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1.
It was Gotham. There was a lull in the usual neverending waves of crime and mayhem and, against Batman’s wishes and preferences, Nightwing seemed to like calling for Wally to join him, on those nights that weren’t overencumbered with the usual amounts of crime.
Lately, he also liked to call for Wally to teach him bits of that birdsong language that the Bat’s kids used, out in the field and when casually talking to each other when they were off-duty. It was flattering that Nightwing wanted to teach him at all, and Wally was always enthusiastic to know more about Nightwing and his family, even if that “more” was actually a language that was… generally pretty private.
(For a while, Wally hadn’t been sure if Batman even knew his kids’ language – then he’d heard Batman responding to the whistling chirps, albeit in gruff English, rather than the language itself.)
“Another lesson?” Wally skidded to a stop a few feet in front of Nightwing, grinning already.
Nightwing nodded and, with no official start or acknowledgement to speak of, took Wally’s hands in his own and whistled a long, trilling birdcall between himself and Wally.
That was okay, though. Wally was used with how quickly Nightwing jumped between tasks and subjects. Probably because he was pretty much the same way. It was part of Wally’s particular brand of ADHD, which he was pretty sure Nightwing shared. Not that he asked – he knew how private the lot of the Batbrood were and didn’t want to press Nightwing for any information that he might not have been comfortable sharing.
Nightwing repeated the long, trilling birdcall to summon Wally back from the depths of his thought, prompting him to guess via raised eyebrows and an expectant smile.
“Setting up an ambush?” Wally guessed.
Nightwing smiled at him, then did a short, sharp whistle. A “yes.”
Wally smiled back. “Cool.”
Nightwing gave another whistle, this one a bit longer than the “yes” and more piercing.
“Danger!” Wally grinned.
Nightwing nodded and whistled the “yes,” once more, then whistled a call that went high and low and high again, almost like an auditory barrel-roll.
“Over there?”
In the background, there was the soft zip-thunk and equally soft thwack-zip-click of a grapple gun extending and then retracting. It was either headed up to the roof Wally had met Nightwing on or one of the neighbouring one, but it was definitely a Bat-grapple-gun. Wally wasn’t sure when he’d memorized the exact noise of the Bat-grappel-guns, but it was a useful thing to know, since it meant knowing – more potitively – whether or not he needed to be on guard.
Nightwing gave two short, sharp whistles. A “no.” Wrong answer, then.
“Uh. Over here ?”
Nightwing nodded and whistled once, sharply.
“Bird-bitch, what are you doing?” Red Hood broke in.
Wally tried to pull his hands away from Nightwing and look innocent, but Nightwing held on a bit more tightly, moving closer to Wally. Wally settled and held Nightwing’s hands back, comfortable in the knowledge that Nightwing didn’t mind being caught being touchy-feely with his friends, anyway.
Nightwing turned to Red Hood. “Teaching KF some signals,” he said.
Red Hood was wearing a full-face helmet, but seemed to get prickly and offended, all the same, his body language tightening and becoming defensive. He gave a series of chattering chirps and whistles to Nightwing, somehow making every one of the chirps and whistles sound annoyed. Wally caught a few of them – “danger” and “family” and “no” – but couldn’t follow the whole of it. He was always surprised at how fleshed-out the Batfam’s language was.
(That Red Hood knew the language was what initially clued Wally in on Red Hood not just not being a bad guy, but also Red Hood being a part of the Batfam. He was probably one of the first of the Team to realize that.)
Nightwing retorted in sing-song whistles and cheery trills. “Yes” and “friend” and “safe” were scattered in his calls. There was also a chattery “no risk” in sequence, and Wally was thrilled that he noticed it.
“No risk?!” Red Hood exploded. “You fucking know better, N!”
Wally jumped and withdrew from Nightwing. “Sorry. Am I doing something wrong?”
“Yes!” Red Hood said.
Nightwing whistled sharply, twice, to indicate his disagreement.
“Jesus, N,” Red Hood swung around to face Nightwing again. “Why can’t you be a team player about this, huh? This is about your fucking family.”
Nightwing gave an exasperated sigh, then another series of chirps. “Friend” was in there, again, as was “safe.” The rest of it was like a song, more than the usual series of chirps. But maybe it was all starting to blend together, again. That was what the language used to sound like to Wally, after all – music arrangements, but of birdsong.
“Oh my god, you’re fucking hopeless,” Red Hood muttered. “He doesn’t even know, you fucking dumbass.”
“Me?” Wally asked.
“Stay out of it,” Red Hood snapped.
Wally raised his hands in surrender. “Sorry, I didn’t mean—”
“I said ‘stay out of it,’” Red Hood said.
Wally mimed zipping his lips.
Nightwing cleared his throat. “Hood,” he said, quiet and lilting, almost as if he were still communicating in song.
“No,” Red Hood said. “Don’t fucking — don’t ‘Hood,’ me. I don’t go around creating security risks where there are none, do I?”
Nightwing gave him a flat look.
“What?”
Nightwing rolled his eyes.
“Okay, so maybe I was doing that kind of shit back when I first came back to Gotham, but fuck, I don’t go around—” he made a strangled noise and motioned meaningfully at Wally. “B doesn’t even do this with the fucking Cat, does he?”
Wally glanced down at himself, a bit lost. The cat comparison went a bit over his head.
“It’s okay,” Nightwing soothed.
“Does he know who you are?” Hood demanded.
Wally snapped his gaze over to Red Hood, then over to Nightwing, eyes wide. He didn’t know Nightwing’s identity, and he didn’t think that it would ever be on the table, no matter how close a friendship they had.
Nightwing glanced down at the ground, shoulders dropping. “He won’t let me,” he said.
Red Hood seemed taken aback by the answer. “He won’t let—you want to?”
Nightwing shrugged.
“Should I…?” Wally thumbed over his shoulder.
Nightwing turned to him and grabbed for his hands, shaking his head.
(What was it about his visits to Gotham that made him so quiet, nearly averse to verbalizing himself, anyway? Was it just him being used to the birdsong language he used with his family? Or was it some kind of trauma that stuck in his throat and made it hard for him to speak past? Wally wanted to ask, but thought it might be too much – too personal.)
Wally turned his hands over in Nightwing’s grip, smiling softly down at their joined hands. He wasn’t always so touchy-feely with his friends, but it felt right with Nightwing.
“I’m gonna catch either cavities or cooties from you two,” Red Hood muttered.
“You don’t have to tell me anything, you know,” Wally said. “I don’t mind not knowing. I’m happy with what you do allow me to know. And see. It’s… it’s a gift, just having you around.”
Nightwing chuckled silently, his shoulders rising and falling in almost a shrug. He whistled something almost familiar. He’d heard Nightwing whistle it at his siblings, before, anyway. He didn’t know what it meant, though.
Red Hood made a disgusted noise. “Both, then. Cavities and cooties.”
“What? What does it mean?” Wally turned to Red Hood.
Even with the full-face mask, Wally could tell that he was on the receiving end of a particularly venomous scowl. “Ask the idiot, why don’t you? I’m not a fucking Bird-to-English dictionary, fuckwit.”
“Man, you are mean,” Wally laughed.
“You’re not supposed to sound fond when you say stuff like that,” Red Hood said.
“I dunno, man, it makes me feel part of the family that you talk that way to me,” Wally grinned a bit wider.
“Oh, boy. You have no idea how close to family subsumption you are,” Jason scoffed. “No fucking idea.”
Nightwing did a trio of whistles that Wally mentally ascribed to “hey, hey, hey” – not least because it was how Nightwing, or one of his siblings, called for attention. Wally turned back to him, only to receive the same mildly-familiar, musical birdsong phrase, again.
“My brain is actively melting. Disgusting,” Red Hood grumbled. He turned to leave. “I was just in to drop off some files. I’ll leave you two to continue staring soulfully into each others’ eyes. Fucking losers.”
Nightwing called a chirpy “thanks” after him, still in the musical language he’d been trying to teach Wally for almost a week, by then.
“That’s a thank you,” Wally said.
Nightwing laughed and nodded. “Correct. You’re getting very good at this.”
“I wanna know what the other one meant, though. The one you said to me twice?”
“Not yet,” Nightwing said, He glanced away. Blushing? It was a bit hard to tell, in the clouded moonlight and sparse streetlights, but Wally was… yeah. He was pretty sure Nightwing was blushing. It didn’t phase him to be caught by one of his younger siblings, holding hands with his male best friend, but he was blushing about a translation?
Wally managed to bite back a question about it. He knew pushing tended to meet with the result of Nightwing closing himself off more.
“Okay, not yet. Got it. I gotta level up before I get that information,” Wally shrugged and smiled, to show that he was okay with the withheld information.
Nightwing gave him a small, private smile.
He probably would have given Wally either a new piece of birdsong to learn, or another one to guess, but his comm went off. It wasn’t obvious, but Wally was just close enough to hear the line open and the murmur of a voice in Nightwing’s ear. If there’d been any wind that night, at all, then he wouldn’t have heard any of it.
Nightwing frowned and turned a bit, to show Wally that he was listening to the comm call.
“Gotta go do something?” Wally guessed.
Nightwing sighed and shrugged.
“That’s fine,” Wally said. “Go on. I know it’s just like that sometimes.”
Nightwing smiled at him and tilted his head to one side. “You’re too understanding, sometimes,” he murmured. Then he rolled onto his tiptoes and—
Kissed Wally on the cheek?
Nightwing was gone before Wally had quite processed that.
Was that something they did, now?
Wally raised a hand to his cheek, frowning a little. He… he was okay with it, he supposed. Just a bit surprised. But it was a bit confusing, even if they were good friends. Was he supposed to question it? Or was he supposed to just accept it into their habits like it was just another thing?
He decided on the latter. Nightwing would explain himself if he felt like it, anyway.
But…
He did have to wonder if that was what Red Hood was hinting at, by saying that Wally was close to being subsumed into the family.
He dropped his hand again and looked off in the direction that Nightwing had left in.
–
2.
“You know he wants to wife you, right?”
Wally jumped and swung around to face— “Robin,” he set a hand over his heart. “Why do you all have to do that.” He hated how often the lot of them snuck up on him. At least Nightwing usually revealed himself by a hug from behind. All the other Bats just scared the shit out of Wally and went on with their day.
“Red Robin,” Nightwing’s brother corrected him. “I graduated. Forcibly. So that the Demon could be Robin.”
“Wow, you don’t sound bitter at all,” Wally said, sarcastically.
“I’ve been Red Robin for like two years, now, Wallace. You shouldn’t need to be corrected every single time,” RR crossed his arms and raised his eyebrow. Why the hell did Bat dominoes move like that? It was hella uncanny.
“It’s really close to ‘Robin,’ in my defense,” Wally muttered.
“Yeah, but there’s been five Robins—”
“Five?”
“Spoiler?”
“Dude, that was for like two weeks—”
“Okay, then there’s been four Robins,” RR rolled his eyes. “You should be used to it.”
“I still call N ‘Rob,’” Wally pointed out.
“Right.” RR pinched the bridge of his nose. “You’re hopeless, I keep forgetting. But. Speaking of Rob.” He dropped his hand again and propped both hands on his hips. “He wants to wife you.”
“Wouldn’t it be ‘husbanding,’” Wally asked. The back of his brain was doing an impressive imitation of a dial-up tone as he refused to process what any of that actually meant.
“Bold of you to assume any of us strictly adhere to gender roles, but okay,” RR said. “Are you actually hearing me, though?”
“We’re not, like, dating or anything,” Wally said. “I don’t know what makes you think we are—”
“He’s jumping to the endgame. We all know dating should come first, but he’s so gone on you that he literally shouted B down and rage-quit in the middle of patrol yesterday, because B declined his request to impart his secret ID to you. Again. Do you know how many times he’s asked if he can tell you his ID?”
“No. How many?” the dial-up noise was still going, Wally thought he might be a quarter of the way online, in terms of how much dial-up noise he was in for.
“Too many. It’s been a daily thing for like a month. And it was weekly before that. He’s been trying for permission – being all respectful n’ shit to B’s rules – for the last two years. It’s been for-fucking-ever. I honestly don’t know why he doesn’t just tell you, rules be damned,” Red Robin extended his bo staff, but for the express purpose of leaning his weight on it like a staff.
“Wow,” Wally murmured.
“Yeah, sure. Wow. It’s not like you’re the first person he’s persisted in his requests about. I mean… fuck, it’s been like sixty hours, let me think that through again,” Red Robin let his gaze drift off, vaguely ceiling-ward.”You’re the first person… he’s persisted in making requests for release of information about. To? One of those.”
“Did you say sixty hours? As in… awake?”
“Yeah?”
“Oh my god.”
RR groaned. “No, don’t start. I get enough of that at home.”
“You need a nap!”
“I said ‘don’t start,’ what’s so confusing about that?” RR glared at Wally, though ineffectually given that Wally was noticing how wobbly on his feet he was, and how much blinking he was doing behind his domino.
“Dude, sixty hours?! That’s well beyond the threshold for hallucinations. Are you seeing anything weird? Hearing anything weird?” Wally asked. “Or just, like, stuff that’s not there – weird or not. Or that shouldn’t be there. Any of the above? All of the above?”
“The only thing I’m hearing is a dumbass changing the subject and using selective hearing to avoid having to process that his best friend is down really fucking bad for him,” Red Robin said, narrowing his eyes at Wally. A beat of silence later (because Wally didn’t actually know how to respond to that), RR sighed. “Okay, and The Count counting lightbulbs.”
“What? I mean. What?” Wally asked.
“The Count—”
“Like Sesame Street?!”
“Yeah?”
“I’m pretty sure seeing—”
“Hearing. I don’t see him or anything, I’m not that far gone,” RR interrupted.
“I’m pretty sure hearing a Muppet is a sign that you should be in bed. Sleeping. Are you trying to play out the Nightmare on Elm Street remake or something? Go to bed!”
“He’s only up to, like, fifty-four. I’m sure it’s fine.”
“I don’t see how that makes it more okay, Robin,” Wally said.
“Red Robin, you insufferable brand-safe hedgehog.”
“Um,” Wally blinked at him a few times. He was starting to see why Nightwing wasn’t above drugging his siblings (as sketchy as that was). Clearly Red Robin needed that kind of intervention sometimes.
“You’re right,” RR sighed.
“I am?” Wally straightened.
“You’re not a brand-safe hedgehog. You’re a brand-safe echidna.”
Wally deflated again. Apparently he was right about something he hadn’t actually tried to disagree with. “I was hoping you meant that I was right about you needing a nap. Because I am and I’m also concerned.”
“Jesus fucking Christ – he was Jewish, so I get to say that – you’re not paying attention to the important thing, at all.”
Wally had no idea what RR meant about the Jewish thing, but wasn’t in a position to speak about it, one way or another, so he chose to ignore it. “Actually, I’m pretty sure you’re the one not paying attention to the important thing. Which is that hallucinations are bad and you should be sleeping.”
“Uh, why are they bad?” RR scoffed.
“Because you’re not supposed to have them? You specifically, I mean. You—unless you do experience them even when you’re not sleep deprived. I guess I don’t know enough about you to know exactly what your status quo is?”
RR groaned, head tipped back and everything. “You’re hopeless.”
Wally might have been hopeless, but he knew an impending family emergency when he saw one. Which was why he pulled out his phone and texted Nightwing – rather, texted the number attributed to Nightwing’s gauntlet computer – about Red Robin’s state of sleep deprivation. And hallucinations.
“He wants to bone you. For life. He wants to put a ring on it. He wants to plan a wedding, send out invites, write vows. He wants your fucking babies, Wallace!” Red Robin waved his free hand wildly.
“Uh, um. Yeah. Okay.” Wally gave him a pair of half-hearted thumbs-up. “You still need a nap.”
“I loathe you,” RR hissed.
Wally shrugged. And then Nightwing was popping up beside RR, scowling.
“Oh, you fucking narc,” Red Robin hissed at Wally.
“Sorry, man. I care about you, what can I say?” Wally shrugged.
–
3.
Nightwing held a closed fist out and waited for Wally to offer his hand.
This was a relatively new tradition, but Wally liked it. He offered his own hand, palm-up and open, and waited for Nightwing to drop whatever it was into his hand. The first few times, Wally had expected that it was some kind of prank – that N would drop something gross into his hand and do his quiet, full-bodied laugh. (He was so quiet sometimes. Wally felt vaguely sad about it, but had no idea if he should be. Maybe Nightwing just liked being quiet… but Wally didn’t think so.)
Nightwing dropped a chunk of clear quartz into Wally’s hand.
Wally grinned wide and brought the gift up to his eyeline to look at it. “Thank you,” he grinned past the gift at Nightwing, who almost seemed to preen as he smiled under Wally’s thanks. “Man, I feel like I should be giving you something, as well.”
“I like… giving,” Nightwing shrugged. Then repeated the sentiment – or that’s what Wally thought – but in the birdsong language Nightwing shared with his family.
“Yeah, I know. But I still think it’d be nice. Oh, hey,” Wally dug into his pocket. “I found this cool coin, the other day…” he pulled out said coin and offered it to Nightwing, grinning.
Nightwing laughed, but accepted it. “Very cool,” he said, looking it over, then flipping it over, then looking the other side over, too. “You sure you want to give it away?”
“To you? Sure. You’re worth a million cool coins,” Wally said.
Nightwing blushed. This time, Wally was sure that he was blushing.
Wally wasn’t sure what to do with that.
–
4.
Wally sat there, stunned.
“Well?” Nightwing fidgetted, gaze drifting away from Wally’s.
Gold.
All Wally could think was gold.
“Say something? Please?” N crunched up his domino in his hands, which couldn’t be good for it, uncannily flexible material or no.
“Your eyes are really pretty,” Wally managed.
“Are they?” Nightwing tilted his head to the side, bird-like. Curious.
“So pretty, yeah,” Wally said. “Um. Are you allowed to—?”
“No,” Nightwing laughed once, bitter. “I’ve been told… in no uncertain terms… that I’m not allowed to do this.” His gaze darted away again. “B doesn’t want me to tell you anything.”
“And you’re…”
“Doing it anyway,” Nightwing nodded, not quite meeting his gaze.
“You’re going to get in trouble for that.” Wally scooted forward in his seat, until his knees were knocking against Nightwing’s. He reached out, hesitated for a second, then pushed Nightwing’s long, slightly unruly hair behind his ear. It felt a touch too intimate, even for them, but it drew Nightwing’s gaze back to them and a smile out of him. The worry smoothed away from Nightwing’s brow for a moment.
The look in his eyes was so soft. Gold and luminous and so, so soft.
“I don’t care if I’m in trouble.” Dick said. He took Wally’s hand and brought it up to his own cheek, leaning into Wally’s palm with a smile that somehow went softer. He whistled that sing-song phrase again. The one from before. And he still hadn’t told Wally what it meant.
“Well, I support you doing what you think is right. I mean. If that’s what this is?” Wally said.
“It’s not enough for me to see you in-costume,” Nightwing said. “And I can’t see you out-of-costume, without a disguise, unless I do this.”
“I don’t mind that, you know,” Wally said gently.
“I do.”
“Oh.” Wally said.
“I mean…” Nightwing drew back, frowning a little. “Unless you don’t want that? I don’t have to see you more if you don’t—”
“No! No, no, no. I want more of you. I–I–I mean. Wow,” Wally laughed awkwardly. “I mean I want to, you know, see more of you. See you more! I’m not trying to get you naked! Unless you want that? Oh god, that’s worse.”
Nightwing laughed and settled his cheek back into Wally’s palm, turning his head briefly to set a kiss on Wally’s palm. “I’m relieved.”
“Great, because I’m a little panicked about all the suggestive things I just accidentally said,” Wally laughed awkwardly.
“It was charming,” Nightwing assured him.
“If you say so.”
“I do.”
“I pronounce you man and wife,” Red Robin said, sarcastically, apparently from a vent. Wally could hear him scooching away afterward, but it seemed like Red Robin may have been eavesdropping on the whole conversation.
Nightwing flipped him off – or, rather, flipped the vent cover off – absently, never taking his eyes off Wally. With those gorgeous, gorgeous molten gold eyes framed by unexpectedly long eyelashes.
Wally could easily get lost in those eyes, he was sure.
“Dick,” N said.
Wally blinked a few times. He didn’t feel particularly insulted, but the epithet was a bit unexpected—
“My name,” Nightwing clarified. “Dick Grayson.”
“Oh. Oh!”
Nightwing – Dick – smiled at him again.
“Wow. You, like… willingly go by that?”
Dick shrugged.
–
5.
“It means ‘I love you,’” Robin said.
The newest one, who outright seemed to hate Wally for no reason that Wally could figure out.
Wally turned to him. “What does?”
“Are you dull?” Robin sneered. “The term he keeps using. It means ‘I love you.’”
“This is, like, apropos nothing—”
Robin cut him off with a singsong phrase of birdsong. The one Dick kept using and still refused to translate for Wally, even though Wally was pretty good with the birdsong language, lately. Like, enough to string sentences together, even if those sentences were a bit abrupt and badly composed. He could also translate a lot of what the Bats chirped at each other, which was a thrill for him – being the only person that wasn’t a Bat that was privy to what they said, and all.
Wally tilted his head to the side.
“It means. ‘I love you,’” Robin said, through clenched teeth.
“Oh!” Wally straightened. “Really? That’s so sweet,” Wally grinned. “Why wouldn’t he tell me that?”
Robin eyed him in silent judgement, then turned and swept away.
“Did I say something wrong?” Wally called after him.
“I fear your idiocy may be catching,” Robin returned.
“Wow, harsh,” Wally muttered to himself.
–
+1a.
“No!” Wally zipped forward. He was still too late, his reach a bit too short. “Shit! No!” He gripped the railing, tight enough that he could feel the hollow metal give a bit under his fingers.
It was as if in slow motion that he saw Dick falling.
Falling.
Like his parents.
Wally was about to zip to the ground, ready to catch him and carry him until the momentum that would have killed him was bled off, but he couldn’t. It wasn’t that he suddenly couldn’t make himself move, it was that the bad guy of the minute had a meta dampening field and he’d only just caught Wally in the field’s radius, the moment that Wally would have run.
“Fuck!” Wally couldn’t reach the Speed Force.
Dick hit the ground and lay still.
“Fuck,” Wally fell to his knees, hands still on the metal railing.
It was too mundane.
Too little. Too everyday. Too terrestrial.
They’d fought aliens and metas and AIs. Surely it wasn’t mere gravity that would take Nightwing. It didn’t make sense.
Even worse – as if all that wasn’t bad enough – the last of the puzzle pieces snapped in place and Wally realized, just as he lost everything, that Dick was all he wanted. Which would have been a hilarious double entendre if it weren’t so fucking depressing.
“Shit, no,” he muttered.
The other capes took care of the villain-of-the-week.
Someone put a hand on Wally’s shoulder.
Wally flinched away. “I love him,” he muttered.
“Yeah, no fucking shit,” Artemis scoffed, albeit thickly. She knelt next to Wally and wrapped him in a hug. “There may be something that can be done for him, you shouldn’t—”
Wally shook her off. “Do you see how high up we are?” he asked.
“Wally—”
Wally knocked his forehead against the railing. “He’s gone. Don’t try to give me empty platitudes. I–I know it’s a risk, in this job, b—but…” he swallowed thickly. It was starting to set in.
“Wally!” Artemis kicked him in the hip. “He stood up.”
“What?” Wally startled back from the bar and looked down.
Dick was standing there, dusting himself off. When he noticed the eyes on him, he met their gazes and offered a thumbs-up, then set about untying his half-undone ponytail and doing it up in a lazy bun, higher on his head, instead.
“What?” Wally repeated. Awe and relief and utter puzzlement warred inside him.
Dick wiped a line of black from under his nose and the corner of his mouth.
“I don’t know what to tell you,” Artemis muttered.
“How are you still alive?!” Superboy called, from further up the half-constructed apartment building.
Dick glanced up at Superboy, higher than Wally and Artemis, and tilted his head to the side in confusion. He was only half-done tying his hair up, and seemed to find something in his hair that caused him to make a face and distracted him from Conner’s question. He withdrew his hand and looked at the smears of black across the blue palm of his glove.
“He just does that,” Wally distantly heard Red Robin say.
“Just does that?!” Superboy demanded.
“Yeah?”
“What the fuck,” Artemis muttered under her breath.
Wally stood up, slowly. His legs dicdn’t quite feel like they wanted to hold up his weight. “He’s alive,” he said. Tears, suddenly and unexpectedly, poured over as the relief flooded his system, trying to drown the despair that he was only just starting to feel. The mix of emotions sucked.
“How are you alive?!” Artemis called down. “You didn’t fucking answer!”
Dick shrugged, like he was confused as to why they were confused.
–
+1b.
“I’m fine,” Dick brushed off the infirmary doctor again.
Wally was holding his hand like he’d drift away if he let go. Or like Dick would disappear into the ether if he let go.
“You shouldn’t be!” the doctor said. “You should be very dead. Or at least extremely injured. You obviously hit the back of your head, there’s a bunch of… incredibly weirdly dark blood matted into your hair. You should have cracked your skull clean open.”
Wally really didn’t like the mental imagery of that.
“Thanks, that’s a gross thought,” Dick sighed. “But I’m fine.”
“You should be in a full-body cast, at the very least!” the doctor’s voice rose to an unexpectedly high register.
“I’m still fine,” Dick said. “You don’t do this to Superboy—”
“Superboy! Is half-Kryptonian!” the doctor said.
Wally snorted.
“Wow, that’s almost dog-whistle pitch,” Dick said, though he took a moment to also glare at Wally, in mild betrayal. He turned back to the doctor. “I’m actually really impressed.”
“There’s no reason for you to be conscious! At all! Much less standing!”
“Is the whole ‘undead’ thing not in my medical file or something?” Dick asked.
The doctor got very quiet.
Wally got very still.
“No?” Dick frowned from the doctor to Wally.
“I’m going to need you to explain that,” the doctor muttered.
Wally agreed, but couldn’t quite convince his mouth to voice it.
“I mean. Undead. It’s self-explanatory.”
“No, it’s not,” the doctor said, eerily calm after the sheer volume of his previous shouting.
“Have you heard of, um, Talons?” Dick asked.
The doctor was, once more, very quiet.
Wally was, also once more, very still. Wally didn’t know exactly what the doctor knew, but he suddenly thought he understood why Dick had told him about Talons, and why he hadn’t been able to meet Wally’s eyes for the entirety of that conversation.
“Oh,” Wally breathed. It felt like his heart decided to start beating again and his uncanny stillness dissolved under understanding.
“They’re from Gotham—I mean, I guess… we’re from Gotham?” Dick tilted his head slowly to one side. “Are you okay?”
“No,” the doctor said, calmly.
“Oh. Um. Sorry?”
The doctor nodded absently. “Okay, I’m going to check your lungs for liquid and do one more concussion test, then I’ll let you go. I’ll have my freak-out afterwards, then I’ll go shout at Batman for your incomplete medical file.”
“Shout at Batman?” Dick asked, straightening.
“It won’t be the first time, not the last,” the doctor said darkly.
“Oh,” Dick said.
“Wow,” Wally breathed.
“He may be ‘The Batman,’ but he’s also an idiot,” the doctor sniffed. “I used to work under Dr. Leslie Thompkins, at her clinic. I know just how fucking stupid he can be.”
Dick snorted, then leaned back, against Wally.
–
+1c.
“I almost lost you,” Wally said.
“No, you didn’t,” Dick insisted.
“But I thought I did,” Wally said.
Dick sighed. “I’m sorry,” he said.
“I love you,” Wally said.
Dick hesitated. “I love you, too?”
“I mean it,” Wally raised his head to look Dick in the eye. “I love you. As a friend, sure. As family, even. But… but in other ways, too? I think. And I almost didn’t get a chance to tell you that.”
“It was always going to be fine,” Dick said weakly.
Wally gripped Dick’s hands harder. “I didn’t know that,” he said softly.
Dick sighed and sat next to Wally, instead of standing in front of him. “I’m sorry I did that to you, Wally,” he said.
“I almost didn’t get to tell you that I love you,” Wally reiterated, bolstered by courage he was pulling out of nowhere. Or bullshitting, which is a bit like pulling things out of nowhere. “I almost didn’t get a chance at-at kissing you. Or taking you out. Or rounding the bases—”
“Rounding the bases?” Dick smiled a little.
“I’ve never given a blowjob before, but oh my god am I willing to learn,” Wally glanced down, then snapped his gaze back up on Dick’s face. “I mean. Wow, that was too much, sorry—”
Dick shifted, crossing his legs and snickering. “It’s fine. Unexpected but, uh. Fine.”
“Okay, good. Cool, cool, cool. Yeah.” Wally swallowed and glanced away. “I want to try to, you know. Be together. I want you. I don’t want to risk life and limb, again, without at least trying out, you know, us. And everything that might entail.”
“Sounds like it, yeah,” Dick said, leaning in. “We could start with a kiss?” he said.
Wally turned to him and, in a shock of adrenaline and impulse (but not Bart-impulse, just impulse-impulse), Wally leaned in and kissed Dick. It was too fast, but at least it was a human “too fast” and not a speedster “too fast.”
It was chaste and quick and Wally could immediately – in a flash (hah!) – see the entirety of a beautiful future spreading out before him. He could hear wedding bells, feel adoption papers, smell burnt toast, see the latest in a long line of apartments as they hunted for the perfect home, and taste a million kisses.
Dick turned and threw a leg over Wally’s lap, straddling him, and cupped Wally’s face in both his hands.
“Marry me,” Wally breathed between them.
“One step at a time,” Dick laughed. “But yes. It’ll always be you. It’s always been you, already.” Then he leaned in and kissed Wally softly. And then a bit less soft. And then thoroughly in a way that stole Wally’s breath and seared itself to his soul.
Wally set his hands on Dick’s hips and—
“This is the common room, oh my god!” Artemis squeaked.
Dick reluctantly pulled back from Wally. “You’re going to get uninvited to our wedding,” Dick joked, but he didn’t remove his eyes from Wally’s gaze, or his hands from Wally’s face, in spite of his words being directed at Artemis.
“Are you two getting married?” Conner asked. “Are they getting married, Red Robin?! Why didn’t you tell me?”
“Yeah, man,” Cassie popped in, “You’re supposed to keep us apprised!”
“This is new to me, too!” Red Robin – Tim, Wally now knew – complained.
Wally sighed. It seemed like the whole Team was migrating to the common room, then. “Not yet,” he said.
“But one of you proposed?” Artemis asked.
“Not on purpose,” Dick said.
“Oh, no, it was on purpose,” Wally said. “It was just premature.”
Dick tilted his head back and laughed. For once, it wasn’t the quiet laugh he usually gave.