TW: SUICIDE 

https://suicideprevention.ca/

https://suicidepreventionlifeline.org/

https://www.inclusivetherapists.com/

"I know you wouldn't want this," Damian said quietly. He stared at the grave before him, the very sight of it feeling like some sort of horrid fear toxin-induced hallucination. Soon it would be nothing but a reminder of that dark day if he knew what he was doing, which he did. The Lazarus pit had brought himself and Jason back from the dead so why wouldn't it bring back his beloved brother? He cringed at the wording since it was carved into the stone. Dick wasn't in the Wayne plot. He was close to it but he wasn't in it. He was put to rest alongside his parents. Somehow it felt like a final illustration of how he didn't feel like a Wayne. That he'd always been a Grayson. Damian didn't intend to change him into a Wayne once he was back. He just wanted to connect back to the Waynes. Grayson-Wayne. "Your death was self-inflicted unlike the others that have weighed upon our family but that made it hurt the most. Even in your death, you tried to protect us and I know that in some way, what I'm doing is selfish." The teen brought out the small vial he'd gotten. Talia said it would be enough. He was rather surprised when his mother gave it to him so willingly without a fight. He'd called her the night after he'd come out of his self-induced amnesia asking to meet up without Bruce finding out. They swiftly agreed on a time and a place.

The night was cold and he quickly regretted the jumper he'd chosen to brunt the Gotham cold in. It didn't help that he'd decided the meeting spot would be near the harbour where there were fewer security cameras. He'd decided it best to go as Damian rather than Robin to keep Bruce off his back. People were much less likely to report someone lingering at the docks if they weren't wearing vigilante costumes. He noticed a small boat and immediately recognised it to be belonging to his mother. Correcting his posture and maintaining a steely stare, he let out a breath to prepare himself. Meetings with his mother went one of two ways. They'd either fight or have a rather touching heart-to-heart. He'd prefer if tonight was a new third option. Something that was closer to a business transaction than a meeting between mother and son. Eventually stepped out onto the hull of the ship before beckoning him to join her inside away from the cold. He refused. She sighed. "I'm sorry for your loss," Talia began, her voice genuine. 

"No you're not," he replied.

"I am. I'm to understand the two of you were close. You have to be if you're asking me to bring you this." He refused to rise to that and she seemed to understand. "The side effects of this are great. Are you prepared for the very likely case where he is not the same man you buried?"

"I'm aware and I will handle that. Did you bring what I wanted or not?"

"I did bring it because I know you would only follow me home if I didn't. All I want is to make you aware of the other possibilities. The ones you haven't idealised and therefore refuse to take into account." He gritted his teeth together at the comment and stepped forward, jutting his hand out expectantly. Talia shook her head and pulled out the small glass vial. It was just enough to bring one person back and she'd intended for that to be the case. She wanted to ensure he couldn't do anything else. After placing it in his hand, he brought it to his chest and marvelled at the green hue it cast. "You'll have to dig him up. You know that?" He shivered at the thought but nodded. "Open his coffin and pour it on him? You will see his dead body after-"

"I know what I'm to do Mother!" he snapped. "I have lived without him for far too long. The last time I lost him there was no body to find but there he is waiting in the ground. He is tangible and I'm going to make sure he wakes up." She gave him a sad look but he ignored it. "What do you want in return?"

"I want you to think before you do anything. Sit by his grave and truly think if he would want this."

"That's all?"

"That's all."

"It won't change my plans. It will only waste my time."

"It'd be time worth wasting then," she replied. "Good luck with your endeavour." 

Damian had returned that night and no one noticed he'd gone. Nobody knew he was out tonight either. They thought he was in bed still mourning rather than preparing for the rebirth. He wondered how everyone else would take it but found that he didn't really care what they thought about it in the end. He cared about getting his brother back. "You were hurting Grayson. I will make sure once you're back that you will stop hurting and that you'll be happier. It's the least I can do for making the mistake of not noticing sooner." He picked up the shovel he'd brought with him. Whatever Talia wanted him to get out of wasting his time like this he didn't know and he was growing impatient. He wanted to see his brother again and to do that, he had to get to work. With a loud sigh, he pierced the ground with his shovel and began scooping the earth before placing it into a small pile. It would take a while but he was determined. 

Eventually, he struck the wood of the coffin and he smiled in triumph. It had taken roughly an hour to dig up the grave but it was well worth the work. He dusted the dirt from the coffin before finding his footing and grabbing the edge. He gave himself a moment to prepare for the sight he was about to bear witness to before yanking it open. A pungent smell greeted him and he took a step back to gulp down fresh air as he gagged on the stench. He didn't know what he expected the decay to smell like but it wasn't that. Maybe he should've hung around a murder scene more to prepare himself. Damian let out a shuddering breath and forced himself to push through the stomach-churning smell. The body of his brother lay before him and gagged again as it became abundantly clear Dick had begun to liquefy. It had been a month since his burial so he should've been prepared for the sight but all he could do was stare, his eyes tearing up that this is what became of a man he looked up to. A man who would give his entire being for those around him. He let out a sob and struggled to recollect himself. It was only until he got a good grip of the vial in his pocket that he reminded himself that this could be reversed. It didn't matter how many times Dick died, life could be returned to his corpse no matter the state. "I'm sure you'll thank me for this brother." He unscrewed the cap before pouring the fluorescent liquid into the coffin and waiting. For the first few moments, nothing happened. He feared that Talia had tricked him for some reason but that fear was dashed when slowly Dick's features returned. His skin returned to its rightful place on his skull, plumping up and returning to an albeit paler rosiness Damian was family with. His hair returned to his head and his eyelashes grew from reformed eyelids. The teen stared in awe of the process of a decaying corpse returning to its former glory. How had he not done this sooner? Before he forgot about the death in the first place? Maybe it didn't come to mind or perhaps it had been heavily dissuaded by the others. He didn't care. Dick was coming back to him. 

He didn't know how long it took for Dick to become fully restored but eventually, the process finished. He looked like he was sleeping in a coffin. A lively version of when he laid to rest even with his eyelids closed. Damian chewed on his lip nervously as he waited for some sort of movement from the older. How would he react to being resurrected? Finally, there was something. Dick's face screwed up in what could be seen as pain before his eyes snapped open and he flung himself forward. He looked terrified. He didn't acknowledge Damian's presence, only staring at his newly regenerated hands and the veins that ran beneath them. His lips parted but instead of a greeting, a guttural scream erupted from him. "Grayson, it's okay, you're alright," Damian jumped in, putting his hands on the man's shoulders to ground him. It didn't work though. He continued to scream at an ear-piercing level and his hands jumped to his hair where they began pulling out chunks of black curls. The teen grabbed his wrists and only just managed to stop him. "Please, it's okay. You're with me again. You're here."

"What did you do?" he hollered. 

"I saved you. I brought you back to life." 

"Why?" he sobbed, unable to comprehend any of this. Damian was of course very understanding toward his confusion. It was disorientating to be dead one minute and alive the next so he knew to speak slowly and calmly. Without proper guidance, he might go off the deep end.

"Because we need you and if we'd been better, you wouldn't have died in the first place. You're going to be okay this time."

"I'm- I- I'm sorry," Dick whimpered. 

"Don't be. I'm going to take you home and you're going to be okay now. I'm going to look after you as you looked after me," he explained. The acrobat nodded slowly, numbly even. He probably wasn't taking in much of the words being spoken to him but that was alright. It took time to get back into the swing of things and that's what Damian was there for. He stood up and climbed out of the grave, gesturing for the older to do the same. It took a while but eventually, Dick began to move and climbed out after him, becoming incredibly distressed when he saw his gravestone behind his parents. "It's alright Grayson."

"No! No it's not okay! I died!" he yelled, furiously wiping away the tears that travelled down his cheeks. "I wanted this so why does it hurt? It hurts!" 

"I know it hurts but you're going home now, remember? You're going to have us help you. You'll have me." He put an arm around the sobbing man, deciding it better to wait it out than to urge the man to move. 

Batman was patrolling when he heard a scream. It was guttural and blood-curdling so there was no way he could ignore it in good conscience. He abandoned his plans for the night and turned to find the source of the scream, slowly figuring out that it had come from the cemetery of all places. A pit formed in his stomach as he thought about some grieving individual perhaps visiting a family member they'd only just heard had passed or worse yet, a person coming there to grieve only to be attacked. Such injustice couldn't go unchecked. As he got closer, he heard cries of anguish coming in waves. When they got quiet, he got worried and his speed picked up. Whoever was there needed him. He couldn't fail another person. Once the cemetery was in sight, he jumped over the fence and continued his path to find the victim. He didn't call out for them until he was sure the attacker was no longer around. They might run off if they knew Batman was swooping in and he didn't want someone to get away with hurting someone in a place that was already the cause of so much grief. He thought the people of Gotham had at least some decency not to attack one another in a place like this but he supposed he shouldn't expect any better of the city. He turned a corner, the person he was looking for coming into view but they weren't alone. Now alongside their cries were gentle hushing and words of affirmation. These coming from Damian who to the best of his knowledge was supposed to be locked up in his room, consumed with the grief of remembering a loss so traumatising his brain thought the only solution was to forget. Upon noticing this, Batman took a better look at the victim. They were dressed in a fine black suit with a blue tie, their black hair poking out at all angles and curling near the nape of their neck. The hero slowed his pace as he approached the pair. His eyes glanced to the graves they sat beside the pile of dirt and a shovel by one of them. He felt sick. Bile was rising in his throat and he felt his knees grow weak the closer he got but he continued his morbid march because he just had to know this was real. Damian caught sight of him, his eyes widening with surprise. "Father," he greeted quietly. Dick's head rose from where it had been hanging in his hands and turned to face Batman.

"What did you do?" the older whispered, unable to get his voice to be much louder. You'd think after having two sons come back from the dead that a third would be of no surprise but it was. It hurt in the most painful of ways. He should be happy that his son was resurrected and sitting right there but he just couldn't find it in him to work past the wave of guilt. "What did you do?" he roared, finding his voice. Anger was oddly a part of the emotions he was drowning in. Dick had died and didn't want to be brought back, how could he not bring the man back himself instead of leaving the end of the Grayson lineage at a self-inflicted death and what the hell was Damian thinking doing this? He was so mad at Dick for dying, no matter how awful that sounded, and here he was now sitting quite literally with one foot in the grave.

"Don't be angry Father," Damian told him. "You mustn't be mad. He's back and we can try again. We can be better so that he won't have the same ending."

"You brought him back," he stated.

"I did. Why are you so upset with this? You should be happy."

"He shouldn't be," Dick cried. "Just say it won't you? Say you're mad at me for dying! Say you think I'm a failure for what I did! I know it's true anyway!" The acrobat's voice was raw from sobbing and partly because it had only just been reformed. Thrust back into working as though it never decayed and liquified in the first place. "I've always been your mistake, haven't I? That's what you said after Two Face nearly killed me!"

"No," Batman said. He suddenly found the strength to run forward and drop to his knees in front of his son. He cupped the man's face and wiped the tears away with his thumbs like he did when Dick was only little. He'd hold that boy like he was his whole world and what did he do to that world? Destroyed it. Pushed it off the side of the building. He may as well have dug the grave years ago since he'd had such a hand in filling it. "No, I was wrong for saying that. I never even knew that you remembered that?

"How could I forget you calling me your mistake?"

"You're not my mistake, you're not a mistake at all- God you're so far from a mistake. You've saved my life countless times."

"You're a liar," Dick replied bitterly, shoving his hands away despite the comfort they provided. He pushed Damian off too and finally got to his feet albeit with a little wobble back and forth. "I just wanted it all to stop, I went to great lengths just to protect you all from it but you-you couldn't accept it, could you? It's not fair!" He sounded almost drunk on anger and began to stumble away from the grave he'd spent the last month in. "Never got a fucking thank you during my life and here you are digging me up. What? Was dying all it took for you to appreciate me?" Batman and Damian had risen to their feet at this point, cautiously following as he took laboured steps back. "I wanted to die! I died! Fuck, I actually died for real."

"Yes, but we can fix it now," Damian insisted. "We can get you to professionals you've not seen before." Dick threw his hands up in the air with a strained laugh before dragging them down his face, pulling at his skin as he did.

"You're not listening! Never did, no all you did was hear what you wanted to I just-" He deflated and rubbed at his eyes. "I can't just kill myself again. Waste of a resurrection. Now I'm stuck. That's what you've done. You rose me from the dead but guess what? I wasn't the man you wanted to bring back. He died years ago and fuck I wish I had died that long ago so you wouldn't have brought me back."

"Dick, you were and are a good man. Right now you're being forced to process far too much so please just take a moment to breathe," Batman told him. His voice was steady and sturdy. A rope that Dick could hang onto and pull himself out of the pit he was tumbling down. The acrobat's eyes continued to water as he continued his pain-filled rambling.

"Why weren't you there for me? You promised me but you weren't. I wanted so bad for somebody to fucking notice but none of you did. Why didn't you? I know I wasn't good at hiding it. I know you know the signs. Did you want me to attempt and fail? Did you want me to attempt and succeed?"

"There has never been a moment in my life where I wanted you to die," his guardian replied. "I failed you because I did see all the signs but I just didn't do anything. You've always been so good at being independent so I thought you'd be okay. We all did."

"We're here for you. Please understand that this is a second chance and you aren't alone this time," Damian added.

"So what's the plan huh? You're gonna take me to the manor and tell me to take more walks? Put me on some happy pills that'll "fix" me and teach me fucking breathing techniques?" Dick asked. His sarcasm didn't hide his desperation for a real answer. He was confused, terrified of what this all meant for him and so upset with everything he thought he'd escaped when he hit the ground. Guilt was hitting him like a truck too. He hurt his family and friends only now he had to face all of them when before he'd never have to deal with the fallout. Another sob racked him and he let out a yell full of pent-up rage and pain. "Fuck! Fuck it all!" He stared at them as he straightened up. "I was just so tired. It was too late for me." Damian walked up to him and held his hand, giving it a comforting squeeze.

"It wasn't. It isn't. You're coming with us and we're going to get you help. Let us fix our mistakes." He nodded numbly. He hoped it would be better this time. 

"I'm sorry. I'm so sorry," he apologised, suddenly regretting everything he'd said and done. "I regret it. I really do but I didn't know what else to do. It just got so loud." He forced himself to suck in a deep breath and rubbed his eyes. "Can I have a hug please?" They both rushed forward and wrapped their arms around the acrobat. "I didn't mean to hurt anyone. I just wanted it to be quiet."

"It's okay. We've got you."