gaaah, god damnit, I mess up the cutlines in my plot document. Last chapter should have been longer, I stopped it too early.. and now this one is endless! And so much is happening at once. Sorry for the emotional roller coaster. At least that way, I think I made up for the double-cliff hangers, yes? And some characters finally have their first appearance, that's also something.


FAULTLINES

ChAPTER THREE

Batman was running.

The comm link was deadly silent; no one dared to speak after the first wave of panic and confused shouting that followed Oracle's first, stricken whisper: 'Someone's on the Manor grounds.'

They didn't have enough manpower to keep the gig going after Damian got hurt. With Jason back in Blüdhaven to stop a large illegal cargo transport and Tim undercover, Batman had risked the rest of Gotham in order to stop the gang that terrorized the city for weeks. Alfred had been his additional eyes and ears instead of Damian, and Oracle had been assigned to help Nightwing. Only by chance did she notice the small, blinking light on her right that had been triggered through the Manor's security system.

It was too late for Alfred to get out of the Cave, the danger of running into the intruders too high. As much as Bruce hated to leave Dick and Damian on their own, he was also glad that Alfred was out of danger for now. But Dick and Damian... One was hurt, the other one recovering, not strong enough to squash a bug. The icy fingers around his chest constricted again when Bruce thought about them.

So Batman was running.

He couldn't enter through the Cave, which would have been the fastest way, for obvious reasons. Instead he had raced through Gotham with the Batmobile and screeched to a halt a few hundred meters from the Manor. Now, he ran.

'They're going upstairs.' Barbara's voice was calm, strained. She was just as afraid as he was. 'Dick and Damian are rushing towards Dick's room... oh shit, B., hurry.'

Bruce grunted in response, reaching the Manor's walls just then. He contemplated for a second bursting into Dick's room through the window, but decided to try to sneak up on the intruders from behind. Maybe they wouldn't see him and no hostage situation could occur.

'I'm getting out,' Alfred suddenly announced over the comm link, impatience and worry echoing in every syllable. With the intruders upstairs, he could finally slip out of the Cave.

"Don't go up there alone. I'm there in a few seconds." Batman willed the panic away behind a veil of logic and calm. With swift movements, he pulled two devices out of his belt. With one, he sucked in the window pane of the living room, and with the other he cut a hole into the pane with clinical precision. The heated diamond shard in his hand melted the edges of the glass he just laid bare in the process and smoothed them – no shards, no jutted edges, no blood. Catwoman taught him that trick.

"Oracle, what's happening?" he asked before climbing noiselessly into his own home. He headed to the staircase, cursing his heavy boots, and saw an impatient Alfred standing there already. They nodded at each other and began to make their way upstairs, painfully slowly in order to avoid any creaking of the old stairs. Not for the first time, Bruce decided to make plans for renovations.

'They're entering Dick's room right now,' Barbara said and sighed. There weren't any cameras in the private rooms; the kids had insisted on the privacy and Bruce had agreed. When Dick had been sick and moved back to the Manor, Bruce and Alfred had discussed the possibility of installing one, but had consented to just take Dick's key. Everyone had been happy with that arrangement... until today.

Bruce gritted his teeth in frustration. Why did this have to happen now? Jason out of town, Cassandra and Stephanie in Hong Kong, Tim undercover – who was probably going crazy right now, since they had cut off his comm link so he wouldn't be constantly distracted – and even Selina was absent. Clark was off-world and Wallace West had been seriously hurt in battle a few days ago. Damian was hurt, and neither Bruce nor Alfred knew how badly since the boy hadn't let them look at the injured shoulder, adamantly insisting he was fine when he clearly wasn't. And Dick? Dick couldn't even stay on his feet for more than ten minutes without tiring, even if he stubbornly refused to acknowledge that fact.

Bruce was pulled out of his musings when they turned the corner and were greeted with angry voices. Alfred and he shared an incredulous look. They were arguing?

The door to Dick's room was still open and the sounds of curses and insults were echoing through the halls. Bruce tried to explain to himself how such amateurs managed to overcome his security measures, but he was actually glad for it. A bunch of professionals would have been in and out with whatever they wanted before he'd even set foot into the Manor. Oracle had reported that they had already argued down in the living room area, which must have given Dick and Damian a lot of time.

Bruce and Alfred crept towards the door and pressed their backs flat against the wall next to it when they reached their goal. Bruce was just contemplating how to proceed, when one of the thugs suddenly yelled "I'm done with this, suckers!" and walked right out of the door into their arms.

Even as the thug registered in front of whom he was standing, eyes widening at the recognition of Batman, Bruce had already activated the knock-out gas pressure sprayer in his left glove and sprayed a good dose straight into the intruder's face. Eyes firmly fixed on the black figure, the thug slumped forward and was caught by strong arms and a hand that clamped over his mouth for good measure.

That had been easier than expected, but of course their luck didn't last long.

"Greg, you son of a bitch!" A voice from inside Dick's room called and the shouting continued, with one voice nearing the entrance. Bruce knew he had to act. They wouldn't get another happy shot, so he nodded shortly to Alfred and turned, dashing into the room with billowing cape.

The two remaining thugs definitely had not expected him. The one that had approached the door had been held back by the leader, who had grabbed a fistful of his shirt. He had turned around and faced away from Batman, still spewing insults at his comrade. This leader, though, was fully facing the Bat that had just come through the door and turned a sickly shade of white.

They were both lying on the floor in mere seconds. Only now did Bruce allow himself to breathe. All three were out. They had seen him, which was unfortunate, but his sons hadn't been harmed.

One weak moan drew his attention back to the ground and he swiftly knelt down to spray the knock out spray into both faces, while he registered Alfred's swift steps behind him, hurrying towards the bathroom door.

Things went downhill from them.

Bruce was still busy with the thugs – making sure they laid in the right position so they could breathe, all part of the routine of using physical violence and executed in a negligible amount of seconds – when suddenly a door slammed and a voice filled the room.

"Weapons down! Hands up!"

Bruce whirled around in the same moment Alfred gasped, and then the scenery around him froze in unimportance.

A gun.

A gun pointed straight at Alfred.

The sound of pearls clattering on the hard concrete filled his mind and his brain short-circuited. Later, in the hospital, Bruce couldn't find any other explanation for his impulsive action.

Alfred. Gun.

He was moving without conscious thought and immediately barreled into the person holding the weapon. Expertly, Batman had clasped the gun between his arm and rip cage, where layers of kevlar protected his body and added to the deadlock he was placing on it. There was a gasp and then a grunt when they hit the nearest wall, the intruder's body taking the brunt of the impact, and Bruce could feel how the one hand that still held the gun lost its grip.

Bruce stepped back quickly and wrenched it free, and the figure in front of him slumped down and landed in a sitting position... and then the crazy raven curls and the familiar PJs wormed their way through his adrenaline -induced haze.

Dick.

Shit.

Bruce vaguely heard Alfred shouting out the same conclusion behind him; he was distracted when Dick lifted his head again and stared at him in shock. His eyes widened in a recognition of 'Oh, it's you', similar to his own, and then Dick closed his eyes again and leaned back, shoulders slacking.

"Thank fuck," he breathed. "Damian. Bathroom."

Bruce shot a quick look at Alfred; immediately, the old man hurried into the bathroom. He was still trying to catch up with the situation, worry and fear blurring his vision. His suit was heavy, he himself weighted around 210 pounds, and he had just barreled full force into his sick son who wasn't much heavier than Tim.

"Are you alright?" Bruce asked and crouched down, simply laying the gun next to himself on the ground, forgotten for a second in the light of more important matters.

To his immense relief, Dick opened his eyes again and smiled a lopsided smile. "What took you so long?"

Bruce was inclined to smile back, but then Alfred's voice filled the room.

"Damian?!"

The urgency was palpable. Bruce, who was still crouching in front of Dick, watched the colour drain from his eldest's face. They icy feeling in Bruce's chest returned, the emotional roller coaster was plummeting down again. Dick was scrambling to get up, and Bruce swiftly hooked one arm around his waist and hauled him to his feet.

Two steps separated him from the bathroom, in which he found his youngest son and Alfred. Bruce sucked in a breath. Damian was dressed in a bloody Robin costume sans mask and was leaning against the bathtub, almost in a lying position. His eyes were closed, but when Alfred softly patted his cheeks, they cracked open an inch, and Bruce allowed himself to breathe again.

"He's okay, I just drugged him," Dick's voice next to him suddenly spoke up.

Alfred and Bruce both turned around to stare at him, at which he just shrugged his shoulders sheepishly. "He was hurt when he came upstairs, and I wanted him to sleep..."

"What did you give him?!"

"Uh, a pill of my opiate.."

Alfred opened his mouth in an almost comical fashion, but Bruce just saw his 10-year-old lying helplessly on the floor and felt his nerves slowly straining apart. First Dick pulled a gun at Alfred, and now he drugged his little brother into oblivion? What the hell was going on?!

"You gave a ten-year-old your chemo analgesics?!"

Dick sensed the turn in atmosphere and took an intuitive step back. "It was all I had."

Exasperated, Bruce pointed at the two men lying on the ground behind Dick. "He wouldn't have a chance against those men!"

"Well excuse me, but they didn't exactly announce themselves!"

"Master Bruce," Alfred said warningly before Bruce could answer. It was well-tried tool to remind Bruce not to get carried away in an argument with Dick. There was no time for an argument now, he reminded himself and concentrated on the larger situation.

"Master Damian will sleep the drugs off, but I need to redress that shoulder wound," Alfred went on, at the same time concentrating on Dick.

"I'm fine," his eldest sighed, rubbing a tired hand across his eyes. Bruce noticed in dismay that the hand was shaking, either thanks to the adrenaline that was pulsing through Dick's veins or thanks to exhaustion. Either way, Bruce didn't like it. "What happened?"

Dick needed to get back to bed. He was pale and shaking, and the exhaustion could be triggering a fever. Damian needed to get to the med bay. Three unconscious men were lying on the floor. Were the police on their way? Bruce didn't know if Oracle had been fast enough to stop the automatic notification to the police when the alarms in Wayne Manor were set off and none of the insiders reacted in the course of ten minutes. Tim was still alone under a lot of dangerous criminals.

"You tell us," Bruce growled gloomily. The situation at hand was a catastrophe. They needed to hide the gun with Dick's fingerprints on it; still under Bruce's conservatorship, Dick's gun license was inactive. Bruce was still in his freaking Batman costume, and all the while the thugs could wake up or the police could trod in. Hell, even Damian was still in uniform. "Why is he still in his Robin uniform?"

That came out wrong, Bruce noticed immediately, too much like an accusation. Dick's brow furrowed in annoyance. "He was mad and just ran upstairs. The drugs I gave him must have worked faster than I thought."

In Bruce's opinion, Dick hadn't thought at all. He was wise enough to keep himself from saying the words out loud, especially since he knew they were hanging in the air anyway, heavy and accusing. Dick should have known the drugs were too heavy for Damian, since they kept knocking him out quickly. Of course they would have worked even faster on a child.

"Oh, just say it," Dick muttered and glared at the Batman. He had been in enough arguments with Bruce to know what was coming.

"That was irresponsible. You didn't know how Damian would react."

Dick crossed his arms ostentatiously. "If you had talked to him rather than just gotten rid of him, I wouldn't have had to drug him in the first place."

"That's not up for debate." Bruce could feel the annoyance rising at Dick's childish attics. He had already gotten an earful from Alfred after he had dismissed Robin a few hours earlier and had a bit of a guilty conscience. And Dick needed to lie down; there was no time to debate the whole evening. He needed the facts, fast, and Dick was the only witness he had.

"What did they want?"

"I don't know, how should I -"

"Did they see either of you two?"

"No, I don't think so..."

"You don't think so? Yes or no?"

If the thugs had seen them, they wouldn't have taken so long. But then again, maybe they had seen Damian in the Robin uniform and had started the argument because of that? What other reason would a group of intruders have to get into a fight at the scene of a crime?

Batman was taking over his thinking, the cowl pulling over his mind again, and Bruce was willingly falling back into the cool and calm logic.

"No..."

"What were they arguing about?"

"I don't know!"

"Weren't you listening?"

Batman's logic and the beauty of deduction had always enabled Bruce to deal with stressful situations. To him, Batman's view always resembled taking a step back from the scene, thus detaching oneself and gaining an overview. It was like standing only inches apart from the canvas of a modern painting, and only with stepping back did the planes and lines of expressive colours somehow made sense. On the negative side, though, it detached him from details that weren't part of the puzzle. He didn't notice in time how much the interrogation was freaking out Dick, who had begun to retreat unconsciously.

"I was distracted!"

"By drugging Damian? You should have paid attention."

"I'm sorry I was trying to protect Damian and your secret identity!" Dick yelled suddenly, feeling pushed into defensive.

It pulled Bruce out of his musings, as the sudden change in tone and loudness disrupted his thought process. Damn. Alfred suddenly appeared next to him, trying to get between the two of them in order to stop the impending blowout.

"May I propose we all try to calm down? It has been a stressful day for all of us." By the end of the sentence, Alfred was automatically glancing down at the gun that was still lying where Bruce had left it. Bruce and Dick followed the gaze, and Alfred noticed his mistake. He began another sentence, but grew silent when Bruce started to move with a jolt. He walked towards the gun.

"Bruce, I -" Dick's voice piped up, unsure and fearful.

"Is it loaded?" Bruce was watching the weapon like in trance, and all the feelings he had repressed for Dick's sake for the past minutes started to pour through the cracks of his strained nerves.

"..Yes... I'm sorry, Bruce, I didn't see another way -"

"You pulled a loaded gun on Alfred."

A gun. Dick had used a loaded gun. Almost shot Alfred. Bruce shuddered inwardly at the mere thought. It was the stuff of so many of his nightmares and more; so far, it had never been Dick who had pulled the trigger in those dreams.

The feelings washed over him, in all their illogicalness and violence. "You pulled a gun under my roof!"

Dick stepped back even more, bringing his hands up in surrender. "I'm sorry, what was I supposed to do?!"

Bruce was catching up to him swiftly, ignoring Alfred's voice, and was only inches away from Dick's face in the matter of nanoseconds. His finger poked into his son's skinny chest accusingly. "There is no excuse whatsoever for using a gun in this house and you know it."

Dick exploded at that, at the proximity, the accusation, the chiding tone. "I had to protect Damian!"

"By shooting Alfred?"

"I didn't know it was Alfred!" A painful flicker flew over his son's enraged features. The hurt startled Bruce, who didn't want to yell at Dick. He didn't want to hurt him or accuse him of an action he knew Dick never intended. But there was this gun lying around in his house, so close to destroying his whole life once again, that the panic just welled up in Bruce's chest and washed his self control away in steady intervals.

Just the fact that Dick even dared to carry a gun into Wayne Manor was ungraspable... and then it hit him. He hadn't. The panic turned into anger and found a familiar target.

"How did you get it?"

Dick's eyes widened, and his own anger evaporated into fear. He shook his head slowly and stepped away from Bruce, now backed against the wall of his room.

"Jason gave it to you, right?"

"Don't be mad at him, Bruce, he was only doing what he believed was..."

"He brought a gun into this house!" Unaware, his voice was rising.

"Only because he wanted to protect me!"

"Protect you! By giving you a lethal weapon!"

Dick's voice got louder now, too, in order to match his. "Stop! You're looking for reasons to be mad at Jay so you don't have to face your other problems!"

Bruce snapped at his now fuming son. "Do you really think you're the right person to judge someone's decisions?!"

"What's that supposed to mean?!"

"After tonight's actions? Drugging your little brother? Aiming at Alfred?"

Said butler suddenly yanked on his arm with surprising strength. Bruce whirled around to face him, to snap at him too for disrupting the wonderful release he had found for the whirlwind of emotions inside of him, but Alfred's expression shut him up immediately. It was a mixture of anger and worry, and with a jagged movement Alfred motioned to Dick, who was by now leaning against the wall and taking ragged, shaking breaths.

Shit.

The argument had been too much; Dick's exhausted and weak body wasn't up to an emotionally draining shouting match in the middle of the night. Oh, no. Bruce hadn't meant to cause this.

"Dick, easy," he said as he hurried to him, taking in the hand that was pressed against the young man's chest. Dick nodded, eyes fixed at a distant point. He was visibly trying to calm down, to slow down his breaths, and apparently, it worked. The hand that had pressed against his ribcage now came up to press against his forehead.

"Okay?"

"..Yeah."

"You need to lie down." Bruce didn't like the shaky voice Dick had answered with at all.

Dick nodded slowly and pulled a few curls away from his forehead, drawing back the fabric of his shirt's sleeve.

Bruce's heartbeat failed for a second.

"What's that?" he asked hoarsely, staring at the colourful skin on his son's wrist.

Dick blinked at him and followed Bruce's gaze to his arm. "What?"

Bruce grabbed the arm and roughly yanked the loose sleeve up. He exposed a large bruise, yellow and violet and blue. His stomach churned at the sight. "That."

"It's nothing," Dick answered briskly and shoved the fabric over his arms again. He turned around to leave, but Bruce grabbed his arm once again. They both stared at each other, and Bruce saw that Dick knew exactly what Bruce was thinking about.

Bruises weren't good. Bruises were one of the early signs of a lack of thrombocytes, of an imbalance of the blood components. Of leukemia.

Relapse, Bruce's mind repeated, and his chest turned into one giant ice block. Relapse.

No. He wouldn't allow that again.

"We need to check your blood count," he gritted out between clenched teeth. Freeze would not win.

Dick's eyes widened at the suggestion. Stubbornly, he shook his head. "No, it's nothing. It's just a bruise."

"That's not 'just a bruise'. Alfred, get the med bay ready!" There had always been the chance of relapse, of cancerous cells hiding somewhere in Dick's body and multiplying at some point. If the new bone marrow was spewing out mutated leukocytes again, they needed to act fast.

"It's probably from when you ran into me!"

Bruce turned back to examine the piece of skin. "It looks older. Did you knock into something recently?"

"I... I don't know. Yeah, probably." Dick was starting to panic now, too, breaths shortening. Bruce guessed that Dick hadn't even worked through getting sick once, or miraculously recovering, let alone dealing with the possibility of relapsing.

"Let go. It's nothing," he insisted therefore, trying to twist out of Bruce grasp.

Alfred had quickly appeared to asses the situation and was now staring at Bruce too, awaiting his orders. He was afraid as well, Bruce noticed, also not daring to pronounce the dreaded possibility.

"You're exaggerating. Let me go. Bruce!"

Dick was in denial, and understandably so. Bruce was hoping to be wrong as well, but knew that he couldn't take the chance. Bruce gritted his teeth and took in the situation once again, trying to regain control for all of them.

Damian was still unconscious in the bathroom and needed a doctor. There were still three unconscious men on the ground that needed to be locked away so they would never see the light of day again. And the gun still hadn't disappeared.

"Bruce, it's not a relapse!"

Dick wrestled against his grip weakly, and Bruce let go as he turned away.

"Dick, hurry downstairs and take a blood sample," he ordered with Batman's voice. "Alfred, take care of Damian. I need to make sure the intruders stay asleep..."

A soft thud interrupted him mid-sentence, Alfred's flabbergasted "Dick!" followed. When Bruce had whirled around again, Dick had crumpled to the floor and didn't move.

Alfred and Bruce both stared at the scene, needing a moment to catch up. Then they both moved simultaneously. Routine had steadied them in the face of emergencies; it was hardly the first time Dick (or any other family member, for that matter) had passed out. Since he had been in relapse Dick had fainted a few times, especially in the very early days of his return to the Manor. Already high on adrenaline, Bruce's head started to feel light as he knelt down.

"Dick?" he coaxed as he gently pushed against Dick's shoulder. The unmoving body rolled onto its back without resistance. Dick's head lolled with the movement. He was out cold, eyes rolled back into his skull and non- responsive to any impulse.

"What happened?" Looking at Alfred, Bruce allowed some of the icy panic to show. Dick wasn't responding to his calling, and his breaths were weak. There and steady, but weak. "He was fine a second ago!"

Alfred pushed two fingers against the skin of his grandson's neck, deadly calm in the midst of mayhem. "No, he wasn't. He seemed to have trouble breathing... oh. Bruce."

Alarmed by his old friend's irritation, Bruce fumbled to find Dick's pulse on his own... and there it was, weak like his breathing, but steady, and.. oh. That was new. Shit.

"Arrhythmia?"

Bruce nodded solemnly, biting his tongue. The heartbeat beneath his fingers was gliding out of rhythm, changing its speed or the lengths of its intervals. For an agonizing second, Bruce thought he knew the pattern, from hours on hours of watching it on a mute EKG-screen while Dick was losing to the illness surging through his veins. "We need to go to the hospital. Call Leslie."

"Bruce," Alfred stood up, uncertainly, but didn't move to the phone. "What about the rest?"

Bruce cursed inwardly. The situation had been a nightmare a few minutes ago, but now? He wanted to get Dick into a car and drive to the hospital himself, but Dick couldn't wait until he had changed and cleaned up this mess the intruders made. Dick's lips were already paling, displaying a blueish tint. Rolling him onto his side gently, Bruce forced himself to let go of the childish notion of taking care of Dick on his own. He didn't like giving control to others, but he had other things to do now.

"Call an ambulance. Give him oxygen." Bruce raised the cowl's lenses up, readying himself for the next task Batman needed to fulfill without being distracted. "I'll carry Damian down into the med bay and set things up. Then I'll get rid of those guys."

The ambulance would be here quickly. A call from Wayne Manor wasn't something that was ignored, especially not since the Wayne Foundation had just sponsored three new large-capacity ambulances.

"Call Leslie. Tell her to check for a relapse. And then I need you to take care of Damian."

Knowing Dick was in good care, Bruce marched over to the bathroom and picked up Damian, who had blissfully slept through it all. The wound on his shoulder had stopped bleeding, but definitely needed some professional attention. Bruce shifted the small boy in his arms carefully, trying to put less pressure on the wound, despite the coma-like state.

He wouldn't be that careful with the thugs, that much he was sure of.


Bruce was running.

Moving through the dark hospital, he was trying to find Leslie. Dick wasn't in the emergency room anymore as they had told him, but he didn't know where they had put him. Leslie Thomkins seemed to be with him, so at least Bruce didn't have to worry about an incompetent doctor.

The forty minutes he had had to wait for the phone call from the hospital had been terrible, even though he had anticipated it. As soon as he had carried the three thugs out of the Manor and to the Batmobile, Bruce had been counting the seconds. Ten minutes until the ambulance arrived. Five until they left again. Ten minutes back to the hospital. Five minutes admission procedure, standard tests. Alfred was busy with the police by then. As it turned out, the alarm had indeed reached Gotham's police station, which had been lacking personal – since Batman and Robin had been busy with the gang gig for the last few days, the rest of Gotham had to be taken care of by the police.

Then the phone call reached him; he was already dressed in spare clothes he had stored in the Batmobile and waited in one of the more usual cars he had placed all over the town in case of undercover emergencies. A quick SMS message to Alfred had made up the cover story: Bruce Wayne, officially on vacation in Switzerland, was indeed living the life in one of his mansions outside of Gotham, with a few select (and non-existent) guests the press would have a field day with. When the phone call came, Bruce immediately rushed to the hospital to be greeted by a very uninformed receptionist.

He had been asked to stay in the emergency waiting area, where he had stared at the clock and miserably reviewed the evening's catastrophes. There was much he didn't understand yet; the thugs were in jail now, the police owing Batman a few favours, but there wasn't time to interrogate them. Most importantly, what was wrong with Dick? Under the cover of the cowl, Bruce had been able to largely ignore the uneasiness in his chest, but as Bruce Wayne with nothing to do but waiting, the fear started to crush him.

Did he relapse? Or had he exaggerated? In hindsight, Dick might have been right; the bruise might have been from when Bruce had crashed into him. But he couldn't take chances. And the arrhythmia... was that due to leukemia? A new symptom? Or something entirely new? One of the long-term consequences cancer often carried along?

The only thing he knew was that he himself hadn't done a damn thing to help the situation. He still felt in the right about his reaction to the gun pointed at Alfred; he hadn't seen Dick from his position, and he refused to recognize a fault in protecting the butler. But Dick had taken the attack rather well. Only later, when they argued, did his breathing become irregular, his behaviour more agitated. He should have seen it. He should have known better.

Jason had appeared just in that moment of self loathing.

He was still Dick's emergency contact and had been notified right after Bruce. It had taken him a while to get from Blüdhaven back to Gotham, but here he was, walking towards Bruce with that damned boastfulness that was so typical of his wayward son.

Someone who knew him well could see the lines of distress in his face, though. Predictably, Jason didn't waste time on formalities.

"What the fuck happened?!"

He was sporting a busted lip, so one of the thugs he had stopped in Blüdhaven this night must have gotten a lucky punch. That was alarming; Jason had largely adopted Dick's Nightwing-style and went for close combat. Maybe he needed more training, but Bruce didn't know how to tell him that without sounding condescending to the sensitive vigilante who still put every word he said on the scale.

"We don't know yet," he answered instead. "He collapsed with an arrhythmic heartbeat after we got into an argument."

Jason cursed silently, running a hand through his wild hair. Bruce wasn't fazed by Jason's open display of affection for his older brother anymore, and it usually made him smile inwardly. Right now, though, he just wanted Jason to explode at him – he had promised himself he wouldn't instigate the clash that was undoubtedly coming in order to honour Dick's effort to bring them together. But that gun... No, Jason had to give some really good answers to that.

"You were arguing with him? After all he's been through tonight?!"

"He almost shot Alfred."

Jason's eyes widened. Immediately, the tables had turned. Jason stepped back, achingly similar to Dick's movements that evening. The moment of shock vanished quickly, replaced by a mask of calm and confidence. Bruce had taught his sons well.

"Where did he get the gun from, Jason?"

"I gave it to him, obviously." At least there was no beating around the bush. Jason and Bruce were so used to arguing and placing the blame on each other that they fell back into their old roles easily. Bruce had a problem with Jason's gun? Big deal. Jason used them to provoke him, so denying them had never been an option.

"When?"

"During the chicken pox episode."

Bruce counted back, quickly. Two weeks. The gun had lain around in his house for two weeks.

"Are you out of your mind? He was feverish for days. It's a wonder nothing happened!"

"Is it?" That snarky grin appeared, the one Jason had adopted after his resurrection. "Or maybe you're just not giving us enough credit."

That again. Bruce slowly stood up and walked up to his wayward son. "How on earth can you justify what almost happened today?"

"I take it he tried to protect himself? The brat was hurt, so he probably went into mother hen mode?"

Jason didn't know the details of the evening; he was shooting at the dark. It hit Dick's reasons uncannily well, and Bruce could hardly say anything against Dick trying to protect himself.

Luckily for him, a nurse called out his name just that second.

"Mister Wayne?"

Jason and he moved apart immediately. More important matters were finally coming up.

The nurse jogged towards them. "Mister Grayson was moved to Cardio a while ago."

"A while ago?" Bruce asked, displeased. "Why didn't anybody tell me?"

"There's so much going on in the ER, right now..." The nurse shrunk back from the two tall men who were staring at her gloomily. "Doctor Thompkins arrived and took the matter into her hands."

That was good. Leslie was a reliable person; honestly, Bruce didn't know how they would have managed without her during those months of crisis.

"Has he woken up yet? Are the blood results there already?"

Next to him, Bruce could feel Jason flinch. He didn't know about the bruise.. and apparently neither did the nurse. Panicking, she just shrugged her shoulders and told them to ask the nurses and doctors at the Cardiology Unit before she hurried away.

Bruce and Jason turned to each other when she left. They were still standing close to each other, but the atmosphere between them had changed drastically.

"Blood results? You said he was arrhythmic!"

Jason was afraid, Bruce realized, and decided to drop the gun-matter.. or, to put it in better words, to postpone it for the time being.

"There was a huge bruise on his forearm and he didn't know where it was from. He collapsed after I told him he needed to check it out."

Jason opened his mouth to say something, but Bruce interrupted him before they could indulge in another game of 'who-did-the-wrong-thing-first'.

"I need you to get Tim out of there." Tim was still undercover with a faction of the gang they were chasing, and wouldn't be able to simply leave. Bruce expected Barbara to watch out for him, and he knew that Tim was perfectly capable of keeping up his appearance, but the whole thing needed to stop. Whatever had happened at the Manor and was going to happen with Dick proved that they weren't ready for long-term missions like that yet. In hindsight, they should have never started it. "The mission's over. Bail him out."

Jason looked conflicted for a second, but nodded nonetheless. He wanted to make sure Dick was alright, but the two of them had spent enough time in the hospital's various waiting areas that he knew there was nothing for him to do but go through the horror scenarios or engage in an argument. Neither was an attractive alternative right now and to be honest, Bruce himself would prefer to actually do something.

"Keep me updated."

"Same here."

They nodded at each other, both knowing that the arguments weren't finished yet. Then Jason turned around and swiftly walked away, out of sight. Bruce closed his eyes to compose himself again, and then walked away in the other direction.

And now, he ran.

At Cardiology, the nurse had sent him to ICU. With a heavy heart, Bruce hurried over, slowly panicking. Emergency room, Cardiology, Intensive Care – he didn't like this order one bit. The mobile phone in his hand had only rung once, when Alfred called to quickly update him about Damian's condition. The boy was fine, the wound on his shoulder treated and the drug slowly vanishing. Barbara had sent him a few messages, but he didn't have the time to read them; if anything serious was going on, he would be flooded with calls.

When he walked into ICU, a place too well-known for his tastes, familiar faces met him. Jim Gordon was talking to one of the nurses, and Barbara had wheeled her chair a few feet further and was tapping on her tablet. Jim was still in uniform, Bruce noticed concernedly, and heard him approaching just that second.

"Bruce," he called, and Barbara looked up anxiously. "How's Dick? They won't tell us anything."

The uncooperative nurse seemed relieved to see Bruce. She shrugged her shoulders and murmured another "We can't tell you if you're not family."

Bruce nodded at Jim and Babs and turned his attention to the nurse. "I'm Bruce Wayne. How is he?"

"Stable," she smiled at him apologetically. "The docs put him on meds that keep him under. All the tests Doctor Thompkins ordered are still running. She insisted on being the first to talk to you as soon as the results are here, so I'd advice you to wait here."

Bruce cursed silently, watching as the nurse retreated. Dick had been in the hospital for more than an hour now, and there still weren't any results. It was beyond frustrating. A single green light burned over a door on the far left side of the corridor, and Bruce suspected it to be Dick's. He debated walking up there and risking being skinned alive by Leslie, who couldn't stand people interfering while she worked, or indeed sitting down as the nurse had told him to.

Jim and Barbara decided the matter when they pulled him back into the present.

"Bruce, what happened?"

They both looked genuinely concerned; Jim had laid a hand on his shoulders, and Babs had wheeled closer. Bruce forced up a small smile, but both of them knew him well enough to see right through it.

"I don't know much. There was a burglary at the Manor, and Alfred found Dick passed out on the floor. The hospital called me a while ago and I've been running around trying to find him since."

"They wheeled him in fifteen minutes ago," Barbara piped up, solemnly looking at the door under the green light that indicated that hospital staff were present there. "Doctor Thompkins was with him, and ordered a long-term EKG. We didn't hear much more."

"I'm already assigned on the job," Jim continued. "Batman dropped the thugs who broke into the house at the police station earlier. They haven't woken up so far."

"Batman? Seriously?" Bruce was too tired to act on his usual level, but he still tried to bring up some convincing surprise. Good thing he could shift bad acting onto being preoccupied with Dick's situation.

"Yes. My colleagues are questioning Alfred right now. I made sure I'm the one who'll interrogate Dick as soon as he's ready to."

Bruce couldn't allow Jim to talk to Dick before he did. They needed to make up a story.

"I doubt he'll be up for an interrogation, Jim," he said with an icy voice, glaring at the Commissioner, because... seriously. Dick might have relapsed, for all they knew. "I'm sure he doesn't need to give testimony right now."

Jim sighed quietly and shrugged helplessly with his shoulders. "Normally I'd say yes, of course, but this time... Bruce, the two of you will be very busy as soon as he wakes up."

Bruce's brow furrowed. Did Jim know something he didn't?

"The media knows about everything," Barbara clarified. "Some hobby moviemaker filmed Batman climbing out of your window with the thugs in tow. And the ambulance didn't go unnoticed either – it's running non-stop on TV."

God damnit. Now Bruce really wanted to sit down. The media didn't need to be involved in this, for God's sake. They still hadn't found the culprit who had taken photos of Dick while he had been in chemo, and the media's attention was nothing Dick needed now, especially if his diagnosis wasn't good.

"Dad, maybe you should call at the station and let them know that Dick won't wake up until tomorrow."

Jim nodded and pulled out his phone, walking out of the ICU to have his conversation in quiet.

"B., there's more," Barbara predictably said. She tapped against her tablet a few times and then gave it to him, face grim.

Bruce took it, and saw a news bulletin from about forty minutes ago. A picture of the Batsymbol up in Gotham's cloudy sky was in the background as the news anchor spoke.

"A hobby camera man might have just filmed the movie of his life," the anchorwomen said, and a shaky camera sequence filled the screen. It was a bad shot of a forest scene, with a really lousy actor, probably drunk, in a Halloween werewolf costume in the middle. In the background, Bruce recognized Wayne Manor. They had been shooting in the woods surrounding the mansion. They were still part of Bruce's property, but Bruce had never cared about the amorous teenagers or film students that used the woods.

"At about one a.m., someone broke into Wayne Manor, property of Bruce Wayne, the richest man in Gotham and probably this side of the country," the voiceover announced. "Garret Dinkley didn't know anything of that when he suddenly glimpsed one of Gotham's rarest creatures."

On screen, the camera zoomed close to the Manor. Agitated voices of Dinkley and the werewolf-guy were audible, and then suddenly Batman appeared in one of the Manor's windows. Bruce sighed as he watched how he himself heaved three unconscious figures out of the window and then disappeared with them in the far side of the woods.

"There's more, keep watching," Barbara reminded him solemnly.

Indeed, after a few seconds of praise for Dinkley's bravery, the anchorwoman made a serious face again. In her background, a photo of Arkham Asylum appeared, and Bruce drew in a sharp breath. What the –

"Batman's involvement in the Waynes' case is highly suspicious, considering that later that night, the supervillain Mister Freeze escaped Arkham Asylum."

Bruce felt the ground beneath him shift as he locked eyes with Barbara. Freeze was free? He escaped the same night as someone broke into his house to look for his children?

"After neglecting our beloved town for days, Batman chose to stop a burglary rather than a dangerous criminal from breaking free. Suspiciously, Bruce Wayne is one of the very few outspoken sympathizers of the Batman, and is already suspected by many to sponsor Batman financially. So far, no official statement by the Wayne family nor Wayne Enterprises has been given."

The news bulletin turned towards some high-society story now, and Barbara took the device out of Bruce's icy hands. This was bad. Freeze was free, and the media would beat a path to their door now. Batman, the human interest story about Dick's illness, and Bruce's fortune would serve for so many newspaper headlines, Bruce's head swam when he thought about them. Jim had been right; the faster they managed to clarify tonight's events, the better.

Barbara grabbed his sleeve, suddenly. She had her eyes fixed on the far end of the corridor, and Bruce followed her gaze and saw Leslie coming towards them. His stomach dropped at her serious expression; now was the moment of truth.

"Leslie," he croaked, nodding towards her. Barbara pushed him towards a chair, and he willingly sat down. Leslie gave a short smile as greeting and lowered herself in the chair next to him. Barbara stayed were she was, anxious as well. It didn't even occur to Bruce to send her away. In the corner of his eye, he could also see that Jim had made his call and now hovered around a few metres away, giving them privacy.

"Dick's stable and drugged. He won't wake up until tomorrow and we don't want him to move around and mess up the long-term EKG I ordered."

"What's going on? What happened back there?" Bruce needed answers, fast.

"Okay, I have some bad news and some good news," Leslie announced, which didn't help Bruce's wrecked nerves at all. "Which one do you want to hear first?"

"Which one is connected to the leukemia?" Inwardly, Bruce wanted to close his eyes to block out the whole situation, but then Leslie smiled reassuringly.

"The good news; his blood count is fine, we checked three times. Not one single cancerous cell."

Barbara and Bruce both let go of deep breaths. A tight knot in the middle of Bruce's chest came undone. No relapse, no cancer. They could deal with everything else. Freeze, or media attention, it didn't matter as long as Dick wouldn't have to go through that again.

"The bad news?"

Leslie grew solemn again, and looked down at her papers. That wasn't good; Leslie always stalled for time before delivering a bad diagnosis.

"We're still waiting for some test results, but I'm pretty sure about the outcome. Bruce, has this evening been exhausting for Dick?"

It was possible she hadn't seen or heard the news yet. "Yes, very," he said therefore.

"More exhausting than anything else since he woke up?"

"Probably." So far, Dick hadn't had to face a real threat to his life, hadn't been physically attacked, or had a nasty shouting match.

Leslie wrote something down onto her clip chart. "I think Dick's suffering from cardiotoxicity."

Bruce felt the colour drain from his face. He had heard that term before, when the doctors and nurses he had bribed to force Dick through more chemotherapy had warned him about possible consequences. "What does that mean?"

Leslie sighed sadly. "Dick's heart is damaged. The evening's excitement must have triggered it."

-tbc-