Only Talon! Dick one-shots

60. I know you but you don't know me pt 4

linnie-colt wanted this pt 4 and it's fun writing him slowly coming back to being Dick through angst

"I can't believe you're here," Bruce commented, still cemented to the spot he was standing in. He never thought he'd be faced with this dilemma of having absolutely nothing to say to a man he left behind. Searches were thought to be useless yet he should've done them. A part of him always thought that Dick would come back to him one day with all these war stories about how he fought through the ranks just to take it all down from the inside but at the end of the day, he'd say he was glad to be home again. That wasn't what he was looking at. The man in front of him was like a painting of his ward. One with dead eyes but looking the same age as the day he disappeared.

"Surprised someone actually checked into your bullshit?" Jason asked. As much as he was slightly projecting, he couldn't stand any of the baffling personas the billionaire was going with when faced with a mistake. Plain and simple, this was a mistake or some sort of horrible-intentioned action. Even though Dick needed to talk with his ex-mentor, he was never one for waiting and it's not like his brother was in the best mind set to fight for himself. "I still can't believe you told all of us that he was dead. An entire League mourned for a man who was just one plan away from saving. An entire town lost their hero."

"What was your goal?" Tim asked, jumping in. "What was the point of not telling people the truth? If you felt you hit your limit, you should've handed the case to Barbara or someone in the League. You have a Robin in order to check your work or change your perspective."

"I thought-"

"You left him for dead plain and simple," Jason snarled. 

"You left me for dead?" Dick questioned. 

"No! No, you will not accuse me of leaving him for dead. He was as good as dead in my eyes. If I knew there was hope, I would've done something but it was in everyone's best interest to mourn rather than hope for him to come back," he explained. "I admit I was wrong to do so but don't you ever say I intended for him to die. When I got to his flat, he'd been gone for months and I tried after that too. There was no sign of him."

"If he'd still been your Robin, would you have tried harder?" Jason asked. His ex-mentor felt sick at the suggestion.

"I didn't do this as some sort of sick punishment either. I made a mistake."

"You didn't want him!"

"Yes, I did!"

"No, you didn't! That's why you let him die."

"Jason you're projecting."

As they continued to argue, Dick was frozen. He'd been frozen since the suggestion that Bruce had wanted him dead. He'd remembered nothing of his time before the Court of Owls but had been regaining his memory in small increments up until that point. Now he was stuck in one particular memory of the night he'd been taken. 

There was no warning to it. He was so used to the sunlight meaning he was safe until night that even when the sun was setting, he didn't think anything could happen to him. He'd just finished an intense workout when it happened. It went by in a blur but he remembered the sound of his window being opened. He often left it unlocked in case Jason wanted to swing by and come in unannounced so he didn't turn when he heard the footsteps. Stupid. He should've turned. He should've looked. He should've known better.