You weren't supposed to get involved.

Yeah, you worked a part-timer near the drug bust. Damian knew that — better, he came up with way too many fallbacks to keep you safe. He was probably going overboard. But his father also dealt with alien (and non-alien) entities trying to destroy Earth on a damn near daily basis — it wasn't that far-fetched.

So how the fuck did this happen? You were basically stuck in a freezer — body iced but still (barely) alive until he could get you to the Lazarus Pit. You were barely holding it together — gunshots mangled your body. You were falling apart at the seams, quite literally.

You were pale. Lifeless.

He needed to do this fast.

The lid of the freezer container opened up and he scooped your dying body into his arms, holding you tightly to his chest as he neared the edge of the Lazarus Pit. With no regard for his clothes, he waded into the green water, laying your body on the surface of the glowing substance.

And you sank.

"No, no, no, no, fuck," he hissed, his voice raising as he reached down in the water to fish you out. The lump in his throat almost came up when he pulled you from under the water. The gunshot wounds were rotting away, arteries pulsating with a green glow under your skin, desperately pumping blood.

If anything, you looked worse than before.

You felt worse when you woke with a headache. Familiar walls, familiar blankets, familiar lighting — Damian's bedroom. It brought comfort as you began to recall what had happened.

... You were supposed to be dead.

That was the first thing you had shakily whispered to Damian when he came in the room — bags under his eyes, and a bitter frown on his face that upturned when he saw you, then went right back when you spoke.

"The... Lazarus Pit," he managed to murmur, pressing his lips together in a thin frown. "The stress of 'revival,' it— it activated a metagene."

Regeneration. Immortality. You were your own Lazarus.

He should've been holding you right now, not explaining your stress-activated metagene.