Archive of Our Own

Bruce had bought Damian an entirely new set of markers three days ago, but the packaging was intact and the box had been laid almost haphazardly on the boy’s desk. Uncharacteristic, to say the least, for the boy.

Frowning, Bruce straightened it so its edges ran parallel to the desk’s. He had researched for nearly two hours the best kind of markers for drawing on plaster casts, but these had not even been tested. Perhaps Damian found the color palette displeasing. Did he think it would be ungrateful to tell Bruce that?

Bruce set out to investigate the matter.

Raucous noise greeted his ears the moment he exited Damian’s room.

Intruder? Earthquake? Seizure?

Bruce broke into a sprint for approximately five paces until he registered the voices that reached his ears. Not an emergency, then. He adjusted his pace to a leisurely stride and approached the main staircase to glare at the two uninvited guests in the foyer of his home.

Tim, who had also emerged from his room at the loud noise, glared just as furiously at Bruce’s side. His hair was flattened on one side and stood straight up on the other. The distinct pattern of pillow creases decorated his cheek. It was almost six p.m. in the evening and he had just woken up, apparently.

Tim scratched at the skin beneath his neck brace, which was still padlocked shut. Jason had the key somewhere. Everyone was pretending not to worry about what he would do when they decided to take the brace off. Knowing Jason, his idea of a practical joke would be to ‘lose’ the key, and knowing Tim, he would risk cutting off his own neck to get it off. “What are they doing here?”

The loud clatter could be attributed to the two pieces of a family heirloom that Clark Kent held in bashful hands. His son Jonathan embraced a sullen Damian despite many colorful threats. And despite the threats, no weapons manifested into his youngest’s hands.

Seeing that Clark’s elder son was not present, Tim wandered off, probably to sleep more.

The small table that used to hold the broken vase was on its side. Judging by the angle it had fallen, Bruce deduced that Jonathan had knocked it over in his haste to embrace Damian, and Clark, despite his superspeed, had failed to save the artifact. What was the point in flying fast enough to turn back time, Bruce wondered, if he could not also catch a cup before it fell to the ground?

“Hello, Bruce,” Clark said. He adjusted his spectacles nervously. The vase fell to the ground a second time. This time it split into three pieces.

“Master Clark,” said Alfred, who emerged from the kitchen while wiping his hands on his apron. Behind him, Jason’s form darted around the counters. Come to think of it, they had been preparing a suspiciously large amount of food earlier, but Jason had told him to ‘Shut up and go away, old man,’ so Bruce had remembered he had business to attend to in his office. “That is a two-hundred-year-old family heirloom.”

“Oh, jeez,” said the alien. “Sorry, Jon said we have to act like humans today. We even drove here.” He displayed a set of beaten-up car keys with pride.

“It is a school night,” Bruce said pointedly. He saw no supplies for a sleepover but wanted to make his opinion of that idea abundantly clear.

“We’re just here for dinner,” Clark assured him.

“Of course.” Naturally, Clark couldn’t have given him a heads-up.

“How long ‘til dinner’s ready, Alfie?” asked Jon.

“You and Master Damian can play for another twenty minutes,” replied Alfred. “But not one minute more. I’ll expect you two to be washed up and ready to eat at precisely…” He checked his watch. “Six-thirty.”

“Coolio!” Jon flew Damian up the stairs and in the direction of his room. Almost the moment they left Bruce’s sight, he heard a massive thump and a cackle of adolescent laughter. Bruce could only hope his walls would still be intact when he went to check on them later.

Clark cleared his throat against the silence that fell. “So how have you been, Bruce?”

“Working,” Bruce grunted.

Clark put his hands in his pockets and nodded. “Oh, very nice. A real change of pace for you, isn’t it?”

Bruce glared.

Clark smiled.

Alfred coughed politely. “Perhaps, Master Bruce, you and Master Clark would like to chat in the foyer while we wait for Master Dick’s arrival?”

“Dick is coming?” Bruce asked without thinking. Dick had said he wouldn’t be able to come up to Gotham for over a week because of a major case his precinct was occupied with.

“Yes,” said Alfred. “Once he heard that Masters Clark and Jon would be attending dinner tonight, he found time within his schedule to join us.” The butler even had the gall to smile as he left the room.

Clark didn’t look concerned, even after Bruce scowled at him. Cocky bastard. Bruce wondered if Jason would be willing to slip some Kryptonite into his food.

Fifteen minutes of stilted conversation later, Dick made his entrance. As always, he swept into the manor with a crash, and brightened the entire house.

“Hello, Dick,” greeted Clark first.

“Uncle Clark!” Dick attacked the older man with a hug, and the alien might be Kryptonian, but Bruce could swear he almost stumbled from the force of it.

Then Dick turned to face Bruce, but at the same time, Jason appeared from the kitchen and said, “I thought I heard an obnoxious voice. Stop being lazy and come help, Dickface.”

Then Jon came flying with Damian down the balcony and Bruce found himself pushed to the side. Forgotten, perhaps, but content regardless, as he watched his eldest surrounded by a family Bruce had always been worried he would never be able to give Dick. The others could give Dick the warmth he had always craved.

Bruce had never been able to fulfill his children’s needs in that regard. Dick had come from a loving, small house, into the large, empty manor, and Bruce did his best, but he couldn’t replace Dick’s parents—not that he’d ever tried. With Jason, Bruce had been better, up until he was so much worse, and things were… good, but still not perfect. He wouldn’t try to hug Jason unless his son initiated it, unless he wanted a gun pointed in his direction. Then Tim had marched to his doorstep, lonely and fiercely independent, craving a parent’s affection and loathing it in equal measure. Their partnership had been rife with controversy at the beginning. Cass had been much the same, though with less of Tim’s hostility. Just as deprived of comfort as he was, and wary of strangers, but she was quick to accept Bruce—at least he hoped—as a guardian, if not a father.

And Damian.

Angriest of all his children, the one that looked least like him, and the only one he could claim biologically. Funny how things like that worked. Bruce and Damian hadn’t known what to do with each other when he first arrived. Damian was entirely unique; although wholly like all of his predecessors, Bruce had no idea how to handle him, and feared daily what might have become of their relationship had he not spent months indisposed with Dick acting as Batman. Anyone could see that Bruce would never have been able to break through all of Damian’s walls. Even now, knowing what Tim had told him, of how Damian felt his position at the manor precarious, all of Bruce’s attempts to reach out were accepted with the utmost hesitation. Yet Damian didn’t hesitate to lean into Dick’s hugs, or Jason’s hand when he ruffled the boy’s hair, even if Damian put up a show of trying to bite Jason’s fingers.

It was then that he noticed Cassandra at his arm. Only years of honing his instincts to become a lethal fighting force stopped him from jumping and swearing; as it was, his heartbeat skipped several beats, and Clark looked over questioningly. Though Cass didn’t have Clark’s super-hearing, she was a marvel, and Bruce was fairly sure by the tilt of her lips that she knew perfectly well that she had startled him.

Tim was last to slog down the stairs, still groggy and grumpy, albeit less so when Cass slung her arm around his shoulders and had his neck brace unlocked and falling to his feet in less than five seconds.

“Cassandra,” Bruce said warningly.

She looked at him innocently, shrugged, and said, “Easier to eat without it.”

“Yeah,” Tim agreed. He tried to nod, but Cass grabbed him by the chin and held him still. Their faces pressed together cheek-to-cheek, two of Bruce’s children staring up at him with big pleading eyes, and how could he say no?

With a sigh, he relented and picked up the brace himself.

Hmm. The material felt slightly scratchy against his calloused fingers, and Tim’s neck was much more sensitive. Did he see marks of irritation around Tim’s throat? When Bruce tried to inspect, Tim batted him away with a look of irritation, and he watched the party troop into the dining room.

Something felt hollow in Bruce’s chest, though he could scarcely imagine what. Perhaps it was that the manor felt emptier without Duke, who was eating dinner at a friend’s house this evening.

Alone in the foyer, Bruce carefully placed the neck brace on the cabinet by the stairs. It was a highly visible spot, but he had no doubt that Tim would be blind to it on his way up the stairs.

“Father?”

Startled for the second time in ten minutes by one of his children, Bruce looked up hastily. Damian stood in the doorway, arms crossed. “Yes, Damian?”

“Will you not join us for dinner? Timothy is starving.”

From the dining hall came an offended squawk. “I didn’t say that!”

“I heard your stomach grumble,” said Damian without turning.

“Of course,” Bruce said. He should have woken Tim earlier to eat something.

Damian did not step away from the door when he approached, so Bruce slowed his walk. Did Damian want him to enter from another doorway? It seemed highly illogical.

They found themselves facing each other. Damian raised one eyebrow, obviously attempting to communicate something, but Bruce could not for the life of him figure out what.

“Come on,” Dick groaned. “Some of us are hungry.”

A shadow settled over Damian’s features. He turned awkwardly. With a whoosh of air, Jon appeared to help assist him to his seat at the table, and Bruce was free to take his spot at its head.

The moment Alfred set food in front of them, everyone attacked their plates vigorously.

Except Bruce.

He felt as though his lunch had curdled in his stomach. Perhaps he was coming down with a sickness.

Vaguely he recognized that Clark was attempting to engage him in conversation, but eventually gave up in favor of speaking with Dick. Halfway down the table, Jason, Tim, and Cass found themselves in a vicious three-way food war that they thought they could hide from Alfred (they couldn’t and would be picking peas up from the floor the moment dinner ended) and Jon chattered away while Damian answered him absently, but his eyes were fixed on Bruce.

He had no idea why.

As they said good-bye to Clark and Jon while his middle children picked up their dinners from the dining room floor, the former held up his keys and declared so loudly that he would drive home, Bruce had no choice but not to believe him. The so-called Man of Steel had never been able to deceive him before; he didn’t know why Clark kept trying. He abruptly saw that two new signatures had found their place on Damian’s cast, next to the names of everyone in the family and some of Damian’s school friends. Neither, as far as he could tell, had been written by any of the markers he had bought Damian.

Bruce pondered in his study the possible reasons both for Damian’s dismissal of the gift and his silence on the topic until Alfred entered under the guise of dusting and ordered him to stop brooding.

“I’m not brooding,” said Bruce immediately.

“You never were good at lying to me, sir.”

Somehow, Bruce found himself ushered up to bed at a reasonable hour, as Cass had agreed to watch Gotham for the night. Apparently Damian threw quite a fit when Bruce patrolled without him. So he had been spending most of his nights in the manor while Damian recovered, much to Bruce’s dismay. And, even worse, Alfred insisted on a bedtime that would allow Bruce to be awake in time to work at Wayne Enterprises.

He found himself desperately commiserating with Tim, who unfortunately had no sympathy, given that he was in the same boat, only it had been Bruce to deliver his sentence.

Over the weekend, Batman found himself escorting Robin to the Watchtower, only because Dick threatened to take off work and take Robin himself if Batman wouldn’t. It was amusing to watch Robin crutch around the common areas and alternately threaten or demand that heroes sign his cast.

Clark, of course, had already signed, but Kon, who had apparently decided to spend the day harassing one of his fathers, took the opportunity to sign next to Tim’s name. J’onn volunteered himself as well, but Batman had to stop him, given that there was no conceivable way their secret identities knew the Martian Manhunter. The Waynes were already under enough media scrutiny as it was. J’onn wrote ‘John’ instead.

With Diana, Robin was the politest. While he had completely ignored Hal Jordan when he offered to sign, and shoved a marker into Barry Allen’s hands while snapping, “If you must sign my cast, at least do not cover up any of the other names,” (they were still working on his manners) Robin had the good sense to stand in front of her, clear his throat for her attention, and point out that oh, there was some empty space left on the plaster. Diana offered to sign it immediately and Robin almost smiled, which seemed to scare Hal.

Around noon, Captain Marvel wandered into the Watchtower, yawning, obviously having just woken up, but he perked up the moment he saw Robin. He body-checked Oliver out of the way so he could sign. Oliver looked relieved and like he wanted to escape—Robin had been brandishing a marker at him like a knife—until Batman scowled at him. He gulped and resigned himself to the arduous task of adding his name to Batman’s son’s cast. Honestly. Batman needed better colleagues.

After Bruce and Damian returned to the manor, Jason arrived for the second family dinner in a row. Externally, Bruce remained calm, but internally, he was ecstatic. And only slightly suspicious.

While Alfred prepared the meal, this time refusing to let Jason help, all Bruce’s sons except Dick sat down to… play Clue. At Alfred’s suggestion. To ‘give their detective skills an outlet more appropriate for their ages’.

Board games weren’t exactly a regular occurrence at the manor, and Bruce half-considered running a test on the three to make sure no one had replaced them until Tim and Damian started to squabble. Then he was sure they were themselves. All the better. It had taken a long time, but Damian was on the way to reconstructing his definition of family to include Jason and Tim.

Bruce was—well, for lack of a better word—lurking outside the door, enjoying the sounds of brotherly laughter when Tim made his first guess. Jason checked the envelope and burst into laughter. Apparently, he’d been wrong on every account.

“Hey!” Tim protested. “How do we even know you’re telling the truth? Damian, you make a guess.”

“Timothy,” said Damian, “I can either focus on the situation at hand, or I can correct your impressive imbecility. Be quiet. Obviously, the murder weapon—”

Tim mocked Damian’s words in a high-pitched voice and several loud crashes occurred in the room.

Bruce burst through the door in time to see Damian wrap his hands around Jason’s neck and squeeze. Unfortunately, his hands were too small to wrap around the whole way, so Jason just looked bored.

“B,” said Tim indignantly. He held a nutrient bar in the air. “Look what your son just threw at me!”

Bruce squinted. It didn’t look poisonous, toxic, or radioactive.

With a grunt, Jason peeled Damian’s hands off his neck. He locked the younger boy’s arms behind his back and rubbed the top of Damian’s head with his knuckles.

“Jason,” Bruce said calmly over a rather impressive stream of curses in Arabic, “stop giving your brother a noogie. Damian, why did you throw a nutrient bar at your brother?”

“I will shove it down his throat and ruin his appetite before supper,” Damian snarled. “Pennyworth will be displeased, and Timothy will become hungry again before sleeping! Father, tell Jason to unhand me at once so I may continue my revenge!”

“Well, we’re not going to force-feed Tim anything,” Bruce said patiently. He caught Jason’s eye and nodded. As soon as he let Damian go, the boy leapt for Tim, but Bruce caught him mid-air. He struggled weakly, but Bruce held firm, until he went limp with defeat. Bruce was reminded of the way Dick had always asked to be picked up when he was little. Damian couldn’t be more different from him in that regard.

Bruce’s phone buzzed. He shifted Damian so that he rested in the crook of Bruce’s left arm, then answered the call without looking at the Face ID. “Hello?”

“Hey, B!”

Damian perked up and twisted around in Bruce’s arms. “Is that Richard?”

“Dickface?” Jason asked. “He’s not coming tonight, is he?”

“Yes, it is,” Bruce said. “I don’t believe so.”

“What?” asked Dick.

“Nothing—talking to Damian and Jason.”

“Oh, what have they been up to?”

“Well, they and Tim were playing a nice game of Clue until tempers ran high.”

“Oh, I see.” Dick’s tone turned to amused-but-trying-to-sound-stern. “No bloodshed, though, right?”

“Damian has been practicing his self-restraint.”

Damian huffed.

Dick shouted into the phone. “Hey, Dami?” Bruce winced and moved it away from his ear. He didn’t even need to press ‘Speaker’ for everyone to hear.

“Yes, Richard?”

“One of my co-workers has a daughter that had to go to anger management classes and she said that making sculptures out of toothpicks helps her calm down. Does that sound like fun?”

Jason met Bruce’s eyes, utterly bewildered, and Bruce couldn’t help but echo the sentiment.

“Great,” muttered Tim, “give him more pointy things to throw at people.”

“Maybe you’re just jealous, Timantha, because you know the demon brat can make better sculptures than you,” Jason said.

“It’s not a competition,” Bruce said immediately.

Dick clapped with excitement. Bruce could just picture the look on his face. “We could make it a competition! B, do you have any toothpicks?”

“Certainly not enough to host a sculpture contest,” Bruce said dryly, as it seemed that there would be such a contest whether he liked it or not. And he did not. But any way for Damian and Tim to exercise their competitive sides without exchanging blows was worth a shot.

“Father, we may acquire the necessary materials tomorrow,” Damian proclaimed. He sounded especially regal for a boy with one ankle in a cast currently being held by the waist. Usually he would be struggling to get out, but he seemed especially docile.

Bruce frowned. Tomorrow was a Monday.

“Oh, yeah, I forgot you have the day off,” Tim said vaguely, but he shot Bruce a pointed look.

Bruce grimaced. He’d completely forgotten. “Of course, Damian. There’s just one Wayne Enterprises meeting I have to attend in the morning, and then we can shop together.”

Damian nodded. “That is acceptable. At what time will we depart for your office? And will Timothy be joining?”

“I have the day off; Bart and Kon want my help decoding some message from deep space,” said Tim. “That’s why Bruce is going in the first place.”

“And,” declared Jason, “since I have no plans—”

“Would you like to join us, Jaylad?” Bruce offered.

Jason stared at Bruce, straight-faced, and laughed exactly once without changing expression. “Yeah, no. I don’t want to join your toothpick competition.”

“Why?” teased Tim. “Scared you’ll lose?”

“I know exactly what you’re doing,” said Jason. “It won’t work.”

“I’m not doing anything,” Tim said innocently. “I won’t force you to do anything that you don’t want to do. I know losing to a six-year-old is embarrassing, but—”

“I am not six years old!”

“You look like it.”

Damian really started to struggle then. It was like holding a slippery, feral otter, and Bruce knew that from experience (don’t ask). Between grunts of effort, Bruce managed, “Damian, stop attacking your brother. Tim, stop antagonizing your brothers. Jason—”

“What?” Jason asked. “I’ve done nothing wrong.”

“For once,” Tim muttered. He smiled. “It’s easy not to mess up when you don’t try new things.”

Jason stared at him. His right hand flexed, like he desperately wanted to reach for a weapon, but both his holsters were empty. “Your whole competition is stupid.”

“Jay, don’t call your brothers’ interests—”

“Because I’m going to crush both of you.”

Bruce had a headache before he entered the Wayne Enterprises building. Actually, he’d had it before he even left the manor.

No. No, this was the same headache from last night. Bruce hated staying home, especially on busy nights. And if he’d been out as Batman last night, maybe Stephanie wouldn’t have needed stitches. She was fine—as fine as ‘needing stitches’ could be—but it made Bruce feel helpless.

Still, Bruce Wayne didn’t feel stress about the health of Gotham’s vigilantes, except perhaps in passing, so he pasted on a smile and nodded at the people filing into the building around him and Damian. No one seemed at all perturbed by the slower pace Damian set on his crutches, even though Bruce knew it bothered him, and they were polite when overtaking him. Bruce made a mental note to give everyone raises.

Lucius was chatting with one of their security guards in the waiting room. He raised a hand in greeting and Bruce returned the gesture. They didn’t have to pass through the metal detectors, so they waited for the guard to unlock the gate.

It had been so long since Bruce had really worked at Wayne Enterprises, instead of all the tedious paperwork he did at home during the odd hours he spent awake and not on patrol, he hardly recognized anyone.

That man with the fuzzy socks and blue lab coat must be one of their engineers. Did they have a meeting with a private contractor today? A woman in a black blouse and slacks had a briefcase on her lap as she tapped away on her phone. They’d also moved the vending machine and complimentary water dispenser. Whose bright idea had it been to move the water dispenser directly next to the water fountains? Bruce needed to speak to someone about that.

“Hey, Damian,” Lucius said once he and the guard had drawn close enough. “That’s a hell of an injury. What happened?”

Bruce squeezed Damian’s shoulder. “Tim tried to teach Damian how to skate. You can see how it ended.” He gave a self-deprecating laugh as Damian gave him an evil glare. He hated the cover story they’d created for the injury. ‘I would never ask Timothy to teach me to skateboard,’ he’d said, ‘and if I did, I would be exceptional! I would never fall.’

But they’d already used the story, so Bruce’s hands were tied.

“Well, I’m sorry to hear that,” said the guard. His nametag read ‘LARRY’. Bruce felt like he should know Larry’s last name, but kept coming up blank. “When do you get rid of your crutches, little dude?”

Lucius met Bruce’s eye. Larry, somehow, didn’t notice the heat of Damian’s furious glare at being called ‘little dude.’

“As soon as possible,” Damian snapped. He fished around in his sweatshirt pocket and pulled out a Sharpie, which he shoved into Lucius’s hands. “If you insist on signing my cast, make sure you do not write over anyone else’s name.”

Larry the security guard wandered off in the direction of the sitting woman, presumably to offer his assistance. Lucius, ever a good sport, crouched to sign Damian’s cast. Both his knees popped loudly and Bruce winced with sympathy. He was beginning to sound the same, no matter how much he tried to deny the passage of time.

“Father,” said Damian. “Could you retrieve the pack of markers from my backpack, please?”

They were the markers Bruce had bought Damian. “These? You haven’t opened them yet.”

“Well, of course,” said Damian. “I had not finished collecting my signatures. Those markers are for drawing, not for signing.”

Bruce’s chest felt awfully warm all of a sudden. He had a sudden urge to offer Larry the security guard a promotion.

Bruce looked up just in time to see the black-clad woman stand up, pull a gun from her briefcase, and shoot Larry in the chest.

Everything froze for one second. Then someone screamed. Larry’s body fell. People started to panic, and the woman pointed her gun in the air and fired at the ceiling.

“Get down!” Bruce shoved Damian and Lucius behind the nearest chair. Damian’s markers spilled across the floor. Bruce sprinted to the security guard—his employee—currently bleeding to death. The woman’s eyes widened and she swung the gun around to point at Bruce.

“Father!”

Bruce froze. He hadn’t stared down the barrel of a gun held by a stranger, without the safety of Batman’s mask, for a long, long time.

A puddle of blood was spreading around Larry’s body. The man’s breaths were getting weaker.

“Call 911!” Bruce shouted. He dropped to his knees and put his hands over the hole gushing blood in Larry’s chest. Blood spurted out from between his fingers. Larry gasped something Bruce couldn’t hear over the rush in his ears. Damian was here. Damian was here, on crutches. Bruce’s son was here, while a crazy lady was shooting people in the chest—

“The phone lines are down!” the woman shouted. “So don’t bother.” Still keeping the gun aimed at Bruce, she said loudly, “Everyone stay calm, and the only person that has to die is Stupid right here.”

“I need gauze,” Bruce said hoarsely, but his hands were slick and red and all he could smell was copper. Larry’s uniform was sodden and his breaths were shallow. “Someone get me gauze!”

Nobody moved as, slowly, Larry’s chest stopped rising and falling. The blood stopped gushing out of his chest.

Bruce could deny it no longer. He sat back, stomach roiling, and stared at his dead employee. He should have known something was odd about the waiting woman. The briefcase should have been cause for alarm.

A shadow fell over Larry’s slack face. Dark shapes blotted out the light streaming in through Wayne Enterprise’s glass doors as a group of twelve darkly-clad people swarmed into the lobby. And, slightly behind them, a slight man dressed in green and purple.

“Riddler,” Bruce growled. When had he escaped from Arkham?

Riddler squawked at the sight of the dead body. “Christie! I told you there was no need for blood today!”

Christie shrugged. “It’s the most efficient way.”

“What a waste,” Nygma sighed. “Anyway! Bruce Wayne, I presume.”

Bruce said nothing.

“I’m pleased to inform you that I have taken control of your tower,” Nygma said. “If you cooperate, none of your other employees will be harmed.”

“How can I trust your word?” Bruce challenged.

“Why, you can’t!” Nygma laughed. “But let me ask you this, Brucie: what can you always count on when things are going wrong?”

Bruce set his jaw. As long as he kept the goons’ eyes on him, Lucius could sneak Damian out of the tower. Unless Nygma had people watching the back entrances. He was a rather detail-oriented criminal. But Lucius knew the building better than almost anyone. He could find somewhere safe for Damian to hide.

“Your fingers!” Nygma crowed. He wiggled said fingers in front of Bruce’s face. “Can you count ‘em, Brucie? Five fingers a hand! Wanna multiply that by a hundred and tell me how many employees are in the building today?”

“Five hundred,” a bored-looking man said. “If you don’t cooperate, all five hundred will die. If you do, they might not. You decide.”

Nygma pouted. “You take the fun out of everything, Chuck.” He stood and tapped his cane thrice. “Let’s get to work, boys.”

“Where’s his boy?” Christie asked suddenly. “I saw Wayne come in with his kid.”

“He’s gone,” Bruce said immediately. His heart raced and his stupid head still ached. “What do you want, Riddler? Don’t touch anyone else and I’ll give it to you.”

“I see him!” Christie said.

She only made it three steps.

Bruce tackled her to the ground as Lucius and Damian made their escapes. Well, more like Lucius tugging an unwilling Damian behind him. “Leave!” Bruce shouted hoarsely just before Christie simultaneously brought her boot up between Bruce’s legs and whipped her gun across his face. It bought her enough time to scramble out of Bruce’s hold and sprint for Damian and Lucius.

The man called Chuck kicked Bruce in the back as he tried to stand. Christie caught up to Damian.

“Don’t touch him!” Batman roared.

For a moment, no one moved.

Then the air above Bruce shifted, Chuck moving, and white-hot pain bloomed inside Bruce’s skull.

“FATHER!”

Everything went dark.

Bruce’s bed felt especially lumpy this morning. Perhaps Jason had put rolls of quarters beneath the mattress again. And why were the lights on?

Alfred nudged his arm.

“Five more minutes,” Bruce grumbled. God, his head hurt.

Alfred grabbed him by the hair and yanked him up.

Not Alfred.

Bruce’s eyes flew open and squinted just as quickly; someone had put the force of the sun into the room.

Someone with three eyes and two noses grinned and said, “Well not too feeling Brucie eh?”

That couldn’t be right.

“Code you need just pass from.”

Another person with no face chimed in and said something with way too many syllables. It all turned into white noise.

Another voice chimed in, just noises, but he recognized this one. Bruce tried to turn to look, but the hand in his hair tightened. He felt each individual hair as it was ripped from his scalp.

A man wearing green and purple sauntered into view. He was familiar too, but not welcome. “                                     ,       !                                            .”

The world swam. His head went white. Bruce slumped and the hand pulled out more hair.

A heavy boot knocked the wind out of his stomach and the hand let go, dropping him with no warning. Bruce’s head hit the floor with a crash he felt deep within his brain. He couldn’t, however, feel the rest of his body save for the prickle of blood flow in his fingers and toes.

Oh.

Concussion.

A pretty bad one, too, he thought dimly.

A child’s voice.

He looked up in time to see the three-eyed man (he was down to two now) grab the front of a child’s shirt. Bruce couldn’t hear the words over the rushing noise in his ears, but he didn’t like the man’s tone and body language.

“Let him go,” he said, wincing. Every word was a gong chime in his head.

The child took the opportunity to knee the man in his crotch. Three-Eyes hunched over, but the child only made it two steps before someone whose head was on fire grabbed him around the neck.

Walking Question Mark shouted something.

What was going on? People with three eyes or heads on fire shouldn’t be allowed… here. Wherever here was.

Where was Alfred?

Foggy, Bruce made eye contact with Walking Question Mark just in time to hear, “—out of your hair!”

“Hair?” Bruce repeated. He tried to touch it, but found that his arms were too heavy, and besides, everything felt shaky, like he was about to vibrate out of his skin. His fingers trembled, or maybe his eyes were.

His hair was fine, mostly, apart from a couple strands. His scalp stung. There was something in it?

The floor was comfortable and cold against his flushed cheek. Bruce closed his eyes and laid until someone tapped his cheek.

Maybe Alfred would leave him alone if he pretended to be asleep.

Tap. Tap. Tap.

No luck.

Bruce squinted his eyes open and winced. They felt dry as the desert. Blinking felt like rubbing sandpaper over them.

The face over his was vaguely familiar. The skin was tan, the hair dark, the scowl familiar, and the eyes… they were Talia’s eyes.

Talia’s eyes. They reminded Bruce of… “Damian?”

“Yes, Father,” said the boy. “Listen to me. Aliens—”

Bruce sat up and swayed, woozy. Around a fuzzy tongue, he asked, “Where’s Damian?”

“What?” The boy looked alarmed.

Bruce looked around, but Damian wasn’t hiding anywhere. “Where’s Damian?” he repeated. “My son.”

Boots scuffed. The woman with the flaming head was back. Behind her, Question Mark tapped his cane three times. “My son,” Bruce said again.

The woman sighed. Her mouth moved.

Bruce missed the next three things said, but he eventually parsed out that she’d said, “I told you Chuck broke him.”

He was never this slow. What was wrong with him?

Question Mark knelt in front of him. Oddly, Bruce felt the urge to punch him, although he didn’t punch people. Right? Loud enough that it felt like an ice pick driven behind Bruce’s eyes, he said, “His pupils are very different sizes.”

The child grabbed Bruce’s chin to inspect for himself. Bruce’s eyes slid slowly from Question Mark to Talia’s green eyes in the child’s face.

“  ‘   have    do       fast.”

His ears probably weren’t supposed to ring this much.

Suddenly Bruce’s stomach roiled. He barely leaned over in time to avoid emptying his stomach into the boy’s lap. The puddle of sick landed on the woman’s shoes instead. She leapt back with a sound of mingled anger and disgust. Too late, Bruce realized that swinging her leg back meant she wanted to kick him.

The child was quicker. The woman’s boot caught him in the shoulder and he careened away with a grunt of pain.

Bruce’s vision washed white. It might have been anger, but it also might have been because he jumped to his feet. He lunged for the woman—how dare she attack his child, no, the child, where was Damian—but she stepped to the side. Bruce threw too much of his weight behind his fist and fell over. He vomited again.

“Get this over with quickly,” Question Mark said. “     need     pass    . We’ll be back!” He and the woman left Bruce and the child alone in the room.

The child crawled to Bruce’s side. His ankle was casted, but he had no crutches. That seemed odd. On his knees, he tried to hold Bruce’s shoulders up, but gravity seemed to be behaving oddly, so he dragged Bruce against the nearest wall. Well, he tried to. He was deceptively strong for his small size, but Bruce still did most of the work, even though he wasn’t sure if the floor would still be there every time he moved. “Damian.”

“Father.” The child spoke at an excruciatingly slow pace. “I—am—Damian.”

“Damian?” Bruce frowned. Well, he did look like what Bruce remembered Damian looked like. He tried to hug Damian, but his arms didn’t want to move, so he settled for tipping forward until his forehead bumped Damian’s. That turned out to be a mistake.

Damian said something harshly, but it wasn’t harsh the way the woman spoke.

Bruce nodded. Damian knew what he was doing.

Slowly, Damian explained that… something was going on, and they were in…

“What?” Bruce said. “Where are we?”

“I have told you three times,” said Damian. He looked pale.

“No, you haven’t,” Bruce said confidently. He would have remembered. His head really hurt and he was quite tired.

The world span and Bruce’s stomach flipped. He leaned over and retched, but from what he could see through his blurry vision, not much came out.

“Father, look at me. What is your name?”

Bruce frowned. “You don’t know it?”

“Of course I know it,” he said impatiently. “Do you?”

Oh. Concussion protocol. Bruce answered Damian’s questions as best as he could. Judging by the pinched look on Damian’s face, some of his answers were lacking, but to be honest, he had no idea which ones. He couldn’t remember the last question Damian had asked him, or what his response had been.

“Listen to me,” Damian said finally. “Earth is under attack.”

Then Batman was needed. Bruce tried to stand up, but Damian yanked him back down.

“Listen to me. Batman is in Paris with the Justice League and Young Justice.”

Bruce frowned. “But I’m—”

“Being held hostage,” Damian said pointedly.

Oh. That explained why they were in an office instead of at home.

It had to be past their bedtime. All the lights were off. If Bruce felt tired, how must Damian feel?

Fingers snapped in front of his face. Bruce reeled back, startled. His eyes had been closed. Unfortunately, the harsh office lights were still turned on. He really needed to speak to someone about that.

“Pay attention,” Damian ordered. “The Justice League and Batman are occupied. The only vigilante available to rescue us is Spoiler.”

“Spoiler’s injured,” Bruce said immediately. “She can’t come. She—”

“We are in no way fit to save ourselves,” said Damian. “And I am not in the mood to negotiate with terrorists the likes of Edward Nygma. Spoiler will have to handle herself.”

“Where are your crutches?” Bruce asked. “You have to be able to walk.”

“I can walk adequately without them,” sniffed Damian.

“Lucius,” Bruce said. “Where is Lucius?”

“He is with the rest of your employees. He is safe for the moment.”

“They said…” Bruce thought slowly. “He wants… a password from me.”

“Yes. A recent prototype developed by your robotics department caught his interest.”

“It’s a shame,” Bruce mumbled. He slumped against the wall and closed his aching eyes. It felt so good to close them. “He was doing so well…”

“Father!” Fingers snapped loudly in front of his face. “Do not fall asleep. You have to stay alert.”

Bruce frowned. “Why?”

Damian swore loudly.

“Don’t do that,” Bruce mumbled.

“Do what?”

He had no idea.

“Ridiculous,” Damian said. “Useless.” Bruce opened his eyes in time to see Damian swing his booted foot at the wall, then curse, grab his foot, and sit down heavily. His eyes were clenched tight, jaw set against the pain.

Damian was in pain.

It didn’t matter how injured Bruce was. Damian was in pain, and he was scared, and he was Bruce’s son, dammit.

“What do they want?” Bruce asked lowly.

“Pardon?”

“What do they want from me so that they will let you go?”

Damian looked startled. He blinked. “Why would Nygma relinquish me? I am a powerful bargaining chip.”

“I won’t give him anything,” Bruce swore. “Not until you are completely safe.”

Damian bit his lip. He looked away, at Bruce, away, and back at Bruce. He whispered, “Father?” like a question, but if he said anything else, Bruce didn’t hear it, because he crawled forward until he hesitated just in front of Bruce’s lap.

For once, Damian didn’t protest or struggle when Bruce picked him up and reeled him in. Bruce held all of his youngest son in his lap and said, “I won’t let anything happen to you, Damian.”

Then he leaned his head against the wall and closed his eyes.

Something poked his rib.

Bruce’s eyes flew open.

Paper in his face?

Damian in his lap—no, people taking Damian from his lap—

“The password, Brucie,” someone said above his head, “just tell me the password and—”

Faces in the walls.

“What?”

Talking to him.

“What are you going to do about the faces in the walls?”

Question Mark spun around and cursed. He saw the faces in the walls, too. No—in the vents.

A girl in purple dropped from the ceiling directly onto a redheaded woman’s shoulders. A gun fired twice before they fell to the ground, grappling with each other, and a second shape peeled away from the vents and fell with a little more grace. He straightened smoothly and brandished a long staff at Question Mark and his goons, who hesitated at the sight of him.

The purple girl continued to struggle with the redhead and the last person jumped out of the vent wearing a bright yellow and black costume.

“Red Robin,” Damian said with no little amount of venom. “What happened to your neck?”

Bruce squinted. He didn’t see anything wrong with Red Robin’s neck.

The vigilante gave Damian a look of annoyance a split-second before a large goon swung directly for his jaw. He ducked out of the way just in time. Signal was behind him, and he punched the goon so hard the man’s jaw cracked.

Question Mark rushed for the door.

Bruce snagged Damian’s collar just as the boy attempted to chase him.

Though the floor roiled beneath his feet, it was up to him to catch Question Mark—no, that wasn’t his name, Bruce knew his name.

Not Joker. Not Ra’s.

“Riddler!”

The shout tore his throat and practically burst his head. Bruce gritted his teeth and withstood the pain. Riddler—Edward Nygma—faltered at the sound of his name.

There wasn’t time to think.

Bruce tackled him.

Nygma shrieked as they fell. He lashed out, kicking frantically with his legs and arms, but Bruce’s strength overpowered his own and he was quickly pinned.

“You shot my employee,” Bruce growled. “You endangered my son. Why? Why would you do this? You were doing so well! Did you stop taking your medications?”

Nygma stopped struggling and stared at Bruce, openmouthed.

“Mr. Wayne!”

Two security guards rushed down the hall.

“You caught him, Mr. Wayne!” the taller one said, adjusting his hat. He sounded amazed.

“We’ll take it from here, sir,” said the shorter one. He was a little overweight and balding. Bruce vaguely remembered the man’s employee file. Did he have two kids or three?

“How did you two get up here?” he asked.

“All us downstairs revolted,” said the shorter man as he handcuffed Nygma. “They forgot we had guns, too.”

Bruce straightened the sleeves of his jacket, but it didn’t matter much when the suit was bloodstained and smeared with vomit. “Any casualties?”

“Nope, just a couple scrapes.”

“Good.” Bruce’s stomach dropped as he suddenly remembered— “My kids!”

Now that the adrenaline was wearing off, Bruce could hardly walk in a straight line. His legs seemed disconnected from his brain.

Staggering, he made it back to his office.

The redhead and three goons were tied up in the middle of the room. Spoiler and Red Robin were talking with Damian, who straightened when Bruce walked in.

“B…ruce Wayne,” Spoiler said, awkwardly recovering from the fumble.

“Spoiler,” Bruce said evenly. He narrowed his eyes, but it was less of a glare and more because the light was sending daggers straight to the back of his skull. “Are you favoring one side? You wouldn’t happen to be injured, would you?”

Spoiler gave him a look that promised swift retribution.

Bruce would have to watch out for bleach in his shampoo for the next several weeks.

“I hear you’re injured yourself,” said Red Robin. He, Signal, and Damian exchanged a conspiratorial glance. Oh no. Would they be ganging up on Bruce now that they were getting along? To the security guard, he said, “Make sure Mr. Wayne gets checked out, would you? His son told me he’s been disoriented and vomiting since getting hit in the head, so I’d say there’s a fair chance he has a concussion.”

“I’m fine,” Bruce said. “I was barely hit.”

Signal shrugged at the guard. “With injuries like these, we can’t trust what they’re saying. You’ll get him to the hospital, won’t you?”

The guard nodded and took hold of Bruce’s elbow. “Yes, sir, Mr. Signal, sir!”

“You’re a real one,” said Red Robin.

“Enjoy the hospital!” Spoiler added.

Damian said, “Wait, where are you—”

Spoiler unlatched one of Bruce’s windows and dove out. Red Robin stored his staff and leapt out behind her, followed quickly by Signal.

“Well, you heard them, sir,” said the guard. He tugged lightly on Bruce’s elbow. “We should get you checked out.”

Those brats.

Alfred acquiesced to taking Damian home, but refused Bruce, so he spent the day in Gotham General refusing service and arguing with nurses. He felt a little bad about being such a pain, but he couldn’t afford for anyone but Leslie to treat him. Civilians would find it suspicious if they saw just how many scars were littered on Bruce Wayne’s body. Not to mention the scarring on his brain tissue from concussion after concussion.

He didn’t feel like answering their questions, so he sat in the chair by the bed—if he laid down, he would fall asleep—and accepted food and water and nothing else.

At the same time, he watched the news. The attack on Wayne Enterprise wasn’t the main story, surprisingly. Apparently a small race of aliens had tried to invade Earth that day as well. The Justice League had to fly to Florida to fight them. Batman had accompanied them, of course.

Of all the alien invasions to miss… Well, Bruce couldn’t exactly say he was sorry to miss Florida. That was a little too much sun.

With Duke on patrol, Stephanie and Tim avoiding Bruce so he wouldn’t ground them for going out while injured, Alfred fussing over Damian, and Dick in Florida, Bruce expected to spend the night in the hospital before he could bribe his way into a discharge. Apparently, his concussion was ‘too severe’ to leave, but he figured they’d change their minds by the next day. He’d had worse concussions, after all.

The sun was setting when a nurse ventured back into his room.

“I’m not hungry,” Bruce grunted, not looking away from the window. Maybe they would give up and leave. That would be preferable; he wasn’t in the mood to argue with them again about sleeping. Anything could happen if he let himself be so vulnerable in public.

“Mr. Wayne? Your bodyguard is here for you.”

Bruce frowned. It could be the concussion, but he didn’t remember hiring a bodyguard. Maybe it was that oddly persistent security guard, who’d taken Red Robin’s words to heart and made it his personal mission that Bruce was checked into Gotham General. If not for him, he probably would have argued his way into Alfred’s car.

She stepped aside so the mysterious person could walk into the room.

Bruce’s so-called ‘bodyguard’ was tall (only one inch shorter than Bruce), muscular (his benchpress PR rivaled Bruce’s own), and dramatic (he wore sunglasses inside).

Bruce knew all that because he knew the man.

He grunted.

Jason smiled. He lifted the glasses, winked, and said, “Come on, old man. Let’s get you home.”

Bruce felt stiff, and Jason capitalized on the two seconds it took him to stand up. He rushed to Bruce’s side, made a big production out of helping him stand, and said in a mock-whisper to the nurse, “He needs more and more help in his old age.”

“Isn’t Mr. Wayne only thirty-nine?” she asked, confused.

“I know,” Jason said gravely. He kept holding Bruce’s elbow like he needed help to walk. “Isn’t it tragic?”

Bruce grunted again.

“Your bodyguard assured me you have a doctor at home,” the nurse said. She looked a little intimidated, but she faced Bruce and Jason head-on. “You will let her look at you, won’t you, Mr. Wayne?”

“Yes,” Bruce said reluctantly. Leslie would give him hell for all his injuries.

“You know how these millionaires can get,” Jason said as he steered Bruce out of the room. “So eccentric.”

“Billionaire,” Bruce grunted.

“Shut up or I’ll guillotine you.”

The moment they stepped outside of Gotham General, it felt like half the pressure in Bruce’s head disappeared. He breathed easier. Stood up a little straighter.

The back of his neck prickled. Bruce glanced to the side to see Jason watching him. “What?”

“Nothin’.” Jason shook his head. “I just remembered how much you hate hospitals.”

“You didn’t need to pick me up,” Bruce said. Jason hated hospitals, too.

“Sure I did,” Jason said easily.

Bruce waited for the punchline.

“I need your credit card.”

There it was.

“The competition’s still on,” Jason said. “I need to crush your little brat’s hopes and dreams.”

Bruce smiled as he clambered into the car. It wasn’t one he recognized. He really hoped Jason hadn’t stolen it. Better not to ask questions. “You already have a credit card, Jaylad. I pay for it.”

Jason adjusted the rearview mirror (it didn’t need adjusting) and cleared his throat. “I lost it.”

“Right.”

Bruce gave him one of his cards anyway.

Sure enough, when Jason opened his wallet to use the new card to pay for a truly shocking amount of toothpicks—the convenience store clerk looked at them like they were insane—Bruce saw Jason’s old card right where it had always been. He didn’t say anything.

Bruce slept for two days straight. He only woke up when Damian snapped his fingers in front of Bruce’s nose. It was high time, he claimed, for Bruce to judge the toothpick building competition, so every competitor marched their creation into his bedroom for immediate judgment.

Bursting with pride, Damian presented to Bruce a leaning, sagging, unstable pile of toothpicks. Apparently, he’d tried to recreate the Colosseum. It looked more like a colander gone horribly wrong.

Tim showed him a pretty accurate replica of the WE building. Jason had built a gingerbread-style house. Duke had abandoned the building theme and stuck a lot of toothpicks into a ball of clay, wrapped a string around the ball, attached it to a stick, and called it his new one-time-use-only flail. Even Dick had participated. He’d taped together five toothpicks to make a toothpick person to live inside Jason’s house.

Bruce looked at every one. He pondered over the decision.

He announced Damian the winner, to cries of outrage and disgust from all but Dick and Damian.

“Ha!” Damian crowed. “I am superior to all of you. It was foolish to believe you could ever—”

“Good job, Dami!” Dick, ignoring the boy’s protests, spun Damian a couple times, then kissed him loudly on the cheek.

Jason met Bruce’s eyes and mouthed, Are you kidding me?

Bruce mouthed back, Just let him have it. Yours was the best.

Mollified, Jason mustered a grudging, “Good job, Damian.”

Apart from a slight pause and widened eyes, Damian hid his surprise well. Bruce’s chest swelled with warmth when he said, a little uncertainly, “Thank you… Jason. You performed admirably in the contest as well.”

Tim leaned down and whispered into Bruce’s ear, “You thought mine was the best, didn’t you?”

Bruce frowned and reached out to touch Tim’s neck. He was probably imagining any irritation left over from the neck brace, which had inexplicably ended up on the manor’s tallest spire after the Riddler’s attack. “Of course, but don’t discourage him.”

Tim leaned back and said loudly, “You know what, Damian? Jason’s right. I like your Colosseum.”

“I like your building as well, Timothy.” Damian whispered loudly in Dick’s ear, “Even though it is rather plain.”

“Be nice,” Dick said under his breath.

Bruce made eye contact with a smirking Duke, who’d watched all that happen, and now said loudly, “I can’t believe my flail didn’t win!”

“It was a building-making contest,” Damian said flatly, still in Dick’s arms. “You were disqualified immediately. Wasn’t he, Father?”

Bruce shrugged helplessly, then looked at his son’s cast. “You decorated it!”

Damian didn’t smile, but something inside of him glowed as he tilted it back and forth for Bruce to admire the plaster. He’d used the markers after all. “Of course. I just had to collect all of the signatures first so I could draw around them.”

"I'm glad you liked the markers."

It was then that Alfred barged into the room, scolding the children before he’d even crossed the threshold. “Master Bruce requires sleep!”

“We’ll be quiet, Alfred!” Dick promised. “Dami, do you want to make another? I can make more stick-people for your Colosseum.”

Duke tugged on Tim’s sleeve. “Did you still want to…” He trailed off and tilted his head.

“Oh, yeah.” Tim said, “Bye, Bruce, see you later,” but he didn’t quite make eye contact before he and Duke rushed out of the room.

Bruce frowned, but one look from Alfred kept him from standing up.

With a grunt, Jason settled on the bed next to Bruce. He pulled a small book from his pocket, flipped to a page nearly halfway through, and began to read.

Dick and Damian were relatively quiet as they started their new toothpick project on the ground by his bed.

Bruce leaned his head back against the pillows and fell asleep to the sound of pages turning and soft voices whispering.