Anon asked: 6. "You can't die. Please don't die." Dick and Damian (preferably with Dick hurt!)

It's been a couple weeks since I got this, but I hope I did it justice!

"Get Red Robin and meet back here in ten."

"No."

"Comms are down, and someone need to get him."

"No."

"Robin—"

"I'm not leaving you here by yourself," Damian hissed as he jumped over the bat that swung towards him. All without looking at his opponent. Dick was impressed, and he would probably tell Damian that if they weren't in the middle of a fight.

Dick ducked under his own opponent's swing, barely missing getting brained by the butt of the guy's gun. Taking a deep breath, Dick relaxed his shoulders and pushed into the man's space in an instance, taking the man off guard. Dick managed to get in a few hits, one sinking into the guy's stomach before Dick knocked him out with an elbow.

"I'll be fine," Dick told Damian as Damian knocked out Mr. Baseball Bat. When Damian turned and scowled at him, Dick just sighed. Sometimes getting this kid to do something was like pulling teeth, especially if it had anything to do with Tim. "Look, I can hold the area here, and the longer you wait to go get him, the longer it's going to take to leave."

And Dick was really looking forward to leaving.

They'd gotten a distress call from Tim two hours ago, and they'd gotten to the warehouse within minutes. Of course, as soon as they met up with Red Robin, an EMP had taken down their comms and left them cut off from each other while they fought their way out.

At some point, Dick had been handed one of the missing children Tim had been after. It turned out that she was the only one to survive this particular hideout, a bittersweet thing, but Dick had done his best to protect her. They had really needed to get out, then, but Tim needed more information on the other missing children's whereabouts.

He had said fifteen minutes, but Dick and Damian had been guarding the Batmobile—in which Dick had stashed the little girl until they could safely get her to Leslie's to look over—for more than twenty, now.

"He gave us a timetable," Damian argued, his voice cold, "and if he's not back by when he said he would be, then he can't blame us for leaving him."

"We're not going to leave him," Dick said. "We don't abandon teammates."

Damian scoffed and turned away. Dick knew that Damian had a hard time letting anyone past his defenses, but this thing between him and Tim seemed so heightened that sometimes Dick was just at a loss as to what to do.

"Robin," Dick pleaded, mostly losing the growl he kept up in the cowl. "Please? Please just go get him?"

Damian grit his teeth, but he finally looked back at Dick. "Fine, but only because it's faster than waiting."

Dick turned to smile at him. "Thanks—"

BANG. BANG. BANG.

Everything seemed to freeze. Damian looked horrified, staring at Dick's chest, and Dick blinked down to see what Damian was staring because it was getting kind of hard to—oh. Oh. He'd been shot. The bullets—because there were three, three bullets in his chest—were all relatively close to each other, pretty lose to his lungs, and Dick had barely had time to realize all of that before he crumpled to the ground.

"NO!" Damian screamed, making to drop to his knees next to Dick, but the gun went off again, and Dick, breathless and in so much pain, could only watch wide-eyed as Damian flipped neatly away before the bullets could land. After that, he was out of Dick's eyeline.

There was scuffling for a few moments before Damian was sliding down next to Dick, tilting Dick's head up so that he was staring up at the sky, not the warehouse. Once that was done, Damian carefully took the cowl off, revealing Dick's eyes.

It was a weird thing to do, Dick thought a little fuzzily, especially out in the open.

"I'm putting pressure on the wound," Damian told him, his tone clipped and clinical, and Dick couldn't help but want to ask which wound? because he was pretty sure there was more than one. But he was still a little winded from getting shot and all that.

Damian took off his cape and pressed it to Dick's torso once , and Dick winced at the pressure. At this rate he was going to pass out.

"Da—" he started to say, but he couldn't get the boy's name out.

"You can't die," Damian gritted out, not even trying to listen to what Dick was trying to say. "Please, just—just don't die, Grayson. Red Robin will surely be out soon, and we can move you then."

Damian's words were stuttered, and his tone was harsh, but his face was saying everything that his voice wasn't. Damian was scared, terrified that one of the only people he had somewhat opened up to would die in front of him, and Dick's heart broke for his little brother. The kid didn't deserve everything he'd been through in his life.

Except—

"Damian," Dick whispered when he got some semblance of breath back, even as the kid pushed against the wounds again. Damian didn't seem to be listening. He cleared his throat and tried again, "Damian, look at me."

"What." Damian ground out, dark eyes snapping to Dick's.

"I'm okay."

"You were just shot—"

"Yes," Dick conceded, coughing lightly. "I was, but the Batman suit is weighted down with more Kevlar than anybody else's. The armor took most of the damage. I'm not fine, but I'm not going to bleed out in front of you."

Damian didn't let up, but he looked less certain now.

"This is not just another ploy?"

"I wouldn't joke about this," Dick promised. "Now please let me up before you make me pass out."

Damian, very, very reluctantly, let up the pressure on Dick's torso, putting his relatively clean cape back on and curling his knees up to his chest. He was staring Dick down with a critical gaze, and Dick tried not to disappoint as he carefully pushed himself into a sitting position, pulling the cowl back on as he did so.

When Dick looked down at his torso, he saw that yes, his hunch had been right. He'd not felt light-headed with blood loss, only dizzy because of the force of the shots knocking the breath out of him, and then Damian putting enough pressure on his chest to stop even Bruce in his tracks. Man, sometimes Dick forgot just how strong this kid was.

Sure, they'd be some nice bruises, and it looked like one of the bullets had shallowly dug into the skin, but Dick was probably going to be fine otherwise. Nothing Alfred couldn't patch up in the Cave after they got the little girl to Leslie's.

"You're really alright?" Damian asked, his face scrunched up in a weird way, and Dick wondered if he was worried or just embarrassed for overreacting. Dick actually kind of felt like he was going to melt at how far Damian had come in the past year.

"I'm really alright," Dick promised with a small smile. "Probably just a few bruises."

Damian gave him a shaky nod. "Good."

"What about the shooter?" Dick asked, pushing to his feet. Damian followed after him, careful to right Dick after a little wobble. He'd stood up to fast, he thought, and he gave Damian's shoulder a grateful squeeze. "Did you get him?"

Damian waved at another unconscious goon on the ground. "He shot from one of the windows of the warehouse and jumped out to catch me once you went down."

"He's not dead, right?" Dick didn't think so, but he wanted to be sure. Damian wasn't one to lose focus, even with an injured partner, but it could never hurt to check.

"No."

"Good," Dick said, leaving it at that. Then he blinked at the gaping warehouse entrance. The one they were supposed to be guarding until Tim got back. "Do you think—"

"What're you guys waiting for?" a voice interrupted. Both Dick and Damian turned towards the Batmobile to see Tim climbing in, looking harried and ready to go. "We need to go. I bought us some time, but we need to get out of here."

Dick shot Damian a grin. "Ready to get out of here?"

Damian huffed a breath. "More than."

"Are those bullets?"

"Later, Tim. Wait until later."