Wandering Worlds
Chapter Five – Ghost in marble
It should feel stranger, he knows, attending to his own funeral, even if from a distance, but Dick lost the perspective of what possible feels like when he held Kory's frost covered, broken body.
Yet…
A Bruce that never killed more than his child's murderer, and therefore never started the end of the world, buries his version of Dick Grayson himself. From his position behind the blinds on the second floor, Dick watches Bruce's body flex and shake as he shovels the dark earth from the garden over his son's casket. Not even Clark was allowed to help, Dick saw Selina locking arms with him, in that subtle way of hers to get men to do her biding. Both of them came for the services, and it hurts to look at them too, the blue cape hanging heavy from the rain, Selina's small dark frame. He knows that he should want to go there, see them, tell them that he is alive. But they are not the person he's lost, and the idea of trying to prove to them whom he really is makes Dick physically sick.
To make things even more depressing, his eyes keep dragging themselves to Kory's frame, the night before didn't have the effect he hoped for. It didn't make him numb. And when he woke up cold and alone in that dusty tearoom, it was as devastating as it should be.
That morning, he walked around the Manor as its own ghost, haunting it more than Bruce's childhood memories, more than Alfred's absence. Nobody seemed to remember of his existence, and he tried to be out of their way for the most of the day. He's used to solitude, but real solitude, not the kind that is enforced by feeling alone among other people. He doesn't really know what to do with himself. There is no mission, no objective, he doesn't even have to worry about surviving anymore.
This world is missing a Dick Grayson, it's grieving, his loss can be felt in the very air howling through the Wayne Manor corridors, and yet, he's there, superfluous.
From the window he sees the little group leave the garden, Kory managing to walk and hold Gar and Rachel against her chest, she has the grace of a swan sheltering her ducklings from the rain. Donna tails them, Superman flies away. Only Bruce, covered in sweat, rain and dirt remains where a new grave rests next to Thomas', Martha's and Alfred's, with Selina behind him, holding an umbrella over her head.
Dick turns away from them when Donna disappears from this field of vision. She's the only one not ignoring him, when they met in the morning over breakfast, she briefed him that Conner had left with Blackfire and was surprised, and even amused when he told her he didn't know who that was. Dick didn't push for more information, mostly because turns out the hangover for the bitter truth was a real bitch, but also because finding funny that she knew a lot of things he didn't was half of Donna's relationship with him, and he wanted to bury himself in the familiarity of it.
She had told him about the funeral, told him, not invited him. It wasn't like he wanted to go, be among those people that seem to resent him for breathing, but it wasn't like he had anything else to do. Where to go.
Kory seems surprised when she enters the kitchen and he's there. As if she's completely forgotten about his existence until then, he doesn't want it to hurt, but still does. Especially when her taste is still so fresh in his mouth. The kids pay him no attention, sitting by the table he used to do his homework. Well, not quite. Dick does what Alfred would do when he entered the kitchen looking miserable after a mission gone wrong or trouble at school, he puts the kettle on and go through the cabinets for cookies.
Donna actually smiles at him when she enters the kitchen, he nods to her and relaxes a bit when she joins him leaning against the counter.
"Do you have those vanilla and lavender ones?" she asks when he pulls a box of chocolate chip cookies from the hiding place in the back of the cupboard, he reads the expiration date, but remembers he has no idea of what day currently is.
"You hate those. What's today's date?"
"I do not! I love those," they exchange a look but are interrupted by Gar who's suddenly standing next to them.
"Your water is done."
The awkward moment gets a new layer of chaos when Bruce and Selina thread into the kitchen. Bruce makes a barely human sound and soars towards Dick, Donna pushes him out of the way and the full kettle flies from his hands, screams fill the kitchen and boiling water hits the ground, spilling on Gar who was closer, the kid cries out and Rachel runs to the rescue. Kory is the one that shouts for everyone stop, and, soon enough, the world stop on its tracks and Dick finds himself sitting down and holding his hands up as Donna wraps his wrists with her Lasso of Hestia.
"Who are you?" she asks, just like they did before.
"Richard John Grayson," compelled by Donna's Lasso, he tells his story again, it isn't easier than the last time, he feels like something is being robbed from him. He wants to pay attention to the faces around him, try to gather their reactions, but every time Donna askes something and the truth escapes through his lips, it becomes harder to escape his memories and focus in the current moment. When she finishes, murmuring an apology only high enough for him to listen, it takes Dick a while to remember that he's not it that abandoned CADMUS lab anymore.
Bruce rans out of the kitchen without saying anything, Selina follows him, Dick barely notices. Then, someone is putting a warm mug between his now free hands, and when he looks up, he is surprised to see not Donna, but Rachel.
He mutters a weak "thank you" and she tries to smile, the corners of her lips trembling with the effort. Her angelical face puffy and stained by all the crying. Dick wants to hug her, as if he'd do with his own daughter, before he lost her.
"What are we going to do with him?" the question comes from Gar. Rachel leaves Dick's side to join her brother, wordlessly stretching her hand towards his wounded one, her dark energy enveloping their linked limbs as the lines on Gar's forehead soften as he is released from the physical pain.
"Sorry about the boiling water," Dick manages to say sipping his tea, it's perfect, exactly how he likes it.
"Not your fault," but the hard way Gar speaks doesn't feel like he accepts the apology at all.
"A lot of people saw Nightwing die," says Kory, joining the kids and inspecting Gar's healed hand "but out of us hardly anybody knows about Dick Grayson."
"They saw Nightwing being wounded," said Donna.
"Do you think…" Rachel's soft voice cuts through the tense air, "the other me knew I'd not be able to bring Dick back?"
"What you mean, Rach?" Kory asks, lovingly caressing the girl's hair.
"That's why she send him?"
All eyes turn to Dick, he swallows hard. How could he answer that?
"You'll just let him take Dick's place then?" Gar asks, now not hiding his anger at all.
"I don't want to take anybody's place."
The air is suddenly colder and the gazes move from Dick to the doorway. Bruce is there.
Out of conditioning, Dick stands up. Bruce walks towards him, Dick fights the urge to flinch, the urge to be sick, the urge to hurt that man that is not the same that killed the woman he loved and destroyed his life. He tries to lock his eyes to Selina's, so very alive, standing spectating. He tries to hold himself to the reality of Kory, just across the room, tendrils of her warmth somehow still reaching him even if she very clearly doesn't want to have anything to do with him.
"I have one son behind bars, and one son in the ground," Bruce starts, "I can't afford denying your existence or your identity. My son died, but Dick Grayson doesn't have to. However, I can't afford dealing with whatever you are either. I want all of you out of my house by next morning."
"Bruce," the plead come from Selina, but Bruce holds a hand for her to stop.
"Am I understood?"
"Yes, sir," Dick croaks, the words leaving his mouth not unlike when he was under the influence of Donna's Lasso.
Bruce leaves without any more words.
It takes a while to notice Selina was still there, but when he does notice, she's standing before him. Her green eyes are huge and clear with tears. He just realizes that he never saw her crying before. She throws her arms around his neck.
"There is no version of Dick Grayson that Bruce won't love. He'll come around," she says only loud enough for him to hear.
Dick doesn't know what to do with that. So, he just stays there, stone frozen, as she pulls back and leaves.
"Go pack your stuff," Kory's voice sound distant, and he hears the muffled sounds of the children moving, it feels like his head is full of cotton balls.
After so much fighting for the smallest things, having other people's decisions reigning over him doesn't exactly feel good, and he knows that, eventually, he'll have to take the driver's sit of his own life and decide what he wants to do with this new life that was imposed to him, but now, he can't move.
End of Part One – Twice Dead.
Tim and Scarecrow never happened here. So, who brought Jason back from the dead? I don't know man. It doesn't matter lmao. Jason Todd is not important to this story, because Jason Todd is not a Titan. Most of the reasons it took me so long to finish this chapter (beside adult life, work, and mental illness) was deciding how to wrap up the Gotham bs, but I think we're all good and now I can finally just press go. Especial thanks to my friend escapism-through-imagination (honey, I just realized I don't know your name lmao) who helps me a lot listening to me rambling about this story and complaining about the show even if I didn't stick with anything I told her I'd do about this chapter.