"Do you want to tell me why you left your phone in the library when you left?"
Dick looked at him – so far not with the anger Bruce was expecting but collected and detached as if Bruce wasn't important.
"… You want to tell me why you're tracking my every movement?"
"Dick…"
It didn't take much to ignite the boy's temper, after all. The calm demeanour quickly morphed into anger.
"No, I'm serious! Where is it? I swear, I'll burn the whole outfit if I have to… But that's not even going to be enough, is it? If you've bugged one piece, you've probably bugged everything."
"I don't have any bugs on you…"
"Yeah, right."
"There is a tracker, so I can find you if anything happens. I promise I don't have anything that I can use to listen in to you…"
"Tell me where it is, or I'll go to a charity shop and get rid of everything, every time I go out."
Dick was stubborn enough to do it if his temper flared; Bruce did not doubt that. He thought about all the times in his future when he had been terrified by not knowing where one of the kids were. And the times when he had been too late to prevent things from happening…
He was not going to let Dick run around without a way to locate him. If the boy only could understand that it wasn't about control, it was about keeping him safe.
How come there were words that refused to pass his vocal cord? He could think it all right – "I love you, I'm terrified to lose you" – but it was like a brick wall between his brain and his mouth that prevented him from speaking them out loud.
There had been a time when it had been easier for him to voice his feelings. When he was younger, when Dick was this age… before Jason's death.
"Dick," he tried. "Do you realise how worried I am when I can't find you?"
Twenty-something Dick Grayson would accept that, to a point. Preteen Dick Grayson, who lived in a more peaceful Gotham and who had yet to lose a friend or family member because help arrived too late, was not impressed.
"Why would you need to find me? You left me at the library; you would have picked me up at the library. Why would you even think something could happen?"
"… Be fair, Dick – you left."
Dick pressed his mouth together and didn't answer.
"… I wasn't supposed to know, I get it," Bruce sighed.
That got Dick fired up again.
"Why should you know? I have a right to talk a walk in Gotham without you knowing exactly where I am! You wouldn't even let me take my bike downtown for a few hours."
Bruce chose his next words carefully.
"You're right; you do have a right to privacy. But I'm responsible for you, and I have a right to know where you are, too. We'll have to find common ground."
Dick snorted.
"Right… And your idea of common ground is to plant trackers on people in secret…"
"Why did you leave the library? I take it you left your phone behind because you knew I could trace the signal."
"Hnh."
"You knew there was a chance I would call you. How would you explain that you didn't pick up?"
Dick rolled his eyes.
"You're not supposed to take calls in the library," he pointed out, clearly thinking that Bruce was behaving as if he'd never set foot in a public library.
"Barbara said she saw you reading."
"I did look at some books I needed. I took photos of the pages; that way I can read any time."
"… Okay. Why did you leave?"
"I just wanted to walk around the city, all right! I wasn't even going to climb the rooftops or anything; I just wanted to look around."
"You had a notebook with you. What are you planning."
"…."
"Dick…"
"It's for school. I didn't lie," the boy murmured.
"I didn't think you did," he replied, not feeling up to the discussion about lies by emission at the moment.
He waited in silence. Dick had already started to confess; he felt sure the boy would continue. And after less than a minute, his patience was rewarded.
"… The school is planning to let my grade make a movie, next term. Anyone who wants can write a script, and one of them will be picked. I wanted to look around for possible locations. It would have been much simpler on my bike…"
Bruce took a deep breath and rubbed his forehead. Half an hour of intense stress and fear, all because of the boy wanted to write a story…
"Why couldn't you tell me? I could have taken you in the car. Hell, I could have walked with you; it even sounds safe enough that I would let you go on your own. Why, Dick?"
Dick seemed to struggle with his words.
"I… I didn't want to say anything… In case my script wasn't picked, okay? It would be a nice surprise if the school decided to make my film."
He closed his eyes and felt a wave of sadness. Dick had always been eager to make him proud and afraid to disappoint him – that's why he had wanted to keep the assignment to himself. If his work weren't picked, Bruce would never know.
How could the boy feel so insecure about their relationship, when raising him was one of the few things Bruce was proud of…
He remembered it now – how it had happened, the last time. Dick's joyful smile when he told Bruce and Alfred that his script had been chosen, his juggling of two identities while the movie was made, how the criminal The Clock and his gang had become involved, and the boy's pride when they went together to see the finished film…
No wonder he didn't remember anything like this happening – at this time of their life, he had let Dick come and go as he pleased, with no way to keep an eye on him.
"…God, Dick, you almost gave me a heart attack when I realised your jacket wasn't in the same place as your phone. You should have told me you were working on a secret; I'll accept that."
"Hnh. Really?"
There were no mistaking the scepticism in Dick's voice; fair enough, Bruce had to admit.
"I promise. If you ever find yourself in a similar position, tell me where you want to go, and that it's about something you want to keep secret. I trust you to know the limits of what you can keep for yourself. If it's safe, you can go on your own. All right?"
"… All right."
"Or you can go to Alfred. He wouldn't betray your confidence over something like this."
"Yeah, I know," Dick said in a low voice.
The boy was reasonable enough. Bruce had to give him something in return.
"For the record, I've put a tracker in your wristwatch. And one in your phone."
"My phone?!"
"As I said, a tracker," Bruce insisted, "I can't see or hear what you're doing, it's just so that I can locate you quicker than with the GPS."
Dick huffed in annoyance and looked at Bruce with narrow eyes.
"You're really something else, Bruce… But I wasn't wearing my watch – where was the other tracker?"
"Your jacket," Bruce replied. "I will tell you where I've put trackers in your clothes. As long as you promise not to get rid of them to hide from me."
Dick took his time answering.
"I don't know, Bruce," he finally said. "I'm not sure that's a promise I can keep."
At least, the boy was honest. Bruce fully intended to keep his word and tell the truth about where he had put trackers in Dick's clothes so far, but he had better keep silent about further plans. Time would have to tell if it was safe to disclose everything. But first, he had to coax his boy to make the promise.
"Why? It's simple enough. Unless you don't trust me?"
Dick's forehead wrinkled.
"You know I trust you. With my life. But you have given me plenty of reasons lately not to trust that you trust me."
Bruce certainly didn't have a good track record when it came to supporting and letting his boy go as he grew up. Now that he had a second chance, he was damned if he wasn't going to find a way to balance his need to protect with Dick's need for independence.
"Dick. I'll be blunt. You do realise you are the heir to one of the largest fortunes in America. You could be a tempting target for kidnappers. I think I am justified to ensure that I can locate you if anything were to happen."
"What…You've never said anything about that before… Has anything happened?"
"No. I didn't mean to scare you," Bruce said hastily.
Dick was depressingly accustomed to being held hostage as Robin – but it would be a different thing if he were ever to be taken as Dick Grayson. To hide behind a professional persona, a persona who was able to fight back, did undoubtedly give a sense of security that civilian Dick Grayson would lack.
In the lifetime Bruce remembered, it had never happened. But it was already evident that his return had changed things – who knew what could occur in this future.
"But I'm sorry to say it is a risk you will always live with."
Dick frowned and chewed on his lip, clearly trying to get his head around this new perspective. Bruce took the chance to drive home his point.
"I really won't use the trackers to monitor you, Dick. As long as you tell me where you're going, and keep in contact if you for some reason won't make it back in time, I promise not to check on your location unless I have a solid reason."
Dick snorted.
"Come on, Bruce. These days, I think you'd argue that 'I worried' was a solid reason…"
Oh yes, the kid was perceptive, all right…
"I won't worry if you give Alfred or me a call, regularly, when you're out of our sight."
Dick's eyes narrowed.
"I already do that, and obviously that's not enough for you."
"… And what do you call your leaving the library without your phone?"
It might not have been his most brilliant move to bring that up again – Dick's was growing agitated once more.
"We've been over that. If you'd trusted me to go to Gotham on my own, it wouldn't have happened."
"All right," Bruce said calmly. "We don't need to retake the argument full circle. I understand why you did it, and you didn't break any promise."
Indeed, he had never asked Dick to promise not to leave his phone behind at this age. It had never occurred to him that there was any need for that.
"But I need to know that you will keep your phone with you in the future and that you will not dispose of my trackers. Will you promise?"
Dick pursed his lips, and he cocked his head before he answered, slowly, "No, I don't think I will. Not now. I need to think some more about it. I won't leave my phone again, but I'm not sure I'm prepared to be a… walking signal station."
Bruce let his hand fall on the boy's shoulder and gave a slight squeeze.
"… All right. We'll talk about it in a few days."
Dick was relenting, he was sure; as soon as his temper had cooled, he would see reason and make the promise. It wasn't ideal to end the discussion without having reached an agreement, but Bruce was sure it would only hurt his position if he pressed on.
Besides, he felt exhausted. How could it be more demanding to talk to a child than to fight a warehouse full of criminals…?
In just a couple of hours, he would need to head out for the evening – not as Batman, but as Bruce Wayne, billionaire socialite. With his youthful ward in tow. And getting Dick ready for the party, with tuxedo and bowtie and cufflinks – complete with a tracker installed, of course – was a whole different kettle of fish than getting Robin ready for a night on the town.
"I'm going to take a shower and take it easy for a while. I suggest you do the same. We're going to the Governor's reception tonight, and we don't want to turn up looking as if we're worn out before the party has even started."
Dick was indeed up to something, in the last chapter, and that something is from the Golden age I'm so fond of. He wrote a movie script for his school, in Star Spangled Comics # 70 from 1947. "Clocks of Doom" by Bill Finger, art Win Mortimer and Charles Paris.
The last time Bruce comments on how difficult it was for him to let Dick go was in Nightwing vol 4 # 7.
It did cross my mind whether Bruce should take a cue from Bruce in the Titans show (that I still haven't seen). But operating in a chip in Dick's arm, without letting him know, and then locking him out of safe houses is more of an asshole that I'm willing to put up with. So he'll stick with clothes. And equipment. And anything else he can get his hands on without bloodshed…
Every Dick Grayson fan knows that time when Bruce was quoted on saying "The only time I ever feel pride is when I look at Nightwing. Sometimes I think he's the only thing I ever did right." In JLA # 73.
And of course Dick is dressed like a miniature Bruce on receptions and grand parties:
Look for my illustrated footnotes on my Tumblr: northoftheroad