Tim loved living at the Manor. Some days were still hard, but he tried not to think about what had happened. Bruce said it was better to remember the good times Tim had had with his parents. It did help and Tim was able to pass the Drake Mansion without looking away. He had asked Bruce if it could be sold. There was a large for sale sign at the front entrance, now.

Oswald Cobblepot pled guilty to the two murders. He didn't even try to make a deal. Everyone said that the Batman, Nightwing, and Red Hood had scared the man so bad, he wanted to go to prison for his own safety. Which was true, of course. The three had hurt and hounded him until he turned himself in.

Tim wanted to meet the Dark Knight so he could thank him, but there was little chance of that happening. Half the city probably wanted to thank Batman, but he never stared long enough for them to tell him and his partners how much they appreciated what they did.

Bruce, Dick and Jason were always showing up to the breakfast table with a few bruises. One morning Bruce didn't come gone at all. Alfred said he was sick, but something didn't seem right with that story. Bruce had come down the next morning just fine, but when Tim went to hug him, the man had flinched hard as if he was in pain.

Tim had asked Dick and Jason for an explain for all this, but they had just said to ask Bruce. So that's what Tim was doing. He was sitting in Bruce's office waiting for him to get home for work.

The door was opened and Bruce walked in. Normally Tim, Dick and Jason would go to meet him at the front door, when he got home from work. So Bruce knew at once that something was bothering his son and he had a pretty good idea what it was. He didn't want to tell Tim who Batman was. The eleven year old would want to join in as a member of the Bat family and Bruce was terrified of that happening. It wasn't a game, it was dangerous. Dick nearly got killed on a regular basis, and only last month Joker had tried to kill Jason. Luckily, the clown had gotten killed in a shot out with the police and the city was free for him.

Bruce had tried to stop Dick and Jason from putting on masks, but both of them had tried to go fight crime on their own. If they were going to fight, Bruce was going to do everything he could to make sure they were safe while they were out on the streets.

"Is everything alright, Tim?" Bruce asked, setting his brief case on his desk. He wasn't looking forward to this conversation.

"No," Tim said shortly. He looked down at his hands. How was he supposed to ask this? "How do you, Dick and Jason get hurt? And don't say you're working on something. Jason already tried to sell me on that lie," Tim said.

Bruce was silent for a moment. "That wasn't a lie, we are working." He was avoiding this and he shouldn't be. It would make things easier if Tim knew. "Timothy, what I'm going to tell you I never want you to repeat to anyone. Are we clear?"

Tim nodded. He was just glad he was finally going to be getting some answers. He had an idea what was going on, but it seemed a little too wild to be true.

"I'm the Batman," Bruce said after a second. He half excepted Tim to laugh at him, but if that happened he could always take him done to the Batcave.

"Figured that's what was going on," Tim said shortly. "Can I see the Batcave?"

Of all the people Bruce had told who he was he had never gotten that response. He couldn't help smiling. "Sure. Let's get Dick and Jason. They wanted to show you around the cave your first week here."

A little while later the four of them were headed down to the Batcave. Tim was in awe of it all. Everyone had their own ideas of what Batman's hide out was like, but none of them did justice to the massive cave. Bats flew about the ceiling of the cave, waiting for night. Their calls bounced and echoed off the walls. The gear and computer system were the most advanced Tim had ever seen. There was a small alcove near where the Batmobile was parked that looked like a hospital room with rock walls of course.

That reminded Tim of how Bruce had been badly hurt a few days before. What if something happened to his family? He couldn't lose them, not after everything that had happened.

"What happened that day you stayed in bed?" Tim asked, looking up at Bruce.

Bruce sighed. "I got shot. My suit protected me from the worst of it, but Alfred insisted I rest," he explained. He didn't want Tim worrying, but that was unavoidable. He had been to doing this since he was twenty years old. He could handle whatever Gotham threw at him and the same went for Dick and Jason.

"Reinforce Kelvin?" Tim asked. He had heard that Wayne Tech was working on a light weight, flexible bullet proof material for the army. That must be how Batman had all that high tech that everyone was always talking about. What better place to get advanced gear than from Bruce's own company?

Bruce nodded. He could see where this was going and he didn't like it.

"So you're pretty much bullet and knife proof?" Tim asked.

"Yes," Bruce said shortly. Here it came.

"I want to help," Tim said. There it was.

"Absolutely not," Bruce said. Why did his sons want to do this? He knew that answer of course. They had been victims and they didn't want anyone else to go through what they had been through. Plus they looked up to him and wanted to be like him. Bruce wished they didn't want anything to do with the Batman side of his life.

Dick and Jason both slipped away. They had an idea how this was going to go and they didn't want to be around if it got ugly. They had had already had their fights with Bruce about this. If Tim was smart about it things would go his way.

"You let Dick and Jason put on masks, so why can't I?" Tim asked crossing his arms.

"Dick and Jason have been trained," Bruce answered.

"So train me. I've been an acrobats since I was seven, I'm almost as good as Dick," Tim shout back. Dick had shown him a few tricks since he had come to the Manor. Bruce had gotten a lot of trapeze equipment for Dick when he first came to live there.

"Almost as good gets you killed," Bruce snapped. He wouldn't lose one of his sons to this life. It was dangerous, Tim had to understand that. "Besides you're only eleven."

"How old were Dick and Jason when they started fighting crime?" Tim asked. He wasn't giving up that easily. Batman protected people. It didn't matter what they had done, he wouldn't let someone kill another person if he could stop it. If Batman had known that Tim's parents were in trouble the Dark Knight would have done what he could.

Bruce's jaw clicked shut. He should have seen that coming. "Dick was nine and Jason was ten."

"So why can't I help you?" Tim pushed.

Bruce didn't have an answer for that. He made multimillion dollar deals, he should be able to outsmart an eleven year old, but the problem was he didn't have a good augment for this. There was no reason Tim shouldn't join the Batfamily.

"If you are going to do this your better be ready to fight harder than you think you can," Bruce said seriously.

Tim's face brightened.

"This isn't a game. It's your life and the lives of others on the line. If you mess up people could die," Bruce said. Maybe there was a chance he could scare Tim out of this.

"I understand," Tim answered.

"Don't even think you'll be going out there until you've been trained," Bruce continued. Tim might quit under the pressure of the training. He had thought Dick and Jason would quit too after everything he had put them thought before he let them leave the Batcave. He had hoped they would quit, but they had stuck to it.

Tim nodded. He couldn't wait to get out there and help people. To stop criminals and watch his families' backs was what he wanted to do. Maybe that would help him find some peace knowing that he was preventing others from losing their families like he had lost him. That was the reason Bruce, Dick and Jason did what they did and that would be his reason as well.

A few months later Red Robin appeared on the streets of Gotham. He was as strong as Red Hood, as graceful as Nightwing and as clever as Batman.

The End