When a mission with the Young Justice Team goes wrong, Dick Grayson finds himself possessed by a bloodthirsty demon with no control over his body as the demon rampages through the country, leaving a trail of death and destruction in its wake. Can Ba...
Bruce was irritated. Beyond irritated in fact. No, he was both furious and frustrated, concern and anger fighting a continuous battle within him ever since he had learned of Dick's possession. He had watched the footage from each attack, had tried to trace and track his youngest protégé to no avail, and that alone was infuriating. Left unable to do anything but watch as with each appearance it grew all the more clear that Dick's body was giving out, his naturally thin frame having grown dangerously gaunt, dark bags encircling the once happy blue eyes, Bruce was growing increasingly worried.
Especially as he watched the footage of the last attack, watched as the skeletal form of his son's body massacred thousands of people. If they managed to somehow find him and get rid of the demon, Dick was going to be traumatized.
No.
Not if.
When.
He had to stay positive. Even if all clues led to dead ends, Bruce still needed to have hope. There was no way he could give up on Dick, not until all hope was completely lost. And as long as there were still signs of Dick being in there, all hope was not lost.
Pressing play, Bruce re-watched the last part of the security camera footage, watched as the demon strangled a child and then passed control over to Dick, watched the tears streaming down his youngest's face, watched as he tried to bring the boy back to life, watched as he was unsuccessful, watched as he begged for the demon to stop, and, finally, watched as the demon took control again.
The video ended, and Bruce restarted it, eyes and ears absorbing as much as they possibly could from the grainy footage, searching for any kind of clue even though he knew all too well that none would be found.
In the three years of killings, no clues had ever been found.
"Bruce? You've been watching the same clip for nearly an hour." Tim murmured, placing a steaming mug of coffee on the desk as he looked over Bruce's shoulder, unable to stop the soft sound of horror that slipped from his lips. "Oh no... Dickie..."
"He's looking worse, Tim. I–" Bruce cut himself off, words heavy with emotion, sipping the coffee in an attempt to suppress the overwhelming feeling of hopelessness. "I can't stop looking yet. He's running out of time. If... if we don't find him soon, there won't be anything left for us to save."
"I know that. I've been looking too. But you won't be of much use to him half dead from exhaustion. It's five in the morning and you've been awake for three days straight. Don't even pretend that you haven't, I checked the security cameras before coming down." Tim leaned around Bruce, powering down the computer. "Go to bed, Bruce. Dick would want you to sleep."
Bruce sighed, reluctantly extracting himself from his chair, his joints popping as he stood. "And what about you? Will you be sleeping?"
"Nah. I've gotten my hours in. I'll take over the search." Tim lifted his own mug of coffee, giving Bruce a reassuring smile as the older man headed up to bed. With a sigh of his own, Tim took Bruce's vacated seat and rebooted the computer.
He replayed the footage of the attack, eyes locked onto the screen, continuing the search for a clue that, deep down, he knew would never come.
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