The blast of light fades, and Damian’s world goes silent.

He stands in the center of the bedroom—their bedroom—fists still clenched from the argument he can’t even fully remember the start of. His breath is sharp, cutting. The air feels wrong, thinner. He blinks once, twice, letting the bright afterimage burn out of his vision.

And then he notices the empty space.

His chest tightens before his mind even understands why. The dresser is… cleaner. Too clean. The small stack of books on the nightstand—gone. The mug with the faded design they refused to throw out—gone. The scent he’d grown used to, the subtle trace of them in the room—erased.

His heart stutters, and for a moment he can’t breathe.

“What—” His voice comes out low, a scrape of panic he immediately hates. He forces his shoulders back, but the tension coils tighter instead of easing.

He moves fast, checking the closet. Empty. His movements become sharper, more frantic. He throws open drawers. Bare. Not even a stray thread. The bathroom cabinet holds only his things, arranged with a precision that suddenly feels mocking.

“No,” he mutters, but the word trembles despite his attempt to steady it. “No, no—this isn’t—”

He remembers saying it. Every syllable. The venom, the heat, the way it wasn’t even the argument he was angry at—it was himself. Always himself. And he’d thrown the ugliest, most untrue thing he could think of.

I wish I never knew you.

He had seen the hurt hit them like a blade. He had watched the light swallow their expression.

And now…

Now they had never existed in his life at all.

His legs suddenly feel weak, and he grips the doorframe to stop from swaying. His breath comes shallow, uneven, stripped of its usual control. He forces himself down the hallway, boots striking too loudly against the polished floor as if noise alone could anchor reality.

He checks the security feeds—no trace of them ever entering or living here. He clicks through the systems with a trembling impatience he can’t hide. There is no record. No logs. No missions shared. No files. Nothing.

He swallows hard. His throat burns.

“This isn’t real,” he insists, but the manor answers only with its vast, hollow quiet.

He moves to the living room next, scanning every spot they used to claim as theirs. The cushion they always stole—unstained and perfectly arranged. The photo frames—each one a lie. His jaw clenches so hard it aches as he picks one up. The picture inside has changed. It shouldn’t have. It shouldn’t have.

The weight of it in his hand starts to tremble.

Damian sets it down carefully, almost reverently, as if the world might shatter if he moves too fast. His chest is tight, breath trapped somewhere between fury and terror.

“Come back,” he whispers before he can stop himself. The words are thin, threadbare. They sound foreign coming from him. “Please…”

He presses the heel of his hand to his eyes, drawing a shaky breath through his teeth. The mansion feels colder now, as if the warmth they’d brought had been ripped out with them.

He knows what loss feels like. He knows grief. He has lived with both longer than most people experience in a lifetime.

But this—this absence so complete it warps reality—hits him like no blade ever could.

This is the first time Damian Wayne has truly understood the meaning of regret.

His voice comes out hoarse, cracking in the empty room. “Beloved… where are you?”

No answer comes.

Just the echo of a wish he never meant.