Chapter Text
This was Damian’s year so far. Which might have been an odd thing to think considering that Alfred Pennyworth died late last year literal days before the school year started but Damian had to have something to keep him from completely crashing out unlike his Father.
Or more like his Father and his relationship which is now nonexistent thanks to Alfred Pennyworth’s death--though the butler himself did not do anything to spur it on himself that he had any control over--but Father making his own conclusions on the state of things, aka blaming Damian for Alfred dying when Damian did everything in his power to save Alfred was just a slap in the face.
Father took away Robin. Damian could care less. Being Robin was exhausting at this point, it did not hold the same meaning as it used to for him and this point just caused him to be miserable because it was one more thing that his Father could hold over his head. Unlike the other Robins before him Damian had seen how they all had fallen into the pit of trying to prove that they are Robin and Father cannot take that away from them.
Spoiler alert they had all failed, even Spoiler herself.
Damian was never under any delusion that he was Robin and Robin was him, with Drake bearing the title while he was “out of town” thinking he was so slick and just calling himself Red Robin.
No other Robin before him has had to share the title of Robin before like this. One could make the argument that Drake was included in that statement then as well but he was not considering that he had a completely Damian free Robin stint. Damian was never held under such delusions.
All of which to say is that Damian knew that him being Robin was on thin ice, having only been instated originally during Grayson’s run of Batman in the first place where Drake had the break downs of all break downs over it like he didn’t replace someone who replaced Grayson? Did he truly think that he was never replaceable? Did he not understand that that was the Robins curse? It all seemed very naive to Damian but the guilt on Grayson’s face told him that unlike the rest maybe Drake was the irreplaceable one at least not replaceable by Damian of all people.
After Alfred died the family that finally seemed to have come together spread apart. Damian hardly ever saw his Batman anymore. Jason, the one person he had during his time during the League that is still in his life, vanished from the Manor and Damian's life completely. Jason’s was probably the least surprising considering that he would always say that he was coming around for “Alfred and Alfred alone.” but Damian had always thought that maybe just maybe he had come around because he missed Damian sometimes. But now? That was proven to have been a very wrong assumption to have been made. He truly was just coming around for Alfred and Damian never truly meant anything to Jason or Todd now. Todd does not deserve to be addressed by his first name now or well he never truly did because Damian was a naive fool.
Drake had moved out which just made the Manor feel more lonely and empty after Alfred had died. It made Damian just realize more and more how little he means to everyone around him. Drake and Damian had never been on the greatest terms but they had been getting better and it felt nice to just have another person around in the house. That was now gone along with Duke who had been living at the Manor mostly now also gone with no semblance of a relationship left either. Stephine, Babs, and Cass it's all the same everyone is all gone and out of the house leaving Damian behind without so much as a “Hey : )” once in a blue moon.
It makes everything in the past that happened feel so so fake. Especially that last stretch where they truly felt like a family and Damian truly thinks about it and realizes that he was just some add to it all. Except for Alfred. Alfred truly cared. Though Todd always went on about doing stuff with the family “Just of Alfie.” Damian was the only one that had permission for the older man himself to call him Grandfather when no one else was around. Damian was the one that Alfred’s daughter is in contact with, no one else knows her name. Julia cares a lot about Damian always asking about how he is doing after Alfred has died.
Julia knows what Father said, more like excused, Damian of doing and it made her so upset. Julia helped Damian feel more human when he was all alone left by his family. She was his saving grace that no one else had.
Julia helped even when Alfred was alive even though she is much older than Damian. Giving him an Aunt/older sister figure to help guide him. Especially after he lost the majority of his friends. Jon went to the future, disappeared from Damian’s life without a trace and came back so much older than him. There was nothing to say or do about that relationship considering that though for Damian his best friend had been gone for three weeks Jon had been gone for years and had lived a life that Damian could never even begin to understand. So Damian cuts it loose and lets Jon live his life free of this little kid from his past.
Damian sees on the news nowadays that Jon as Super whatever he goes by now hangs around Nightwing and can’t help but feel that, that is what or more like who replaced him in Grayson’s life but who wouldn’t take an older more mature person with powers over the little brother you never actually wanted to have.
Whatever happened to Maps, Colin or Flatline? Damian is not sure but he knows that he was left behind for things that were greater to them than him. While he can’t be upset about being happy, they are finding something that makes them happy.
He does have one friend left after all of this and that is Skylar from middle school. She has stayed by his side all of this time. Damian has even revealed secret identities to her and her parents by accident but they have sworn not to tell.
Skylar’s mother, Katherine is a social worker and therapist while Skylar’s Father, Joe though his first name is actually something different and that is his middle name, is a Vice President at Western Gotham University. Damian is at their house about every weekend after Alfred has died because he feels like these people actually care and understand him in ways that others do not or could not.
Knowing the identities, though Katherine already had a great “hypothetical” idea already given certain work she has had to do in the government he can talk to them and get opinions on things that are not biased because they have known his Father for years before knowing him. For once people actually take his side.
Which comes to back to beginning which is this so far has been the best year of Damian’s life. This is because Skylar’s parents and herself along with help from Julia because they all talk now apparently have been asking Damian about what he wants to do with his future. First he does not want to be a vigilante or be involved in it. To the smallest degree as possible given his life and decisions he cannot control himself. Second, he wants to go to college. Third, he wants to be a doctor want kind of doctor he has yet to fully decide on, but this is the plan.
To do this plan he is going to do a running start which means going through Gotham Academy's dual credit program through the local community college Gotham Community College because they have a deal where they do this for free in schools in the area. Since part of the subsets of these goals is for Damian to be as independent as possible from his Father and therefore his bank account which he has thankfully already started building by working for animal shelters as soon as he had gotten to the legal age to do so.
Alfred had helped him set up a savings account with a really good interest rate to store the money that he was earning in there, which was still going strong as of now. Damian was unaware if Father was aware of the account or not but since it was made when Damian was still minor and the fact that he still is one Alfred had to co sign it as the adult which has now fallen to Julia his daughter which Damian and her made sure of.
Damian has all the records on the taxes that his paychecks have needed all over the years, he has physical copies, and digital just in case.
One might think that Damian is being very paranoid with how meticulous and cautious he is being like he is escaping a cult which if you think about for a bit to long yeah he kind of his escaping a cult it is because when Grayson moved out to go to college and gain independence from Father, Father had the crash outs of all crash outs. Which is also how Todd joined the family which in of itself was a huge mistake. And Damian did not need the whole family breathing down his neck if his Father goes and gains another child because of his choices okay?? He just wants to live his life.
Anyways this year Damian has a shit ton of credits to get done with at Gotham Academy so he is doing a more than full course load, along with the SAT that is breathing down his neck that he has to get passing scores on or else he won’t be able to go to Gotham Community College for the dual credit program starting this Summer semester. Right now Damian is a Sophereme in high school. Thankfully his dumbass was already ahead of credits for most classes because of the homeschooling stint that he did but he had to get the rest of the credits done.
While Damian was panic planning with Skylar, Katherine, Joe, and Julie, Damian had to admit he understood why Drake dropped out of high school in these conditions. You see Metragoth (in the in post ww 2 1940s the cities Gothman and Metropolis were so outlandishly different they became their one state out of New Jersey) as a state has some of the hardest requirements to graduate high school let along for those high schoolers to get into colleges in their own damn state. Damian is not sure the process is for out of staters but he does not want to find out when they find out what they have to do.
First is the credit plans that you have. Now when you first get into high school they have these beautiful things majors for high school which do not exist in their neighbor New Jersey according to Duke who used to live there. Deciding on the major you want to pursue can help the high school help you pick which type of credit plan that you want to go with.
Really these “Majors” are endorsements for certain fields of study. There is the STEM, Business and industry, public service, arts and humanities, or multidisciplinary. Each one requires you to take a certain number of extra classes plus your scores such as in the STEM one you would take the required 3 years of math and science then another year of math and science as it is required.
The range of credit needed to graduate are 26-22 the average being 24.
26 credits is for those who want to get special endorsements from the state to help get into colleges plus the ones in the speciality that you picked in high school. This is to help get into very competitive schools in the state like Ivy University. 24 credits means that you are university ready because that means you did all 4 years of cores meaning you did 4 years of math, science, english, and social studies even if it was not required for your endorsement. Then lastly the 22 credit plan is just doing your endorsement plan without completely your cores meaning you can just get into a trade or community college after graduation. If you would want to continue to go to a university afterwards you would need to first complete the necessary courses at a community college. It is similar in concept to a GED.
Since Damian had plans on becoming a doctor the best course of action would be doing the 26 credit plan since the STEM endorsement along with the endorsement from the state will look better on college applications in the future. Luckily he already had a head start with credit gathering from his homeschooling days so he is not too far behind on that.
Secondly, he has to consider the mastery tests. Mastery tests are another thing that are seemingly not that very common in other states other than Metragoth, and they only take place in one's Freshman and Sophomore years of schooling. These mastery tests are to make sure the students have “mastered” the subjects that they will have been tested in, which are scores that they have taken during the school years. You take one for each semester of the course. So you take two each. The subjects these mastery tests test you in are in English 1 A & B, English 2 A & B, Algebra 1 A & B, Biology A & B, and U. S. History A & B. In total you have to pass 10 of these mastery tests. They are graduation requirements to have passed if one does not then they have to wait for the next semester to retake the mastery test.
Damian just finished the last one of these for himself. He never heard back about the scores he had gotten on the previous 9 he had taken in the past so he assumes he had passed, last school year he had last minute dropped a class and switched to US History B and missed the pre test (because you have to take one of those before all of the mastery tests) and therefore could not take the mastery test that semester. When he took the pre mastery test for US history B he was worried because he had summer break and worried he had forgotten everything he needed to know along with the grief of Alfred’s death still hanging over him quite heavily but he felt confident when they seemingly gave him all the sources he needed to know.
So when he went to take the US History B mastery and the English 2 A mastery test he felt quite confident in himself. He finished the English 2 A mastery test in record time and once he opened the US History B mastery test he still was running from that high only for it to drop to the ground dead. He had forgotten everything. And there were no sources this time.
The only confidence that Damian had left inside of himself was that he was going to fail the US history mastery test. So he quickly went through it trying to bring anything up to the surface that may have been stuck in his memory. He even started drawing on the scratch paper because he was going through these tests so fast he didn’t want teachers to catch onto the fact that he had no idea what he was doing. That he didn’t study because what in the world was he supposed to study for these types of things?
Yes he was a 4.0 GPA student but that doesn't mean he always makes the smartest decisions all the time! Especially back when he was Robin. The thought sent a sharp stab of pain through his heart though the pain never did truly ever leave him. Damain was truly worried that he was going to fail and he did not like failing. Especially nowadays failing was not to be tolerated. How he wished Alfred was still alive so he could go to him like he did in Freshman year...
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Damian had gotten into the car with his nerves on fire. The mastery testing was done today for Algebra 1 A, English 1 A, and Biology A, and Damian was not confident in his performance that he had completed and his stomach turned over itself and made him want to puke. At least because he had to do this type of testing the rest of the school seemed to let the Freshman off easy and left them screwed around. Well if screwing around was everyone looking like they were going to pass out at moments notice. All of the Juniors and Seniors were looking at them with pure pity, that is if they themselves did not have to retake the mastery tests because they failed them the years before...
The thought made Damian want to bash his head against something. Just one single comment from lunch kept replaying over and over again inside of Damian’s head.
Skylar and Damian were in the library where it was much quieter for their lunch break considering the cafeteria was usually over crowded with everyone else and they did service hours for the librarian. Some of the aids were in here hanging out because they had free periods, this always bugged Skylar and Damian because if they are aids should they not be aiding when they are on their aid time like everyone else? But no one can really make seniors work even if their lives depended on it. And though Damian and Skylar would never admit it, they love to listen to what the seniors say because they somehow always know the big stuff happening around the school while Damian and Skylar remain clueless.
Damian and Skylar were helping with some of the Elementary students from the Gotham Academy's elementary branch next door with some art project while they were listening in. It was a nice mind numbing thing to do after having been torched with tests for the first 4 hours of the day.
“...I can’t believe that Kevin is asking a freshman out for the football game. It's so gross.” A blonde girl said from the table not in the evening pretending to be doing anything important. Though Damian noted the name to stay away from as another older student creeped.
“Okay but can we really be that surpised?” The tallest guy asks the table to which they pause for a moment before they all start to burst out in a fight of resigned laughter. “I mean, this is Kevin Koil we are talking about here.” The tallest guy continued after the laughter died down a bit.
“Dude is so obsessed with being Freshman, he can’t even pass the Freshman Mastery tests still.” A person with long shaggy hair from the corner spoke up, rolling their eyes.
“Hold it there, not everyone can pass the mastery tests on the first try, most don’t. You are just special,” The blonde girl spoke up again pointing an accusing finger at the person with shaggy hair.
“Wait no they got a point.” The tallest guy said, “Didn’t Kevin pass all of the Sopherme ones first try?”
“How would I know? I passed all of them on the first try. Unlike most grades.” The person with shaggy hair boosted and the rest of the table just groaned and shook their heads clearly sick of hearing this.
“Yeah, yeah we get perfect students over here. But that is what Ms. Lake says that the majority of students don’t pass the mastery tests first time and take them over into their Junior year. You're lucky if you even pass all of the sphere ones on the first try.” The blonde girl said, clearly getting defensive, it seemed like this was a sore subject for her. “But now that you mention it, it is really weird that Kevin passed all of the sophomore year ones for the first time and yet he is still taking the freshman ones as a senior...”
The group then went on talking about a weird psychological theory that maybe Kevin was trying so hard to be a Freshman that his grades reflected that to be able to date Freshman or something or another. That was not the point that stuck out to Damian and Skylar no it was that fact that it seemed that no one was able to pass the mastery tests on the first try according to Ms. Lake the librarian and proctor for all testing and academic counselors.
Once Damian and Skylar were done helping the elementary students with their art project and they went on their way back to the building for Elementary Gotham Academy with them as escorts with their teachers they were on their way back to the high school building when they got the chance to talk about what they had overheard.
“Do you believe it?” Skylar asks, looking worried as they strolled on the paved path between buildings her and Damian taking the long way around. Her red hair long and braided down her back out of her face. The gloomy sky surrounding Gotham as always seemed to have darkened with the information that the two had just received. Though that might be Damian just being dramatic. Her brown eyes were clear and tried from dealing with being poked and prodded at for all the knowledge that she possessed in her brain. She looked rumpled but earlier she looked proud now she looks defeated even though she doesn't even know if the things she has heard are even true.
Damian cannot help but wonder what he looks like right now at this moment. Does he look like Skylar? Does he look worse? Does he look confident? Defiant? Or neutral?
“I am not sure. But Ms. Lake would not lie about something like that. It would explain why it seemingly paused the whole school and not just the Freshman and Sophmores.” Damian admitted because it was the truth. Even if he did not want to believe it or hear it himself.
The mastery tests have about 80 questions a piece and that does not count the ones that have part A part B, etc. they are draining time wasting and grad requirments. Grad reqirments. You have to pass them all in order to have met the requirement. It can hold you back from graduation. Sure they can write them off but that can keep you from getting into colleges and universitys....not to mention the TSI requirements and....Damian feels a headache coming on....
The rest of the day felt like a blur where Damian just wanted to curl up and cry in some corner of the room from feeling so overwhelmed. Which was stupid because he was Robin and a trained assassin and has literally come back from the dead but now the worst thing he can deal with is graduation requirements that feel like a never ending list that makes him want to curl up and die again to avoid it.
Maybe Damian should take a page out of Jason’s book.
“Damian, is everything okay?” Alfred- no Grandfather, Grandfather asked looking up and making eye contact with him in the rear view mirror which said enough about how mental out of it Damian was currently that he had forgotten that he was now old enough to ride in the passenger seat which he now preferred to do. It made him feel closer with Grandfather and less overwhelmed.
“No,” Damian said, feeling his throat clog up and his eyes burn like they are on fire and God- why does the start of tears have to hurt so much, and why is he even crying over something like this in the first place? This is radical.
Grandfather’s soft expression somehow softened even more a feat that Damian was still left wondering how he was even capable of doing. “Well what is then my boy?”
“I had to take all those mastery tests today and you know they are graduation requirements and I heard some seniors talking about how Ms. Lake said that most people don’t even pass them the first time around and I just don’t want to have to do them again. They are 80 questions each and you only have the chance to do them once a semester and they can hold you back from graduation or if they write them off hold you back from college-”
“It sounds like you are thinking too much Damian. You are just 14 years old, a Freshman. Most freshmen are not even thinking about graduation requirements. I really have no idea why they have those tests. They really test you kids here too much. Don’t worry about it right now Damaian, you don’t even know if you passed or not.” Grandfather ranted which shocked Damian out of his panicked spiral enough to snort out some laughter which made Grandfather smile at him again the wrinkles from all the smiles of his lifetime showing on his face clearly in that moment. It was a moment that Damian after Alfred had died would draw to never forget how happy he was and proud he was of him for the words that followed afterwards were some that Damian was never going to forget.
“Besides I think you are smarter than the rest of the lot at that school anyways so don’t worry too much about it. Now how about we stop and get some ice cream before I drop you off at the animal shelter for your shift. It sounds like you need to pick me up.”
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...unfortunately Damian did not have Alfred to pick him up after he felt like he failed the Us history B mastery test. He went on the bus and got dropped off on the point where all the kids in the diamond district walked the rest of the cold way home. Once he got to the front doors to the manor he took a breath preparing himself to go inside but really he was never ready to go back in there.
That day was especially hard. All Damian wanted was the comfort of his grandfather, but when he opened the door what he was met with was something very different.
Father and the rest of the family were gathered together in the family room laughing and having the time of their lives together. Even Todd was there. Damain was excluded. Forgotten. Cast aside. On purpose because he was the one that ruined the family to begin with. The burden was thrown onto his Father’s lap when Damian’s Mother did not want to care for him anymore. Destroying the family with him because his Mother thought that it would be a nice seed of revenge that way.
As the Demon Brat that destroyed the Wayne family. The Wayne family rebuilt around the Demon Brat not with around but Damain was a fool enough to believe he was with. Until the Demon Brat could not save Alfred something that still eats Damian up alive every second of every single day. Because his Father said he was not good enough. That was when the Demon Brat learned he was never a part of this family and that he was not wanted and that he needed to leave. Now.