Father who art in heaven-

Don't take my dad- Don't take my dad- Don't-

Bruce blinks, twice. Numbly, his side pulses. His eyes unbelievably heavy and his body submerged in heat. He sees Jason, of all his sons, hovering over his side. A single white stray hair falling into his eyes as sweat slides down his face. He's… so grown up. Bruce wonders when that happened. Birthdays pass before his eyes. Bright eyes, dark hair… He's dying.

Bruce is dying. He blinks heavily, eyes sliding shut.

"Bruce!" Sharp pain shoots up his side and those Lazareth Pit eyes are boring into his body. Tearing apart his soul and pushing him back together with each breath. "Dad," Jason corrects and Bruce is confused for a moment having forgotten what fear looked like in Jason's eyes. It's written so clearly now, so… open. "Dad, please."

Father who art in heaven-

Don't take my-

"Dad?"

Bruce stares at his feet. Blue eyes unblinking as he wills his body to move. Dammit, move! His legs remain unresponsive and Bruce doesn't turn to acknowledge the child at his side. He can feel the warmth of a hand in his own but he can't feel his legs.

"Dad," Dick squeezes his father's hand, willing Bruce with all his might to turn and face him. "It's not that bad," Dick whispers because a paralyzed dad is better than a dead dad. He knows that with certainty. "Batman…" the name falls off his lips. Bruce's eyes drag to Dick, red and angry. "Dad?"

Father who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name.

The priest reads from memory and Bruce can feel the hollow of his chest swallowing him deeper and deeper with each of the man's words. He's done this a hundred times, Bruce knows, and now as the priest asks his God for forgiveness, as if his parents had ever done any wrong, Bruce blinks back tears.

Alfred's heavy arm settles around Bruce as if he could hear every fiber in Bruce's body calling for him, begging him to bury himself alongside his parents. He craves death, tastes it in the corner of his mouth and under his tongue. He wants it so bad and Alfred won't give him this one request.

Thy kingdom come, thy will be done-

Don't take my dad.

"When I was…" Dick's voice wavers ever so slightly and Jason looks up at him. Alfred refused to let them back to see Bruce. It was for all of their good, not just Bruce's. They gather, instead, in the living room. Draped in Bruce's stolen clothes and cramped up on his favorite couch. It's the first time Jason realizes Richard Grayson has the thinnest strip of grey in his hair and the saddest cloud of tears in his eyes. "I remember the first time I saw him laid up."

Dick looks out at them with that look in his eyes, that fatherly look. Jason frowns at the dirt on his shoes as little children dance along his vision. They look like Dick, talk like Dick, and Jason knows without a shred of doubt his brother, the good man, would be an even better father.

"I kept running away," Dick tells them in a voice that isn't his own. "I don't know why, can't remember but even then I don't think… I kept running at the same time every night. I wanted him to catch me, to understand how unhappy I was." Dick's eyes wander off but he's captured the room's attention. "One night," Dick smiles sadly, "he was late and I sat in front of the grandfather clock because I needed him to know." He adds, "at least… that's what I told myself."

Jason frowns but says nothing. He ran away. Actually, ran but even then he ended up in the same spot. He can remember the twist in his stomach as the night grew older and older and Batman's night watch grew to an end. He'd convince himself Bruce wouldn't come and when those boots would hit the dirt a few feet away Jason's heart would beat hard in his chest.

"He didn't come up," Dick tells them, that sad smile twisting his face bitterly, a single tear falling. "He was- He was beaten pretty bad. Alfred was fixing him up in the cave, too bothered with keeping him alive to make sure I hadn't succeeded in my escape…" Dick shakes his head, clearing his throat of the emotion taking over his voice. "So, I went looking for him instead."

Dick wipes his nose with the back of his hand, "he was downstairs, on the cot. Alfred put me on the side, showing me where he'd stitched Bruce's side up and to be careful. And-And I remember when he woke up he cupped my cheek in his hand and said 'there you are' and-and I never ran away again." Dick smiles at the ground, remembering that through the night, every so often, Bruce would wake in a start and he would reach out and make sure Dick hadn't slipped away.

But what he doesn't say, what he feels so strong in his chest is this fear. Bruce Wayne is Batman. He's supposed to die on the streets roughed up and bloody or of old age surrounded by kids in costumes. Some nobody, some pick-pocket wasn't supposed to get an option. He wasn't supposed to get the drop.

Don't take my dad-

Please, God, don't take my dad.

Barbara gets him a set of gloves. She wraps them in the ugliest gift wrap he's ever seen and tenses when he gently pulls the tape away. Bruce looks up and she's smiling shyly, "the wheels will tear your hands up." She holds her own hands up and he realizes she's gotten him the same pair she's wearing. "We can match."

He finds out what the gloves are for very quickly. His hands hurt, Batman's calluses are no good for this. Bruce finds the other guy isn't good for a lot anymore.

"Here," Jason tosses a box at him, it's heavy as it lands in Bruce's lap. He looks up and Jason is grinning wildly. So, he takes the time right then to see what it is. He holds up two caster wheels and finds the yellow batman symbol stamped into their sides. "Sick," Jason approves with a grin.

Tim finds out about the casters and ends up in Bruce's room. He's nursing a coffee and is balancing a laptop on his forearm. "Can I take that apart?" He uses his head to motion to the wheelchair by his father's side. At the raising of Bruce's eyebrow Tim amends, "can I put the casters on, for you?"

Bruce puts his laptop away, "why don't we… do it together?"

By the end of the hour, Bruce's room is filled with his children all geared up for the night. They watch as Tim holds the last caster in place and Bruce works the bolt back in. There's a collective grin shared amongst them and Bruce can't help but share it. "Go on," he motions with his head, "don't want the goons thinking we're taking a night off."

Cass is the last to file out. Slowly, she moves to where he is and sits on the edge of his bed. "You smiled," she informs him, tilting her head like a cat.

Bruce nods, "I suppose I did."

Cass hums and stands to leave, "long time."

It takes Bruce a moment to understand what she means. Long time? His smile. He shakes his head with a small laugh, maybe it was the first time he'd really smiled in a while.

He wakes in the middle of night to light laughter and opens an eye to spot his oldest boys. They've bent behind his wheelchair, it's back open. Jason hands Dick something, the darkness obscures the pattern and shape until Dick clicks on his flashlight. Bruce watches as Jason takes a needle and threads it through the fabric Dick holds. Soon, it's sewn into the wheelchair and that's when Bruce sees it.

The two of them have managed to find a patch of every member of the bat family.

"Don't you think that'll draw some suspicion?" Bruce's voice is a rumble of sleep, hoarse from disuse.

The boys both jump and Dick clicks the flashlight out like that will somehow allow them to disappear. Jason smacks him and they argue for a moment before Bruce clears his throat and all the attention is back to him. Jason fixes his father with a smug grin, "we thought you might say that." Jason fumbles for something on the ground and proudly holds up two figures. Dick helpfully shines the flashlight on the figures. "That's why I bought these!"

Bruce groans and Jason's grin only grows prouder.

"These bad boys are going right here," Jason says, holding the Superman and Wonderwoman patches on the far sides. "It's gonna be great."

And it is great. Everything.

Until it isn't.

Bruce wakes up bathed in sweat. His hands tremble as he reaches for the corners of the comforter, throwing them off his legs. He doesn't think, just closes his hand and brings his fist down on his thighs. Nothing. He raises his arm again, watching the skin move but not feeling the contact.

"Bruce-" Alfred catches his fist, easily deflecting Bruce's attempt to scramble away, to deliver another blow. With some difficulty, Alfred pins Bruce's arms and pulls him to his chest. Effectively pinning arms between their bodies. "It's alright, Bruce. It's alright." Alfred holds him close, soothing him down again. "Easy," Alfred cups the back of Bruce's head, gently shushing him as he cries.

Later, when Bruce's eyes drop shyly to his lap Alfred will drop in that he heard Bruce's cry in his sleep. He'll drop a hand on Bruce's shoulder and tell him, he didn't wake up any of the kids. And Alfred will be gone in a blink, so fast Bruce will wonder if he was there at all.

"Father?"

Bruce keeps his steady typing up, pausing as he collects the right word and continues on. He hums, raising his eyebrows but doesn't move his attention away, not fully.

The bruises on his thigh, from that night, are healed now. He had forgotten about the bruises and worn shorts to a sparring practice. In the middle of demonstration to Tim how to hold his wrist the right way when maneuvering his weapon the boy had looked down and seen them. Like everything else in his life, not even the bruises could be his own secret. The boys knew and they danced around the subject with little to no grace.

"I…" Damien steps up to his side and Bruce tries not to think too much about how they're nearly the same height now. "I-" he frowns tightly and throws his arms around Bruce's neck. It catches him by surprise but after a moment, Bruce picks Damien up, settling the boy into his lap. He can feel Damien's hot tears on his neck and he rubs the boys back.

"When we thought-" Damien hiccups," when we thought you were dead… I-I" Bruce reaches up and brushes a tear from his eye. Damien cups his face in his hands, "la tatrakani baba." More tears fall from his little eyes and Bruce can't catch them all. "Please, baba."

Bruce pulls Damien against his chest, "I'm not going anywhere, buddy."

"To Batman!" Clark knocks his glass a little too hard against Dick's but the boy is too lost in a fit of laughter to care about the alcohol spilling. This only encourages Clark further and that only makes Dick laugh that much harder.

The other end of the table, Bruce's end, is filled with the same mirth. Tim knocks his glass with Stephanie's and they lock elbows and drink around the other's limb. Stephanie's giggling causing Tim to lose focus and spill nearly all of his small glass all over himself.

Damien makes a move to snatch some of Jason's but the older boy smacks his hand. "Don't think so, Gremlin. The kids are too young as is, don't need a tot getting plastered." But before Bruce can say something about picking on siblings or name calling Damien pouts. He crosses his arms and looks rather sad at his siblings enjoying the one glass Bruce has allowed them.

Jason glances at Bruce, down at his brother, and then to Damien's empty glass. He knocks shoulders with Damien and lets half of his glass 'spill' into Damien's. He grins happily and Bruce watches Jason smile too, leaning down to rustle his brother's hair. The sound of Jason's laugh when Damien takes a large drink and coughs as it burns his throat is music to Bruce's ears.

He looks down at the tumblr in his hand.

Batman doesn't drink.

It's just two fingers worth and Bruce can hear their jokes about drinking and driving already. He taps his ring finger against the glass and looks into the amber liquid.

A glass lightly taps against his and he looks up to find Cass. She's holding her one glass, far less full than the others and Bruce knows it's not because she's been drinking but rather because she has self-control and his other children simply do not. "Drink," she says nodding to his tumblr. "To Batman."

The glass is oddly heavy. It's his mantle, he supposes. It's his retirement and tomorrow night Dick will go out as Batman and Gotham will know it's new caped crusader. Never realizing the old left. "To Batman," Bruce whispers and Cass clicks their glasses together. Her eyes watch him, smiling when he drowns the whole glass and grimaces.

He laughs along with them, deep within his chest.

Bruce Wayne is not dead and he couldn't be happier.