The Dark Knight Chronicles; My Brother; the Renegade; My Father, The Batman

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Chapter 4: Sudden Urges and Chaise Lounges

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Directed to the one place they could talk, Slade made a gesture that had again piqued the interest of Cassandra as she watched both assassin and mercenary speak to Alfred while causing him to somehow put up a glove in protest, before setting it down with one clearly to his temples. "There is a space in the manor available; you are certain this cannot be performed another way?"

"Not until we know which grounds we'll be walking, no."

Slade seemed to speak for Dick far too much, always the victim or was he just not wanting to talk…

"We have to work out a schedule with the new bats." Dick finally said as he tried to reassure his care giver's own father - figure. "Set a room aside later for him, Alf. My room has to –

"It was preserved in the instance….and at any chance you might be in town, Master Dick." Slade looked at the man with a wonder as to WHY. Was Bruce the one regretting leaving his ward to that mad man? Was he the one who still had attachment issues?

That was what Cass dragged out for that look and see, until she saw Dick's body language and scrunched her nose at how he was…so misrepresented in a way only a possessed figure might be if made powerless. Ah, but he was not. He was…

She had her suspicions on everything from blackmail, their desire to steal the Bat's secrets in the time it took to hardwire the heroes. This was a typical scandal to the mini bat. She shook her head and thought from around the corner. Evidence, she needed evidence...

Slade muttered something as Dick pushed his partner into the one shared room. The room where she had to get a good explanation, once the coast was clear. As did her very nosy siblings once rumors could again start to spread of another pound of gossip on the family's doorstep.

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"What is the plan then." Slade shut the door with a pull, keeping the hinges rather silent as Dick flopped onto the freshly made queen size in the shared room between them. There was a bed, lamp and a walk in bathroom with as much of a tub for a couple….

"We could talk more, open up about what we want to happen, but they have Bruce's training. I have to get through to Jason…This, bites…. with a hard head. I –

" Can act. Can't you?" Slade quizzically eyed the child, he expected an answer as Dick would be twenty one in the spring. Winter was still here, still as brutal as the reminder of how much they all hated him for trying to fit in. "They are on Jason's side regardless, but I need to help. You know that I won't leave until he's found or... It was why I came back. I have to wear…his actions? Act like him? Reconstruct myself? The galas are usually Tim's deal, but -

"Some things, holograms just cannot replicate." Slade shrugged and found a chaise lounge to seat himself into where he let himself be for a bit to think.

Dick seeped in a breath as his hands flew to his scalp. "I'm going to need to cut my hair –

"Grow a few feet taller, maybe?" Slade rolled his neck a bit. "You can't fix that fact, but I know that inventor I use from time to time; Squirrel can do us a solid if that's allowed."

"It has to be, make me tall, come on!" Dick flopped onto the bed as he heard the seat across from him rustle a bit, a creak as Slade was getting up. He leaned over the former boy wonder and as before in the hall, he was gentle with his next sentence. "I told you. This is for your benefit. Once Bruce and the kids are perfectly happy…"

Dick turned his head, biting his lip. "Slade, we're not –

Slade moved back, releasing himself as he straightened while leaving Dick to his pouting. "One year ago, you were saved by my actions to take care of you."

"It was a case we didn't anticipate. The toxin –

"Would have left you for dead." Slade stepped back over to the lounge; an armored leg crossed over his knee casually as Dick then got up. Licking his lips, he tried not to stumble over his own words. "We can't do that, but you can always try to tell me…why you didn't do something…. More, to me."

He leaned in as Slade gripped his upper arms, Dick's body bowing over the man's legs. Both without masks and then, a memory flourished.

/

There was a sulfur smell and a chemically intoxicating set of fumes that filled the abandoned lab right up as a wood stove. Likely, Ivy had taken the liberty to go after Deathstroke's client; a tycoon with a lot of toxic sludge to spill into the longest river in the state while they were still in Bludhaven.

How she'd decided to swing in for a spell was beyond Dick's traditional comprehension. She wasn't here, and his eyes and limbs burned to high heaven once that fact came to the fold. He seethed and felt for what was touching at his wrists. Tied, tethered as his face was not the only effected by the gas.

"S….nmm…." Dick squirmed to see through it, to get the serum to kick in while he was already so low down into the criminal underbelly. A crashing sound had his body wither as the bulk of madness, of a man had the boy's pants grow –

"Ang!"

"Stay still, apprentice." He was still not twenty. He was still Slade's to see to. It was why he'd stopped being so willing to hear the word "Master" ever again. Why Dick had the liberty to speak the man's name…Not as a title, nor a privalege. But as a merciful act.

"Sla…. slad….."

"Calm down, she got you…. I don't –

"anntii…"

"No." Slade of course had a shred sympathy. In his own way his pity was hard to trace, as he scooped up the shaking, sweating nineteen-year-old with a mouth full of illogical sounds coming from numbed pale lips. "We'll get back, and when we do –

"I…. ivy…. lust…. dr…."

Slade's eye scanned the kid as he passed out. Lust? That sounded so…. difficult.

/

He'd had to approach Slade with some added precautionary tales in mind to learn from since. Or, for a while. What happened after… nearly twenty-one and his mind echoed what he was. The serum's coding had been something evolutionary and vague from the very beginning. Slade let the ex-hero raise his hand to the man's goatee, tracing the stubble under his shaky fingertips as his body moved in a little closer. Their eyes watched, waiting at one another to say or do. Dick was also, still a virgin. He'd discovered that the last attempted fling before becoming a Titan, with Barbie that advatage had been denied and their puppy eyed love was never founded on trust all along. But, pity.

Slade was platonic in most of his hazy memories of coupling and steamy romances, all but to Addie as she still made his eye socket itch every time they spoke. Every time Grayson looked at him with those curious and vindictive eyes on a contract. Every time, that fire was numbed by his master's voice. Just like with the collar, their trust with one another was different. Just like the toxin from that plant loving mistress, they'd gone far enough to never let it go so easily. He searched, hand moving as Slade's face brushed his own. Their lips only touching…

A knock came at the door, three times it went. The two's eyes shot out as Slade scrambled to stop the stumbling assassin with a knee to his crotch practically. The boy faced his possessive protected with a hiss. That hurt . "You're hard. Let me answer it –

"No. Stay put." Slade was covered in his sport's cup and Dick was wearing an outfit to blend in better, no cup. He couldn't hide his now bruised erection, not like how the mastermind knew how to make his wither in an instant. Which, to no one's shock, it did just that. Dick was swapped over as Slade man handled his body carefully and quickly to switch positions. The man dragged his protégé into the seat while he rose from it, letting go as Dick tried to act casual and grabbed a side cushion to hide the blossoming bulge. The damned this; still bucking to be set free from within the confines of its owner's now far, too tight black pants.

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She stood with her neck craned at the duo. Cassandra was now convinced that they were secretly trying to rob the manor, yet when she saw Dick's face, his eyes changed her mind a bit more so to keep her thoughts tucked away.

" Yes, my dear." Slade looked to her, seemingly in the middle…. as she let her mouth fall shut with a snap. "We were hoping to know you'd adjusted to your arrangements…" She trailed off, while Dick was smiling back sheepishly as if he'd snuck in a dirty book –

"Well, anyway. I'm curious to see what exercises we'll be doing as your current associates."

"Family, isn't the word." Slade hummed.

"We're still deciding on the place to train. Might be an outdoor scavenger hunt." Dick chuckled, something Cass was not used to because he had to be faking that smile. "It won't matter. Jason should come to soon, by tomorrow. He deserved to be put down a peg. And…. I'll tell Alfred…." She stopped herself. "Why did you not want your room back, Richard?"

Dick sought the answer as it took a minute to gather his thoughts. "I will, but not yet. This is just temporary."

"Tell your very kind butler that, we will come to him for anything else. Should there be a second open consideration on the earlier offer." Slade's words were careful, yet mocking and lacking in showing that. Cass could read people very well, and she'd gone toe to toe with the man thanks to her late family…. Shiva was dead to her as of then, so too was her real father if he dared call himself that. But Slade? Under order by her family, she'd been used as a weapon. It hurt, to come back and see that man tell her thanks at all. Dick though…

She nodded, turning to Richard from the doorway, trying her best to let him see her honesty. If she could have had telepathy, it would be to say that she couldn't say he wasn't lying to her face. "Rest well. Please know that we appreciate your aid in locating Mr. Wayne."

"Goodnight, Cass." Dick waved with a small smile, still as withheld by the looming jailer that was his rather convinced partner. "Goodnight then, Cassandra." Slade shut the door, and Cass was forever lost in why Dick had not moved from that spot.

Was…was Slade abusing him??

(So, Cass thinks that the duo has a master and apprentice or abusive partnership while Jason hinted that he knew. If so, then the adults will be watching. Will the exercise the next day actually have a silver lining for the bats? Noted, I do not write action scenes well so I apologize for the poor concision of my fictions.)

Ticking in mere breadths of time as Dick allowed his arousal to dwindle, the noise didn't come as Slade waited . he didn't expect much to get done, especially not while their hearing both could pick up a set of feet headed closer to the hallway.

They'd been given a few minutes to dawdle for sure, had the surely few minutes again not had to get up and answer that door right after. It was Alfred, a note in hand as Dick was safe; no longer pushing to sit down while there was trouble on his watch.

"It is, urgent news, Master Dick and Wilson. A notice to the Gotham Police Department less than one hour ago was addressed….There were, feathers. Found at the crime scene."

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Drearily gloom crept in to her mind as Cass sighed and walked aimlessly to her room. Beside it was someone who was not to rest either. His eyes were stuck on autopilot. Damian had been trained in a similar fashion to herself at a young age to be the leader to the Demon's Head. The Shadows Ra's hopefully had not told to fetch the Bat, while the boy mulled over these current events, not even seeing Cass until it was too late. He pounced at any chance to expose the new guests. Any at all to proclaim the relationship a torturer and keeper instead of master and teacher's simple vacation to good Gotham central…

"How did it go, the talk."

"They…" She turned her head a bit, not sure of how to explain what she'd believed had happened. Jason and Damian were not convinced that Slade was a good person on a new leaf. They wanted to get Dick away, tell him to atone…Not, what she'd assumed was in any way not related to Richard hiding his face and hands. Why was he such a quiet person?

"Tell me, Cassandra."

"Slade and Alfred with Richard went to the cave. There is, a new mission and they were to leave –

"Damian?"

He swiftly reached for the corridor to the secret passage in the library. There were those here like a castle in Wayne manor in case Alfred had no where to go when Cobblepot came to gloat and whine about his family's finances. "What then should I –

"Keep the others busy." Dami called back without turning his head. "I need to have my own questions answered by Deathstroke." Vitriol was spat in that sentence as the fifteen year old did not stand still when he could make the journey. He'd tail, take notes. Do what he could and then.

Snap the trap, put Slade away for coercing with a minor. He had to catch them and for once…he believed Todd had been onto something. Cassandra slipped away to see if the others had gone to bed; not Tim, as he'd been buzzing his associates and college friends to keep in the game until his eyes were totally bloodshot. a pink through his cell had the young seventeen year old poke at his device to open up a video chat.

"Oh. Hiya, Luke….Why so late?"

~ How are you for meeting. Not now, but talking now, then meeting tomorrow with my pop. ~

Tim rolled over in his bed and groaned, a hand to his temples as the fuzzy light of his dozen desktop monitors made it harder to think of a simple meeting, or a tomorrow. He looked at the ceiling while Luke sighed. "Tim, I know you didn't give up. Dad is holding out on me, but you…you wouldn't do that. Would you? ~

Tim snorted and cracked a nervous grin at the screens, looking away from Luke before sitting up to try and not lie to his friend's face. "Me? Naw! I'm a good guy, we don't lie often, and Bruce put me in charge. Well, now that…sorry, bad time." He scratched his cheek and tried to sound less like an ewe. "Tomorrow? But, mind the eye bags. Course is into mid week and I am trying to get over the reports that your dad had me study up on. He's a hard teacher. No wonder I nev –

Tim stopped. "Yeah, same place, the office?"

~Should be the safest to talk about him. ~ Luke replied. ~ I'll be there. Dad will too. If I can get him to wake up and smell the dirty java cookin'. ~

Tim chuckled at the joke about bad coffee in Gotham. They'd had a shortage because of the sanctions on Bialia and Saudi Arabia as well as associated nations due to the war that the Shadows could be starting. Starving the good people of a decent wake up. Tim tried to forget the taste an that tea did nothing but make him twitch. "Yeah, hope you don't mind it with cream. Gets rid of the swill."

~I hear that. The man who stationed me out in the Congo on a relief mission said that we couldn't bring anything back that was perishable. Not even soap. Weird, but I still think I could have taken a market price there for the right price.~

"Not sure if the locals would agree on that." Tim chewed his lip and turned over, the cell still hot in his palm. "Well, like I said, no promises. Bring your game face."

~ I hear that, Timmy. You too, Vice CEO. ~

The lights went off, Steph sighing in her damned rejection of the boy next door. In the kitchen, she was peckish but resisted only a cookie instead of the whole container in bed with her. She heard the patter of slippered feet and alarms went off with a bang of the door falling back. "Who's –

There was only the wind as she held her treat, question marks littered about her skull while the mystery could survive another night.

Duke was up for the bathroom, and at the same time, he tested his gall to see a shadow. Squealing sharply, the gasp of said shadow had the boy running messily in his robe and slippers after the intruder.

"Hey! Stop!"

He panted, coming to the door of a rather…wait a second…

The creak of the latch had the character bolt for the walk in shower.

The feet walked, the fear on her brow heavy as the sound of a voice she knew rang out. "Y – ello? Hey. You can't be in this room. I can try to –

The dummy newbie. Cass rolled her eyes as she clung to the ceiling about the shower, the wall tall enough to cast a decent shadow. Then, another set of feet were there. And a voice that made her bite her lip.

"What are you doing?"

"Agh! Oh, Mr. D – Slade!" Sighed the teen as his heart was nearly seeping through his chest out of fright. "I heard someone in the hall. I think, they went into your room –

"Move aside, kid." Slade was listening. She heard no breath. Just a shuffle of him moving a chair, looking under the bed with a hum, coming…

To the door where she'd lose her cover!

"Sorry, should I –

"Slade! Hey.,." A third voice, Dick's. He was an angel after all.

"We have to suit up. Oh. Why are you in here, Luke?"

"Ah –

Slade held up a hand. "Saw a mouse, thought it was something else and it came here. I'll Alert your butler to set some traps." He turned his eye to the bathroom and then and there…

He knew , but did nothing to spare Dick the agony of knowing.

Why?

He could, because Deathstroke was no fool.

She withheld a gulp.

"What's the situation, going into the city to meet your father's playmate?"

Dick scoffed and walked to the entrance. His steps were heavier and Luke was breathing differently.

Dick was in the suit. Bruce's Bat suit…

"Alfred did a bit of altering before I came. Bruce had one designed in case…he needed it."

"Too serious, just like you." Slade smirked, Luke swallowing and following the men out into the hall. Slade looked, happy. Happy to make this false bat….He bobbed his head, his face going red by the fact he was up past curfew. "Off to bed! I only got up to use the rest room – AH! TMI…..Good luck!"

That, was weird. He caught his breath but like before, what was going on?? That looked too bizarre…friends didn't…..do that!

/

Cass waited until everyone was dead quiet. Just as her feet touched the tiles, a damned light went on and she almost tripped. "Dami…you scared me..!"

"I know, I had to come find you." He was in his Robin outfit, she in hers for what was going to happen next. "They already left."

"So will we." Smiled the boy wonder, offering a hand as Cass took it. "What is the plan."

"Get dirt later, find out what Gordon found." Dami brought up his hood and walked to the window to open a latch, pushing the frame up with a shove. "Feathers, that's what I gathered from their discussion –

"You bugged the cave." Gawked Black Bat. "You, broke one of your father's rules."

"He's your father too."

"Maybe, in some ways." Cass sighed. "Where to?"

"The subway in lower east Gotham."

"That far??"

"We've made worse trips." He rolled his eyes at her, motioning to the window with one leg out of it. "I deactivated the alarms for one hour, we can do this. Dick will be free of that, sociopathic gun toting gorilla for good this time, and I want you to help me catch him in the act."

"Dami –

"Come on, we're up to thirty minutes left."

Dami and she bounced and bounded from roof top to roof top to see the city, from a height that only winged things could touch. "There." Robin spotted the danger signs and the subway was closed off. Perfect for sneaking in if they took the old entrance on fifth avenue.

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Keeping this moving along but yes, there will be a Court thing and Thomas will show up but – but, it leads to something. Ra's Joker, you name it! Find out!

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