Part Four
This is what the last Robin remembered.
This is what Damian remembered before everything.
He woke up on his twelfth birthday to giggling and the heavy scent of maple syrup. He'd yelled something vaguely threatening because being woken at three in the morning after patrol was not a winning scheme. Completely unrepentant at losing the element of surprise, Brown called back down the hall about making the waffles herself.
They were probably safe to consume in that event; Brown made half-way decent waffles.
It seemed fitting that half of their celebrations took place before the sun rose. Damian had returned from patrol (and the novel experience of an ice cream cone courtesy of Todd) to find a new bike in the Cave. Well, most of the new bike and a promise of assistance in modifying it appropriately from his father. Damian quite looked forward to the project. Now he was eating waffles in the dark a mere hour later with the certainty that there would be yet more food by breakfast.
The darkened slouching figure in his doorway honed in on him with unerring accuracy, collapsing against Damian's back. "Steph said you had waffles?" Grayson asked blearily.
"Get your own. These are mine," Damian sniped and shoved his mentor, but with neither malice nor effect. Grayson draped himself more comfortably over Damian's shoulder and made a plaintive deprived noise in Damian's ear until the younger boy fed him a bite to shut him up. Dick hummed appreciatively and rested his head atop Damian's.
"She seriously made you waffles at three AM?"
Drake—as put together and alert as Grayson wasn't—leaned against the door frame. Damian swallowed, and smirked at his predecessor. "Jealous, Drake?"
"Yes, Damian," he could practically hear the rolling of eyes as Drake peeled himself away from the support and crossed the room to take a seat on the foot of Damian's bed. "I'm extremely jealous of the fact that my ex-girlfriend broke into the Manor and woke all of us up by making you waffles at three AM." Drake nudged the tray with his knee. "Well, maybe just a little bit. She could have at least made waffles for the rest of us."
"It is not your birthday," Damian informed him smugly, taking another bite.
The problem of being a genius was that one's clone often manifested the same level of intelligence. Benjamin was ever finding new and creative ways into Damian's closely guarded quarters. Security was, of course, an illusion under his mother's watchful eye, but it would be nice if his younger brother refrained from proving it so readily. Damian invented new blockades, and Benjamin inevitably found ways around them over time.
Aside from the annoyance, it was a fairly generic offense that seemed mostly harmless. Sometimes Damian would return to find Benjamin wearing his cloak or examining the weaponry at Damian's disposal. It was amusing and somewhat evocative of an eight year old boy wearing pieces of an older brother's costume. Not the same certainly; Damian had other motivations for donning the red tunic.
But it was innocent . . . until the day it wasn't.
It was only a few days past Benjamin's fourth 'birthday' that Damian returned to his quarters to find Benjamin had bypassed the security measures once again. He wasn't expecting the scent of burning flesh.
"What are you doing?" Damian demanded, throwing open the door that divided his bedroom from the rest of his quarters. "Stop it!"
Benjamin flinched as Damian descended, knocking the lighter from the younger boy's hand. Brown didn't move, and Damian cradled her hand in both of his to keep from further striking out against the clone.
Benjamin's hand was inexperienced. The burns were mostly superficial, and Damian would treat them as soon as he could successfully evict the little monster from his quarters.
"You have hurt her," Damian accused, and he could not stop the lessons learned in his father's shadow from spilling forward. "She cannot harm you, cannot defend herself in any way. It is not worthy of a Bat to injure the innocent."
Benjamin scowled, still massaging his wrist. "I am not a Bat. I am Benjamin al Ghul."
Damian stared at him. When he found his voice, it had dropped an octave—suiting the occasion for once instead of breaking in the emotion of the moment—and sounded to Damian's chagrin, uncannily like his father's through no effort of his own. He persevered, nonetheless.
"Should that name mean something to me?" This was not a lesson that Damian learned in Gotham. This was a lesson that had been drilled into his head from early childhood, the first thing that Ra's al Ghul had ever said to his daughter's bastard child. "What have you done? Who have you defeated?"
Benjamin blinked.
"You can burn a living creature that you command. Well done, Benjamin al Ghul. Well done," Damian allowed his voice drip with the sarcasm that once colored everything Drake had ever said to him. "Do you believe I should respect you for that, little master?" and there was the dry tone of Pennyworth on Damian's most trying days.
A Wayne no longer.
Never again to be Robin.
His mother's captive.
Damian was still his own man, and the men that he chose to emulate had earned his respect. Benjamin may be Damian's clone, but he would have to earn that respect . . . if his replacement was even capable of doing so which Damian doubted.
Damian pulled together everything that he had ever learned at Ra's al Ghul's knee or in Bruce Wayne's shadow, and held out his hand. "Fetch the lighter." When Benjamin didn't move, Damian let the Batman bleed into his voice: "Now."
Benjamin scrambled for it, pausing a defiant moment with it reclaimed, but reluctantly gave in and placed the tool in Damian's outstretched hand as commanded.
Damian held out his left hand, and brought the flame directly under his palm. Waiting a moment to be sure that he had Benjamin's full attention; Damian raised the flame to his hand.
Benjamin cried out. Damian held the burn steady and issued his challenge with the carefully measured voice that Grayson so often used to reason with a childish Damian: "When you can take the pain you wish to inflict, I'll respect you enough to fight you without holding back."
"You . . . you don't hold back."
Damian grinned, tossing the lighter aside and turning his hand over to display the star-shaped burn in blackened skin radiating outward from the center of his palm. "I was trained by both of the Batmen. I could hold my own in a fight with Red Robin and even the Red Hood. I survived two years in Gotham with a damn bounty of half a billion on my head. Little master," he intoned mockingly, "I am always holding back."
"You're bluffing."
"As you like, Benjamin," Damian waved dismissively. "Now go away."
The performance must have been effective, because Benjamin edged away from Damian, his footsteps turning into the soft patter of a barefoot run once the boy is out in the hall.
There would be consequences. Even if Benjamin didn't run straight to Talia, Damian knew that some damage had been done to his fragile standing in the boy's eyes, but maybe some good had been accomplished. He would ruminate on it later; other priorities pressed for his attention now.
Once he was certain that Benjamin had gone, Damian plunged his hand carelessly in a nearby vase that had been filled with water from the Lazarus Pits. Such vessels littered the estate with eternal blooms, and the water sufficed to care for Damian's own wounds. He would not, however, expose his siblings to a single drop of the tainted water. Damian would treat Brown's injuries personally with the precious medical supplies he hoarded from the missions gone awry.
Fetching the medical kit and clean water, Damian returned to the blonde girl's side. "I apologize, Stephanie," was the formal reparation, the only way he can atone aside from the careful tending of her hands. It fell short as so many of Damian's gestures do, and he was generous with the burn salve instead. "Benjamin does not know any better, and I will find more useful things to occupy his time." He secured the wrappings on her left hand, and cradled it in both of his.
"He will not harm you again, Stephanie. I will not allow it."
It was a worthless promise.
"Tt," Damian looked away from the blank blue eyes, settling on the loose blonde hair instead. "Your hair is in complete disarray," he grumbled reaching for the hairbrush and comb. Stephanie's long blonde hair was prone to escaping the confines of any hairstyle, but braids somewhat prolonged the inevitable.
Damian carefully smoothed Stephanie's hair, separated the first three sections, and began to weave the intricate design. Damian did nothing halfway. His siblings were valuable. It would not do for Leviathan or the League of Assassins to forget it.
Damian's speech had made some impact on Benjamin, although the exact sway was hard to measure. Benjamin avoided him for a few days, but Damian had been occupied with problems belonging to the Demon Head. He certainly hadn't missed having his younger brother underfoot during the struggle to coordinate all four of the other Robins in an attack on the foreign embassy.
He had originally only intended to take Drake with him as he usually did when working for his grandfather, preferring to keep Grayson and Brown safely sequestered in his rooms. They were his closest allies before all of this, and Damian hated to risk them in service to either Leviathan or the League.
Given his shaky standing within the family after lashing out at Benjamin, this time he had been reluctant to leave the others in Talia's 'care.' The pill supply had not yet been altered, but Damian found it hard to settle for the day until the pills had been administered and his siblings survived the experience.
The mission had been a tricky operation. Damian was not used to directing Grayson's movements—his former Batman had always directed him with the soft little verbal quips and the code-words that the older man had favored. It was an unusual role reversal, but Damian had risen to the occasion.
The building had been burned down, no civilian casualties had occurred, his siblings were unharmed, and the ninjas were murmuring superstitiously to themselves in the Robins' wake. It was, Damian considered, good to be a growing legend.
Having had the opportunity to eat, wash, and sleep, Damian was in a good enough mood to report to his mother. It pleased her, made her more complacent, and while Talia demanded obedience—she never required him to grovel. Damian could better assess her mood, and perhaps Benjamin's interpretation of their earlier encounter through the meeting. Then he could track down his brother and . . . what was the phrase Pennyworth once suggested?
Play nicely.
Damian could be nice. He could play the game, pandering a little bit to Benjamin's bruised pride and thirst for recognition, and then push the child a step further on Damian's path. Gently, of course . . . Damian could be gentle.
He even smirked a little upon finding Benjamin wandering the halls. "Playing hooky," he assumed, passing the boy by. It was Thursday; Benjamin should be at his ill-favored history lesson prior to the lunch hour. "Or have you 'misplaced' your tutor, Benjamin?"
"I killed him," Benjamin told him simply, ensconced as he was in a game involving his toys and a convenient window sill.
Damian whipped back around. "What?!"
Benjamin glanced up, his hands tightening around the toys. "I killed him. So now, I don't have lessons. I don't like history."
Damian rattled the glass as he brought his hands down, pinning Benjamin in place against the window. "Why?"
"It's boring," Benjamin scowled, shifting into a ready stance.
"I am not asking why you don't like history, Benjamin al Ghul," Damian seethed. "I am asking why you killed your tutor."
"He looked at me oddly," Benjamin shrugged, eyes darting past Damian's shoulder.
There were all kinds of ugly interpretations of that sentence, things that Damian simultaneously rejected of his old tutor and—even crueler—almost hoped for as if that would absolve Benjamin of guilt in the man's murder. It was an excuse that Damian could accept even if their father wouldn't.
"Explain," he said instead, because Benjamin's single sentence can't convict or vindicate either party.
Benjamin seemed to decide that Damian wouldn't lose his temper. It was a premature decision, but at least the boy was less likely to damage either of them in a tussle when he was relaxed. "He took away my toys. I told him he shouldn't do that, but he didn't listen. I told him I would kill him, and he didn't believe me. He said Mother wouldn't allow it, but he looked strangely when he said it."
Fear was more likely than perversion in that case. Damian had said equally cruel things over his lifetime, and anyone familiar with the al Ghuls should realize that no threat is an empty one.
"Did . . ." Damian struggled to let this terrible sentence out. "Did you ask Mother?"
Benjamin scowled. "I don't have to ask Mother. He was my tutor, and he wouldn't listen. Mother says they should listen."
"And what did you do when he didn't listen?" Damian demanded.
"I killed him," Benjamin repeated simply. "Mother said it was alright."
Damian stilled. He inhaled and exhaled slow measured breaths for the sake of control. "What else did Mother say?"
"She told me to go play," Benjamin held his obviously reclaimed toys aloft. "Will you play wi—"
"No," Damian cut him off. "Go to your rooms. Now."
Without waiting to see if he had been obeyed, Damian walked away. He found the schoolroom almost by accident, drawn by the bustle of people as much as by his inner turmoil. His mother was inside, holding court like a queen over the medical personnel, her entourage, and the fallen man.
"Benjamin tells me that he killed Monsieur Rene," he issued curtly. A crying woman let loose a wail that was only stilled by a wave of Talia's hand.
"Relax, Damian," she coaxed, correctly interpreting his mood and extending a hand to stroke his cheek. "The man lives. Benjamin only broke his neck. There's only so much forty pounds of boy can do, my dear."
Damian glowered—refusing to betray even his relief. "You taught me that only a pound of pressure can cut flesh, Mother."
"When applied correctly," she returned, raising one eyebrow delicately. It's as much a critique of Benjamin as a rejoinder to Damian's barb.
"And how was this applied, Mother?"
Talia pretended not to hear the question, instead directing her currently favored doctors to escort Rene and his wife to the medical facilities. Damian was soon left alone in the overturned schoolroom.
His mother wouldn't waste a spine on Rene. The tutor's value lay in his mind and he didn't need mobility for that. Within the week, he would be reinstalled in the schoolroom and at Benjamin's mercy.
Would Benjamin make a second attempt? Damian had made his first kill when he had been only a little older than Benjamin. His father didn't think Damian was capable of being saved with blood on his hands. Even if his brother's hands were technically clean, was it too late for Benjamin?
Had it really been too late for Damian?