Who: Damian, Dick, and Helena What: Snowball fight and picking out a tree Where: Wayne Manor grounds When: Prior to Christmas Warnings/Rating: Dami and Hels being cute Waynesibs.
Damian had been doing a pretty good job at being an adult. Obviously, not the most mature or experienced adult in the batfamily, but his brattiness wasn’t bookended by ignorant indifference or an apathetic attitude to anyone who tried to be part of his life. In fact, he was trying to do what Selina suggested and piece parts of the family back together. Some of them wouldn’t fit or didn’t have any interest in trying, but simply doing holiday things with his sister and Grayson was a good start. He even tried to reach out to Tim, the bastard, even though he still had some massive stick up his ass since the last time they talked. Damian was maturing. Slowly but surely.
But, now he felt like he was ten again. He trekked across the snowy Wayne grounds after Helena and Dick, axe swung over his shoulder as he hid his nose in an overly large scarf with his wool knitted cap pulled down to his ears. Christmas and celebrating the holidays was a new thing for him and while he was used to people like Grayson and Steph trying to get him to do “normal kid stuff”, this was a whole lot bigger than just taking him to a bounce castle. There was a tree, decorating, egg nog, presents, lots of sugar and all of this cheer the holiday season apparently brought with it. Damian did his best to seem pretty grumpy about all of it, but anyone who knew him well enough could tell he was enjoying it as much as a little kid trapped in an eighteen year old’s body could.
“I probably should have brought a chainsaw.” Damian said suddenly, looking at the axe over his shoulder with doubts. And, in that second he stepped into a pile of fresh snow and sank three feet with a woosh of powder. He threw the axe next to him, which promptly sank into into snow, too and tried to struggle free.
Hels couldn't do pink, but white for snow? Definitely do able. Decked out in head to toe white down to her white snow boots and the knitted white cap with a poof ball on the top, she was ready for this. Christmas at home had always been a big deal, with trees, dinner, people coming over. It was a balancing act between who knew Dad was Batman and who didn't, but when they all got around the dining room table to share stories. There had never been a lot of caroling, but she was fine with that.
This? Not quite the same, but it was still good after five years of not having it at all. Hels had tried the first year that she and Kara were on their not-home and it flopped. Badly. Since then it'd been beaches and parties and with her trying not to get twisted up in knots about it while Kara found something to distract herself with.
She was so ready for this. And going to get this tree? She was ready for that too. Hearing the whoosh of snow, she glanced back from where she was walking next to Dick and laughed, the upper part of Damian's body visible from the snow drift. "You okay?" She asked as she walked over, careful not to sink as deep down as he had and offered out a hand to help him out.
Dick was bundled up, but he definitely didn’t have a hat with a puffy ball on top of it. He stuck with gloves, his jeans, a hoodie and a warm coat over it. His nose was pink from the cold, and he could see his breath. He was trying to blow breath rings as they walked out to chop down a Wayne Family Christmas tree.
And then he practically stopped in his tracks. Damian. Chainsaw. No. The answer was always no. “I think we’ll do just fine with an axe, don’t be a wuss,” And then he fell in the snow. And Dick almost fell over from laughing so hard. It was always nice when Damian tried very hard to be very important and fell over. “And that’s why,” he said laughing and damn near crying from it. “Good thing you’re taller now, kid. You’d be in over your head for sure.”
“Stop laughing!” Damian squirmed in the snow, arms flailing a little as it made him sink a little more. “I’m going to kill you Grayson.” That serious boy assassin look in his eye, though when it was directed towards someone like Dick, was completely meaningless. Damian was the king of empty threats (and also real threats but that tended to involve beating up ninjas). He reached for Helena’s hand and stumbled out of the snow, the white powder clinging to his jacket and pants and he tried to shake it off. This is what happened when Pennyworth wasn’t here. Banks of snow for people to fall into and probably die.
Damian went to pick up the axe, but instead formed a perfect snowball between his gloves and hurled it at Dick’s head before reaching for another handful of snow to throw at Helena. Was that a smile on the baby bird’s lips? No. No it couldn’t be.
Even as new as Damian was to her, Hels could tell that it was all bark and no bite, not until Damian got that look in his eyes. She knew looks like that and ducked, grabbing a handful of snow up between her mittens and molding it into a perfect snowball. "Don't even think about it," she said lowly, grinning, watching as he went for the second handful of snow.
Not that she thought Damian would listen for a second. She lobbed her perfect snowball at his center mass and ran for cover behind a tree, kicking up snow behind her and laughing all the way.
“That didn’t take long,” Dick said dodging snow balls and flying snow from Helena’s feet. He was laughing because this was probably the most normal thing he’d done in a long time, and the most normal thing he’d done since he’d gotten to this weird place. So he did the only thing he could which was make a snowball of his own and pelt it right at Damian’s head.
Damian was taking this snowball thing pretty seriously. He dove behind a stump, his entire jacket now covered in snow as he made three more hasty snowballs and fired them first at Hels and then at Dick. The last snowball was a mistake, however, because as soon as he showed his melon head, Grayson pelted him hard on the side of his temple. Snow was everywhere now. His face, his hair, his eyebrows. It made him look like some kind of demon snow teenager set to get his revenge on Christmas.
“Not fair! You guys are ganging up on me!” Damian gave the both of them the look of an 80 year old grumpy man and rolled behind a nearby tree. “Fine. You want to team up, then do it. Not like it’ll matter if-” Damian was halfway throwing his next barrage of snowballs when he realized the tree he was hiding behind might look good in the manor decorated with lights and ornaments. The little bird looked up at the branches and with a jump, started to climb upwards to check for bird nests. The smart ones migrated, right?
"It's his repressed childhood," Helena said to Dick. It hadn't taken long, but there was all this beautiful, pristine snow that looked like it had been taken directly from one of those heart warming cards in Hallmark.
It was absolutely a crime to let it go to waste, even with the snow covered Grinch-Damian laying down the glower. Watching Damian out of the corner of her eye, she made her next barrage, but chucked one at Dick's head just so he didn't feel left out. The rest she was saving for Damian, as soon as he got himself out of that tree.
There was no mistaking the look of pride on Dick’s face while Damian climbed the damn tree, he certainly wasn’t surprised but he was always pleased when Damian showed off - as strange as that sounded. Dick liked to show off too, it only fit that he’d be pleased as punch when Damian did it. For a good cause. “I think we’re all full up of repressed childhoods, we may as well throw some snow at each other once in a while to get it out of our systems.”
Damian went up the tree pretty fast, but that wasn’t really much of a surprise to anyone present. He started to pick through the branches to make sure there weren’t any birds or woodland creatures scurrying around or hibernating. “This looks clear to me!” He called from the branches, hidden in the green of the pine. A moment later and Damian was hopping back down, stumbling a little on more snow, but ultimately making a pretty good landing. “I want this tree.” Yes, it was the first one that he saw in the clearing, but Damian wasn’t exactly the shopping kind.
"I'm not," Hels said. Her childhood had been good, even with all the training and the being dropped out of planes -- she didn't mention that last bit though and she honestly didn't know if this Dick or this Damian went through anything similar. Dropping her half formed snowball into the snow as Damian made his assessment, she came out from behind her tree and trekked over. Little globules of crushed snow remained on her gloves as she looked at her half-brother and then up at the tree. "Looks good. Think we should find another one that's fuller though?" She asked, reaching up as if to clap him on the back and grinned as she put her gloved hand, little snow balls and all against the back of his neck.
Damian shouted, hands flinging back to scoop the cold snow out of his jacket with zero success. “That’s it.” He looked to her like oh now you messed up and kicked the tree they were standing under as hard as he could. In an instant, all of the snow that had been on the branches came tumbling down on both of them in an avalanche of white and branches. A moment passed in the wake of his suicidal snow fighting tactic and Damian crawled out from under the tree, laying on his back as he picked out twigs from his clothes and hair. “I am victorious.” He said quietly, eyes narrowed.
Dick was glad that he had emerged from this adventure mostly unscathed - more than content to watch Damian and Helena kill each other with snow. But he was on his guard. When he dumped half the tree on Helena he laughed outright. “Nicely done, Damian, and you look like you’re one with nature,” he said raising his eyebrows, “Move so I can chop it down and watch you two bring it in.” He said smiling mischievously.
It took her a minute longer to unbury herself from the snow and spot Damian there, a snow-ridden target. "You could almost be a snowman," she said as she buried both gloved hands in the snow. This time she didn't even bother trying to make them into snowballs, just started heaving snow at her half-brother. "We could bury you like they do on the beach, leave just your head above ground," Hels started, grinning as she picked the branch stuck halfway down her coat out.
At this point he was shoveling armfuls of snow her way. It wasn’t an effective tactic, but in the flurry of snow flying everywhere, it didn’t really seem to matter anymore. About halfway through the sibling snowstorm, Damian stopped and backed away from the tree. He opened his mouth to announce he no longer wanted to cut the tree down himself, but decided against it. Because the more he thought about it, cutting down a tree wasn’t all that fun. It was needless work that Grayson could do for him. And, if Damian said he didn’t want to do something, they’d probably make. “Pfft. I bet that tree isn’t too heavy.” He said about carrying it. “Though, I don’t know if Hels has the upper body strength for it.”
Helena stopped shortly after Damian did and watched him, ready for another attack, but it didn't come. Her left eyebrow scooted up her forehead at his proclamation and then his assumption. "As long as you do your part, I'll do mine." But her grin said something else. He was going to pay for that little comment later. Maybe not today, maybe not tomorrow, maybe not even this year, but when the little bird wasn't ready for it, she was going to get him back for that. "Though I understand if you don't have the strength for it. Growing up so fast, you probably need some time to build up those muscles again," she teased.
Dick rolled his eyes, but he was smiling, “Now children, behave,” he said and then went to work on managing the tree issue. It was huge. Bruce was going to kill them. And it would be awesome. It didn’t take him long, not by most standards anyway, to cut down a tree, And he could tell it was going to fall rather easily. “Get out of the way, get on this side and just push it over,” he said helpfully.
Damian gave Helena a grumpy look that was playful in his own way, but to the common observer it looked like he was trying to render his entire face expressionless. He moved to push the side Grayson designated without arguing or finding another stupid way to get it to fall over. With Helena’s help, the huge thing easily toppled over with a fwooosh onto fresh powder. There was something immensely satisfying about seeing something huge fall over, but the reality of having to carry the damned thing set into Damian quickly. He gave a half frown, already moving to the middle of the tree to pick it up and carry it inside.
"We are behaving," Helena retorted, smiling as she bent down to loop her arm around the top of the tree (it was going to need at least two people to carry it inside, no matter what Damian thought). She wouldn't even throw a snowball at his turned back this time as they started the trek back across the snowy lawn. "We're going to need decorations," she chimed up as they neared the Manor. It was going to be awesome.