"Sit down." The eyes of Bruce Wayne seemed to bore their way through the skulls of the two men standing on the other side of the dining room table. "Both of you." Dick and Jason shared a quick glance before doing as told.
The door to the garage opened and closed, and footsteps were heard entering the kitchen, pausing for several seconds, and then advancing toward the smallest of the four dining rooms in the Manor. "Hey Bruce, are we expecting company?" Tim called out as he pushed the door open and started into the room. "Alfred's made enough..." The sixteen year old boy froze as he caught sight of Jason Todd seated at the table. He started into a combat ready position, but stopped as he noted the fairly relaxed posture of both Bruce and Dick. Tim looked at the original Robin. "Hey Dick, good to see you, didn't know you were stopping by."
"Yeah, figured a drive across the Hudson would be a good idea today. I called this morning to let you guys know to expect us, but you'd already left for school." Dick smiled, volleying the ball back into Tim's side of the court.
Tim decided that he'd have to be the one to point out the six hundred pound gorilla in the room. "I see you've brought a guest. How nice." The teen slowly made his way between Jason and Bruce.
"Relax squirt, I come in peace this time." Jason stated as he heatedly stared at the boy.
Tim looked to Dick, sending a silent question. Dick nodded, so Tim slowly sat down at the table. "Good to know."
"Let's get down to it then, shall we?" Bruce's authoritative voice shattered the silent tension between the younger men. "So, what is the purpose of this peaceful visit of yours, Jason?"
"I was wondering if I could borrow your tools." Jason smirked. "According to Dicky boy, I've got some fences to mend."
"More like bridges to unburn." Tim grumbled.
"I'm sorry, who are you again?" Jason snapped as he glared at the youth.
"Someone who didn't earn his spot by committing theft!" Tim snarled back.
"Fu..."
"Shut up!" Bruce pounded his fist on the table, paused to let the three young men take in his fury, and opened his mouth to continue.
He was interrupted by the door swinging open and Alfred walking into the dining room with a large metal tray with matching cover. The elderly man sent a smile to both Dick and Jason, his gaze on Jason lingering, the combination of joy and fear clearly etched on his face. He then made his way toward Bruce at the head of the table and lowered a plate of steaming lasagna, asparagus and chopped carrots in front of him, following with a tall glass of milk, and then continuing to the others. "Dinner is served, young masters."
"I hope you fixed a plate for yourself, Alfred." Jason said, almost antagonistically as he sent an daring look toward the blue-blooded Bruce and Tim.
"I appreciate the sentiment, Master Jason, but it isn't my place."
"He's right Alfred." Dick countered. "This is family business, not a formal affair. You're as much a part of this as any of us, so grab a plate and a chair. We'll wait."
Alfred smiled and started to shake his head, but before he could voice another refusal Bruce chimed in. "Listen to the boys Alfred, we need you aware of everything that will be said and done here, as well as providing input of your own. As Dick said, it's family business, and you're part of the family."
"As you wish." Alfred announced as he left for the kitchen to retrieve his dinner.
A few moments later Alfred was seated across from Tim, and Bruce addressed the table. "Alright, now that the family is complete, let's get to it." The head of the house turned and looked directly at the resurrected young man. "Jason, believe me, there's nothing that would please me more than to welcome you back with open arms, both as a son and as a partner. And to say that you've gone through ordeals that none of us could imagine would be an understatement. But you've committed murder. Whether or not you were in your right mind while doing so might be a murky area of speculation, but there's no doubt that you were lucid and rational while doing so. Even if I could overlook these past transgressions, refrain from turning you in to the authorities, and forgive you, what assurance do I have that this won't be repeated?"
Jason met the stare the entire time, and paused a moment before answering. "You're making a few assumptions. First, I'm not asking for anything. I don't want anything from you, not anymore. You've got a new son, you've got a new partner. I've been replaced, and I'm fine with that. Also, I couldn't care less about your forgiveness."
"Jay..." Dick whispered angrily.
"What?" Jason snapped across the table at Dick. "I'm not here to offer a mea culpa and beg to have my old room back. I'm here to offer a cease-fire, nothing more. I thought you understood that."
"Perhaps I mis-stated things then." Bruce interrupted. "I was illustrating my desires, not yours. My enlisting Tim as my partner and adopting him as my son are no more a replacement of you than my doing so with you was a replacement of Dick. The fact is that from the day I took you in you've never not been my son. You were taken by death, but you were still my son, and now that you've returned to life, I want you back, if not in my house than in my life in some capacity. If you find my desires to be offensive, then I'm sorry, but that's just the way I feel." Bruce allowed a moment for his words to sink in. "Now, as far as us being together on a professional level, that's far more complicated. My concerns regarding the continuation of your homicidal behavior need to be addressed."
Jason quelled his emotions and forced a smirk as he glanced at Dick before answering Bruce. "I assumed that Dick vouching for me meant something."
"Trust me, it means everything." Bruce replied. "But I want to hear it from you."
Jason looked down at his untouched dinner and nodded slowly. "Fair enough." He turned to look at the other faces at the table before settling on Bruce. "I'm done killing." Jason paused and his eyes seemed to drift off to another place before he continued, his voice distant. "With one possible exception."
Bruce nodded. "I see."
Jason turned back and focused his eyes on his adoptive father's. "If...when we encounter the clown, my intentions will be to take him down by the book. But I can't promise anything."
"That's not good enough." Tim muttered.
"What?" Jason muttered as he turned his attention to the boy that was, to his dismay, his adoptive brother.
Tim met Jason's glare and calmly replied. "Nobody can fault you for your hatred of the Joker. But if you're going to be out there, either with us or on your own, you need to put justice above your hatred and thirst for revenge."
"How dare you, you little shit?" Jason snarled. "You have no idea of what I've been through! You have no idea of what it's like! Even if Bruce gave me a shovel and left me in a field with you and a pine box, and in the unlikely event you mustered the stones to break out and dig your way to the surface, even then you'd know only the tiniest fraction of what I've been through!"
Tim nodded before calmly answering. "You're right, I don't have any idea of what you've been through. I'm not trying to judge you or minimize your experiences in any way. You are completely justified in your rage against the Joker, but this justification doesn't dismiss the fact that you are willing to take a life." The boy's gaze turned icy as he continued. "And the chances are good that your excessively violent behavior may not be rooted in your death and resurrection. Care to tell me about Felipe Garzonas? The file on the computer seemed a bit...abridged."
Jason stood suddenly, his chair sliding back and tipping to the floor. Despite his aggressive movements and posturing, the rest of the table remained calm. Jason too seemed to relax after a couple of seconds, turned, righted his chair and sat back down. "OK, let's see. Felipe Garzonas...Felipe Garzonas...Felipe Garzonas...oh yeah, son of a diplomat who raped a girl. He was shielded from justice by his father's diplomatic immunity. From what I recall, I went to pay him a visit, saw him on the balcony, landed a few feet from him, which unfortunately startled him enough for him to fall over the railing and to his death. Is that what you want to know?"
"That's your official answer?" Tim sarcastically replied.
"That's the truth." Jason firmly replied. "I went there to beat him to a bloody pulp. How bloody I didn't know, I did a lot of things without thinking them through. But I did not so much as touch him. He saw me land, leapt away from me startled, and down he went. I did not commit murder...not on that day anyway."
"But you could very easily of saved him, yet chose not to." Tim pressed.
"I suppose you're right." Jason shrugged. "I didn't stop him from dying. What a blockbuster of a revelation that must be for you." The choice of descriptive for the type of revelation was not lost on anyone at the table, and both Tim and Dick's eyes shamefully dropped. Jason picked up on this and smiled, leveling his gaze at Bruce. "I'm not here to bash Dick. Quite the opposite. In the eyes of both of you he's damn near the pinnacle of what a human being should be. Hell, he's that in the eyes of most capes, even me. He's a better man than I am...he's a better man than you are too Bruce." Tim raised his head, Dick's eyes remained fixed on his plate, a deliberate attempt to refrain from seeing Bruce nod in agreement. "He's fallen short of your ideals, not just with Blockbuster, but he beat the Joker to death too. I love him for that, even if it was in response to thinking Redturd here had been killed because of Smiley. Hearing that the Huntress resuscitated the friggin' clown actually dropped her a peg or two in my estimation, as well as contradicting what I thought I knew of her. Anyway, I don't see these things as faults with Dick, I see them as faults in your goddamn expectations. I readily acknowledge I've gone much farther than he's gone, and if you're going to pass judgment on me in regards to the criminal scumbags I've killed, then so be it. But if your judgment is going to be based on letting a piece of shit fall to his death, or my potential willingness to kill the Joker, then screw you. I don't need you, and am perfectly content being lumped in a category occupied by your better."
"Jason, stop." Dick whispered. "I'm nobody's better. Those are things I regret to the very base of my soul, things I'll spend the rest of my life trying to atone for."
"Everyone is more than willing to give you the opportunity for redemption." Bruce muttered as he rested his chin on his hands, thinking deeply. "Jason will be given such an opportunity as well." Bruce straightened up in his chair and directed his intense gaze at his middle child. "But there will be some ground rules that you will abide by. Is that understood?"
Jason thought about pointing out that he had not requested anything from Bruce, that he didn't need his forgiveness or approval, that he didn't need or want to be a part of his life again. But even if he thought there'd be a chance of Bruce buying the lies, he no longer had any desire to spit them out. "Yes sir."
"Excellent." Bruce reached forward to take his fork and spear a short stalk of asparagus. "Now, on to the details of bringing you back to life from a legal standpoint."
"Yeah, if you can pull that one off I'll be really impressed." Jason quipped, eliciting a subtle grin from Bruce. The tension that was present just a moment before seemed to fade from the room as they all seemed to find themselves on the same side.
"Tell me Jason, do you remember Nickles Manley?" Bruce asked.
Jason shrugged. "Small time bookie. The only reason he blipped on our radar back in the day was that he reportedly took bets from high school kids. But even then, we had much bigger fish to fry. And a few months ago, when I was pretty much running the Gotham underworld, he still wasn't much."
"He was found dead yesterday." Tim offered matter of factly. "Presumably killed by a rival bookie looking to steal his action."
"I'll be sure to send flowers to his common law widow." Jason muttered, a little confused. "But I'm not sure what that has to do with me."
Jason wasn't the only one with this question, and all eyes turned to Bruce. "Nickles may have been small time, but his ability to keep records was most impressive. Tonight Robin is going to sneak into the crime scene, his house, and alter his records going back four years. Tim's going to add a record of a quarter million dollar gambling debt owed to him by a then-fourteen-year-old named Jason Todd."
Jason smiled. "You're telling me that I was run out of town and faked my death because of a mook like Nickles?"
Bruce nodded. "To the public at large you weren't a crime fighter, you were a street kid taken in by a blue blood looking to enhance his philanthropist reputation. Those that knew you considered you to be impulsive; the idea of you running up a huge gambling debt, especially in light of your new found environment, would be one they could believe."
"So with the news of Nickles' untimely demise I can come out of hiding?" Jason asked. "I don't think so Bruce, those that took Manley's business will also have taken on his outstanding debtors. Especially one's owing so much."
"Your debt to Nickles was merely to provide your motivation for wanting to disappear. When you are discovered I will be so happy to have you back that I'll eagerly pay off your debt. I'll just publicly lament that you felt you couldn't come to me in the first place." Bruce replied. "The more difficult task was to explain away your death in Ethiopia. Fortunately, with your mother's embezzlement being revealed, that opened up the possibility for her to have had criminal partners. Enter Andrej Blahnik, a Czech national who was last seen alive a week prior to your death. Twenty years old at the time of his disappearance, he had garnered a fairly impressive criminal resume and would be a good fit as a partner for Sheila Haywood." Bruce reached into his suit jacket and pulled a small printout from his pocket, one of a mug shot of the person in question, and slid it toward the center of the table. "He was five foot four, athletically build, dark hair, blue eyes, and as you can see, close enough in appearance to you that given the physical injuries involved, an addle-minded billionaire playboy could mistakenly misidentify the body as yours."
"Sounds good," Dick chimed in "but there's a chance this Blahnik guy is still alive, or at least was beyond Jason's death. He or someone who'd dealt with him since then popping up could screw things up for us pretty badly."
"Blahnik died four days before Jason." Bruce answered. "A shallow grave was discovered by Interpol last week. Checkmate took control of the investigation and identified the bodies. It appears to be a hit on a Russian mob boss named Nikolai Akhatova and nine of his thugs that were unfortunate enough to be present with him at the time, including Mr. Blahnik." A smile came over Bruce's face. "I have a...contact within Checkmate's hierarchy, one willing to do me a favor. The official report will read that Akhatova and eight of his associates were found. Blahnik's body should already be flying over the Atlantic." Bruce turned to the youngest member of the group. "Tim, please prepare the hangar for Sasha's arrival after dinner." He then turned to Jason. "Once she's here, you will need to take the body and put it in a replica of your casket, which you will then bury in your grave. Consider it penance for the shit you've pulled these last several months."
"OK, good so far, but you've still to explain why I'm finally going to be coming out of hiding." Jason said.
"Simple. You'll be discovered because of your older brother's indiscretion." Bruce answered.
"Uh, what?" Dick asked.
"I have a villa outside of Monaco that I have not been to in six years. That has been where Jason has been lying low for more than four years." Bruce explained. "Though he never felt he could confide in me regarding his gambling debt and continued existence, he did choose to confide in you. In those years you've made periodic trips to the villa with money and other provisions, the records have already been added to the computer archives of various airlines and the applicable customs documents will be added in the coming days. In the near future you will rekindle your romance with Cheyenne Freemont, and invite her on a trip to the Monaco villa for the weekend, a trip where the paparazzi corps will definitely follow Ms. Freemont. In the unlikely event that she spurns your romantic interests, then confide in her the real reason for the trip; she knows your secret anyway. Actually, it may better with her knowing, as then she won't make any attempts to shake the photographers. Anyway, arrive at the door of the villa, give the photographers some steamy shots they'll be sure not to miss, and Jason will open the door, revealing himself to the cameras. Should they choose not to publish any of the photos with Jason, I'll be sure that Clark either gets a hold of them or sees to it that someone who would recognize Jason does. One way or the other, Jason will be discovered." Bruce finally shoved the piece of asparagus into his mouth and started chewing.
"OK, I'm impressed." Jason smiled before cutting into his lasagna.
"You know, I am seeing someone now, it might lead to something serious." Dick mentioned as he too took a scoop of lasagna from his plate, and continued through a mouthful of food, much to Alfred's dismay. "A public weekend trip with an ex...whatever would definitely put an end to that."
"It's your brother Dick." Bruce replied. "There will other girls." Dick nodded in complete agreement, but shared a look with Tim. There would be other girls, plenty of them, and each one of them would wind up devastated or worse for getting involved with these men. He would probably be doing Deb a favor by ending it before it really began. He'd have to break it off with her prior to his escapade with Cheyenne, he could at least do that for her.