A/N: I started writing this story in the middle of 2019. Since then, I've graduated from university, written an honours thesis during multiple lockdowns, graduated from university again, started a master's degree, finished a master's degree, graduated AGAIN, obtained a job, and finally started posting this story more than four years later. Whew!

Timeline notes: This story takes place just after the end of a large-scale gang war in Gotham that was inadvertently started by Spoiler, during which Tim's school was attacked and Steph was severely injured after being captured by Black Mask. Bruce is Batman, Barbara is Oracle, Dick is Nightwing, Tim is Robin again (after a break), Cassandra is Batgirl and Steph is Spoiler (though recently Robin). Other allies include Alfred, Catwoman and Onyx.

For comics readers: Family Crisis picks up partway through Batman #633, at the end of Batman: War Games, and becomes a canon divergent AU from there. It draws details from many different comic series and miniseries, and I've cited the exact issues at the end of each chapter. You don't need to have read any comics, though! I welcome all readers, and if there's anything confusing, please feel free to ask.

Part 1: Blood

Chapter 1: An Echo of an Old Ache

For want of a nail the shoe was lost.
For want of a shoe the horse was lost.
For want of a horse the rider was lost.
For want of a rider the message was lost.
For want of a message the battle was lost.
For want of a battle the kingdom was lost.
And all for the want of a horseshoe nail.
—traditional proverb

BATMAN

The call came through barely a minute after the destruction of the clock tower.

"We need to be certain Black Mask somehow didn't escape," Batman said into his com-link. Robin was with him, but the others—Batgirl, Catwoman and Onyx—had vanished. With Nightwing out of commission for the time being, he needed all the help he could get.

His com-link crackled immediately after he spoke.

"—sxttczxx— Hello? —sxttczxx— Is this thing still working?"

"Is that you, Leslie? Unless it's an emergency, I need to—"

"It is. You need to come to the clinic right away." The words fizzled. "—ssxxttczxx— minutes only —sxxttcchhzxx—"

Batman turned away from the shifting rubble and voices, straining to make sense of the buzzing fragments. "Say again, Leslie! You're breaking up!"

"O— ssxxcthhxx— Stephanie— ssxxtchssxx—"

The line fell dead. In the corner of his vision, Batman could see Robin behind him, intent on lifting a beam from among the debris. Their eyes met, and something must have shown in Batman's countenance, for Robin felt the seriousness of the gaze and abandoned his efforts, springing over the rubble to meet his mentor.

Batman took a breath. "Robin…"

And stopped. The events of the last few days were etched across Robin's face, and still he looked strong. And… young. The implications of Leslie's distorted message sent a sudden chill to Batman's bones. He knew that he couldn't tell Robin. Not there. Not then. There was enough devastation already. He couldn't add any more.

"You look like hell," he said instead. "Go home. Rest. Spend some time with your family."

"But, there's still important—"

"No," Bruce corrected, placing a hand on Tim's shoulder. "Right now, the most important thing is a father knowing his son is okay."

For a moment, Batman watched as Robin swung away, then he made his escape. Nobody took heed of him as he slipped away to the summoned Batmobile and sped down the familiar route to the clinic on Crime Alley. He felt strangely alone in the car; too often, he'd driven an injured Robin—

Stephanie…

Leslie had interrupted him. No one, not even Alfred, dared interrupt the Batman unless it was for good reason. A dreadful vice-like terror seized his heart, an echo of an old ache, and he thought he was going to be sick.

He swallowed and pressed down harder on the accelerator.

He exited the car in a rush, running into the clinic, which was unsurprisingly packed with patients.

"One side!" he barked. "Make a hole!"

They parted—not rapidly enough for Batman's liking—and he crossed the room in several strides. Leslie Thompkins, her ageing face tired and careworn, met him in the corridor beyond the waiting room.

"Batman. In here."

Her voice was quiet but steady as she led him to a private room where Stephanie Brown lay in a narrow hospital bed.

Batman took inventory of Stephanie's condition in an instant. There was a bloodstained bandage around her head, both eyes were black with bruises and numerous scratches and lacerations littered her skin. Several tubes were in her right arm and a heart monitor beeped dully behind her.

But, beyond that… her blonde hair lay dirty and limp on the pillow and her face was streaked with tears. She looked young.

"Is there any hope, Leslie?" he asked, voice low.

Her tone was equally soft as she answered, "I'm… afraid not. She just… she suffered too much internal trauma before making it here. It's only a matter of minutes now."

He stepped into the room, looking back at Leslie. "Leave me alone with her a moment."

Her hand was already on the doorknob. "Sure. I'll see you're not disturbed."

The door clicked shut.

Batman approached the bed with uncharacteristic trepidation. What could he say to a girl who had been the cause of immeasurable chaos and destruction, but had only ever wanted to impress him? How could he have been so foolish as to discard her like jetsam, knowing that she was scarcely capable of making it to shore?

The bruised eyelids fluttered but did not open. "Batman?" came her weak voice, almost too soft to hear.

"I'm here, Stephanie," he told her. "You shouldn't try to speak. You need to save your strength."

"But I screwed up so bad. It was all me. I started this war." As she spoke, he could hear the despair in the tone, and he despised himself for being its cause.

"I know. But there's no need to worry about it now. We took care of…"

"You were so right to fire me. I was such an idiot."

He could not offer false reassurance by pretending that her words weren't true, even as he ached at her self-loathing.

"Does Tim hate me?" she asked, finally opening her eyes to assess his reaction.

"No. Of course not." He could be sure of honesty in this, at least. "He adores you. He always has."

"I have a baby," she continued. Her right hand twitched towards him and he touched his gloved fingertips to hers, offering silent support. "Did you know that? She's not mine anymore, but—"

He had known, but hadn't seen fit to interfere beyond checking that the baby had been placed in a suitable home. "Don't worry, Stephanie. She'll never want for anything. I promise."

Stephanie was silent for a long moment, and Batman wrestled desperately with thoughts that he could not speak. Don't give up, Stephanie… we need you so much… I'm the one who should apologise to you… do NOT lose sight of the value of your own life! Do NOT!

"Batman?"

"I'm still here. I'm not going anywhere."

"When you let me be Robin… it wasn't just some kind of trick, was it? A way to get Tim to come back? Or your way to show me I wasn't cut out for the job?"

"Stephanie, I…" Should have told you of your strengths long ago. Should have told all of you…

"Was any of it real? Was I ever really Robin?"

Oh, Stephanie… "Of course you were."

She closed her eyes again. "Good. Then I really was part of it… part of the legend. Even if it was only for a little while. No matter what, no one can take that away."

"No matter what," he reassured.

"I think I need to rest now," she murmured, and her voice was the weakest it had ever been.

The vice-like terror that had been building during their conversation reached a dizzying intensity, and although his lips moved, he barely recognised his own voice as he said, "You bet. I'll be here, watching over you."

The regular beeping of the heart monitor stuttered, then stalled as the jagged display stretched out into a straight red line.

Bruce's blood rushed in his ears, drowning out the unceasing tone. Time stopped, then split into shards, each as clear and painful as glass. He stumbled back from the bed. There was a phantom weight in his arms of a small body pressing against him. He remembered how he had found Stephanie, stumbling and bleeding out on a rooftop after her escape from Black Mask.

"I tried… to stop…" she was mumbling, and she would have slipped off the side of the roof if Batman had not caught her.

The words spilled from his lips before he could stop them. "It's all right. Everything's all right," and he grasped her hand and pulled her into his arms even as she continued to whisper deliriously, "I just… wanted to… help."

He had clutched the broken, bloody teenager to his chest in the same way he had cradled his lifeless son on that endless day several years ago, back when the inflexible nature of his oath seemed simplistic and naïve—a promise sworn by a lonely, angry young man with a chip on his shoulder and unhindered by any duty of care more personal than protecting his own city. How could such a promise be kept in the face of the death of a child under his wing—a death in the family? The thought had fuelled him throughout the gang war, culminating in a death brawl with Black Mask in the clock tower less than an hour ago.

Bruce was brought back to the present by a touch at his arm. It was Leslie, her face pinched with stress and fatigue. There was no expression of commiseration, only of a quiet, simmering anger that Bruce sensed as keenly as if Leslie had said the words. The ghost-like weight on his chest had vanished, leaving only the very real Stephanie, pale and still in death.

Jason had been so small. Bruce had removed the tatters of the Robin costume, and then he had reported the matter to the police. There had been questions about the bodies and the circumstances and the funeral arrangements, but he had answered on autopilot, letting the words leave his mouth while he retreated to a lonely, vengeful place within his mind, where he entertained fantasies of destroying the Joker in a thousand painful ways. He could not let himself stop, because then he would remember the way his son had felt in his arms, shattered and bloodied, body cooling to the touch. Even now, he could not let himself gaze upon the bruised and battered Stephanie any longer. He reached forward with a gauntlet-covered hand and drew the white sheets up to cover Stephanie's face.

The heart monitor continued its piercing ring.

"Leslie—"

Leslie turned away from him to halt the heart monitor, one hand pressed against her mouth. "Just go."

Bruce could not move. The shards of time refused to become whole again, but remained tantalising fragments of past and present and possibility. He gripped the bed rail and tried to steady himself by tipping his head back slightly and blinking hard. But when he pulled his gaze down again, all breath left his lungs. For Jason Todd stood before him in his Robin costume, unblemished and whole and the age he had been at death.

"Jason." Bruce's lips parted, but no sound escaped. You're dead. This isn't real.

The apparition smirked at his reaction, then pressed two gloved fingers to his own wrist in an imitation of checking his pulse.

In the rubble, one look told the story. There was no need to check for a pulse. But Bruce did anyway.

Bruce drew a sharp breath, briefly shutting his eyes against the memory that ghosted his fingertips. I'm sorry, Jason. I know I was too late. I should have been there for you. Despite himself, he made eye contact with Jason, willing the spectre to understand.

Jason looked away, eyes flicking down to the figure in the bed. Then, he glanced up at Bruce and tapped his own wrist again. Do it anyway.

Wrenching his eyes away from the image of his son, Bruce pulled back the sheet in a swift motion and felt Stephanie's wrist, ignoring Leslie's aghast exclamation. His vision grew blurry, and he had to force his fingers to stop shaking.

He did not remember much of those agonising days that had followed. There were vague recollections of Clark and the Joker and his own aching knuckles and an infuriating lack of closure. He ate, but the food was tasteless and his appetite lacking. He slept, but when he closed his eyes, he was back among the rubble and the death. He did not contact Alfred, Dick or anyone else. It was only much later, on the solitary aeroplane ride back to Gotham, that he had allowed himself to weep.

Gone, Bruce told himself.

There was a subtle movement under his fingertips.

He froze, forcing himself to block out all distraction and concentrate. Again, he felt Stephanie's pulse, this time steady and unmistakable. Not gone…

"Bruce. Please." Leslie's weary voice divided his attention. Jason vanished. Bruce turned to her, but the words he was about to say died when he saw her face.

"Stephanie's alive. But… you knew that."

Leslie bowed her head. "Yes."

Something quite different was building within him now, cold and righteous and powerful. "You faked her death."

"Yes."

"Why, Leslie?"

Leslie kept her voice low, but her eyes filled with tears. "I—I wanted to protect her—to get her away from all of this. She's suffered enough."

"That's not yours to decide."

"Yes, it is! She was dying. I saved her life, but I still wanted to end it all—all the secret warriors in hoods and capes. The endless violence. I could no longer be a party to such madness. Best to sacrifice one to caution others from putting on those stupid masks. Was it so wrong of me to try to stop the cycle by taking her away from Gotham—away from you?"

Bruce thought of Dick—currently in Alfred's care due to a gunshot wound in his right thigh. He thought of Cassandra—brave, wonderful Cassandra, who could read his body language the way no one else in the world could, and who deserved so much more than life had given her. He thought of Tim, who was level-headed and resilient and would probably have the best mind of them all someday—though Tim himself might be the last to realise it. They were young—so young—but they all looked to him for guidance and needed so much more support than he had been giving them of late.

"Yes," he ground out. "Yes, it was wrong. Death doesn't occur in a vacuum. You and I both know that. How dare you even consider murdering Stephanie in the eyes of her mother? How dare you make Tim lose someone else? What about her daughter? How can you expect to give Stephanie a full life when you're taking away everything that she lives for?"

"Perhaps those are things you should have thought of before you recruited her," Leslie was quick to reply. "She could have died tonight. As it is, she'll have a long recovery ahead of her. And then, it'll be back to the life—a life of continuing to be the creature you and your kind turned her into. It never ends, Bruce!"

"And that's why I keep fighting. But I've never taken it upon myself to decide who lives and who dies. I never threw another corpse on the pile, thinking, 'This will show them all! This will bring everyone to their senses!' That's a sick idea from an evil mind."

"She's not really d—"

"Don't tell me. Tell that to her mother."

Leslie turned away in shame.

Bruce jerked his head toward the sleeping patient. "When can she leave?"

"Excuse me? Bruce, she was tortured!" Leslie's voice was a hiss.

"When?"

"I—" She shook her head. "I can't say—"

"You told me it was an emergency."

"Yes."

"Why?"

"You wouldn't have come otherwise."

"And now I won't leave," he snapped, not bothering to contradict her. "I'll stay with her until Robin comes, then we'll take her to the Batcave. She'll need protection; you need to take care of your other patients." With a last glare at Leslie, he moved back to the bedside.

"Bruce—"

Bruce checked Stephanie's pulse again. It was strong and even. "Just go."

There was a heavy pause, then retreating footsteps and a small click as Leslie shut the door after herself.

Bruce took inventory. Dick was with Alfred… he could wait. Tim would arrive at the clinic in a few hours, probably by the roof to avoid the police presence. Bruce would need to decompress with them all afterwards. But scavengers would already be profiting from the war.

He touched his com-link. "Batgirl."

"Yes." He hated how he could hear the tiredness in her voice. But he knew she would never forgive him if anything else happened to Stephanie.

"I need a favour… please. Penguin's M.I.A. The streets will be filled with scavengers…"

"On it."

After triggering remote return of the Batmobile to the Batcave, Bruce opened another call.

"Alfred. How is Nightwing?"

"Still unconscious, sir. He has developed a fever and is increasingly delirious."

"And his leg?"

"As patched up as can be under such circumstances."

"Good. Are you both back home?"

"Yes, sir."

"Then send a mobile Batcave to the Thompkins clinic. Disguise it as an emergency transport vehicle and park it out back."

If Alfred was surprised, not a trace showed in his voice. "Consider it done, sir."

It was only after he had ended the call, in the small clinic room beside the sleeping Stephanie, that he pulled back the cowl and allowed himself to breathe.

Alive, he thought, and the hope contained in that single word overwhelmed him until his throat grew thick and his eyes stung with unshed tears.

Alive.

It was a few hours later by the time Batman heard the door open again. This time, the footsteps were almost silent. He met the figure at the door. "Robin."

"I recognised the mobile Batcave out back," said Robin. "The police haven't spotted it."

"Good." A pause. "How are you?"

Robin frowned, looking impatient. "I saw my family. I took a nap. And now, I'm going to see Steph. She's in this room, isn't she? I need to see her." Without waiting for permission, he slipped under Batman's arm and towards the bed.

You didn't answer my question was on the tip of Batman's tongue, but he restrained himself. Instead, he watched as Robin put together the clues about Stephanie's condition, like he himself had done just hours ago. Then, Robin turned to Batman, clearly stricken beneath the cool exterior.

"What happened to her?"

Batman did not have the will to withhold the information any longer. He told Tim almost everything. How Stephanie had started the gang war to gain Batman's favour. How she had fought valiantly against Black Mask to correct her mistake. How Batman had tracked her down and taken her to Leslie's clinic. He only stopped short of telling Tim about Leslie's confession.

"She's stable," he finished, watching the sleeping Stephanie.

Tim's face was stark white against his domino mask. "And… you've been here all this time? That was the message you got earlier, wasn't it? Why didn't you tell me? I was right there!"

Batman opened his mouth and found that he could not articulate the words.

"We need to bring her to the Batcave," he said instead, breaking eye contact but still sensing Robin's mutinous expression. "She needs protection. Stay with her; I'll get Leslie to release her." He swept out of the room before Robin had a chance to respond.

Robin seemed to have regained his usual composure by the time Batman returned with Leslie. All three were silent as Leslie checked Stephanie's vitals one last time before removing the heart monitor and tubes. Robin seemed to realise the tension between the other two, but did not comment on it.

A few minutes later, the disguised mobile Batcave was speeding past the police to the real Batcave, with Robin and Stephanie in the back and Batman behind the wheel. Again, Batman's com-link buzzed unexpectedly.

"Batman, Steph's awake!" The relief in Robin's voice was palpable. In that instant, he sounded like a child instead of the teenager he was.

In the solitude of the driver's cabin, with its privacy windows enabled, Batman allowed himself a slight smile. "Hold tight, Robin. We're nearly home."

A/N: Next chapter coming very soon! I plan to almost upload every day until this story is complete, with extra chapters on some days. I encourage and adore all kinds of comments and reviews, as long as they are relevant and respectful, so please let me know what you think!

Sources:

The lines spoken between Batman and Leslie and then Batman and Stephanie in the opening scenes are modified from dialogue found in Batman #633 (Batman: War Games).

The scene of Batman and Robin in the clock tower rubble and the scene with Batman and Robin in Stephanie's room borrow direct quotes from Batman #634 (Batman: War Games).

Stephanie Brown was Robin in Robin (1993) #126-128 and Detective Comics #796. In canon, Batman confronted Leslie about Steph's death in Batman: War Crimes, and Steph was later retconned to have been alive all along (thanks to Leslie faking her death) and returned in Robin (1993) #170-175 and Robin/Spoiler Special (Robin: Violent Tendencies).

Batman's line about the value of life is adapted from a similar sentiment he expresses in Nightwing (1996) #117.

The flashback scene of Batman rescuing Spoiler is from Batman: Gotham Knights #58 (Batman: War Games).

The details about Jason's death are taken from Batman #426-429 (Batman: A Death in the Family).

Leslie's explanation to Batman in Stephanie's hospital room is inspired by dialogue from Batman #644 (Batman: War Crimes).