Author's Note: Back to Bruce's POV following Jason's unsuccessful intelligence-gathering operation on Gotham Docks. Jason is not in the mood for lectures. After the meeting, the POV switches to Alfred as he shares some quality time with the youth. Alcohol is involved. Enjoy.

Descent 6

Bruce

I have called the boy into my father's study after his return from the docks. Alfred has informed me that Jason was unsuccessful in his efforts to lean on Harrison for proof of Pedro's identity as their boss. Although he managed to incapacitate over thirty individuals in spite of the firearm risks presented and get to Harrison before Jim and the GCPD arrived, he did not have enough time to interrogate him effectively. I have been led to understand he is furious with himself and in no mood for a lecture of any sort. I do not intend to antagonise him further by listing all his improper conduct during the operation. His use of a semi-automatic weapon as a form of crowd control was far too dangerous given he did not know the type of armour his opponents were using, but admonishing him would only sour the situation further. My concussion is dissipating with every hour, however I will not cross the old man by prematurely returning to duty. Therefore I need Jason on side. I must be neutral. A little after eleven-thirty, the boy enters the study without knocking.

He is dressed in nothing but a grey pair of cotton shorts, showing me old and fresh bruises, cuts and what look like cartridge burns on his neck in varying states of treatment. The cut on his forehead from earlier in the week has opened again whilst the jagged pattern to his split lip suggests taking a blunt implement to the face whilst wearing his respirator. From what I can tell, he took a number of hard shots to the face, but has survived reasonably well. When he slams the door shut and slumps back in the seat before my father's desk, I bite my tongue at his serial lack of respect for the traditions and history of this household. He glares at me as blood begins to seep out of his forehead cut. I open the desk drawer and produce a Band-Aid from the first-aid case inside. I hold it out for him.

"Your forehead is bleeding." I inform him. He responds by running a forearm across the wound and then licking the blood off his arm like some kind of wild animal, keeping his eyes fixed on mine the whole time. I put the Band-Aid on the desktop and try to open a dialogue again. "How close were you to securing the evidence?"

"If he'd stopped screaming like a fucking girl, I could've already had it by now. All I got was a file about shipping regulations before good ol' Jim and the boys turned up for the sting." He snaps, more at himself than me. His frustration is threatening to turn into violent outrage if I do nothing to quell it soon. Fortunately I have prepared something precisely for this scenario. I reach down into the bottom drawer and produce two glasses, a bottle of Caribbean rum and a bottle of coke before setting them on the desktop. The boy's fondness for rum and coke has not escaped my notice over the years, nor has his propensity to wreak havoc when graduating to concentrated spirits. Jason's eyes flicker at the appearance of alcohol but nothing more. "Is this your latest ploy to bring me back into the fold, Bruce? You're going to ply me with drink like I'm a club whore or the town's bicycle?" He says derisively. I begin to pour rum in both glasses.

"I hold no expectations of you doing anything I wish. I just feel you would not be so hard on yourself if there were some kind of reward for your efforts beyond words." I explain truthfully as the coke is generously added to both glasses. The boy's bitter expression softens slightly. He rolls his eyes.

"Please can I have the Band-Aid now?"

I hand it to him along with one of the glasses. I am inwardly relieved when he takes both. He covers the cut and then tests my mixture. He is quiet for several moments after swallowing. I await his verdict. He shrugs. "Not bad."

"I would like to look at the file you recovered. Perhaps there is some clue inside its pages we can exploit. How are you feeling?" I ask after we have been mired in silence for three of four sips of our drinks. Jason shrugs again before taking another sip. His drink is almost empty already.

"I'm glad I didn't have any medication before I came in here. Chances are I'd be convulsing on the floor by now." He responds, draining his glass afterwards. "I feel like shit, in response to your concern."

"I see. Perhaps you should go to bed."

"Says the man drinking with a head injury? Do you listen to anything Al says?" Jason retorts with more than a valid point. I push my drink to one side and nod.

"Yes, I see your point."

"Yeah, well, if you'll excuse me…" The boy says whilst reaching forward and snatching the rum bottle off the desk, "I'm going to go and 'convalesce' in my room. Don't try and get me up before my hangover passes or things will go even worse for you." He warns before getting to his feet and preparing to leave. "I'll get you the file tomorrow. Night."

Considering his mood only ten minutes earlier, this meeting could have developed into something a great deal more troubling than it has. Jason needs time to himself, I understand that after what stresses he has been subjected to in the last week. If he wishes to drink a little more alcohol, he may as long as it does not become a crutch. There is a knock on the door some fifteen minutes later.

"Enter."

I watch as Alfred walks in, spots the half-full glass on the desk and adopts a stern countenance I recall all too well from my youth. "Your attempts to curry favour with that boy are not compatible with your doctor's orders." He tells me taking hold of the glass and briefly scanning the room. "He has appropriated your rum I take it?"

"Will you please ensure he does not indulge himself too much tonight? I need him sharp for the day after tomorrow. There is an avenue of this investigation against Pedro that has yet to be fully explored."

"Certainly Sir. I shall also keep you abreast of Commissioner Gordon's efforts in derailing tonight's arms shipment. Will that be all, Sir?"

"No." I say grabbing the coke bottle, "Take that with you and make sure he uses some of it to stem the carnage." The old man smiles at me. I manage to give him one in reply. He relieves me of the bottle and inclines his head: he knows far better how to control wayward youths than I ever could. I trusted him to get Jason on side and he did just that. This operation tonight was not a failure. The boy's full participation meant it was a success. Alfred's intervention made it a success. I am hoping for a similar result with the next mission.

"Very good. Goodnight, Master Bruce. Please get some rest."

Alfred

I arrive at the lad's bedroom door shortly after midnight, having given him roughly half-an-hour to get nicely settled. I knock on the door and am told to come in by a voice that is beginning to slur. When I open the door, I find the boy sprawled on his bed with a barely half-full bottle of rum tucked into the crook of his arm. It appears he has dispensed with the need for a glass altogether. He waves at me.

"Hey Al. What's the word on Jim?"

"He and his men are in position and merely awaiting the ship's arrival in just under an hour." I inform him whilst circling the bed and sitting on the edge. I retrieve his glass from the floor and present both it and the bottle of coke. "Perhaps it is time for a little moderation? I don't want the pleasure of scraping your vomit from the carpet pile again." He smirks in a way that tells me he will take my advice. He takes both articles off me, meaning I have to save the rum bottle from spilling when his arm no longer supports it.

"You always make a compelling argument, Al. Will you join me for one or two?" He replies, having seemingly not noticed he almost spilt rum all over the duvet. I smile and nod.

"As long as we stick to sensible measurements, I would be glad to spend some time in the company of a drunken teenager."

"Well, you're here, Al, so I doubt improper conduct with alcohol will be much of a problem." The boy laughs whilst pouring slightly more than a fifty centilitre helping of rum in my glass. He begins to pour himself the same. I stop him before he has one-and-a-half shots worth, somewhere around the thirty-five centilitre mark. His eyes, slightly glazed now, look at me in approval. "My hero." He just about manages to steady the coke bottle when filling the glass the rest of the way up. To prevent any accidents, I pour the coke into his glass on his behalf. We clink glasses.

A couple of drinks somehow turns into five, by which point I am suitably tipsy and the lad has his head in my lap. I have managed to decrease his alcohol intake with each additional drink by increasing mine and subtly pouring some of the bottle's contents onto the floor, although not all spillages have been deliberate. The rum bottle is mercifully empty now and signals the end of our revelry as the boy grows sleepy and contented with the night bleeding away. Despite his drowsiness, he is still talking in a comprehensible language. I have entertained him with stories from my time in the theatre and British Army whilst he has been describing the more pleasant moments of his childhood in the Narrows. He is currently regaling me with his proudest moment of grade-school education, a third-grade history report on Gotham Cathedral, for which he was given five gold stars on the merit board, entitling him to a candy bar of his choice.

"I chose a Herschel's, which is a Narrows market rip-off of a Hershey's. My mom used to buy me one as a treat when I was good for a week. I think I only ever earned like four of them in my whole life. I could never be good for a week." He explains snuggling down further in my tailcoat, which I threw over him shortly after our third drink. I comb through his hair and he closes his eyes for what I hope will be the final time tonight.

"I'm sure that's not entirely true. She probably didn't have the money to treat you every week."

"Lousy parent, huh?" He mutters, prompting me to retract my remark.

"I'm sorry, I think I may have phrased it incorrectly."

"No, she was a lousy parent. They both were. Even in a neighbourhood as poor as I grew up in, my family was the one struggling to pay rent. My old man couldn't get honest work and my mom's cancer just…buried us. My childhood was lousy. I hated being my old man's son. Nobody liked hanging around with me." He tells me with a sigh. "Sorry about boring you to tears, Al. Nobody likes to hear a billionaire's ward bitch about having a hard life." Even drunk and in the safety of my company, the boy's walls only come down for moments before going back up and fortifying themselves even more. It is sad he still feels guarded.

"I do remember you haven't always been with us, Jason. I do understand things for you have been very different than they have for us. If you won't talk to therapists about these kind of issues, you may always talk to me."

"No, I can't." He says getting up and opening his eyes to look at me. He shakes his head. "Not even with you, Al. I love you more than I've probably loved anyone ever, but I can't tell you the things I keep inside. No-one can ever know." He adds with an air of finality I cannot breach. We have had this kind of conversation before. He has been to therapy before, if only once. No matter what forum or freedoms he is given to express himself with, he does not get into his thoughts and feelings on his darkest issues. He never has. He probably never will. And as much as I want to help him quash these insecurities and banish these demons of his, I know I cannot force him into letting me. I excuse myself.

"In that case, lad, I bid you goodnight. I must go check on the GCPD's progress at the docks. Please excuse me." I say reaching for my tailcoat only for the boy to refuse to part with it.

"Can I keep this for tonight, Al? I think my dreams might be better with a part of you hanging around me." He says already retreating under the covers with my coat still wrapped around his shoulders. I allow him such a trivial thing and nod.

"Certainly." I stand up, adjust his covers and then kiss him on the forehead, due in some small part to my inebriation. "I will wake you sometime in the afternoon, if I am not nursing a hangover of my own."

"Lightweight." The boy murmurs before turning away from me. He begins to snore only moments later and I vacate the room after turning out the lights and collecting the empty bottles and glassware. After managing the stairs down to the cave, I check the commissioner's progress at the ducks…I mean the docks of course. From the GPS tracking and breaking story reports flooding in on the internet, I can assume they have successfully halted the arms trafficking out of that particular pier and dealt a telling blow to the entire criminal operation in the process. I consider trying to negotiate the stairs back to the house for some time. If anything, my vision has blurred further in the past twenty minutes and my legs can no longer be trusted to coordinate themselves in an appropriate manner befitting a butler of this house. I therefore grab a blanket from the medical bay, recline back in the command centre's chair and let myself drift off until the morning. Master Bruce will just have to wait for his breakfast.

Yes, the miserable sod will just have to wait…