Chapter Text
“Oh Icarus! For all you have fallen, still you flew! And for a moment, the sun knew you too. (For those smile as they drown and laugh as they fall, who are we to define tragedy after all?)”
Alfred Pennyworth, if nothing else, was a sensible man. A bit too sensible at times (if one could be too sensible at all.) One could argue that it was his sensibility that kept the house running like clockwork; though letting pride and vanity get the better of him was unbecoming of a man such as himself.
However, it was his sensibility that caused him to overlook a very important detail that could have saved the household much grief. Two months prior, Alfred had received a call from an unknown number on Wayne Manor’s private line. At the time, he had assumed there had been some sort of information breach and attributed the call to pranksters. Now he was sure he knew who it was from.
The boy was standing in front of him after all. “Hi again I guess...”
Alfred’s eyes crinkled. “Master Jason,” he said before enveloping the boy in a hug. Lord, he had grown so much. Tears pricked at Alfred’s eyes. “It is so very good to have you here.” He drew away quickly, hopefully as to not make the lad too uncomfortable. “Now, before I forget my manners; my name is Alfred Pennyworth and I would love to make your acquaintance.” Of course, he already knew of the children thanks to Master Dick and Timothy but the courtesy was a principle of the matter.
The children that stood on either side of the lad were steely, eyes carrying that heavy numbness that Alfred had become accustomed to seeing in the trenches. He swore to himself that he would give them the world.
“I am Damian Wayne al-Ghul,” the young boy standing to Master Jason’s left asserted. “You must be the family butler.”
“Indeed I am, young sir.” Oh Lord, this boy was going to be a handful. His father’s son indeed. “And may I learn your name, lass?”
“That’s Cass,” Master Jason filled in. “She doesn’t talk much.”
The girl gave a small wave.
Alfred bowed his head, smiling. “It is very nice to meet the both of you. Do come in.”
The butler led the children to the kitchen, mouth quirking as the children slowed to gawk at the Manor’s elegance. If the children were intimidated by the house, perhaps it was best to keep the meeting strictly to the less-formal confines of the kitchen for now.
“Pennyworth,” Master Damian interjected suddenly. “I am hungry. Do you have any–” the boy was cut off by a sharp elbow to the ribs. “What? I am hungry and so I am informing Pennyworth so that he may provide us with food.”
Alfred barely heard the hissed response. “Ihtaram." So Master Jason had picked up new languages on his years away. Whatever the boy said, it certainly dampened master Damian’s previous command.
Nevertheless, Alfred served the children food anyway. What kind of host would he be if he didn’t? He set out a tray of roast vegetable sandwiches and fruit in hopes that the food would be to the children’s taste. He’d refine dishes later when he knew what Master Damian and Miss Cassandra liked. He would have to see if Master Jason had still retained the same palette as well.
Miss Cassandra was the one to finish most of the halved sandwiches on the plate, despite Master Damian being the one to complain of hunger. Alfred smiled as he tucked away the mental note that she liked the sandwiches. That is until he realized that she was the one who had also eaten most of the fruit. Nostalgia tugged at his heart, remembering a small boy very much like her with a bottomless pit for a stomach.
But Master Jason had hardly eaten anything. Not today.
“Would any of you care for some tea?” The three nodded. “Master Jason, may I assume that you are still partial to earl grey with two sugars?”
“Uh,” the boy stared awkwardly at his plate. “Yeah. Thanks.”
“Excellent. Master Damian and Miss Cassandra, what can I get you?”
“I shall have what Jay is having,” Master Damian announced proudly.
Miss Cassandra’s hands flew like young birds. Same.
“Alright. It should be ready soon.”
And indeed it was. Master Jason sat with a sombre solemnity over his steaming mug while Master Damian battered the old man with questions and Miss Cassandra looked on expectantly.
“Did Jay really grow up here, Pennyworth?”
“Indeed he did, Master Damian. I can even tell you a story if Master Jason will allow me.”
Belatedly, Master Jason glanced up from his tea. “Yeah sure.”
Given the approval, Alfred launched into the tale. At heart, Alfred was a storyteller and there was scarcely anything he could do better than telling people the escapades of his charges. “In the foyer, if you look closely behind some furniture, you will find a sizable dent in the wall. Unlike many things in this old house, it is quite new. Now, you must know that at the time it was made, a young Master Jason had just finished watching a video about how some very… creative children his age made a makeshift slide, if you will around their own house.
“As you can imagine, Master Jason was quite inspired and ambitiously tried to re-create the ride in the Manor. Except,” Alfred sighed, “he was determined to do it better, bigger and faster.”
Master Damian and Miss Cassandra snickered into their mugs. Alfred continued.
“So, he lay down some sort of tarp over the stairs and into the foyer to, and I quote, ‘minimize friction’. He attached skis to the bottom of a cardboard box (which he had dubbed the ‘Jason-mobile’) and brought his vehicle to the stairs. Can you guess what happened?”
Master Damian’s eyes were alight with suppressed laughter. Miss Cassandra was beaming too, pantomiming crashing into a wall.
Alfred chuckled. “Well his contraption seemed to work too well because for a moment, I am positive that Master Jason did indeed fly. Into a wall that is.”
The confirmation issued a fresh peal of laughter from the children. Not Master Jason though– who only smiled absently, as if far away. Something was wrong. The boy he knew would have squawk in embarrassment, berating the old man for ‘exposing him like that’. Alfred would check up with him.
“And that is why ‘Jason-mobiles’ are now outlawed in this house, my dear audience,” Alfred finished charismatically.
The front door popped, then opened. The children froze. Alfred sat back in his seat. Master Bruce was home.
–––––––––––––––––––
“Hey Alfred I’m–” Bruce stopped. Sitting across from the old man was– was– He was thrust backward in time. Back to when he thought the only thing he could feel was the heart-wrenching grief that suffocated him every minute of the day.
Bruce remembered hearing the explosion just as his car skidded to a stop on that dirt road. No. The warehouse had gone up in flames, its acrid stink burning his nostrils. He remembered sprinting toward the rubble, tearing through it to look for– to look for his son. He had to be alive. Somehow. His son was tough, after all.
He found bloodied fabric first. What was once a yellow mesh of silk and kevlar was now stained red red red. Bruce’s fingers tightened around the scrap. He kept looking.
There was a faint groan behind him. He scrambled towards it frantically. His son was alive alive alive. Bruce pushed off the final slab of concrete and– and–
What he saw made bile rise in his throat.
There was blood, blood everywhere and the skin that wasn’t slick with that coppery liquid was bruised blue, purple, melding perfectly into each other. His leg was bent at a painful angle and his face– Bruce swallowed. Carefully, he moved the battered boy into his arms.
“Oh Jay… I’m so sorry...”
The boy’s eyelids fluttered. His boy his boy his boy. Bruce brushed his soaked hair away from his face.
“Hang in there Jaylad, help is on the way, okay?”
“Br–” The boy coughed. It sounded wet. “Br’ce?” he croaked.
“Yes, Jay. Now save your strength.”
The boy’s breath hitched and Bruce’s heart stuttered. “‘T hurts, Dad.”
He never called him Dad. Not outside of his sarcastic remarks. Why did this first have to be like this? Bruce hugged the boy closer. “I know, baby, I know.” He mentally calculated how much longer the rescue helicopter would be. Twenty minutes, at best. His mind screamed at him. Stop the bleeding! Buy him time! Bruce tore a piece of his shirt to begin staunching the blood. “I’m going to try and stop the bleeding, okay Jay?”
“N– no,” he rasped. “They’re waitin’ f’r me, Dad.”
Bruce struggled for words. “Alfred and Dick and Barbara are waiting for you back home,” he said finally.
The boy gave him a bloodied grin. “N’t h’re. Up th’re.” He said it like it was the funniest thing in the world. “Ma’s makin’ me breakf’st, Dad.”
Why did he say it like this? Why did he accept leaving, leaving Bruce, so easily? Bruce ran his fingers through the boy’s hair wordlessly, tears welling in his eyes. “Are you gonna leave me all alone Jay?” he asked softly.
He knew what the boy would have said if he had the energy. You’re not completely alone, Bruce. You got some pretty awesome friends– like Aunt Diana. More tears threatened to fall at the thought. The boy gasped, as if clinging to life. “C’n I go?”
Bruce looked down at his son. He hurt, he hurt so so much. Bruce couldn’t protect him from this hurt. He pressed a kiss to the crown of the boy’s head. “As long as you finish all your homework and eat your vegetables and promise to not stay up ‘till ungodly hours,” he choked. Like he was sending his son away for a sleepover. Why did this hurt so much?
The boy sighed. “I love you, Dad.” He drew in a long breath before exhaling a final time, leaving Bruce all alone in the desert.
“Master Bruce,” a voice called. “Master Bruce I do believe I taught you better. Now come meet our guests.”
Bruce shook his head, clearing his mind. He needed to be present. “Sorry Alfred.” Swallowing his nervousness, he strode into the kitchen. “I see Alfred’s treated you to a favourite of his,” he said noting the tea, trying to break the tension. (Nevermind that Alfred hadn’t made that particular tea since Jason–) Try as he might, the only person he could look at was Jason. His boy. His son.
Jason stared back, just as stunned. Bruce had seen the computer’s reconstruction. He’d read descriptions of his son’s appearance. Yet all he could seem to do now was stare at Jason’s face, memorizing it; the changed things– his hair, his eyes, that terrible scar that ran across his face. The things that didn’t– the way he could never keep his bangs out of his eyes, the way he squared his shoulders just-so, the way he pursed his lips when he thought.
“I was not aware that it was customary to stare at people here, Father,” a young voice from beside him snarked. Bruce looked down. Hm, certainly Talia’s eyes there, he thought. But his nose shared an eerie resemblance to that of his mother– Martha Wayne.
Bruce bent down. “You must be Damian.”
The boy tutted. “You’re shorter than I expected, Father.”
A girl approached from behind Damian. Her movements were quick, precise, but graceful. She looked familiar– Lady Shiva’s daughter he remembered. He smiled. “Cass.”
She lifted her hands carefully. Hello.
I’m Bruce, he signed. The girl beamed.
Then she looked over her shoulder– at Jason. She flicked his ear and tugged his sleeve in Bruce’s direction.
Jason finally came up to Bruce, glaring at his shoes fiercely as he spoke. “You remember me?” The question was barely a whisper.
“I do, Jason.”
“I’m sorry I don’t remember you though.”
Bruce laughed humorlessly, now joining Jason in studying his shoes. “That’s okay. We’ll work through it, alright?”
Jason’s jaw ticked. “Okay.”
“Can I hug you?”
“Yeah,” Jason said, melting into Bruce’s arms. “Yeah.”
Closing his eyes, Bruce relished the feeling of his long-lost son in his arms. But he had another son here too. And damn, if Cass would let Bruce adopt her, he would. So he opened his eyes and motioned at them to join him. They did so hesitantly, but Bruce welcomed them all the same.
He didn’t think his heart could ever feel so full again.