The Court of Owls

Bruce was now in the batcave preparing to go out to patrol gotham. He had already put on his batsuit and was now adjusting his gloves on the second floor.

"You're going out on patrol?" selina asked from the first floor

He looked up to see her by the stairs "I do this every day of the week, you know that"

"Need any help?"

"I'll be fine, catwoman is still known as a criminal to gotham so it wouldn't be right if batman was seen with her"

She thought about it for a moment "True"

"I have finished placing Richard's belongings in his selected room master bruce" Alfred came down to join them

"Thank you alfed" bruce walked over to the pole and slid down to the last floor to get to the batmobile when an alarm sounded over the batcave and the computer was pulling up an alert

"What's going on?" selina asked

"Alfred check the signal!" bruce called

Alfred ran over to the computer and pulled up the information "It seems that all available police and medics have been alerted to a distress signal from" when he saw from where he immediately got as bad feeling

"From where Alfred? Bruce called

He hesitated to tell him "Gotham's Juvenile Detention Center sir"

Bruce and selina were both shocked and both felt a sudden pang in their hearts, selina looked down at him "Bruce you don't think…" but she saw that the batmobile had already started and drove out of the tunnel

Batman hoped that what he thought wasn't true and that there was just a small problem with the inmates of the detention center, he hoped that Richard was still safe in his cell, but deep down he knew that he was wrong

His foot pressed harder on the gas flooring it and he wrapped his hands tighter on the steering wheel. He had driven through gotham plenty of times but now it what was usually minutes felt like hours to get to the other side of the city.

The scene at the center seemed chaotic there were numerous policemen outside of the center and some ambulances on the side. Commissioner Gordon was speaking with the director and a few other officials by the entrance, some medics were tending to the wounds of some of the guards and helping them the critically injured to the ambulances. There were a few body bags on the ground that you could clearly see had dead bodies in them and there were a few firefighters still putting out some fire that had been erupted from the explosions.

Batman went up to Commissioner Gordon to find out what had happen, the officials backed away to give them their privacy

"What happened here?"

"Were not exactly sure but from what some of the gaurds told us some people broke into the center, we looked through the security footage but it was wiped out, nothing was stolen and its seems that all the inmates have been accounted for…"

"Actually sir one of the cells was broken into" a detective came up to them

"Who was the person assigned to that cell?" Gordon asked, batman already knew the answer before he responded

"Were still trying to figure that out the computer systems were destroyed so we have to wait until their fixed to find out"

"Try and see if any of the workers know who's cell it was"

"Yes sir!" the detective ran off

Gordon turned back to batman "The people who broke in came in from the yard entrance so you can look over there for clues on who they were"

Batman nodded headed straight to the yard, he was shocked to see a massive hole on the side of the building, it had been taped off by the police and detective were taking pictures and investigating the scene.

Nobody stopped him when he walked in through the hole to start his investigation, all the inmates close to the hole had been moved to other cells so they could investigate without interruption. Batman looked around to see some blood on the walls and multiple bullets on the floor 'who could have done this?' he then came to a stop when he saw the cell that had been broken into

It had been taped off as well but no one was around it so he strolled past the tape to inspect it, he saw that the bar door had been blown off the entrance and the bed had been flipped over 'You must have been so scared' he tried not to imagine what Richard must have been thinking when they broke in, he cloud already tell though that he had tried to hide under the bed. 'I promise I'll do whatever it takes to find you' he vowed and then continued to inspect the building for any clues

He narrowed his eyes when he saw a zig-zag shaped shuriken imbedded in one of the walls so he walked over to it and yanked it of the wall, he saw that it was black and gray with sharp points on each side. He turned it around to find an owl symbol on it, the owls wings made a circle shape around it. 'well that's something'

He decided to leave to look for any information on the symbol when he heard arguing back where Gordon and some of the workers were. He was surprised to see that Ms. Russuel had arrived but was now arguing with

"The little gypsy brat obviously escaped so we need to report him as an escaped convict" Ms. Russuel yelled at Gordon

"How would a six year old boy pull off an escape plan of this magnitude even if he did want to?!" Ms. Rossi yelled

'She must have been able to tell them who's cell that was' batman figured

"Who knows but would you like to explain why he is the only one missing?!"

"I don't know but I know that Richard was too innocent of a boy do something like this we need to get the police to search for him before something bad happens to him!"

"We need to report him as a convict!"

"Alright quiet!" Gordon yelled making them shut up "Richard may have been the only one taken" he saw Ms. Russuel was about to argue but glared at her to keep quiet "But we don't know all the details yet so for now we will report him as a missing person"

"Thank you" Ms. Rossi smiled while Janine huffed and stomped off

Gordon turned to batman "Were you able to find anything?"

"I investigated around the cell and was able to find a weapon imbedded into one of the walls it has a symbol on it so I'll be looking into it"

"Alright thank you" Gordon nodded

He was about to leave when Ms. Rossi called him

"Um batman sir" he turned to her "Can you please look for the boy Richard Grayson?! I'm sure he must be really scared wherever he is and Bruce wayne was planning to adopt him"

Seeing the look on her face she realized that she was extremely worried about Richard just as he was 'She must have gotten attached to him too' he decided' he really is a wonderful boy' "I swear I will do whatever I can to find him and bring him home"

oOo

Dick groaned as he began waking up and opening his eyes. He woke up to find that he was in what looked like a dungeon and immediately started getting scared again. He saw that the walls were made of cinderblock and he was sitting on an old looking blanket, he looked over to see a thin rectangular window on the side and ran over to it

When he almost reached one of his feet stopped him so he looked down and his eyes widened to see a brace around his ankle with a chain connected to the floor. 'what in the' he gaped at it and began shaking so he leaned over to look out the window a but saw nothing but a large forest and that it was still night 'Where am I?'

There was no source of light except for the window in the small room he was in and there was a door on the wall opposite from him but no knob. Even if he could get the door open he couldn't escape with the chain wrapped around his ankle.

He began crying in fear as he slid down the wall to sit on the floor and wrapped himself in a ball, he felt something hard around his neck making his eyes widen to look down and brought his hands up to it to feel what seemed like metal. It was thick wrapping around his entire neck and he could tell it was black with a few lights on it, he tried to get it off but it wouldn't even budge 'what is this thing' he cried as he started to panick

His thoughts were interrupted when he heard the door being opened from the other side of it and crawled as far from it as possible getting even more scared. The door opened to reveal more of those men he had saw before he was knocked out at the center

"W-w-who are you?!" he cried

They didn't answer his question and instead came up to him and grabbed him making him scream "QUIET!" he immediately obeyed as his arms were pulled behind his back and he could feel cuffs bounding them together. One of them bend down and got some keys from his belt then unlocked the brace on his foot

"Don't try running there are hundreds of talons around the facility and that collar will shock you if you even try!"

His eyes widened 'Talons?' he was pulled by the two men out into the hall that was made of cinderblocks as well and he could see other doors just like the one he had just come out of. 'What is this place?'

When they walked across a railing he could see over the pathway more of these men training at the bottom and they seemed to be really good at fighting 'why was I brought here?'

As far as he could tell the room that he was in had been in the basement of the building and on the opposite side of where they were taking him. They stopped in front of a door with an intercom on it

"Sir we have brought the boy" one of the men pressed the button

"Good bring him in!" the light on the top of the door flashed green and they opened it to lead him in. The floor was covered in carpet and there were lights made into the ceiling, behind a desk there was a man dressed in the same armor except he didn't have on the helmet, he could see the man was probably in his 60's or 70's.

He could also tell that this man was obviously the leader of these men and that frighten him making him shake and tears well up in his eyes

"No crying boy!" a man yelled making him flinch and was shoved to the floor

"You are dismissed men" the leader told them and they bowed then left the room leaving him alone with this man.

"Hello Richard" his eyes widened 'how does he know my name?' he was too scared to look up at him so continued to look at the floor

"I would like to start by introducing myself, I am willian cob and this is the court of owls"

"The court of owls?!" he blurted out

William smirked "Yes you have heard of us correct?"

He had heard of the court of owls only in the old children's nursery song and from urban myth's

"But you've probably only heard of us from what other people have told you am I right?" he gave a weak nod in confirmation "We are a cabal of some of the oldest and wealthiest families in Gotham, and we've used murder and money to make our name throughout history"

'So we must still be in gotham' dick concluded

"And to carry out our interest we use highly trained assassins called talons as you've most likely seen during your time here"

"So why am I here? Are you going to kill me?" he was afraid of the answer

"Were not going to kill you child were going to train you to become our heir as the most highly trained assassin in the world"

Dick's eyes widened and finally looked up at him "What?!"

"Your parents didn't tell you I assume"

"What do they have to do with anything?"

"It's not just your parent that have anything to do with this child it's the entire circus" he began explaining "Do you remember during your last tour in america Gotham's Children Night?"

He got even more confused but answered "Yes"

"Would you explain the purpose of that night to me please?" he asked

Dick didn't know what that had to do with the court of owls but answered "Gotham's Children Night is an event that happens for every generation of the circus, it one of the peeks of the circus. During that night the children of the circus get to perform on their own to try and show everyone what they could do"

"That is one of the purposes of that night but you see something you don't know is that during that night the court of owls were watching in the shadows" his eyes widened " We watched with sharp eyes for the one who would continue our legacy and we've chosen you" he leaned closer to his face "Congratulations"

Dick back away "We had security all around the circus that night told us so, how did you get past them"

William laughed "The supposed 'security' were the talons, Haley fooled you along with the rest of the adults including your family"

He gaped at him "Why would they do that. no they would never do something like that! Especially to their own son!"

"You stopped being their son to them that night! You were decided as property of the court at the moment we chose you! Your family signed you over to us and we were to decide when you would join us"

"Signed?"

William smirked " Without the protection and funding our court gives to the circus it would have died out years ago. Haley agreed that if we funded his circus he and every other adult would sign over any child we chose as the next talon!" he walked over to a cabinet next to the wall and pulled out a file then brought it back and dropped it on the floor in front of him "See for yourself"

Dick looked down at the documents. There was a small picture of him paper clipped to the folder and his birth certificate under it. There were a lot of papers in the folder but the one on the top was obviously a contact the word that stood out to him the most were:

Richard John Grayson, is hereby and forever know as the property of the court of owls.

He looked further down the paper to see very familiar signitures

I, Mary Lloyd Grayson, hereby give the custody of my son Richard john Grayson to the court of owls

I, John Grayson, hereby give the custody of my son Richard john Grayson to the court of owls

He was horrified to see that his parents had signed him over, him their own son, to the court of owls, assassins! "No! you did something to them, they would never to this to me!"

William shook his head and took back the folder "Silly boy they never really loved you" his eyes widened "you were just a child they had to train for the talons"

"That's not true!"

"Think about it child, they trained your acrobatics day and night to their peak, you were constituently told to study your academics, you were hardly aloud to eat sweets, and you always had to eat healthy meals!"

Dick flinched at the harsh tone "B-but they said that was normal for every child to do"

"You're a fool child! Do you really think companys would produce all these foods for them not to be eaten, do you really think all those dropout were genius's, and would every child in the world be trained!"

"B-Bu.."

"Get it through your head boy! They never cared about you and you shouldn't care about them! They sold you off and if they hadn't died you would have been taken anyway and they would continue on in their lives forgetting all about you!"

"I-I .." he stuttered 'how could they!'

William smirked at his dumbfounded face "This may be a shock to you but we are actually related"

Dick became shocked at looked for any similarities between them

"Yes I am your great-great grandfather on your father's side. You should be happy that there is some family that actually wants you now that you know your own parent didn't"

"That doesn't mean I want to be a killer!"

"Well get used to it boy! This is what has been decided for you and you will carry it out! If you don't like tough! Your parents and the entire circus made you our property so if you want anyone to blame, blame them!"

Dick looked down at the floor

"Welcome home child!"

oOo

Bruce had been up all night investigating into the symbol but hadn't found anything legit about it; Selina had offered to help by going out as catwoman to ask some of the criminals and villains about the symbol and was now waiting for her to get back.

"Master Bruce you should try and take a break I know you are worried about the boy but you won't be much good to him if you're not at your best" Alfred came up behind him

"It was more serious than I thought Alfred, I thought the people would be ordinary criminals but these people had highly advanced weapons and were trained fighters. Who knows what they could do to Richard now that they have him"

Alfred didn't try to persuade him again and went off to clean the cave

Bruce sat back in his chair to think 'These people have some sort of connection to the circus' he thought back to the circus and tried to think of anything that seemed out of place 'the children seemed to act pretty normal but the adults looked like they were hiding something' he decided that he should go and try to interrogate haley into telling him who they were that a way he could find them

Before he could get up he heard the batcycle come down the tunnel of the cave and then selina come up the pole to meet him "I found out what the symbol was"

"What?!" he was shocked

"Yes I was surprised too and you're not going to believe this but the symbol stands for the Court of Owls"

"The court of owls?!" bruce had heard about them but it was only a myth

"Yeah I was able to get two face to talk and he said that the court of owls was real it has been around for at least a century and I gave him an indication of why would a child be taken by them. He told me that every generation a child would be kidnapped in the middle of the night and trained to become one of their assassins"

"An assassin!" he was shocked to even think about it. He couldn't imagine a sweet, innocent, kind little boy become a cruel, merciless, unemotional killer

"He couldn't tell me where their base was because no one knows the talons only appear in the shadows and no one can ever tell they are there until it's too late"

Bruce became angry now he remembered how he had been trained by the league of assassins to become the fighter he was today but the league had also made a monster out of him before he managed to escape.

"What are we gonna do bruce?" selina was worried

"I'm going to talk to Haley!" he growled

"What?! Bruce you can't do that how would you explain batman knowing about this situation!"

"She is right sir, batman is only seen as the protector of gotham and he only deals with the most advanced cases. Richard is only seen as a missing person right now" Alfred added

"I don't care!" bruce jumped down to the batmobile and drove off

oOo

Haley had just finished watching the morning news in his trailer and was now pouring himself some coffee to think about what he had just heard

'I'm so sorry dick' he sighed as he thought back to the little flying grayson

He tried not to become too attached to the children of the circus but dick had this strong power to make any adult fall in love with his cute personality. He remembered how dick was always laughing and playing around with everyone at the circus, haley had never seen dick angry or sad before. He hoped William hadn't told him how he and even his parent gave them custody of him he couldn't imagine what dick would think of them if he ever found out.

He moved to the door to start his day when it has suddenly broken in half shocking him making him yelp before he was grabbed by the collar of his shirt and pushed against a wall. He opened his eyes to see it was batman that had him "W-what do want?"

"Information!" he growled

"Wh-what a-are you talking about?!" he had never thought he would be on the receiving end of batman's wrath

"Start with explaining your connection to the court of owls!"

Haley was shocked to hear that "I-I don't know what you're talking about!"

"Don't you even try it! I've been investigating into the disappearance if Richard Grayson all night and I know he was taken by the court and you are going to give me answers!"

"Alright the court funds the circus!"

"What?" batman had to admit he was surprised

"The court of owls have funded our circus for generations but they gave us a price in order to have their protection every generation during a specific night we had to sign over a child they picked as an heir to them so they could continue their legacy!"

"Any you agreed! You agreed to hand over innocent children over to a group of assassins and cause more people to be killer by them in the future!"

Haley bowed his head in shame "I know it was wrong but I had to do something to keep the circus! We would have died out years ago if it wasn't for them! I don't like the price I swear but if that's what they want in return we have to give it to them!"

"How was Richard chosen by the court?!"

"During our last tour in America when we came to gotham it was time for them to pick their heir so we put on a show for the children to perform on their own while the court watched in the shadows and they chose dick that night!"

"Why would a parent do that to their own child?"

"The parent try not to become attached to their children until that night is over for this generation we just raise them and be kind to them as if we were strangers"

"Where is the boy?! Where is the base?!"

"I-I don't know! Honest! He flinched when batman gripped him harder "Our agreement only stated that they fund us and in exchange we give them a child they never said were their base was or where they took the children!"

"You were more worried about keeping your entertainment facility over the lives of innocent children"

He nodded in shame

Batman let him go and watched him slide down to the floor "You disgust me!" he growled "I hope Richard finds out the truth so he won't be fooled by a false image"

"What are you going to do?" haley asked

"I'm going to rescue Richard for one thing but too you nothing I want to make you live with regret to what you've done to these children!"

Without another word batman left leaving a frightened Haley sitting on the ground