꒰ঌᰔᩚ໒꒱

Dick is helping Alfred bring out dinner at the dining table while Tim and Damian wash up, and Jason and Cas set the table; ever since they found out, the entire family has made a point of being home so as not to miss The Conversation.

"-swear, Timmers and Kon are not getting together by the end of the year. I'd bet on it!" Jason is saying when Dick enters. Cas raises an eyebrow and holds out a hand. "$100?" She shakes her head and grins, holding up five fingers. "$500??"

Dick laughs out loud as Jason visibly rethinks his bet. It's never good to go against Cas, but especially when she's this confident.

"You know what, I forgot but I actually quit gambling. Trying out a new thing…" Jason lies shamelessly, much to Cas's amusement. With the table set, Alfred brings in the last plate.

"What are we laughing at?" comes Tim's voice as he jumps down the stairs.

"Most likely, you, Drake," Damian tuts from behind him. He goes down to sit, almost falling to the floor when Tim yanks the chair from under him. He returns Tim's easy grin with a glare, but says nothing as Tim pushes the chair back in for him. Turnabout is fair play, and all that.

"Eugh, mushrooms?" Tim wrinkles his nose as he sits. "Don't we have vegetables that are less… slimy?"

Alfred raises an eyebrow at the comment. "Especially as a young, growing vigilante, I expect you to eat every bite, master Tim."

And that-

That rankles at something in Dick.

Food was a common issue noted in Bruce's Arkham patient reports. He struggled with texture, and mushrooms especially had been hard for him. Mealtimes turned into exposure therapy sessions where Bruce was forced to choke down bite after bite of food, even when it made him sick. And when he did sick up, he had to eat that too.

Alfred would have known about that. He knows, and there are still fucking mushrooms on the table.

There's a sudden shift in the air, a tension that didn't belong after such a common refrain. Intentionally, he drags his eyes up to Tim's, gets a nod. From his periphery, he can see that the others are suddenly sitting straighter, eyes sharp and knuckles white. Guess Dick isn't the only one suddenly electrified with anger.

"Or what?" Dick asks casually. It has to be him; somehow, they all know it has to be Dick. "You'll throw us in Arkham?"

Alfred, finally, catches on to the energy from the others. Unfazed as always, he responds with a cool, "If there is something you'd like to say, master Dick, then speak plainly." It's a challenge and an out in one; Dick could laugh and end it here and now, and Alfred would let it go.

Or, he could dig his teeth in deeper like a rabid dog.

"Sure, Alfie, we can talk. Let's talk about how a grieving eight-year-old under your care was sent to Arkham for electroshock therapy. Let's talk about the torture Bruce endured at your order."

Alfred sighs and straightens. "I do not know how you came upon that information, but I assure you it was not an easy decision to make. If I'd had another choice, I would have taken it."

"Another choice?! You had every other choice in the world, and you chose to hurt him." Dick lets his distress be swallowed up by anger. He wants to hurt for failing Bruce so badly, for never noticing this toxic dynamic, for keeping silent for weeks after realizing it. For weaponizing it, for joking about it.

"Master Dick! You have no idea what I was dealing with; I'd hope that if your child were as beastly as your father, you'd make similar arrangements!"

"Who the fuck are you calling a beast?" How could anyone look at Bruce, or even the Batman, and think beastly? Bruce and Batman both signal safety for Dick, something instinctual and soul-deep. Sure, the Bat might be scary sometimes, he guesses, but the Bat exists from compassion. He is the hand that reaches in the dark, no matter how many times he's burned or bitten. Sometimes, Dick thinks he's the only one to see that.

Dick doesn't realize he's out of his chair and snarling until Cas is there, lightning-quick, with a hand on his bicep. She casts a burning glare at Alfred. Jason's jaw hangs open, and Tim has a comforting hand on Damian's back as betrayal crosses the boy's face. Tim tilts his chin up to speak.

"I can tell you right now, Alfred, that we would show that child the same love Bruce showed us. I really wanted to believe you'd regretted it. How could you have…?" Tim covers his mouth with a fist, gaze drifting to the floor.

They'd talked about it, what to do if Alfred regretted it. None of them believed it, not with the way he still manages Bruce, but they wanted to. It brought comfort, that they might not lose Alfred forever if they confronted the abuses he inflicted on their dad. Because, god, they still love him. He betrayed their father at his weakest and most vulnerable point and they all still fucking love him.

There were good times, weren't there?

Weren't there?

Cas takes the lead from there. "Dad wears… someone else when you're around. He has not been free to be himself." She swallows. "He's always burdened."

"I had to," Alfred says firmly. "You do not know what he was like, and you are lucky for that. You would never respect him as he was then. You'd certainly never love him."

As if any part of Dick could not love every part of Bruce. As if Bruce didn't save him, all of them. As if Bruce isn't the best man Dick knows.

What's it matter if he's autistic? How does that detract from his compassion, his intelligence, his bravery, his love? Because there is no feeling like being loved by Bruce Wayne, of huddling under his cape in Gotham rains or crawling into his bed after nightmares. Of his hard-earned praise or harder-earned laughs.

Bruce doesn't deserve this. He doesn't deserve his abuser still controlling him, eating Bruce's food and living in Bruce's home. He deserves fucking peace, and Dick will claw it out of the man in front of him with his bare hands if he has to.

He tears forward over the table, Cas stepping back and letting him get the first hit in. Alfred stumbles back, and the fear in his eyes sends wicked satisfaction down Dick's spine. His fist is centimeters away from Alfred's jaw when fingers wrap around his wrist and twist Dick to the right. There, Bruce stands over him, eyes flickering between his kids. Dick looks around too, tries to see what his dad must be seeing.

Tim and Damian are still by their seats at the dining table, standing but turned around to face Dick and Alfred in the walkway. Cas is across from them, where Dick had just been behind the table. Jason stands to Bruce's right, by the head of the table.

"I heard the local circus lost its elephant's toys."

Dick turns back to face Bruce. "…Nah, they're in the elephant's trunk. I'm not mind-controlled, Bruce."

"Your fist was seconds from colliding with Alfred," Bruce says dryly. He positions himself more firmly in front of Alfred as he waits for an explanation, and Dick hates it. How could his dad still protect the man who threw him to sadistic doctors, who saw no value in Bruce's rawest self? Irrationally, he's mad at Bruce, too, for protecting the man who hurt his dad.

"He sent you to Arkham, Bruce," Jason says quietly, breaking the long silence.

Bruce takes .14 seconds more to blink than usual. "I'm aware, Jason. I was there…?"

"That's the issue! B, you were just a kid, an autistic kid, and instead of- of- learning to support you, and make you feel safe, they sent you to fucking Arkham!"

Bruce looks at his kids again. "And this bothers you."

Dick wants to slam his head into the wall, but he settles for pushing his head into Bruce's shoulder and accepting the automatic arm wrapping around him as Bruce releases his wrist.

"Yeah, B," he says quietly. "It really fucking bothers us."

He closes his eyes as fingers rake through his hair.

"Alfred was right to do it, chum."

Dick jerks back, eyes wide as he stares at Bruce. What? Dick wants to tear out the tongues of Bruce's critics for just insulting Bruce; there's no saying what he'd do if he faced the sadistic Arkham physicians right now. And Bruce is saying they were right to do it?

Before he can get a word in, Bruce holds up a hand.

"No, listen. He's right. What I was back then…" Bruce shakes his head in shame. "I'm sorry you found out I was ever like that. I'm sorry I was ever like that. I needed to go, okay? I needed that."

Dick is stunned speechless. Actually, if he tries to talk right now, he's going to vomit.

"You- you reformed it, though. You wouldn't do that if you didn't know it was wrong. You do know it's wrong, right?" Jason asks weakly.

"It's more complicated than that. I needed it. I was something… I was uncivilized, undone, and I needed to be made human. Of course I don't believe any other child should go through it, Jaylad. It was cruel and unjust, but I needed it. Just me, son."

From behind Bruce, Alfred lays one arm on Bruce's shoulder, a rare comforting touch.

"You did well, master Bruce," he says quietly. Bruce closes his eyes and lets out a measured exhale. Dick turns and catches Jason's eye. There's helpless pain in there, but that has never stopped a Bat. They'll keep trying, they'll yell and shout and grab Bruce by the shoulders and shake until he understands that he matters too.

A quiet snuffle from Dick's right distracts him. Damian is looking at the floor in shame, fists clenched at his sides. Tim is looking down at him and still rubbing his back. "Dami?"

"Baba," he starts, then stops. "Father," he tries again, stiff. "I have something I must confess." He swallows thickly, and Bruce can feel his son's discomfort and shame from here.

Automatically, and against his own will, Bruce connects the dots between the pure anguish on Damian's face and the topic at hand, then forcibly tries to disconnect them. Still, his heart stops in his chest. No, there's no way. There is simply- it can't be. Damian must want to change the topic now to a case he messed up on, or something. Desperately, he hopes Damian won't say what he thinks he will say.

Desperately, he hopes he has not abandoned his son to a cycle of fear that Bruce is still stuck in.

"I believe I was born as- broken and beastly as you say you were." Bruce stops breathing. "I read the patient reports and the news articles. I also…" Damian audibly swallows before finally looking up at Bruce. He holds his hands behind his back, chin down but eyes level. It's the attentive and submissive stance every League member knows.

"Father, Grandfather noted the same… eccentricities in me when I was young. They successfully trained it out of me, but I must confess I have started indulging myself in them. I am, as you say, beastly." Damian dips his head and lowers his eyes in shame. "I'm sorry, Father." His voice had wavered throughout his speech, but he barely paused long enough to gather himself before continuing.

Bruce stares at his son in shock and a tidal wave of horror. His son? His son, saying he was coming undone?? Damian, as human and kind and brave as any of them, but all he saw of himself was this- this beast?

Because Bruce had said it, and meant it, but only for himself. How could- It is different, Bruce is different. Never mind that the behaviors are the same; it's different. It has to be.

He stumbles past Dick and kneels over to where Damian stands, hands hovering awkwardly over him in a moment of uncertainty. With Damian's words still pulsing in his mind, he settles a hand on Damian's cheek, gentle and sorrowful.

"Damian, you- you're not a beast, my boy." And there is such visceral pain in Bruce's voice, so evident that it makes half the room flinch.

His son is the same as him, and his son knows. He read Bruce's medical reports; he knows. Bruce's eyes flicker to the table where he knows a bowl of mushrooms sits. He's seen Damian eat them before- did he have the same issues Bruce had had, at that age? Had he felt too unsafe to express his distaste?

Despite Bruce's best efforts, had Damian felt unsafe his whole time in Bruce's care? Bruce tried so damn hard to steep love into the very foundations of this home so Dick would never feel alone, then Jason and Tim and Cass and now Damian, but it turns out he's been failing his youngest son.

Beastly, he said. Damian saw himself as beastly. Did he constantly feel isolated, even in the midst of his peers? Did his erratic impulses leave him disgusted with himself? Did he feel improperly assembled, a misshapen jumble of limbs and organs, each time he made a social mistake? Did Bruce raise someone just like him??

"You know I am, Father," Damian says quietly. A pained hitch escapes Bruce as Damian continues to drive a knife deeper in Bruce's very soul. "I- sometimes, I flap my hands, or I rock on my heels, or I… I'll repeat phrases, over and over, simply because it… brings comfort." Damian says the last part in a shameful whisper, leaning forward into his father's palm and closing his eyes.

"And you- you absolutely should, Damian. You should do what comforts you, or relieves stress and anxiety." Bruce can't take his eyes off Damian's face as he speaks, trying to see all that he's apparently missed. "Why would I want you to suffer?"

"Because it's uncivilized, Father!" Damian snaps, stumbling back a bit in frustration. "If you are not allowed to- to satisfy your baser urges, then why should I? I am just like you! If you needed Arkham, then in equal measure, so do I!"

Bruce's jaw drops open. Bugs are crawling under his skin again, he thinks distantly. He can feel himself detaching from this world, this conversation. Damian can't possibly mean…. no. There's no way. He's so small, had Bruce been that small when he'd gone to Arkham?…No, actually, Damian will be a teenager soon. Bruce had been 7, and then 8. But Damian is already so small, and he can't imagine sending his precious boy somewhere he would only hurt.

And, it's different, isn't it? Bruce needed it. Just him, right? Because it's only Bruce who was born so disfigured and unlovable, but Damian wasn't. Isn't. The family around him, right now, loves him so wholly in a way Bruce's parents just couldn't, with him. His brothers will accept Damian, will adjust and accommodate if it's for Damian. It's just when Bruce does it that it becomes too much. You can't be born broken and weird.

…How does he even begin to explain all that to his son? Who demands that he treat him as Bruce treats himself, for this?

Impossibly, he wants his dad. And it's sick, because he knows exactly what his father would say.

Behind him, Bruce hears the clicking of worn, black leather shoes against hardwood, a sound that instinctively snaps him back to his body, even as he feels unsteady in his skin.

"Master Bruce, there are nearby clinics. The ones in Gotham, by your own design, no longer have the facilities needed for young master Damian," he adds reproachfully.

Bruce is stuck. He's stuck in his body (wasn't he just not here?), frozen as he internally screams at even the thought of sending Damian away to be- to be tortured!

(If it's torture to Damian, was it torture to him…? No, but- No. His parents sent him, the first time. It's blasphemous to even think that.)

As Alfred continues, Bruce slowly turns his head, a statue cracking apart.

"We're not sending him anywhere, Alfred," Bruce says softly. He can't even look the man in the eyes. The Batman is on his knees before his butler, unable to even look up.

How pathetic.

"He himself wants it. Weren't you just saying how much you needed it?"

"No," Damian cuts in. "I want to be treated as Father treats himself. Father believes he needed Arkham, so I must need it too."

What is he even saying? How could such a thing even be possible, for them to be treated the same? Bruce is… ruined, disgusting, subhuman. He pretends better now, but his walls hide the same sorry excuse for a person that they always have. How could his darling boy ever be treated the same? No one could look at the two and deny Damian's compassion, so wholly separate from Bruce's… feeble attempt at personhood.

Bruce finally turns and stands to face Alfred, still hazy with shock but with a clear objective. "He's not going anywhere," he repeats firmly.

"It won't be easy, but it is necessary. He has already admitted to his training coming undone; soon, he will be unfit for polite society. It will be more of a burden to have him stay, master Bruce." There is sorrow and resolve in the old man's eyes, and it just makes Bruce hate the words out of the man's mouth even more.

"He's not a burden, he's my son!"

"No, he is not. You should know as well as I do that he is barely human for as long as this issue remains uncorrected!"

Bruce stumbles, feeling the words like a blow. With Bruce out of the way, Alfred can finally see Damian, who tenses under the cutting judgment in Alfred's face.

Bruce blankly observes Alfred's sudden coldness. Even if he stops Alfred from checking Damian into a clinic, Bruce knows the future awaiting his son:

Constant micro-managing to ensure Damian is unmoving and uncomfortable in his own home. Itchy clothes left on his bed because they are "proper," even though they can certainly afford the same clothes in softer textiles. Dishes prepared specifically to have the worst textures known to man. Tone policing and condescending social lessons designed to humiliate.

Bone-deep exhaustion from constantly masking, permanent isolation from knowing that your freest, calmest self is repulsive to even those who claim to love you.

Bruce can imagine this future so easily for Damian because it is just a mirrored reflection of his own past.

There is only one way to break the cycle, Bruce.

"Come, Damian, we shall pack your bags. You may choose which of the clinics you'd prefer."

Your son is so, so small, Bruce.

Damian, hesitant, takes his first step forward.

He will never be safe with him in your home, Bruce.

Damian takes another step towards Alfred, shaking off Tim's hand.

GET UP, BATMAN.

Batman lurches between his son Robin boy and Alfred, a possessive hand on Damian's shoulder.

"Alfred," he looks the butler in the eye. The man served him and his family as faithfully as he knew how for as long as Bruce has been alive. He has been loyal to both identities and has kept the family's secrets close to his own heart. But Bruce will not let him hurt his kids. Alfred will not look at them the same way he looks at Bruce.

He will not.

"You're fired."

Even for bats, the room is eerily silent. Batman's heart thuds against his ribcage, and for a moment, he's sure the bones will snap out of his chest and spill onto the floor. His throat closes as he stares Alfred down. The man's eyes are wide with shock, but his expression smooths out soon enough. He watches Batman — Bruce, now, under those dissecting eyes — with the same contemptuous look he always gives when he catches Bruce misbehaving.

Finally, Alfred comments quietly, "Very well, master Bruce. If my services are no longer needed, then I shall take my leave. I will be gone by daybreak." With one last bow, Alfred very carefully avoids the eyes of the rest of the family in the room. Eyes forward, chin up, back straight; that's how he taught Bruce to walk and that's how he walks now.

Knowing this is the right decision does not silence the screaming chasm in Bruce's chest. Even if for the wrong reasons, Alfred had known that hidden, vile part of him and stayed.

Bruce stares unseeingly at where Alfred had just been, past the click of Alfred's bedroom door closing. He wants to hide, he wants to fight, he wants to waste away into nothing. Alfred may have been repulsed, but he stayed.

What was Bruce going to do now? He is alone again, again, again. Always and again. His children would leave him one day. Damian would realize the difference between him and Bruce and leave. His children would see the squishy, weak, deformed thing behind Bruce's walls and leave.

There is movement behind him, perhaps voices, but Bruce is blind and deaf to it all. There is only a ringing hollow in his chest as his mind drags him through shorn snapshots of his past.

He is 8 and he is alone in an alleyway. He is 17 and he is alone in Siberia. He is 21 and he is alone in the ruins of Lazarus. He is 36 and he is alone in Ethiopia. He is a thousand years older in mind than body and he is alone.

There is- oh. There is something draping itself over his shoulders. No, not draping itself. It's Dick. Dick is- oh.

Dick is draping his jacket over Bruce's shoulders.

He looks down at the lapels. It's so ugly, he thinks fondly. One hand clutches at the lapels. He tilts his head up to meet Dick's warm and worried gaze. His hand is on Bruce's shoulder- when did that happen?

"Hey, B," and Dick's easy grin has Bruce relaxing his shoulders, just the tiniest bit.

"…I apologize for forcing your hand, Father," comes Damian's hesitant voice. He's still at Bruce's side, looking up at him.

It takes a moment for the words to penetrate through the fog in Bruce's mind. When his lips move, they don't feel like a part of him.

"You never have to apologize for what I do to keep you safe. I'm only sorry you weren't safe this whole time."

Damian studies the honesty in Bruce's face, then pushes himself in for a brief hug. If his voice is suspiciously thick when he manages a short, "Thank you, baba," then no one mentions it.

Jason huffs and throws himself into Bruce's chair at the dining table. Leaning back, he says, "I, for one, am glad he's gone."

"Jesus Christ, Jason!" Dick hisses, and Tim motions for him to cut it out.

Bruce purses his lips. The protectiveness that should leave him warm inside just raises his hackles. "No, it's fine," Bruce gets out, perhaps too forcefully. He's getting whiplash from his own mood swings, but he doesn't temper it. Can't, really. "Don't pity me, or coddle me just because of my condition, or my institutionalization. It was just another bad thing that happened, and I got up from it like I do everything else. I don't suddenly need kiddie gloves."

He's snapping at them, he knows he is, but. But, he still hears the echoes of doctors calling him stupid, making decisions for him like he couldn't be trusted with his own damn self.

He still feels chafed raw, a wound never healed, from the control Alfred holds held over his life.

Cass steps closer. Well, she jumps over the table and lands neatly in front of Bruce. "Not coddling. Accommodating."

He narrows his eyes, still aggravated by the suggestion. "I'm the same I've always been. I don't need accommodations."

She hums. "You accommodated me," she points out. "When I was still learning to speak, you and Barbara taught me sign, then English. So we could talk better."

"I'm the same I've always been," he repeats. "We talk well enough, now."

She crosses her arms and gives an impatient look.

The Batman does as he always does when faced with his teenage daughter's frown: he relents. "I- what do I even need accommodations for?" He barely manages not to spit the word out like poison. He's the fucking Batman, he's been functioning just fine all these years. What could he possibly need help with?

She gives a sweet smile at his surrender. "Later," she promises, and darts in to kiss his cheek.

Well. He can't exactly be mad at that. He huffs, but lets it go. At the very least, it's a promise there will be a later, with her at his side. Cas, who understands him inherently because she is the same, who wades through her own self-hatred with him. Who could choose to be an orphan, but instead chooses to be his beloved daughter.

He surveys the rest of his children.

Jason, who had hurt him and who Bruce had hurt, yet is still here. Who wants Bruce to be safe from someone he believes is Bruce's abuser, even at the cost of Alfred. Who allows Bruce the gift of being his father.

Tim, who wanted to believe Alfred had changed, but wanted more to ensure Bruce's mental well-being. Who saw value in Bruce even when he was at his lowest, who gives Bruce the privilege of caring for him.

Damian, who opened his heart to criticism and pain, and would have accepted it, too. Who has come so far from the perfect soldier he had been, who is now Bruce's precious son. Who allows Bruce the honor of guiding him to a gentler life.

Dick, his first Robin, his partner, his light, his son. Who wrapped his jacket around Bruce. Who swore an oath with him, who may leave but always comes back. Who chooses Bruce.

Maybe, he is not as alone as he'd thought. Maybe he's broken just enough cycles of pain and grief for them to be better than him. Maybe, instead of leaving him behind, alone, they're reaching back in their own dust. For him.

Bruce clutches the jacket tighter to himself. Feels his lips tick up in a smile (and this time it feels like him).

"Batburger?" he asks, holding up his car keys. "First one to the car rides shotgun."

He can't hold in his laugh at the subsequent scrambling as five vigilantes childishly wrestle and bite at each other to get a leg up.

He loves them, he trusts them, and he thinks, someday, he can be himself around them.

As he fondly watches their squabbles, he finds himself looking forward to it.

tags:

@sanctum-em @javieyau @lunawanders70 @batshipinsane @urk-m @omegakevinday @sarcasbloom @superblyscentedflower @lwklillies @mpacifico35 @detectivebambam @s0urst4rz @donnaflower @glden-purple-angel @analogical4ever @definitelynotinurwalls @riali11

it's done!!

well, not quite. This is turning into a series. In the second part, the kids will actually learn how to identify and support Bruce through meltdowns, auditory processing issues, etc. It'll also deal with Bruce allowing himself to unmask, and the relief that comes with being loved even more for it. It'll be a bumpy road, but they'll overcome the chasm between them and end up in a better place, together, because of it. I'll still tag anyone who requests it in the next part, but it may be easier to subscribe to the ao3 series.