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"So there's no soulmates on Tameran?" Beast Boy asks.
Starfire shakes her head, curls bouncing, "No, I am wholly unfamiliar with this, 'soulmate' concept. The word is... Similar to our 'love' and 'marriage'."
"We have those, dog," Beast Boy lounges back into the couch, "Sometimes you don't meet your soulmate or your soulmate dies. So instead of the ceremony, you have a marriage."
Starfire turns to look at Raven. Raven is calm, looking down at her book. They all know she is listening, as much as they know she doesn't want to partake in the conversation.
Starfire has no qualms, "Raven, do you have this... Soulmate?"
Raven purses her lips, "No. I suppose we are similar in that... One aspect."
End of story.
Starfire turns to Robin, "Robin -."
"No."
She frowns.
"Oh, ignore those two. How does it work then?" Beast Boy cuts in leaning forward.
"What do you mean?"
"On your planet, mama. How do you pick a... partner...?"
Words run through her head as she tries to understand. She has been alone all her life, no one at her side to fight with. No, this has a romantic context.
"... Duty, sometimes," If she had not been cast away her marriage would have been arranged otherwise the Tameran do love as they do everything, "... Passion."
The back of her neck prickles. Robin is staring at her. He approves.
Deathstroke is dangerous. He is different from the crazies of Gotham. He is trained, dangerous, enhanced and ready to kill. Efficient, something usually lacking in the crackpot schemes from Arkham. He makes Robin wary. Reports have him fulfilling a contract in Jump City. Robin refuses to admit it might be something he cannot handle.
He decides to do reconnaissance. Decides it is best not to tell the team. Raven is his closest bet to stealth and he doesn't even want to take her.
They are all so powerful. Power is loud.
Deathstroke is a professional and Robin barely even sees him drop behind him before a large meaty arm lunges and he's being choked.
It burns. Chemicals erupt in his brain - oxytocin drowns him. He tenses and goes limp. Above him a man twice, maybe thrice his age has frozen solid. The hand strangling him though has loosened to a caress.
Robin is afraid. The man leans over him - Deathstroke. He has to remind himself.
"I... I almost slit your throat," Slade says, confessing his own horrors like Robin is a priest behind a screen, "If I hadn't been so amused I would have shot you in the head and been done with it."
Robin thinks, 'That's fate.'
What he says is, "No..."
The hand stiffens. Robin realizes his mistake, Slade's grip threatening to crush his larynx right here on this grungy roof in Jump City. Deathstroke lets go suddenly and Robin scrambles, leaping off to the other side of the roof.
He catches his breath and tries to pull his thought back into line. Deathstroke watches him, mask making him look soulless.
"Deathstroke. The Terminator."
His soulmate.
Slade stands to his full height, adjusting the katana straps over his chest.
"You can call me Slade."
"Slade."
The man shivers. A sick feeling drops in Robin's gut. His hand moves to his grappling gun and he falls backward off the roof. Slade only tilts his head as he watches him fall.
"I will catch you if I must," Slade says if only to himself.
Robin absconds back to the tower. He locks himself in his room after rushing through the living room like he had a hell hound at his heels.
He chokes on the terrible swirl of feelings from the chemical cocktail swimming in his head.
Maybe he did.
Slade. Deathstroke the Terminator.
No. It wasn’t supposed to be someone whose first touch were hands around his throat. Someone who almost killed him. He looks up, finds himself in his bathroom.
Ripping the mask off his face he looks into the reflection of his eyes. The signs are there - flushed cheeks, pupils blown wide, increased respiration.
Robin takes a long breath.
“No,” he drags a hand over his face and works on controlling his respiration, "No, no, no."
It will be fine. Slade is a grown man; he won't have an interest in a kid like him. Hell, he might have a wife. Most people started giving up on their soulmates in their late twenties.
His breathing shudders and he imagines the bonding ceremony, different from marriage. There is no divorce or redos only red ribbon tied around hands. His and -
CRACK
His fist aches but his gloves protect him from the shards of glass from the broken mirror.
There’s a knock on his door. Starfire’s voice calls out, “Robin? Are you alright, friend?”
Robin closes his eyes, takes one last breath and puts his mask on.
Slade chases and chases.
He is brutal. Usually, soulmates hurting each other is impossible. It hurts both parties, the emotional toll too stressful and the pain reflecting back between the two parties like mirrors facing each other. Slade is different. Slade is a monster who relishes in Dick's pain. A hit across the face; a broken arm; sword cuts meant to hurt.
Even worse, Slade relishes having control - relishes brushing his hand against Dick's cheek when Dick can do nothing but bare his teeth.
Some part of Dick wants Slade to die and a small, small part wants to give in to him.
Jason comes for a visit, whether to make friends or to annoy him Dick isn't sure. It's unfortunate that he does in the middle of one of Slade's games.
"Let me help," Jason says, trailing after him as Dick hops on his bike.
"No," Dick grits out, "Do not follow me. Not this time."
Jason frowns.
"I'm serious," Dick says, "Not Slade."
Dick watches Jason's face as it twists in frustration but he doesn't have it in him to comfort him, the little kid trying to fill shoes much too big. If it was anything else. Any other villain. Dick would... still protest. But not as much. Not as adamantly. Dick can't bear to have him witness this. This cycle of Dick chasing Slade down, fighting, losing, getting beaten and then those moments after where Slade tends his wounds and holds him because that's the only time Robin will let him.
Dick sighs, "Go home," he says, softer, "I'll take you on the next one, okay? Just not Slade."
Jason pouts then grins at him cockily. Dick ruffles his hair. Jason protests but the grin doesn’t drop.
Slade is over him, hand gripping into Dick's hair when something collides with Slade's back. The man jerks forward, barely and pulls away to see the new threat. Dick somersaults backward and looks up to see Jason. Jason, the reckless, rebellious brat followed him and now Slade has Jason by the throat. Dick is stuck, feet planted on the cement of the roof they all stand on. His focus is on the hand wrapped around Jason’s neck. Dick’s own hand moves up to hover his neck. The memory of burning haunts his mind.
"What an amateur. Should I snap his neck little bird?" Slade taunts. There is no tenderness in the way he handles Jason.
Dick is breathless, "Don't... I'll never forg-"
Slade throws his head back to laugh before Dick can even finish. Slade doesn't want his forgiveness, not for hurting Dick and he certainly won't want it for hurting Jason. Besides that - between soulmates, forgiveness is inevitable.
Dick swallows, "Fine."
He unclips his utility belt and strips his gauntlets. He backs up, a parody of their first meeting. He gives Slade a crazed grin. He spreads his arms out. Slade is watching intently. Jason’s struggles still, wide eyes focusing on Dick.
Dick falls backward. He sees Slade toss Jason away and lunge toward him in the same movement. Slade dives and reaches out to catch him, grabbing his wrist when Dick reaches back. The adrenaline makes it so that Dick doesn’t even feel his shoulder dislocate when Slade wrenches him out of the air, Dick’s own discarded grapple hook in his hands.
When they land, Slade backhands him. Dick is laughing - unsure of when he started.
He looks up. Jason is staring at them, from up on the roof. Dick's arm hangs useless and he's bleeding from his lip where Slade just split it. Jason though, Jason is safe with at least six stories between him and Slade.
'Go home,' he mouths at Jason as Slade leans forward to grab his neck with one hand and his dislocated arm in the other.
And then Jason is dead. For once Dick is tracking Slade without reason. No crimes or provocation, just a safe house that he breaks into. Slade pulls him in and uses momentum to throw Dick into a wall.
Dick gets up but he’s sloppy with grief and Slade pins him down while Dick is left struggling uselessly against the man’s dead weight.
Slade's hand cups his cheek. Dick stills. He leans into it, closes his eyes and sighs.
He breaks.
That is the first time he sleeps with Slade. Slade picks him up like he weighed nothing and carries him to the bed. Slade lays him down gently and doesn’t say anything. He just hovers, unmasked, his one eye staring him down.
Dick surges up, grabbing onto the man's shirt to kiss him. His head is in a spin. Grief. Anger. Adrenaline.
Slade pushes back to pin Dick to the bed. It’s like a seal is broken and Slade’s hands are at the zipper at his back to strip him. He wastes no time in feeling him up from his shoulders down to his hips.
Slade devours him silently. His mouth and hands worshipping his body like Dick is his god resurrected. Dick is no stranger to Slade’s intensity. His games. His control. His obsessions. He’s not even a stranger to fearing Slade but this - his knees pressed up to frame his head, Slade’s hands around his ankles keeping him bent and spread, and Slade’s eye never leaving his face, looking at Dick like he’s the first bloom in a barren wasteland.
It leaves Dick’s already broken heart aching.
In the morning Slade watches him as he dresses and leaves. He has the audacity of silent satisfaction that makes Dick feel exposed long after he leaves.
Rose breaks him down in ways Jericho - who is older than him - did not.
This is his soulmates child, his irrational brain yells, that makes her his responsibility. His rational brain tells him she is a sensitive and malleable girl. For once his heart and head agree. Dick takes strides to mentor her as he hadn't the others. As he should have mentored Jason and as he tries to with Tim as separated as they are by distance and hatchets that he and Bruce have not even buried let alone forgotten.
But Rose, Rose is there in arms reach and suddenly Dick knows he has to do right by her. Learning to cook to give her homemade meals. Sparring with her above others. Taking her shopping so she can have some facsimile of a life that a teenage girl should.
He also gives her affection and praise that Slade will never give her. Pats on the shoulders and rufflings of hair that evolve into hugs and pecks on the forehead.
Slade likes that they are bonding as much as he hates that Dick is bringing her to the light. Jericho has nothing to sign although from the looks he gets after the siblings go out for lunch, Dick knows that Rose must talk of him a lot.
He thinks or knows that he should encourage her to build relationships with the other Titans besides him and Jericho but his efforts are half-assed.
It comes to a head. They celebrate her 16th birthday - anyone who's not on a mission watches her blow out candles and open gifts. They are small things from people who have barely put effort into knowing her - two different mugs, novelty candy, a pair of fuzzy socks with cats on them. Starfire does the best - a Teen Titans poster that features her, a first, and a candle that smells like the vanilla sugar cookies Dick makes for everyone once a month.
Rose smiles and says thank you genuinely, but her wide smile is a bit forced at the ends.
After opening the last present, she looks expectantly at Dick. He smiles. Starfire beams at him as he had consulted her on the matter before hand. Not just her but Clark as well.
Starfire herds the others back to the kitchen so Dick can pull out a flat box.
Rose eyes narrow when she opens it. Tentatively she grabs the edges of a black uniform, "What is this?"
"Well, I know you've been talking about moving away from Ravager. And. Well. I wanted to offer you Flamebird."
"Flamebird?" Rose makes a face as her mouth twists around the word but she doesn't comment more, instead, looking at Dick for him to continue.
"Nightwing," he begins, "Came from a Kryptonian myth Superman told me. Well, in the story Nightwing had a partner."
"Flamebird," she repeats.
Looking at the uniform as she processes his offer has Dick feeling nervous.
"It's okay if you don't like it," Nightwing says, reaching a handout.
Rose pulls the uniform closer.
"No! I like it. I just..." Her hand pulls up to brush her cheek.
Nightwing glances at the domino mask.
He laughs, "Of course. Feel free to change the design however you want."
Her smile is brilliant.
That night she sneaks into his room. He turns, hearing the door click and there she is. Wearing a bathrobe.
"Rose -"
She opens the robe. He rushes towards her and closes it. She looks scared.
"No," he tells her.
He backs away and sits on his bed, head in his hands. He’s failed her.
It takes a second but she comes and joins him. He's so thankful that she doesn't try to touch him or god forbid, come onto him again.
He takes a deep breath, "Rose," he looks up at her scared face, "I'm so sorry I gave you the impression that I..."
"No! I'm sorry... I misunderstood." She drawls and catches on the last word, her face a mess of confusion and embarrassment.
Dick closes his eyes. He remembers her background. Her mother and her business.
"Rose. I care about you, so much. So, so much," he pleads for her to understand, "Just not like that."
Rose takes a breath. Looks down at her hands.
"Okay," she says. Her hands are shaking, "I just don't understand."
She looks up at him and continues, "Then why? Why do you care so much? Why give me Flamebird?"
Dick looks at her accusing stare.
"Rose," he says, "I - there's something. Something I've been keeping. Not just from you. I haven't told anyone."
Her brow furrows. Dick can't stand to look at her.
"My soulmate -"
"Starfire?"
Dick shakes his head, "No. Tameran doesn't have soulmates. It's..."
He breathes in sharply and then it gushes out, “Your father...”
Rose stands.
“What?”
Dick crumples into himself. Shame and disgust swallows him, “He’s... We’re...”
And saying ‘we’ is in the same vein as saying ‘us’. There is no "us" or "we" - not when it comes to Dick and Slade.
Rose has her hands cupped over her nose and mouth. Her eyes are closed.
Then she’s smiling, tears in her eyes. Laughing and embracing him, “I understand.”
She moves away, a crazed grin on her face, “Sorry for the misunderstanding.”
Dick smiles, feeling kind of crazed himself.
Tim is dead. Joker has killed another Robin.
His pasty face bleeds where Dick punches him. The clown's bones crack under his fists.
It's not a conscious decision, Dick is a creature of passion after all. His rage has no words. Just the sound of knuckles cracking across flesh.
Shut up, he thinks even though the Joker has stopped laughing by now.
Not again. Not Tim.
And then Tim is there and Joker is dead.
He finds Slade - uniform still ripped from the fight, especially on his hands where he tore the fabric in his rage. Slade never strays too far from Dick these days and he rarely makes it too difficult for him to find his location. The implications make Dick feel uncomfortable until the moment he needs to seek Slade out.
Dick collapses in front of the armchair where Slade watches him.
"I killed him..."
Slade tilts his head, a bemused smile on his face, "Who, little bird?"
Dick wraps his arms around himself and looks Slade in his one eye, "Slade. I killed the Joker."
And then Dick is clinging to him, crawling up onto Slade's lap to straddle him. Dick feels crazy. He feels broken. He feels like how he did when Jason died.
Slade is passive, accepting the kiss. Then he pulls Dick into his arms. Dick tenses and then he's sobbing, clinging to Slade as Slade tries to comfort him.
"It's okay, Dick," Slade says, "I will always accept you. No matter what."
Bullshit, Dick thinks, and yet a part of him knows this to be true.
Joker is not dead - though eating through a tube in a cell with only walls, maybe death would be a mercy.
"Pathetic," Slade mumbles, aiming his silenced pistol and firing.
Dick goes through spurts - grueling training that leaves him exhausted and then laying dead to the world. TV off. No food or water except what Slade, in all his strangely not uncharacteristic patience manages to feed him. To Dick, it's like Slade is a stranger. A stranger that is identical in everything except for his gentleness.
He makes tender love to Dick when Dick wants to be fucked into oblivion. He washes Dick's hair while it's all Dick can do to not drown himself in the bathtub. He strokes Dick's hair when Dick lays in bed, not sleeping but staring at the wall seeing nothing.
Once, Dick had shifted to look Slade in his eye.
“Why?” he had spoken, voice hoarse from lack of use.
Slade had run a hand through his hair, taking a moment before answering, “Love is patient, little bird.”
Love? The thought had pulled Dick back into his torment and he had closed his eyes to sob.
A silhouette passes in the window. Dick's head lolls from where he's slumped in an armchair waiting for Slade to come back
He tenses and curls in on himself as Batman's shadow looms over him.
Dick laughs hysterically. Who am I, he thinks, to flinch away from Batman when I've been waiting for Deathstroke?
"Dick," the voice growls out, gruff but worn thin with concern.
Dick shakes his head, moaning lowly.
An impatient huff and Barman is there pressing a hand to his shoulder, "For God's sake, snap out of it!"
Dick heaves in a sob and presses his hands against his face. He isn't sure of when he started crying, "Wh-why are y-you here?"
He's not sure why he's even asking. He knows.
Batman is here to lock him up.
"Dick. The Joker's dead."
Dick takes a sharp breath even though he knows.
"I killed him," he stutters out, moaning again, "Oh God."
"Snap out of it!" Batman snaps, "Joker was shot in his cell!"
Dick snaps his head up, "What?"
Batman takes a step back, "He was shot right through the eye. Found this morning. No one heard a sound. No sign of a break-in. Nothing."
Oh, God.
"Oh no."
"You know who did it." That isn't a question.
Dick laughs, "Th-that's why you're here? For him?"
“For who, Dick?” Batman leans back into his space, “Who killed Joker?”
“I-...” Dick’s face twists, “It’s my fault. I-I killed him.”
Batman stands to his full height and Dick can practically hear his teeth grinding.
“There are only so many people who can break into Arkham and kill a man without setting off any alarms or leaving any trace except for a bullet and a dead body," Batman lifts his chin, looking down at him like a judgemental god damning him, "And from what I'm seeing you are in no condition to do any such thing.”
Dick sits up. His barely taken care of body protests. His stomach churns under the pressure of the conversation and his sudden movement.
“Tell me B. You know who did it,” Dick speaks with fervor.
Batman’s voice tightens in confusion, “You think I know?”
Dick’s eyes are wide open and crazed, “You have to. How could you not? After all these years...”
Silence.
“Dick, what are you talking about?”
“Oh God, you don’t know,” Dick sinks back into the chair giggling hysterically, “You really don’t know. I thought you always knew...”
“I can’t know everything.”
Dick shakes his head and groans. That was the crux of the matter he realizes suddenly - Bruce’s imposing inflexibility on all matters. His unyielding control. Yet, he wasn’t a god no matter what Dick thought. He can’t know everything. Can’t fix everything.
He can’t fix Dick, “Leave. There’s nothing you can do.”
“... This isn’t over.”
“Get out!” Dick screams, voice pitching shrilly.
Slade is unlocking his door barely an hour later.
“You have a bat stalking around,” that awful relaxed grin with perfect teeth shines at him, “Don’t worry. I didn’t allow him to see me.”
Dick scoffs, “I don’t see why you bother to hide. Wouldn’t it be better for you? Let everyone know about us? Alienate me from my family?”
Slade sighs but doesn’t stop smiling, “Oh, kid. I told you before, everything between us stays between us. If you want your family to know then tell them. But I won’t be caught crawling through your window when I could just walk through the door.”
Dick glances to the window. He had closed the window and blinds, rushing to them after Bruce had left.
“He’s watching the windows?” Dick asks weakly.
“He’s certainly not expecting Deathstroke the Terminator to walk through your door. Besides, I doubt he knows what I look like without the mask.”
Dick looks at him and sighs, “Slade -”
“You already know, kid.”
Dick looks up at Slade as he towers over him - a parody of the previous scene with Batman and yet Dick tilts his face toward him like a flower towards the sun.
“... Why?”
Slade reaches down, fingers brushing his hair behind his ear, “Because I killed him.”
“Why? You!” Dick yells, surging up and trying to make his bulk intimidating against an enhanced soldier.
“Me,” and then Slade is swooping down to kiss him. Dick struggles but Slade’s hands are wrapped around his throat.
Then he’s gone, mask pulled over his face, and leaping out the window in a dramatic flurry of glass.
Tim is scrolling through files on the batcomputer. Not exactly files he is supposed to be looking at, but he considers it a test of his mettle and detective skills. Besides that how could he resist? Especially when he realized that Bruce definitely had files on him and his ‘siblings’. Not that he hadn’t known on an intuitive level, but he’d never really gave the thought any time until recently. Suddenly it had wormed his way into his head and wouldn’t rest until Tim knew what those files looked like.
He had already checked his first, nothing new but more surprising was what was there and what wasn’t. The fact that Bruce doesn’t know everything still manages to blindside him even after all these years. Next, he surveys Jason’s but that was a can of worms he is happier letting rest. Besides that, there wasn’t much he didn’t know. Finding out that Bruce had a faint suspicion of Jason and Talia having a relationship - ya he didn’t really want to even think of that. He checks Damian’s and Tim is surprised to find that rather than discovering anything new Tim personally felt like he could add to it.
He supposes Bruce had been rather absent when it came to Damian. A pang of pity strikes him and makes him squirm. He quickly clicks out of the file and into Dick’s.
Nostalgia and anticipation hit him. He had tried a few times when he was still within his first year of Robin to try and read Dick’s file. It was the starstruck fanboy in him. He still cringes when he thinks of how obsessed he was.
It got him Robin and a family though, so it’s hard to really regret it.
Back then though, Bruce would catch him or the security would shut him out. Finally, Dick had found out and had sent him a copy of the file. Tim had been mostly satisfied, as areas had been redacted, but he had settled and stopped trying.
To read Dick’s that is.
Now he clicks it open feeling only slightly guilty. He wonders if this is an invasion of privacy and decides - yes a bit. But they’re Bruce’s files in the first place and at least he can relay what he knows to others.
Not the soundest logic but Tim is too curious to click away now.
Dick’s file is the largest out of the four of them; makes sense with him being the oldest. Looking over the first entries Tim can’t help but smile. Progress reports on training and mission. Dick had even left some notes in there in a kid's scrawl.
There are hundreds, maybe upwards of a thousand cases and entries. Bruce had even created a tagging system to sort them. It takes a moment for him to figure it out but he manages. One - critical - catches his attention.
There are multiple entries. Tim almost laughs when he sees the first one titled- Soulmate.
He clicks that one because the alternatives are heartbreaking. Tim is itching to read up on the Blockbuster incident but that had destroyed Dick. He is almost afraid to know now, somethings better left in the dark and unknown.
“Possibility of having none - unlikely. Sensitive to the topic in his early twenties. Avoided it. Shut it down. Relaxed over the years to the point of being nonplussed. Claims soulmates “are not a big deal” and that he is “uninterested”.” Tim cites.
Tim had noticed that, although it had never seemed important. Out of all the batboys Tim is lucky enough to have found his soulmate in Kon - who hadn’t even known he could have one. Jason is never interested in the topic and says he didn’t have it in him. Tim can't help feel bad even though it was better than the alternatives: never finding yours, your soulmate dying, or your soulmate rejecting you.
He’s watched strong men and women crumble at any of the previous provocations and it was awful.
Cass is also lucky. She has a platonic soulmate in Barbara and what seems to be a budding relationship with Stephanie. Cass deserves all the love she could get and so does Stephanie.
Stephanie didn’t believe in soulmates. Or at least she didn’t believe in waiting for something that might not come or what might be platonic or even what might just be bad. Tim respected that but that’s not what he believed in.
Bruce, he knows is destined with Selina, but she is a free agent and lives on her own terms and Bruce didn’t have room in his life for anything than the mission. He wants Bruce to be happy and as a kid used to feel resentment toward her because of the bad moods Bruce would be in when they had spats. Now he is happy for her for not giving up everything for something she doesn't believe in, even though Tim knows their lives would be much more fulfilled if they could make room for each other.
Dick though. He doesn't talk about it. Claims it just hasn't happened yet, but there was always a slight stiffening of his jaw no matter how he tried to hide it.
Looking at the list of potential candidates Bruce had listed, Tim could understand why. Starfire - who was Tameran and would not feel the trigger - Barbara who's name is now crossed out, Roy Harper - also crossed out, his soulmate being Cheshire. Wally West with a note of platonic(?) was greyed out and Tim winces at the reminder of the lost speedster. Midnighter crossed out for his soulmate Apollo. Tiger. Helena.
Tim is a little surprised at how in-depth the list is. There are even schoolmates and people from when Dick was on the force, most crossed out. Near the bottom is Deathstroke. Tim gave a laugh at the thought.
Slade and Dick had both had their bouts of obsession for each other, Tim will give Bruce that. Though the number of times Slade has tried to kill Dick practically disproves that theory. Soulmates killing each other is a death sentence and Slade is also so much older. While a huge age gap isn't an impossibility it was highly unlikely. Soulmates are usually within a couple of years to each other and rarely more than five. Cases of more than ten years are nearly nonexistent.
The name under, Rose Wilson holds much more ground. She is a bit younger though, and there is little evidence. Catalina’s entry has him worried. She made claims in jail that Nightwing was her soulmate. Bruce had typed in that, when asked, Dick denies it.
Wow, even Tim and Jason are listed as possibilities. Tim crossed out. Damian is even listed and he isn't crossed out either although, like Tiger, they both have a caveat of a note indicating that it is "unlikely" and "incorrect time frame".
Tim closes the file. It must be Starfire, he decides, still remembering years ago going to their trainwreck of a wedding and how desperate Dick was to marry her. What a pity, he thinks, Dick deserves someone to love who will love him back as passionately as Dick will.
Dick can’t move. His stomach lurches and he’s leaning over his bed to puke his dinner from the night before. He groans as a wave of pain washes over him.
This is - Slade.
What is happening to the man? Dick has felt phantom aches but Slade’s healing factor is powerful.
Is he-?
He can't. He can't be dead.
“Don’t leave me,” he gasps out between heaves, “Don’t you dare leave me alone.”
He pukes again and crashes out of his bed to the floor.
It’s Alfred who finds him in the morning shivering in a pile of his own puke. It takes Bruce to lift him and Tim to keep Damian away. Dick is barely conscious but he tries to ignore the fact that he’s ruined Bruce’s Armani button up.
“What’s wrong with Grayson?” Damian is demanding from behind Tim who is trying to physically block his view.
“He’s probably just sick,” Tim tries to rationalize.
Damian scoffs at that but visibly relaxes.
Dick is not just sick. Almost a week and he can’t eat more than a couple of crackers at a time. After the third-day scans are done and after the fifth they call in Leslie.
“Symptoms?” She asks Bruce, watching an unconscious Dick twitch in his sleep.
“Vomiting. In and out of consciousness. Refusing to eat,” Bruce lists off, “He seems to be in pain but there’s no injury. We’ve already had a magic-user come in and they found nothing.”
Leslie looks up, “You called a magic-user before me?”
Bruce frowns.
Leslie sighs, “Unfortunately there’s not much I can do for him.”
“What do you mean?!” Damian snaps.
Him, Tim, and even Jason are hovering in the background. Dick being incapacitated for unknown reasons is alarming. Damian is not handling it well. Neither is Bruce.
Tim in desperation had called Jason in.
Leslie shakes her head, “From what I can tell there's nothing actually wrong with him. He doesn't have a fever, no signs of any infections. All his blood and chemical levels are coming back normal. Either it's a soulmate sickness or he needs a hospital. I’m sorry.”
Silence. Leslie sighs and asks Alfred to escort her out.
“Starfire?” Tim asks once she leaves.
Jason barks out a laugh, “Her people don’t have soulmates dipshit.”
At the same time Damian bristles, “Impossible!”
Tim puts his hands up, “Look, look. Maybe it’s just unreciprocated? It was just in Bruce’s file -”
“You looked in his file?” Bruce asks.
“You didn’t know?” Tim whines while Jason busts out a tense laugh.
Bruce clenches his fists, “I can’t know everything.”
“Kor’i is unworthy of Grayson!”
“Grayson is unworthy of her,” Jason barks and then turns to Bruce, “God, Dick never told you?”
Bruce growls, “You know?”
Which has Jason putting his hands up, “No. No, I don’t know anything.”
“You know something,” Damian accuses.
Jason snarls, “I don’t know anything.”
“What about Rose?” Tim sighs, “Maybe a platonic one?”
Damian crosses his arms, “Flamebird and Grayson are close.”
Jason scoffs, “That crazy bitch wouldn’t keep it platonic. Are you kidding me? I’ve seen the way she idolizes him. If they were soulmates she’d be in his bed.”
Tim purses his lips in frustration, “Helena? Tiger? Raptor? Raven? Catalina?”
Bruce flinches, ever so slightly, at the last one. Quietly he says, “Dick has stated explicitly that Miss Flores is not...”
“Ya and the timelines don’t match Tiger and Helena,” Tim grunts out in frustration.
“God, I can’t believe you have a folder on this,” Jason says bordering hysterical.
“It’s pretty long,” Tim lets out weakly, “We’re on it.”
“All of us?” Jason replies incredulously.
“Well it is not me,” Damian states, almost sounding disappointed.
“I mean he didn’t have a reaction when I died?” Jason looks at Bruce, pleading without pleading for him to say no.
Bruce’s mouth curls, “I... We don’t know.”
Jason scoffs, “There’s no way.”
“It didn’t seem like there was any... Reaction before he was... Notified.”
“Ya moving on,” Jason spits out, “Who next? Why not Raven? She fits.”
“Then why pursue Kor’i?” Tim asks, “They were close. I think.”
“Well shit I don’t know if I would want to do the ceremony with an emotionally stunted demon-spawn,” he glances at Damian, grin sharp, “No offense kid.”
Damian growls and leans back, getting ready to pull his momentum back to pounce.
“Then that only leaves...” Tim frowns looking to Bruce, “No. There’s no way.”
The look in Bruce’s eyes is unreadable. Maybe pity. Maybe denial. Maybe guilt.
Finally he speaks, “It’s...”
“No! That’s... That’s awful!” Tim shouts.
Damian whips his head back and forth between his Father’s stony exterior and Tim's emotional storm as Tim begs Bruce to tell him he’s wrong. Finally, he turns to Jason whose mouth is pulled into a line as he looks down at the floor.
“You all know,” he shrieks, “Who? Who is it that fate has deemed worthy of Grayson?”
It’s Tim who breaks the ensuing silence. Shoulder’s shaking he turns to Damian, “It’s...”
Before he can finish something sparks in his eyes and he snaps back to Bruce, “You allowed this? You knew and you allowed this?”
Bruce cracks - a slight twitch of his right eye.
“I didn’t know,” he sounds more lost than Damian has ever heard him and it scares him, “How could I have known.”
A strangled cry comes from Tim’s throat and he moans, “How did you not know?”
“I can’t know everything!” Bruce shouts, his fist crashing down on the wall next to him.
“To be fair. It was a well-kept secret.”
The four conscious people in the cave spin to see Deathstroke the Terminator - Slade - standing at the entrance. His uniform is torn and there is dried blood splattered all over him, but whatever had shredded him left no mark on his skin.
He just. Slade just.
He just walked in, through the manor presumably, to find them all bare-faced.
Bruce moves quickly to block Slade’s view of Dick.
“How did you know? Why are you here?!” He grunts out.
Slade tilts his mask covered head, “What do you mean? Dick told me. Oh maybe not in so many words but once I knew who he was, it wasn’t hard to piece together.”
“He told you his identity?” Bruce’s voice rings with betrayal.
“Oh, no need to sound so hurt it was nothing quite like that. After so many... Liaisons between us it was only a matter of time.”
Bruce growls and Tim seems to shudder - even as he has his bo staff ready.
“If it makes you feel better in his youth capturing him and peeling off that flimsy mask was child's play.”
“Did you?” Jason asks hauntingly.
Slade’s mask moves. Maybe he's smiling.
“No. Grayson came to me willingly. Who else could he go to? Estranged from his father. His brother dead. Alienated from his friends.”
“By you!” Jason spits out. Anger spinning out of control from the mention of his death.
“No,” he replies sternly, “Because he was to be their leader. Unyielding and infallible. Maybe something the Bat manages but it’s ill-fitting for Richard. He needed to be perfect. He needed to be strong. Even more than the Bat he needs to be loved,” Slade shakes his head either mockingly or in pity, “Truly an impossible role to fill and when he inevitably could not please everyone where does the blame fall?”
“Shut up,” that's Tim.
Slade laughs.
Damian is snarling. The truth of what Slade has just said rang too true for him. He understands that Grayson is weak but he does not like Grayson's flaws being dragged out so accurately by a man who has no business here in his home, “Why are you here? Your obsession with Grayson is unbecoming.”
Slade shakes his head, “You still don’t get it, kid?”
Damian’s eyes widen comically. Then his face distorts in disgust, “You? You are not worthy to even look at him.”
“Worthy? Oh, kid. I am the only one for him.”
“Slade.” Dick groans and rises from his fitful slumber like a ghost.
And, oh, Dick has called his name many, many times but the desperate toll of Dick’s tone has Slade heeling like a dog.
“Grayson,” Slade breaths out, equally as desperate.
Dick brings himself up to his feet, leaning heavily over himself, and then he’s surging forward into Slade’s open arms. Damian reaches out to stop him a second too late.
A sigh comes out as he relaxes.
I’m sorry, Slade tries to say with how gently he holds him, I’m all better now.
Dick's breath shudders, “I thought you died.”
“Torture. It was probably worse for you than for me,” Slade mumbles.
Dick’s eyes flutter shut and he passes out.
Slade lifts Dick up bridal style.
A gun cocks, “Oh no. I don’t care if you are his soulmate. You are not leaving with him.”
“And you are going to stop me?”
“Please. Can you walk off a bullet in between your eyes?”
Slade glances at the man in his arms, “You would risk him?”
“Would you?” Jason asks seriously.
“...” And then Slade is laughing, “Are you so sure of your answer?”
“How?” Tim cuts in pleading, “How can you stand to hurt him?”
“I only hurt him for his benefit.”
“You believe that?” Bruce demands.
Slade lifts his chin up, “I’ve made him stronger. I gave him a place to go when no one else would have him. I killed the Joker so that he couldn’t die in the night and leave blood on Richard’s hands. I killed the Joker so that Richard would not have to live with the Joker killing another one of his brothers. I have done for him what no one else would.”
Jason flinches, gun swinging low, “What?”
Tim has lowered his staff.
Bruce snarls, “You blackmailed him and have repeatedly assaulted him!”
“Justifying your actions?” Damian taunts, “You really are nothing but another villain who believes in his own righteousness!”
Bruce and Damian’s words rally the other two even as they are still unsure and wavering. Jason re-aims his gun and Tim pulls back into a fighting stance.
Slade curls forward around Dick. This is sloppy for him. Dick has that effect on him.
“And what will you do? Lock me up? After the failure of his apprenticeship, Dick has only come to me willingly.”
Bruce takes a step forward.
“... I don’t need to take him,” Slade states, “He will come to me willingly.”
Setting him down on the cave floor Slade springs up with the momentum and flees just as quickly as he came.
Bruce rushes to Dick. Scooping him up to carry him back to his cot. Damian following on his heels.
Jason still has his gun in his hands. He watches helplessly as they resettle Dick in, Bruce soothing out the blankets Dick had kicked off and Damian there, sitting at Dick's side and holding his hand.
“You understand this soulmate stuff,” Jason whispers to Tim, “What do we... What do we do for him?”
Tim shakes his head, “There’s nothing we can do. They’re... It’s -”
“Don’t say it,” Jason rushes out just as sharp as it is quiet, “Don’t you dare.”