This part one of the fic! I've posted some background information it might be helpful to know before reading. Enjoy!
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There are three sharp knocks on the door.
“Come in.” Bruce calls without looking up from his paperwork. The door to his office in the Manor opens then closes.
“Father, do you have a minute? I have an urgent matter we need to discuss.”
Ah, Damian. Bruce frowns as he looks up to where his youngest stands stiffly on the other side of his desk. “Of course Damian. Is everything alright?”
Damian has his hands clasped behind his back, his eyebrows furrowed in concentration. His eyes are cast downwards, which isn’t unusual for Damian but causes Bruce to tense all the same. He gets out of his office chair and rounds the desk towards his son. Damian jerks his head towards the small seating area in the corner of the office and Bruce takes the cue to sit on the sofa. He gestures for Damian to take a seat beside him, but he chooses to remain standing behind the coffee table.
“Damian – “
“I have a twin sister.” Bruce’s brain takes a mini vacation after his son’s interruption.
“what….” The word rushes out of him.
Damian looks at him directly in the eye this time and says with utmost confidence “I have a twin sister.”
“I…You’ve never… I – what!?” Bruce stares at his son, searching his face for…something. A twin sister!? He has another biological child? A girl. That he never knew about. Who presumably also grew up in the league. With Damian. And he didn’t know! What the –
He takes a deep breath in and runs his hands down his face. Focus. What is most important right now?
“You’ve never mentioned a twin sister before.” Close enough. Surely if Damian had a sister in the league, she would’ve been sent to Gotham with Damian.
Damian breaks his gaze to stare out the window.
“Tt. Initially, I did not think you deserved to know of her.” Bruce frowns again. He would’ve helped to get her out of the League if only Damian had asked. Unless they didn’t get along well. He’s broken from his thought as Damian continues, his voice quieter. “I kept it a secret because I realised you did not deserve to lose another child before you even had a chance to get to know her.”
Bruce’s eyes snap back up to his son. Oh…
“Damian….” He trails off, unsure what to say next.
Damian evidently does not have the same problem as he returns his fathers gaze with a hardened resolve. “Two months before I arrived in Gotham, she was sent on a mission. She didn’t check in on time, so Grandfather sent some of his assassins to find her.” He clenches his jaw. “They reported that she had been killed and had the photographic evidence to prove it.”
There is no emotion in those last words.
It’s like he’s giving a post-patrol report, not recounting the instance of his twin’s death.
His twin. Who is …. dead.
Bruce slowly gets to his feet to avoid startling the boy – because he is just a boy – and pulls him into his chest.
“I’m so sorry Damian.” Bruce whispers.
Damian lightly grasps his father’s shirt and rubs his fingers along the hem while Bruce cradles the back of his head. The two stand there for a while, soaking in each other’s presence.
Damian pushes out of the hold. He turns away from his father, trying to subtlety wipe a tear from his cheek.
“Tt. It doesn’t matter now.” Damian sniffs.
No. No no. Damian will not inherit his inability to process emotions. Bruce places a hand on Damian’s shoulder to turn him around and talk about this … this … revelation.
“Damian –”. He starts with a firm voice but is interrupted when Damian shakes his hand off and violently spins around to scream at him.
“No Father! It does not matter because she survived!”
Bruce’s mouth falls open in shock. His eyes find Damian’s as they start to glisten.
“I found her. Well, no. She found me. Five months ago. And I ran all the tests and it’s definitely her and she’s alive and I couldn’t believe it so I ran more and –”
Damian is throwing his hands all over the place as his words turn into giddy hysterics. Bruce loves the fact his son is able to display his joy and childlikeness so freely nowadays, but he won’t get any useful information if Damian continues like this.
“Woah, woah Damian slow down. Breathe for me for a second, ok?” Bruce catches his hands, ensuring his grip is light so Damian can pull away if he wants to. He squeezes each hand intermittently to try and help Damian focus his thoughts. And maybe to can focus his own.
Damian stares at their interlocking hands for a second before giving Bruce a quick nod.
“You said you found each other. Five months ago.” Bruce clarifies as he lets go. “Can you expand on that?”
How did they find each other? Five months is a long time. Why didn’t Damian tell him sooner? Is she in trouble? Hurt? Is she with the League? Has she been with them this whole time?
Damian glances up at him. He takes a deep breath then begins his explanation.
“She’s been hiding from the League. It’s…complicated. Well not really, but that’s her story to tell. Not me. When I found her, she believed that if we told you there would be a higher chance of the League finding out she is alive and then she’d be dragged back or they’d kill her again or something worse…” He trailed off, his shoulders dropped, and his eyes gained a haunted look. Bruce was about to reach out, say something, when Damian pushed his shoulders up and back and stared directly into Bruce’s eyes without a hint of the previous emotion.
“At first I agreed, but then I realised that the very thing she feared might destroy the life she made for herself would in fact make it so much better. It took three months, but I finally convinced her that being part of this family was worth the risk. And that you lot knowing about her would actually be more help in protecting her life than letting her brave it alone.”
Bruce is so proud of him. He pushes down a watery smile before remembering he was trying to set a good example for his son. He let the corner of his mouth tick up and his eyes to crinkle, then places a hand on Damian’s cheek.
“Thank you, Damian.” He whispers as he strokes his cheekbone. Damian’s eyes widen before he looks down and leans into the touch.
“I wanted you to know first.” Damian admits quietly. Then he pushes Bruce’s hand away and says in a voice full of venom. “But know if you mess this up, I will never forgive you. The only reason I voted not to tell Todd of her return first is because he pissed me off last week.”
“Language.”
The half-hearted reprimand is followed by two realizations. Jason met Damian in the League. Jason knew his daughter. He must’ve done. And he doesn’t know her name. He hasn’t asked for the name of his daughter. He calls himself a father. Well, only one of those issues can be solved right now.
“Damian what is her name? Can I meet her?”
The little frown almost stops Bruce’s heart for a second. Does she not want to see him? Wait no. Damian just said he had convinced her to do the opposite. Damian withdraws his phone from his pocket and unlocks it.
“Actually, we agreed we would do this together.” He says scrolling through a text chain.
Did his daughter chicken out? Or did she do research on him and decide that he in fact was not a suitable father.
“But we also said we’d tell you at 4 o’clock today so when she didn’t show up, I decided to just get on with it myself. I assume she’s just running late –”
The door behind them flies open with a bang.
Both vigilantes whirl round, ready to face the intruder. In shoots a teenaged girl with blue-black hair and wide, bluebell eyes. His mother’s eyes.
“I MADE IT!” She shouts.
Said girl immediately trips over nothing and faceplants onto the hardwood floors.
Bruce jerks forward with a wince.
Damian simply relaxes from his pose and turns back to his father. “Tt. Perhaps I should have mentioned she is a walking disaster.”
A soft groan emanates from the floor while Bruce stares open-mouthed between the two children. His two children. A headache is already forming behind his eyes.
I spent waaaaaaaay too much time on him, and might make another because he's not perfect to me, and I was hoping to send him to a friend.
I got sick of seeing absolutely nothing when it came to Ford merchandise, and my bff has made me warm up to him over the last few years, and I'm glad I made him. A few nights the last few days, he was helping me cope with issues, and I dove into this so much, I would forget why I was upset.
But, to my Ford friends, I hope I brought a little justice to him. If I love Stan, loving him comes naturally now too, because he's a good egg.
