#cass is very pleased with her little brothers exectution of the flip

[luciusime]

As with all things in the bat and bird colony, it happens at a gala. It's one Dick sadly doesn't have the time to attend as he's working a case in Bludhaven. Jason is still legally dead and wanting to stay out of the Wayne family spotlight so he's also M.I.A, and Tim had been made to take the night off by a combination of Alfred's patten disappointed look and Bruce enlisting Cass's help to switch all the coffee in the Manor to decaf. Duke was asleep and Steph, Cass, and Babs were covering the streets for the night with Kate's help as was customary for their bimonthly "Girls Only Patrol". This meant that only Damian could attend, but he was going to have to anyway to fulfill his allotted persona boosting time; that did not mean he was enjoying himself.

Old ladies kept pinching his cheeks and telling Father what a good job he'd done raising such a respectful boy, Father would airily reply back that he'd hardly done anything at all, it was Damian's mother and Alfred who'd had truly drilled the boy on manners, afterall, they all knew how abysmal Bruce's own manners could be at time. The old women laughed of course, taking the opportunity to bring up their granddaughters and just how lovely it would be if Damian and they could meet and get to know each other. Damian had to fight to keep the scowl off his face and his neutral expression glued firmly to on. Why would he ever wish to interact with such lower life forms when he already had perfectly adequate company to keep? He turned and tugged on his father's jacket sleeve to get his attention, feeling foolish even if this was the agreed upon signal. Father looked down at him with a more genuine and warm smile than he usually showed at these sort of events and Damian felt his shoulder loosen just a little.

" Yes buddy?" Damian scoffed at the absurd nickname.

" May I be excused to get some punch?"

" Sure, just don't stay too far out of my sight."

Father ruffled Damian's hair, much to his chagrin, before Damian walked over to the refreshment table. He wasn't really going to drink any of the punch being served, both because it was outside of his preferred and tailored diet and because by now some idiot was bound to have spiked it, but he needed to be out of the greater crowd of people for a while.

He'd been at the manor a while now, and while he didn't have great social skills or self regulation when it came to situations where he had to be social, he did have enough to know when he should remove himself from a situation before he said something that would get him in trouble with Father. There were to many people being superficial around his Father, and with every honey fake word that dripped from their mouth, Damian could feel himself getting that bit more upset. The punch was an excuse, and his Father knew and accepted that. But even if Damian and his father knew, others did not, and so it should not have been as startling as it was when yet another old woman and what looked to be her grandson came up to him and started speaking.

" Oh you must be Damian, Bruce's boy! My name is Mrs. Mallory, I and my husband are in business with your father. This is my grandson David, I hope you won't mind if he keeps you company while I go talk to your father about a few things?"

She phrased it like a question, but she was gone before Damian could reject her, and she left her plebian grandson where he was next to Damian. The other boy began to ramble on and on about this is that thing, Damian wasn't really listening as he proceeded the audacity of the woman who strode right over and began to talk to his father, who had migrated even farther from Damian in the small tome he'd been away.

It seemed that Damian had been ignoring the other boy too long though, as the idiot decided to get louder and in Damian's face to get his attention with rather rude words, bordering on calling hiw slurs. Never being one to withstand disrespect to such a degree, Damian flipped to boy so he was face first on the ground and his arms were restrained behind his back. Eyes were on them now, and Damian was sure he'd be getting in trouble for this later, but he frankly didn't care. He could see Father striding over quickly though, so he got off the boy with one final warning.

" Had it not been for the rules of my father, I would have killed you where you stood for such disrespect," and then he was walking over to meet his father.

The media outlets there had their story for the night and it was published the next morning on the front page. Someone had already been recording one of their friends when Damian flipped the boy, so their camera had easily been switched so Damian was the focus. They posted that video to their Twitter and it went viral within the hour. Memes, edits, unhinged fan rants, and of course the ever present fingerling spread like wild fire, and Damian's were informed by lunch the next day. None of them had any intention of ever letting him live it down.

I know this wasn't a prompt or anything, but I haven't written in a whole and this hit me with inspiration right before midnight so I hope someone at least enjoys reading it.

I like to imagine that in the DCverse, Damian is the origin of the "Had it not been for the laws of this land, I would have slaughtered you," meme.

Except instead of "laws of this land" it's "the rules of my Father."