When Alfred woke Bruce up a few hours later the boy was his first thought. "Tim?" he asked sleepily before he'd even finished lifting his head out of the pillow. There was something brutally unfair about his own bed. Bruce couldn't remember sleeping well for more than a night at a time in his adult life, but he almost felt safe in the Manor and that made sleep very tempting.

"Not yet," Alfred said. "But I'm expecting Master Richard will be up and about shortly, so I'm preparing your breakfast. Would you care to join him?"

Bruce groaned and rolled over, grabbing a pillow and jamming it over his face. He only noticed his scent when he'd been away from the place for a few days.

"That was very much the response I got from Master Richard," Alfred said. "Well, I shall prepare breakfast for both of you anyway and hope that you will be down for it before it gets too cold."

"Fine," Bruce mumbled, knowing full well that Alfred would do no such thing.

Alfred might have left him alone with the warmth of his blankets but almost at once his guilt about Tim and his worry about telling Dick wormed into his mind, started to gnaw at his stomach and sleep didn't feel particularly restful anymore. Regretfully he threw off the blankets and dragged his heavy feet across the bedroom floor towards the shower.

Dick was downstairs, sitting at the kitchen table, staring blankly into his coffee. Bruce smiled a little. Some things never changed, and it brought him a little bit of comfort somehow. Dick had worn the same expression over breakfast his whole life, slightly bemused, slightly stunned under a mass of messy dark hair.

"Morning," Dick said, looking up and smiling. Bruce grunted his answer and dropped down into the chair opposite of him and poured himself a cup of coffee. "Alfred's making eggs and sausages. He keeps popping up to find out if you're here yet."

"Sorry."

"It's okay," Dick said, shrugging it off as he usually did. "I assume you didn't sleep very well. How was your trip? Where ever you were."

Bruce didn't answer. If this bothered Dick he didn't say anything. Then Alfred appeared with food, set it down in his very specific breakfast arrangement and left again without saying anything to either of them. Again, this didn't seem to upset Dick at all but Brice understood what it meant. That he had to say something.

They sat there, looking at each other over a plate heaped with protein rich foods.

"So," Dick said after a few minutes pause. "I guess you're not going to tell me what's going on then?"

"Dick," Bruce started and then found that he didn't have the words to explain things.

"Oh god this is serious," Dick said, shifting in his chair because he could never sit still for more than a few minutes and stabbing at a sausage. "You haven't looked this uncomfortable since you tried to explain sex to me Bruce." Bruce let himself almost smile. "What's going on? We're not having the sex talk again are we?"

Well, it wasn't a great way to start the conversation, but it was more or less right.

"Do you remember Talia?" he asked quietly.

"Oh my god you are," Dick groaned, sitting up and dropping his fork. "Did you sleep with her?" Bruce met his eyes. "You did!" Dick's face was strangely conflicted, like he was torn between confusion or betrayal and giggling.

"Dick, I don't," Bruce sighed. "I didn't mean for it to happen. She drugged me, it was never my intention, I,"

"Hey," Dick interrupted, suddenly serious again. "You don't need to explain Bruce. If anyone's familiar with somewhat less than consensual sex, it's me. Don't worry about it." Bruce nodded, surprisingly grateful for the younger man's lack of judgement. "I'm just waiting for this uncomfortable back story to connect to Tim lying upstairs on an IV drip."

"A few days ago I was in London and Talia showed up," Bruce stumbled over the worlds like he wasn't sure they were the right ones or his tongue was second guessing him. "She had a child with her, a boy. She claimed that he was mine."

"And was he?" Dick asked. For a minute Bruce didn't answer and Dick understood what that meant. "Wow," he said quietly, leaning back in his chair and running his fingers through his already messy hair. "Okay, so I've got another brother then. Weird, but I'll adjust." Dick grinned for a second but as he looked at Bruce his smiled slipped away from his face. "What's happened?" he asked, curling up again.

"Damian's with Talia," Bruce whispered. "If he survived, he's with her again."

"Bruce," Dick said hesitantly. If Bruce hadn't been so tired he would have found it amusing, watching Dick struggle with his drive to express everything physically. Holding still, not doing something was clearly torturing him. In the end he laid his hand on the table next to Bruce's. "I'm sorry."

"He tried to kill Tim."

"What did she do to him?" Dick hissed angrily. Bruce wasn't sure what he'd been expecting exactly, but Dick's defensiveness hadn't been it. Anger at him, at Damian, yes but anger at Talia, somehow he hadn't thought of that. Not from Dick. Or himself.

"Raised him to be an assassin," Bruce said. "Then she sent him to me. I don't understand her game yet." Dick nodded thoughtfully.

"Well if you need anything," he offered.

"Thank," Bruce answered with a little bit of a grunt. "I should have known better than to trust him, to leave him alone with Tim. Anything Talia's touched has an ulterior motive. I was just so," he broke off and took a deep breath. "He was my son. Is my son, is my son even if I've lost him."

"Hey don't worry about it too much," Dick offered. "If anyone can bring back an angry kid almost on the edge, it's you Bruce." Dick's faith in him was touching, almost heartening but Bruce knew that the boy was lying. He couldn't make it work with Jason, and he had a tenth of the trauma Damian had. No, if any one in his family could ever reach that boy it would probably by Dick, but Bruce would never take that risk. Damian was gone.

"Dick," he said shakily when Alfred stepped into the room quickly.

"Master Timothy is awake sirs."