has nothing to do with you and me. Neither does Damian. So why don't you just tell me what you want and let both of them go?"
"My dear, dear Dick, you know I can't do that," Slade responded. "I want you to suffer. Talia wants Bruce to suffer. We managed to come to a mutual and beneficial agreement." Angered, Dick took a step towards Slade, but the mercenary merely tightened his hold on Alex. "One more step, and this boy dies." Dick stopped, glaring daggers at Deathstroke.
"Come with me boy," Slade said, dragging Alex away, "I need your help in breaking a particularly stubborn pre-teen." Alex stumbled, causing Slade to trip over the boy's feet and reflexively hold out a hand to catch himself. While the mercenary was confused, Alex twisted from his grasp, delivered a vicious kick, and ran toward Dick. As he did so, hit lit a match and flicked it over his shoulder. Parts of the roof ignited and Deathstroke swore as the flame created a wall between him and his targets.
"Smart boy," Slade told Dick. "Careful, or he'll be the next bat-in-training. And boy," Slade stared coldly at Alex, "Damian will be paying for you actions today." With that, Slade leapt off the roof.
Dick began to run from the flames, but stopped when he realized Alex wasn't with him. He ran back to the teenager, who gazed up at the man in despair. "Dick, what have I done?" Alex whispered. "I shouldn't have…I…Damian's going to be hurt because of something I did!" The teen was angry at himself, and Dick could understand the guilt, but he knew it wasn't Alex's fault.
"Alex, look," Dick said gently, aware of the flames getting closer and closer, "you did the right thing. You would have been dead otherwise. And Slade is going to hurt Damian either way," it hurt Dick to say that, but he needed to assure Alex that he wasn't at fault, "and Damian would have broken if you died Alex—I'm sure of it. Don't blame yourself, alright?"
Dick got a small nod. "Alright, now we really need to get out of here," Dick said, and he grabbed Alex's hand as he turned and ran toward the edge of the building. He motioned for Alex to begin climbing down the ladder, and the boy obliged. Dick scanned the skies, wondering where Slade could possibly have hidden, and more importantly—where Damian was. He was so focused, he forgot his surroundings and nearly fell a few stories when the roof collapsed.
Thankfully, he had his reactions and skills honed by Batman. Barely thinking about it, Dick flipped off the burning roof and landed on the motel roof. Still on autopilot, Dick flipped off that roof, swung around on a flag pole, did a handspring as he touched the sidewalk, and stuck the landing. He turned around only to find Alex staring at him opened-mouth.
"Um…" Dick began to say.
"You're Nightwing. And Damian is Robin. Which means Bruce Wayne is Batman. And Slade is Deathstroke, Nightwing's greatest enemy. And I bet Tim and his friends are the Teen Titans," the words tumbled from Alex's mouth as he stared wide-eyed at Dick. "Oh my god, I need a drink," he muttered, sitting on the sidewalk and resting his head in his hands.
"Grayson! Rider! Thank god you're okay! What the hell happened?" Gibbs thundered as he, Ziva, Tony, and Tim raced to the two on the sidewalk, guns drawn.
"Alex? You alright?" Tony asked. Alex sighed.
"Gibbs I—" Dick began to try and explain, but Alex cut him off.
"It was my fault," Alex said. "I realized that the warehouse would be a perfect place to hide something, so I went to check it out. Though I saw something on the roof, but it turned out someone didn't want us finding anything. As soon as I stepped on the roof, Deathstroke attacked me and lit the place on fire. Dick saved me, but Deathstroke got away."
"Uh…" was all Dick had to intelligently add to Alex's story. He mind was spinning—Alex had figured it all out, but he wasn't telling anyone. Part of him was suspicious, but the greater part was thankful.
Everyone stood awkwardly for about twenty minutes while Gibbs yelled at Alex for disobeying orders, endangering himself, etc. Finally, Gibbs ordered him to get in his car so they could get back to headquarters. Tim would drive with Dick. Alex just rolled his eyes once Gibbs and his team had turned around. He sent a wink at Dick and followed Gibbs to the car. Tim exchanged a few more words with Gibbs before coming back to Dick.
"Does Alex have a death wish?" McGee questioned as he watched the teenager walk off with his boss.
"Apparently," Dick replied as he and McGee drove back to the NCIS building.
Hey, so sorry for the long wait; works been a bit hectic.
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