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Even behind his domino mask, Green Lantern very clearly blinked at him. “But doesn’t your kid fly?”
Bruce narrowed his eyes, causing the lenses of his own mask to glower dangerously. “Excuse me.”
“It’s just- come on, I know you’re the only one of us without your own powers, but laying down a blanket ‘no metas in Gotham’ rule seems kinda, well, hypocritical, considering your own kid is a meta.”
Aware he needed to be careful how he phrased his words, Bruce took a long moment to slowly fold his arms and lean a little closer for his signature looming effect. “And what, precisely, makes you think that, Lantern?”
The other man’s head swiveled for a few seconds, taking in the wide-eyed other members of the newly formed Justice League, and his shoulders slumped upon realizing that, no, none of them were going to jump forward to back him up, he’d gotten into this situation entirely on his own. “Well. I do read newspapers from time to time, and I remember at least a couple articles about Robin when he first showed up. Didn’t he rescue some people who insisted he hovered off the ground and then flew up over the top of a building?”
“I’m certain you’ll find many people in Gotham who will also insist I am made of shadows and have burning flames instead of eyes,” Bruce said flatly. He also reached into his utility belt to pull out a compact, handheld device. “And this is a grapple launcher, Lantern. I’ve developed a great many of them in the past few years, to make travel around Gotham’s rooftops safer and faster.”
His unspoken (and untrue) implication evidently made it through the other man’s thick skull, because Lantern’s shoulders slumped even further and he backed off. “Alright, alright, point made, don’t trust newspapers.”
Oh, Bruce was definitely going to come back later to get a copy of the security footage from this, if only to forever savor the complicated expression that twisted Superman’s face.
-Fly-
He also ended up saving a still from Clark’s first visit to the Cave - the exact moment he realized that, no, Dick really was hovering midair under his own power, and turned an exasperated look in Bruce’s direction.
“If you’ll recall,” Bruce said in a dry tone, “I never actually said he uses grappling lines like I do.”
-Fly-
Diana became the first to learn the rumors about Jason’s strength were in fact under-exaggerated. And it was of Bruce’s own volition, too, because he knew the boy needed pointers from someone else who could also punch through brick walls.
...although asking Diana to come over instead of Clark had been a choice made entirely to see the awestruck expression on Jason’s face. (One son wore Superman pajamas, but the other went with Wonder Woman, and secretly Bruce couldn’t help but feel amused by the difference.)
“He’s got the basics,” Diana cheerfully stated after they finished with a full spar. Jason grinned, even as he laid sprawled across the training mats, still winded from the final take-down. “You’re probably already getting some reinforced punching bags and such for him, but I wouldn’t mind scheduling regular meetings so we can keep working on his precision.”
Jason looked about ready to explode from excitement. Bruce snorted lightly, and let a small grin flicker onto his face. “Only scheduled meetings, Diana.”
The woman rolled her eyes. “Yes, of course, because you don’t allow metahumans in Gotham.” She shifted to address Jason over her shoulder, “We’re all relying on you to keep him as socialized as possible, little one, since he refuses to let anyone else get within arm’s reach.”
His son’s face suddenly turned incredulous, and Bruce snorted again.
-Fly-
By the time Tim came along, the League no longer remained set at seven individuals. They’d grown, time and again, to nearly fifty active members, affiliates, and reservists allowed access to the various Towers and other bases connected via zeta tubes. And yet, despite that, and despite all the other Green Lanterns to have popped up, very few people still managed to drive Bruce’s patience from limited to nonexistent in an instant like Hal Jordan.
So, he deliberately picked a day when the man would be on the Watchtower to bring along his newest Robin.
For three grin-inducing hours, Bruce watched the internal security monitors as Tim drove Hal up a wall. Giving the man a heart attack when he first spoke up, only for it to fade to a half-memory; causing numerous double-takes, while Hal interacted with other people, and slipping away before the Lantern could catch up to him and demand to know what was going on.
J’onn wandered in to join him at one point, and watched the screens with a blank but somehow bemused expression. “This is characteristically mean of you, Batman.”
“Yes,” Bruce replied, watching Oliver stare blankly at Hal while the other man insisted he kept seeing something follow him through the halls, Tim laughing around the corner out of sight, “Yes it is.”