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The phrase “A City on a Hill” was made infamous in a speech by John Winthrop circa 1630, in reference to the Massachusetts Bay colony, where Winthrop and other Puritans were heading in hopes of a new, freer, better life. Winthrop claimed that Massachusetts Bay would be the pinnacle role model for all other colonies, and God would look down on them with pride.
Most colonizers, including those in Massachusetts Bay, proceeded to slaughter Native Americans for their land. In turn, colonizers were also slaughtered in bloody, violent conflicts that lasted for centuries.
Massachusetts later grew into a thriving state of 7 million people, but the history of its origins remain cemented in historical sites, public school curriculua, and legends to this day, never to be forgotten.
~ • ~
When the grief has left his system in the immediate wake of his parents’ deaths, when he’s sitting alone in his new, humongous room in Wayne Manor and feeling like a speck of dirt drowning in this massive bed, the first thing that comes to mind is murder.
The rage that sweeps over him like a violent fire takes over his entire body. He digs his nails into his knees where they’re drawn up against his chest, grits his teeth, and imagines Tony Zucco in broken, mangled pieces on the floor of the circus, while Dick watches from the top of the acrobat’s nest.
He feels bad after a while. His parents would be disappointed in him, thinking about hurting someone — killing someone — for a selfish reason like revenge.
He still goes after Zucco. Batman — Bruce, he can hardly believe it — intercepts him, and Dick hands Zucco over. He’ll get justice one way or another, and that’s the right thing to do. Bruce tells him as much when they get home, and that he’s proud of Dick for what he did. It makes Dick feel better. Zucco may not be dead, but his parents are avenged, and that’s what he really wanted.
When Bruce eats dinner with him that night, and almost every night after, Dick stares across the table and thinks, I’ll never let it happen to you.
He knows, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that he would kill someone to protect Bruce. He keeps the thought to himself.
•
When he finds out Jason is dead, the grief hits first — the guilt, the despair, the devastation. He drowns in it for days afterwards, skipping patrols and losing himself in shitty soap operas and bottles of alcohol.
When he’s sober, reeling from one of the worst hangover migraines in his life, and a week has passed since he got the news, the anger starts boiling up in his body.
It’s directed at a lot of people, all at once — Joker, for killing Jason; Bruce, for not telling him; the Titans, for having to be their leader and having to go with them when it happened; Joker, for killing Jason; the Tamarians, for having to be off-world when he could have been helping Jason; the Joker, for killing Jason; himself, for not being there when it happened, not being there to stop it; Bruce, for not telling him; the Joker, for killing Jason.
Dick yanks on his suit and storms out of his apartment.
He’s in Gotham in about half the time it should have taken him, but any cop that flashed their lights at him backed off when they realized who it was. He doesn’t radio for Bruce. He doesn’t call in the Titans.
Instead, he parks his bike in an alley on the east side, hidden under a sheet, and starts making his way around town, flitting through the shadows, and snatching people off the sidewalks. Each one, he cracks their heads against the alley walls and demands to know where the Joker is. Each one puts up a fight. “I ain’t sayin’ nothin’,” they tell him at first, when they think Dick is bluffing. Then they turn into a quivering, sobbing mess when Dick makes sure they know he’s not bluffing, when there’s blood trickling down the sides of their heads and gaping wounds in their sides and broken arms at the elbows.
After that, each one gives up a little piece of the puzzle.
An old building on the outside, refurbished on the inside. Boards on all the windows, with one in the upper right corner that has a green spray-painted dot on it, stark against the black and white graffiti that covers the rest of the wood — no other colors. Someone sits on the curb, smoking; looks homeless, but isn’t, because he’s a guard. It’s on the east side, they assure him, but that part is useless to Dick — he already knew that.
When he lets them go, they crumple to the ground, coiling themselves tightly into balls to protect themselves and to grasp at their wounds. Dick leaves before any of them ever look up.
He finds the warehouse after a bit of searching. The lackey isn’t there. Feeling molten ire flood through his veins, Dick slams his way inside, through the boarded-up windows and the glass. He goes hallway by hallway, room by room. But they’ve all been emptied.
By the time he gets to the main room of Joker’s lair, Dick realizes that the Joker and his goons have fled.
The room is as empty as the others, but his stupid golden throne is still there, tipped on its side. Boxes and crates are open and spewing styrofoam peanuts, and the power has been shut off. No bullet holes, and no batarang indents in anything. The Joker left in a rush, but Batman wasn’t here. He must’ve thought Bruce would go after him.
Coward.
Dick slams his boot into the back of the throne once, twice, again, watching the plush backing dirty up and start to rip. He kicks it again, and again, and then his foot goes through the wooden back. It splinters everywhere, some of the wood tearing at his suit and cutting his leg. Dick pays it little mind.
He yanks his foot free and bends down to lift the chair off the ground, then hurls it at the nearest wall. The fragile back shatters into hundreds of wooden pieces upon contact, and one of the legs snaps off. Dick grabs it and uses it to beat at the throne, over and over until it’s lying in sharp, mangled pieces.
Dick exists the building, anger still pumping through his system, and leaves Gotham. He sneaks into his apartment where no one can see him, sheds his suit, drops it in the washing machine and turns on the spin cycle, then heads to his alcohol cabinet.
He grabs a bottle of whiskey — he is his father’s son — and settles in for the night.
•
In the morning, he throws away all of his liquor and heaves the bottles out the window so that they shatter across the ground.
•
He finds Joker two days later, trying to cross into Blüdhaven and get onto a ferry to take him out of the country.
Dick knocks out the lackeys that are with him, and before Joker can say much of any sort of taunt, Dick sends his fist straight into Joker’s face.
He goes to town, letting his rage and guilt take over. Joker collapses at some point, and Dick goes down with him, knees clacking painfully against the concrete. But he doesn’t let up. He holds Joker by his stupid purple vest and lands punch after punch, until Joker’s face is covered in blood and unfamiliar at a glance. When his knuckles start hurting too badly to continue, he switches hands.
“You killed him,” Dick seethes, watching as blood spills over Joker’s teeth. “You fucking killed him! He was fifteen!”
Joker goes to speak, a sputtering, wet noise. So Dick pauses, lowers his fist to grab Joker by the vest with both hands to wait him out.
“F-Funny he d-didn’t… call af-after you,” Joker gasps, his red-painted smile smeared and broken. “Only… called for d-daddy… but dad— didn’t-t come in… time.”
Dick yanks his body upwards and slams it violently into the ground. Joker’s skull makes a sickening crack.
Before he can do it again, two hands grab Dick by the arms and pull him roughly away. Normally, Dick is pretty strong, but both of his hands are sore and probably broken from beating the Joker to a pulp; he’s too weak to hold on, and the Joker leaves his hands.
He’s thrown roughly to the side before his ambush training kicks in. He whirls one leg around, anticipating his attacker catching it so he can curl his other leg around his opponent and flip him, but both of his legs get caught and pinned before he can do so.
He looks up and sees the white eyes of the Batman cowl staring down at him.
“Nightwing,” Bruce says, “that’s enough.”
The fury hasn’t left Dick’s body, fueled by the adrenaline of a new fight. He shoves his legs free and stands. Then he gathers all of the strength he can muster up, channels it into his arms, and slams them into Bruce, hard.
Dick’s hands alight with fire from the pain. Bruce stumbles back, obviously not expecting that kind of reaction. Dick shoves him again before he can retaliate.
“What the fuck is your problem?” Dick snaps at him. “How dare you come into my fucking city—”
“He’s my criminal,” Bruce argues. “I have the jurisdiction—”
“Jason’s dead and you’re quoting legal bullshit at me?” Dick shouts.
The face lines around Bruce’s cowl soften, ever so slightly. It makes Dick enraged, so he shoves Bruce again. “You’re just as much a criminal as he is!” he hisses. “You’ve got a lot of nerve telling me—”
“You would have killed him!” Bruce shouts.
“Of course I would have!” Dick shouts right back. “Why wouldn’t you?”
Movement catches Dick’s attention from the corner of his eye. He and Bruce spin around at the same time, only to find a pool of blood where the Joker used to be, and no Joker. Both of them stare at the puddle in silence. The rage beating through Dick’s body is slowly waning, leaving only the guilt that despair that he’s been trying to force down for months.
Eventually, Dick turns away from the puddle, and from Bruce, and pulls out his grapple. “Get out of my city,” he orders, hoarse, and grapples away without another word.
•
Two days later, Dick hears that the Joker has taken up refuge in Iran, where he has diplomatic immunity. There’s no way anyone could do something without causing an international incident.
Dick thinks about it, anyway. He decides not to, in the end.
•
Tim is a fresh start. Snarky as hell and too smart for his own good. Dick watches as Bruce slowly warms up to him, slowly lowers the walls he frantically built up after Jason died, and takes to Tim like— well, like Batman to a Robin.
Dick watches as Tim dons the Robin costume — a costume stained with death — and puts pants on it. Maybe it means something. Maybe it means Tim will live.
(He lives. He gets tortured, a lot; gets hurt, a lot; nearly dies, a lot. But he lives.)
•
Tim has trouble sleeping sometimes.
Dick’s been staying in the manor more often — not often, but more often. He let Jason slip through his fingers because of anger and jealousy, and he refuses to let that happen again. So he grits his teeth past the tension between him and Bruce and joins them for family dinners when Tim asks for him, introduces him to new skills with the bo staff when Tim struggles, and shows Tim how to escape from every rope knot known to man.
He’s an insomniac. Dick’s not quite sure why — part of him thinks it’s because his parents left him home alone so much that Tim never had a firm but gentle hand setting boundaries for his benefit, like going to sleep at a reasonable time. Not that it would matter much anymore, considering most Bats are semi-to-fully nocturnal. But when Dick and Bruce go to bed, Tim does not.
Dick stares at Tim across the Batcave, wide and erratic eyes contrasting with the tired slouch to his body. He’s doing some sort of mathematical calculations — Dick might be brilliant, but Tim is just something else — writing at the speed of light. He hasn’t looked up from his papers in half an hour. Dick knows, because he’s been timing it.
Dick stands. Bruce is doing his own inane typing as he searches their medical database for interactions between different toxins. Dick walks right by him without a word. He grabs Tim’s chair and drags it away from the desk. Tim squawks in surprise, limbs flailing as his struggles for balance. One of his papers slides onto the floor, and his pencil goes flying.
“Dick!” Tim yelps.
Dick keeps pulling until the desk is far out of Tim’s reach. When Tim looks up at him, Dick says, “Go to bed.”
Tim makes a face. “I need to finish this.”
Dick narrows his eyes ever so slightly, and Tim shrinks back. “But— Bruce!”
They both turn to look at Bruce. He doesn’t look at them, but he pauses his typing for just a second, just long enough to pause, weigh his options, and say, “Listen to Dick.”
It makes him feel good. They still fight like cats and dogs, but Bruce has shown some release of control when Dick is around. An attempt to show Dick that he is, in fact, his equal. He goes right back to typing, trusting Dick to handle it.
Dick turns back to Tim, victorious. Tim has his arms crossed and looks absolutely resolute. Something warm and fond spreads through Dick’s chest. This is what it could have been like with Jason, if he’d been better.
“Bed.”
Tim glowers. “I’m not tired,” he grumbles. But there’s something thin buried underneath it. Frustration, maybe, but not at Dick — at himself.
“I know,” Dick tells him. “Come on.” He motions for Tim to stand, which he does, then ushers Tim upstairs. When they exit the clock, Dick says, “Go find a pair of Bruce’s pajamas and get in bed. I’ll be there in a minute.”
Tim wrinkles his nose. “Bruce’s pajamas?” he questions. “They’ll be too big.”
Dick gives him a look. “Just trust me, kid, okay? Pajamas, bed, be there soon.”
Tim rolls his eyes but walks off down the hall towards the bedrooms. Dick heads down the winding stairwell, straight to the kitchen. Alfred has already gone to bed, like a normal, functioning human does. But Dick is capable of making more than just cereal, despite what some might say, so he pulls out one of the pots from the cabinet and sets it on the stove.
He rummages through the drink cabinet, where the box of powders sits. He flips through the packets — protein powder, whey powder, water flavoring — until he finds the handful of hot chocolate packets. He plucks one from its spot and shuts the door, making sure to stay quiet enough that he doesn’t wake Alfred.
There are a few different hot chocolate packets — regular, low calorie, zero sugar — and while Dick personally believes zero sugar would be best to keep Tim from having an energy spike, desperate times call for desperate measures, and nothing hits as good as regular, sugary-sweet hot chocolate. Best not to fix what’s not broken.
He makes the hot chocolate quickly but methodically. While it simmers, he digs through the fridge to find the cheese cubes, then grabs a box of crackers from the cabinets.
He stumbled on this trick when he first moved to Blüdhaven and was having trouble sleeping with all the added stress of handling a whole city by himself. He stuffed himself with cheese and crackers one particularly difficult night and was out an hour later. He was constipated as hell the next day, but he slept, and that’s what matters.
He looked it up the next day: cheese does something when in the body that converts to melatonin. Dick can’t remember what exactly happens, but that’s the gist. The crackers provide carbs that fill him up faster, and the fuller someone is, the sleeper they get. It’s not a fix-all, and it doesn’t work for everyone; but it worked for Dick, so maybe it’ll work for Tim.
He sets up a large plate of cheese and crackers, then pours the hot chocolate into two mugs, one slightly larger than the other. He turns off the heat and pushes the pot to a cool burner. He’ll clean up after Tim is asleep.
He precariously balances the cheese crackers and mugs on the tray, carefully walking up the stairs and to Tim’s room. Blessedly, the door is open, inviting Dick inside. He pushes it open with the toe of his foot, then takes large steps towards Tim’s bedside table to set the tray down. He makes it, thankfully, then shuts the door behind him.
“Cheese?” Tim asks skeptically. He’s wearing a pair of Bruce’s pajamas, as instructed. It’s one of his silk pairs, a light tan that shines in the light from the bedside lamp. It contrasts against Tim’s skin, revealing just how pale he is. The arms are dangling down past his hands, and the collar is drooping down Tim’s shoulder on one side. “That’s your big idea?”
“Hush, you,” Dick orders playfully. He takes a seat beside Tim in the bed, then takes one of his arms and rolls the sleeve up and over, then over again, and again, until they’re cuffed thickly at Tim’s wrists. He does the same to the other, then straightens the collar out. It stays for a moment, then slides back down. Dick gives up on it.
“Here,” he says, putting the mugs on the table and placing the tray of crackers on the bed in front of them. “Eat. Trust me.”
Tim gives him a quizzical look, but does as he’s told. Dick takes the smaller mug for himself and starts sipping on it. They sit in silence for a while as Tim works his way through the cheese and crackers. When he’s done, Dick sets the tray back on the bedside table and hands Tim his mug of hot chocolate. Once again, Tim looks skeptical, but no kid is going to decline hot chocolate, so he drinks it.
When he’s drunk enough to not spill it when he moves, Dick eases Tim back and to the side, so that he’s lying propped up against Dick’s chest.
“My mother used to make me hot chocolate when I couldn’t sleep,” he tells Tim. “I’d be so nervous about a show, for whatever reason, and my mom would fix me a cup of hot chocolate and send me off to bed. Kind of like how people do with warm milk.”
“So why not do warm milk?” Tim inquires.
Dick shrugs, careful not to jostle the liquid in their mugs too much. “I dunno. I liked milk well enough. I think it was just a kid thing — hot chocolate was kind of a treat for us, so it was exciting. Helped settle the nerves and forget about whatever had me worried.”
Tim’s sucking down the hot chocolate faster than Dick expected. That’s good; he’ll feel fuller faster, which will help make him sleepy.
“Of course, I’d wake up the next morning and start freaking out again,” Dick chuckles, “but I’d gotten a night’s sleep, so I could do whatever it was I needed to do — tightrope, trapeze, aerial silks — well enough.”
Tim hums a little, wrapping his other hand around his mug so that both hands were holding it. “What was your favorite thing to do in the circus?”
Dick’s throat gets a little tight. It’s not that he doesn’t talk about the circus; he just doesn’t do it that often anymore. He didn’t want to when his parents first died, because it was too hard to think about; then it was all he had left of them, so he talked about it constantly; but now he’s grown, moved off on his own. He’s gone through two vigilante personas and lived a hundred different lives already, and he knows there’s a hundred more waiting for him in the future. It’s not that it feels like a distant memory — he still remembers circus life vividly and affectionately — but it feels like, well. A past life, he supposes.
It’s been a while since anyone has actually asked for a story.
“Oh, that’s easy: riding Zitka,” he answers, a fond smile spreading across his face at the memory of his precious elephant. “She was an elephant in the circus that traveled with us. I rode her around the tent all the time. I even made her part of a few of my stunts, when I was really young. After a while, I got too big, and I didn’t want to hurt her. But I still rode her every night.”
“Cool,” Tim says, grinning a little. “My parents rode elephants in India once.”
Dick looks down at him and sees a wistful look in Tim’s — drooping, drooping!! — eyes. “Not you?”
Tim shakes his head. “They didn’t take me on that trip,” he replies.
Dick curses himself internally. He knows the Drakes are neglectful assholes who go on vacations and archaeological explorations without Tim — or without a babysitter. It’s why Bruce has him staying at the manor whenever his parents are gone.
“She’s still alive, you know,” Dick says, trying to steer away from the subject. “Zitka. Asian elephants can live for seventy, sometimes eighty years. She’s still with the circus as far as I know.” He nudges Tim a little. “I’ll have to introduce you next time they’re in Gotham.”
Tim finishes the last of his hot chocolate with a sigh of contentment. “Met her already,” he mumbles, handing his mug off to Dick. “‘Member?”
Dick takes his mug and sets it down on the bedside table, besides Dick’s empty one. “That’s right,” he says, remembering. Tim met Zitka before — and Dick. He and his parents came to the circus when he was a baby. There’s a photo of them together, somewhere, where Dick is cheesing hard at the camera with his parents behind him, and the Drake family — including little baby Tim — posing beside him.
He’s got to track down that photo.
“I remember,” Dick says softly, brushing Tim’s hair back. “But do you really remember her?” When Tim doesn’t answer, Dick continues, “I’ll just introduce you to her again. She’d love you.”
Tim doesn’t say, “Really?” like most kids that hear an animal has taken a liking to them. He doesn’t say, “You think?” or “I’d love her, too,” either. He asks, “Promise?” without looking up at Dick.
Dick is going to crush Tim’s parents, and anyone else who ever made Tim think he was unlovable.
“Promise,” Dick swears.
The conversation is dwindling, but Tim still isn’t quite asleep. So Dick leads into a new story, this one about an eating contest with the son of the lion tamer to see who could eat more cotton candy without vomiting. He doesn’t even realize how the story, or the time, has gotten away from him until he looks down and finds Tim fast asleep.
Mission accomplished.
Dick considers leaving, but he doesn’t want to risk waking Tim up, because he’ll never get back to sleep otherwise. So he stays, pulling the covers up around them more, holds Tim a little closer, and falls asleep.
•
Nightwing is at the Drake house the night they return from their latest trip — one that took two more weeks than they said would. Dick holds his escrima sticks to their necks, thumbs hovering over the shock buttons, and forces them to sign over guardianship to Bruce Wayne.
They do what he says, because of course they do. He slams his sticks hard in both of their faces, and uses the small advantage to disappear through the window before they can even look back up.
•
The Drake’s try to get guardianship back, about six months later. They miss him, they claim, and want to do better this time. They swear Nightwing threatened them, though there’s no evidence, and the judge seems to regard that comment in disbelief. Their lawyer suggests not using that angle again after that.
Nightwing drops by that very night. He starts at the back door, watching through the glass. Mrs. Drake screams when she sees him, but when Mr. Drake comes racing down to the room, Dick is gone.
They venture upstairs. Mr. Drake gets his wife settled into bed and goes to the bathroom to brush his teeth. When he opens the door, he sees a pair of bright, white lenses staring at him from the darkness. He screams just like his wife did and trips over his feet in an attempt to backtrack out of there.
They pack their things in a hurry. A hotel would be good, they frantically say to each other. Just get out of the house.
They practically fly down the stairs, dragging their suitcases with them, and then lock eyes with Nightwing through the living room window outside. Neither scream this time, but they bolt to the car and tear out of the driveway without their seatbelts on.
Dick watches them go through the trees.
•
The next day, Mr. and Mrs. Drake don’t show up to the court meeting they arranged, but their lawyer says they have rescinded their appeal to regain guardianship, and Bruce gains full, legal custody of Tim forever.
Dick watches from his seat in the back of the courtroom with a smile. When Bruce takes Tim out for ice cream, Dick tags along, one protective arm wrapped around his little brother’s shoulders, a rocky road ice cream cone in the other.
•
Jason comes back. He’s been back for a while, actually. The whole thing was a shitshow, what with him trying to kill Bruce and all. Dick is at his wits end by the time they manage to work the lingering Pit effects out of his system for good, and Jason comes back to them, fully.
He’s still furious with Bruce, and he’s still killing people in an attempt to clean up Crime Alley, but he’s not insane anymore, so. That’s a plus.
About a month into Jason’s new role as Crime Alley’s resident Red Hood, Dick’s passing through downtown Gotham and sees Red Hood in an alleyway, caging someone against the dead end. Dick peers over the edge of the roof as he approaches, and a flash of green forms the jolting reality that he’s got Joker on the ground.
Joker is barely recognizable as he struggles for air, a crumpled heap on the ground. Red blood stains his white skin and green hair, and his suit is ripped up and smudged with dirt stains. While Jason watches, obviously reveling in his struggle, Dick watches Jason.
Jason must hear him, or sense him, because he looks up and finds Dick instantly. They stare at each other for a long moment, wondering what the other will do.
Dick puts his finger up to his lips, then leaves without a word. The Joker deserves whatever is coming to him, and Jason deserves to dish it out.
(He finds out later that Joker lived because Bruce intervened just minutes after Dick left. It makes him feel bad for Jason. He deserved to kill the Joker, and the Joker deserved a long, painful death.
He wonders if he should do something about it.)
•
Cass is quiet. She likes it when Dick calls her Cass instead of Cassandra, and she learns that it’s okay to smile whenever Dick brings her sugary treats from Blüdhaven’s Candy Kitchen. She’s reserved, always watching everything, like something is always out to get her, and shoulders always tight and alert. But she starts to smile, little by little.
Bruce has been doing really well with it, actually. His experience with Dick and his brothers is slightly different from Cass’s situation — Grade C criminals and a set of deadbeat parents versus a world-class assassin training his daughter since birth. But Bruce seems to know how to navigate assassin children better than non-assassins, somehow. Maybe because he has so much experience with assassins. Maybe because Cass is actually, legally Bruce’s daughter, and he’s never had a daughter before.
Whtever the case, Bruce is more open with her. It’s not a lot, and he’s still closed-off and too careful for his own good; but Cass feels comfortable with leaning against him in the Cave, and Bruce starts putting his hand on her shoulder when she does. Small things like that, that seem like hardly anything to a normal person, but are significant actions in Dick’s family.
Jason also started dropping by more. The addition of an assassin into the family makes Jason curious and feel more welcome (at least, that’s what Dick thinks). Tim is still wary around Jason, but they’re warming up to each other. Steph is ecstatic about having another girl on the team, so she comes by whenever she can. Cass enjoys it a lot more than she lets on, Dick can tell.
But of course, as is with anything involving assassins, there are issues — namely, those involving outside threats.
Someone tries to take a shot at Cass one night on patrol, only a month into her stint as Batgirl. If she wasn’t so well-attuned — if she wasn’t so experienced — the shot would have hit. Luckily, she managed to evade it. But despite hunting all night, the shooter managed to get away.
Bruce forbids Cass from going out into the field until the shooter is caught. It doesn’t go over well with her for obvious reasons, and Dick yells at Bruce for doing to Cass the exact same thing he did to Dick. It shakes Bruce a little, reminding him of life during the years where they were fighting. He goes to apologize to Cass immediately, and though he does not lift her benchment, they emerge hugging each other, and Cass does not protest when they go out without her that night.
It takes a lot longer to find the shooter than they expected — weeks, when they thought it would take days. In the end, Dick is the one who finds him first.
It’s just a random hitman. Based on what they know about him, he’s likely been hired by someone related to one of Cass’s father’s victims when she operated under him. They’ll investigate more once he’s no longer a threat to Cass. For now, it’s Dick’s job to apprehend him.
He finds the hitman looting through the trash outside a ratty casino, probably looking for anything valuable that was accidentally thrown away. Dick watches him from his vantage point on a rooftop overlooking the casino’s alleyway. He should call the others for backup, but he’s got the perfect opportunity to deal with this guy alone, and Dick is feeling greedy.
If he wants an assassin, he’ll get one.
Silently, Dick descends to the ground, hiding out in the shadows. Dick approaches the hitman. The hitman turns. Dick grabs him by the front of his shirt and shoves him into the brick wall behind him so hard that his head makes a violent cracking sound.
“Consider your contract with Batgirl void,” Dick snarls. The hitman tries to fight back, but he’s an amateur. Dick drags him away from the wall and wrestles him back to the opening of the alley.
“What are you doing?” the guy shrieks, flailing, but to no avail.
Dick stares at him without a word, glancing out at the street behind the hitman, then lifts his leg and slams his foot into the guy’s gut. He goes stumbling backwards into the road, and before he can do anything, a car runs right into him. Dick watches the hitman tumble across the hood of the car and roll into the street, a sick sense of satisfaction bubbling in his chest.
The car screeches to a halt before it runs over the hitman, much to Dick’s disappointment. The driver looks like she’s on the brink of a panic attack, so Dick steps over to the passenger’s side window and taps on it. The driver startles, eyes widening even more when she sees Nightwing standing there, then rolls down her window. She looks like she’s in a trance.
“Your car is fine,” Dick tells her. There’s no damage to the front of the car, and there are no cracks in the windshield. “Keep driving.”
The girl stares. Dick raises his eyebrows. The girl slowly puts the window back up, then puts the transmission in drive. She carefully swerves around the hitman, who is groaning on the ground, and drives away. Once she’s gone, Dick puts his foot on the hitman’s chest where he knows his ribs are broken, then puts his finger on his earpiece.
“Guys, I found him,” Dick announces. He breathes heavily so that he sounds out of breath. “I chased him into the street, but he got hit. He needs medical assistance.”
He glares down at the hitman, whose groans have turned to whimpers. Dick puts his finger to his lips as he presses his foot down even more. In his ear, Bruce says, “Five minutes out.”
What a bummer.
•
Stephanie’s father is a criminal, and it haunts in her eyes every time Dick looks a little too long. She tries not to let it get her down. She’s bubbly and energetic, ready to take on the world by making the shadowy corners of Gotham a little bit brighter.
Dick sees so much of himself in her. It’s how he knows she’s struggling.
Dick drops by the Batcave after patrol one night. He had a quiet night in Blüdhaven, but there’s never a quiet night in Gotham, so he figured he’d stop by to see how everyone is faring. By the time he gets to the cave, though, he finds everyone is turning in for the night, working on nightly reports and icing fresh injuries.
“Dick!” Tim exclaims when he sees him. Bruce and Steph both look up at Tim’s shout, both too involved in the computers to have noticed him enter. Dick feels mildly pleased with himself — it can be easy to sneak up on Steph sometimes, seeing that she’s still getting her feet wet with vigilantism, but it’s a feat when he can sneak up on Bruce.
“Hey, baby bird,” Dick grins, opening his arms for a hug when Tim hurries over. He’s grown so much and so fast — still pale, still having trouble with sleeping, but still smiling. He sees an ice pack set against the side of his bare torso, wrapped up in bandages to keep it in place. “What happened to you?”
Tim scowls and pulls away. “Bank robbery,” he answers. “Steph pushed me out of the way, but I ended up running into the side of a jewelry counter.”
Dick grimaces. He’s had his fair share of impacts with the sharp, pointy glass of jewelry store counters in his time as both Robin and Nightwing. “Ouch,” he says sympathetically. “Alfred fixed you up good?”
Alfred harrumphs, though Dick can tell there’s no heat behind it. “As if you have to ask,” Alfred sniffs, putting away the last of the tools in the medbay to sterilize. “Master Timothy, I need to remove your ice pack and put a proper bandage over that bruise before you retire to bed.”
Tim frowns, looking away from Dick. “Aw, Al, I can do that on my own—” he tries, but one stern look from Alfred has him slinking back to the medbay without another word.
Dick shares a private smile with Alfred, then heads over to the Batcomputers. “Other than the bank robbery, how was the rest of the night?” he asks, leaning against the top of one of the monitors.
Bruce grunts in response — not unusual, and usually means something along the lines of average, which probably means a couple major issues and a lot of small ones. Bruce’s behavior is to be expected. Stephanie, however, draws her shoulders up to her ears, and her fingers start hitting the keyboard keys a little harder.
Dick raises his eyebrows at her. “Uh oh.”
Steph doesn’t look at him. Which is strange, because Steph is usually ready to talk his ear off about patrol. The excitement of vigilantism is still fresh and new in her, the way it’s still in Tim, so to see her so unwilling to talk about the night is setting off alarm bells.
Dick narrows his eyes. He doesn’t want Stephanie to be forced to say what happened, but Bruce isn’t giving any indication that he’s going to fill Dick in. In a very measured, careful tone, Dick says, “What happened?”
Steph slouches at his tone, and Bruce raises his eyebrows at him. He looks like he’s eaten a sour lemon, but he replies, “We ran into Cluemaster.”
Oh. Shit.
Stephanie’s father is, understandably, a difficult topic for her to talk about. His criminal stunts are the entire reason she became a vigilante to begin with. He’s been in and out of prison for most of her life, and no matter how much good Stephanie does as Spoiler, it’s not enough to ease the shame and anger she feels whenever something comes up about her dad.
“Oh,” Dick says eloquently, then sits down in the chair beside Stephanie. “Do you wanna talk about it?”
Steph shrugs. “He took a couple off-duty cops hostage to try to get the codes for the PD computers,” she tells him, tone short. “He wanted to wipe his records. So he could leave. Start a new life or something, I dunno. I wasn’t really paying much attention to what he was saying.”
It’s very much a lie. Dick can tell by how dismissive she is about it. Besides, Stephanie knows better than to ignore any piece of information at a crime scene, especially when it’s coming straight from the criminal’s mouth.
“Did you get him?” Dick asks.
Stephanie grits her teeth. “No.”
That’s when Bruce finally looks over, cowl off and eyes sharp, and gives her a pointed look. “Our focus was on retrieving the hostages alive, which we did,” he reminds her. “I spoke to Jim. The injured cop had a head wound — lot of blood, but not a lot of trauma. He should be fine.”
“He still got away,” Stephanie snaps.
Bruce nods. “Yes. But Cluemaster isn’t known for his criminal skill set. It won’t be hard to find him or apprehend him.”
This doesn’t seem to console Stephanie much, but she doesn’t say anything else. She just goes back to her report, furiously slamming her fingers into the keys. Her cheeks are tinted red from anger, or maybe from trying to keep her composure. Dick misses her laughter.
He stays for a bit longer, talking to her about other things to take her mind off the situation, then sends her upstairs with Tim. The kid obviously has a little crush on her. Dick thinks it’s adorable. Once she, Tim, and Alfred have disappeared into the elevator, Dick turns around to leave.
“Dick,” Bruce calls out. Dick pauses. Bruce stares at him for a long moment. “Don’t do anything stupid,” he warns.
Dick gives him a playful salute, then swings his legs over the seat of his motorcycle. “Who, me?” he asks, grinning.
Bruce does not look amused. Dick speeds out of the cave without a helmet, rerouting his GPS for the north end of Gotham on the way.
•
Dick returns to the Batcave two hours later. Bruce is waiting for him, still awake, though obviously tired.
“Up past your bedtime, old man?” Dick teases, hopping off his bike. He really can’t say anything — he’s exhausted himself. This is around the time he usually goes to bed; but, of course, there were more pressing matters at hand.
Bruce gives him a flat look, which tells Dick that he isn’t fooling anyone. Dick shrugs, then yanks Cluemaster off the back of his bike and throws him down at Bruce’s feet. He’s unconscious, handcuffed with his ankles wrapped in duct tape and his elbows secured together. His face is bloody and swollen, but nothing appears to be broken.
“The part about not doing anything stupid?” Bruce questions.
Dick rolls his eyes. “I didn’t kill him. I just couldn’t have him finding the Batcave,” he replies nonchalantly. “He put up a fight.”
Bruce obviously doesn’t believe him, but for once, there’s no judgement in his eyes. He just nods, says, “Good,” then picks up Cluemaster by the chain of his handcuffs and drags him towards the Batmobile.
Bruce has got this under control now, so Dick turns tail and heads back out into the streets of Gotham, heading home. He’s gonna sleep well tonight.
•
Stephanie is still upset when she hears her father has been put into Arkham, but she smiles easier when Dick cracks a joke with her, and she eats more for dinner that night. Dick stays, just to make sure she’s alright.
He convinces her and a few of the others to watch a movie before he leaves, so they bunch together in the media room and watch Grown Ups. Dick makes sure to sit beside her, and when everyone else falls asleep except them, she whispers jokes and snarky comments about the movie to him, and he whispers his own right back. Their own little inside jokes in the dark of the room.
•
It’s not very often that Dick’s family comes into his city at night. It’s even less often that it’s Jason (read: never). Since his triumphant and violent return to Gotham tensions have been high, though he seemed pleased that Dick was still off in Bludhaven. Less people encroaching on his territory, or something like that.
Things have calmed down a lot, and there has been an uneasy, brittle alliance between Jason and the Bats: as long as Jason stays in Crime Alley, and the Bats stay out of Jason’s territory, everyone is happy. Dick’s fine with it — he never really goes through Crime Alley on his trips to Gotham anyway, and it means Bruce and Jason aren’t trying to kill each other anymore, so. Dick is counting it as a win.
Jason is very strict on the rule about staying in Crime Alley, so when Dick is driving through the west side of Bludhaven and spots Jason’s bright red hood in an alleyway, he’s pretty taken aback.
He parks his motorcycle far enough away that he won’t be spotted by Jason, or any of the parties he’s currently fighting. He takes off his helmet and zooms in with the lenses in his mask to figure out what exactly is going the fuck on.
Jason’s outnumbered one to three. He’s fistfighting all of them. Jason’s guns are on the ground though, out of reach — which isn’t really a problem; Jason agreed to switch to rubber bullets to mollify Bruce, mainly to keep him out of the Alley. But he’s always been a skilled fighter, especially considering he spent so much time being trained by the League of Assassins.
But Jason seems to be struggling. Dick can’t tell if he’s been injured, but that’s likely the cause. There’s no way Jason would struggle to take down three unarmed lackeys otherwise.
Jason manages to knock one out, but another comes up from behind him and slams him into the wall. He’s got a gun in his hand — definitely not one of Jason’s — and Dick has a split second to decide if it’s worth intervening without Jason’s permission. Then he thinks, fuck it, it’s his city and his little brother. He’s in charge here.
Dick revs his bike and shoots forward. He weaves through the cars parked on the side of the road and hops the curb, speeding down the sidewalk towards the mouth of the alley. Jason’s lucky — or smart, if he planned it — that he’s right near the opening instead of deeper inside. It gives Dick the perfect opportunity to reach out and grab the collar of the criminal aiming his gun at Jason’s head.
Dick is there and gone, grabs the guy as he goes, and speeds off. In his right-hand mirror, he sees Jason lunge at the other guy and take him down, able to gain the upper hand now that he’s no longer outnumbered.
Dick doesn’t go back immediately. He keeps driving, hand still holding tightly onto the criminal he grabbed. He lets the guy’s head smack against the parked cars — not hard enough to kill him, but enough that, after a few cars, he’s definitely got a concussion.
They approach a red light, so Dick stops at the intersection. There’s one other car to his left. He nods at the driver, who stares at him with wide eyes before realizing her light is green, then pointedly looks away and drives off.
The guy is begging for him to let him go, begging for mercy. Dick drops him.
He collapses to the ground, holding his head and moaning, but he’s thanking Dick as he struggles to his knees. Dick’s light turns green, so he reaches down, grabs the guy by his ankle instead, and hits the gas. The guy starts yelling again as the front of his body and his face are dragged against the street at 40, 45, 50 miles an hour. Dick just revs the motor louder to drown it out.
Dick drives the entire four miles to Blüdhaven General. He sidles right on up to the front entrance of the emergency room, lets go of the guy, and drives off again.
He doesn’t go back for Jason. He’s probably pissed that Dick got involved — even though he’s in Dick’s city — but also probably a little embarrassed, deep down, or annoyed that he needed Dick’s help. Better to leave him be, a silent acknowledgement that Dick is there if Jason needs him and won’t make a big deal out of it. They don’t have to talk about it, or acknowledge it; as long as Jason knows that he can come to Dick for help, Dick will do whatever he needs to.
•
Ninja watches the boy swing after the Batman. They settle on a rooftop about two hundred yards or so away. He puts his hands on the throwing stars stashed into his sash. The Head of the Demon wants the little brat back, and while Ninja does not understand, he will not refuse an order from his master. He will not fail.
He hears something behind him. Barely perceptible, obviously a trained assassin or spy. He whirls around and flings a throwing star in the direction of the noise. He misses — misses — and the star clinks against a wall a yard away from his target.
A pair of white eyes stare at him from the shadows. Ninja slides out his katana and wields it, ready for a fight. Ninja is not sure how he was detected — his stealth is the reason the Head of the Demon assigned him this task in the first place — but he is ready to defend his title. The figure moves, slowly, and the shadows melt and mesh around it. Broad shoulders, a bulking frame towering out of the shadows, just a peek of wispy hair across its forehead. A man.
Nightwing.
Ninja lunges. Nightwing’s arm shoots outwards, and everything goes black.
•
“I apologize for the situation,” Talia says, staring down at her father’s ninja in disgust. “I assure you, this will not happen again.”
Dick nods. He touches the ninja’s cheek with the toe of his boot, just to make sure he’s still out. “No harm done.”
Talia gives him an amused half-smile. “I never doubted that,” she replies. “I fear for the sake of those who try to cross my son with you around.”
Dick scowls down at the ninja. “He’s lucky I didn’t cut his hand off,” he snaps. He should have. He should have sent it to Ra’s as a warning. Don’t touch him.
Talia eyes Dick curiously, though there is no surprise on her face at Dick’s vehemence. “Yes, he is,” she agrees. “How’s my son?”
Dick’s scowl turns upwards at the mention of Damian. “Fierce as ever,” he answers. “You’ll have to stop by soon. He’d love to see you.”
Talia nods, pleased. “Of course.”
“Good,” Dick says. “I’ll arrange a day for him to spend the night. You can drop in.”
With plans set, Talia bends down and hefts the ninja over her shoulders in a fireman’s carry. “Good day, Richard,” she remarks. “Keep him safe.”
Dick’s face shifts into something more serious. Something darker. “Always.”
•
[Video transcript: a tall, brunette woman beams at the camera, a large microphone in hand. She appears to be on a sidewalk somewhere in a large city.]
Alicia Benson: “ Hello! I’m Alicia Benson with Gotham City 1, and this is a new segment we’re calling, ‘Ask Gotham.’ Every week, we’ll take to the streets to ask the people of Gotham a new question regarding the city. It’s time for our voices to be heard. This week, everyone’s favorite topic: the vigilantes!”
[New clip. Alicia Benson is in a new location, surrounded by skyscrapers and a major highway.]
Alicia Benson: “Sir, excuse me! Alicia Benson, Gotham City 1. Which Gotham vigilante do you think is the scariest?”
Blond Man : “Is that even a question? Batman, obviously.”
Red-Headed Woman : “Batman.”
Brunette Woman : “Batman.”
Red-Headed Man : “Oh, Batman, no contest.”
Blonde Woman : “Everyone is saying Batman? They must not live in Crime Alley. The Red Hood beats Batman in that category hands-down.”
A Very Young Child : “Red Robin!”
Alicia Benson ; “That’s a first! Why Red Robin?”
The Very Young Child : “He’s got a really long stick that he can hit people with.”
[New clip. Alicia Benson is now outside of Crime Alley.]
Alicia Benson : “Excuse me, ma’am! Alicia Benson, Gotham City 1. Which vigilante do you think is the most frightening?”
Blue-Haired Teen : “You’re gonna stand in Crime Alley and ask that sort of question? Even the people that don’t think it’s Red Hood will answer Red Hood because they’re so afraid of him.” [She turns to the camera.] “Red Hood, call me!”
[New clip. Alicia Benson is now on a sidewalk in Downtown Gotham and asks people the same question.]
Brunet Man : “Batman.”
An Older, White-Haired Woman : “Nightwing.”
Alicia Benson : “Nightwing? But he’s always so sweet!”
The Older, White-Haired Woman : *nods* “He puts up a good front, doesn’t he?”
Teen Boy : “Black Bat, obviously.”
Teen Girl : “Black Bat.”
Blonde Girl : “Robin’s pretty frightening, not gonna lie.”
Alicia Benson : *laughs*
Blonde Girl : “No, I’m serious. I mean, who carries around a katana if not to use it on someone? What else would he use a sword for? Some people think he’s got assassin training. No one ever suspects the little guy.”
Red-Headed Man : “Batman.”
Girl With Braids : “Spoiler.”
[Alicia Benson targets a group of young women and asks them the same question.]
Girl 1 : “Red Hood.”
Girl 2 : “Batman.”
Girl 3 : “Red Robin.”
Girl 2 : “What? Red Robin scarier than Batman? Are you crazy?”
Girl 3 : “Intimidation wise, sure, Batman’s scarier. But c’mon, Red Robin knows EVERYTHING. That’s way scarier to me than a dude dressed up in a leather bat suit.”
Girl 1 : “Okay, but Red Hood kills people.”
Girl 2 and 3, in unison : “Ohhh yeah.”
[New clip. Alicia Benson is now outside of Batburger and asks people the same question.]
Man With a Buzz Cut: “He’s not a Gotham vigilante, but the Green Arrow’s pretty terrifying when he wants to be.”
From the couch, Jason snorts so loud he has to cover his face with his hand when the others shush him. “Bruce is gonna love that,” he says sarcastically, voice filled with joy at the idea of Bruce’s reaction to Oliver Queen being scarier than him.
“Not any worse than what that one woman said,” Tim counters. “She thought Dick was the scariest?”
“Hey!” Dick exclaims. “I can be terrifying when I want to be.”
Damian scoffs. “Of course you could, Richard. To a kitten, perhaps.”
The others cackle at the comment. Dick leans back into his seat and lets them. He meets eyes with Cass, who gives him a knowing smile. Dick winks at her. They can think what they want. What they don’t know won’t hurt them, after all. Nothing will. Not while Dick is around.