A Chance

-8-

Danny woke up silently, his chest heaved as he breathed in a deep relaxing sigh and curled slightly on the warm soft mass beneath him.

Wait a second.

Danny jerked upright, eyes open wide, finding Bruce above him... well- around him. He'd been resting in his lap last time he remembered, he must have fallen asleep.

"Good morning." Bruce said, his cool blue eyes open as well and watching Danny shrivel.

The halfa huddled down, wondering what was going on and what he should be doing. He kept his eyes lowered, not quite remembering everything about this man but he kept an eye on his core.

It was still black, that odd color he couldn't place, writhing with some other colors making their smaller appearances. There was mostly blue besides the black, yellow was tiny but it was there, and there was a ring of light orange. Oh shoot... light orange again... he really needed to keep a list or something.

Bruce had a hand on his lower legs, keeping him on his angled lap, his face had that happy up lip thing again and Danny wanted to ask about it. But he had just fallen asleep on the man... was that okay?

"It's okay Danny, you can look me in the eyes, remember?" Bruce shifted, sitting up more and lightly pressing his hand on his back, coaxing the boy into leaning against him again. "Did you sleep well?"

Danny just stared at the core right in front of him, he was against the man's chest again, therefore he was as close as he could possibly get to the core. It looked so weird up close, it didn't look like a liquid, but it swirled and arched like solar flares, splashing around in a constant circular motion. Kinda like a toilet, but less violent of circling, Bruce's core was gentle at the moment but he'd seen it get angry and violent, Bruce was dangerous.

The halfa twisted his face up, still leaning against the warm chest, giving a calculating look to the man's face. Faces and cores were different, but most of the time they said the same thing... except for Bruce. Bruce's face was only the same as his core when he was angry, or maybe he was always the same as his core, but since Danny had no idea what the black meant so he couldn't accurately judge. He remembered Dick had the black too, and the old guy Alfred, but they all had different amounts, and hope when dashed turned into black, so did the crimson red last night and the dark dark blue however long ago he woke from his nightmare.

"How are you feeling Danny?" Bruce asked, meeting his green gaze with his cold blue one, his eyes slightly crinkled because his lips were pointing upwards.

The small halfa lowered his head, grating his hair against the man's shirt. He absentmindedly realized he liked the rubbing sensation, it made his scalp feel numb and numb meant no pain. So he did it again, and then again. It scratched his head but he desired more, feeling the need to spread the numb to places he didn't usually feel anything but pain. He turned his face into the man's shirt, rubbing the tired out of his muscles and making him feel pleasant.

He flinched when a heavy hand landed on his head, but then it started rubbing too and Danny completely melted. His eyes closed and his body relaxed but he held no desire to sleep. The hand went through his hair, rubbing at his scalp and giving his head a happy buzzing sensation, he liked this a lot. He liked feeling numb, it was like the vertigo, it detached him from reality and let him imagine himself somewhere safe.

"You like that?" Bruce's voice broke the silence, the near serenity Danny was swallowed in by the simple touch.

The child's eyes opened stickily and slowly looked up. The hand on his head went away as his white hair grated again against Bruce's shirt and his neck and torso lifted oddly to look up at the man upside down. Bruce was still doing the happy lip thing, at least he thought so, he was upside down so it looked like he was frowning but really because he was upside down he must be doing the happy lip thing. Danny wanted to know how to do it because his core flashed a brighter yellow each time he did, Danny wanted to be happy, and he knew he could be happy without the happy lip thing but maybe he could get some sort of reaction from Bruce and the others if he showed it. The child kept his eyes locked on the man as he reached up with one arm, he pointed his pointer finger at his mouth, making his eyebrows twist in confusion because he wanted to ask a question.