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The poisoned gas had already spread to the entire building when Bruce arrived.
Bruce covered his mouth with his cape. The fume was one of the newer compounds that he didn’t have an antidote to, and he hadn’t the faintest of clues of who made it. The police vehicles had cordoned the apartment complex; the entire street was evacuated, thanks to Nightwing’s efforts earlier. Bruce tapped his earpiece.
“Nightwing?” He was greeted with static. No voice coming through. “Nightwing, report.”
Nothing.
Bruce looked up at the abandoned building, at the misty gas rising out the windows. No sign of Dick—no shadows, no voices calling back. The place was a ghost zone.
Bruce’s mind went through every scenario, of all the things that could’ve happened. Only fifteen minutes ago, Dick had been communicating with him, giving him live updates of what had been happening while he evacuated the building.
The last he’d been heard from, Dick was just carrying out a little girl to reunite her with her mother before rushing straight back into the war zone.
Bruce dropped his hand from the comm and pulled on a gas mask. Keeping a hand on his belt in case of surprise, he entered the building.
A blue-tinted mist rushes up at him. Bruce activated the IR lens in his cowl and trudged forward.
The mist soon swallowed him like some solid, tangible thing. Waving it away did nothing. There was something incredibly familiar about it, the information hidden somewhere deep behind Bruce’s mind.
The long hallway led to open doors of each apartment, all filled with mist. Bruce went through each room, searching with his infrared lenses. Dick had done a good job of evacuating everyone from the first floor. Bruce ascended the emergency staircase and repeated the process with the following floors.
He found the gas tanks on the fifth floor. There were several waist-height canisters with release mechanisms. Gas still screeched from a couple. Bruce turned them off. The obnoxious sound was replaced by silence.
The attacker didn’t bother spreading out his canisters; they had a lot of faith in their new substance.
There was someone else here in this room with him.
Bruce sensed their presence before he spotted them with the IR lenses. He spun around, a hand at his belt, but then he was too stunned by Nightwing’s feral face coming out of the mist toward him to act before his former ward tackled him to the floor.
They rolled on the floor, Bruce’s cape wrapping around them before Bruce found the stunner in his belt. Dick’s suit was nonconductive, so he had to target the sliver of skin just below the ear.
The stunner made a loud zapping noise, and Dick let out a howl that was almost animalistic. He let go of Bruce, rolled to the side, and got up quickly, as if the device hadn’t affected him at all. There, seven feet away, he stood at a lower stance and bared his teeth.
Bruce got up after him and scowled.
Nightwing’s face was a wild animal—devoid of his former intelligence, replacing it with feral instincts. He’d lost his gas mask at some point—whether from an unseen adversary or for another reason, Bruce couldn’t tell.
Nightwing lurched at him again.
Suddenly, it became clear to Bruce who the gas belonged to. It was way too similar to the poisoned gas used by Dr. Crane, with its unique viscosity and tinge. A related product? Something that kicked off the fight response instead of the flight?
He dodged, retrieving a batarang from his belt. Dick swiveled and made a grab for him. Bruce was about to slice him before changing his mind and dishing out a perfunctory punch to Dick’s jaw.
“Snap out of it. This is similar to Crane’s toxin; it’s doing something to your fear response.”
Dick was stunned for the moment, but that didn’t stop him. In recovering from the punch, his silence turned into a growl.
It was alarming—it was like an animal; the sound made by a man with his every inhibition stripped away. The worst part was, that wasn’t just anyone. This was Dick. Bruce had to be careful.
Bruce reached into his belt and found the sedative syringe, gripping it in his hand.
“Nightwing—”
But his feral former student growled again and launched himself, his teeth bared, face scrunched up. Bruce could almost see spittle flying before Dick tackled him to the floor.
In a second, Dick was on top of Bruce, kneeling on Bruce’s chest. He saw Bruce raise the sedative, so he gripped his mentor’s wrist and kneed him in the forearm three consecutive times, forcing him to drop the syringe. Somehow, Dick had kept his problem-solving skills in a fight, despite resembling a feral dog with his slavering jaw and crazed pull of his lips.
“You raised me, B, so you should know better. That little trick isn’t enough to stop me.”
Bruce frowned. His chest and wrist throbbed, but he kept his voice steady.
“I’ve raised you too well, then.”
Dick smiled amid his madness, stretching the corners of his lips too far to look natural.
“You always thought of me as this kid, B. But I’m not. I deserve more than what you gave me credit for.”
Then Dick’s smile turned into something serious, something wistful. If it weren’t for his mad look from earlier, one might have thought nothing was wrong.
But Bruce knew that if he peeled off Dick’s mask, he’d see dilated pupils; he’d see an unnatural breathing pattern and fast heart rate if he tested him; Dick’s bloodstream was still infected, and Bruce could almost see the chemicals drifting from his pores.
Dick reached down and plucked Bruce’s gas mask off him. He caught Bruce’s wrist when he tried to stop him, peeling his hand away.
The mask went off, and Bruce took in a sharp inhale of the toxin.
“I love you, B,” Dick said, looking down through the mist with a repulsive sincerity that made Bruce’s stomach roll with a guilty conscience. “Ever since Robin I’ve loved you, and that’s never changed. I thought dating Babs and Kory could help me forget you, but… But. How long do I have to wait for you to answer my calls?”
A pang of guilt gripped Bruce’s heart.
Despite his precarious position, despite the crazed toxin light in Dick’s eyes, Bruce felt the leaden weight of inescapable responsibility.
He knew he couldn’t control who Dick loved, who he imprinted himself on, but it was because of Bruce that Dick was on this path at all, chasing after one shadow after another. If it weren’t for Bruce, Dick would’ve had a chance to be a normal teenager, go to a normal college, choose a normal vocation. It was Bruce who’d taken a boy and made him into a soldier.
And for that, Bruce was responsible.
Dick lifted his knee from Bruce’s chest, pinning his mentor’s wrists over his head with one hand. His other hand was then at Bruce’s cheek, caressing it, drifting to his throat. The rubber of his glove pad stroked Bruce’s Adam’s apple, sensual and slow and full of longing.
Bruce gasped when Dick pushed a hand on his chest, fingers spread over that symbol of a bat. Then it landed on the buckles of his belt, undoing it, his motion deft and agile despite his altered condition. It was a painful reminder of who Dick was, how well Bruce had trained him, and how familiar he was with everything having to do with Bruce—his tricks, every little booby-trap and safety measure attached to his uniform.
“You’re not yourself.” Bruce’s hands fisted inside Dick’s grasp. A grasp that, despite its steel-like grip, Bruce could’ve escaped if he tried. “Release me, let’s get out of here first… and then we can talk.”
Was it guilt that stopped him from stopping Dick from pulling loose his belt? To open the zippers and clasps of his uniform so he could reach in to stroke him? Was it guilt or something more sinister that drove Bruce to groan and arch up his torso when Dick pulled Bruce’s restrained hand forward and took Bruce’s erection in his mouth?
Bruce tried not to think about it; he tried not to enjoy the salty taste on his tongue when Dick leaned up to kiss him after giving him a blowjob. He even opened his mouth to let Dick in.
Dick rutted against Bruce while he inserted his hand—glove removed—under Bruce’s suit and stroked the muscles lining his stomach, sliding across the bumpy abs before pinching a rock-hard nipple. It felt intimate, as if they were lovers, even if that imagery was held up by delusions.
To Bruce, this wasn’t romance; it wasn’t sex. It was the desperation and illusions of a student and the mentor too weak to deny him this one request after so many years of watching his student long and pine for unattainable affections.
Bruce bit his lip when Dick folded up his legs to finger him, holding back whatever sound that might come out of his mouth—moans, hisses, pleas. Any sign that Dick might be hurting him or he might be enjoying it, even just a little. He savored the pain and tried to disregard the pleasure. If this was anything, it was retribution. It was Bruce atoning for his mistakes.
Dick removed his fingers. It wasn’t completely dry; Dick had found the bottle of lubricant in his belt, but it did feel hasty. It hurt when Dick sheathed himself, hooking his arm behind Bruce’s neck to press him against him; hurt something more when Dick pulled back slightly to fuck him with shallow, attentive thrusts.
Bruce let Dick have his way, but he didn’t look at him, refusing to spare the wounded student even one glance of comfort. He watched the ceiling and the remnants of the gas swirling there, their effects sinking into Bruce’s system and disrupting his sense of self. He bit his lip and used up all his concentration to keep himself from spiraling into the realm of no return.
Now, Bruce could feel desperation leaking through Dick’s motions, feel Dick easing his thrusts and complementing them with gentle kisses to Bruce’s cheek and lips to beg for reciprocation, for some semblance of love. But what still remained of Bruce’s pride and will held him firm; he would not give in to these base instincts. He was too well-trained for that.
“B…” Dick whispered against Bruce’s lips, tasting of mint and scorching like lava. “I love you… love you…”
The motions of his hips became more erratic, the sounds of his words ragged and rushed. He moaned, vulnerable now with his armor peeled away. The only time Bruce had seen him this way was years ago, when a young boy had knelt in front of the contorted bodies of two acrobatic parents. Marionettes with broken strings.
Bruce reached for the syringe that had rolled away, grabbing at the air. Dick pressed himself against him as he was reaching his climax, keeping his face buried in the thick fabric of Bruce’s cape while rutting erratically into him. Bruce’s legs tightened around Dick’s torso just as his fingers touched the side of the syringe, bringing it up toward the man lying atop him.
“Bruce…” Dick whispered, injecting passion into this word. “Bruce.. Bruce…”
Bruce felt Dick coming into him, filling him, and his hand holding the syringe shook. He kept it in the air, the needle tip lined up to the juncture between Dick’s ear and the exposed strip of his neck, waiting for Dick to finish first… as if this was too intimate a moment to disrupt.
Then Dick turned lax on top of Bruce, the strings pulled off his limbs.
Bruce jabbed the needle into Dick’s skin.
It was surprising how easily he pushed down the plunger, considering how he was also affected by the toxin.
He had to roll Dick to the side to get up and pull his uniform back on. The syringe contained a sedative, not an antidote. There was no immediate cure, so even with Bruce’s training, there was no guarantee of how long he could keep standing. He had to get them both out of there.
Bruce’s muscles were sore; despite his dangerous lifestyle, somehow that had taken more of a toll on his body than the nightly fights he got into as Batman.
“Nightwing.” Bruce knelt beside Dick and gently placed a gloved hand on his biceps. “Dick. Can you move?”
Dick groaned. His face tilted up toward the ceiling before his vision roamed slowly to the face of his mentor. Bruce couldn’t see his eyes behind the white lenses of his mask, but he could see the confusion on his face.
Dick had been weakened, but he was conscious, so that was good.
“B,”—Dick’s voice trembled with horrified realization—“what… have I done?”
Bruce started to respond but stopped. His rational brain, like always, urged him to simply tell the truth. But rationality wasn’t all here with him tonight. There was too much guilt and feelings of failure for him to see clearly. They clouded his vision.
There was no right answer to Dick’s question, not if he didn’t want to wound him further.
“Nothing we couldn’t fix.” Bruce inserted his forearm below Dick’s neck, hooking it around Dick’s shoulder. “Can you get up?”
“What did I do, B?” There was something terribly vulnerable in Dick’s voice, and Bruce had the brief illusion that he was back to the earlier days of his vigilantism again, where Dick had just been a boy, and Bruce was feeling his way through the darkness blindly with a new responsibility attached to his hips.
It hadn’t been just enough to fight crime and win; he’d had to think about the safety of another person then. He had a kid to take care of, and keep going on the way he’d been going on—throwing his life and safety on the line every night to protect the city—that simply ceased being an option.
That almost made Bruce choke on his words again, but he kept himself steady. He had to keep his head on his shoulders… for Dick.
“Get up. That’s an order.”
Dick grunted, but he shut up and obliged. There was still Robin in him, following orders whenever it counted. He struggled to stand up, but in the end, he managed to lean most of his weight on Bruce.
“We’ll get you home to safety first.” Bruce held him up steadily, pulling Dick’s arm over his shoulders. “The car has auto drive. We’ll be okay.”
He picked up the dropped gas mask and pressed it to Dick’s face. There was only one; his Robin needed it more than he did.
“Alright,” Dick said simply. No retorts or questions. He knew when to trust Bruce, having been partners for as long as they were.
Stumbling a little, Bruce guided them toward the exit.