Sup folks, in a surprise move, this lazy author has now decided to actually update a story. Shocker! For the record, I've edited how some ages here and there from canon to make the rest of the timeline work out how I wanted it to. So, without further ado, Chapter 3:
"Okay but seriously, who's your baby mama and how is Dick 8 if you're 16. I mean seriously, the math just isn't adding up here dude." Ollie whined as he sat in the recliner across from Bruce's in the watchtower lounge. Bruce looked up from his textbook and raised an eyebrow.
"Where is this coming from?"
"I'm actually curious here, because at first, before you told us the whole teenager thing, I was pretty sure he was your son. After the whole teenager thing, I did some mental math and I realized that couldn't be right and that you must be brothers. But brothers don't kick brothers out of the house for being embarrassing when they have friends over which means you must be some sort of parental figure to him which means I want to know what crazy lady had a child with an eight year old." Ollie babbled out in one breath. Bruce raised his other eyebrow in what must have been the most judgmental look Ollie had ever gotten from a teenager.
"It's a long story." Bruce said. Then, to clarify, just in case Ollie was as stupid as he seemed sometimes, he continued. "But Dick isn't my son unless you're talking legally."
"Well, I've got time and you've somehow made me more curious." Ollie admitted. Bruce sighed and snapped his history textbook shut. It wasn't like he was going to get any more work done tonight anyways.
"This isn't a fun story."
"I don't care. I'm really curious."
"Well, you kind of have to understand my story to understand how I became Dick's not dad. My relationship with the Gotham Child Protective Services started when my parents got killed. I was four years old and I barely remember it but there were some disputes with some crazy old four times removed great great great cousin who wanted me to be placed with her after my parents died. You see, my parents asked that custody of me be turned over to Alfred, our butler in the event of their untimely demise. Normally though, the court would find my closest living relative who was willing to take me. So you see where the problem arose. The family attorney, a man by the name of Bob Kane sided with Alfred and I and did everything in his power to make sure I was placed with Alfred. Sadly, that just wasn't going to happen. The judge ruled in favor of putting me with my aunt."
"Wait, why wouldn't the judge put you with who your parents wanted you put with, especially because you knew him better?"
"I eventually learned that my aunt Gertrude payed off the judge because she wanted my inheritance."
"Holy cow."
"I know. Turns out that even though she wanted my money, she didn't want me. She shipped me off to a fancy pants boarding school after eight months of living with me because that's when I would have started kindergarten. Those eight months were still some of the worst of my life though. I learned a lot of my most important skills like doing everything silently and hiding in the shadows from those eight months because she'd snap at me just for existing. Unfortunately, boarding school wasn't much better, the one she selected was on Infinity Island in the Caribbean because she liked the idea of telling people that I was in the Caribbean. What she didn't know was that the headmaster of the school was a league of assassins associate who, upon discovering how good I could be at acting sneakily started giving me impromptu lessons. By the time that the testers from the League arrived at our school to decide if any of the children were worth taking to Nanda Parbat, he had pretty much been beating the living hell out of me for three years after school every night and I was all the stronger for it. I was pretty much proficient in fighting with eskrima sticks, bo staff, and swords when they came for me. My aunt received a letter claiming that I had been chosen for a "young minds exchange program" and that she could quit paying tuition to the Infinity Island Academy if she wanted to so of course she consented to me being sent to Nanda Parbat in a heartbeat."
"Wait, Bruce, you were in the heart of the league of assassins when you were eight years old?!" Ollie exclaimed, amazed that the younger man had made it out alive.
"Well I didn't actually get there until I was nine but I did technically become a member at eight, yes." Bruce frowned, remembering his time far better than Ra's Al Ghul probably wanted him to. Ollie threw his head back and groaned, feeling awful for the wayward teenager.
"I'm so sorry you had to go through that." He said, feeling bad for his friend.
"Well, I was a member of the league so they didn't treat me that badly, after all, they wanted their soldiers to be able to fight. They did make us train day and night though. I had been put in a barrack with all of the youngest recruits who were from all over the world, so if we wanted to talk, we had to learn each others' languages. By the time we made it to first examination, we all spoke English, Spanish, Arabic, Farsi, Japanese, and Mandarin Chinese. Of course, the league does this intentionally because it's a lot easier for spies to blend in with locals regardless of ethnicity or race when you speak their language. I passed every assessment with flying colors and was almost always ranked at the top of my age group. Leadership began taking an interest in me and they started taking me out on missions. I learned about hidden bases that they had all over the world. I'm not going to lie, I believed in their message and happily drank the Kool-Aid."
"Well what happened? How did you go from masked assassin to masked vigilante?"
"I failed a mission." Bruce shrugged, trying to act casual about it. "Up until I was thirteen, I had never been sent on a mission to kill anyone and so I wasn't an issue but assassins get assigned to assassinations eventually and when I was, I froze. I literally could not kill the man who I was instructed to. They called me back to Nanda Parbat that night and I was beaten half to death before being sent home with a note claiming that I was mugged and may have a serious concussion which could lead to me making up stories and believing that I'd lived them. They almost killed me for the sake of protecting themselves and at the time it made sense to me, after all, they were only doing what they had trained me to do. I was just too soft for the league, it was my fault and I deserved what I got."
"Oh my god, Bruce, nothing you could say or do is worth getting beaten for" Ollie started, making to get out of his chair and go hug Bruce before being waved off. "Anyways, I'm glad you didn't kill that man because if you had, I wouldn't have met you and the league of assassins would have one more member, and you'd still be in that hell hole.
Bruce chuckled. "Thanks, but it wasn't all smooth sailing from there. When I got back to the home I lived in before being sent to boarding school, it turned out that my aunt had gotten drunk, crashed her Lamborghini, and had been comatose for the last three years. The League of Assassins had erased me from existence so thoroughly that the hospital didn't even know to notify me when she got hurt which meant that I was once again a ward of the state. Luckily, Bob Kane stepped in to keep me from being placed in a foster home so I ended up with Alfred who had continued his employment as the Wayne family butler thanks to my parents' will. He helped nurse me back to health and I told him everything, including that I was going to fight the league of assassins in Gotham whether or not he wanted me to. He, probably correctly, decided that I'd be less likely to get hurt with his help so she showed me the secret exit from the house which led to a naturally occurring cave that didn't take much effort for Alfred and I to block the outside entrances to and create 'the Batcave' in. The bat thing wasn't even intentional, I just needed extra space in my cowl for the bulky computer gear in my original costume which, in tandem with my cape and dark clothing from the league, eventually was misconstrued as me being a bat themed vigilante." Ollie laughed aloud at that. He and Barry had always wanted to make jokes about Bruce being a pseudo furry and now it turned out that the whole bat thing was a mistake. "I couldn't change my look at all after that because I had a reputation which was what I wanted. After all, there're a lot of people who won't commit crimes just out of fear, regardless of whether or not I'd go after them simply due to my reputation."
Ollie nodded. "I've noticed the same thing in Star City with the Arrow," He noted.
"During that time, I got more than just my identity as Batman though, I also got my adulthood." Bruce stated.
"How does that work?" Asked Ollie, genuinely curious. How could a kid become an adult at what, thirteen? Fourteen?
"Well, in the state of New Jersey, children don't automatically become adults at 18 so you have to either get permission from the court or meet a stupid standard. Alfred and I both agreed that if I got injured while fighting crime, it'd be for the best if doctors didn't need to worry about the legality of operating on me before he arrived. So, Mr. Kane filed a motion to emancipate me early and the court rubber stamped it. In essence, while you lot have been worried about me being a kid this whole time, I've been legally an adult since I was fourteen."
"Yeah, no, that definitely doesn't count, if you're a teen you're a kid." Ollie quipped. Bruce rolled his eyes.
"It doesn't matter anyways. I met a doctor who has helped me out a lot so it turns out the emancipation was a moot point. When the emancipation really turned out to be helpful was a year or so ago when Alfred and I were at the big top one night because a circus that my parents and I had gone to when I was younger was in town. The Flying Graysons, a famous acrobatic troupe was performing that night but the ringleader, a man named Haley had run afoul of the Italian Mob. Tony Zucco, one of their head men, had a potent acid poured on the wires which led to every member of the troupe but one falling to their deaths."
"What does that have to do with Dick?"
"I'm getting there man, hold your horses. Dick was seven at the time, and he was the only member of the troupe to survive. I immediately wanted to help him. After all, just over a decade ago, I had been in his position. There was a problem though. The family court was being overseen by that same judge who assigned my guardianship to my aunt and she genuinely though I had lost my marbles trying to adopt Dick. Mr. Kane had to sue for my right to adopt Dick almost four times before the court agreed to assign his citizenship to me." Ollie whistled, leaning back in his chair. "I'm sending Dick to school at Gotham Academy, the school where my parents wanted me to go when I was starting my education. He seems to really enjoy it and even though he didn't have any formal school before this year, they've put him with the fourth graders!" Bruce smiled. "He gets really good grades, and he's got a best friend named Barb whose dad I've become close to from behind the cowl. She has a bit more common sense than him which I really appreciate because between Dick and me it's a miracle that we've not burned the house down."
"Alfred probably has a hand in that." Ollie laughed. "I just don't understand though, why would he throw you out for being embarrassing if he really just views you as a brother?"
Bruce frowned. "I wanted to bake cookies tonight and apparently that's not cool enough for Barb who's the epitome of everything amazing and wonderful." He rolled his eyes. "So Dick told me to go hang out with my friends and I didn't have the heart to tell him that I'm a bit short on that particular resource."
"Aww we're your friends!" exclaimed Ollie.
"We only hang out when the world's in danger or during mandated team bonding days."
"C'mon kid, I'm going to introduce you to a little thing called the Legend of Zelda."
"I know what the Legend of Zelda is."
"Well with an attitude like that, why wouldn't I want to play with you?" Ollie snarked.
"Just shut up and help me set up the console," Bruce said, smiling for the first time that whole day.
"And so basically, then our spooky assassin child got his own funky acrobat child." Ollie finished, looking up to see Barry and Hal's reactions. Both looked suitably amazed but wiped the looks off their faces as Bruce walked in. The bleary-eyed teen looked around in confusion, clearly not expecting anyone else to be in the Watchtower cafeteria at 3:00 am on a Thursday. He shrugged and started rifling through the freezer, ignoring the three men watching him. He pulled his head back out and frowned at them.
"Which one of you ate my coconut chocolate chip ice cream?" he growled, suddenly reminding the adults that he was the nightmare fuel for all of Gotham. Hal gulped and did a not very subtle job of hiding the empty container of ice cream they'd been eating while Ollie told his tale. Bruce slammed the freezer door shut and sighed. "Dick wouldn't do me dirty like this," he groaned and trudged back out of the kitchen.
Bruce didn't retaliate for that instance of food thievery but between Ollie's story and the look on the bat's face, from that day forward, Hal and Barry always made sure the coconut chocolate chip ice cream was well stocked. No matter what.
Thanks for reading! If you're wondering, Bob Kane is the name of one of the Batman writers. Also, I don't know if this is clear or not but after a year and a half of not updating this story, I've lost my outline so for the foreseeable future this is going to be a collection of one shots which happen in the same universe. If there are any characters/dynamics you want to see, feel free to write a review because I'll gladly do that, otherwise, there isn't really going to be a coherent update schedule. Have a nice day, be excellent and party on dudes! :)