Dick beamed as he watched the members of Haly's Circus get ready for the big show. Show nights always excited him. Even if he wouldn't be able to perform with his parents tonight, he could still help with the background stuff, and he would, as always, watch his parents and their amazing quadruple flip. Pride blossomed in his chest as he thought of how the Flying Graysons, his very own parents, were the only ones who could manage it. Someday HE would learn to do it, and then the three of them would be a part of an exclusive club of mastery, together as a family.
He was interrupted from his elaborate, eloquent, and unnecessarily extended thoughts by his mother calling his name. "Dick! Come on. Your tată wants to show you how he sets up."
He turned to her from where he had been standing by the elephant pens, staring at them. "Okay, Mami! I'll be over in a minute!"
He started to make his way from the animal pens to the main tent. However, as he passed a small sideshow tent, he heard raised voices.
"I shouldn't have to pay you 'protection money.' We're only going to be here for another day." That was Ringmaster Haly.
"That's not how this works. You pay us, and we LET you leave, at least, without trouble. However, if you don't..."
Dick heard Haly draw in a sharp breath, then his father calling him. "C'mon, Dick! I've been looking for you!"
"Coming, Tati!" He called back.
As he continued walking, he wondered if he should tell someone what he heard. But that was soon pressed from his mind as he approached the main tent.
xXx
They were falling. He couldn't do anything. He watched them plummet, and all he could think was that he should have told someone.
He raced down the ladder, wishing his feet could move faster. He pushed through the already-gathering crowd as everyone gathered around, crying out for someone to call an ambulance.
Haly, crouched next to them, felt their pulses as Dick drew next to him. As he knelt next to his mother's still form, Haly shouted, "They're alive!"
They were? They were? They were! He finally saw his mother's chest rise, and then his father's. They were alive! Dick sobbed. Whether it was from his previously unvented terror, or relief, he did not know.
But his parents were alive.
And that was all that mattered.
xXx
Sorry for the short intro chapter, but it was right where I wanted it to be plot-wise. So it is what it is.
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Circusmaster Grayson
FanfictionDick Grayson's parents survived. Instead of the fall killing them, they were crippled for the rest of their lives, his mother on crutches and his father in a wheelchair. They had to retire, but their son decided to carry on in their footsteps in the...
