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Chapter 6

Induction

Dick was running by the time he reached the room where Jason was being held. There wasn't a lot of time. Especially since he hadn't tied Tim up. It had been a risk, but just as much of one as Bruce or Damian stumbling across a bound Tim and knowing instantly something was wrong. Jason looked up as Dick flew through the door, immediately trying to sit up, understanding something of the urgency.

"You were right, Jay." The bolt cutter he'd taken hung heavily in his hand, even as he positioned the tips around the cuff. "Bruce can't be trusted."

"It's about time someone saw sense around here," Jason grumbled. "Hurry up!" Dick clamped down hard with the bolt cutters, snapping the metal cuff.

"What's with Tim?"

"Hell if I know," Jason replied. "Bats must have something on him." The handcuffs finally fell off. Jason rubbed his raw wrists even as he sprang to his feet, relieved to be free, finally. Just to feel the full stretch in his arms was a wonder, he'd been restrained so long, only released to bathe or switch restraints. But as good as the moment felt, he wasn't sticking around to enjoy it. He started toward the door, Dick in tow. "Let's blow this place." But when they reached the hall, Dick hesitated, staring down the hall to the right. Jason stopped, five feet farther down to the left, looking back at the man. "You coming?"

"I have to… Tim…"

"That is one messed up cuckoo bird. Just leave him." Jason had tried to get through to him—boy had he tried—and if all the months of his incarceration had taught him anything, it was that Tim wasn't on their side. There was no point weighing themselves down dragging along a kid who would only undermine them the first chance he got. Dick, however, pressed his lips together, unhappy with the idea of leaving his brother behind: the little brother he was supposed to protect. But even he had to see the impossibility of it. Tim had already proven he was willing to fight them every step of the way if need be. Finally, Dick nodded reluctantly.

"All right."

As it turned out though, leaving Tim wasn't going to be an option.

"Slacking off, Drake?"

It was a most unwelcome wake up call. Tim groggily lifted his head to find himself curled considerately up on one of the sofas, the floral swirls of a throw pillow pressed against his cheek. He didn't remember laying down there. And just that quickly reality slammed into him and he sucked in a breath, jerking upright.

Eyes focused on Damian.

"You traitor!" He sprang to his feet in another second, heart racing, hands clenched into fists to keep from throwing himself at Damian and attempting to beat the brat to a pulp. "You little snitch! How could you?" The only reason he didn't, the only thing holding him back was the logical whisper in his head, prevailing by a hair's breadth, that told him there were things that needed to be done, now, and fighting would only slow him down. Nevertheless, the alarm he'd felt when he'd realized Dick knew was still strong, thrumming through his veins, the electric thrill of fear. This family, this home, everything he'd gained, it could still all be taken away from him. "You told Dick!"

"Of course. I–" Damian didn't even deny it, mouth curved smugly, obviously pleased that he'd ticked off Tim, not even realizing the true extent of what he'd done. Tim didn't wait for him to finish, cutting in coldly.

"He's leaving!" He wanted to shake the boy. He'd never been so furious, so panicked.

"What? Why?" The smug air dropped away into surprise. Damian seemed honestly confused. Later Tim would wonder that Damian hadn't scoffed something like, "One less replacement to worry about," would wonder that those blue eyes so like Bruce's reflected only worry. It made sense that the brat didn't understand, of course, because he'd never lost his parents. He honestly didn't know. But right just then Tim didn't have time for that naiveté.

"Why?" he bit out, brutal in his frustration, mocking. "Because he's going to do what he thinks is right." The irony twisted his mouth. "You're going to lose your father after all, Damian." So help him, he was going to get through to the kid, and then he was going to get him to start helping, because he couldn't do this alone. Damian's face burned red with answering anger, and for a full minute he seemed to struggle, hands clenching and unclenching.

"I won't let him!" he declared finally. "Grayson can't leave until I say so!" Tim blinked, taken aback once again. He'd expected an argument at the very least, nearly expected the boy to launch himself at him, not this purposeful resolve. But he could use that. He'd use anything he could get right now.

"Find Bruce. I'll stall Dick." He didn't wait for Damian to whirl and dash off down towards the cave, he was already headed toward the front door, blocking off exits.

He couldn't let Dick escape, couldn't let Dick ruin everything. Not his home. Not his family. The man would try to make everything right, and in so doing take everything from Tim. He'd be orphaned again. Homeless. No, he wouldn't lose Bruce, who had been beside him his first night as Robin, who treated him like a son, who'd saved him again and again. No matter what Bruce had done, the man loved them. Tim was still wanted, still cared about, and he wouldn't give that up. He needed Bruce. Gotham needed Bruce. Without the man's nightly vigilante work stemming the influx of filth, the city would be overrun. The good people would die.

No, they definitely couldn't afford to lose Bruce. Not that last bulwark against the darkness. Even if he'd finally been tainted by the city he protected, he was all they had. They needed him. And he needed them: his boys, his family, the visible and immediate reminder that there was something worth protecting. He needed their support, their strength, their warmth. They were the only ones who could understand, who knew what it was like to lose parents, to carry that hollowness around inside of them. And they were the only ones who knew what it meant to surpass that aching loss and fight for something beyond themselves.

Tim understood what was at stake. He would do whatever it took to keep this family together.

Bruce wasn't a bit surprised when his youngest nearly collided with him on his way up the stairs to the manor.

"Father–" he burst out, but Bruce's large gauntleted hand was already settling on one thin shoulder comfortingly, his cowl already pulled back.

"I know," he said, forestalling any preamble. He'd already locked the exits from the cave. Damian blinked once—his only sign of surprise—before nodding his understanding. "Come," Bruce continued grimly, continuing up the stairs. The purposeful tread of black boots was the whisper of trouble mounting in his wake. Damian trailed after, nearly as swift and silent as him, following his lead.

By the time they reached the manor proper, Bruce could already hear Jason's cursing. A grunt that sounded like Tim. Dick's sad but resolute words, "You're coming with us, Little Brother. Maybe some distance will help you sort things out."

Somehow the fight had been quarantined in the living room. Bruce stalled in the shadows of the doorway, taking in the scene before him with quick efficiency.

Jason had a fireplace poker held bar-like across Tim's chest, pulled tight with his right hand and the elbow of his other arm, still cursing. His left hand was dripping blood profusely. Tim had managed to pierce it with a piece of shattered ceramic vase. Jason was dragging the younger boy toward the door even while trying to cut off his oxygen.

Dick strode beside them, face crinkled with guilt as he watched Tim's struggles. Someone must have hit a nerve, because one of Tim's arms hung uselessly, the other trying to leverage against the bar of the poker. It was lucky they hadn't gotten any farther.

Bruce felt the frown pull at his mouth even as he stepped into the room. He caught Jason, who was distracted with Tim, from behind with a grip at either side of his throat, black gauntleted fingers digging hard into the corded muscle on the left, reducing the flow of blood in the carotid artery, and pinching tight at the unprotected junction between shoulder and neck on the right. The man jerked, an aborted little surprised jerk, brought up short by the numbing pain blossoming along his shoulder and arm. He hissed, air escaping through his clenched teeth.

"Jason!" Dick exclaimed, blue eyes flashing accusation. He sprang forward, trying to come to Jason's rescue, except Damian was there first, suddenly between them, blocking the way.

"I won't let you hurt Father!" It was just enough of a stall.

Jason's arm went numb, grip weakening. The poker clattered to the floor at the same time Tim dropped from his grasp, choking and gasping in air.

"Darn you!" Jason struggled to pull free, but he was weakened now, and Bruce held on, transferring his grip on the left side to cut off the blood flow there too.

"Get out of my way, Damian!" Dick shouted, rushing the younger boy. Damian blocked, but Dick was stronger, pushing him back. He grabbed the dropped fireplace poker, holding it like a bo staff. Tim pushed to his feet to support Damian, and Dick growled his frustration. As much as he wanted to aid Jason, he didn't want to have to hurt his brothers. The reluctance radiated off him. And then it was too late.

Under Bruce's supervision, Jason slowly sank towards the floor, brought low by weakening muscles and the darkness creeping into his vision. Bruce held on until the last, catching his son when he would have collapsed and laying him gently down on the carpet. With one last caress of fingers through raven-black hair, he stood from his crouch, facing his oldest. Damian and Tim found positions by his side, sliding into place with the seamless coordination of long practice. But Dick's attention was all for Bruce, blue eyes accusing even as he backed away from the united front they presented.

"Why?" he demanded, hurt and angry. "Why?"

"Because I loved you. All of you. From the moment I saw you." They'd been so perfect. They'd had so much potential. They'd just needed a little push in the right direction. A new home where he could care for them properly, guide them the way they needed. So he could have them, their warmth, by his side.

"You don't know what love is, B." Dick shook his head slowly back and forth. "You never did."

"Father's philosophy on family may be somewhat radical," Damian replied, nonplussed, "but you can't argue with his results."

"What's done is done," Tim said, stepping forward, unmindful of his damaged arm. "What's important is what we have now. Why would you take that away from us?"

"This isn't right. Somewhere inside you still know that."

"Come on, son," Bruce cajoled carefully, closing in as unthreateningly as he could manage. "Come stay with your brothers. They need you."

"You brainwashed them!"

Tim opened his mouth, probably to protest, but Bruce held out an arm to warn him back, and he held off, still frowning.

"They chose to stay of their own accord." Bruce put a carefully restraining hand on Damian's shoulder, his other hand finding Tim's head, gentle strokes down black hair that melted the frown away. His boys. His beautiful boys.

And the one who'd lost his faith. His oldest.

"Stay," he said simply. The hand that had been resting on Damian's shoulder slipped away, reaching into his bandolier for a moment. Dick tensed, but when it came back out empty, relaxed minutely with only the smallest of suspicions still crinkling the corners of his eyes.

"Please, Dick." Tim leaned forward, blue eyes wide with worry and distress. "Don't leave us."

"Your presence was not a complete irritation," Damian admitted.

Bruce held his hand out coaxingly, offering it like he'd offered it all those years ago when this same sad boy had come to live with them.

Dick's grip tightened on the fireplace poker.

"And what when you decide you want another son? What then? Do I just sit back and watch you destroy some other boy's family? How did you think this was going to work?"

Bruce was close enough now, he reached out slowly, hands open and empty, with the same air as one coaxing a cornered cat, and connected them, grip comfortably loose covering Dick's hand on the poker. The man looked down, eyes drawn to that place where their hands met, shoulders sagging, and only then saw the nearly invisible grains of powder coating the finger tips of Batman's gauntlet. Those blue eyes jumped back up to meet Bruce's, wide with betrayal. Lips parted around words that wouldn't come.

Then he collapsed.

The next day, Tim brought Jason his meal with a cup of orange juice. He didn't feel like smiling—there wasn't enough bright hope left in him for such a thing—but he smiled anyway, attempting to lighten the gloomy pall, because Jason needed it, and sat down on the nearby chair, waiting patiently for the other boy to notice the meal.

"Back in the brig, huh?" Jason asked, listless on the bed. His bandaged hand had been thrown over his eyes as though to block the visual reminder of another failed escape.

"Well, you did try to run away."

"I'm a prisoner!" He lifted his hand enough to frown at Tim, but the words didn't hold any bite this morning, just a deep weariness.

"You're a patient."

"And you're going to heal me with the power of family bonding?" The sarcastic tone came with a leer. When Tim only stared coolly back, Jason tipped the cup toward him to eye the contents with a grumble. "Haven't you heard of coffee?" Tim only smiled a bit wanly.

"You could be choosing your own breakfast…"

"Nah. The price tag is too steep." Jason grimaced, downing the orange juice. Tim watched raptly, leaning forward to follow the man's motions.

He was sorry it had come to this, but even Bruce had agreed it was necessary. They couldn't wait any longer for Jason to come to them on his own. They needed him at their side—their friend, brother, son—not locked up. And Jason was an important key in convincing Dick.

A regretful situation, really. He'd truly hoped Jason would come to want to stay with them of his own accord.

As Jason moved on to the toast, Tim couldn't hold back the faintest of melancholy sighs, the bitter edge of regret.

"Why couldn't you have loved us?"

Jason looked up at him abruptly, blue eyes locking on his with startled intensity, wide and horrified. The next second he had leaned over the edge of the bed, fingers down his throat, and Tim couldn't allow that. It was no good. Not at all.

He struck the back of Jason's head with the point of his fingers, just so, and the older boy crumpled before he could get anything up. Tim caught him, struggling briefly with the weight before pushing him back up on the bed, unlocking his wrist so the older boy could rest easily for once. It wouldn't be necessary to keep him bound anymore anyway. Looking down at him, Tim felt a great swell of melancholy.

"Oh, Jason. We just want you to stay with us, be part of the family again. We care about you." He laid down beside the older boy, petted black strands of hair soothingly. "I promise, you'll never even notice the change. Just a little rewiring." He brushed Jason's forehead gently, reverently. It would take a little while for the nanotech to assimilate into its host and start rerouting the electrical impulses in his brain down safer avenues. Jason just needed a little nudge to put him on the right track. By the time he woke up it would be too late.

When Jason woke up, he'd love them. When Jason woke up, Tim would have his brother back.

"I told you we wouldn't let you go." Tim laid his head on Jason's huge chest, where he could soak in the peaceful set of his brother's mouth, the serene feathering of thick, dark eyelashes. Absently, he splayed fingers over Jason's stomach, where the older boy had ingested the nanites, where they were undoubtedly already burrowing through the stomach lining into the bloodstream. For a minute, he just enjoyed the even sound of Jason's breathing, the rise and fall of the chest beneath him, and imagined he could feel the changes taking place under the warm skin.

Brother. It was a nice thought.

Dick woke up later that evening, groggy, his head aching, his arms pulled up… It only took a second to recognize the cold clamp of metal around his wrists as handcuffs, and then he was really awake. He bolted up, or tried to, managing no more than the flex of abdominal muscles before the cuffs jerked him back down, attached too low to the headboard to allow him much movement. Only then did he realize the warm weight draped across his chest and pressed against his left side was a sleeping Tim, soft black hair fanned across his shirt. Damian was the tight heat pressed to his right side, clinging limpet-like there, one hand splayed possessively over Dick's navel. Both jarred awake at the commotion. Damian's nails dug briefly into his abdomen.

"You're awake." Tim lifted his head long enough to smile slowly, beautifully, before draping himself artfully back over Dick's chest with an air of contentment.

"It's about time," Damian added, huffing to cover his startled jolt earlier.

Dick jerked on the handcuffs a second time, harder.

"Are you going to keep me here like Jason then?" he asked bitterly.

"Tt. We want you as our brother, not our prisoner."

"We're so glad you're here, Dick." Tim yawned, propping himself back up on elbows. "We've wanted you with us for a long time."

"This isn't right. You know this isn't right." Dick shook his head dazedly. His little brother had helped take him down. Helped tie him up. The little brother he loved. Bruce had taken his little brother from him. No. He had no one to blame but himself. He'd noticed Tim had been unusually cuddle-prone lately and he'd enjoyed it too much to worry about it. To think what it might mean. He was the one who hadn't been there when Tim needed him.

And Damian. Naïve, adorable Damian, who just needed someone to accept him.

"What isn't?" Tim tilted his head, eyes narrowed, lips pursed just the tiniest bit. Had he always been this coy? "The fact that we're wanted? That there's someone waiting for us to come home at the end of the night?"

"Father does seem insufferably attached to you all."

Dick didn't know what to say. Didn't know how to fight those arguments.

And then Jason walked in. Walked in. Bruce behind him. And Dick felt the world rock a bit more.

"Hey, Bluebird," Jason grinned, obviously enjoying his predicament. "Bout time they tied you up instead of me." Dick stared to see him standing by Bruce's side as though there was nothing wrong, as though their father wasn't a murderer.

"Jason!" Tim murmured happily, slipping free of Dick's side to glide over to the pair, instantly crushed against the older boy, whose fingers lodged in Tim's hair, shaking him affectionately. In his absence, Damian claimed a little more of Dick, thumb rubbing absently at a thick line of stitches against his tan skin down his abdomen. Had he been injured there? He couldn't recall. Couldn't bother to recall.

"Jason, what did they do to you?" He struggled a little against the cuffs again with the need to reach out, to understand with his hands, to make things better with touch and feel. He'd always been a physical person.

"They brought me home."

"That man killed our parents!" Now he was just jerking on the cuffs in desperation, uncaring of the bruises he'd have the next day, uncaring of the raw pain tearing at his wrists.

"You'll hurt yourself," Damian said, disapproving.

"He killed them!" Dick was still looking at Jason, looking for recognition, or understanding, or something, anything to hold onto as he drowned. His eyes stung, his throat tightened. Mouth pulled taut into Nightwing's snarl. "He's a murderer!"

"Yeah," Jason frowned. "Obviously Bruce cares about us more than they ever did." He leaned into the older man, simultaneously pulling Tim a little closer, who sighed with satisfaction, tucking his head under the man's chin.

Dick wanted equally to sick up and scream with frustration. He couldn't do this alone. Couldn't fight this. Bruce had truly taken everyone from him. Everyone. That knowledge was a heavy weight in his gut, dragging him under, filling his lungs with thick, burning helplessness. He couldn't breathe. He couldn't breathe.

"Be calm, son, you'll hyperventilate." Bruce sounded concerned as he sat down on the bed, large hand gripping Dick's thigh above his knee, steadying. Dick wanted to jerk away from that touch—this was the man who'd taken everything from him—but he couldn't bring himself to move. He'd always listened to that voice. Always trusted it. Obediently, against his will, his breathing evened out. Years of practice, following that voice, had left him darn near conditioned. He wanted to cry from sheer frustration.

"You belong by Father's side."

"Come on, Dick. Stay with us." Tim reached out to him, still hugging Jason with one arm, and it was so wrong.

Dick looked at Tim's big, blue eyes, wide and worried—still so lost and broken under all that newfound shrewdness. He looked at Damian, clinging fiercely to his arm. He looked at Jason, waiting expectantly, waiting for him to join them. He couldn't just leave them. Not with Bruce. They needed him.

If he turned Bruce in, he'd destroy them all. He'd never felt so helpless, so hopeless.

Mother, father, I'm sorry.

"I'll stay." The words felt like glass coming out. He could only stare blankly at the far wall, only feel tight pain when Tim's mouth blossomed into a smile, when Damian's scowl took on smug satisfaction. Jason laughed warmly—it had been so long since his laugh had sounded like anything but broken glass, sharp and derisive. It was a welcome change, even if it was fake.

"My boys," Bruce smiled, gathering them together, outright ignoring Jason's half-hearted complaint of "I'm too old for this." Tim laughed breathlessly, crushed in the tight embrace, and pulled a scoffing Damian in. It was uneasy and terrible and wonderful. Dick ignored the painful thudding of his heart that felt a lot like betrayal.

Epilogue

Watching his family (all four of them for once) around the breakfast table, Bruce couldn't help but feel whole for the first time in a long while. Maybe it wasn't yet perfect—Dick's smile was wan as he parried Damian's butter knife, his laugh forced, and on the other side of the table Jason seemed momentarily confused when Tim murmured something about the advantages of orange juice.

But Bruce knew that the more Dick smiled, the more the response would become conditioned, until he wouldn't remember not wanting to smile. In the mean time, the tracking device under his oldest son's skin would relay his location, vitals, and stress levels. Just until he was sure. There was still a tiny bit of worry that his son might hurt himself, might, in some twisted form of self-recrimination and guilt, not give it his all when Gotham spewed up the darkest dregs of its filth. Bruce wanted to reach out and pull the man to his side, reassure him the way he used to be able to do. But he knew any attempted comfort on his part would be spurned. Dick wanted nothing to do with him right now. Maybe coming from Tim or Damian… It was worth considering.

"Give up, Grayson! The egg is mine!" His youngest bumped into him trying to avoid one of Dick's jabs, and Bruce hid the curve of a smile in his glass.

Dick might not want to look at him now, but he would. He might brush off Bruce's touches, turn away from his offered warmth, but he wouldn't always. Eventually he'd lean into Bruce's touch the same as Tim did, willingly. Eventually, so slowly perhaps that Dick wouldn't feel the creep of it, he'd stop fighting, stop turning away, and there wouldn't be any distance between them at all.

Bruce knew also that eventually the nanotech redirecting the electrical impulses in Jason's brain (Robin's idea, it had been singularly brilliant), directing them down more positive routes, would eventually deteriorate and cease functioning. But by then the paths they'd mapped (love, family, the need to stay together, to protect at all costs) would have already been carved deep, would have (for all intents and purposes) become part of his personality. Eventually they wouldn't need the nanotech at all.

Tim leaned his head against Jason's shoulder, blue eyes bright. Jason's happiness meant a lot to the younger boy, Bruce knew. Robin had been dispirited since they'd locked the older boy up, as though Jason's reluctance to join them had been a personal weight. It was good to see him happy now.

Damian was young still. Dick would wear off his rough edges, and he'd make a fine Robin yet.

The boys he would do anything for—had done everything to keep.

All together at last.

Author Notes: I did warn you all at the beginning that this was going to be bad, right? This is one of those times where doing the right thing would have ripped out the heart of the family, and the fic would have ended with everyone grieving. In comparison, I prefer this ending. Even if it's wrong.

I couldn't see Dick not doing the right thing here. He would have turned Bruce in. The only way I could think to stop him was by making it so he'd hurt everyone else if he did. Thus, the need to change Jason's mind. Except I couldn't break his will, and let's face it, I didn't want to. Weak, broken characters don't interest me much. Using the nanotech, I could preserve his strength but change his mind. A compromise. I like to think that he is now silently engaging in combat with Damian around the manor: "Oops, I didn't see you there, brat. Did you get shorter recently?" When he's not making sure Tim is being social. And for the most part everyone is happy. That's the most I could ask for.

And for their next family movie night it's Lilo and Stitch (Jason was wrong about Bambi). Ohana means no one gets left behind! Lilo and Stitch has never seemed so sinister! (I can't take credit for that, it's totally my beta's idea)

I don't know why I am highly amused by Damian making decidedly agreeable remarks to Tim over Dick. Oh look, they finally bonded over something! *sweet*

Writing sequels always bothers me. I'm not sure I've lived up to the promise of the original.

P.S.: If you find any random, jumbled letters while reading, my daughter got hold of the draft after I'd proofed it. Please let me know so I can fix it.