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Dick sits in the medbay and he folds his hands carefully in his lap and he does his best to hold perfectly still. It is hard, Dick likes moving, likes the energy that comes with flowing from one thing to the next without actually stopping between anything, it makes him feel alive. And after watching his parents fall, after watching the way his Mom had flailed as gravity gripped her and pulled her down to earth despite the way she attempted to fly, Dick feels like he needs to be reminded more often than not.
Now though, he holds as still as possible., Because maybe, if he holds still, the spell will keep on weaving itself around him, it will not break. Other things move, Bruce’s chest going up and down, the machines that measure out his vitals one beep at a time, the shadow of Alfred just beyond the medbay. But Dick holds perfectly still.
He needs to keep holding still.
Dick does not understand why he knows that this is the thing that will hold everything together, but he knows that as long as he sits in his chair and keeps himself as still as Bruce does when he is looking out over Gotham at night, waiting for the moment when the air breaks with a scream or a cry for help, as still as one of the statues that litter the tops of all of Gotham’s building, then Dick will be able to keep Bruce’s heart beating.
Bruce’s heart needs to keep beating.
Nothing else matters, not the way his leg is starting to cramp, not the way this bright room hurts his eyes after being in it for so long, not the way he can feel the blood growing tacky on his skin because he still has not taken off his costume, and Alfred had been too distracted with keeping Bruce alive to notice that Dick is still covered in Bruce’s blood.
Dick is still covered in Bruce’s blood.
He can feel it on him and Dick wants it off. He does not want to know what Bruce’s blood feels like as it cools against his skin, he wants it off. He wants it off.
His mom had still been bleeding when Dick had managed to make it down to the ground, down to where they had fallen from where he had been frozen to the platform he was supposed to jump from. Her blood had been mingling with his dad’s, but hers had still been coming out of her and Dick had tried to find the source of it. Because that is what he had been taught when Pop Haly had agreed to let Dick perform, if anyone was ever injured, part of his responsibility was to stop them bleeding if no one else could help.
So Dick had tried to stop her bleeding because if he could stop her bleeding he could keep her there with him. Pop Haly had said stopping the bleeding would keep people alive.
But she had not survived, Dick had been covered in her blood and his dad’s blood and neither one of them had survived. And he had just wanted to get it off him because it was sticking to him and even after he had been transferred to the delinquent center he had not been allowed to wash it off because showers took place in the mornings only. So Dick had spent the whole night covered in the blood of his parents.
And now he is covered in Bruce’s blood and it is not the same thing, but it feels the same as that night. It still feels like that awful, never ending night. And Dick wants the blood off him.
But if he moves, then he breaks the spell.
Dick is the lynchpin holding everything together. He cannot move because moving means that things are set in motion again, and if he sets things in motion, then there is the chance that things will spin wildly out of control. There is the chance that Bruce will start bleeding again and Dick will try to hold all his blood in again and he is going to fail, just like he failed with his parents.
He is going to wind right back in that alleyway when Bruce had collapsed and Dick felt the whole world grinding to a stop between his heartbeats. And in the moment, had managed to keep the blood that Bruce had been spilling in long enough for Alfred to get there with the Batmobile, in the moment, Dick had been able to do for Bruce what he had not been able to do for his mom. He cannot risk it now though. He cannot risk the possibility that he could make it all go wrong again.
So Dick holds still despite the fact that his skin is crawling with Bruce’s blood. Because it is the one thing he can do to help Bruce, to keep him here and alive.
“Good heavens! Master Richard! You look a fright!” Alfred says when he reenters the medbay.
The shout makes Dick flinch, his eyes darting to Alfred for half a second. It is half a second too long.
Because as soon as Dick moves, everything comes crashing down around his ears. As soon as he moves, Dick loses his grip on that indescribable thing that he has been holding onto, the thing that has been tying everything down tight, together.
“I thought you’d gone to bed hours ago!” Alfred continues, oblivious to what Dick has just lost.
To the fact that Dick needs to get to Bruce to make sure that his blood stays inside his body, where it is supposed to belong, where it can keep him here, with Dick. He cannot fail Bruce like he did with his parents.
Dick surges up and out of his chair, towards Bruce, but he has been sitting still for so long, his legs have gone numb, they cannot hold his weight anymore.
Alfred catches him around his waist before he can collapse to the ground, holding him upright. Holding him back from Bruce, who is going to start bleeding out again. Who is going to die and Dick is going to be covered in his blood and he cannot get the blood off him, they will not let him wash the blood off him. He tried to scrape it off with his nails when they would not let him wash it off but by then it was too dry, it flaked under his nails and he had spent days afterwards washing under his nails trying to get the last of his parent’s blood out from under his nails.
Dick struggles in Alfred’s arms, trying to get free. But Alfred holds him fast.
All Dick can do is open his mouth and let out a wail that comes up from somewhere deep inside him. Because he is going to lose Bruce. There is nothing Dick can do because he cannot reach him and Bruce is going to lose too much blood.
He is going to die and all Dick will have left of him is the blood drying against his skin.
“Master Richard, hush, hush,” Alfred tells him. But Alfred does not understand.
“He’s dying! He’s gonna die!” Dick screams, struggling to get free from Alfred’s arms, to get to Bruce so that Dick can save him.
“Master Bruce has stabilized, Master Richard, he is not in danger any more, you kept him safe,” Alfred tells him. But Alfred does not understand. He does not understand that if Dick does not get to Bruce then Bruce is going to die, they are going to wind right back at the circus and Dick is going to be taken away again.
He is going to be put in the detention center and they will not let him wash Bruce’s blood away. And this time, there will be no Batman to save Dick, to step in and rescue him from the dark.
“He is going to be alright, Master Richard, I promise you, Master Bruce is going to be alright.”
Alfred does not let Dick go as Dick cries. He just keeps holding him. Keeps promising Dick that Bruce will be alright. Dick wishes that he could believe him, but he knows the truth. He knows that by not getting free, he is letting Bruce die. Slowly but surely.
Dick cries until he does not have any tears left. Alfred does not let him go, and Bruce does not get up or respond in any way. The machines just keep on beeping.