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Dick likes having siblings. He loves having siblings, he loves being a big brother. He used to beg his parents to give him a younger brother or sister, pleading with them to give him someone to play with, someone to teach tricks to, someone to protect.
It wouldn’t be until much later and under much different circumstances that he actually got a sibling. And then a second, and more recently, a third. And he loves it, just as much as he always knew he would. Being an only child had been so lonely, not just in the circus, but while living with Bruce, too. Dick loves Bruce, he does, but it had been so hard to grow up alone in the manor, with no one to grow alongside him. But now he has siblings, three siblings, brothers he fights next to, siblings he tries to protect and ones he loves with his entire being.
Most of the time.
“Psst. Dick. Dick! Wake up!”
Dick groaned, turning his head further into his pillow. A hand jostled his shoulder and he groaned again.
“Dick.” Tim whispered, shaking him again.
Dick pulled his face out of his pillow to glare up at his brother. A glance at the clock on his bedside table told him that it was disgustingly early. Tim was in his pajamas, his hair a mess, but seemed wide awake and clearly unempathetic to the fact that Dick was trying to sleep.
“Tim, get out of my room, dude, it’s three in the morning.” Dick whined, attempting to pull his blanket further up his shoulders before Tim snatched it away.
“Dick, somebody’s in the house. Someone’s robbing the house!” Tim whispered back, shaking Dick again. Dick slapped at his hands, becoming more annoyed by the second. He rubbed at his eyes, still half-asleep, and waved Tim away.
“What? Tim, you’re Red Robin, dude, go deal with it. Go be.. Red Robin-y.” It’s not like people haven’t tried to rob Wayne Manor before. This was Gotham, after all, and Wayne Manor was situated at the top of a fucking hill, practically announcing to all of Gotham hey this is where the richest guy in town lives. Dick couldn’t care less about some low-level robber, knowing full well that there were at least two other people besides him that were perfectly capable of handling it. Besides, he was fucking tired.
Tim grabbed Dick’s hand, attempting to drag him into a sitting position, which Dick made as difficult as possible by becoming completely dead weight.
“Dick, no! This is our house, we have to protect it.”
Dick sighed, now sitting up, and rubbed at his face, still puffy with sleep.
“Besides, when was the last time you got to kick someone’s ass without moral obligation?”
Dick let his hands drop and looked up at Tim, who had a concerningly excited look on his face, his eyes wild. Dick forgets that Tim, while often the most level-headed out of all of them, could still be fucking crazy. He made a good point, though. Dragging his hand down his face one last time, Dick conceded.
“Alright, alright, just give me a second, okay?” He grumbled, swinging his legs over the side of the bed.
“Yes! Thank you, Dick. But hurry, I heard him downstairs.”
“Tim, are you sure it isn’t Bruce?” Dick asked. Tim leveled him with an incredibly offended look.
“Bruce isn’t supposed to be back until next week, remember? Now hurry up!”
Dick grumbled again, pushing past Tim and making his way over to his closet, where his escrima sticks and pajama pants were. He was not fighting in his underwear.
“Yeah, yeah, I got it, I got i-” Dick cut himself off with another sigh after opening the closet door. “Dami, what the hell.”
Damian stood in his closet, drawn up to his full, menacing height of four feet and eleven inches, his face passive as always, as if there was nothing out of the ordinary. As if he hasn’t been hiding in the dark in Dick’s closet at three in the morning.
Damian’s upbringing with the League, as well as lack of interaction with kids his age, has caused a lot of conversation in the Manor about what is appropriate behavior and what isn't. If Dick was more awake and less annoyed, he might have turned this into a learning opportunity for Damian, to calmly pass on the message that hiding in someone's closet in the middle of the night was inappropriate. But, well, Dick was tired and annoyed.
“There’s an intruder.” Damian stated.
Dick pinched the skin between his eyebrows, trying to stave off the headache that he already knew was bound to form.
“Okay, why didn’t you just wake me up? How long have you been in there?”
“Seven minutes. You were slow on the uptake, akhi.”
“Oh my god, okay, get out of my closet.” He shooed Damian out, reaching for a pair of sweatpants that he quickly tugged on, deciding to leave his escrima sticks. He shouldn’t need them, not with four of them against one, and they weren’t really something that civilian Dick Grayson would have anyway.
With his sweatpants pulled up, Dick turned to his brothers, both standing at attention behind him, waiting for instruction. If he didn’t think Damian would kill him, Dick might have laughed at them, serious and battle-ready in their respective Bluey and Pokémon themed pajama pants and bare feet.
“Okay, are we ready?” Tim asked, eager as ever.
“No, we’re not ready! We need to go get Jason.” Dick whispered. Beckoning his siblings to follow him, he slowly inched his bedroom door open before peering out into the hallway. It was empty. He nodded back to Damian and Tim, who nodded seriously back. Together, they crept quickly and quietly down the hall into Jason’s room, using their Bat training to the highest degree.
Dick could hear the snoring before he even opened the door. Jason laid completely flat on his back with his mouth wide open, and the noise emitting from him was so akin to a freight train that Dick would have thought to look out the window to see it pass had he not seen it coming from Jason’s mouth.
“Jesus.” Tim hissed, echoing Dick’s thoughts exactly as he quietly shut the door behind them. “We need to get this guy a fucking CPAP machine.”
Damian rolled his eyes, “Someone needs to wake him.”
Dick made his way over to the side of the bed. It had been a long time since Dick had seen Jason so vulnerable around him, and had there not been more pressing matters, Dick might have stopped to appreciate it. In a brotherly, non-creepy way of course. But there was someone robbing their house and Dick didn’t think Jason would want to miss it.
“Jason!” Dick whisper-shouted, shaking his brother’s arm. He kept snoring. “Jason! Wake up!”
Jason woke with a start and a snort, mumbling something that sounded like no please before cutting himself off with a cough.
“Jesus Christ, what the fu- okay, Jason, dude, wake up, we’re being robbed!”
“Didya say we’re being robbed?” Jason asked as he sat up, voice still slurred with sleep. All credit to him, Jason got with the program much faster than Dick did.
“Yes, Jason, get out of bed.” Tim whispered. “I think I can hear him coming up the stairs!”
Jason sighed, long suffering and annoyed as he heaved himself out of bed. “I swear to fucking God, if it’s Duke or Bruce, I’m gonna murder all of you. Where is he?”
The sweatpants that he wore to bed were rolled all the way up to his knees, causing them to bunch around his thighs like a pair of grey pantaloons, while one foot was clad with a red Wonder Woman sock. The other foot was bare. Dick tactfully chose not to point this out, however Damian shared no such qualms.
“Tt. You’re a mess, Todd. Why are you wearing one sock?”
Jason glanced down at his attire before scowling. “I get hot at night, shut up.”
Tim let out a breath of annoyance. He clapped his hands lightly, drawing their attention. “Guys, shut up. We need to make a plan.”
“I agree.” Dick said.
“I say we flank. No mercy.” Damian said. The phrase no mercy is also something that Bruce would likely label as inappropriate.
“We’re not killing anybody, Dami.” Dick stated.
“I can get my gun.” Jason pipes up at the same time.
Dick huffs, exasperated. “No guns, Jesus, why do you guys want to kill someone so badly?”
“I wouldn’t kill them with it.” Jason whisper-shouts back. “Just cause a slight injury.”
“A bullet wound isn’t really a slight injury.” Tim points out, his hand on the doorknob, clearly impatient. “But, I mean, technically the Stand Your Ground Law would be on our side, right?”
Dick was ready to point out that, again, they were not going to kill anybody, as well as the fact that New Jersey doesn’t even have such a law, when a creak echoed from the opposite end of the hallway. Tim slowly and quietly opened the door before poking his head out, his brothers quickly following and peeking over his shoulder.
The hallway was dark, but a large silhouette of a man could clearly be seen at the end of the hallway. The intruder quietly opened the door to Damian’s room and slipped inside, disappearing from view. The brothers took this opportunity to shut the door again to debrief.
“That’s one big ass dude.” Jason says, brow furrowed, clearly perturbed with the sight of an unknown man entering the room of their youngest sibling, even with Damian perfectly safe next to him.
“Yes, it is.” Damian whispered through clenched teeth. “So what is the plan?”
“Are we sure that wasn’t Duke?” Dick double checks. He likes Duke. The last thing they need is to fucking jump the guy when they’ve been trying so hard to convince him that he’s perfectly welcome at the manor.
“It’s not fucking Duke!” Tim said, his volume still low but still able to convey his annoyance and wavering patience. “I heard him use the front door!”
Jason nodded his head in agreement. “Yeah, Duke would never use the front door.”
“Okay, okay.” Dick clapped his hands lightly together, the four of them leaning closer towards one another, tightening their huddle.
“Alright, I say, on my count, we flank. No killing.” He shot a pointed look at Damian, who shot an annoyed look back, rolling his eyes. “Tim and I will go left, you two go right. Okay?”
After a nod of confirmation from each of his brothers, Dick corralled them closer to the door. With one hand on the door knob, he turned to silently mouth 3..2..1 before swinging the door open.
Each with a battle cry, Damian and Jason shot out of the door. The intruder had moved much further down the hall while they had been planning out their attack in Jason’s room and was now a mere ten feet away, caught with their hand on the knob to Tim’s room. It may have been because Dick had come out of the room with much less speed than his brothers, or the fact that the intruder was now much closer, that Dick was able to see that the “intruder” was not an intruder at all, but Bruce.
Damian and Jason, however, were an unstoppable force, moving much too quickly and purposefully to either stop in time or recognize that the man they were about to tackle to the ground was actually their father. Dick watched, helpless, as his adoptive father was taken to the ground by two of his siblings. Dick glanced at Tim, who had come to a complete stop next to him, clearly having drawn to the same conclusion, and was covering his mouth in horror, his eyes wide. Dick heard a muffled what are you doing and boys stop! before he realized he should probably help put a stop to the scuffle.
“Jason! Damian!” He yelled over the commotion. “Guys!”
“What is going on?” Bruce yelled, quickly and effectively putting a stop to the beat down he had been receiving. Jason and Damian both clambered off their father, Jason looking incredibly sheepish and Damian appearing slightly smug. Bruce was clad in a button down and slacks, now completely disheveled on the ground and appearing none too happy about it.
“Um.” Tim started. “We, uh, we can explain, Bruce.”
Bruce glared as he shoved himself to his feet, brushing off his shirt as he went. “Yes, please explain why I was just attacked in my own home.” Bruce crossed his arms, eyeing the four of them, now in a line up of shame against the wall. Even being well into his twenties, Dick still felt the familiar burning of mortification when Bruce fixed him with his disappointed dad stance.
“You aren’t supposed to be back for, like, four more days!” Jason defended first.
Bruce rounded on him, focusing his disappointed stare into his second oldest. “The mission finished earlier than expected. And your solution to a home invasion was a beat down? In civilian attire, no less?”
“Well. Um. Yes?” Jason said, looking as pained with his own words as Bruce seemed to be, who rubbed his forehead, sighing in a mix of exhaustion and exasperation.
“And why did you think this was wise?” He asked, voice slightly muffled by the hand now dragging down his face.
“Tim came into my room and said someone broke into the house!” Dick exclaimed under absolutely zero pressure, feeling like a five-year-old tattling on the playground, but it was true, and it was every man for himself right now. Besides, Dick never even wanted to get out of bed in the first place.
Bruce looked to Tim, whose face was the picture of betrayal, for an explanation, arms crossed once again. “Tim. What made you think someone broke into the house?”
“I-I heard you come through the front door! You never use the front door!” Tim rushed to explain, his cheeks blotchy with embarrassment.
Bruce looked up at the ceiling, letting out a long, deep breath. “Tim? Would you like to know why I used the front door?”
Tim nodded tentatively, to which Bruce answered, “Because I live here.”
Damian, always with the best timing, and who likely felt left out of the conversation, stated, “You were behaving suspiciously, Baba. You were lurking and entered my room. It was unusual”
Another sigh. “I wasn’t lurking, Damian. I was trying to make sure that my children were safe and in bed. Which all of you should be. Please, go to your rooms.”
Jason scoffed. “‘Go to my room’? I’m a grown ass man, Bruce!”
“Jaylad, you’re a grown ass man wearing one sock.”
Jason stuttered, gesturing wildly as he said “I get hot at night! Why’s everyone focused on my fucking socks?”
Bruce put up a hand to silence him. He looked at his children, still in a line and now properly chastised, all of them looking down in embarrassment. He heaved one last sigh. “We’ll talk more about this in the morning. But please think about the fact that, if I was an intruder, Alfred would have shot me before I made it this far.”
Oh. Right. Dick didn’t really think about that. By the sounds of his brother’s muttering, they hadn’t either. Seemingly done with talking, Bruce stood in front of them, arms crossed, as they slowly trotted off to bed, murmuring sorry Bruce under their breaths as they passed him. Their doors shut behind them, and Bruce was left alone in the hallway. He sighed deeply, fully exhausted, and let his arms fall to his sides as he attempted to digest the fact that more than one of his children needs a reminder on what is appropriate behavior and what is not.