Just Robin Oneshots Part 2

An oath

does moshi monsters still exist?

Dick made an oath when his family was ripped away from him. He promised never to have another family. If he never had another family, then he'd never forget them. They'd always be in his thoughts that way. Though, that oath was difficult to follow when Bruce welcomed him into his home and desperately tried to make him feel like they were family. On the one hand, Dick wanted to have a new family. It would make him feel less lonely since he knew there was someone there to protect him still. On the other, he couldn't bring himself to accept being part of a new family in fear of belittling his original family. This internal dilemma was solved one stormy night in the manor.

Lightning lit up the room, followed by a crack of thunder. Dick yelped loudly and dove beneath the covers to seek some comfort from the storm. He'd seen quite a few storms on his travels and this wasn't the worst he'd been in but the missing comfort he had from his parents no longer being there to help cause it to be insufferable. He squeezed his eyes closed and curled up into a ball, hoping he'd calm down but no such thing happened. With every roll of thunder, he jolted and dug his nails into his skin in terror.

Bruce knew that the storm would get some sort of reaction from the nine-year-old living with him. He only knew of two reactions to the vicious storms that traveled over Gotham; fascination and fear. He hoped, as he lightly knocked on Dick's door to check on him, that it was the first rather than the latter. The door was opened by a shaking weary-eyed Dick who had his blanket draped over his shoulders. "W-what's up?" Dick asked quietly. His black hair stuck out at jagged angles and he was visibly shaking. It was the latter of the reactions. 

"I wanted to see how you were doing. Storms can get pretty scary here," Bruce responded. A small sigh escaped the younger's lips as his eyes darted to the floor. Asking Bruce for some comfort would be great but it went against his oath. He couldn't do that. It wasn't fair on them for him to replace them. "I'm fine. Shouldn't you be asleep or something?" he said. There was a small crack of vulnerability in his voice and Bruce noticed it. That's something Dick hated about Bruce. He could tell when he wasn't being truthful about his feelings. "It's alright to be scared," Bruce insisted. Dick was cautious to reply to that statement. He didn't like it when Bruce cared for him. It was too much like his own family. "I want to help you, Dickie, please let me."

Tears prickled at Dick's eyes at the sentence and his grip on the door tightened slightly. "I-I." He didn't know how to get the words to leave his mouth. Were there any words for how he felt? He wanted to accept the help but he made an oath. He wanted something he couldn't have. He cursed himself for being a living oxymoron. "I can't," he finally said after stumbling over his words. Bruce knelt down so they were at eye level with a fretful expression, "What do you mean?" He sounded so genuine and it was eating Dick up inside that he wasn't giving this man such a simple thing but he couldn't bring himself to do it. Whether he was genuine or not, it didn't change the rules Dick made for himself and held himself to so strictly to. "I'm not supposed to have another one," he replied, his voice shaking. Bruce's worry increased upon hearing the young boy's reply but he remained patient, deciding to let Dick explain what was going on inside his head. It was the best he could do without knowing how to help. "My dad is gone, I can't have another one," Dick clarified.

Bruce let out an empathetic sigh and held the boy's small shaking hands. He ran his thumbs over the smaller hands to ease their shaking but it didn't do much good. "I'm not here for you to replace what you had and I will never ask you to replace your family," Bruce assured him.