Chapter 3
The wind here bites.
It isn't like Gotham's—thick with rot and smoke. No, this wind is thin and sharp, like it was never meant for lungs. Each breath feels like inhaling knives, and the gravity tugs differently at his bones, like someone set the world just slightly off-kilter. The ground beneath his bare feet is dry and red, scorched and alien. He doesn't need long to realize he is not on Earth. That much is obvious.
What isn't obvious is how he got here.
The last thing Damian remembers is the flicker of lights in his room, the strange pull in his chest, the sudden vanishing of the world around him like someone yanked the curtain back on reality. Now—he's standing in the ruins of a battlefield, with blood-colored soil underfoot and shattered pillars stretching up into a lavender sky, two strangers facing him like ghosts caught mid-step.
He's still in his sweater. Just a soft, oversized one he'd stolen from Grayson months ago—something he never wore in front of others. It's a forest green color, cozy, loose, making him feel strangely vulnerable now. His sweatpants are too thin for this wind. He has no weapons.
No hidden knives, no utility belt, not even a single blade tucked into his waistband.
Stupid, he thinks, jaw tight. You should have known better. You should have always been ready.
He hates that he's empty-handed. Naked, practically. Any other day, he'd have at least a dagger or three on him, something to tilt the balance if things went wrong. Silently he curses Grayson for having rushed him out of bed to have breakfast. But who brings weapons to bed? Who prepares for interdimensional kidnapping in their pajamas?
And now he's standing here. Three steps away from a man in some kind of damaged metal suit—sparking at the joints, the chest piece dim—and a tall, sharp-featured woman made entirely of metal and blue skin. A robot? He thinks. An alien? Both?
Her eyes glow faintly, scanning him with open suspicion. She hasn't moved her weapon, but she hasn't lowered it either.
Damian glares back, eyes narrow, his whole body still with tension. His chin lifts in defiance.
The silence stretches. The three of them just look at each other.
Tony Stark, still processing Peter Parker vanishing mid-sentence, stares at the teenager who took his place. Nebula hasn’t spoken a word since aiming her weapon. And Damian—young, unarmed, barefoot in borrowed clothes—stands like a prince torn from his palace and dropped into hell.
But even stripped of his tools, Damian Wayne does not cower.
“Are you going to shoot me,” he says, voice calm and razor-thin, “or are you just going to keep staring?”
His words fall flat in the open air, swallowed by the strange sky. His tone isn't loud, but it cuts all the same.
The man blinks. “Well, I mean... I don’t want to shoot a kid in sweatpants, but you're not making this easy, Robin Hood.”
Robot girl still hasn’t lowered her blaster. Her eyes haven’t moved from Damian, and it’s starting to piss him off.
“Do you mind?” he snaps at her, voice curling with venom. “I’ve been here for less than two minutes and you’re already threatening me. You could at least tell me where I am before trying to vaporize me.”
Hobo guy raises a brow. “That’s fair. Welcome to Titan. It's a real fixer-upper.”
Titan, Damian repeats silently. Not a city. Not even a country. A planet. Of course. Of course he’s on another planet.
The weight of it presses behind his ribs like a stone.
Damian looks around again—really looks—and now sees the dead things. Ruined architecture. Scorch marks. Scattered ash that might not be just from fire. He’s standing in the aftermath of something terrible, and he doesn’t know what, or who, or why.
He turns slowly back to them.
“I want answers,” he says, low and cold. “And I want them now.”
The vacuous man exhales, rubbing a hand over his face. “Yeah, we all do, kid.”
Damian frowns. His hands curl into fists at his sides. The sweater’s sleeves are too long, and the hem brushes annoyingly against his thighs. It makes him feel like a child again, a civilian—soft and unprepared.
But he isn’t. No matter how he looks. No matter how unarmed he is.
“I don’t know how I got here,” he says. “But this isn’t where I’m meant to be.”
The alien speaks. Her voice is low and metallic. “You’re not lying.”
Damian locks eyes with her. “I don’t need to lie.”
The wind picks up again, ruffling the hem of his sweater. The three of them stand still in the dust of a dying moon, each one waiting for the other to make the next move.
And Damian, finally—grudgingly—asks:
“Who are you people?”
The man clears his throat, the sound oddly loud in the stillness. His face—what Damian can see of it past the dirt and scuffed plating—is somewhere between strained patience and a salesman’s grin.
“Right,” he says, dusting invisible ash off his chest plate. “Let’s do this properly then. I’m Tony Stark.”
He pauses like that name should mean something.
It doesn’t.
Damian just watches him. Blankly. Quietly. The wind whispers past, tugging at the ends of Damian’s sweater.
Tony hesitates.
“Billionaire, philanthropist, genius, Iron Man… you know.”
He gestures vaguely toward his battered suit, the arc reactor flickering dimly in the center. He even lifts a brow like he’s waiting for applause. Or at least a flicker of recognition.
He gets neither.
Damian stares at him like he’s just claimed to be Gotham’s queen.
Iron Man? What kind of name is that? And why is this man introducing himself like he's trying to sell shoes?
Damian’s lips twitch, not quite a smirk. Internally, he’s cataloging every flaw in the man’s posture—strained shoulder, favoring one leg, an edge of panic under all that wit. He’s seen that act before. Many times. It's a mask, plain and simple. Brucie Wayne would’ve gotten along just fine with this Tony Stark.
So that’s how you play this, Damian thinks. The charming fool. Let people underestimate you.
It doesn’t work on him.
Tony, oblivious or maybe just used to being adored, gestures over his shoulder.
“And that bundle of sunshine back there is Nebula. You might want to avoid pissing her off. She tends to shoot first and never really ask questions.”
Nebula says nothing. Her weapon lowers by a hair, but her eyes are still locked on Damian like she's trying to measure him by soul-weight.
Tony then shifts, hand fluttering toward Damian like he’s waving a magician on stage.
“Alright, kid. Your turn now. Who the hell are you?”
The wind blows again, rustling Damian’s curls and making his sweater flap faintly at the hem. His arms stay folded, dark eyes unblinking. He considers not answering. He considers lying. It would be easy to say nothing at all.
But there’s no power in silence right now. Not when he’s clearly outnumbered and off-world. Not when this man already thinks he’s some kind of civilian child.
He lifts his chin a little, voice quiet but firm.
“Damian.”
Tony tilts his head. “Just Damian?”
Damian narrows his eyes. “You don’t need the rest.”
The silence hums between them again.
Tony blinks, then huffs a half-laugh. “Okay. Damian. Got it. Just Damian. No ominous surname or secret prince reveal incoming?”
Damian doesn’t answer. That is a secret, and one Tony Stark hasn’t earned.
Tony shrugs. “Fine, fine. Mystery it is.”
Nebula finally shifts slightly, lowering her weapon the rest of the way—but Damian doesn’t miss how her fingers still hover near the trigger.
He doesn’t trust them. Not yet. Maybe not ever.
And yet… they’re the only ones here.
He exhales through his nose, slow and measured, mentally calculating his odds. No weapons. Unknown planet. Unknown allies.
The red haze of the ruined planet stretched far in every direction—craggy, lifeless rock glowing under a sickly, setting sun. Titan, they had called it. A name Damian had never heard before, not in the League’s archives, not in Bruce’s files. It was a graveyard. The air buzzed faintly with leftover static from energy weapons and dying tech. The silence was suffocating.
Tony Stark—who had still not properly introduced himself, because apparently manners weren’t a requirement in whatever reality this was—rubbed a hand down his face, then motioned vaguely toward the bleak horizon.
“Alright, kid,” he said, voice rough with exhaustion, “we’ll circle back to the whole ‘a random kid just appeared out of nowhere’ thing, and the ‘what the hell just happened’ thing. But priority number one? We need to get off this rock. Preferably before the air gets thinner than it already is.”
Damian folded his arms, still tense, still half-ready to strike if this stranger made a wrong move. “And go where exactly?”
“Earth,” Stark said simply, as if it were obvious. “Home. You are human, right?”
Damian bristled. “Of course I’m human.”
Stark lifted both hands in mock surrender. “Hey, I’ve seen some weird stuff lately. Had to ask.”
Damian narrowed his eyes. “How are we getting to Earth?”
Nebula, the blue woman with the cutting gaze and voice like grinding metal, stepped forward, her cybernetic eye flickering faintly as she scanned the horizon. Her skin shimmered dully in the dying light, patched together like living armor. There was something cold and hollow in her presence, but precise, too. Measured. Calculated.
She didn’t turn as she answered, “The Benatar.”
Damian followed her gaze.
At the edge of the ridge, half-buried in sand and rock, sat a ship—sleek and angular, bruised from battle, its hull scorched and dented. The Benatar was massive, with forward-thrust wings and a jagged, predatory silhouette that made it look like it had claws waiting to unfurl. Its exterior was deep red, faded in places by heat and time, and silver markings crawled across its sides like old scars.
“I can help,” Damian said sharply. “I’ve studied dozens of aerial and space-class vehicles. I’m trained in systems diagnostics, microcircuitry, and mechanical repair—”
Tony turned, already walking. “You’re twelve.”
“I’m fifteen—”
“Still a kid. So just sit tight and keep the angry ninja glare to a minimum, alright?”
Damian gritted his teeth as they made their way to the ship.
The Benatar came into view like the ghost of a bird of prey buried in ash.
Perched on a jutting slope of reddish-brown rock, the ship looked—at first glance—surprisingly intact. Damian’s sharp eyes swept across its form, cataloging damage and design alike.
It was sleek in a way that felt deliberate, made to cut through atmosphere or space alike. The forward cockpit jutted out slightly like a hawk’s beak, with tinted glass shaped into a visor that wrapped around the front and sides. Its hull shimmered in hues of deep crimson and burnished copper, with interlocking panels that looked like they were folded over one another for added durability. Twin engine pods sat at the rear, compact and efficient-looking, while four maneuvering wings arced outward with subtle elegance. The metal was burnished but not ruined, scratched by re-entry and battle, not crippled.
Even from a distance, Damian could tell the thing could fly.
Tony was already running a scan near one of the access hatches, muttering about power reserves and "failing coupling circuits." Nebula stood near the back, examining a panel that had been jarred loose—exposing some wiring and a coolant line that had clearly overheated.
But that was it. No massive hull breaches. No smoking wreckage. No trails of blood or scorch marks from the inside. The Benatar wasn’t a broken ship.
It was a tired one.
Most of what they were doing looked like rerouting basic power, patching coolant systems, and rebooting navigation. Damian could’ve handled it, if they let him. If they trusted him.
But instead he stood on the ridge, arms crossed, jaw tight, watching as they worked.
The ship’s design intrigued him. It didn’t follow any Earth-based schematic he knew. Its body was smooth, its curves too elegant for military craft but too utilitarian for a transport. The wings weren’t ornamental—they housed tiny thrusters, and each one adjusted with a subtle hum when touched. It was clearly meant for high-speed maneuvering in deep space.
And it had character. The way the panels had been repaired in places—clever but not symmetrical. The slight tilt of the right engine. A decal near the cargo bay that had been scrubbed away, but not completely. Like it had a story.
Damian watched silently, committing every inch of it to memory. Every tool Stark used, every movement Nebula made, every diagnostic screen that flickered into view.
Stark talked constantly—mostly to himself—about energy regulators, fuel compression, and some completely absurd thing called “quantum field harmonics.” He cursed at a panel, kicked it, then apologized to it.
Damian’s eyes narrowed. He wasn’t just improvising. He understood this tech—maybe even built it. A scientist, then? No. An engineer. A genius, probably. And from the way he kept checking his reflection in the Benatar’s cracked glass, a very full-of-himself genius.
He reminded Damian of Dick in the most infuriating way. That same smugness. That same instinct to joke instead of explain. That same ability to be annoyingly good at everything.
Nebula, on the other hand, moved like a blade.
Every motion she made was minimal, calculated, precise. She didn’t waste time. She didn’t speak unless necessary. She didn’t seem tired, either—just focused. Deadly.
Damian watched the way she handled tools and tech—her grip exact, her eyes scanning for inefficiencies. Her left arm, metal from shoulder to fingertip, extended and split at the wrist, transforming seamlessly into a multitool she used to weld a ruptured thruster line.
No wasted movements. No nonsense. No trust.
Damian recognized it instantly.
She was like him.
And that made her a potential threat.
As Tony cracked another joke about needing “a burrito and a billion-dollar wrench,” Damian stood silently at the ridge, arms folded, observing everything. Memorizing.
He didn’t trust these people. Not yet.
But he would understand them. He would learn everything he could.
Because one way or another, he was getting back home.