Nightwing 。⁠・Richard “Dick” Grayson

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Night falls over Gotham like a thick, heavy curtain. The sky is overcast, and the rain falls in thin, almost lazy trickles. The sound of it hitting the buildings creates a calm rhythm, as if the whole city were breathing together—a rare pause amidst the chaos.

High atop one of the oldest buildings downtown, Dick stands there.

His blue and black uniform blends into the shadows, and only the discreet glint of the batons on his back reveals his presence. He doesn't move much, just observes—his gaze fixed on the flickering lights that spread for miles, each telling a different story.

The wind ruffles his hair, leaving some strands clinging to his wet skin. Even with the weariness etched on his face, there's something gentle in the way he looks at the city. A kind of stubborn hope.

You slowly climb the emergency stairs, feeling the night's chill on your face. By the time you reach the top, he already knows you're there.

Without even looking, he speaks in a calm tone, almost with weary humor:

“Did you know that lights seem more beautiful when you're exhausted? Maybe because you finally stop to look.”

You let out a soft laugh, and he continues:

“Or maybe it's just the tiredness talking. But I like to think there's something poetic about it. Like... the world trying to remind you that it's still worth staying awake to see the sunrise.”

Dick takes a step to the side, making room for you to approach. He sits on the edge of the building, his legs dangling in the void, and pats the spot beside him in a silent invitation.

“Sit down. It's not as high as it looks.”

You sit down, and the cold concrete contrasts with the warmth that still comes from his body. For a few seconds, no one says anything. The city seems distant—as if they were on top of the world, floating above everything.

He takes off his gloves, rubs his hands together, and sighs:

“You know... sometimes I think I live so much in the middle of the rush, the missions, the ups and downs... that I forget that the simple things also have power. Like this.”

He points to the lights, the sound of the rain, the moment.

“Two crazy guys sitting on a roof, looking at the city as if it were a painting.”

You laugh, and he smiles too—a lazy, but sincere smile.

“The worst part is that it works. You stay here long enough, and the noise becomes music. The rain becomes company. And when someone shows up to share the silence... it’s almost as if the world stops weighing you down for a few minutes.”

The rain intensifies, but he doesn’t move. He just closes his eyes for a moment, letting the drops fall on his face.

“It’s strange, isn’t it? Being a security guard, but finding peace in places where you should feel tension.”

You notice the way he speaks — his hands gesturing slightly, his voice hoarse from holding back what he feels.

Gotham was too quiet.

Or maybe it was just the constant buzzing in his head drowning out the sounds of the city. The rain had started a few minutes ago, fine and persistent, trickling down the alleys and reflecting off the red lights of distant patrol cars. Dick Grayson stood there, his body arched and his chest rising and falling unevenly, trying to understand when everything had gone wrong.

The mission was supposed to be simple—a quick interception, just reconnaissance and containment. No high-risk threat, no surprise factor. At least, there shouldn't have been. But Gotham has this peculiar talent for turning the simple into a disaster.

The building they were in collapsed ahead of schedule, the escape plan was compromised, and he had to improvise. The batons fell somewhere in the chaos, the communicator was destroyed on impact, and Tim's last words over the radio—"Dick, get out of there!"—still echoed in his mind, trapped between the sound of breaking concrete and the dry crack of his own ribs hitting the ground. Now, each step to his apartment felt like an eternity. His costume, torn in several places, was covered in dust and blood—not all of it his, which was almost a relief. The blue emblem on his chest was stained black, his knees trembled, and his right shoulder burned with a dull pain that rose to his neck.

Even so, he walked. He always walked.

"It's not the first time."

That phrase repeated itself in his head, like a kind of distorted mantra.

The first time had been at age nine—the circus ring, the ropes, the scream. The emptiness.

Then came the falls, the fights, the endless nights when he swore to himself that he would never let another fall without trying to catch them.

But that promise, however beautiful it sounded, had a price. And sometimes, the price was a bruised body and a weary soul.

He arrived home on autopilot, climbing the fire escape with the instinct of someone who had done it a thousand times before. The apartment was dark, only the streetlights filtering through the windows. He took off his mask first—it fell with a dry thud to the floor—and leaned against the wall. The air smelled of iron, rain, and dust. The blood drying on his skin pulled, burned.

The mirror in the living room reflected a version of him that looked more like a ghost than a man. The tired look, the deep dark circles under his eyes, the cut on his eyebrow still dripping slowly. He ran his hand through his hair, pushing the wet strands away from his forehead, and let out a low laugh—that laugh that always came when the pain was so intense that crying made no sense.

"You're good at this, Grayson," he thought. "At falling and pretending everything's okay."

He sat on the sofa, without completely removing his uniform. His body gave way, and he felt the weight of the entire day fall with it. Gotham seemed to stretch beyond the window, alive, cruel, and indifferent. And yet, he couldn't hate it. He never could.

Because, somewhere between the chaos and the sirens, there was still beauty. The lights. The sound of the rain. The fact that, despite everything, someone out there still believed he would return whole.

He leaned his head against the back of the sofa, closing his eyes. Memories of the mission returned in quick flashes—the sound of shattering glass, the metallic taste in the air, the glint of the explosions reflecting off the blue symbol on his uniform. The voices of the team sounded distant, fragmented, and he hated himself for having lost control of the situation.

Dick had always been the type to carry guilt along with his smile. It was part of him—a strange mechanism that mixed empathy and self-punishment. He believed that if he joked enough, people would forget how much he blamed himself. And sometimes it worked.

But there, alone, with no one to distract him, the weight returned.

He opened his eyes and looked out the window. The rain was falling harder now, scratching the glass with irregular lines. The constant sound made his head spin between exhaustion and daydreaming.

“How many more times?” he thought.

How many more times until he finally broke down?

Still, there was something inside him that refused to stop.

The same stubbornness that made him defy Bruce so many times, that made him believe he could be different—that he could still save people without becoming as cold as the world around him.

He stood up with effort, feeling his body protest, and walked to the balcony.

The cold air hit his face, bringing a little clarity. The city below seemed to pulse. From above, Gotham was almost beautiful—almost. The lights danced in the fog, and the distant sound of a siren mingled with the thunder that echoed behind the buildings.

Dick rested his arms on the railing, took a deep breath, and let out a weak laugh, the kind of sound that comes from someone who has already passed their limit, but still tries to find humor in the ruin.

For a moment, he stood there, letting the rain wash away the blood and dirt from his uniform. He closed his eyes and let the cold in, feeling the weight of the hours slip away with the water.

Wayne Manor was so silent it felt like it was holding its breath. It was always like this on nights that asked too much — the old walls seemed to absorb the weight of the dawn, as if they carried the exhaustion of those who lived there.

The sun hadn’t fully crossed the horizon yet, but the pale morning light was already slipping through the tall kitchen windows, cutting the room into golden stripes. The smell of fresh coffee filled the air, warm, familiar, almost too comforting to exist inside a house that had seen so many broken nights.

Dick Grayson was sitting alone at the table, leaning slightly forward, hands wrapped around a large mug of black coffee. It wasn’t his first cup — and judging by the look of him, it wouldn’t be the last. He wore a loose gray shirt, the kind that only came out when he was officially off-duty, and dark sweatpants that were way too comfortable for someone who had just spent hours running across rooftops.

His hair was a mess, almost comically so — the result of dried sweat and the cold wind of the night. His skin still carried a few smudges of dirt and a small cut on his eyebrow, already cleaned but still visible. The deep circles under his eyes made it obvious he had slept little — or not at all.

Instead of the flawless posture of an elite acrobat, that morning brought a Dick who was vulnerable, unarmed, more human than most people ever saw him.

He was reading a folded newspaper on the table — an old habit, almost a ritual — but his eyes betrayed his lack of focus. They skimmed the lines like his brain was trying to follow along but his body was sitting somewhere between alertness and collapse.

And still... he smiled.

A faint, crooked, lazy smile, the kind that only appeared when he finally managed to relax for a few minutes. Even exhausted, he seemed to have his own light — not intense, but soft, steady, like a lamp that stays on even when everything around it is dark.

The comfortable silence of the kitchen only broke when he heard slow footsteps behind him. Dragged, sleepy steps — the kind that only happen in the early morning when the body is still trying to convince the mind it should be in bed.

Without fully lifting his face from the newspaper, he let a smile stretch slightly at the corner of his mouth. You could always tell when someone had just woken up by the rhythm of their breathing, and Dick knew all the rhythms.

He looked back at his coffee for a moment, as if gathering the scraps of energy he still had before speaking.

He was tired — the kind of tired that weighs on your shoulders, that slows your thoughts and keeps your muscles tight. But there was something soft about that morning too, something that made him relax a little more into his chair, as if simply sharing that space turned the chaos of the night into something more bearable.

The patrol had been a mess from start to finish. A robbery that turned into a chase. A chase that turned into a shootout. A shootout that ended with a warehouse going up like a soggy match — unexpected and completely off-script.

He’d come back to the manor with his uniform dirty and his head pounding, and Alfred had basically shoved him into the shower before he could bleed on the living-room carpet.

Now, freshly washed, dressed in comfortable clothes, and with the smell of coffee filling the air, Dick finally looked less like a vigilante and more like... himself. Or at least the version of himself that only showed up when nobody demanded anything from him, when the city wasn’t screaming for help, and when he could, for five minutes, just be a tired guy trying to survive a rough dawn.

When he heard someone approaching, his first instinct wasn’t alertness — it was nostalgia. Dawn always brought a strange feeling: memories of mornings at the circus, waking up to the smell of warm food and distant laughter. Sometimes, in those quiet moments, he still found himself searching for that lost sensation.

And that morning, for the first time in weeks, the world didn’t feel quite so heavy.

He flipped the page of the newspaper with slow, almost lazy movements. His fingers, still marked by small scratches, caught the golden light coming through the window. For all his attempts at acting chill, the way he held the mug gave him away — he needed that coffee like it was oxygen.

A stray lock of hair fell over his eyes, and he brushed it away with a fingertip, letting out a long sigh — the kind that can only happen when the body begs for rest but the mind is still trapped in the events of the night before.

Even so, there was something soft about that morning. Something almost beautiful. Something that warmed his chest despite the deep exhaustion.

And when he finally lifted his eyes from the newspaper and looked at the person entering the kitchen, the smile appeared for real — small, but sincere, with that characteristic brightness Dick Grayson only had when he was trying to hide how broken he actually felt inside.

His eyes said everything: He had survived another night. And now he just wanted to survive his coffee.

He rested his elbow on the table, brought the mug to his lips, and even with dark circles under his eyes, let his charm do the work — in classic Dick fashion.

“If I say coffee is my superpower... I really hope no one tells Batman.”

And in that moment, with morning light pouring through the window, steam rising from his mug, and exhaustion still weighing on his shoulders, Dick looked exactly as he was: A hero desperately trying to get five minutes of peace before the world broke again.

The Wayne Manor was waking up slowly, as if it had been dragged through the night right along with him. The silence was heavy, but comfortable — the kind of silence that only exists in houses that are too old and too full of stories. The morning light slipped lazily through the wide windows, casting long golden shadows across the polished floor and giving everything a faint, unreal glow.

You were coming down the stairs with half-closed eyes, breathing quietly, your hair in that “I was not built for mornings” state. The kind of look you’d never call impressive... until you notice someone looking at you a little too long.

And that someone was there.

Dick Grayson. Nightwing. Exhausted, bruised, and far too good-looking to be awake before eight.

He was in the kitchen, leaning against the marble counter like it was the only thing keeping him upright. He was still wearing the uniform — the top half unzipped down to his chest, revealing sweaty skin, tense muscles, and the faint rise and fall of someone who had been running, fighting, falling, getting back up... and now just wanted coffee. Maybe coffee. Maybe something else.

His mask was tossed beside the coffee maker, still smudged with dust and a little dried blood. His escrima stick rested on the counter, silent — the only remaining evidence that hours earlier he was fighting armed men, dodging explosions, jumping rooftops... and now he was here, quiet, dealing with something much more dangerous: you walking into the room.

You let out a small sleepy cough — the soft sound of someone who’s not fully awake.

And that was when his body reacted before his mind.

Dick lifted his eyes. And everything in him shifted.

The exhaustion was still there, of course — marked in his slumped shoulders, the cut on his arm, the torn uniform, the way he held the mug with both hands. But in his eyes... there was something else. A spark. A slow, warm, completely inappropriate kind of heat for a man standing half-unzipped, hair dripping from the rain.

Then came the forbidden gesture.

He ran his hand through his hair.

Slow. Lazy. Way too deliberate.

The motion was supposed to tidy it — it didn’t. It only made it worse, leaving the strands even more tousled, falling over his forehead in a way that made the temperature of the room climb half a degree. And the worst part? He did it because he saw you. Because you walked in. Because, exhaustion and all... you got to him.

His gaze followed you across the room — down, back up, back to your face with a calm that wasn’t calm at all. It was the kind of look that said, I’m too tired to pretend I didn’t notice you.

And then he shifted, resting one hand on the counter — the movement flexing the muscles of his arm, stretching the fabric of his suit over the defined lines beneath. He angled his body slightly, like he was assessing you... but the truth was that he was appreciating you.

The smile that followed was slow, crooked, too pretty and too dangerous for this early hour.

“You always catch me at moments when I... really shouldn’t be seen.”

His voice was rough — low, warm, and intimate, in the way that only happens when he’s too worn out to hide anything.

He lifted the mug as if to drink — but didn’t. He just held it close to his mouth, watching you over the rim with that small, teasing expression he uses only when he’s trying to hide the fact he’s very clearly interested.

The tension thickened instantly.

Your body reacted before your mind did. A shiver. A skipped breath. A slower step, like the air around him demanded you move differently.

And he noticed. He noticed everything.

Dick ran his hand through his hair again — quicker this time, almost nervous, almost. His fingers slid down to the back of his neck, tugging lightly at the edge of the suit, opening it just a little more — not enough to be indecent, but enough to be distracting. Enough to be unfair.

He took a slow breath, his eyes flickering to your mouth for a second before returning to yours with a spark that felt like a soft invitation and a quiet warning at once.

And then:

“Good morning... If we’re even calling this morning. I’m still on ‘middle-of-the-night’ time.”

He let out a quiet laugh — low, warm, unguarded. Then, with a voice even softer:

“But seeing you like this... makes any hour better.”

The uniform, the cut on his arm, the hair, the exhaustion — all of it faded into the background. What mattered was him. And you. And the warm, heavy tension that made the air in the kitchen feel thicker than it should.

The patrol was over. But the dangerous part of the night? Maybe it was just beginning.