Dick was having difficulty keeping a beaming grin off of his face as he sauntered up to the car he had just pulled over. It was rare that a day came along when he didn't love his job, but this shift was special. Today, he thought giddily as the driver's side window rolled down, he was going to get to play the ultimate good cop.

"Morning, ma'am," he greeted the harried-looking woman behind the wheel. "I'm afraid I need your license, insurance, and registration."

"I swear to god I usually use my turn signal, officer," she sighed as she rifled through her overstuffed wallet. "I'm in such a tizzy this morning that it just slipped my mind entirely when I turned out of that parking lot...could you please just let me go with a warning? It would make such a huge difference to my Christmas, it really would."

"...Been out shopping, it looks like?" he asked, noticing the bags in the backseat.

"For my girls. You wouldn't believe how difficult it is to buy for twins. You'd think they'd make it easy and want the same thing, but no, they have to be different colors, or a different style, or a different...ugh. Here it is." She shoved her documents towards him. "At least I managed to find one thing today."

As he examined the license he'd been handed, Dick tried to pull the information he really needed out of the woman. This was his first attempt to make progress on the special mission he'd been granted permission to undertake, and he sensed that it would be an indicator of how the rest of the day was likely to go. He had to get what he wanted out of her. "Let me guess," he smiled, "they want one of those really popular toys that all the stores are low on?"

She arched an eyebrow at him. "...Do you have children, officer?"

"No, but I have a little brother," he shared. "I'm familiar with the old 'out of stock, here's a rain check for after the New Year' runaround."

"Oh." She seemed to relax at that, and the nugget of truth that Dick had been searching for fell out of her mouth. "It's those damn 'Modern Pizzazz' dolls. I've found everything else on their lists except those, and I've tried four stores now. It wouldn't be so bad if they wanted Maisie or Anabelle, but of course they were smart and put 'only Trixie' and 'only Madeline'. I guess I'm going to have to pay the babysitter for a few extra hours this weekend and go look for them in Gotham, but...well, you want to be with your family at this time of the year, you know?"

"I know what you mean," he nodded. "Well, let me just run a couple of things really fast, and then we'll get you on your way. I'd hate for you to miss snagging the last Trixie or Madeline at the next store just because of a turn signal."

"Thank you, officer."

"No problem, ma'am." What was going to come next, he thought gleefully as he walked back to his cruiser, would be no problem at all. "...Merry Christmas, dispatch," he spoke into his radio.

"Been waiting to hear that call sign," came back. "Whatcha got for us?"

"I've got an order for two 'Modern Pizzazz' dolls. One needs to be Trixie, the other Madeline."

"...10-4. Will relay. Stand by."

Minutes passed. He ran the woman's information while he waited, and wasn't surprised when she came back clean. Technically he should have checked her out before he'd called in her request, but he'd trusted his gut instinct instead. Her story about spacing turning on her blinker was probably true, he smirked, if she had really visited four stores unsuccessfully before ten o'clock in the morning. If the off-duty officers who had volunteered to play his elves today could manage to succeed where she had failed, then things would be off to a very good start.

"10-20, Santa?"

"Yessss," he hissed before he picked the handset up. Dispatch wouldn't be requesting his location unless someone had found the items he'd called in; now the only question was how quickly they would arrive. "1700 block of Westchester," he reported. "What's the ETA?"

"5 minutes."

Dozens of cars streamed by in the meantime. How many of them, Dick wondered, would he have time to pull over during the two days his public relations quest had been allotted? He wanted to get as many as he could, but the odds were good that they wouldn't all be as fast as this first one was turning out to be. If he could get ten people per shift and some decent media response in the aftermath, he decided, he'd consider the project a success.

Flashing lights rounded a corner several blocks behind him. The second cruiser pulled up behind him, and the driver stepped out. Dick joined her on the shoulder between their vehicles, angling himself so that the woman who was now staring wide-eyed into her rearview mirror couldn't see the exchange that took place. "...Thanks, Meredith," he said, taking the bag she'd brought.

"Don't thank me, Santa," she winked. "Just keep on pulling people over. These two literally came in on a shipment ten minutes before you called. We had to dig through a tractor trailer to get to them."

"Sorry about that."

"Are you kidding? This is fun."

"I'll try to get another really good one for you, then," he joked.

"You do that. I'll be waiting." With that she retreated to her car. In a moment she'd merged into traffic and was on her way back to her post at a nearby mega-mall, where she would be waiting to ferry further gifts to him at top speed. Dick watched her go, then approached the sedan he'd pulled over. This was going to be the best part, and he was practically skipping in anticipation. "...All right, ma'am," he began, "here's the deal. I'm just going to give you a warning, like you asked-"

"Oh, thank god..."

"-But I need you to do something for me in return."

Her grateful look turned cautious. Dick couldn't blame her for being worried – until a couple of years ago it wouldn't have been unheard of for a member of the Bludhaven Police Department to demand money or other 'favors' in exchange for letting an infraction go – but it still made him sad to see the legacy his predecessors on the force had left. Eager to allay her fear, he lifted a toy-store branded bag into her line of sight. "I need you to give these to your girls and tell them that Santa says Merry Christmas."

For a moment the woman didn't move. Then she began to blink rapidly and bounce her gaze between him and the dolls. "You...you're...are those...?"

"Trixie and Madeline, right?"

She nodded, her expression shell-shocked.

"Well, that's what I told them, so I'm sure that's what they got. Here," he offered her the bag. "Take a look."

When the dolls had been unsheathed, she simply stared at them. "I can't believe this," she murmured. "I...you're giving these to me?"

"Yes, ma'am. They're courtesy of the BPD. The only repayment we ask is that you continue to follow the law and be a good citizen. Teach those girls of yours to do the same things, and we'll be more than even. Sound like a deal?"

"That's...that's the best deal I've been offered in a very long time, officer. I...I can't thank you enough. These will make my babies' Christmas."

"Good," he grinned. "Now, some people from channel 12 are going to come ask you to sign a release and maybe talk to them, okay? It's totally voluntary; you can still keep the presents even if you don't want to be on TV. Just be sure you follow all the rules when you pull out, okay? We want to make sure you get home safe so you can see those bright faces on Christmas morning."

"I will. Oh, god...thank you, officer. Thank you so much. I can't even..."

"Not at all, ma'am. Happy holidays."

Back in his car, Dick's mouth stretched so wide that it was a wonder the top of his head stayed on. He felt so light that it didn't seem possible for him to not be floating above the ground. Clearly, he thought as he went in search of his next 'citation', whoever had made up the basic Santa myth hadn't been writing from experience; if they had, they'd have known that such a generous old man didn't need reindeer to fly.

The idea had been born out of a patrol of a month earlier. He'd been conducting an arrest when the man in cuffs, who was sober but packing a distribution quantity of methamphetamine, had said something that had stuck with him. "You cops are always taking," he'd accused. "You take me to jail, you take a person's license if they drive drunk, you take away somebody else's future by giving them a rap sheets for petty crimes or by just outright killing them. You used to take bribes, but that was okay because at least then you didn't take so many of the other things. Now you don't do that anymore, though, and we're all poorer because of it. I'm sick of cops taking; I want to see a cop give for once."

That comment had seemed to sum up a great deal for Dick. The entire precinct had just sat through training designed to make them aware that public confidence in the police – not just in Bludhaven, but across the nation – was falling. A few recent scuffles between cops and civilians in other communities had ended badly, leading to public protests and calls for reform. And then there was this guy, the man on the street both literally and metaphorically, telling him that all he ever saw the police do was take. Dick knew how much he and his fellow officers gave in the name of duty, but clearly the people they served didn't, and that was a problem.

He'd fretted over a solution for days. There would have to be media involvement, he knew, so as to maximize the number of citizens who heard about whatever it was he came up with; there would have to be direct, meaningful contact with average men and women, something more unique and memorable than holding a fundraiser or volunteering at a soup kitchen; and there would have to be capital from a third party source, because to fund the project with taxpayer dollars would undermine the entire intent. He knew how to wrangle the first and the last requirement, but the second one eluded him.

On the day after Thanksgiving it had finally come to him. He and Jason had been sprawled out in the den, recovering from a massive lunch of leftovers by watching some old Christmas movie. Santa Claus had featured in it heavily, and as the faces on screen cheered to see the red suit and hat it had occurred to Dick that no one disliked someone who gave out meaningful presents. Maybe, he'd mused, that was his solution. Yes, the police provided the ultra-important gifts of civil order and general protection every day of the year, but those were intangibles, the sort of things that most people quickly sickened of being reminded about. What they needed was a way to give something more solid, something that people could actually hold in their hands and show to their friends and neighbors.

What they needed, he realized, was to play Santa Claus.

It had all come together quickly after that. His sergeant had taken a little convincing, but she was on the streets often enough to recognize the difference a gesture like his proposal would make. The idea had risen quietly through the chain of command from there without any help from Dick, who had been a little surprised to be pulled into a meeting with his precinct's Captain one afternoon. Upon hearing that funding was already in place – Dick would be paying for the whole thing himself, although he didn't share that with anyone – and that the only material contributions the department needed to make were a few squad cars and the use of dispatch, the project had been green lighted. He had been named Santa Claus on his sergeant's suggestion – 'we need a charmer, Captain, and I've never met one better than Grayson' – a local television station had been enlisted to report on the results, and that had been that.

As the first day of giving drew to a close, Dick couldn't have been more pleased. He'd pulled over eighteen vehicles in twelve hours, and had given gifts to the occupants of eleven of them. His only regret was that not even his best efforts had succeeded with the other seven. Four of them had been in an unfriendly hurry, and were uninterested in answering any question not related to their warning citation. The other three had straight up told him to go to hell when he'd tried to inquire about their wishes for this holiday season. As tempting as it had been to write those few actual citations, he had refrained, content to let them leave with a warning but without any presents.

Day two was even better. He only managed to surprise nine vehicles with their requested items, but that was due to his time-eating bust of a drunk driver, not for lack of trying. Fewer people told him to piss off than had the day before, and he allowed himself to think that it was because word was beginning to get around about what happened to those who answered the nice officer's questions.

While the lady who'd needed dolls for her daughters would always be a fond memory for him, his favorite encounter by far was the last one he had. He pulled over a family of seven for a busted taillight, and the five children in the minivan's back rows were all whispering as he walked up to the window. They looked like good kids, and he determined right then and there to get them no matter what it took. "Evening, sir. Can I get your license, insurance, and registration, please?"

"Yeah, sure." The driver pulled the requested items down from his window visor with the heavy finality of a man who had been expecting to be stopped.

"...Do you know why I pulled you over?"

"Was it the back light again?"

"Yes it was. You knew it's broken?"

"I know," he slumped. "Somebody slid into my car in a parking lot a few weeks ago and drove off without a note. I've been pulled over for it already," he confessed, "but I don't have the money to fix it yet. We've been trying not to drive at night, but we were the kids' school concert and...well. It's something free we could do together. Or it was something free...shit..."

"It's okay, Deshaun," the woman beside him said quietly. "We'll figure something out."

"I know we will, but this is the third time this week I've been pulled over because of some bas-" Deshaun glanced at the children behind him, "-some jerk who didn't leave a note," he finished. "There's no fairness there, you know?"

"You're right," Dick agreed. "There isn't. Look, let me run some info through the system and we'll see what we can do, okay? Ma'am, if you'll hand me your ID as well, please?"

Back at his car, he checked the parents. Sure enough, the man had two previous stops in the last seven days. The first time he'd been given a warning; the second, a fix-it ticket. That citation would expire the day after Christmas, after which time there would be a $150 fee levied on the driver for non-compliance. Judging from the father's explanation and his wife's quiet despair, this family didn't have that kind of money just laying around. What would they have to go without in order to pay for the repair and the fine, he wondered?

The problem was that he didn't have enough information to act on the behalf of anyone but the driver. He wasn't letting them leave until each one of those kids had a toy and a grin, but unfortunately the only way he could think of to achieve his goal without giving the surprise away entirely required that he cause a moment's fear. He didn't like it, but the end result would be worth the brief angst.

"...Sir, I'm going to need you to step out of the car for a moment."

The father swallowed hard. "I...I haven't done anything wrong," he said.

"He's a good father, sir," his wife argued. "He's a good man."

"I believe you," Dick replied honestly. "...But sir, I need you to step out of the car. It will only take a minute."

"Daddy, what's wrong?!" a voice called from the back.

"Ain't nothing wrong, baby girl. You just keep quiet. Daddy'll be right back." He turned a pleading gaze on Dick. "...Please, sir, don't do this in front of my kids. Please."

"Mr. Davis, I'm not going to do anything," Dick swore. "I just want to talk to you out of earshot of your family. That's all this is." It hurt that he was scaring these innocent people so badly, but he kept telling himself that they would look back on it and laugh when all was said and done. "Now please step out of your vehicle and come with me."

He did as he'd been told. When they reached the rear of the minivan, he spoke again. "Officer, please-"

"Mr. Davis," Dick cut him off, "what do your children want for Christmas?"

The other man's mouth stuttered to a halt. For a second all he could do was gape. "...What's that?"

"What do your children want for Christmas? The biggest wishes they put on their lists; what are they?" He smiled. "I meant what I said; I just want to talk, and I didn't want them to overhear."

"I...you're sure you want to know that?"

"That's all I need. Well, that and what you and your wife want, too."

"Um...well, I guess...trying to remember, here...Tania wanted one of those Modern Pizzazz dolls, you know, like all the girls her age do...and Tyrin, he wanted..."

Davis listed off the deepest desires of his children's hearts while Dick listened and took mental notes. When pressed after that he revealed that his wife desperately needed a new computer with which to work on the classes she was taking online in the hopes of getting a better job. He himself wished he could afford a better mobile phone, as the one he had occasionally stopped working and left him fearing that he would miss a call from the school or the babysitter. Most of all, though, he just wanted his damn taillight to be replaced so that he didn't have to worry about being pulled over any more.

"...Thank you," Dick said when the man seemed to have finished. "Go ahead back to your seat, and just wait there. You're not in any trouble, I promise. I just have to run a couple more things."

"Okay, but...officer?"

"Hmm?"

"What's...what's this all about?"

Dick just smiled. "You'll see. It's a good thing, I promise."

"I...all right. Whatever you say. I don't want any trouble."

"You're not causing any, so don't worry. Just wait."

He was sure it gave the family another scare when not one, not two, but three cruisers converged on their location some twenty minutes later. There wasn't enough room on the shoulder behind him for all of them, so one parked in front of the Davis' vehicle. Putting on the most reassuring grin he possessed, Dick walked back up to the driver's door. "Mr. Davis?"

"...Y-yes, sir?"

"Oh, god," Mrs. Davis moaned, covering her face with her hands. "Oh, god, please..."

"I'm sorry if I've scared you this evening," he apologized. "But I think you'll agree it was worth the fright when you see why I did it. You see," he directed back towards the children, all of whom were watching him with eyes like platters, "I had to make a few phone calls about you all to make sure you're on the 'nice' list."

"...The 'nice' list?" Mr. Davis repeated.

"Right," Dick nodded. "Santa's the only one who has that information, of course, so I had to call him. It takes a little while for a call to go through to the North Pole, so that's what took so long. But the good news is that every single one of you was listed, so Santa gave me special permission to take care of a few things on his behalf."

Now Davis seemed to understand. "You...when we talked...that's why...?"

"Right," he whispered back. "So," he clapped his hands, "without further adieu, my helper elves and I would like to give you each an early present straight from the big man in the sleigh himself."

Two of the other officers appeared on the passenger side of the van. The one by the passenger window handed in a bag containing a phone and a laptop; the other slid open the van's side door and began passing out toys to the children. Finally, Dick took a small, thin piece of plastic from the third cop, who had come up beside him. "And, Mr. Davis, Mrs. Davis," he went on, pulling them momentarily away from their joy, "on behalf of the Bludhaven Police Department...get your taillight fixed." He handed the gift card over. "...What's on there should cover the cost of the repair in full. Just make sure you go before the ticket expires, okay?"

A tearful Mr. Davis reached out through his window to clasp Dick's hand gratefully. "Thank you…thank you so much…" Mrs. Davis shook her head in disbelief and clutched her laptop to her chest, crying as if the device had saved her life. Behind them, all five of their children began to squeal with joy.

It was the greatest sound Dick had ever heard in his life, and from the looks on the faces of his fellow officers it was high up on their lists, too.

The end of his project also marked the end of his work week, and not even the long drive he took that night from the east end of Bludhaven to beyond the west end of Gotham was enough to wipe the residual smile off of his lips. As he skipped up the front steps of the house to where Alfred was already holding the door open for him, he wondered how best to describe the highlights of his week to his family. Without having been there, would they be able to fully understand the sheer pleasure he'd felt so often over the last two days?

"Good evening, young sir," the butler greeted him. Dick paused; while the older man was always happy to see him, there was an exceptional light of pride in his gaze tonight.

"Hey, Alfred," he replied. "…You look happy. What's up?" There was no way the news of his mission had already reached Gotham; he'd just wrapped it up, after all, and it was only set to be broadcast on a local Bludhaven channel.

""Oh, I'm quite happy this evening, Master Dick. I'm very pleased, indeed. Here, let me take your coat…now, if you'll just follow me into the den, Master Wayne wants to see you right away."

"Uh…okay." He would have gone looking for Bruce straight away even without the butler's pressure, but the urgency of the request was baffling. Maybe, he thought, Jason had done something really great at school, won an award or something. That would just be perfect, to come home and learn that his little brother had an achievement of his own to celebrate…

Jason was grinning when they came upon him in the doorway to the den, but the slightly smirking nature of the expression told Dick that he wasn't smiling for himself. "Well if it isn't Old Saint Dick," he teased.

"…Huh?" It was impossible; how could they know? And yet, what else could Jason's comment mean?

"Don't play dumb, kiddo," Bruce said as he pulled Dick into a tight hug. "…You know what you did. That was a hell of an idea, and I know it was yours, so don't try to argue."

"I…wait, you do know," he boggled. "But how? I mean, we just finished up a few hours ago, and it was only going to air locally…"

The billionaire gave one of his rare full laughs. "Locally? I don't know who you've been talking to, chum, but your little Christmas caper is on the national news."

His jaw dropped. "…National?"

"They didn't name you or anything," Jason put in. "They just showed a bunch of footage with you in it, and some clips of the people you gave presents to."

He'd known that the station that had agreed to run a story on the project was interviewing some of the recipients, but he'd never imagined that they would have all that footage ready so quickly. For it to have gone out to the national stations on top of that was unbelievable. "I…wow. I didn't think…I mean, I just wanted to make sure Bludhaven knew, you know? The way things have been lately…"

"It was brilliant, Master Dick," Alfred beamed. "Absolutely brilliant. It is such a nice change to hear something positive involving the police on the news."

"I…thanks. I just hope it makes some people realize that cops do more than just take, you know?"

"I don't see how they could fail to see that after the gesture you've made, young sir."

"Tell me," Bruce said, "how much of your own money did you spend on all of this? I know a 'private donor inside the department' paid for the gifts – they said that much in the report we saw – but how much did you end up giving away?"

Dick shrugged. "I don't know. I think it came out to eight or nine grand." Jason gave a low whistle. "It was worth every penny, though."

"…Get me an exactly figure, would you?"

"Bruce…no. I don't want you to pay for it. No offense," he apologized, "but…this was my project. I'll pay for it."

"You're crazy!" Jason exclaimed.

The billionaire just studied him silently for a long moment. "…You're sure?"

"Yeah," he nodded. "I'm sure. I already got paid back in smiles and tears; the money doesn't mean anything."

"You are crazy," Jason reiterated.

"No," Bruce corrected him. "…Just generous. Okay, Dick; have it your way. But at least give me consent to talk to Jim Gordon about funding something similar on this side of the river for next year."

"Absolutely!" he agreed. "That's a great idea. I love it."

"Good."

"…Wish I'd been pulled over for a minor infraction," Jason mumbled.

"I rather think that you don't, Master Jason," Alfred lectured. "Breaking the law is unacceptable even if you think it will net you a gift."

"Don't worry, Jay," Dick winked. "I'm pretty sure there'll be something under the tree for every 'minor infraction' you committed this year."

"That's probably a roughly accurate count," Bruce sighed. "You're both spoiled."

"Yup," the boys said at the same time. "Spoiled rotten," Dick appended.

"Not rotten," his surrogate father said. An arm landed across Dick's shoulders, and Jason was beckoned forward to take up position on the other side. "…Not rotten. Just spoiled."

"On the note of spoilage," Alfred chimed in, "I've been holding your dinners for some time now. If you would care to attend to them…?"

"Sounds great," Dick cheered. "I'm starving."

"Being Santa is hard work," the butler acknowledged. "Particularly when one does as good a job of it as you seem to have."

"Thanks," he grinned. "…But let's see if I can do even better next year…"

Author's Note: This story was inspired by an article I read in the news yesterday about a police precinct that did basically this exact thing this year. The way it came about in real life is a bit different than the way I've portrayed it here, but in my opinion the true tale is an even better story because it made a difference in real lives. If you'd like to read the article, please visit my blog and click the link I've provided there.