Summary: Bruce makes an unexpected discovery about his new ward. Dick has his good days…and his bad.
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(More) Pressing Matters
by Syl Francis
[Sat., 6 Jun./0600 EDT]
Before long, it was obvious that Dick was advancing at an incredibly rapid rate. In a few short weeks he reached a level of prowess that usually took a year to achieve. Of course, most boys Dick's age started at the bottom, while Dick was already an accomplished athlete. Adapting his considerable acrobatic skills to those of the martial arts came almost as naturally as breathing to the boy.
Plus, Bruce was picking up some pointers from Dick to help him improve his own balance and flexibility. Bruce doubted that he would ever reach Dick's skill on the high wire or any of the myriad gymnastics apparatuses he'd had installed in the gym.
The boy was just as comfortable fifty feet in the air—literally performing handsprings, cartwheels, and other feats of derring-do on the high wire—as most people were on the ground. Seriously, the boy knew no fear!
Bruce found himself envious of a move that Dick could do from a running start. It included a graceful leap, which was immediately followed by a flying triple spin-split kick combination. Dick could achieve some serious air and hang time—practically defying gravity.
Bruce thought he had seen it all; thought he'd tried just about every possible martial arts kick combination; thought he could teach Dick how best to use his gifts. Chagrinned, he privately admitted that even as a beginning student of the martial arts, Dick's acrobatic skills were miles ahead of his.
The boy was almost scarily good and a quick study, learning at a faster rate than Bruce himself had.
Bruce immediately saw that if he could adapt Dick's flying triple spin-split kick to a less-flamboyant flying spin kick (emphasis on only one spin), the momentum gained would add considerable power to his kick. And, depending on the need, he could use the spin-split kick to knock several heads at once.
Eager to help his guardian learn something new, Dick worked with Bruce for almost four hours, until Bruce was able to achieve sufficient height in his leap and gather enough power in his spin-split kick to accurately strike at more than one practice dummy. In fact, he hit with so much force that he ended up knocking off their heads.
Dick whistled. "Whoa…that was awesome, Mr. Wayne!"
Bruce gave him a half-smile in response. "Thanks to you, Richard." At Dick's answering, beaming smile, Bruce felt a hitch in his chest. He reached across and tentatively ran his hand through the boy's hair. "Hey, about this 'Mr. Wayne' nonsense. How about you call me Bruce?"
Dick nodded eagerly. "Okay, Bruce, but only if you call me Dick. It's what everybody in the circus called me. Except for Mom. She called me Robin 'cause I was born on the first day of spring, and on account of I'm a Grayson." At Bruce's questioning look, he shrugged and explained. "You know…I was born to fly, just like my dad."
Bruce nodded in understanding. "So…which do you prefer? Dick or Robin?"
"Dick…only my mom called me Robin." He smiled. "Well, Dad did too, but only when I did something really awesome on the trapeze. Like the first time I aced the quad!" Dick's blue eyes sparkled at the memory. "Dad said I flew like a robin!" The next moment, his small face grew pensive. "I guess I'm never gonna fly again…not I like I did with Mom and Dad. " He shook his head sadly. "Call me Dick. I guess I'm not Robin anymore."
In a comforting gesture, Bruce placed his large hand on the small boy's thin shoulder and squeezed gently. He didn't say anything; offered no words filled with empty platitudes.
Bruce understood that there were no words that could fill the deep hole that the loss of his parents had left the boy. All Dick could do was live day to day with the pain, until it lessened one day. Bruce could only hope that the boy would one day be able to feel true happiness again.
Bruce, himself, was still waiting for that day after 25 years…
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[Wed., 10 Jun./1730 EDT]
Dick was turning out to be quite an apt student. And there was so much more that Bruce wanted to teach him. While Alfred took care of literature and proper grammar, Bruce started him on basic computer programming, science, and math. To his surprise, Dick showed a natural affinity for these subjects.
Within a week of getting him the latest laptop off the WayneTech assembly line, Dick modified it to process faster and even increased its memory.
Later in Dick's room, which was the manor's combination playroom-nursery, Dick showed Bruce a paper in his childish scrawl with logarithmic equations and—was that a form of trigonometry?—that Dick had jotted down to show his work.
Bruce's expert eyes spotted glaring holes in the math, and in a few instances, Dick's reaching a solution "the hard way." On the other hand, he also realized that the "glaring holes" were the result of intuitive leaps in Dick's thought processes. The boy hadn't bothered to write them down, because he wasn't even aware that he was doing it.
The boy displayed an impressive mental acuity. He had a brain that was as fast and nimble as his body. Scarily good was an understatement.
Bruce blew out a long breath. I'm the legal guardian of a child genius. He'd have to make arrangements to have Dick tested. And the fall term is coming soon…I'll have to see about getting him into a top school. One that'll challenge him…or maybe a tutor. He's used to being home-schooled. Maybe we can start with a tutor this first year and ease him into school next year. Then again, he needs friends his own age…
These thoughts and others flashed through his mind as he read over Dick's work. Looking up, he silently watched Dick as the boy put the finishing touches of a picture he'd been coloring in. From his vantage point, Bruce could make out a circus tent in the background and a stick figure on top of an elephant. On the ground were two additional stick figures waving at the one on the elephant. It didn't take the World's Greatest Detective to determine whom the figures represented.
"Dick, who was your math teacher in the circus?" Bruce asked.
Keeping his head down, Dick continued coloring in his drawing. Bruce waited patiently as Dick paused for a moment, studying the box of crayons and selecting one. Bruce recognized a delaying tactic when he saw one. Dick was probably considering the question and how best to answer. Dick continued shading in the remaining empty spot in his picture's background. Finally satisfied with the results, he put the crayon down and looked up at Bruce, his face thoughtful.
"Mom taught me at first. She home-schooled me, 'cause it was hard keeping teachers." He shrugged, smiling. "One day I asked my dad a question, and he said I had to ask my mom 'cause he didn't do math. So I asked her, but…she couldn't help."
"What did you ask her?" Bruce asked, curious. By now he'd pulled up one of the child-sized chairs that furnished Dick's room and sat down.
"Just stuff about the trap." Dick used the carny slang for the trapeze. He took out another blank piece of paper and began sketching a pencil outline.
"What kind of stuff?"
Dick shrugged, concentrating on the pencil sketch. A vague outline of the trapeze over center ring was beginning to take form. "Just stuff…like how come I had to speed up before I could do the quad. Or, how come it was easier for me than my dad to reach the top speed needed even though he'd been a flyer a lot longer."
"Anything else?"
Dick had filled in more detail into the drawing. Bruce could make out a small stick figure standing alone on the platform, while two other figures reached for each other in midair.
"I asked how Dad knew how to time the swings so that he would be exactly there to catch me." He spoke quietly, his right hand pressing harder on the pencil, shading the background in stark black.
In the back of Bruce's mind, warning bells were going off over Dick's sketches. However, he still considered the boy's questions regarding the mass and velocity of the two aerialists, and the radius of the circular path of the swing—even the stress on the ropes, the bars, and catcher's arms—as showing an instinctive grasp of higher math skills.
"So what happened next? Who taught you math?"
"Toby."
At Bruce's questioning look, Dick explained. "Toby is our sad clown." He shook his head. "It was supposed to be just pretend...being sad. But…something from before, I guess." He laid his pencil down, staring unseeing at the sketch lying in front of him.
"From before what?" Bruce asked gently.
Keeping his head down, Dick turned the sketch face down. "Before he joined up with the circus, Toby did something…math-y—" He shrugged as he struggled for the correct word. "I don't know what."
"I see. So, the circus sad clown was your math tutor." Bruce decided that perhaps it might be a good idea to run a check on this Toby the Sad Clown. It might help him solve the riddle of Dick's math skills—namely how a boy with so little formal schooling could be solving such highly advanced math problems.
But first, he reached for the sketch and turned it over. The lone stick figure on the platform was hunched over, looking sad. The rope on one of the swings was split in two. "Do you want to talk about it?" he asked quietly.
Dick shook his head.
"Sometimes, it helps. When I—" Bruce stopped, struggling even after all these years. "When I first lost my own parents…" He paused gauging Dick's reaction. The boy had stiffened slightly, but was definitely listening. "…Alfred was there for me. It hurt to talk about…it—that awful night. And about them." He reached over and ran his hand gently through the boy's hair. "I won't lie to you, Dick. Even after all these years, it's still very painful."
Dick looked up at his words, his eyes stricken.
"But it's better. And guess what? It's because over the years, I've had lots of times when it was just Alfred and me remembering my parents. He's helped remind me that their memory doesn't always have to be surrounded in pain and darkness. There's a lot of good there, too. But there are still so many things that I wish I had said to them…could say to them, if only…" He shrugged helplessly.
Dick's face crumpled in distress.
"It isn't fair! Why did Zucco have to kill them? They never did anything to him…they never hurt anyone! I hope somebody kills him! I hate him! I hate them! Why did they have to leave me?" Dick swept his arm across the table, knocking everything—crayons, paper, and drawings—onto the floor. Bruce plucked Dick from the chair and onto his lap, but Dick refused to be consoled by his guardian's soothing words and presence, his small body wracked with heartbroken sobs.
"Why did they have to leave me? I hate them…I hate him…!" Dick's angry, broken cries were muffled against Bruce's chest as he struggled in his guardian's arms. In the back of Dick's head, his conscience demanded: Why did you say you hated mom and dad? You know you don't. You loved them. Grief-stricken, Dick could only fire back: Why did they have to leave me? A soft voice, barely breaking through his resounding grief, reassured him that he wasn't alone, but Dick closed his ears to it. I am alone…all alone.
As Bruce held his disconsolate ward in his arms, his thoughts flew back 25 years to his own days of pain and anger following his tragic loss. He had also lashed out at anyone and everyone who had tried to console him. Alfred had borne the brunt of his rage through the first year.
In the years following, he'd learned to channel those dark emotions into a single-minded purpose: to prevent such a tragedy from happening to another child.
Clutching Dick closer to him, Bruce felt a momentary epiphany. He swore that he would do everything in his power to prevent this boy from ever being hurt again. Dick was family now. And, next to his mission, there was nothing more important to Bruce than protecting his family.
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[Wed., 10 Jun./2345 EDT]
That night, Bruce ran a background check on one Toby the Sad Clown of Haly's Circus. Toby AKA Christopher Alvarez y Diaz, Ph.D., had started an engineering company, Diaz Instruments, from the ground up in Metropolis.
When his company put in the winning bid for a defense contract, his manufacturing plant suddenly suffered a series of nuisance accidents that affected the company's production line, leading up to a mysterious fire that set the company back several months.
In the end, Diaz Instruments went under and was bought up by LexCorp as part of a bankruptcy agreement: LexCorp paid all of DI's fees; restructured the company—thus letting several hundred of DI's employees go; absorbed its assets—including intellectual property and the defense contract.
Batman's eyes narrowed under the cowl. If LexCorp was involved, then whatever happened to DI was suspect. Digging deeper, Batman found evidence of payoff money. Following its trail, he traced its origin to a LexCorp subsidiary in Finland. The recipient turned out to be a convicted felon, Garfield Lynns—current whereabouts unknown—who had a love of incendiary devices.
Smiling, he sent the information anonymously to the one person he knew would be able to bring it all out in the open: the World's Most Annoying Reporter, Clark Kent. Once Kent wrote his exposé, and the appropriate authorities initiated their own investigation, Toby Diaz would be vindicated.
Bruce thought back to that afternoon in the nursery. After Dick had calmed down, he'd begun talking quietly. Not about his mom and dad as Bruce had expected, but about a quiet man who had befriended him.
Dick had liked the sad clown who took the time to show him how to find a problem and the steps needed to repair it correctly the first time. Toby had even shown Dick a series of math equations, explaining they were basic formulae of electronics. Dick had watched fascinated as the circuits inside a palm organizer were reduced to numbers on paper. Afterward, no repair job was complete without Toby asking Dick to write out the solution on paper.
As he headed toward the Batmobile, Batman reflected over the wheels of justice that tonight's research had set in motion. And all because a sad-faced clown had recognized the gifted mind of an inquisitive boy who had asked questions his dad couldn't answer.
End of Part 3
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Acknowledgements: Some ideas and dialogue borrowed from Batman: Dark Victory #8; All Star Batman and Robin, the Boy Wonder #9; Batman: Legends of the Dark Knight #100; Gotham City map/points of interest from Batman: Gotham City Secret Files and Origins #1; The Brave and the Bold #28; BTAS: Robin's Reckoning S2E2; The Sandman #1.
Additional Notes: A special thanks to my betas—Beth and Ellen.
Disclaimer: All characters belong to DC, Time Warner, and CN; this is an original story that doesn't intend to infringe on their copyright. Feedback is welcome.
Copyright: October 2012