*A Nightwing Oneshot*

_____

"TELL ME WHAT I WANT TO KNOW!"

The scream is commonplace, the words as familiar as her heartbeat. She does not respond.

The fist comes down, blood sprays on the ground as her face is knocked to the side. Her body jerks and the chains rattle, but she makes no sound. She is used to the pain.

His voice quiets, becomes cajoling, gentle. "You can make it all go away. Just tell me what I want to know. Tell me who he is."

She is still silent. She knows there is only one way that it will go away, and that is not an option she desires. He growls, his spittle hits her face without the force of his fist. Somehow the cold wetness is worse than the pain of his punches. "WHO IS HE?!"

It's as if he thinks breaking her eardrums with his voice will make her want to talk.

It doesn't.

His fury mounts and he reaches for the whip.

She doesn't react to the stinging pain. He screams at her incoherently, questions she doesn't care to decipher. She closes her eyes. She wants to sleep.

He gets bored.

The door slams behind him and she has peace for a moment. She allows herself to smile. She will never talk. She will never betray her lover.

She lets her head droop to rest on her chest. She lets the memories pull her in.

**__**

"R!" She squeals and laughs as he chases her around the kitchen, but she's not really trying to get away. He catches her easily, throws her over his shoulder. She laughs and pounds playfully on his back. He throws her onto the table, scattering her work papers.

He kisses her, and for awhile they are lost in each other.

Later, they sit in her window seat, drinking cocoa. They stare out over the city as the sun begins to set. He holds her closer because they both know he will have to leave soon. He has stayed too long already. He tilts her face toward him, kisses her softly.

He whispers her name against her lips--a one-sided privilege. She has never said his name. He thinks she doesn't know it.

She won't tell him that he's wrong. She wants him to trust her enough to tell her the truth himself. She is patient.

He smiles at her, one side of his mouth lifting in an expression that is only for her. She kisses him, and when he pulls away he brushes her hair away from her face. She wishes she could see his eyes behind his mask--she knows they are a beautiful emerald green. She knows that they are windows to his soul. She wants to see them for real and not just in pictures that she has to keep hidden from him.

But she is patient, like her love.

He stands and moves quietly around the living room, gathering his clothes. One of his boots is missing and she giggles as he rummages around looking for it. She goes into the kitchen and finds it under the table, and she thinks it's funny that it's the only thing still in the room.

He laughs softly when she gives it to him, and then he is gone. The curtains billow after he's passed through them, as if protesting his continued use of the window instead of the door.

She smiles and closes the window, locking it. He always insists that she lock up after him, even though he never has trouble getting in. She knows he's never used the key she gave him.

She doesn't mind.

She makes herself dinner, something light and spicy, like her mood. She sits in front of the TV and watches cartoons as the time flies by. She waits until the clock says 11:00 PM. She changes the channel to the news.

It is nearly half an hour before there's a bulletin, only two minutes long, about him.

"In other news, the city's favorite vigilante apprehended the infamous Doctor Light this evening, rescuing over twenty of the madman's hostages." A video byte comes on, a young woman with tears in her eyes.

"I thought we were going to die, and then he just swooped in and saved us all! I don't care what anyone says, Nightwing is the best! WE LOVE YOU NIGHTWING!!!"

She smiles and turns off the television. She knows they don't love him like she does. She takes a shower and climbs into bed. She doesn't sleep.

Her blood sings because she knows that he is still alive.

**__**

Her questioner has changed. Her captors are tired of her silence. They tell her they will kill her if she doesn't talk. She says "Talk."

She is beaten.

She retreats into her mind to avoid the pain. She cannot let them see the pain.

**__**

She is walking home from work. She stayed later than usual to help out, and darkness has already fallen. She is careful, staying on the lighted paths, not taking routes that have no people.

But her neighborhood is not very populated, and she finds herself alone a block from home. She keeps her head down and walks quickly, knowing that R won't be happy with her if he finds out she walked home alone in the dark.

Despite her caution, she is suddenly surrounded. There are five of them, young and arrogant and probably high. She remains calm, she will never show fear to scum like these idiots.

Not showing fear will not save her.

But she knows who will.

They have barely touched her when he appears. This is how she knows he was waiting for her to get home, and she sighs because she hates arguing with him.

In moments the men are unconscious on the ground. R takes her arm, and his lips are pressed tightly together. "What were you thinking, Mel?" He grinds out the words, and she sighs again. "I had to stay late, I didn't have a choice, R."

"So take a cab home! Don't walk in the dark!"

"There weren't any cabs!" Her words are adamant, but she knows he hears the lie.

"You mean you spent the last of your money on cat food for the strays instead of saving it for an emergency." His voice is resigned, and she winces before nodding.

"If I don't feed them they'll starve."

He sighs, running a hand through his dark hair. "You're going to be the death of me you know." She wishes he wouldn't say things like that. "Come on, let's get you ho-" his sentence is cut short by a siren a few blocks away. His fingers tighten around her arm and she puts a hand to the side of his face, reassuring. She smiles. "Go. It's not far and the bad guys are all unconscious."

He scowls. He wants to say no, and walk her home himself. She can't let him. She pushes him lightly. "Go R."

He mutters something she can't catch, then kisses her, hard. He is gone before she can enjoy the kiss, but she smiles anyway. She turns to continue on her way, but a shiver down her spine makes her stop. She glances around, and her eyes widen.

One of the muggers is staring straight at her, and the expression on his face is like glee and a promise.

She hurries away, and locks herself in her house, and closes all the curtains. She turns music on loud to drown out her heartbeat.

It doesn't drown out her thoughts: they know. They know that I know.

She knows she should call R, she knows this is an emergency. She has made herself a target now. Something to be used against him. She picks up the phone.

She remembers the sirens, and she thinks of the people who could die if he comes to help her.

She puts the phone down and goes into her room. She climbs into bed and hugs a pillow to her chest. She whispers the words she has wanted to say, the words she has never dared to say to him.

I love you.

They are words he will never hear.

She hopes she sees him one last time before they kill her.

She doubts that she will.

She is right.

**__**

He finds her body in the morning. He spent the entire day and night before searching for her. The sight of her battered form hanging from her own fire escape terrifies him. He panics, runs to her. Cuts her down. Screams her name.

She doesn't answer.

He picks her up and starts to run.

He doesn't stop until he's at the hospital. The people there--patients, doctors, nurses, secretaries--all gape at him. He is covered in her blood. He clutches Mel to his chest, pleading in his mind for her to be alive.

"Save her." He says only two words as he hands her off to the doctors' care. They are all he can say without giving his feelings away.

His heart hangs from those two words.

He has to leave or they will get suspicious.

He wants nothing more than to stay by her side.

He leaves quickly. He takes some clothes from the bin at the homeless shelter. For the first time in almost four years, he takes off his mask. His face feels strange without it.

He washes off her blood and changes clothes.

He rushes back to the hospital, tells them he's her brother. He is so panicked that the nurses don't question him further.

It's hours before there is a verdict. He is edgy and nervous, always on the brink of panic. The other patients and family members in the waiting room eye him nervously. He is like a wild thing, pacing and ripping at his hair.

If she dies, he will never forgive himself.

No, she cannot die! He needs her. He loves her.

Finally the doctor calls the name he's given them. He stalks toward the man in the white coat, forces himself not to grip the doctor's shoulders. "Well?" The word is harsh; it holds his soul.

The doctor sighs. "She's doing fine. She's severely wounded, but she's a fighter. She's going to pull through." He sags with relief.

When they let him see her, he refuses to leave her room until she wakes. The orderlies have to drag him out of the room. It takes all his strength not to fight them off. He can't give himself away. He can't make her a target again.

They tell him to leave and not come back until the next day.

He dons his costume again.

He tears the underworld apart, looking for the men who hurt his Mel. It is a week before he finds them, but when he does, he is relentless. He uses the toxin Bruce told him never to use, the one made by Poison Ivy long ago.

The men are found and taken to a hospital. They are beaten and bruised, and the doctors are perplexed--though all of them are recovering, none of them have any memories at all.

He returns to the hospital. She is still not awake. They say her coma could last for years. He stays by her side.

He is at the hospital every day. The nurses and doctors all know him by name. They have figured out that he's not her brother.

They let him stay anyway.

The police question him. He is evasive. They are frustrated. They want to close the case.

After four months, even the lead detective gives up. The doctors tell Dick she might never wake up. It might be best to let her go.

He leaves the room to avoid strangling the doctor. He pays for all her medical bills. He tells them he wants a new doctor for Mel.

They give him one.

After eight months, he sits at her beside and despairs. His mind drifts.

**__**

"What am I supposed to call you?" She is looking at him with bright gray eyes, beautiful and devilish. He laughs. "What everyone calls me: Nightwing."

She pouts. "That's too long. I know! I'll call you R."

"R?"

"For Robin. That used to be your name, right?"

He chuckles. "Not for a long time, but if that's what you want then sure."

She beams. He doesn't know why he's still here. She is beautiful and thankful that he saved her friend's life. But she is no different from other girls he's saved.

"You're not going to ask my name?" She raises an eyebrow at him and he thinks it looks cute. He shrugs. "Names aren't important."

She laughs. "Fine then." She goes back inside. He studies the small diner and wonders if she has a family to feed, and how she does it on a waitress's pay.

He finds himself there the next night. He doesn't know why. She comes out and he backs away, but not fast enough. She's seen him.

She calls to him. "I know we have good pie, but it's no use to you if you stay out here." She holds open the door like she expects him to come in. He tries to walk away.

Instead he walks into the diner. She's right--the pie is good. Her company is better.

The next night, he manages to stay away.

The night after that, he can't. He watches the diner from a roof across the street. He can see her sometimes, through the big front window. He feels like a stalker and calls himself an idiot.

He is about to leave when she comes outside. She looks up at the roof like she can see him, but he knows that she can't. She sets a plate down on a parking meter.

He uses his mask's zoom feature to see what it is, and nearly falls off the roof in surprise. It's blackberry pie, the same kind of pie he said was the diner's best.

He wonders how she knew he was there. The next night, he asks her. She laughs at him, then surprises him with a small, serious smile. "Because I wanted to be where you were, but I couldn't be. You have no such barriers."

He walks her home and they talk. She invites him in and he refuses.

But the next night, he walks her home again.

After a month, he accepts her invitation to come in.

After two months, she no longer has to invite him.

He is a permanent fixture in her house. She is a permanent fixture in his life.

He tells himself it means nothing.

He knows that he is lying.

**__**

One year, two months, and thirteen days.

That's how long she's in a coma.

He's on patrol when the night shift's head nurse calls him. He's so shocked that he almost barrels into the hospital in costume.

She is sitting up, doing muscle exercises with the nurse. The nurse smiles and leaves them alone. He rushes to her side. She frowns at him, and he smiles. "How do you feel?"

She hesitates. "I'm... okay. I'm sorry, do I know you?"

He chuckles. "Don't pretend. I've seen that scrapbook you keep in the freezer."

She shakes her head. "No... I'm sorry but I really don't know what you're talking about."

"Mel..." he trails off, worry snaking down his spine.

She continues to frown. "Who's Mel?"

Ice washes over him. He calls for the nurse.

Later, they tell him she has amnesia. It is something he already knew. He does't miss the irony. He is numb inside. They tell him it's unlikely that she'll ever regain her memories, though there is a slim possibility. Very slim.

When he sees her again, he sits carefully in a chair by her bed. She looks at him. "I'm sorry."

"It's not your fault."

"Who are you?"

He smiles sadly at her. He wishes they'd had this conversation Before. She had a right to know who he was and how he really felt.

"I'm the man who is in love with you."

She blinks and looks down. "I'm sorry."

"It's not your fault." They sound like a broken record. He runs a hand shakily through his hair. What is he supposed to do now?

She bites her lip and looks up at him. "What's your name?"

"My name is Richard Grayson. Most of my friends call me Dick, but you always called me R."

She smiles faintly and nods. "R. Can you... tell me about myself?"

He takes her hand and smiles when she doesn't shy away. "I'd love to."

And so it begins again.