#bfw2018

LIVE

BatFam Week Theme: Vacation

“Ugh, I need a vacation after this,” Dick huffed.

“You all need vacations, but you never take one,” Babs pointed out. “The only time any of you leave the city is to go fight aliens in outer space.”

“That’s not fair. Sometimes B has business overseas.”

“Still not a vacation, Nightwing.”

Dick opened his mouth to argue, but shuddered instead, breath catching in the back of his throat.

“’Wing?” Babs asked, voice sharp. “You stay with me. They’re on their way, but you have to stay with me until they get there.”

“Y-Yeah.” The word was thready, shaky, like the wiggling feedback of a polygraph machine. Dick cleared his throat and tried again, clenching his teeth to keep his voice steady. “Yeah, of course. You know me, O. Why leave w-when I can make the party come to me, right?”

“Keep moving as best you can,” Babs coaxed.

If Dick closed his eyes, he could see her hunched over her keyboard, fingers flying as she guided the rest of the team to him, eyes fixed on her screen as if she could see through it straight to him. Though really, it didn’t matter if he closed his eyes or not, since he didn’t have so much as a glimmer of light to see by.

“I’ll start hopping again in a s-second,” Dick promised. “Just let me c-catch my breath.”

“Night—”

“Something in m-my leg is broken,” Dick cut her off. He sucked in another steadying breath, trying to keep his voice light even through clenched teeth. The bone-wracking shivers and the pain were making it hard to keep his voice steady. He had to keep it steady. For Babs. “I can’t put a-any weight on it. And even if I could hop around for m-more than a minute, there’s nowhere t’ g-go. I can’t see. I’m in a f-freezer the size of a walk-in closet. N-Not rich people walk-in, either.”

He leaned his head back against freezer wall and winced as the frost settled in his hair. “I n-need to catch my breath,” Dick repeated softly. But she was right. He needed to stay alert. “Talk to me?”

“About what?” Babs’s response was immediate, unhesitating. Good ol’ Babs.

For a moment, Dick’s mind was blank. He blinked against the darkness, making the squiggling flashes of phantom lights in his eyes dance. God, he was so tired.

He rallied. “V-Vacation. Where sh-should we go?”

“We?”

Dick, to his own delight, managed a chuckle. “S-Sure. You th-think we’re bad? W-When was the last time y-you left that tower, O? A-At least I leave the h-house every now and th-then.”

He sighed, thinking of Babs high above Gotham, locked in a dark room and lit by the glow of screens on all sides. “Rapunzel, R-Rapunzel, let d-down your hair.”

Dick didn’t realize he had breathed out that last thought until Babs snorted in his ear.

“Sure. A vacation sounds nice.” Her voice was warm and eased down his throat like a cup of Alfred’s honey tea. “Someplace far from Gotham. Out of the country. Preferably not reachable by phone, I think.”

“S-S-Someplace warm,” Dick added. His smile glinted in the dark as he was rewarded with a laugh from Babs.

“Definitely. Someplace warm.”

“A b-beach.” Dick was getting into the fantasy now. He kept his eyes closed, his busted leg stretched out against the ice-slicked floor, and tried to picture the perfect place. “Somep-place remote. Not deserted. B-But quiet. N-No crowds. Clear w-w-water. Warm s-sand. You in a-a-a bikini.”

Sun on his face, on his chest, on his hands. Wind in his hair. The scent of salt spray and coconut sunscreen in the air. If he concentrated hard enough, Dick could pretend he was there. The pain in his hands dulled, receded. He sighed again.

“Sand and wheelchairs don’t mix,” Babs was saying, warm laughter still rippling in her voice. “And my bikini days are long gone.”

“You’d l-look good in a poncho to me.” Dick was crossing a line somewhere, he knew. He and Babs weren’t… what they were wasn’t what they had been. He knew that. But keeping the words in his head was like trying to hold onto fistfuls of sand. They would slip and stream out before he could stop them.

Dick rubbed a hand against his chest, trying to push the pain out of a body that felt as tight and as brittle as an old rubber band. His breathing was too loud. He needed to keep Babs away from her worry and away from his careless words. She’d said something about… about… sand. Yeah. Sand and her wheels.

“W-We’ll hire a… a…” Dick shifted against the unyielding floor and gasped as pain shot bright as a lightning bolt up his nearly numbed leg.

“Dick?” Babs’s voice was hot and needling with concern, but it sounded further away. Easier to ignore. Dick knew he shouldn’t, but he couldn’t remember why exactly.

“One ‘those chairs,” he breathed, waiting until the pain pulled back again and left his body feeling numb and empty once more. “W’ll hire g-guys t’lift it. Y’ll b-b-be a… princess.”

God, he was so tired. Dick wanted to sleep. He wanted it more than anything in the entire world. But Babs kept saying his name. Why wouldn’t she let him sleep?

Blurry visions of an empty beach shimmered in his head again, and he felt a heat spread through his body. It was too much, too hot. Dick whined low in his throat and tugged at the neck of his suit with clumsy, unbending fingers. After a few seconds of struggling, he tired himself out and let his hand fall back into his lap.

Babs was still talking, he realized. She sounded upset. He didn’t like Babs upset. “B’s almost there, Nightwing. You stay with me. You promised you’d stay with me.”

“S’kay,” Dick whispered. His teeth had stopped chattering, but he hadn’t noticed. “S’kay, Babs. ‘m j’s g’na sleep f’r bit.”

Babs was yelling now, but that was okay. He didn’t mind. It wouldn’t keep him awake.

A/N: Now on AO3 if you feel moved to give some love: https://archiveofourown. org/works/15476685