Ra's al Ghul, caught in a rare moment of weakness, is being pulled apart piece by piece.
A pair of mad scientists, just the kind of deranged he would hire normally, had built weapons that were...far more effective on him than he'd anticipated. Also, he hadn't been there to fight them at all. They were a true unknown, coming out of nowhere equipped to deal with the Demon Head himself.
Ironically, from what they had started shouting, he wasn't who they were hunting.
He'd been knocked unconscious by what could only be described as pure dumb luck.
He woke up strapped to a table, as those selfsame scientists started peeling him apart with scalpels.
His torture is interrupted when a young boy walks into the basement, sees what his torturers are doing to him, and screams.
Then the boy pivots, and off the top of his head, creates a distraction to pull his parents away from trying to see how Ra's works.
It's admirable; someone so untrained able to think so quickly. It's clumsy; the equivalent of a child pointing at something and screaming as a distraction.
It's just what was required for the boy to remove his restraints and hand him...a vial of the purest Lazarus Water he's ever seen.
"You're already like, really liminal, so it shouldn't kill you, just heal you. But you need to drink it fast, before they come back!"
And like that, it clicks.
The mad scientists are hunting someone as 'liminal' as him. Their son's eyes are glowing green.
Normally, Ra's would drink the Lazarus Waters and slaughter the scientists and anyone they were allied with.
But.
This is a debt.
He'd been waiting for the two scientists to leave so he could free himself, but this boy had stepped in.
Now he owes the child.
He can tell just by looking at the boy that killing his parents is not going to be considered paying back the debt.
However.
This boy is in clear and present danger with those two lunatics about.
So.
As the adult, is it not Ra's responsibility to make sure the boy is safe, whether he wants it or not?
Instead of killing the scientist parents, he knocks the boy unconscious and takes him to Nanda Parbat.
After all, there is nowhere safer than under the Demon Head's protection.
Just to be sure, he adopts the boy as his grandchild.
Now nobody will dare to touch the little hero.
~~~~~~
Danny wakes up in an assassin compound so soaked in Ectoplasm that he can't phase through it, and the ectoplasm in question is so contaminated that it's making him sick, so he can't punch or blast through it either.
He's trapped in a gilded cage by a madman who's insisting that it's all "for Daniel's own good", and his only chance at escaping is telling the little kid, Damian, stories about Amity. Stories about his friends and family.
Stories that he can't make obvious are cries for help, but entertaining enough for a kid to pay attention to.
Stories that will, hopefully, make it to the kid's father.
Who is, apparently, the Goddamn Batman.
Somewhere along the way, the kid starts calling them brothers. It sounds like the kid believes it with his whole heart.
And Danny...Danny's too selfish to correct it.
He lets Damian believe that Danny is his older brother by blood.
~~~~~~
Damian has an older brother, hidden away in Nanda Parbat, who is sickly and weak, and to whom the Demon Head himself is indebted.
Damian has always thought that Danyal was in the best place for him; away from the unnamed hunters that Grandfather said stalked him outside of the compound.
Recently, though, Damian is. Rethinking this.
Why was Danyal so sickly? Why did he always look so sad and desperate?
Perhaps it is time to tell father of his sickly older brother who physically could never meet Grandfather and Mother's standards to meet the Bat.
I tried drawing Danny with dead mom hair style. No colors though
Sorry if it doesn't look good
Ancients, how long has he been stuck here? He lost track somewhere around the eighteen month mark, and that feels like it was a while ago. But it was the last mark he could remember. So even as his hair grows longer and he trains more and more with the assassins that run this place and gains more scars, one of which costing him his left eye, he tells himself it's just been eighteen months.
He's too weak in this place to keep up with the standards the assassins try and hold him to, though the madman that brought him here won't let them hurt him too badly. What made it worse was that, when he'd lost his eye, he'd been taken to a pool of contaminated ectoplasm and dunked in it.
It hadn't saved his eye. It had just made him weaker.
He couldn't go ghost, couldn't heal, or fly, or anything he used to be able to do. He almost felt completely human again, save for the constant ache of his core at being around so much contaminated ecto. It reminded him that he was far closer to the dead than the living.
The only upsides to his days were the letters he'd get from Damian every so often. He talked about his father ("our father," he said in the letters), of the training he was receiving. Of how his father cared for him in ways the assassins had not, and how he didn't care in the ways the assassins had.
Damian talked about the rouges he fought, calling them Joker and Scarecrow and Two Face and the like. It reminded Danny of when he'd been Phantom, when he'd been home in Amity.
He loved living through Damian's letters.
His little brother (he couldn't bring himself to think of Damian any other way, after all this time), spoke of other siblings. Adopted by his father over the years. Victims of tragedy, or neglect, wanting more than anything to make a difference, change the world so that no one was hurt like they were. And if not the world, then just that one city.
The only name of them that he recognized was Todd. He'd been at the compound during Danny's stay, but they'd never seen each other. Danny had only heard of his training, how well he was doing. Apparently he and Damian had known each other during their time here, and were still close in Gotham.
Danny was glad he had people to talk to out there.
But his most recent letter was concerning. It left Danny tossing and turning in his cot for days.
Damian had told his father, had told the Batman, about him.
Of how he was sick.
Of how he was weak.
Those did not bother Danny. They were true statements, after all. He'd forgotten the feeling of strength that came with being healthy, let alone what it felt like to float weightless in the air, looking at the stars. Oh, how he missed the stars.
No, what worried him was that the Bat was coming. He was coming for Danny. He hoped it would be to sneak him out, somehow. He knew it was a foolish hope, no one could manage to sneak into Nanda Parbat let alone back out again.
~~~~~~
It irked Bruce to no end that Damian had convinced him that he'd be a necessary part of the rescue operation. But he didn't know precisely where Daniel was being kept like Damian did, nor would he be a truly comforting presence like his youngest would. No, he needed Damian here. Which was terrifying because he was flying them both back to where the boy had been raised and trained.
What if the League saw him coming? What if he fell and Damian was left stranded in that place? Worse, what if he made it out and Damian didn't?
He shoved those thoughts to the back of his mind as they arrived, landing the plane out of direct sight of the compound and opting to sneak it. It would be better if he managed to get his son out without attracting the attention of hundreds of trained assassins.
He allowed Damian to lead the way once they got inside, running silently through stone halls and going deeper into the compound. Daniel was close to the center, a place Damian seemed to think was a high honor.
It was close to Ra's, which meant it would be well guarded. An easy way to keep a prisoner from wandering about while convincing them that they were an honored guest.
The door they finally arrived at was ornate, decorated with white and green designs. There was an air of staleness around it, as if the sickness of the room's inhabitant had spread to the hall outside. The whole compound was silent, but here it was even more so, the kind of silence that left your ears ringing, searching for some kind of input that must be there because nothing natural was this quiet.
Damian opened the door to a dark room, a figure curled up on the bed beneath plush blankets. A desk sat in one corner, covered in sketches of people that Bruce couldn't make out. Next to the bed was a cane.
"Brother. Daniel, wake up," Damian whispered, nudging the figure on the bed. There was a groan and a shifting of blankets and...
God, what had they done to him?
Danny's face was scarred on his left side. Not from blades or poisons, but electricity. Lichtenberg scars traced around his left eye and down his neck, and Bruce saw the way the scars trailed down to his hands as he reached for his brother.
"Dami, Akhi, is that you?"
"Yes, Daniel. I'm here. And I brought Father with me." Bruce did his best to hide his horror and outrage as his son, who he hadn't known existed three weeks ago, turned to him. His left eye was clouded over, a faint scar in comparison to the electrical ones crossing over it and making clear what had happened to him.
"Oh, he-" whatever Daniel was going to say was cut off by a coughing fit strong enough that he doubled over. Bruce was there in a moment, steadying his son as he tried to regain his breath over the next few minutes.
"It's nice to meet you. Damian's told me a lot about... about you, and what you do. But... why are you here?" he said between gasped breaths. Whatever illness Daniel had, it was a wonder he'd lasted this long in the League. They were not known to tolerate weakness.
"To get you out of here. You're sick, Daniel, and you need proper medical care and a better environment than this to recover." Daniel just nodded, moving to pull himself out of bed. He grabbed the cane, pulling himself to stand and moving to gather the sketches on his desk.
"Okay. If you think you can get me out of here then... then I'll go with you."
They made their way out, much more slowly this time to keep Daniel from pushing himself. Every step seemed like it exhausted him, and when they paused to let him catch his breath Bruce couldn't help but notice the way he winced when he moved. Eventually he offered to carry him, which Daniel seemed grateful to take him up on.
They managed to make it to the jet before alarms were raised, thankfully. Now they just needed to get home. Then Bruce could work on getting his son the help he needed. Damian was chatting to his older brother, filling him in on his life since coming to Wayne manor, what it was like to be Robin, the menagerie of pets he'd collected, and of course what his siblings were like.
"Richard will likely be the most annoying about meeting you. Cassandra and Brown will be much more restrained in their enthusiasm. Todd and Drake will likely try to interrogate you for some reason or another, but it is simply to ensure you are of no threat to the family. Thomas will meet you later, as he patrols during the day."
"They sound like a... a fun bunch. I can't wait to meet them."
"They're all quite excited to meet you too, Daniel. I promise, they aren't as bad as Dami makes them out to be," Bruce said.
"Please, call me Danny." Bruce looked over his shoulder at his sons. Damian was clinging to Danny's hand and sitting as close to him as possible. Danny, for his part, looked exhausted, but was trying to smile nonetheless.
"Of course. Now, you should get some rest. It's a long flight back to Gotham, and you could definitely use the sleep."
Danny nodded, squeezing Damian's hands before closing his eyes and letting his head rest against the seat. It wasn't long before he was out, and Damian followed not long after.
Going a little bit back, but what if Danny was Tim's twin that the drakes gave away at birth cause they only needed one heir. That would definitely increase Ra's obsession over both of the boys. Perhaps Ra's would boast about Danny like a trophy that he won.
Once Damian makes the connection between Tim and Danny, it may haunt or fuel Damian's drive to save Danny. Like there is a healthy version of my brother. If he can be healthy then so can mine. I must bring him here. He'd definitely get better here cause there's a healthy version of him. Or allow Damian to give Danny the experience he once told to a younger Damian, back when they were in the LOA together.
Tim on the other hand would freeze. All of those only years he spent alone, yearning for acknowledgement. That could have all been prevented had his parents not decided they only wanted one child. He could have grown up with a brother.
Damian slammed into Tim's room.
This was unusual for multiple reasons; first, Damian usually tried to be quieter when entering someone else's domain. Second, Tim did not live in Wayne Manor, and on top of that was currently in a safehouse.
That no one was supposed to know about.
"Uhhh..." Tim said, trying to find out what to say at the same time as what to do.
But Damian did not appear to be out for blood.
"Drake."
"No, that was a very badly thought out hero name, I don't use it anymo-"
"Timothy."
Tim froze.
Oh no.
Oh shit.
"Who died?" Tim hissed, launching to his feet.
"No one, I....are you well?" Damian said haltingly, eyes searching Tim for...something.
"What, like physically or mentally? One of those has a lot of different answers." Tim tried to joke, buying time while he tried to figure out what the hell was going on.
"Physically. Do you suffer from routine sickness? Did your parents seek out a cure for a rare disease when you were younger?" Damian asked, getting more and more intense as he walked further into the room, circling Tim and inspecting him.
"Uhh...I had the Clench? Other than that, no. What's-"
"Are you prone to sickness in general? A weak immune system, perhaps?"
"I...well, I don't have a spleen, but I've never really been prone to getting sick. Damian what is going on?"
But Damian stilled, barely breathing.
"You do not have a spleen and I have never seen you ill."
"I take pretty good care of myself, actually? I'm on top of it."
"Then it is not an illness, and is instead a shackle."
Tim blinked, still lost but starting to put some pieces together.
"Wait, is there like, a clone of me trapped somewhere?"
"I must leave; I need to tell father."
"Damian, wait!"
Tim took too long to grab for Damian, and Damian was long gone by the time he managed to stumble out of the safehouse.
Oh no, poor Damian. Just that one realization.
“It’s not an illness.”
Damian remembers how his brother used to be able to walk around. He used to keep up in training, in fact he was Damian's primary instructor. And if he really concentrates, he can faintly remember nights before Danny was forbidden from seeing Damian at night and before guards were posted outside his door. Of nights pressed to a larger man’s chest as he rushes through the halls of Nanda Parbat. Of a calm voice telling him to be quiet as they snuck around and attempted to climb walls….almost as if….they were trying to get away from something.
“It’s not an Illness.”
Damian remembers how his brother would slowly get weaker over the years. Soon he couldn’t spar for as long or needed more breaks. Then he wasn’t as fast and his reflexes dulled. He eventually stopped sparring at all. Danny just remained on the side and shouted pointers to Damain, then his visits from his quarters grew limited until he couldn’t leave his room at all and Damian had to come to him in his final year at the League Base.
“It’s not an illness.”
Domain always wondered why his brother was so wary of Ra’s when the man would only sing his praises. Surly it couldn’t be fear of being cast aside or failing. Danny didn’t even go on missions. (Why wasn’t he allowed on missions. Why had he never seen Danny leave the base?) He knew his brother was skilled. Danny absolutely refused to allow Damian to participate in the rituals taking place at the Lazarus pits. Something about him being too young? Is that what his mother said when he asked her? Damian can’t remember. It was one of the few times his brother actually fought fellow league members for that right. (One of the few times Damian saw a glimpse of the man who saved the demon head’s life.) Damian only ever caught a glimpse of the pits, once during Todd’s resurrection. Even then he didn’t stay long. Danny was always protective like that. But why
Like why his brother would always check Damian’s food before letting him eat. Or always made sure he was the one doing medical on Damain’s wounds.
Damian felt sick as those memories he always thought of sweetly as just his brother fussing over him now had a potentially darker meaning,
Damian knew Danny and Ra’s often had private chats together in the center of Nanda Parabat. Where the heart of the biggest Lazarus pits were located. The most honorable place. He always thought Danny seemed just a little more tired after those talks alone. A little more pale. His eye bags just slightly darker. But he always assumed that was because talks with the demon head were draining and he obviously didn’t enjoy them. But then again…why was he so reluctant when they should have been a great honor? (Why could Danny never refuse them? Wasn't he an honored guest?)
Oh god. All this time.
It wasn’t an illness.
His brother was poisoned.
