When it came to the Bats, Jim's knowledge was limited by choice. If he thought about it, if he tried, he was sure he could figure out their identities. Honestly, he already had suspicions. But for the most part, he didn't think too hard, and he never asked about them.

The only times he ever broke that rule, in all his years of working with Batman, were when one of the Bats disappeared.

It didn't always turn out to be a bad thing. When the first Robin had disappeared, it was because he had moved on to become Nightwing. When the first Batgirl had disappeared (and oh, Jim was very careful not to think too hard about her), it was because she'd decided to retire from being a vigilante and focus on her civilian life.

But then the second Robin had disappeared. And then the fourth. And then Batman himself, for a while. Some of the disappearances were fine, but some of them... Some of them were bad.

When Nightwing had disappeared, months ago, Jim had known it was bad. And yet, there Nightwing was, standing next to Black Bat and beaming at Jim with the same smile he'd had since he was a child wearing a leotard.

"Long time, no see, Commissioner."

"Nightwing," Jim said, his lips twitching into a smile of their own around his cigarette. "Good to see you again. How long have you been back?"

"Depends on what you mean by back," Nightwing said, his voice airy despite the sudden tension Jim could see him trying to hide. "I've only been out patrolling for two weeks. I've been back in Gotham for a few months."

Jim carefully didn't think about how Dick Grayson had also just returned to Gotham a few months ago after an unexplained six month disappearance that coincided almost perfectly with Nightwing's. Rumors had abounded on what Dick was up to, rumors that weren't at all stifled by the terse statement that Bruce Wayne had finally released about his son's private vacation. Theories ranged from rehab to medical problems to a mental breakdown, but no one seemed to have connected it to Nightwing. Jim hadn't thought about it too hard then, and he wouldn't think about it too hard now.

Batman hadn't said much about Nightwing's disappearance, but the look on his face when Jim had asked had been so gutted that Jim had immediately assumed Nightwing was dead. Given the lives that the Bats led, the fact that Nightwing was back doesn't necessarily mean he hadn't been. It did explain why all the Bats had been much more cheerful recently, ever since...

Well, if Jim really thought about the timeline, they'd been cheerful - or a given value of cheerful, at least, given that he was talking about the Bats - since that mess with Deathstroke and the Blackgate breakout. Jim wasn't sure he wanted to think that hard.

"Well, I'm glad you're back," Jim said. "We all missed you."

For a moment, Nightwing looked surprised, then he beamed at Jim, even bigger than before. "Missed you too, Commish."

Black Bat tapped Nightwing on the arm and signed something too quick for Jim to translate. Nightwing nodded, then turned back to Jim. "Gotta go. Duty calls. I'll see you around!"

"Until next time," Jim agreed, and Nightwing and Black Bat swung away.

It was good to see Nightwing again, and it was good to know that he was doing well. Clearly, something serious had happened; he'd admitted to being out of Gotham for six months, and there had to be a reason he'd been back for a while before he started patrolling again. But he seemed to be alright now, and Jim was glad of it. Nightwing had been a bright light in Gotham ever since he'd first gone out as Robin. The city had been worse off without him, but hopefully things would be better now that he was back.

Jim raised his cigarette in salute, then he ground it out underneath his heel and went back inside. His duty called too, and anyway, he was sure he'd see Nightwing again soon.


The next time Jim saw Nightwing, it was under decidedly worse conditions.

"Hey, Commish," Nightwing whispered, smiling despite the blood on his face and teeth. "I'm here to get you out."

"What the hell happened to you?" Jim hissed. "You look like you were hit by a truck!"

"Not quite," Nightwing replied, "but that guy hits almost as hard as one. They thought I was unconscious, so they left me alone and basically unguarded."

"And I'm guessing that was all part of your plan," Jim groaned. "Did you get beat up on purpose, just to get me out?"

"It's not as bad as it looks," Nightwing dismissed. "Come on, we need to get you out of here before they realize I'm gone."

Nightwing was right, of course, but Jim still didn't like his plan. The fact that he didn't seem to be too badly hurt only mollified him slightly. It was strange, though; given the blood, he would have thought Nightwing would show more signs of pain, but he was moving entirely normally. Honestly, Jim couldn't even see any cuts that the blood could had come from. He wondered if some of it was fake; that sounded like the sort of insane thing the Bats would do.

It didn't take Nightwing long to get Jim out of his cuffs and out of his cell. He insisted that no other cops had been taken hostage and refused to let Jim go and check, so Jim crept after him quietly, down the narrow, dimly-lit halls. At first, everything was blessedly silent, and then...

"That probably means they've figured out we're missing," Nightwing said as an alarm began to blare. "Or, at least one of us, which means they'll check and find the other one is missing soon too."

"How much further until we're out of here?" Jim asked.

"Not too far," Nightwing said, but Jim could tell from his tone that things weren't ideal. He seemed to be thinking hard about something, and after a moment, he handed Jim a taser and said, "Head that way until you get to the exit. I'll distract them."

"What?" Jim protested. "No, you won't. We're not splitting up."

"It's the best plan," Nightwing replied. "I'll be fine. Now go!"

Nightwing was gone before Jim could say another word. He huffed, unappreciative of being treated like a child, and was still deciding whether to go after Nightwing or go to the exit when one of the goons who'd kidnapped him turned the corner in front of him.

The goon froze, but Jim didn't. In a moment, he had the taser pressed to the goon's neck, and he slowed his fall enough that the body didn't make too loud a noise when it hit the ground. He took the man's gun and found some spare ammo in his belt, and just as he straightened, he heard a gunshot ring through the compound, followed by a cry that he hated was familiar.

Nightwing.

Jim wasn't a young man anymore, but he could still sprint fast if he had to. It didn't take long before he was outside the room where the goons and Nightwing were. He couldn't see much from his vantage point, but he could see that Nightwing was on the ground in a pool of blood. That was more than enough for him. He raised his stolen gun, cocked it, and fired at the one goon who was in his line of sight.

The man fell with a bullet to the knee, and in the chaos, Jim managed to disable one of the others. That still left a few goons, but to his surprise, Nightwing jumped to his feet like Jim's arrival had been a prepared sign and started fighting as well, taking down guards with sharp hits from his escrima sticks. He seemed remarkably unaffected for someone who had just been shot, and Jim watched him with narrowed eyes as he took down the last goon.

"I told you to get out of here," Nightwing said, turning and shooting Jim an exasperated look.

"Was that all faked, then?" Jim asked. "I thought I heard you get shot."

Nightwing abruptly looked shifty. "Uh..."

"Did you get shot?" Jim demanded, taking a step towards Nightwing and scanning him from head to foot. Most of the blood seemed to be from a tear in his costume just below the right collarbone, so Jim took another step forward and checked for a wound.

"Don't tell the others, okay?" Nightwing asked. "They'll be so annoying about it."

"You were shot-" Jim began as he finally found the strangely small bullet hole, but then, right before his eyes, the hole closed and smoothed over into undamaged skin.

"Have you always been able to do that?"

Nightwing looked vaguely embarrassed. "No, it's new. Look, I'm not shot anymore, so let's just keep it our secret, okay? B will freak out."

"I thought none of the Bats were metas except Signal," Jim said, still staring at Nightwing's shoulder.

"And that used to be the case, but there have been some new developments," Nightwing replied. "We should get out of here before the other goons arrive."

Jim allowed himself to be pulled down the hallway. "Did you let yourself get shot on purpose? Just like you let them capture you on purpose?"

"It's not a big deal-"

"Bullshit! You got shot!"

"Nightwing got shot again?" a new voice asked as Red Robin dropped down from a vent. "You really need to stop doing that. B's gonna flip."

"It was the best option in that situation," Nightwing protested. "I needed a way to get the upper hand, and the easiest way to do that was to make them think they had the upper hand."

"B is still gonna flip."

"Yeah, I know."

"Since when can you heal like that?" Jim demanded.

"Look, you're a smart man. You know I was missing for about six months, right?" Nightwing said. "Let's just say, a lot of shit happened in those six months."

"Nightwing-"

Jim's brain decided not to listen this time when he told it not to think too hard, and he wasn't hugely fond of the connection it came up with. "You came back around the same time that Deathstroke was here," he said, because his brain also decided to turn off his verbal filter. "Deathstroke has a healing factor."

"Damn," Red Robin said after a moment, "you weren't wrong, 'Wing. He is smart."

"I think I should be offended by that," Jim said distantly.

"It's just that most people don't put the pieces together like that," Nightwing assured him. "And... yeah, Deathstroke played a part in everything that happened. But we really should get out of here before I give you the whole traumatic backstory."

"Right," Jim agreed, following Nightwing and Red Robin as they headed towards the exit. He had the feeling they were having some sort of silent conversation in front of him, but they'd angled themselves so he couldn't see their hands, so if they were signing, he couldn't translate. And if they were having a silent conversation he couldn't exactly blame them; they were probably trying to figure out how much they could safely tell him. The answer probably wasn't much.

And honestly... Jim didn't think he wanted to know. He resided on a very fragile island of plausible deniability where the Bats were concerned, and he didn't want to risk that. He didn't want to know anything more about them. They were good people, he knew that, and he didn't need to know anything else.

So when they got out and Nightwing turned to him, clearly bracing for an unpleasant conversation, Jim cut him off. "I don't need to know the details, I just need you to answer one question."

Nightwing looked at him warily. "What?"

Jim thought about Nightwing's disappearance and how much it had devastated his family, as if he had died. He thought about Deathstroke and how brutal he could be. He thought about Nightwing getting beat up and shot and apparently thinking nothing of it, just to get Jim out.

"Are you doing alright?"

Nightwing looked at him for a moment, surprise clear on his face despite the domino mask, then a slow smile spread across his face. Jim felt his shoulders loosen in relief. If Nightwing could smile that warmly - and Jim could tell, even without being to see them, that the smile reached his eyes - then maybe things weren't as bad as he feared.

"Yeah," Nightwing said, his voice soft, "I'm alright. Thanks, Commish."

"'Wing, B is demanding a status update on the comms," Red Robin reported. "And when I say demanding, I mean it."

"Right," Nightwing agreed. "Commissioner, do you need one of us to go back to the station with you?"

"I'll be fine," Jim dismissed. "Thanks for the save, Nightwing."

"Any time," Nightwing said brightly, then he and Red Robin shot off their grapples and swung over to the next building over. Jim watched them as Red Robin said something that was clearly teasing, based on his body language, and then Nightwing tugged Red Robin into a headlock and began mussing up his hair. Nightwing was a good actor, all the Bats were by necessity, but this rang true.

He was alright. Whatever hell he'd gone through - and Jim had no doubt he'd gone through hell, based on the little snippets he knew - he'd come out the other side, and he was alright.

Jim was glad to see it.