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Damian looked up at the two assassins standing at his door, a sparse number compared to the ten the stood outside. He studied their stances. It’d been twenty minutes since they’d first bunkered in the server room. Damian was sweating because of the heat. The overworking technology toasted the room up like an oven. The air conditioning wasn't working. Damian wished they’d chosen a different room to hide in, but this is what they had to deal with for an emergency shut down. Mother had told him to stay put even if he heard noises outside.
Damian couldn’t leave even if he wanted to because his guards were barricading him in.
It was impressive that they could hold their defensive battle stances for so long. They were expecting something. Damian wondered what could make everyone so tense. The warning sirens weren’t going off, and yet everyone was waiting for a fight. Damian wondered what he’d missed, or what they knew that he didn’t. Not a lot could get them this worked up, not after all the training Grandfather had instilled in them. They were taught to be collected at all times. Yet, they were sweating. Not because of the heat, but because of the anticipation.
Damian stood in between two computer servers when his mother’s warnings were put to the test. The lights flickered on and off. A lightbulb exploded, springing glass into its rectangular cover. Then, everything went dark save for the light hanging above Damian’s head. He was appropriately spooked, eyes darting upward to observe the phenomenon. He’d always believed in ghosts, but this was just bizarre. What was happening? He’d never been too knowledgeable on the supernatural. His mother hadn’t prepared him for this sort of scenario. Damian was completely unqualified for handling it.
There were hollers and war cries outside. The sounds of fighting penetrate the room. The two guards standing at the door tensed, sharing a glance. Their brows were strewn together, and they looked uncertain. The uncertainty only grew with the dying of battle. One by one, voices ceased completely. The silence that fell upon their surroundings was deafening. Damian could hear nothing besides the thrum of his heart. He reached down for the knife strapped in his sash.
Damian’s hand froze when he heard the door creak. A shadowed pair of fingers wrapped around the door’s edge... slowly pushing it open. Then there were a pair of white slits staring into the darkness, lit up like fireflies on a summer’s eve. They were inhuman, just like the figure’s form. It stepped into the room with the shape of a person, but there were no discernible features. The darkness moved like static, cloaking the area around it. There was no mouth. No nose. No ears. No hair. There were only eyes and limbs.
The creature surveyed its surroundings. It paused upon Damian. Damian’s breath hitched and he grabbed his dagger. He unsheathed it and held it up defensively. He doubted the dagger would do anything to whatever this thing was, but he couldn’t go down without a fight. That was against everything he was – everything he’d been raised to be.
His guards finally make their move after a stand-off. They charge for the entity with their swords raised to strike. Damian felt a tinge of hope. He wasn’t alone, he realized.
The sentiment quickly died when he watched the entity dodge a sword strike, and then leap onto one of his opponents. The creature flew forward like a bed sheet in the wind, and then it began to warp. It expanded and spilled upon its enemy. It devoured him within two seconds and then the darkness collapsed into the ground. Damian watched the shadow figure rise from the residual pool – without the man it had eaten.
The entity’s remaining enemy shook and dropped his sword. He backed a few steps before the entity turned to stare at him with emotionless eyes. They were impossible to read. There was nothing in them. There was only white energy – nothing that could possibly belong to a human.
Damian watched in horror as the entity repeated the same process on the second guard, growing, expanding, and then draping itself across the man like a blanket. Damian heard a frightened scream before it was abruptly muted, disappearing into the creature’s insatiable stomach, and then there was a figure rising from the ground again. It stepped forward.
Damian shrunk backwards, frightened, hands shaking.
The creature pressed towards him.
One. Agonizing. Step. At a time.
It had no qualms with the light, pushing into it. Then it was standing across from him, slouching. Now that it was closer, Damian realized he’d missed a few details about the thing. It wasn’t just shaped like a human – it was a man. It had broad shoulders, and its arms were thick. The head even seemed to have a specific jaw shape, as if it were reflecting the shape of a real person.
Damian held his knife up in warning.
“Go back to where you came from,” he said.
It wasn’t a very threatening thing, coming from a six-year-old, but he tried his best to dissuade it.
Damian flinched when the creature stretched out its hand.
“Da.Mi.An.”
Damian blinked with shock. It knew his name?
Damian let his curiosity get to the best of him as the creature continued to raise its hand, gently resting it upon Damian’s offending one. It lowered their hands down an inch. Damian allowed the creature to push away his armed hand, and then the entity stepped further into the space it had created. Damian’s eyes continued to follow it as it crouched down, like an old man inspecting his garden, or a servant preparing themselves to pick up a heavy load. It was surprisingly natural for something that had just proven it was the complete opposite.
Damian eyed the thing warily before the darkness receded upon its face. It crawled away until there was something brighter – something alive – skin.
Damian’s eyes widened when he saw two eyes staring back at his. It was blue. It was Jason’s blue.
“Jason!”
Damian dropped his knife, forgot all caution, and threw his arms around the man’s neck.
Jason caught him with a noise of acknowledgment.
It was as if he’d never been a creature to begin with. Damian could feel his warmth, as opposed to the coldness he had exuded, and he realized his brother was wearing clothing underneath all the darkness. It’d receded to unveil his entire body.
“Jason, Mother said you’d gone away,” Damian said.
Jason was very careful with how he handled Damian. Damian noticed that his hands were barely pressing into his back, and that there was hardly any strength added to his arms.
“She tried to keep us apart Damian,” Jason was soft-spoken, just like Damian remembered him being, “but she doesn’t know us. She never did.”
Jason turned in place, inviting Damian to hop onto his back, and Damian didn’t think twice. Damian did so gladly, returning his arms to Jason’s neck, and then holding on tight as Jason rose off the ground.
“Why did she order all the guards to attack you?”
Jason didn’t answer straight-away. He stepped out of the light and towards the exit. Then he was carrying Damian into the corridor – a place that showed no signs of life. On appearances alone, Damian wouldn’t have supposed there were ten men out here. Somehow, Jason had taken care of them all. Probably in the same manner he’d taken care of the men posted in the interior.
“She’s afraid of me.”
Jason’s footsteps, previously soundless, were now echoing throughout the stone hall, and Damian found comfort in the rise of Jason’s lungs.
“Why would she ever be afraid of you?”
Jason laughed a soft thing.
“She knows what I’m capable of. That’s why she’s afraid.”
Jason continued walking. There were no signs of human life. Not even after they’d left the corridor for another one. Damian found it… eerie. Had Jason done this, too? Had he gone through these halls? Had he gotten rid of everyone?
“What happened to you?”
Jason didn’t answer at first. He took his time thinking over what he was going to say. Damian waited patiently, having found the quiet to be peaceful. He was with his brother. He was safe. There was no reason to associate his silence with anything bad.
“I want to tell you the whole story, but I don’t think right now is the correct time. I have something to show you first. Do you think it can wait?”
“If it’s for you, yes.”
Jason chuckled. Damian could hear the smile in his voice.
“Thank you.”
Jason took another corner and then they were at the throne room. The doors were left wide open, an oddity considering Ra’s al Ghul’s preference for privacy. Jason walked in and lowered himself down for Damian’s benefit. Damian hopped off with a question in his eyes. He surveyed the room. His grandfather had taken a traditional approach in the decorations, even neglecting to put in lights in favor of torches. The mood set an intimidating aura often times, but now it just seemed lonely.
“Come here,” Jason beckoned. He was walking over to the throne, unoccupied.
Damian hurried to follow him, eager to please. When Jason stopped in front of the throne, Damian paused next to him. The two gazed upon the seat, thoughtful. Jason continued to look at the throne, but Damian was more interested in reading Jason. He couldn’t help himself. He observed his older brother with innocent curiosity.
“What are you going to show me?”
Jason tilted his head downward to look at him. He smiled.
“This.”
Damian laughed with surprise when Jason hefted him, and then twirled him around in a little spin. He set Damian down onto the throne. The torches around them seemed to brighten and the shadows retreated into their corners.
Jason leaned down to look Damian in the eye.
“It’s yours now.”
Damian laughed again. “Perhaps within the next twenty years or so. Grandfather is yet to retire. He most likely never will. I’ll have taken several dips in the Lazarus Pit to retain my youth.”
Jason’s smile fell and he straightened himself to look away.
“No more Lazarus Pit, Damian,” he whispered.
“What?”
Jason stared off in the distance, lost in thought, but then he turned back to Damian again. It was as if he’d never been perturbed to begin with, never bothered by Damian’s statement, because now he was leaning back down again, and his hand was crawling with shadows. Damian felt a shiver travel up his spine as Jason played with a strand of his hair, removing it from his eyes.
“They’re gone, Damian. The Lazarus Pits. Your grandfather. Your mother.”
He removed his hand. His whole body was crawling with shadows now.
“There’s only us, now.”
“What do you mean? Jason?” Damian was shooting up from his seat. “Did you do something to them?”
Damian felt his heart race. His mother, dead? His grandfather? Gone? No. That wasn’t possible. They were too powerful to be gone and – and they were his family. They couldn’t just – no.
Jason didn’t answer. He clasped his hands behind his back. His face was gone now. There were only white slits. Damian was unnerved by the picture.
“Don’t worry. Things will be better now.”
Damian scrambled backwards into his throne as Jason’s darkness swept forward and invaded his space with lightning speed. Damian felt it grab at him and swarm him. He let out a shout before there wasn’t an inch of light to be seen. A chill ran down his body, and something was crushing in on him. He didn’t understand.
“Sleep, shadow prince,” Jason’s voice echoed all around him.
Damian fought it. He fought it and struggled and groaned. But whatever Jason was doing to him held an influence he couldn’t describe, and then he closed his eyes. The darkness was seeping into his very skin, claiming every inch of him for its own.
Nothing would ever be the same.
When the darkness disappeared, Damian was nowhere to be seen. Jason stood guard in front of the throne, staring at the place his little brother had been. When Damian returned, things would be different. He'd see things the way Jason saw them, and then he'd understand. For now, he'd have to wait.
Then, Damian could rule.
He'd be Jason's. Forever.