[Fanfic] Runaway
Title: Runaway
Rating: PG-13
Verse: Everything I do!AU from me_ya_ri crossover Band!AU from Munnin.
Characters: Damian and D.
Warnings: Er...teen kissing pre-teen?
Disclaimer: No ownership, no profit and no offence meant. Thanks me_ya_ri and Miunnin for letting me play in their sandpits. :)
Beta: Munnin
The block D’s currently hanging around is quiet, not really beautiful (or safe), but close enough to something he used to know.
He didn’t tell anyone he was leaving his hotel room, just left a note saying he will be back before dinner. They’ll worry about him but they’ll understand, and they know he can handle it.
D has his own things to let out.
And when he does so, the last thing he wants to hear is fangirls shrieking his name.
He automatically checks his surroundings, looking for ways out of the possible misery. Then he hears footsteps on the cement street; a pause maybe from a leap, and on some iron fire-escape. There's another pause before he sees a figure jump down from a nearby rooftop with a few graceful leaps.
He runs to the oh-so familiar figure, catches a kick in midair and offers calmly, “This way.”
Damian gives up the protest at the moment he is led to another alley. The gauntlet and the belt should be functioning well, but he is not coming to this verse for an emergency retreat.
He is coming here to see someone, someone he knows the best.
Or, precisely speaking, someone knows him the best.
“Since when have you started running away from those stupid people?” he demands once they lose those girls.
“Since the time their number reached to the level of forming a superorganism that can out-strength and outwit us.” D watches the other boy sulking, suddenly can't help his smile anymore, “It's wise to lose them before those working bees informing the whole herd.”
The other boy is still sulking, but the hostile manner is dropped instantly. D watches him check and readjust the gauntlet and the belt. The equipments look slightly unfit on the boy.
His two years younger self.
“You stole it.” Damian glares as D ponders, “That verse jumping Jason's verse? You wanted to see me.”
“Yes. To see my so-called bearable self.” Damian snorts, “And give Drake a headache.” He is ready for some preaching, but the older boy suddenly barks out a laughter.
“We can have a walk on that bridge. It's leading back to the hotel.”
“More of the stupidity we just lost?”
The chuckle from the other boy makes Damian feel weird. The older boy takes off his coat and hand it to Damian for hiding the poorly fitting gauntlet.
“I have no blood relative here. They will assume we are someone else.”
The coat is a little larger than his size, with sleeves long enough to cover half his palms and is soothingly warm. D is a few inches taller than him, clearly in the start of puberty.
They don’t speak as they walk to the bridge. Setting sun casts orange glints on the river. Clouds on the sky are painted rosy and purple hues. Some of the people walking by look at them with suspicion, but they give up quickly, heading home in a hurry.
“What do you want to ask me?” D asks quietly, “You are clearly not here to accuse me for being too soft.”
There is a light snort from the other boy. For a few seconds, he says nothing. “Why did you give up the mission?” Damian finally asks in a strangely not angry, but solemn tone.
“His last will.” D answers. He is ready for accusations of not staying or turning back, but there's just long silence. When they walk down from the bridge and heads to the hotel, the younger boy suddenly grabs his arm, something edging in his voice,
“Why did he send you all away?”
D feels those fingers nearly dig into his flesh. He stands there wordlessly for a while, then takes the other boy's hand and squeezes it.
“Come to my place. Alfred’s making chocolate chip cookies today.”
Pennyworth is surprised, but quickly regains himself. The butler looks older, Damian recognizes. He looks much more than two years older than the one he knows.
“The cookies will be ready in ten minutes, Master Damian. I'll bring them to your room.” says the old man understandingly.
“Thanks, Pennyworth.”
“Thank you, Alfred.”
They say it in sync. Both Pennyworth and D smile. It's unnerving. Damian feels like escaping when following the older boy in to his room.
The room looks somewhat decent enough, but still stark comparing to his room in the Manor. Papers are scattered on the bed, some looks like homework assignments, others with scores on them. There are some Middle Eastern instruments in the room, and three guitars. Damian can only recognize the acoustic one and the electronic one.
“What's that?” He points at the third one.
“A steel pedal guitar. I heard it once in one of Jay's collection.” says D.
Damian crinkles his nose, assuming it produces nothing but noise.
But the other boy picks it up and starts playing.
Then Damian falls silence.
There's a knock on the door when D finishes playing. Steph is standing outside with a plate of cookies and two cup of his favorite hot chai when he opens the door.
“I heard that....oh, ohohoh...wow.” She looks all jubilant and curious as she looks over his shoulder, “This is cool!”
D looks back and sees the other boy is about to snap. He gives him a death glare until his younger self subsides.
“Have a nice time, you two. Dinner's in about an hour. Sorry for the late cookies, I didn’t want to ruin the song. You play well.” declares the girl triumphantly. She hands the plate to D and says to him in a lower voice, “Play some music when you two talk. The sound proof here is really poor. I’m guessing the little guy still can't handle...” she shrugs and scowls at the closed room at the far end, “jerks.”
“Thanks.” says D with a little smile. Steph regards him concernedly, then gives him a squeeze on his arm before leaving. When he closes the door and turns around, he sees Damian staring at him scandalously and incredulously,
“What's wrong with...with you?!” the boy huffs, switching to a more polite saying just in time.
D puts down the plate and turns on the stereo.
“A curse. I guess.” His heart twitches as he shrugs. “O said it's a curse between Batgirls and Robins. I guess I get double cursed since she had been both.”
No, he doesn't believe in curse at all and he's definitely not blaming it on Steph. She gets the worst part of being separated from the one she loves who loves her the same. The worst part for him is that, he can't even get cursed with her.
D is not sure how bitter he looks now. His younger self just studies him intently, but the light in his eyes soften.
There's some noise outside, maybe from another room, muffled by the music from the stereo. The offended and incredulous look suddenly reappears back on Damian's face. “Drake and Todd? They just never behave, don't they?” sneers the younger boy with disgust.
“No. Things are worse here.” says D as he watches the other boy's eyes widen.
“You are not saying...dammit! DAMN IT!” His younger self looks so appalled by the idea of Dick being in that mess, that almost makes D laugh out loud, “It's your fault! It's all your fault if I can't get this out of my system when I go back!” Damian swears as he grabs his hair irritatedly.
And D laughs out loud.
The dinner is super unnerving for Damian with everybody here smiling warmly at him. Drake gets to be the worst case.
He still doesn't understand when his older self tells him to keep an eye for Drake's behalf.
“Slade I will take precaution against but I don't care about Drake.” he bristles, “He hates me.”
“Grandfather has designs on him, very dangerous designs.” He sees his older self biting the inside of his lips with darken eyes. “I regret not stopping him before things went wrong.”
“Yeah. Everybody just thinks so highly of him.” Sourness is burning inside his chest as he growls, “I hate him...”
The older boy takes his hand and leads him to lie down on his bed. The scent of detergent makes his nose tickles, but soothing warmth sipping through his skin while the other callous hand massaging his palm.
Bigger palm. Longer fingers. Different callous. Warmer. The same strength.
“He won't hate you later. One day, they will understand, and you won't hate him anymore.” says D quietly, “I can promise that.”
Damian slowly drifts off to sleep.
Sleep so free of nightmare and deep that he only realizes in the morning he has been changed into slightly larger pyjamas and D is cuddling him protectively.
The breakfast is still very unnerving. Drake is still the worst case. But somehow, it doesn't give him goosebumps anymore.
“I need to go now.” Damian says sullenly after breakfast.
“You are welcome for visit again, but next time you should leave a note before you come.” says D. There's smile in his eyes, although there's no curl on his lips. “Is he...” he takes a deep breath, “How is father?”
“Fine.” Damian drops his head, then raises it again to meet the older boy's eyes, “He's good. And happy.”
D hugs him tightly.
“Do you want me to leave you anything?” Damian instantly curses himself for being stupid. He doesn't have anything special from his father in hand. He should have found some before coming.
Slender fingers clap around his wrist, the one without gauntlet, and touch his watch.
“Can I...?” he hears the voice humming through their touching chest, “I left mine in the Manor.”
Damian turns to take it off, puts it on the older boy's wrist, and hold his hand firmly. It was bought with other clothes and accessories when he first arrived at the Manor. He’ll have no problems buying another one later.
“Thank you.” says D gently, “I think he didn't want us be ruined by the mission. So he sent us away and let Gotham died with him.”
Damian grabs the boy's clothes and leans in further.
“Send my love to him, our love.”
“I will.” he says.
D retreats a little from the hug, cupping Damian’s face and looking into his eyes, the same blue eyes,
“Swear to me. Swear to me you will keep him safe, you won't let him die.”
“I swear. With my life.” Damian says solemnly without a quiver in his voice.
“No, no, live with him. Live on with him.”
“Yes. Yes...”
There are lips on his lips. There's tongue licking his lips and teeth open and tangling with his own. There are arms holding him firmly. There is warmth melting his fear and washing them away, the fear which drives him run to a strange verse to check for possible future.
They don’t pull back until they run out of oxygen. The older boy picks up a few pieces of paper with scores on it and hands it to Damian as they steadies their breath.
“This is for him and you.” he says softly, “You already know how to play the flute, don't you?”
Damian nods as he tucks them safely into his pocket. “See you.” he says as he triggers the gauntlet, watching D wave at him as the light grows blindingly bright.
And the next moment, he's in the cave, with an angry Drake yelling at him,
“WHAT THE HELL IS YOUR PROBLEM DAMIAN?! DO YOU KNOW...”
He takes off the gauntlet and the belt, then shoves them to Drake, who has blood-shot eyes, looking so furious but at the same time like he’s about to have a heart attack.
“I didn't break it. I didn't change anything on it, either.” he walks away irritatedly, suddenly missing the smiling creepy Tim he just said goodbye to, “Stop the whining, OK? I'm sorry but you monitoring the multiverse instead of Todd is really beyond my expectation.”
There's no more fuss from Drake, which he's grateful. He takes a few chocolate chip cookies as the old butler materializes in the cave and puts the plate on the table.
“Thank you, Alfred. Do you know where my father is?”
There's a pause. Damian turns back frowning, and sees the old butler recovers quickly.
“I believe Master Bruce is in the library waiting for you, Master Damian.”
He nods and continues walking up to the Manor. Drake's voice echoes in the cave with a strange kind of...panic, maybe,
“I'd better recheck the data and make sure...”
Damian closes the grandfather clock behind him.
The library is warm. The carpet swallows up his footfalls. His father stands up behind his desk and walks to him.
“You should have left a note.” he says softly.
Damian nods, “I will.” he takes out those papers carefully and hands them to his father, “This is for you. I can play it if you want.”
Bruce unfolds and looks at scores carefully, the scores of Fathers and Sons. He then folds them up again and kneels down in front of his son, “How are they?”
“...Fine.” says Damian quietly.
Deep blue eyes look into his. Then strong arms reach to him and tug him into a firm hug.
“Thank you, Damian.” he hears the baritone of his father, and suddenly, he can't hold his tears no more.
“I'll need a new watch.” he sobs and buries himself deeper into the hug.
“We can arrange that.” Promises his father, as warm hand gently patting his back for reassurance.
Rating: PG-13
Verse: Everything I do!AU from me_ya_ri crossover Band!AU from Munnin.
Characters: Damian and D.
Warnings: Er...teen kissing pre-teen?
Disclaimer: No ownership, no profit and no offence meant. Thanks me_ya_ri and Miunnin for letting me play in their sandpits. :)
Beta: Munnin
The block D’s currently hanging around is quiet, not really beautiful (or safe), but close enough to something he used to know.
He didn’t tell anyone he was leaving his hotel room, just left a note saying he will be back before dinner. They’ll worry about him but they’ll understand, and they know he can handle it.
D has his own things to let out.
And when he does so, the last thing he wants to hear is fangirls shrieking his name.
He automatically checks his surroundings, looking for ways out of the possible misery. Then he hears footsteps on the cement street; a pause maybe from a leap, and on some iron fire-escape. There's another pause before he sees a figure jump down from a nearby rooftop with a few graceful leaps.
He runs to the oh-so familiar figure, catches a kick in midair and offers calmly, “This way.”
Damian gives up the protest at the moment he is led to another alley. The gauntlet and the belt should be functioning well, but he is not coming to this verse for an emergency retreat.
He is coming here to see someone, someone he knows the best.
Or, precisely speaking, someone knows him the best.
“Since when have you started running away from those stupid people?” he demands once they lose those girls.
“Since the time their number reached to the level of forming a superorganism that can out-strength and outwit us.” D watches the other boy sulking, suddenly can't help his smile anymore, “It's wise to lose them before those working bees informing the whole herd.”
The other boy is still sulking, but the hostile manner is dropped instantly. D watches him check and readjust the gauntlet and the belt. The equipments look slightly unfit on the boy.
His two years younger self.
“You stole it.” Damian glares as D ponders, “That verse jumping Jason's verse? You wanted to see me.”
“Yes. To see my so-called bearable self.” Damian snorts, “And give Drake a headache.” He is ready for some preaching, but the older boy suddenly barks out a laughter.
“We can have a walk on that bridge. It's leading back to the hotel.”
“More of the stupidity we just lost?”
The chuckle from the other boy makes Damian feel weird. The older boy takes off his coat and hand it to Damian for hiding the poorly fitting gauntlet.
“I have no blood relative here. They will assume we are someone else.”
The coat is a little larger than his size, with sleeves long enough to cover half his palms and is soothingly warm. D is a few inches taller than him, clearly in the start of puberty.
They don’t speak as they walk to the bridge. Setting sun casts orange glints on the river. Clouds on the sky are painted rosy and purple hues. Some of the people walking by look at them with suspicion, but they give up quickly, heading home in a hurry.
“What do you want to ask me?” D asks quietly, “You are clearly not here to accuse me for being too soft.”
There is a light snort from the other boy. For a few seconds, he says nothing. “Why did you give up the mission?” Damian finally asks in a strangely not angry, but solemn tone.
“His last will.” D answers. He is ready for accusations of not staying or turning back, but there's just long silence. When they walk down from the bridge and heads to the hotel, the younger boy suddenly grabs his arm, something edging in his voice,
“Why did he send you all away?”
D feels those fingers nearly dig into his flesh. He stands there wordlessly for a while, then takes the other boy's hand and squeezes it.
“Come to my place. Alfred’s making chocolate chip cookies today.”
Pennyworth is surprised, but quickly regains himself. The butler looks older, Damian recognizes. He looks much more than two years older than the one he knows.
“The cookies will be ready in ten minutes, Master Damian. I'll bring them to your room.” says the old man understandingly.
“Thanks, Pennyworth.”
“Thank you, Alfred.”
They say it in sync. Both Pennyworth and D smile. It's unnerving. Damian feels like escaping when following the older boy in to his room.
The room looks somewhat decent enough, but still stark comparing to his room in the Manor. Papers are scattered on the bed, some looks like homework assignments, others with scores on them. There are some Middle Eastern instruments in the room, and three guitars. Damian can only recognize the acoustic one and the electronic one.
“What's that?” He points at the third one.
“A steel pedal guitar. I heard it once in one of Jay's collection.” says D.
Damian crinkles his nose, assuming it produces nothing but noise.
But the other boy picks it up and starts playing.
Then Damian falls silence.
There's a knock on the door when D finishes playing. Steph is standing outside with a plate of cookies and two cup of his favorite hot chai when he opens the door.
“I heard that....oh, ohohoh...wow.” She looks all jubilant and curious as she looks over his shoulder, “This is cool!”
D looks back and sees the other boy is about to snap. He gives him a death glare until his younger self subsides.
“Have a nice time, you two. Dinner's in about an hour. Sorry for the late cookies, I didn’t want to ruin the song. You play well.” declares the girl triumphantly. She hands the plate to D and says to him in a lower voice, “Play some music when you two talk. The sound proof here is really poor. I’m guessing the little guy still can't handle...” she shrugs and scowls at the closed room at the far end, “jerks.”
“Thanks.” says D with a little smile. Steph regards him concernedly, then gives him a squeeze on his arm before leaving. When he closes the door and turns around, he sees Damian staring at him scandalously and incredulously,
“What's wrong with...with you?!” the boy huffs, switching to a more polite saying just in time.
D puts down the plate and turns on the stereo.
“A curse. I guess.” His heart twitches as he shrugs. “O said it's a curse between Batgirls and Robins. I guess I get double cursed since she had been both.”
No, he doesn't believe in curse at all and he's definitely not blaming it on Steph. She gets the worst part of being separated from the one she loves who loves her the same. The worst part for him is that, he can't even get cursed with her.
D is not sure how bitter he looks now. His younger self just studies him intently, but the light in his eyes soften.
There's some noise outside, maybe from another room, muffled by the music from the stereo. The offended and incredulous look suddenly reappears back on Damian's face. “Drake and Todd? They just never behave, don't they?” sneers the younger boy with disgust.
“No. Things are worse here.” says D as he watches the other boy's eyes widen.
“You are not saying...dammit! DAMN IT!” His younger self looks so appalled by the idea of Dick being in that mess, that almost makes D laugh out loud, “It's your fault! It's all your fault if I can't get this out of my system when I go back!” Damian swears as he grabs his hair irritatedly.
And D laughs out loud.
The dinner is super unnerving for Damian with everybody here smiling warmly at him. Drake gets to be the worst case.
He still doesn't understand when his older self tells him to keep an eye for Drake's behalf.
“Slade I will take precaution against but I don't care about Drake.” he bristles, “He hates me.”
“Grandfather has designs on him, very dangerous designs.” He sees his older self biting the inside of his lips with darken eyes. “I regret not stopping him before things went wrong.”
“Yeah. Everybody just thinks so highly of him.” Sourness is burning inside his chest as he growls, “I hate him...”
The older boy takes his hand and leads him to lie down on his bed. The scent of detergent makes his nose tickles, but soothing warmth sipping through his skin while the other callous hand massaging his palm.
Bigger palm. Longer fingers. Different callous. Warmer. The same strength.
“He won't hate you later. One day, they will understand, and you won't hate him anymore.” says D quietly, “I can promise that.”
Damian slowly drifts off to sleep.
Sleep so free of nightmare and deep that he only realizes in the morning he has been changed into slightly larger pyjamas and D is cuddling him protectively.
The breakfast is still very unnerving. Drake is still the worst case. But somehow, it doesn't give him goosebumps anymore.
“I need to go now.” Damian says sullenly after breakfast.
“You are welcome for visit again, but next time you should leave a note before you come.” says D. There's smile in his eyes, although there's no curl on his lips. “Is he...” he takes a deep breath, “How is father?”
“Fine.” Damian drops his head, then raises it again to meet the older boy's eyes, “He's good. And happy.”
D hugs him tightly.
“Do you want me to leave you anything?” Damian instantly curses himself for being stupid. He doesn't have anything special from his father in hand. He should have found some before coming.
Slender fingers clap around his wrist, the one without gauntlet, and touch his watch.
“Can I...?” he hears the voice humming through their touching chest, “I left mine in the Manor.”
Damian turns to take it off, puts it on the older boy's wrist, and hold his hand firmly. It was bought with other clothes and accessories when he first arrived at the Manor. He’ll have no problems buying another one later.
“Thank you.” says D gently, “I think he didn't want us be ruined by the mission. So he sent us away and let Gotham died with him.”
Damian grabs the boy's clothes and leans in further.
“Send my love to him, our love.”
“I will.” he says.
D retreats a little from the hug, cupping Damian’s face and looking into his eyes, the same blue eyes,
“Swear to me. Swear to me you will keep him safe, you won't let him die.”
“I swear. With my life.” Damian says solemnly without a quiver in his voice.
“No, no, live with him. Live on with him.”
“Yes. Yes...”
There are lips on his lips. There's tongue licking his lips and teeth open and tangling with his own. There are arms holding him firmly. There is warmth melting his fear and washing them away, the fear which drives him run to a strange verse to check for possible future.
They don’t pull back until they run out of oxygen. The older boy picks up a few pieces of paper with scores on it and hands it to Damian as they steadies their breath.
“This is for him and you.” he says softly, “You already know how to play the flute, don't you?”
Damian nods as he tucks them safely into his pocket. “See you.” he says as he triggers the gauntlet, watching D wave at him as the light grows blindingly bright.
And the next moment, he's in the cave, with an angry Drake yelling at him,
“WHAT THE HELL IS YOUR PROBLEM DAMIAN?! DO YOU KNOW...”
He takes off the gauntlet and the belt, then shoves them to Drake, who has blood-shot eyes, looking so furious but at the same time like he’s about to have a heart attack.
“I didn't break it. I didn't change anything on it, either.” he walks away irritatedly, suddenly missing the smiling creepy Tim he just said goodbye to, “Stop the whining, OK? I'm sorry but you monitoring the multiverse instead of Todd is really beyond my expectation.”
There's no more fuss from Drake, which he's grateful. He takes a few chocolate chip cookies as the old butler materializes in the cave and puts the plate on the table.
“Thank you, Alfred. Do you know where my father is?”
There's a pause. Damian turns back frowning, and sees the old butler recovers quickly.
“I believe Master Bruce is in the library waiting for you, Master Damian.”
He nods and continues walking up to the Manor. Drake's voice echoes in the cave with a strange kind of...panic, maybe,
“I'd better recheck the data and make sure...”
Damian closes the grandfather clock behind him.
The library is warm. The carpet swallows up his footfalls. His father stands up behind his desk and walks to him.
“You should have left a note.” he says softly.
Damian nods, “I will.” he takes out those papers carefully and hands them to his father, “This is for you. I can play it if you want.”
Bruce unfolds and looks at scores carefully, the scores of Fathers and Sons. He then folds them up again and kneels down in front of his son, “How are they?”
“...Fine.” says Damian quietly.
Deep blue eyes look into his. Then strong arms reach to him and tug him into a firm hug.
“Thank you, Damian.” he hears the baritone of his father, and suddenly, he can't hold his tears no more.
“I'll need a new watch.” he sobs and buries himself deeper into the hug.
“We can arrange that.” Promises his father, as warm hand gently patting his back for reassurance.