Work Text:
Dick woke to the sound of repeated knocking on his door. Instantly, he was on high alert. Not a single one of his friends cared enough about his privacy to knock.
Dick grabbed his escrima sticks and approached the door. He used his toes and his flexibility to open the door, leaving his hands free to defend.
Okay, not what he expected.
Bruce’s latest charity case blinked at him with confusion, first at the escrima sticks, then at his pajama pants.
“You like Bluey?” Jason asked, clearly judging hard.
Like Jason had any right to judge what Dick was wearing. Who steals someone’s job then shows up wearing their uniform? Was this some kind of sick power play?
Dick scowled. “What are you doing here?”
Also, why was he sitting on Bruce’s chair? Like that was clearly the Batchair, the one that was supposed to be sitting in front of the Batcomputer in the Batcave. Dick could see the lopsided Batman sticker he’d stuck on the headrest of the chair when he was a kid. The sticker was faded now, and the placement was aesthetically weird, but Bruce had never changed it, and Dick had never bothered to move it.
“I…” Jason swallowed his pride. Like Dick could see him gather up all his pride and physically swallow it. The kid looked like he was about to throw up. “I need your help.”
“You mean Bruce needs my help,” Dick scoffed.
To his surprise, Jason scoffed too and scowled. “Bruce doesn’t need anyone’s help, apparently.”
Oh. Oh, Dick could read between the lines.
“He took Robin, didn’t he?” Dick snarked.
He resisted throwing in a line about how long Jason had lasted in the role. What, two years? Three? Dick had spent almost a decade as Robin. Longer, actually, considering that it was his mom’s name for him.
Jason crossed his arms and slumped in the chair, not answering.
“So,” Dick chuckled. “You decided to steal his chair and run to me?”
Jason bristled, shooting him with a deadly glare. “I’m not a thief.”
“Okay, literally not true. Let’s see, you stole Bruce’s tires, my name, my family, what is it, half the antique silverware? You know they know you took that, right?”
Jason blanched, sheer panic consuming his features. No, apparently, he didn’t know they knew that. There was no snarky comeback about how Dick wasn’t using his name and didn’t belong anymore, just pure, unadulterated terror.
Maybe that was a bit too mean.
“I—I was—” Jason’s eyes welled up, his breathing turning ragged. “I was going to put it back.”
“But you didn’t,” Dick pointed out before his conscience caught up with him.
The words landed like a blow on both of them. Okay, really getting way too mean. The kid just made it so easy by being such a brat.
Jason looked ready to be sick, Dick…
He couldn’t deal with Jason right now, not thirty seconds after he woke up. Especially not if Bruce came thundering in to reclaim his real kid—the one he’d adopted right away, even though he’d never adopted Dick—and take Jason and the Batchair back to Dick’s home.
“Just go home. If Bruce had an issue with a silverware, he would have said something,” Dick grumbled.
Bruce had said something (to Alfred, not realizing Dick could hear) about the silverware, but he’d been more concerned with whether or not Jason felt safe and accepted than he did about the stealing. Besides, as far as Dick knew, Jason hadn’t actually sold any of it, just hidden it in his room.
Jason was beyond words, though. His face was pale and visibly sweaty, and his breath came in ragged gasps.
Great, Dick had sent a teenager, supposedly his little brother, into a panic attack within two minutes of being awake. He felt a stab of guilt for being annoyed, then a stab of annoyance for being guilty. Why was Jason even here?
Dick grabbed the armrest of the chair and pulled Jason into the bedroom, closing the door behind them. He’d read Jason’s file; he knew Jason had agoraphobic tendencies and didn’t want to be touched or talked to during a panic attack.
Dick wheeled Jason into the corner where he could see the rest of the room but no one could get at him from behind, then he went back to his bed and flopped face down into his pillow. Why. Just why.
There was one part of him that really wanted to like Jason. When he was little, he used to imagine how much fun he would have with a younger sibling. The problem was that the little sibling he ended up with just knew every single one of Dick’s insecurities and knew how to push each button like some kind of freak expert button-pusher.
You literally sent him into a panic attack by mentioning silverware.
Maybe Dick was an expert button pusher too. He groaned into the pillow and considered just going back to sleep. No one could stop him, except the hyperventilating teenager in the corner.
Dick waited, even after Jason’s breath evened out and turned to sniffling. He had a feeling Jason wouldn’t handle a visible lack of composure with any amount of grace. Better to let the kid collect himself first before Dick risked pushing any buttons.
“Dick?” Jason mumbled at last.
Dick sighed and propped himself up on his arms. “Yeah?”
“I’m not Robin anymore,” Jason mumbled awkwardly.
Dick sighed again. “You mentioned that.”
Now wasn’t the time to gloat, not when Jason was clearly so upset. Dick understood, of course. Robin wasn’t just a hobby. Bruce told him that Jason had said Robin gave him magic, and…yeah. It did. No matter what was going on in Dick’s life, he could forget it all for a few hours and be something useful, someone people needed. The intoxicating rush of fun and fulfillment and excitement was…everything.
And Bruce took that from him.
Now he’d taken it from Jason.
“I don’t know what to do,” Jason whispered.
“What got you kicked?” Dick was not committing to helping the kid get his name back, but he couldn’t help wondering.
Jason dropped his gaze. “I fell off a building.”
“You what?” Dick swung his legs over the side of the bed, barely stopping himself from standing. The scared kid with a history of domestic abuse did not need to be sent into yet another panic attack a minute after the last one.
Jason flinched at his outburst.
Dick held up his hands, shaking his head. “Okay, sorry, just…y’know, bad history with falling. How tall was the building? Are you hurt?”
Jason shot him a guilty look before averting his eyes. “I broke my foot. I think.”
“You broke your foot?!”
“I think!”
That explained the swivel chair—it was functioning as a makeshift wheelchair, apparently, despite the actual wheelchairs in the Batmedbay. It did not explain why Jason’s feet both were in their normal Robin boots and showed no sign of any kind of medical treatment.
“Did you run off before Bruce put a cast on you?”
The guilty look returned.
Jason winced. “I didn’t…I didn’t tell him.”
Dick just stared. “You what?”
“He didn’t need to know!”
“Literally yes he did,” Dick argued. “You came all the way here with a broken foot? You need x-rays, maybe surgery!”
“You have that here!” Jason protested.
“You have x-rays and surgery at home!”
Okay, maybe not the surgery, but they’d figure something out. All they had to do was say Jason had been climbing a tree or something, then they could go to a normal hospital.
“I’m not Robin anymore!” Jason cried.
“Do you think your health insurance is tied to your job?” Dick threw his hands up incredulously. “Your dad is a billionaire!”
“He’s not my dad!”
“You’re adopted.”
“But I’m not Robin!”
Oh. The pieces were coming together. Why wasn’t Jason home? He wasn’t Robin. Why wasn’t he getting medical help? He wasn’t Robin. Why was Bruce not his dad? Because he wasn’t Robin.
Dick buried his face in his hands. He was not emotionally prepared for this conversation, but he apparently was having it.
“Listen,” Dick groaned. “Bruce is a—pardon my me—dick sometimes, but he’s not…He isn’t going to kick you out because you’re not Robin anymore. You know that, right?”
Jason shifted uncomfortably. He was probably pretty uncomfortable considering the broken foot. “You…”
“I…?”
“He kicked you out…didn’t he?”
Dick scoffed indignantly. “Who told you that? I left. Good riddance, he treated me like I was some kind of bubble he thought was going to pop. Bruce didn’t kick me out.”
“…really?”
Dick softened. The kid was going through a lot, and Dick wasn’t helping by being an asshole about Bruce.
“Yeah, kid.”
“Bruce won’t be mad?”
“That you hid an injury?”
“Yeah.”
“Oh, he’s going to be pissed.” Dick whistled. “That was so stupid on so many levels. He’s going to be mad about that.”
Jason looked green. “But…”
“But he’s not going to kick you out,” Dick finished. “I promise.”
Jason looked skeptical of Dick’s promise, and yeah. That was fair. It wasn’t like they had some kind of close connection. Dick didn’t like Jason anymore than Jason liked him, even with the weirdly emotional conversation. Now Dick was saying nice things about Bruce, a man Jason new damn well Dick couldn’t stand.
“Listen…If Bruce kicks you out…”
Say he can stay here. Say he’s your little brother or something. Say he’s a Titan.
Tell him he’ll always be Robin.
“I’ll help you out,” Dick finished lamely.
It wasn’t eloquent or specific, but Jason’s shoulder relaxed slightly. Jason still looked pale, but that probably had something to do with the terrible injury.
“I can stay here?” Jason asked, his eyes turning hopeful.
Damn, Dick should not have taught Jason about the puppy dog eyes. Dick was weak to them too, apparently.
“Yeah,” Dick agreed with a dry mouth. “Now, do you want to call Bruce, or should I?”