Batman
"My Three Sons: Batman Style"
Summary: Bruce tackles raising three sons: Dick, Jason, and Tim.
Author's Note(s): For the purpose of this story: 1) Jason Todd did not die. He, like his older brother Dick, outgrew the Robin persona and created his own: Talon. His costume is black, except for three red slashes across his chest. 2) Dick is eighteen, Jason is fifteen, and Tim is twelve. 3) Barbara didn't become Oracle, was never shot, and chose to make herself into a new crime fighter called Kestrel. 4) Cassie Cain lives with Babs and Commisioner Gordon rather than Bruce. She's Batgirl. 5) The two girls are the same age as Dick and Tim.
Warning: This story will contain the corporal punishment of teenagers—even an eighteen year old—and adolescents. If this bothers you, DO NOT READ OR REVIEW THIS STORY. YOU HAVE BEEN PROPERLY WARNED!!
Disclaimer: I don't own these characters, I just wrote this story for the fun of it.
Chapter 4: A Day in the Life…
Dick pulled his motorcycle up in the back parking lot, the one reserved for student use, of Thomas Wayne High School. He waited for Barbara to dismount, and then removed his helmet.
"So," he said, flashing his girlfriend and fellow crimefighter his patented smile, "What do you say about playing hooky with me tonight?"
Barbara removed her helmet and shook out her long red hair. "Love to, Boy Wonder," she told him, "but can't.
He sighed, and hopped off his bike. Grabbing their backpacks, they headed inside. "Why not?" he asked.
"Because," she told him, "I need to work on my scholarship applications. Unlike somebody, I don't have a rich father who can afford to pay my way through college."
"He's offered to give you a scholarship through the Wayne Foundation," he reminded her. "Why don't you just take it?"
"Because, Dick," she told him, "I don't want somebody to just "give" me a scholarship. I want to be "granted" one because I "earned" it. Get it?"
Dick sighed. "Yeah, Babs," he told her, "I get it."
"You should really think of doing the same," she told him, as they entered the building and headed straight for their adjoining lockers.
"Why's that?" he asked her, smiling. "Like you said, I have a rich father who can pay my way through school."
"Dick," she told him, giving him a look, "we both know that's not what you really want. You've never taken anything from Bruce that wasn't given to you. You don't want a free ride through college anymore than I do."
He nodded, agreeing with her. "I may not want college period," he told her, hesitantly.
She paused in her search for her history text book to stare at him with her cobalt blue eyes. "What are you saying?" she asked him, surprised.
He shrugged. "I'm just not sure I want to go to college," he told her.
"Then what are you going to do, pray tell?" she asked him, hand on her hip.
"I was thinking," he said, hesitantly, "that I'd become a cop."
Her mouth dropped open in surprise. "You can't be serious?" she asked him.
He frowned. "Why not?" he asked her. "Don't you think I'd make a great cop?"
"Yeah, I do," she told him, "but what are you going to do? Uphold and enforce the law by day and then turn right around and break it at night?"
"C'mon, Babs," he told her, lowering his voice so only she could hear, "you know we don't break the laws."
"We're technically vigilantes, Dick," she told him. "That's called taking the law into your own hands. In any other city, we would be hunted down and arrested."
"We don't actually take the law into our own hands, babe," he told her, smirking. "We catch the crooks and then let the justice system take over."
"So why do you want to become a cop if you're already doing their job for them?" she asked him, pointedly.
"Becaue," he answered her, "at least as a cop I'd get some recognition for catching the bad guys."
She looked at him, puzzled. "I don't get it," she told him, shutting her locker with a clang, "you get recognition now."
"Yeah," he told her, "as Nightwing—not Dick Grayson."
"What's wrong with that?" she asked him, gently.
"Because," he told her, "all anybody sees of Dick Grayson is the former circus performer who was adopted by a billionaire playboy and who's dating the Police commissioner's daughter—probably at his rich father's insistence."
"Gee," she told him, rolling her eyes, "thanks a lot."
"Come on, Babs," he told her, snorting, "you know I didn't mean it like that. It's just…I'm more comfortable in Kelvar and a mask than I am in my own skin. I need to do something worthwhile as Dick Grayson. Becoming a cop might just do that for me."
"Have you talked to Bruce about this?" she asked, raising an eyebrow at him.
He looked away, uncomfortable. "No," he admitted. "I've been meaning to, but…"
"Are you afraid he'll be disappointed?" she asked, knowing how much his father's opinion mattered to him.
"No," he said, "I'm afraid he'll force me to choose."
"Between being a cop or being Nightwing?" she asked, surprised. "Why would he do that?"
"Because," Dick said, "he doesn't want me risking my life twice."
"Isn't that a good thing?" she asked him, grinning.
"Yeah," he said, "if I were still Tim's age, but I'm not. I'm eighteen, Babs, and yet I still have to worry about what he thinks and says…"
"I still worry about what my dad thinks and says," she reminded him, "and I'm eighteen, too."
"Yeah, but that's different," he told her. "You're dad isn't…"
"Isn't what?" she asked, grinning.
"Such a hard ass about every little thing," he said, huffing.
"He's only that way because he cares," she told him. "You know that."
He blushed. "Yeah," he admitted, "I know."
Just then the bell rang for first period.
"So," he said, his patent smile back on his face, "about the Rave tonight?"
She laughed. "Nice try, Boy Wonder," she said, kissing him on the cheek, "but no go. You'll have to fly solo on that one. I'll see you after gym." She then turned and hurried to her first class.
"Yeah," he told her, shrugging his backpack onto his shoulder. "I guess I will."
&
"Come on, Hawke," Jason spoke into his cell phone in the boy's restroom. The bell for first period had just rang but that still gave him five minutes to get to class before he was considered late…and even he was it was only History.
"I can't, J.T." Connor Hawke, the son of Oliver Queen, spoke to him.
"Why not, man?" Jason asked him. "It's gonna be a blast from what I hear."
"I have to patrol tonight," Connor, who worked with his father (Green Arrow) as Nighthawk, told him. "Don't you?"
"I'm just gonna tell the old man I've gotta paper to write," he told him. "He'll take his "heir" with him and little Timmy, too. He won't even miss me."
"Why do you think Batman doesn't care about you?" Connor asked him. "You're his son, after all."
"What are you, my therapist?" Jason asked him, rolling his eyes. "C'mon, just make up some excuse and catch a ride with Roy. You just know he's gonna book it down here to get in on the action."
"I'll think about it, Jason," he promised. "I'll text you later and let you know."
"Great," Jason said, smiling. The tardy bell rang and he swore under his breath.
"Something wrong?" Connor asked.
"No, man," he assured him, 'nothing at all, but I do gotta go. Catch yaw later." He hung up, tucked his cell phone down his pants, and grabbed his bookbag. He dashed out of the boy's room and…
Ran smack into the principal of the school. "Ah," the balding gentlemen said. "Late for class, aren't we Mr. Wayne?"
"Uh, yes sir," he said, jerking his thumb back at the bathroom. "You know, these things take as long as they take."
"Uh huh," The man said, obviously not believing a word of it, "then you'd best hurry along. I'd hate to have to speak to your father this afternoon and interrupt his busy day."
"Yes, Sir," Jason agreed, "that would be very bad indeed. Pops hates receiving calls in the middle of the day. Well, I gotta go. Catch ya later." He then turned and hurried on to his first class.
Boy, that was a close one…
&
Tim and Cassandra walked down the halls of Martha Wayne Middle School together headed for their home room class.
"So, are you going to go on patrol with us tonight?" he asked his best friend and fellow crime fighter.
She shrugged. "Maybe" she said, quietly. That was the thing about Cassie, she didn't say much but then again she didn't have to. Usually, her fists and feet did the talking for her.
"Great," Tim told her, smiling. "Dick and Jason are starting to get on my nerves. They keep treating me like a little kid."
"You are a little kid," Cassie reminded him, grinning.
He scowled at her. "Thanks a lot, Cass," he told her, nudging her in the arm a bit. "You know what I mean. I'm just as good as they are, and yet they don't really listen to any of my ideas."
"Does he?" Cass asked him, referring to Bruce. She almost never called him by his name and when she spoke of him it was always in a hushed, almost awed tone of voice.
"Sometimes," Tim told her, "when he's not too busy listening to Dick and Jason. Sometimes being the youngest just sucks."
She grinned at that, only to have it vanish a second later when they ran into the school's resident bully, Deek Thomas.
"Well, well," the older eighth grader said, "look who we got here. Prissy boy Wayne and his little mute girlfriend."
Tim sighed. "Leave us alone, Deek," he told him. "We don't want to fight. We just want to get to homeroom."
"Not so fast, rich boy," the bully growled at him. "You know how this works. You want to get to class, you first have to pay the toll."
"I'm not paying you anything," Tim told him, glaring up at him. "Now, get out of our way."
"And if I don't?" the older boy said, grabbing Tim by the collar and hoisting him off his feet. "What are you gonna do about it, spazz? Run and tell Daddy?"
Tim gritted his teeth and his fists. He could have taken the bully down easily, but that would have revealed his mastery of both acrobatics and marital arts—two things that might seem strange for a rich playboy's son.
Cassie, however, had no such qualms. Everyone knew who her father was, so there was no reason not to use her impressive skills. She kicked Deek in the shins, forcing him to let Tim go, and then spun to deliver a perfect round house to the boy's gut—pinning him to the wall.
"Leave him alone," she said, her dark eyes boring into the bully's own with lethal intensity that most she reserved for the hardened criminals at night, "or else…"
The bully's eyes were wide and he just nodded. She let him go, and then they started on their way toward home room.
"Just you wait, nancy boy," the bully called after him. "You're girlfriend won't always be around to protect you!"
Tim gritted his teeth, and his fists again.
"Ignore him," Cassie told him, gently.
"That's easy for you to say," he growled at her. "He's afraid of you."
"He'd be afraid of you to if you'd only stand up to him," she reminded him.
"I know," he admitted, "but you know why I can't."
"Actually," Cassie said, eyeing him intensely, "no I don't." She then turned and headed into class.
"You know," Tim said, "I don't either."
But I wish I did.
&
In his office at Wayne Tech, Bruce sat and stared out the window. Lucius Fox was rambling on about a new project they had in the works, but his mind really wasn't on what his old friend was saying. He had been staring at the picture of his boys that lined his desk, and grinned.
I wonder how their day is going?
TBC…