etrayalogs | MISSION 003

MISSION 003

WHO: Everyone and their plushies!
WHEN: June 7th to 25th
WHERE: Everywhere
WHAT: The third Mission
NOTES\WARNINGS: Violence against cute inanimate objects, nightmares, psychological horror, potential death and injury. Please add additional warnings as needed within threads.

⏵ care bear delivery⏴

Last week all characters received one of two possible messages informing them about this month’s mission; some people received a message informing them about the plushie delivery and letting them know they are to protect it.

While others were informed that the plushies must be destroyed starting on June 14th, as any ones remaining after June 20th will cause untold destruction upon the city and its inhabitants. Those who received the second message will find themselves unable to share it with other people.

As promised, on the morning of June 7th, all characters receive a delivery from the companion bots: one stuffed animal plushie handed directly to them. The shape of the plushie differs between characters, but their size is somewhat consistent; they’re all bigger than a fist and small enough to be carried around.

The plushies are magical in nature. Those who fall asleep with their plushies in the same room will find that they will not experience any nightmares and awaken feeling refreshed, even if they only sleep a few hours, or sleep in twenty-minute intervals (looking at you, Bats) rather than go for a full night's sleep. If they lock the plushies away, they will still experience some relief, but it won't nearly as much. Those experiencing intense feelings of guilt, sorrow, homesickness, fear, or pain will find that they still feel those emotions, but with significantly less intensity than they may usually have. Stressors are less stressful, and overall, it seems like the plushies and their magical properties are trying to help. It's as if something else is helping to carry the weight of that suffering.

However, characters will also become more attached and protective of their plushies the longer they have them.

⏵ teddy tailor⏴

After receiving their plushies, citizens of Etraya will find a new, colorful addition to the first level of the hospital, where one might expect to see a gift store, decorated with various tiny outfits. Those who wander inside will find that the place is not a store, but a tailor’s workshop. The companion bots manning it will happily guide people through the steps to make an outfit for their plushie. All kinds of fabrics and patterns can be found throughout the workshop, and a few sewing machines are set up for their use.

The companion bots will not physically help, but perhaps other citizens coming in can assist. After all, all those new plushie friends deserve a special outfit.

⏵ tea party⏴

Before the end of the week, citizens will receive an invitation to a Tea Party taking place at Ramsey Farms. Attendance is not mandatory, but the last several days have been nice, haven't they? Surely everyone is feeling like having some tea and scones.

The farm is set up with various tables and tea sets. All tables have exactly four seats and are meant to be occupied by two citizens and their respective plushies. Once seated, citizens may feel compelled to share how their plushie has been helping them these past few days, perhaps they might even get specific about their fears and traumas.

⏵ seek & destroy⏴

As the first week wraps up, citizens receive one more invitation, this one to participate in a game of Hide & Seek with their plushies. Those who received the message to protect their plushies will be told to hide, while those tasked with destroying the plushies will be the seekers. The game will take place over the morning of June 16th; by then, people may feel fairly protective of their plushies.

No information is provided regarding prizes or winning parameters and Aurora will not answer questions pertaining to the game. But hey, the tea party went so well; surely, this will be fun too.

Once a plushie is destroyed, all of those negative feelings that had been suppressed will return to characters. For those who only had their plushie for a week, they'll feel those emotions more intensely, but it won't be as terrible to lose it. The longer they have had the plushie, the more emotions it absorbs, and the more backlash they'll receive when it's destroyed. Characters with intense night terrors may immediately fall asleep once the plushie is destroyed, throwing them into one of the worst night terrors they have experienced.

Characters cannot destroy their own plushies. Those who receive the message to destroy them are welcome to ask other people to destroy it for them, but if they attempt to explain their reasoning, they'll find themselves losing their train of thought or otherwise unable to explain Aurora's mission.

As stated in Aurora's second mission, any plushies that have not been destroyed by the 20th will become a problem all of its own. The exception to this is if Wade Wilson dresses a plushie in the outfit he had received for it. This outfit will both lower the amount of emotions the plushie absorbs, and slow down its transformation.

⏵ cadaver consolations ⏴
And they do transform. After thirteen days of absorbing negative emotions and taking on nightmares for others, the plushies become something so much more than just plushies. Instead of being soft, huggable items meant to assist in lowering stressors, they take on aspects of those stressors. Perhaps your worst nightmare involves watching your loved ones burn to death - your plushie is no longer a cute little teddy bear but is instead the shape of what had once been your mother, burned and singed almost beyond recognizable if it wasn't for her voice calling out to you, telling you that you did this to her as she chases you down. Perhaps you've been feeling guilty for how things went down in the Labyrinth, and the plushie takes on the shape of a friend who had fallen to save you, whispering into your ear about how it is your fault, you did this to them.

From the 20th through the 25th, these plushies remain corporeal. While they may not look soft and fluffy, it's possible to find threads hanging off their bodies. Yanking on these threads will cause them to fall apart, thus destroying the nightmarish creature intent on following its owner to their death. After the twenty-fifth, they will no longer be corporeal and cannot be destroyed through traditional methods. Instead, player characters will need to pull aspects of their fear out of the mangled creature. Perhaps the creature is carrying a replica of a treasured necklace that needs to be yanked off it, or its chest has been torn open, its heart hanging loose for those around it to grab hold of. The character responsible for the plushie will need to devour their fears, which will cause the creature to unravel piece by piece.

How this looks is wholly up to you, as is how far your character's nightmarish creature gets. Whether it's devour in a literal sense, or if it's overcoming their fear by destroying it or overcoming it - the extent of how messy this gets is up to each player, as is how messy their plushie gets.

⏵ NOTES ⏴
The soothing nature of the plushies is magical. They are magically charmed to absorb negative energies and contain them. Characters who can sense magic of this nature are free to notice this.

Those warded from being affected by others' magic may also find that their plushies are not effective for them. This can be played to players' preference; maybe the plushies can work around the wards, but maybe they cannot.

When a character’s plushie is destroyed, the character will feel the full hit of all the emotions it had been holding for them, if a character's plushie survives past June 20th it will transform into a monster, if it survives past the 25th it becomes much harder (and traumatizing) to destroy. They will need to be destroyed, as the plushies will not disappear on their own regardless of how long they're around.

Any questions can be directed to the mod queries thread in the plotting post

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

( he'd point out that this is exactly why damian had told him what happens, but this isn't his bruce. this one's younger, more vulnerable, and while damian is just fine giving him shit, this isn't something he should be giving him trouble over. or at least, that's what his internal what would dick grayson do voice tells him.

the elevator shaft is a safe enough location to linger in, so damian stays there even while bruce looks over toward him. just in case he needs to make a quick exit. )

You know why I told you.

( straightening up some, there's a huff there on his lips as he continues to stare to damian. )

I didn't ask you to tell me—

( his words are cut off by the sudden knocking that can be heard within the terminal. low and dull, but enough to catch bruce's attention and tear it away from damian to around them instead. another couple of knocks. still low. still dull. then another... and another... until they become quicker and louder. desperate. then stop.

bruce turns, eyes narrowed. confused. gaze landing on a row of lockers a little ways from where they are. the one in the middle, locked, rattles when the knocking happens again, showing that's where it's coming from and bruce stares to it. cautious. taking hold of a batarang off the table there he's standing at. that's when a voice speaks from inside. muffled and difficult to make out at first. but he does manage to catch his name — bruce? — coming from inside and so he takes the batarang with him. slowly making his way over. )

( he didn't ask damian to tell him, but damian did anyway. and he could argue his reasoning, now that bruce has somewhat had time to process what happened. he could, but his words get interrupted by the sound of something banging against something metal, and damian's attention immediately shifts to the lockers, too.

it's a voice he knows he recognizes from somewhere, but can't quite place. so he knows it's not anyone who would be down here; it's not gordon, brown, or cain.

bruce starts towards it, and damian trails after him several feet behind. quietly, with a scowl on his mouth. )

What did you put in there?

( the only response he gives damian is silence and a fleeting glance over his shoulder back to him. fingers hold tight to the batarang there in his right hand. steps slow and careful as he approaches the rattling locker. it's only when he's close enough to reach out and touch the metal door that the muffled voice from within the locker becomes more clear to him. he recognizes the voice and it's enough to make him stop. entirely. staring in a mix of shock and confusion.

bruce? bruce, help me. )

Mother..?

( the word is soft on his lips, disbelief both there in his voice and expression. yet even so, the rattling continues and bruce finds himself undoing the lock there on the door, fingers nearly trembling as he does. they fall away, as does the lock, hitting the cold floor with a hard thud. the door swings open, bruce taking only a single step back and there, coming out from the locker is his mother, martha wayne. dressed as she was twenty years ago when he'd last seen her alive.

bruce.

her voice is like a balm he didn't know he needed and when she steps forward, out of the locker, she wraps her arms around him. embracing him. bruce standing there. stunned. confused. )

Mother...

( the word leaves him again and his free hand lifts, fingers still trembling from... feeling so much right now and rest against her back. a bittersweet reunion he can't believe is real, while martha there holds tight to her son... and slowly looks past him to damian there, the most wicked and sinister grin slowly spreading across her face as she does. )

( his first thought is, that's not martha wayne. it looks like her, but damian knows better. he knows bruce would know better, too, but with everything going on - maybe it's not that simple. he's lurching forward a step to try and pull bruce away, when she grins and he immediately recognizes this isn't going to be easy one bit. )

Father, no!

( a handful of batarangs is out he can think better of it, but he's also reaching a hand up for his earpiece, quickly sifting through contacts as he throws the weapons forward, aiming for her wrists. )

I need you now. ( no pause for greetings, he's yelling at the communicator for grayson. ) Wayne Tower, there's a hidden elevator in the lobby, ( with exact directions for where it is in the lobby, as damian runs behind 'martha' so he can shove his boot up against the lockers and leap up, arms grabbing onto her around her neck and legs trying to force her arms down to her sides. ) leads to Wayne Terminus. Hurry.

[ I need you now, Damian says, and whatever amused or amusing quip had been on his lips dies there. ]

I'm on my way.

[ He's in the air already, swinging through the city in search of plushies to destroy. Changing direction is as easy as detaching one jumpline and freefalling to gain momentum before shooting out another from his escrima stick and soaring back into the air again toward Wayne Tower.

(And, apparently, a hidden cave underneath. In retrospect, he should have expected it.)

He can hear the sounds of a scuffle through the earpiece. He ignores it, focuses. ]

What's the situation, Robin? Is Bruce there with you?

( everything happens so quickly.

the embrace feels warm. wrong. but he can't help himself from falling into it. he's missed her so much and with everything that's happened lately, he wants this more than anything. needs it. no matter how much he might pretend otherwise.

why couldn't you save me, bruce? she whispers the words softly to his ear and those blue eyes of his blink. the guilt he wrongfully carries with him weighing down on him heavy as she says that.

he's about to say something— to apologize when he catches the sound of swift movement behind him and martha pulls a hand down from around bruce, the batarang slicing bruce in the shoulder from behind; he doesn't have the batsuit on. a gasp leaves him, pain shooting through his shoulder, and he nearly stumbles into martha who still keeps a tight hold on him.

shh, i know it hurts. how do you think it felt that day? when she'd been shot and killed alongside his father.

damian moves up against the locker from behind. launches himself for martha and bruce... freezes at first. feels as if he's ten years old all over again and about to, once more, witness his mother die in front of him. then panics and in that panic, feels everything come back to him that day in crime alley. damian grabs hold of martha as he does and bruce — ignoring the batarang sticking out of him — stares in disbelief.

martha, on the other hand, is the one to react and she does so by twisting in such a contorted way. slamming her elbow hard into damian as a means to shove him off and into the lockers. roughly. )

Damian!

( a gasp on his lips, martha looks back to bruce. grips his face tight. starts to squeeze. don't let him kill me, bruce. don't let me die again because you did nothing. )

Edited 2024-06-09 09:44 (UTC)

( her arm shifts, and if damian wasn't as used to bending in weird angles as he is, he's pretty sure his leg moving along with it would have messed up the joints in his leg. as it is, it still hurts, but not nearly as much as it hurts when her elbow shoves straight into his ribcage. it forces the air out of his lungs, but his grip on her doesn't loosen. instead, he's hissing between his lips, weight shifting fully onto his legs so he can push against her arms, try and force them off of bruce. )

Yes. ( hissed between teeth, as damian's eyeing the angle he's at behind her, the grip she has on bruce in front of him. trying to force her limbs off of him isn't working, he needs to try another method. ) Father is bleeding. My fault. Batarang in his shoulder. ( with a grunt, fingers gripping onto martha's hair hard as he gets a leg up onto her shoulders. swings the other one around quickly, too, so he's far out of reach of any elbows, and at a great angle for shoving his fists into her ears until she falls over which he'd take advantage of if he thought it'd do anything. ) There's a shapeshifter, ( no, instead he's putting himself at further risk by dropping the grip he's got on her chest with one calf and swinging himself around to her front rather than the back of her head. in direct line of teeth, but his armor is fairly thick, he's not too worried about that. ) looks like Martha Wayne. ( and he's dropping down into the crevice between them as best as he can. it bends him up small, but he's been squished smaller before. damian's shoulder presses against bruce's own while booted feet shove against martha's neck and the center of her collarbone to push her away. )

Get off of him!

Martha— ?

[ He flings himself into a dive, pushing for speed, throwing everything he has into the swing, the release, the arc, wind whistling around him as he moves, a blue-black streak through the air. Wayne Tower isn't far, but it isn't close, either; he'd give a lot for Blüdhaven's public transportation system right now.

But Martha Wayne. A surefire way to snag Bruce in a net, drown him in the guilt that's always tucked just out of sight, behind a cracking and too-fragile dam. Dick pushes himself faster, harder, he has to get there. ]

It must be his plushie.

[ Even now, it feels ridiculous to say, but hell — it's not like they don't deal with the ridiculous turned terrifying every day of their lives. ] They're transforming all over the city. Try to —

[ Get him away, get him safe, but even though he doesn't know this Bruce, he knows no version of Bruce would ever be able to tear himself away from his mother, no matter how horrible a vision she might have become. People across the city are fighting to keep their stuffed animals safe; he knows how far they'll go to win that fight.

This won't be pretty. ]

— keep her contained, Robin, I'm almost there.

( at some point during the scuffle, martha’s one hand drops away from bruce’s face and ends up around his neck. tight. choking him there while damian moves about behind her.

it's ok, darling. you can rest now. mother's here. remember like we used to when you were little? except this is more like a permanent attempt at sleep rather than tucking him into bed for the night.

bruce brings a hand of his own up and claps it around martha’s wrist in an attempt to pry it off his neck, but. he’s unable to. maybe he doesn’t really want to. feeling as though he deserves this. the way martha looks to him as she continues to choke him… her face twists into something a little more sinister — blood dripping suddenly from the gunshot wound she wears from the night of her murder.

that’s when he sees damian squeeze himself between them then. gasping for air while fingers still hold tight to her wrist there at his neck. martha continues to strangle him for as long as she can and bruce’s eyes begin to roll back a little before damian is finally able to separate them with his kick and she releases her hold on bruce., possibly scratching at damian’s face some as she does.

a hand goes up to clutch his own neck, air struggling to come back to him as he drops down, overwhelmed with about five or six different things at once and he’s gasping for breath, fingers of his other hand curling into a fist that presses there against the floor. he searches for damian — sees the way his mother stands with the blood running down her.

why can’t you protect us, bruce? why can’t you protect the people you love the most? why do you let us all die? me, your father, alfred, your son. no matter how hard you try, we always die. why, bruce? why can’t you save us?

and she lunges for a distraught bruce again. )

Edited 2024-06-09 18:47 (UTC)

( this isn't even close to the first thing he's fought that threw someone off. or he's had to fight against the wishes of someone he would much rather not fight against. it must be his plushie, dick says, and damian doesn't question how that happened. nothing has been normal here, and his stuffed animal had hurt him with a vengeance moments after it had been destroyed. it'd only be right if his father's were to pull something like this and make it all just that much worse, wouldn't it?

'martha's' fingers wrap around bruce's neck, which he can't do anything to stop from where he is, but he can force her off. he uses his body to force distance between them, kicking her off and away as he drops down to the ground between them. he earns a massive scratch across the right side of his face: four claws having intended themselves into flesh starting just below his hairline and going to below his jawline. the second one is dangerously close to his eye, cuts straight through the only good domino mask he has here, but that's a problem damian can handle later.

even with blood going into his right eye, bruising that isn't going to be fun later on his ribcage, damian's still up on his feet between the two.

scowls as she keeps going on and on. )

I've got them separated. I can handle her or him, but I can't take her out and hold him back at the same time.

( which is why he'd called grayosn in the first place. she lunges forward, but damian throws his own body between martha and bruce. intends on keeping them separated until he gets an extra set of hands. the hilt of a katana gets pulled out of his utility belt, and damian swings it out so the blade extends.

holds it steady, waiting for her to hit him. )

ETA twenty seconds.

[ Because there's Wayne Tower, right ahead. Dick hits the ground running, slams his way through the doors into the lobby and looks for the hidden elevator. There's no time to hit a button and wait, no matter how fast the elevator is, so he pries the door open, only to be greeted by Damian's grapple line dangling there, just waiting for him.

Dick grins, bright and fierce, and leaps to catch the thin line, rappelling his way down into the darkness with reckless speed. The flexible soles of his boots hit metal and he lets go of the line to force his way into the elevator, hits the door open button. The doors slide open. He bursts out into the cavernous room beneath like a wave unleashed.

Situation: One undead Martha Wayne, currently attempting to murder both her son and his baby brother.

Damian bleeding, between the nightmare pretending to be a woman and his father, sword out.

Bruce behind him, batarang in his shoulder, pale and shaken.

Dick reaches for his escrima sticks as he runs, as he throws himself into a long flat kick, leg extended, to plant his foot into the small of the back of the thing wearing Martha Wayne's face. ]

Take him, I have her!

[ Hold him back, he means, because this isn't his mother, but it's his mother. Certain as he is that he could take this version of his mentor, partner, father, he'd rather not have to deal with both. And Damian's already hurt; they both need to get back. Dick lands with a roll, springs back to his feet to face the ravening, rabid facsimile of Martha. ]

Hey there, Grandma. What big teeth you have.

Edited 2024-06-10 14:49 (UTC)

( the sudden arrival of dick has both martha and bruce looking over but, much like with all of this happening right now, so much of it is a blur.

dick's taking off towards the ever-changing corpse of martha. skin begins to rot. to peel. chunks hanging from her face as dick busies himself with her and bruce just... stares. in shock and disbelief. none of this makes sense. none of this should be possible and yet... it's happening. right in front of him and he's trying to process it but feels like he's ten years old again.

save us, bruce. save me.

a gasp of pain leaving him, he starts to move — starts to try and get himself up. stumbles for a second. but begins to push himself up from the ground. )

Don't—

( he barely manages to get the word out — reaches back to yank the batarang out from his shoulder, flinging drops of blood to the ground as he uses it to assist in pushing himself. ignoring the way it cuts through his palm as he does. )

( dick bursts into wayne terminus in a flurry of black and blue, barking out orders which is - fine, until he opens his mouth again and out comes ridiculous nonsense. despite damian having blood dripping down the right side of his face and bruce pulling a batarang out of his shoulder to try and push himself up, he still finds time to roll his eyes. barely. because with nightwing's arrival, damian knows his back's covered enough he can turn himself around, and focus on bruce.

the sword gets dropped down to the floor as soon as he's close to bruce; he doesn't have a sheath for it, nor the time to recollapse it, so it'll have to do on the floor for now. especially because damian needs both hands to remove the batarang from his hand. fingers press into the pressure points on his wrist to try and force him to release it, while the other pries at fingers to get it out. )

If you need stitches on your palm later, you're going to be impossible to deal with. Put it down. Lean on me if you're getting up, but know if you try to go forward at all, I will put you face-down on the ground, and I will not feel bad about it.

[ The thing now facing him is getting worse by the second; flesh is falling from her face, her shoulders. Blood drips, pooling on the floor, threading down her torso from the gunshot wound that yawns in her chest. She's wearing pearls. They're getting ruined. ]

Sorry about this.

[ It's not to the hideous, shambling figure attempting to emulate Martha Wayne; it's to her son. He's heard that tone of voice before, half-broken, all anguish. It just about kills him every time. And if he lets it distract him now, it will kill him. Again. And then Damian will kill him. Again.

She lunges for Damian's back, for Bruce beyond him, and Dick's in motion in the next second, barreling forward to wrap an arm tightly around her throat, hauling her back even as she screeches and rakes at him with ragged nails. They open slashes in his suit; first clean, then bleeding sluggishly. The thread, where's the thread?

She thrashes in his grip, superhumanly strong, ferocious, but when she breaks free he's ready, brings an escrima stick down in a hard swing to her temple. ]

( he's aware that damian is there with him — trying to pry the batarang out of his hand, but all he can see is his mother lunging at him and dick—nightwing there, holding her back and knocking her away.

bruce...

he moves as if to step forward, ignoring what it is damian says to him but stumbles a bit again. hunches over. tries to catch his breath. it's not so much physical as it is emotional and it's a struggle for him to try and overcome it. the batarang falls from his grasp, blood spilling as it does and bruce shoves off damian, digging up whatever strength he can find within himself to do so. )

Don't—!

( he tries again, the word still difficult to leave from him but more firm this time. his mother, while swinging at dick, looks past him to bruce and bruce locks eyes with her, ten years old and horrified all over again at how she looks. it's as if he's in crime alley all over again and he's staring in disbelief at the sight before him. this is worse, he knows it is and yet, he can't help but want to reach out to her.

are you going to let me die again, bruce? going to let damian die again, too? why can't you save us, bruce? why does everyone you love die? )

( bruce shoves him off, which is the expected outcome here. there had been a reason why damian had called for grayson; he can take out martha wayne, without any issue. he's fairly certain that he could take out this version of his father, too, without much difficulty. he's young, inexperienced, and damian laps him in combat expertise. he's also emotionally compromised, enough that he thought pushing damian away from him would be effective.

despite him not losing his balance one bit when pushed. he goes with the force of the push instead, then immediately swivels forward and into bruce. he's not tall enough to drop him forward without it really hurting, so he opts to drop bruce onto his back instead. because he's nice like that. it's impossibly quick: damian grabs onto bruce's arm, the injured one, with the arm furthest from bruce and yanks on it; either he'll compensate and throw his weight back some, or go forward with the hit, and both options work just fine for damian - because the hand he has closest to bruce raises between them, roughly shoving his hand in against the underside of the cowl, his thumb on one side of his jawline and the rest of his fingers on the other. damian's leg presses in close under bruce's knee as he twists with his hips and forces bruce's body along with it. damian's body follows along with him after he's down, knee to his sternum with most of his weight behind it. it's not a particularly smart move, the way he leans forward over bruce, elbows pressing to his collar so damian can press gloved hands over his ears to (hopefully) muffle out the sounds as best as he can, but it's what he does anyway.

yells loudly directly in bruce's face too, even though he knows well enough bruce can read lips, and it's not going to be hard given how close damian is. )

Ignore it, focus on me. Just me, I'm right here.

( his voice lowers to less of a yell, but it's still loud enough to carry. enough to muffle 'martha's' words. )

I'm sorry I hit you, it was an accident. I'm sorry I hurt you last time I saw you, but I had to do it. You're emotionally compromised, and I am tired of watching everyone I care about die and hurt themselves! Fight me off, I dare you! I know three dozen methods I could have you pinned, painfully but not enough to cause significant damage, and it would take you at least eleven hours to get out of them. I will leave you down here with Drake to babysit you, with instructions to tell you all the most boring, ridiculous details of his latest excursion and you'll be so bored you'll wish you were dead!

[ Bruce is struggling, Damian's yelling, and Dick's just doing his best to focus on the thing he's fighting. She's still pouring poisonous words into the air, trying to reach Bruce, even as she swipes at him. Dick pushes himself back, arcing in the air in a half-back handspring to avoid her reach, then pushes up to hit her solidly in the stomach with the soles of both his feet. As she stumbles backwards, shrieking, he readies an escrima stick, flings it, lets it spool a jumpline out behind it.

He's always had excellent aim, even before Bruce took him in, taught him how to use jumplines and batarangs. Every circus has a knifethrower.

The stick hits dead center, its end sinking into the bullet wound in her chest, and Martha screams, scrabbling at it with bony, half-decayed fingers as Dick wraps the jumpline around his hand, grim. ]

Damian, keep him down!

[ Shouted over the din, before he braces himself and pulls. The escrima stick pops free with a horrible sucking sound, and for a moment what looks like dark blood gushes from the wound, spilling over her ribs and belly. But it isn't blood, or not only blood— it's something far stranger, something worse: gleaming red threads, bursting from her chest along with the dark liquid.

Dick falls into a spring, ignoring the way she stumbles and lashes out at him; one hand grips her frail shoulder, the other reaches directly into the gaping wound to grasp a fistful of the threads before he pulls, yanking with all his might even as she scrabbles at his chest and stomach. ]

( behind them, dick does whatever he can to keep martha away from him. the sound of things falling, rattling against the floor as they’re knocked over can be heard despite the way damian covers his ears with his hands, but. aside from that, all he sees is damian there above him. weight pressing down on him. eyes staring down into his own through the mask that’s been slashed. yelling at him. demanding his focus and attention.

his mind is all over the place. his body aches in certain spots, blood beneath his shoulder there on the ground from the batarang injury. yet damian holds tight. remains unfazed by what’s going on around them, never mind his own injury to his face and, again, demands bruce’s focus as he threatens him with a bad time. part of him knows what damian is doing. knows he’s doing whatever he can and whatever it takes to keep him from falling for the words his mother- this hollowed out version of his mother whispers to him - words he’s thought himself a number of times. part of him knows it’s a trick, a ploy to get him close to her and yet… she isn’t wrong and he knows that. he hates that he knows that. yet here damian is, like he says. trying to keep him right here. beneath him. in this very moment where he is alive.

but his words are drowned out by the sounds and shrieks that come from martha and bruce twists his head enough to catch what’s happening. to catch the way she begins to… unravel. the way blood pours out from her wound with handfuls of thread in dick’s fist and he stares. horrified at the sight of his mother bleeding out like she is. at the way she seems to be coming undone before his eyes.

she catches sight of him, despite the end she’s approaching, and she smiles. everyone you love dies, bruce. they always will.

there’s a sudden jerk from bruce beneath damian. a pained sound that leaves him as blue eyes become glassy with tears that don’t yet fall. and he stares. watches the way she comes undone at dick’s hand. )

( he's listening to richard, but can't afford to look up at him. the moment damian's attention shifts, bruce's is going to, and he wants to avoid him looking towards the creature that looks like his mother but isn't. it takes a significant amount of trust to not look up when he hears screeching and screaming, the thump of dick's kick landing, but - he manages it. keeps his eyes focused on bruce's below him, tries to keep his attention focused even if it's - not working. bruce looks back towards dick and 'martha', and damian's eyes follow his for a brief moment, just enough to see what's going on, before he's gripping onto bruce by the sides of his face, harder.

leans in closer, weight coming off the knee on bruce's sternum and instead resting on his elbows as he leans in close. presses his forehead against bruce's own, even if it does cause the blood from the scratches on his face to drip down onto his father's. it's fine. it could be worse.

it could be an actual evil alternate version of bruce's mother, which would make this significantly more difficult. )

Father.

( voice significantly more gentle than it had been just moments ago, and there's a hint of something rougher, of grief, because damian does understand. more than he really wants to. )

It's okay. I'm here. You are not alone. I will not let you be. Richard won't, either. We're here.

( he's trying. comforting others like this doesn't - come naturally to him. it's new, but he's trying his best. trying to find the right words to make this better, even though he knows nothing will fix it. )

[ The damn thing unravels into a puddle of cloth and stuffing material, and he spares it just long enough of a glance to be sure it's not coming back to life before he's heading toward the prone figure of Bruce and Damian on top of him at a run.

Dick falls to his knees next to them, a hand already going to Damian's back, the other to Bruce's shoulder as he looks them over, takes in the blood, the slashed cloth and skin. Damian's blood drips onto Bruce's face like tears.

He recalls with perfect clarity the backlash of emotions that had hit him when Damian ripped up his own plushie, and that was over a week ago. What comes next isn't going to be pretty, not for any of them. ]

It's not over yet.

[ His hand is firm and warm on Bruce's shoulder, his knees pressed against the man's side. ]

We're here, Bruce. You're going to get through this. Don't try to hold onto any of it, just listen to Damian, listen to me. We have you.

( the look of horror and shock remains etched there on his face even when damian pulls his focus back to him, forehead pressed to his. hands lay there at his sides, his one bleeding from the open wound courtesy of the batarang he'd gripped far too tightly. his shoulder, wet. blood staining the ground beneath him. the shrieks and the screaming has stopped, as have the words of his failures that still ring in his ears. failures that have both happened and have yet to. possibly. but always a fear of his he attempts to fight.

dick is there suddenly. he can feel his presence there beside him but all he can do is stare through damian as everything he typically suppresses begins to hit him, what with his plushie — his mother — now being destroyed. the pain his body feels is forgotten. the emotional far outweighing the physical and he inhales sharply, finding it all difficult to swallow. )

I— I'm sorry. ( the words more a broken whisper there on his lips. ) I couldn't—

( do anything, protect you, save you... it's anyone's guess what he means — possibly all of it, really. eyes shut tightly, a hitch in his breath, hand blindly reaching up to hold the back of damian's head, fingers trembling as he does. when eyes open, they're wet with tears and he looks to damian first, then dick. eyes falling shut again. )

I don't want to lose you...

( he knows it's not over yet. that taking it out, if it was the plushie, was only step one. damian hadn't had his very long, but he remembers how bad it'd hurt when it'd been ripped from his hands and desecrated in front of him. without 'martha wayne' wreaking havoc through wayne terminus, damian assumes it's safe to at least get himself up, there's no need to shove a knee into bruce's sternum when there's nothing he needs to prevent him from running to. dick's hand presses to his back, and damian gives a soft, almost relieved huff. his shoulders loosen; there's no need to be poised and ready to get up to shove a blade through someone if there's no one here to stab, but the tension returns near immediately when bruce's hand raises and presses against the back of his head when he cries and damian realizes he'd done this to himself.

put himself in just the right position to be the anchor bruce latched onto when everything else came crumbling down. it would have been better if he'd been out there cutting the plushie to shreds and left grayson here to deal with - this. this is grayson's job, damian doesn't do emotional management.

hands leave bruce's ears, and damian - wrestles with the urge to get himself up and busy himself cleaning wounds while bruce pulls himself back together.

instead, he pulls in a breath through his nose and drops down onto bruce. it's less a hug, and more damian opting to go slack in his arms. subjecting himself to letting bruce hold onto him. ) I know.

[ Bruce reaches for the boy who may one day be his son, even in his own world, and Damian— goes boneless, apparently decided the best course of action is to simply play possum. Dick can't help the twitch of a smile that starts, even as he's reaching up to take off his mask, blinking blood and sweat out of his eyes. He rolls down to sitting, one knee up with a foot braced on the floor, the other leg curled, and reaches to pat the closest part of Bruce that he can. (It's his leg.) He stays close enough for Bruce to feel him, for Damian to know he's there. ]

There's nothing for you to be sorry for, Bruce.

[ He's just glad, the kind of gladness that reaches right down to his core and glows there, that Damian's here, that they have each other, even if they're still getting used to it. ]

And all those things she was saying... look, it's all familiar. But none of it's true. I know it's hard to remember that, but you do a lot of good in the world. In Gotham. Here, too.

( damian lays there against him. reassures him. dick does as well, both with words and a gentle touch and bruce... bruce just keeps his hand there at the back of damian's head. staring into the distance. there's a heaviness he feels inside him. not from the boy who's decided to go slack against him, but from everything he's feeling right now in the aftermath of it all. of his mother, her words, of damian holding him back, of dick dealing with what bruce should have dealt with... all of it. pulling him down into the very core of his personal darkness where fears and guilt wait for him alongside anger and sorrow.

he takes a second. swallows thickly. gently lets go of damian and lets his hand drop down beside him. )

I don't know if I can save Gotham.... ( the words are soft, a quiet admission that damian's seen in his private journal. ) ...here or otherwise.

( if he can show eos and aurora that it's worth saving. if he can even return to it and make any sort of difference. )

MISSION 003

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