A couple of things had happened since the accident.
But first of all being in a wheelchair shucked. Everyone looked at him with pity on their eyes, and retired to help him.
And nobody ever thought about the people in wheelchairs! Elevators being to small or too many stairs! He really didn't appreciated something so simple as walking when he should have.
(Believe me, I was in a wheelchair for a month and a half when I was nine, that was an eternity back then, it sucked to got to the cinema or to eat, or basically anywhere like that. But what it sucked the most was going for Halloween ;-;)
Not being Robin was also getting on his nerves.
Ever since the doctors said that he wouldn't be able to walk again, even the league's doctors, he would dream of walking, playing with his pets, patrolling with his family, he just dreamed of using his legs again.
He missed that so much it hurt.
The first couple of weeks he had been sleeping a lot, just so he could walk again at least in his dreams. But then his father decided that he needed a routine to get used to his new...condition.
Damian had never hated so much routines. He needed help to do anything, everyone treated him as if he was a porcelain jar. (Like the one he just broke the first day when he felt from the wheelchair, just don't tell Bruce).
The only one who treated him the same was Gordon because she knew about that. And he was deeply grateful for that.
"Damian, I believe it's time you go back to school." His father told him one day.
Damian agreed, he never thought that he would want to go back to that place, but right now it could be a way to distract himself, no matter how easy those classes were.
He started school again after a couple of months after the...accident. They had told the people that it had been a car crash were Damian got hit in the back.
Everyone believed that. And everyone stared at him.
Look, he wasn't used to be the most nice person before at school. But right now he did his best to not punch the guys who looked at him with a smile on their eyes. And not a nice one.
Just because he was in a wheelchair it didn't mean he wasn't dangerous.
"Dames! Hey! I've been waiting for you to show up!" Jon came running towards his friend.
Damian just smiled, he hadn't seen Jonathan since the last time he visited him, that was weeks ago and Damian hadn't even been able to control his wheelchair properly.
(I mean it's not that hard, but it get stuck a lot, you also need a lot of strength on your arms to do anything by yourself).
Jon didn't offered himself to push him, and he was happy with that, they both went to the lockers' room to talk for a bit.
As Damian looked around he could see people smiling at him with pity, others saying he deserved it, and then there were people seeing him with respect.
Classes finally started, his father had build an elevator for him in the school, as well as some ramps and stuff to make him easier to move.
He sat in the front of the classroom during all his classes.
Class eventually ended and he returned back to the manor. His family was down at the bat cave, and Alfred helped him to get down.
"-if we could go and enter here..." he heard Tim saying as he was showing Bruce some blueprints.
They both ignored his presence until Damian's chair gave away his position by making a creak.
"Damian, I didn't knew you were down here." His father said. "Is everything ok?"
Damian rolled his eyes, "Tt, of course father, I just wanted to see if I could do anything here to help."
"Oh no, we're just planning tomorrow's stuff, we will go to one of the mob's places to do some recognition and getting evidence on this new drugs that have been affecting a lot of people in Gotham." Tim answered, not really paying attention to him and taking some notes in the blueprints. "Shouldn't you be doing homework or something?"
"I already finished." He said as he got closer to take a look of the blueprints, but before he was able to, his father blocked his sight.
"Dames, why don't you go upstairs, I'll be there after we finish this."
Damian glared at the nothing, his father didn't wanted him on the mission, it had been like that since he got paralyzed.
He didn't said anything, Alfred just came to help him go upstairs to his room.
Next day was horrible, Damian woke up in pain. It was a bad day, on good days he wouldn't feel his legs a lot, but on bad days these would hurt, a lot.
"Master Damian, time to go to school." Alfred told him.
Damian didn't answered, too focused on trying to control the pain.
"Master Damian, do you want me to bring your meds?" Even with his high tolerance to pain he couldn't hide this, and much less to Pennyworth, he had learned that it was better to just tell him, since the last time he ignore that he got himself in this situation.
Alfred gave him some pain meds, and then called school to tell that he wouldn't be able to go today. It want a big problem, after all, Jon could just bring his homework to the manor on the afternoon.
All the day was blurry because of the meds, he had been sketching and drawing a lot, and at some point Jon came to play video games with him and give him do some homework.
When Jon finally left it was past dinner time, he had barely seen Bruce or Tim during the day, and it was just a couple of hours before they left for patrol.
He went downstairs through the elevator, and decided to go out, something he hadn't done much because he hated getting stuck in the grass with the wheelchair.
Titus followed him, he had been looking at his owner for the last couple of months, trying to play with him and not understanding what was that big thing he used, or why he groaned in pain sometimes when he jumped on him to play.
"Good boy..." Damian said as the Great Dane sat at his side, Damian was petting him with one hand, while using the other to sketch, it was a Friday, so he didn't care to spend some more time outside.
Some more hours passed, he knew that his father and Drake were returning from patrol, so he decided to go to the cave and check on them.
He did his best to not fall in the ramp.
"Father? Drake? Are you in he-" he was interrupted by Alfred talking through the coms.
"I'll call master Dick, he can help you get out..."
Damian went to the batcomputer, where he was able to see their cameras, they were in a room full of people, trying to find a way out.
He then turned at the table, where the blueprints from yesterday were.
"Wait...I recognize this blueprints." Damian said. "This place is owned by my grandfather."
"A, what did Rob-I mean D said?" Batman spoke.
"Batman, I know this blueprints, I know a way to get you out, uh...if you hit the west wall not very hard, but hard enough to make a hole, you'll see there's an empty room with a window on it, that's the nearest exit, that's also probably we're they have the evidence."
"Wait, no, I memorized completely the blueprints and there wasn't anything about a secret room." Red Robin said.
"Tt. Of course not! This is the league we are talking about. The league would never put everything on blueprints! They are not stupid, we just memorized everything." Damian said annoyed.
"Ok, we will try."
His father grabbed one of the mobsters and threw him to the wall Damian said, leaving a big hole on it.
**
After getting the evidence and leaving the place, Batman and Red Robin arrived back at the batcave.
"We got the drug, now we just need to run some analysis." Bruce said.
"Well demon, that information was handy, but do you've got any idea of why your grandfather would own a mob's place?"
"I've got no idea, but knowing my grandfather those weren't monsters, they were some of his assassins doing some research with that drug, to use it on people."
"I knew those mobsters were too good to be just that." Tim said.
"You know, I can help from here, just like Oracle does."
His father turned his head to look at his son in that moment.
"Damian are you sure-"
"Of course, I have demonstrated that my condition does not affect the fact that I'm useful and can help you."
"Uh I hate to admit it, but the demon brat is right."
Bruce sighed, knowing that his son would find a way to fight crime a way or another, at least like that he would be able to keep an eye on him before he did something stupid.
"Ok, fine, you can help us, but what about a codename? We can't just call you D."
"Shadow, I like the name Shadow."