The garage lights were all on as Bruce pulled up to the mansion, their warm yellow glow creeping across the pebbled courtyard, falling just short of the green. With practice he rolled the matte black corolla into its space, specially designated at Dicks insistence with the yellow painted bat symbol on the ground.
"It's the bat-mobile, it needs its own space"
Stepping out of the car Bruce was surprised to see his young ward was not waiting in the 'Bat-cave' for his return as usual and felt a pang of disappointment. Although Alfred had scolded him for admitting to the young boy about his nightly activities, insisting that it was inappropriate to tell an impressionable young child about your less than legal vigilante work, Bruce had gotten used to giving the excitable boy his nightly 'highly censored' update.
It was cathartic in a way, after all the misery and violence he saw in the city each night, to come home and have that wide innocent grin beaming up at him, asking for a rundown of his adventures, calling him a hero.
It was good for Dick too he had found; the boy had been so nervous when he first arrived, the memory of his parents falling to their deaths still fresh and raw in his mind, nightmares keeping him awake, but after he stumbled on Bruce returning from a patrol, decked out in black Kevlar and demanded to know where he had been, everything had changed.
Bruce had been honest with him. He couldn't not.
The boy had been through so much. Lost so much.
The last thing he needed was his new guardian lying to him. So, he had told a child safe version of the truth.
'I go out at night and fight bad people.'
He hadn't expected the boy to take to the idea as he had, with wonder and amazement emanating from every inch of that tiny form as he declared in a hushed gasp 'You're a superhero!'
As it turns out once an eight-year-old gets an idea in his head it is very hard to dislodge.
Nowadays it wasn't uncommon to find Dick scouring the newspapers looking for any information on 'Batman'
"Why do they never get your name right?"
"Well Dick, most people don't see black body armour and automatically think Bat"
"But you're Batman. That's your hero name! Every super hero needs a name."
"I know champ, and you picked me a great one. Not everyone is as clever as you though."
His enthusiasm knew no bounds.
Bruce loved it, loved seeing the happiness and excitement return to the child who weeks before had been a despondent shell.
There were challenges of course; trying to explain to a boy who had been a trapeze artist since he was five that "No Dick I don't jump off of roofs. That would be dangerous" turned out to be a losing battle.
The near daily argument of; "You should wear a cape" "No"
Or; "Why isn't the Batmobile cooler?" "It's supposed to be inconspicuous not flashy Dick"
The insistence that everything he had even remotely used in connection with his crime fighting work must now be proceeded by the word 'Bat'
There was no question however that the pros outweighed the cons.
Alfred's initial disapproval aside, even he couldn't deny how good it was to see the kid finally sleeping through the night, safe in the knowledge that Batman was watching over him.
Bruce himself felt lighter than he had in years, he was making a real dent in the number of violent crimes occurring downtown, had successfully stopped a shipment of weapons entering the city and had helped bring about the arrests of two major mob bosses. More than any of that, seeing the smile on the face of the boy he was increasingly growing to think of as his son and knowing that he was creating a better world for this boy to grow up in was soothing his soul in a way he never knew he needed.
It was for that reason that Dicks absence from the 'cave' that night was jarring.
Ever since he had discovered Bruce's secret, he had made a point of waiting up for him to come home to hear about everything Batman had done that night.
Although, Bruce realised with a sigh as he stripped off his Kevlar vest, there must only be so many times a child can hear "I lay on a rooftop and watched the bad guys to see if they did anything illegal" before even Dick Greyson got bored.
"Did they?" He heard the excited voice asking in his mind.
"Yes, they had lots of bad drugs stashed in a hideout"
"Did you go down and fight them?"
"No kiddo, there were lots of them and they had guns, I called the police" Or at least those members of the police he knew could be trusted.
"But you're Batman"
"Even Batman has his limits Dickie"
Bruce should have known he couldn't live up to the boys, superhero fantasy image forever.
Stepping into the main house Bruce barely made it two steps before a blur of red and green collided with his legs.
"What the…?"
The bright expressive eyes of his ward peered up at him through a black domino mask perched across the boy's nose and Bruce took in the red costume and green cape that fluttered behind the child. What on Earth?
"Bruce look. I have a costume too now! I'm Robin"
"Robin?"
"Yeah, Robin is Batman's sidekick. All the best heroes have sidekicks"
Bruce felt the corner of his lips twitch up in amusement "Do they?"
"Yeah" The kids grin really was infectious.
"Well then Robin, I'm glad to have you on the team."
Before he knew what was happening Bruce was being dragged along by his hand towards the main sitting room where he realised a lot of…something… had been happening. Fabric and colouring pencils and paper and a considerable amount of glitter was strewn about, Bruce would have been sympathetic to Alfred for the mess if the quality of Dicks new costume didn't prove the Butler had been at least somewhat involved in all this.
They waded through the middle to the seating area.
"So, Robin" He asked tentatively "Did you want my update?"
Dick shook his head, grin still in place. "Your updates are boring"
Bruce winced at the blunt honesty but switched to a frown when an aerosol can was suddenly pressed into his hand. He turned it over to see that a sheet of paper had been stuck to the front of the can as a colourful new label declared it to be 'SHARK REPELANT' complete with a drawing of a shark.
"I'm going to tell you what Batman and Robin did tonight" Dick informed him happily, climbing into the seat beside him with a pile of colourful drawings.
"Oh?"
"Yeah. We fought the Penguin and the Riddler and Catwoman and the Joker!"
"Right…and they are?"
"Super-villains! Super heroes need super-villains!"
"Makes sense." He laughed impressed by the child's imagination "So, tell me about them."
A drawing was slammed down on the table in front of him. A creepy looking clown in a purple monstrosity of a suit.
"This is Joker."
"Is it?"
"Yeah. He's your arch nemesis"
Bruce fought not to laugh at the serious expression on the costumed boys face.
"Is he now? Well then you need to tell me everything about him."
….
It was years later when Dick had grown up and headed off to fight crime properly as part of the 'not quite reformed but getting there' police department that Bruce came across his newest ward, adorned in that familiar red and green, colouring in the sitting room.
"What are you up to J-bird?"
The young boy looked up at him, smile wide, if not quite as bright as Dicks.
He held up a drawing for Bruce to see, covered in colourful characters.
"What's this? More villains to fight?"
The tales of Batman and Robin had become an instant bedtime hit when Jason arrived.
"No. Not villains. This is the Justice League."
"The Justice League hu?"
"Yeah. Every good superhero needs a superhero team."
A pen smudged finger pointed to the middle of the drawing where a blue clad figure was floating off the ground wearing a red cape.
"That's Superman. He's Batman's best friend"
Bruce felt the smile pull at his face, once again in awe of his children.
"Is he now? Well then you need to tell me everything about him."
Dick lost his family, he needed someone to target his pain at, bad guys who could be defeated. He needed villains.
Jason grew up knowing plenty of real bad guys, he needed to trust that there were people willing to fight them. He needed heroes.
Both needed Batman and Robin.