This chapter was written pretty quickly, explaining why it is so short. It has fit what I wanted, though. So everything is good.
I do not own Young Justice, or any DC characters that may or may not be mentioned in this chapter.
One month. It had been a whole month since the lose of one of the youngest heroes ever. Thirty-one days, however, would not be enough to cover the pain that the ones close to Dick Grayson felt.
Bruce Wayne still had trouble going to business meetings, and avoided charity events as much as possible. As Batman, he continued being far more violent then he had with Robin besides him. The Joker had been returned to Arkham, but had escaped only days later. The clown had continued to mock him about the lose of his son, almost pushing the Dark Knight to the edge.
Kaldur already almost stepped down as leader five times. Each instance, however, he realized that there was no one ready to lead yet. Wally was too impulsive, Artemis somehow seemed haunted by something with almost every mission, Conner was still having trouble controlling his anger, and Megan was too quite. The only person other than himself who had ever been fit to lead was Robin. Since that was obviously no longer an option, Kaldur stayed leader, despite still believing himself inadequate as such.
School had become near torture for Artemis. Almost everyday there was new rumors about Dick's death, and she just could not take them. Almost everyday, she swore if she heard some idea that the boy had committed suicide, or was in a plane accident, or some other dumb theory, she would snap. This was only made worse by the familiar laughter she swore that she heard in the hallways everyday. However, the glares sent at her by Barbara Gordan was pure torture. The red head had not forgotten she was at the funeral, and the accusing looks sent at her just asked the same haunting questions as before.
Conner had just gotten angrier. The clone was near convinced that nothing good could truly exist in a world that took away such a pure and kind young boy. While he knew some light still shone, he had quite a bit of trouble finding it. All villains they fought felt the need to remind them they were missing the youngest among them. The team wouldn't even have had so many missions if crime hadn't been going on an all time high. Due to the constant mocking, Superboy often had to be stopped by someone, namely Megan, from completely pummeling the criminals.
The Martian herself had become immensely quite. The new view on the planet she had loved so much brought by the death of her young friend had honestly scared her. This fear caused her to reside within herself more often, and become slightly less trusting. Megan even had trouble talking to those close to her, such as Conner and her uncle. She was frightened of the world she had held so dearly.
Wally had been trying to be himself again. However, every attempt ending abruptly when he forgot and turned to tell Dick some dumb joke, only to see the space where his best friend should have been completely void. He stopped trying when his mind started supplying an image of Dick where he should have been, always smiling just a little too brightly. Healing in one way was not worth insanity, so Wally knew he wasn't ready yet.
Every being that had been close to the dead boy now could not heal completely. During the day, they could at least semi-handle that. It was at night that the true horrors started.
For Bruce, it had been happening since he actually started being able to sleep at all, three weeks after Dick's death. They had just been flashes of his son's bleeding, broken body at first, but had recently evolved into more detailed visions of what the Boy Wonder's final moments may have been like.
However, as Gotham's defender hesitantly slipped in sleep while sitting in front of the Bat computer, a completely new dream occurred.
A slight breeze blew past Bruce, alerting him of another's presence.
"You need to practice that."
The young man who the Bat was speaking rolled his eyes underneath a domino mask. A small smile gracing his features, the younger hero took a step towards his old mentor.
"Quite night. Any reason you're out alone?"
Bruce still did not look up as he spoke.
"Robin still has a fever."
A small laugh came from the young man, finally causing Bruce to look over at him. The man, barely past boyhood, was a good foot shorter than Bruce. He wore a completely black costume, except for a bright blue bird that stood out strikingly on his chest.
"I hope he gets better soon. Did he stay up all night on his computer again?"
It was now Bruce's turn to roll his eyes.
"Yes. Twice. I had to take away his laptop. Remind me, why did you teach him to hack?"
The younger hero shrugged.
"I never ended up teaching Jay, and he really wanted to know..."
Though the word 'Jay' gave Bruce a familiar twang of pain, he did not know why.
"He guilt tripped you into teaching him? You need to stop letting that boy control you so much.."
The young man snorted.
"I will when you do. Speaking of which, I also taught him how to convince you of anything, but he kept looking at me like I'm crazy. He doubts the power of puppy dog eyes..."
Just as Bruce was about to answer with some snide remark, a yell was heard from below.
"Looks like there's trouble."
A huge grin spreading across the younger hero's face, he did a quick back flip and jumped off the roof and towards the alley below. Once again rolling his eyes, Batman followed.
By the time Bruce had caught up with his companion, all the thugs who had been attacking a young woman were knocked out.
"Sorry I didn't leave any for you, Bats. This pretty lady was in trouble, and-"
The hero suddenly fell forward mid-sentence, blood oozing from a bullet wound in his back. The woman he had just saved had a smoking gun pointed just where the man had been standing.
Bruce lurched forward to hold his companion, tears nearly streaming from his eyes.
"Nightwing!"
In real life, Bruce awoke suddenly, breathing heavily, a cold sweat coating his face. His heart rate was sky rocketing, and his dark blue eyes were wide.
Though he wasn't quite sure who this "Nightwing" that had been bleeding his arms had been, but that dream had left him in emotional disarray. Almost as if his subconscious knew something he didn't.
Thinking back on the dream, realization hit him like the bullet from the nightmare. This "Nightwing" talked to him as if he knew him very well, apparently had high hacking skills, did a perfect back flip without a sign of pain, and was obviously a hero...
Somehow, Bruce had a dream about what could have been. If the Joker hadn't taken his son away from him in cold blood. Nightwing was his son. Nightwing was... Dick.
There were many other questions he could be wondering about his dream, such as who this new Robin was, and why the word "Jay" made him feel the same pain he felt whenever he thought of Dick, but the Dark Knight's mind could not focus on any of that now. The only thing that could even cross his mind was the blood that had been leaking from his son's body, so much like the blood he had found dried on the body of the much younger version of the same boy, dried against pale skin...
Bruce's head feel into his hands, sobs rattling his usually firm body. His son was truly gone. Dick was never going to come back, no matter how much he dreamed about it.
There will never be a bright young hero with a blue bird on his chest parading around the world. Nothing even resembling that possible future would ever occur.
More sobs escaped from Bruce. He'd never get to see his son grow up. He was just so young, still figuring out who he was supposed to be...
As the Dark Knight wept, Alfred stood solemnly behind him, a sad look in his eyes as well.
What remained of the broken Wayne family mourned for their lost son, for what seemed like the hundredth time. The hurt never seemed to go away, though.
The hurt would never go away...
Did Bruce have a dream about what 'could have been'? Yeesss...
We are actually nearing the end of this story. There are only a few chapters left until this is done.
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