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“You ever feel like the batcave's too crowded?”
Barbara ducked under Dick's swing, dodging to the left and twisting around to block him again. She hated how acrobatic he was sometimes. He moved so fast and bent himself in ways that shouldn't have been possible, making him seem impossible to beat at times. She liked a challenge, but she sometimes struggled with knowing that the man she was fighting was her best friend. The circus boy shouldn't be that hard to forget, and it wasn't—it was more that Dick shouldn't be capable of half of what he did, and when they fought, she would get trapped by that thought. The Dick Grayson she knew was a sweetheart, a charmer, a boy with a heart too good for this world.
Nightwing could get cocky and fought like an underhanded jerk with all of Dick's natural athleticism plus the training he got from Batman and the coach who'd almost ruined him. If she remembered she was fighting Dick, she got tripped up—literally and figuratively.
“Too crowded?”
Dick shrugged, circling back on the mat, and she tried to find an opening. He was guarded right now, and she needed to find a way to throw him off, make him slip up and lose focus. “I said it back when they wanted to clone me at Cadmus. Me, Bruce, and Alfred were plenty back then.”
She snorted. “In a town like Gotham? You and Bruce are fooling yourselves. You need an army of superheroes in here, not one vigilante. And that's with my dad and the police on your side.”
Dick smiled. “That I agree with. I just...”
She saw her opening about the same time as she recognized the vulnerable tone in his voice. She supposed that was another danger in sparring with a good friend—knowing them too well. “What?”
“I don't know,” he admitted, spinning his eskrima. “I think it might be too much. Batman, Robin, Batgirl. Nightwing.”
“Are you talking about giving up being Nightwing?” Barbara asked, almost thrown herself by that one. She knew he'd had a hard time coming back to hero work, but she also figured that he needed it. Being a hero was as much a part of him as the acrobatics were, and they were like breathing to him.
“No.” Dick frowned, and she could have taken advantage of his hesitation, but she wasn't interested in hurting him. That wasn't what training was about. She could win, but it would be hollow and leave her with plenty of guilt since she'd have exploited a weakness to do it. She didn't mind using opportunities when Dick was in a good mood—definitely not when he was being smug—but when he was down it was worse than kicking a puppy.
“Dick?”
He let out a breath before going on the attack, forcing her back even if his moves weren't as fluid as usual, clumsier and easier to predict. She rolled out of the way and countered with a kick that knocked him sideways. He sighed. “It's just... Batman and Robin are a team. Partners. I feel like I get in the way of that if I'm here.”
Barbara grimaced. She had a feeling that Jason felt the same, and even now there was tension between the two boys despite everything Dick had done to reassure his younger brother that he wasn't taking Robin away from him.
“And it's not like I haven't been spending a lot of time away from Gotham, either. It's not just the team. Have you noticed how often Bruce has been sending me off to Blüdhaven lately?” Dick asked, shaking his head as he rubbed his side. “It's not like Gotham has fallen apart in my absence, though Blüdhaven seems worse by the day sometimes.”
Barbara shrugged. “Blüdhaven doesn't have Batman.”
“Maybe it should.”
She laughed. “Are you thinking of kicking Bruce out of his own city? He won't accept that. And you'd never manage it.”
“You think I can't?” Dick asked, eyes narrowing and lips curving as he flipped an eskrima stick. “Wanna bet?”
She rolled her eyes. She never took sucker's bets and he knew it. “Beating me isn't the same as winning against Bruce.”
“True,” Dick agreed thoughtfully. “It's not like I'd set the same terms with him as I would you. I'd never ask you for a piggyback ride or him for a kiss.”
Barbara stared at him. “What?”
Dick grinned. “I think I just won without even fighting.”
She shook her head. “Oh, the fight just started, Dick. Trust me on that.”