. . . No idea where the inspiration came for this one.

Sorry if Bruce and Dick are a little OOC. I went with what felt natural

One Year Before Season 1 Began – Eighth Grade Year

Batman could figure out many things, from who committed the smallest robbery, to where fill-in-the-criminal's-name planted a kryptonite-laced bomb so that he could save that blundering Boy Scout he called a friend. He wasn't known as the world's greatest detective for nothing.

Bruce Wayne wasn't so dumb either. He knew when someone was in whatever-it-was for the money and when Alfred was ignoring him because he'd obviously done something incredibly stupid.

But this, this scene before him, was something that neither Batman nor Bruce Wayne could figure out.

Dick Grayson was sitting on the front steps of Wayne Manor with a drawing pad on his lap and a pencil in his hand. He had yet to come in the house to change out of his Gotham Academy (1) uniform. In all honesty, Bruce hadn't known that Dick was home until he'd been about to go out searching for him and nearly stepped on him.

It wasn't as though Bruce didn't approve; the pre-teen's artistic abilities were incredible and it'd be a shame if he were to suddenly stop. But he was worried. Every time Dick sat down to draw he'd talk aloud, as if he were talking to real people. And it wasn't just talking about the style of crosshatching and other such artist-talk. It was as if the kids he drew – besides himself – were real. He'd speak, leave a pause, and then seemingly answer a question that was never vocally asked.

This was certainly not the first time he'd seen it come out of nowhere. The question was why was it always coming out of nowhere? Why did it come out at all?

Bruce thought about the first time he had noticed Dick's hand-drawn imaginary friends.

~ FLASHBACK ~

Technically, he was supposed to be working on planning out the next big Wayne Tech meeting he would be having, but he'd gotten drawn away when he'd heard his barely ten year old ward, Dick Grayson, laughing.

Now, this wasn't an extraordinary occurrence – the boy liked to laugh a lot. But considering he still had at least two weeks of recovery (which Dick hated with a blazing passion) from the incident with Two Face (2), it was a bit of a shock. However, that wasn't even the real shocker. The thing about the laughter was that it was spontaneous, and was followed by a, "Will, you're crazy! Kari's gonna kill you!"

Bruce knew for a fact that, unfortunately, Dick had a lot of trouble making friends due to his questionable status, both as an ex circus member and as his ward. He also knew exactly what kind of peple qualified as Dick's friend and who they were. He was The Batman, he couldn't help being a little overprotective. Both The Batman and Bruce Wayne knew that there were no friends of Dick's at school whose names were 'Will' or 'Kari'. And they certainly did not have access to this manor.

He stood up slowly from his chair, walked over to the door, and poked his head out just enough to get a good layout of the parlor.

There, lying on the floor, was Dick. He had a drawing pad in his grip, with several different Artist's Loft (3) pencils spread around him. He didn't seem to notice the door opening, which struck Bruce as odd; Dick was always certain of his surroundings. The boy continued to draw careful, quick lines, all the while smiling brilliantly.

"Who are Will and Kari?" The pencil stopped as the first word was spoken. Dick looked up, surprised to see his guardian kneeling down to be on his level.

"Oh, umm . . ." Dick looked back down at his drawing pad. Bruce took a closer look at it and realized that it wasn't a simple doodle. It was no Van Gogh either, but it was fairly complex work for a ten year old. It showed an autumn scene (that looked suspiciously like the backyard of Wayne Manor) and two – no, three children. Only two were completely finished.

Dick pointed to the girl in the picture. Her jet-black bobbed hair seemed to swirl around her face. He'd set her standing on her feet, face towards the sky with her eyes closed and a soft smile on her face, with her arms outstretched to either side of her as though she were a plant soaking up the sun's rays.

"This is Kari," he said, sounding as though he were introducing her. "She's a little bossy, but she's real nice to her little brothers. She's standing like that 'cause she heard somewhere that you need at least ten minutes of sunlight every day, and so she decided that she was a plant." He looked up at Bruce and saw his baffled expression. He shrugged slightly with a quick smile and gave as explanation, "She's always done it."

He then pointed at the boy who was right behind Kari. He had very similar features to the girl (once you got past the auburn hair), except that instead of a peaceful expression on his face, his face housed what could only be described as a mischievous grin. In one hand was a fistful of dead leaves while the other was slowly pulling Kari's hood back, leaving a gap between the back of her hoodie and her neck. Bruce felt a small smile warm his sharp features.

Dick noticed his expression and laughed. "That's Will, and yes, he is about to shove the leaves down her back. That's why Kari's gonna kill him.

"Usually, Will's real quiet, but when he gets an idea of how to make Kari mad, he goes for it. He's real unpredictable that way." Dick fell silent.

After a few minutes when it became apparent that he was finished speaking, Bruce pointed to a boy standing slightly off to the side of Kari and Will. Dick had been drawing him when he came in. The child was scarcely more than a light sketch, but it was obvious that he was trying to contain his laughter by the way he was positioned. His body was doubled over; one hand was covering his mouth, which was most definitely a hidden smile, and the other arm was wrapped around his waist in an attempt to stop the giggles. "Who's that?"

Dick fidgeted uncomfortably. Well, as well as anyone who's in a body brace and leg cast can fidget. "That's me," he said after an awkward moment of silence.

"Are they friends at school?" Bruce knew what the answer would be before it was spoken.

"No." Dick added in his own suppressed grin into the drawing before continuing. "They're kids that cousin Johnny and I . . . gave life to. We used to play with them whenever we were upset or needed cheering up."

Bruce nodded. It made perfect sense that Dick would want to keep in touch with his family. All thoughts of convincing him otherwise left.

He was still a child, and Bruce didn't want to see Dick lose himself to the world of justice anytime soon. For now, Bruce would let Dick have his imaginary friends.

~ End of Flashback ~

Alright, so Bruce could possibly see how it had been therapy for the ten year old. He'd just gone through a life threatening situation and he had dealt with it in the only way he knew how – well, the only accessible way at the time.

But that was almost two years ago. Dick wasn't ten years old anymore, and he was now able to do things he hadn't been able to when he was in several braces. He could train, he could hang out with Barbara or Bette, he could practically do anything. So why didn't he? Why did he stick to the pad and pencil?

He was interrupted by a soft sigh of contentment.

"You always know just what to do, Kari. Thanks."

Which brought Bruce back to his fears that Dick may have already passed the thin line between genius and insanity.

Bruce shut the front door behind him and sat down next to his ward. Dick briefly looked up at him and gave a quiet 'hello'.

Bruce hesitantly put a hand on Dick's shoulder. "Are you . . ." What did one say at a time like this? ". . . okay?"

The response was instantaneous. "Nope," Dick turned to look at his guardian. He gave a small smile. "But I'll be alright in time for dinner." He returned to his drawing pad. Bruce peeked over his shoulder to see the position he'd drawn the three in this time.

Will, Dick, and Kari – respectively – were sitting on the white couch in Wayne Manor's parlor. They were squished together pretty tightly despite the couch being huge. The three were covered by a large quilt that they were working on. Dick was bent over, pushing a needle up through the fabric; Kari's needle and thread had been placed to the side of her while she pulled her bobbed hair into various pig-tails with one hand as the other rested on Dick's shoulder; Will was threading a needle with one hand (the needle poking out from between his lips), and looping his other arm through Dick's.

They were supporting him, holding him up.

Bruce sighed and pinched the bridge of his nose. "Dick, what happened?"

The boy in question tensed, pulling Will's sewing needle out farther than necessary. He mumbled a word in Romani that Bruce wasn't familiar with; he had no problem believing that Alfred wouldn't have be too happy if Dick had said it in English. Dick pulled out an eraser and started erasing the accidental line.

"Richard, I can only help you if you tell me what's going on."

"That's the thing, Bruce," he said, his voice trembling slightly. "You can't DO anything unless you want a lot of unhappy parents on your hands."

"And why would I have that?"

He stopped drawing, and put the pencils and pad on the ground beside him before turning to look Bruce in the eye. "You'll actually have one set of upset parents today, though." He held up a hand before his guardian could say anything else. "I punched their kid in the nose today."

"Dick–!"

"Alfred got the call since you were still at the JL meeting. I asked him to drop me off here before he parked in the garage."

Bruce felt like slapping Dick upside the head, sometimes. Could he not see sense? "What if someone had connected the dots, Dick? You could have been compromised, and that's not the worst of it!"

Dick's hands curled into fists as Bruce continued with his rant. Finally, after what seemed to Dick like hours, Bruce finally took a deep breath and calmly asked:

"What on earth possessed you to punch him?"

The answer was little more than a whisper.

Bruce's eyes narrowed. "You're going to have to speak up."

The pre-teen took a slow breath. "Anthony Blake called me un murdar jumătate de rasa."

"Engli–"

"Half breed, Bruce. He called me a filthy half breed."

The older man's eyes widened. "Wha–"

Dick shook his head as he pulled his knees up to his chin. "I don't know. Somehow he found out that it was only tata who was Romani. He started saying horrible things about mami and I couldn't – I couldn't just let him tear up her name like that."

"I–"

"I was going to come talk to you later, I promise." Dick put a hand on the sketchbook. "But Kari suggested that finishing the quilt we started a long time ago would be good for me, and Will was pulling that dreadful kicked puppy look that I give you, and I couldn't refuse. I was upset enough as it was without having to look into those eyes."

. . . Which brought them back to his imaginary friends that Bruce came out here to talk about.

Bruce gave another deep sigh, praying dearly that Dick wouldn't blow up on him. How to put this delicately? "Dick . . . I was just in the parlor before I came out here."

"Yeah."

"There were no people sitting on the couch who were sewing a quilt. In fact, there was no one in the parlor except for me."

Dick let out an exasperated breath. "Yes, I know that. Stop beating around the bush. And there's no need for you to say my name in front of every sentence."

Bruce pinched the bridge of his nose again. "Don't you think you're a little old to be having imaginary friends?"

His ward looked stunned for a moment. His gaze shifted from Bruce to the notebook and back to Bruce. There was a new confidence as he looked into Bruce's eyes. "Of course." He held up a hand before Bruce could cut in. "Let me explain." There was a deep intake of breath.

"Kari and Will aren't exactly imaginary, Bruce. They're real. Or, were real." Dick's slim fingers traced over Kari's face. "We were triplets. We were born in a moving trailer, somewhere in Nebraska, and Kari got sick. Really sick. She didn't live long." His hand picked up a pencil and delicately added in a few random spikes of hair to Will's mass of auburn hair. "I can remember Will. When we were four we were in California, and somehow he got caught out in the rain." His face screwed up before smoothing over. "We couldn't afford to take him to the hospital. Pop Haley could only give us so much. He died of pneumonia in just under a week."

Dick's hands flipped through the pages and stopped, resting on a drawing of two boys playing next to a trailer, a big top in the background. "When I was six, one of the elephants got sick. I didn't understand that it wasn't bad, just a little infection. All I knew was that my older sister and little brother were dead because they'd gotten sick. I was so scared, and no one could help until Johnny came. He told me not to worry because Kari and Will could see everything, and they knew that it'd all be good again soon. Then he made up the most ridiculous game imaginable with him playing both Will and Kari and me playing me. It was the most fun I'd ever had, other than flying. A few weeks later I was upset with something else, and he plopped down next to me and said, 'Kari would not approve of this.' And we played another game. Every time after we'd played Johnny would insist we take a picture of what'd happened," he knocked on the pad of paper. "Ergo the drawings.

"By the time I was seven I always went to Kari or Will before anyone else when I was frightened or hurt or angry. It was instinct." Dick leafed through a few more of the thick pages, more scenes of the triplets flashing by.

"When they were killed, Kari and Will became so much more important. They were the only two I could really keep a hold of while everything else was slipping out of reach."

Bruce ran a hand through his hair. He pulled Dick into a sideways hug. "I just don't want you forget that you live in a real world, not a fictional one," he murmured.

Dick pulled away. "Bruce, I know what goes on in my head. Let me explain it this way; Bruce, when the JL is being incredibly dense, what do you do?"

"I–"

The boy waved a hand, staring Bruce in the eyes. "That was a rhetorical question. I'll tell you when you can answer again. The answer is simple: You brood, Bruce.

"What do you do when Alfred has told you 'no' repeatedly to a stupid question and won't relent? You brood, Bruce.

"And it's the same way when I get hurt in the field or come back from being kidnapped. You make sure I'm not hurt, or get me the medical treatment necessary, and then you sit down and brood."

Dick took a deep breath. "But a Bird is different than a Bat. When the Bat has finally been recovered after being taken away from the Bird, what does he do? He flies off and plays.

"What does the Bird do when he's been kidnapped and put through he–" Dick glanced behind him at the doorway. "–a horrible situation?

His gaze finally shifted away from the door, convinced that Alfred was NOT going to pop up with the swearing jar. "He plays.

"So what does the Bird do when he's been bullied and picked on at school?" He gave the older man a pointed look.

Bruce let a small, sad smile find its way onto his mouth. "He plays."

Dick smiled back, letting Bruce pull him back into a warm embrace. "So in the end," he murmured, "when something terrible has happened to the members of the Batclan, the Bat has got to brood and the Bird has got to play." He gazed up at his guardian, appreciation in his cobalt eyes. "But he'll always come back to the Bat."

His blue eyes closed as he leaned into Bruce's strong arms.

"I mean that, Bruce. Kari and Will, they'll always be a huge part of me. I couldn't go on without them. They calm me down so that I can carry on in the real world. But after all of that, they're still just my brain's way of coping with the bad stuff. You're the most important part, because you're the first person I'll always go to when I'm done with all of the fantasy. You'll always be the first person I talk to about anything and everything.

"No matter what."

So funny story, when I first started writing this, Bruce started explaining everything. He's so pushy that way. Some of my original notes for the story actually have "In the flashback, don't have Bruce explain the characters. He's bossy and will try to, but don't let him. It's Dick's story, Bruce just happens to be telling that part of it" written on them. I had to rewrite most of the flashback because of that.

Anyhoo, I thought it'd be okay to tell you that I fully intend for this to be three or four chapters long, just so you knew, even if I don't get the next one posted for quite awhile.

To the numbers:

1. I'm going with the assumption that Gotham Academy starts in seventh grade and that since Dick is a freshman in the first season when he should be an eighth grader, he skipped a grade somewhere. I'm going with the story that he skipped seventh grade.

2. Many people know this story, but I know a few who don't. Basically, Two Face captured a judge who convicted him, Batman, and Robin. He forced Robin to choose who would die first, Robin made a bet of it with the coin obsession-thingy that Two Face has, and the judge still died. Two Face then took the mask off of Batman (because Batman had a rope around his neck as if he were about to hang) and told Robin that he wasn't killing him – the Bat was. He then proceeded to hit Robin, and then swing a baseball bat at him several times. Luckily Batman got out in time to save Robin, but not without a price. Robin had many injuries, and Batman said, quote, "Alfred, he's dying". I imagine that it took at least two months for him to recover completely. Dark times, dark times. So there you have it.

3. Epic artist pencils. They're what I use. :)

I hope you enjoyed! Please tell me what you liked and what I could work on to make better.