Ready Or Not Here I Come - A Damian Wayne Story

Chapter 6

Damian woke up to a throbbing pain in his gut. It felt like he was being stabbed with a burning hot knife. He groaned and turned his head to the side, forcing his eyes open.

He saw that he was in a hospital room, decorated with sky blue walls and white clouds near the ceiling. He was pleasantly surprised to see the lights weren't the usual harsh glare of LEDs; instead they were softer and a yellowish color, like an incandescent bulb. He was alone.

Ignoring the pain in his gut, he tried to get up and failed, flopping onto the bed like a dying fish. He groaned as the pain in his gut flared, making him want to hit something. He sighed, knowing he wasn't going to be doing anything for a while. He moved his hand over his stomach where it throbbed and felt bandages, and under those, stitches.

He searched his mind for the reason his gut hurt, and remembered being impaled by the big chunk of glass in the van he was in. The stitches made sense now. He also remembered that they were, ironically, driving to the hospital at the time. He frowned at the strange circumstances of the incident. The object that had flown at the window was odd; he didn't know what it was, the object had been too blurry for him to see.

But before he could think anymore on the subject, the door opened, and his brothers came in, arguing over something. Again. It's all they seemed to do nowadays. They didn't even notice him until he shifted his head to look at them, raising his eyebrow at their childish behavior, unimpressed.

"Dami!" Dick squealed, rushing towards him and suffocating him in a hug. Damian winced as his wound protested the sudden movement. "I'm so glad you're awake!"

"Grayson, you're crushing me," Damian said, trying to shove him away.

Dick hastily let go of him at his words, having heard the obvious pain in his voice. "Oh, I'm so sorry, Damian! I didn't mean to hurt you! Are you okay? Does-"

Jason laid a hand on Dick's shoulder to get him to stop speaking. The older boy looked at him as he spoke. "Holy shit, Dick. Let the demon breathe. He's fine. Look."

Dick looked at Jason, then at Damian, who was crossing his arms on the bed as he stared at them crankily.

Dick smirked at Damian's expression and nodded. "Yup. He's totally fine. Back to normal already. Isn't this great, Tim?" Dick said, turning to look at teenage boy behind him sitting in a chair as he sorted through bags.

"No." Tim said shortly, not even looking up from what he was doing. "Although I don't really have a choice, do I?" He muttered to himself, though the others overheard.

Jason chuckled. "Nope. Not really. You're stuck with the demon forever. Don't have too much fun with him."

"Shut up, Jason. No one asked your opinion in the matter."

Jason shrugged. "You didn't specify who you were asking, so I took the opportunity before I could miss it. And I am so glad I did."

Tim opened his mouth to reply, but was interrupted by Damian. "Could you act anymore like children? How do you even survive the real world?"

Jason whirled to face him, eyebrows creased in slight anger. "Demon, I know how to survive in the real world just fine. Do you remember where I grew up?"

Damian scoffed, crossing his arms even more. "And where did that get you? Into a Lazarus pit for my mother, that's where. Even the great Batman couldn't save you from her." The sarcasm was plain in his voice as he turned away from everyone and faced the wall. Even Tim looked up from his bags and looked at him in concern.

Jason stood still, not knowing what to say. It was rare for Damian to bring up his mother, extremely rare nowadays. Jason knew that he had been thrown into the Pit by one of the Al Ghuls; he just hadn't known which one. Until now. Jason also knew that Damian despised his mother, probably because she was the one who sent Heretic to kill him, and succeeded. Not to mention all the stuff before that; training him to kill, probably harshly, raising him to rule the world with his grandfather before he was even ten years old?