precisely what it says on the tin, boys and girls.
"I love you," eight year old Bruce forces out, because he's never seen this woman before and now his parents are telling him to say he loves her? "Thank you very much for the gift, 'Auntie Cynthia'."
He doesn't believe this woman is his aunt for a minute, because she looks older than Grandma, and doesn't look like either of his parents even a little bit.
And he's not lying because he never says he likes her gift - a porcelain doll in a pink dress, which is as girly as it gets. Mother's eyes had widened and she'd held the doll carefully to her chest.
His father nudges him with his leg. Bruce is only half the size of him, but one day, his father says, he'll be as tall or even taller than him.
Bruce doesn't believe that either, because Father's huge, and he makes everyone else look tiny.
He wonders what it would be like to be that high up.
"Oh, what a dear!" Cynthia squeals, pinching his cheek so hard it hurts, and ruffling his hair - that Alfred had specifically told him not to mess up. "You two are raising such a good boy here!"
But then Tommy Eliot's there, so he gets to go off and play while the adults talk, and Bruce is absolutely, positively sure that he doesn't want to grow up.
Ever.
"Love you," twenty two year old Bruce forces out, because he's not Vengeance or Darkness or the Night personified right now, he's 'Brucie'. He tells himself to act the part.
The woman next to him, a Russian model, smirks victoriously at the hordes of other females clustering around them. "Love you too, Brucie," she purrs, and he can just tell - the title of World's Greatest Detective wasn't just the thrown out like a t-shirt at a concert - that she's picturing their wedding, with pictures plastered on blogs and tabloids.
"Would you," she pauses seductively, and he feels his mind drift back to Talia Al Ghul, and then to Selina and then to- "like to dance?"
"Sure," he grins easily, and he decides that he'll give the press something to talk about. He turns to a miniature flock of women he's dated, "Rachel, darling, I know how you like to waltz, what if we made this our song?"
The blonde beside him freezes. "Vut?" She hisses, accent seeping into her voice, thickening it like Clayface's goo-
"I'd be honored," Rachel says, not missing a beat as she drags his arm over to the center of the ballroom,
He holds back a sigh. It's going to be a long night.
"Love. . .you," twenty six year old Batman forces out, because somehow the Puppeteer has gained control of his body. This never would have happened if Superman hadn't decided to tag along. The Man of Steel under control of a third rate villain.
He would have called it pathetic but a) he's not in control of his own body and b) he was in the exact same position.
How exactly the Joker had found companionship in the Puppeteer, Bruce doesn't know.
The clown cackles, wild eyes darting between him and the controls. "I always thought so, Batsy, but to hear you say it is a new thing altogether!"
Clark is just staring dumbly into space. As usual.
Suddenly the Joker aims a punch at the small Puppeteer, seizing the controls, and Batman can barely feel himself lurch forward.
Puppeteer falls to the ground with a thud, just as the doors to the warehouse fly open, revealing Green Lantern, Flash and Green Arrow.
He'll never live this down.
"I love you," thirty year old Bruce forces out, not because he doesn't mean it - because oh, lord, he does - but they're hard to say, and he's not sure that they manage to express even a portion of his pure adulation for this child.
Dick freezes midway into his routine, falling to the mat with a thud. His head bobs back up, and the ten year old's cerulean eyes are even bigger than usual, which really shouldn't be possible.
The boy stares up at him, and he can't help but go into 'Batman mode', just a little. Dick looks hopeful and suspicious and torn and elated all at the same time.
"Are you . . . all right?" Dick asks carefully, eyes turning guarded.
Bruce says 'I love you' and the first thing that comes to Dick's head is to ask if he's feeling all right?
"Yes," he adds a curt nod, unable to decide whether he should return to the Batcomputer and act as if nothing happened or repeat it so the boy knows.
Dick smirks at him. "What'd you say?" He asks, cupping a hand around his ear.
"'Yes'," Bruce repeats, because he sees where the boy - his boy, actually - is headed with this.
The acrobat bounds to him, launching himself up while he's a good couple feet from Bruce. He latches his small arms around his neck, squeezing tightly.
Bruce latches onto him as well, 'for security reasons', the antisocial Batman voice in his head fibs.
"And before that?"