A/n: Life is going real great you guys, y'all know that? I've got a headache, and I'm still behind on these prompts, this one alone taking way too long to decide what fandom to write for but hey, at least the next few are pretty easy.

Anyway, for a bit of context, let's say this was a little after Dick returned from Spyral, and his family knew he was alive again. I don't know too much about his time in Spyral (or Damian's death/resurrection) so I'm mainly just going to focus on Damian's reaction to coming back alive only to find out the one person he loved in the family had also 'died'. Purely for an angsty fic so please don't sue me over canonical inaccuracies or anything okay?

"Can't you see that you're lost without me? Admit it, Batman, you get bored without a villain to fight! You need me!"

"Mhm? Hey, Robin," Dick turned to where Damian was glaring at their opponent. "You think I 'need' the Condiment King?"

"I think the Condiment King needs to be put in his place."

"I think so too. And that place seems to be in jail. Goodbye."

If Dick had been Nightwing, he would have given a cheery little wave before knocking the poor guy out, but as it was, he was Batman and Batman just went straight to knocking the guy out.

"I would have liked to get a hit in before you knocked him out, but I suppose it'll have to do."

"Sorry, Robin. I just didn't want to have to trash B's suit because it had too much sauce on it. Besides, now we can finish up early and - "

He never got to finish his sentence, because somehow while they were talking, something had happened. Both him and Damian froze, sensing the danger. They only needed to look at each other to know what to do, backing up so they were covered on all sides but their opponents seemed to know who they were working with and threw smoke bombs into the alleyway.

The fight only lasted ten minutes.

"Little D, come on, wake up."

Damian groaned.

"Names," he mumbled, everything else fuzzy but not his last memory of being on duty.

He heard Dick's soft laugh. "It's okay Dami, there's no one else here."

"Wht'dya mean?"

Memories caught up with him in a rush and he sat up, immediately alert. His eyes took in everything around him within seconds. The sea on all four sides, the sand beneath him, no people or other living creatures in sight other than a slightly worried Dick peering at him, bruise blooming on his cheek already - only visible because of the cowl having disappeared, strewn on the ground behind him along with the cape.

"What's the situation?"

Dick sighed. "Turns out the Condiment King was just a diversion and some other guys had ulterior motives. Don't know what, but they had some kind of gas ready. Hit you harder than me - to be expected - but then they dropped us off… here. I wish I had more answers, but I'm pretty sure I have a concussion because everything's a little… fuzzy and also the small fact that I was also unconscious."

Damian blinked, absorbing the information.

"Have you had time to assess the island yet?"

"I mean… there's no people, there's no big animals, and I can walk the whole length of this island in ten-fifteen minutes which is good because I didn't want to leave you unconscious and alone for longer than that anyway."

Damian asked a few more questions, but only came to the conclusion that they were stranded on this island, with no help on its way.

"Have you tried the emergency beacon?"

"Dami, I've tried it all but there's probably no signal here, so the usual methods aren't working and my phone's broken. I've already tried the emergency stuff too, but there's nothing else to do but wait."

There was a silence as Damian absorbed that information too, but this time once he'd thought it over, there was no other option but for him to relax. His shoulders slumped over a bit and he sighed, peeling off his mask reluctantly. Dick watched him carefully.

"They didn't injure you or anything right? Nothing I need to know about?"

Damian considered. "Nothing apart from the usual. I promise," he added, seeing Dick's scrutinising glare before thinking to turn it on his brother. "Any injury you have that I should be aware of?"

"Um, well," Dick swallowed. "Not an injury exactly, but now as you mention it, there's this little cut," - he paused to show Damian the tear in his suit by his bicep, some blood visible but not enough to be life-threatening itself - "that they might have been smart enough to put poison on whatever blade they cut me with."

Damian blinked. "And what makes you think that?" he asked slowly.

"Oh, you know, I was worried about you not waking up earlier but I'm still breathing a little too hard even though you're fine, and my head feels a little… light…"

He suddenly sat down heavily, Damian rushing to help, only noticing now how pale his brother was. His eyes widened.

"Your recklessness will get you killed one day, Grayson," he snapped as he inspected the unassuming cut.

Dick frowned. "Recklessness? I'm not - don't give me that look - fine, maybe sometimes, but not this time! How was this my fault?"

"Either way, don't die now. I don't think anyone would survive it another time around," he added in a mumble, avoiding Dick's confused gaze.

"What? What do you m- oh." The confusion gave way to dreadful realisation. "Oh," he said again.

Damian just pretended not to notice and instead tried to change the subject. "Did any of the plants here seem to have any medicinal values when you looked around? No? Perhaps I should go and look myself - "

"Damian, no. Wait. This," - Dick paused, searching for the right words - "We should probably talk about it, and now's as good a time as any. There's no one around, and we have all the time we need."

"There is nothing to talk about," Damian said curtly, getting up.

"Look, I may be concussed and poisoned, but even I can still tell that… what happened… seemed to… you're obviously not as okay with it as you seemed. I don't expect you to be either, okay, it's not a weakness, and I know what I did wasn't fine and I've already… talked about it with Tim and Jason so I think it's about time we have a chat about it too."

"About what, exactly, Grayson?" He wanted to hear Dick say it. The petty, selfish part of him wanted to see Dick squirm, see that he knew what his actions had done, what those actions were in the first place.

His brother closed his eyes and took a breath. "I'll say it as many times as you need me to, Damian. Punch me, shout at me, do whatever you need because I know I deserve it but just know that I really am sorry for faking my death, for a year and not telling you guys. I can justify it, and defend myself however I want but I know you don't want to hear it; maybe you have anyway in your own mind. I'm not going to invalidate your feelings about it by doing that."

Damian was quiet. He was grateful that Dick didn't try to defend himself but it also made him angrier. He'd almost wanted Dick to tell him that he was right and Damian was wrong because then Damian could shout even if he knew that it hadn't been Dick's fault. But at the same time, it pissed him off how true every word Dick said was and also because while Damian was also so relieved that Dick was alive, he was so angry for him making them all believe he was dead in the first place.

When he'd come back from the dead himself, one of his first questions had been where his brother was. A mistake as it'd turned out, one only ending in pretty much his whole world shattering and the brief thought of regretting being resurrected and undoing it passing through his mind. Those days, weeks, months however long it'd been without Dick had been painfully barren. The only good thing that'd come out of it was getting the slightest bit closer to his other brothers, all bonding over their loss.

He'd only just been starting to get used to it when they'd found out the truth, that their brother was actually alive and he'd only faked it to go on an undercover mission. God, he'd been so angry then and so relieved at the same time. He almost hadn't wanted to see his brother for fear of hurting him. Tim and Jason had seemed to feel the same way, but they'd gone as soon as they could have to confront Dick. He'd waited to do so until he was sure it was really real, that it wasn't a dream or a hallucination.

The whole time he'd had a plan, to be as cold as he could to Dick and make him hurt so he would know what he'd done to his brothers before maybe giving him one hug. All that had gone out the window the second he'd seen his oldest and favourite brother, alive and well on the rooftop. He hadn't been able to stop himself from letting the relief and joy make him jump into Dick's arms, hugging him fiercely as if he'd never let his brother go again. The anger and fear and hurt had been all pushed aside in favour of just basking in the fact that Dick was alive, he was okay, and he was here right next to him.

Now though, now that it had sunk in, the anger and everything else rose back up. And there was nothing else to distract or stop him from letting it all out now.

"You said you'd never leave," he said softly, surprising even himself with the tone of his voice, so different from the shouts he'd wanted to let out. Dick seemed equally caught off guard and had to take a second to compose himself, but Damian continued before his brother could speak. "You promised you'd stay, that you'd be there for me even when my mother and father weren't."

Dick stayed quiet. They both knew that what Damian was saying now was an unreasonable complaint; they both knew that considering their moonlighting jobs - or even without - that kind of promise was impossible to uphold unless you did something drastic. This wasn't a true complaint and so it shouldn't be treated as one. This was just Damian needing to say things and Dick needing to listen.

"I let myself grow close to you," Damian continued, struggling to keep his voice level as he went on. "I finally let myself think that we were family, that maybe we could all be a true family regardless of blood and then I paid the price for it because I died, only to come back to know you died! Do you know how that felt? I thought i'd never see you again, any of you but then I got a second chance, finding out that actually the one person I cared fo - he was gone forever. But you weren't! You always put yourself in danger for us, we all knew you'd die for us, all too readily, and that was a problem in itself but now you were actually dead until it turned out you weren't!"

Damian was panting now, gasping for breath after his rant. Dick had stood up at some point while his younger brother had been speaking, but had stayed quiet. It was only now that he opened his mouth, deciding what to say when his body made the choice for him not to say anything and instead collapse. His eyes fluttered, and it was only thanks to Damian's fast reflexes that he managed to stop his brother's head from being cracked like a coconut on the ground.

"Dick!"

"Dami… 'm s-s'rry." Dick's words slurred together, as he fought to stay awake, the poison coursing like fire through his veins now.

"No, Dick, I only just got you back, please." It disgusted Damian how he was on the verge of tears like a child, all common sense and composure out the window just because his brother was hurt. It wasn't even the worst state he'd seen Dick in and yet he was like this.

"I… I m'ssed you, D'mi," Dick said quietly as he smiled up at his panicked brother.

"I missed you too, Grayson, which is exactly why you cannot leave again so soon. I'll be all alone on this island and - "

Dick's chuckle was weak. "I thought you liked being alone?"

"If my only choice of company is Drake or Todd then certainly." Damian went along with it if only to distract his brother and himself, hiding his emotions behind his usual scorn and sarcasm. "But… I missed your company too, Grayson."

Not a lie. He had. He'd missed every little thing he used to find annoying about his older brother, things he would have killed to experience again in those times when he'd thought Dick was dead. The bad jokes, the infectious laugh and the charming smile, the pull-Damian-to-do-fun-and-ridiculous-things to get him to 'be a child for once' in Dick's words. The hugs and snuggles were what he might have missed most. The comfort that Dick found so much in intimacy and touch, whether it be hugs or messing up Damian's hair. It was always the little things that had made Damian sad.

His comment had made a faint smile appear on Dick's face. "I'm gonna make sure Timmy and Jay know about this. I knew you missed me. I'm too amazing to forget."

Damian couldn't help but roll his eyes. "Just last long enough to tell them yourself," he said lightheartedly, but an undertone of worry laced his words as he watched Dick lose the fight with consciousness and finally close his eyes, still.

That unsettled Damian more than anything. It never failed to, the stillness. Dick was a person meant to move, be energetic and pull others to be so too. He almost never stayed in one place for long - a remnant of his circus upbringing or just his fundamental truth - unless he had good reason. More often than not, those reasons would be related to their side-job as vigilantes, stake-outs and hiding being two times when being still was essential. But other than that, he was almost always doing something.

For Dick to be still meant something was terribly wrong.

It was why while Damian waited for help, he never left Dick's side, his hand resting on his brother's wrist so all he needed to do to reassure himself that Dick was okay was to close his hand to feel the older man's pulse. It was why even when Batman and Red Robin finally showed up, two hours later, Damian refused to let Dick out of his sight until he was dragged out of the med bay in the Cave by Tim to get checked over himself. It was why even after Dick was okay and just resting, Damian still didn't leave and instead fell asleep right beside him.

He'd lost his brother once. He would die again before he let it happen a second time.

A/n: I usually never really write fics so centred around Damian, I'm usually more of a Dick whumper but hey, things generally never seem to work out the way you wanted it to when you actually start writing so here we are. I know some Damian bits are definitely ooc but let's just blame it on the situation, like can you blame the guy? Not even a guy, just a kid which only reinforces my point even more. It also didn't help that my stupid device kept kicking me out of the app I was writing on like every two seconds.

But anyway, stay safe and see ya soon.

- CrowofArcadiaOaks