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

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Chapter 12: Hallucinations

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Dick had asked to settle in, to be on guard for himself, yet Slade would have none of it. Finally, Damian saw how miserable and money his big brother was, and proposed a plan to shut Slade up and allow Dick his five minutes without the man's bodyguard.

In the library, sounds did reach, and though Slade was outside those walls, he was not alone entirely. Titus. The new bat hound and guard dog to the manor, had Dami's sympathies as the boy had taken to three animals he'd trained while Dick was off dicking it with Deathstroke's many demoralizing contracts.

Alfred the cat was the first to snooze atop a forest green arm chair, while out in the barn was a cow. Yes. A cow, with a mask like marking of a bat insignia. Thus, Dami called her "Bat Cow."

Scratching behind Titus's ears, the droopy eyed great dane mix whined and settled finally his big ole' head onto Dick's knee on the floor by the sofa. He didn't budge as his huffing dog breath stayed mildly less concerning. Maybe he wasn't Ace, the first Bat hound that Dick had grown up with…

Dick continued to keep his companion preoccupied at Dami's request and Slade's approval of a dog being his apprentice's shield. Everyone sort of was though. This Court wasn't one to snuff at, and there was the Bat, Bruce. He'd just been taken while Batwing and Kate had the last dance with those Talon or their sinister leader. Cobb wasn't it, Dick could see that he was just following orders.

Yawning, the dog rested a bit, while Dick stayed up to watch. This was just an experiment. Nothing more. The hearth flickered out slowly, the library as quiet as could be just after a minute.

To midnight, when IT made him force up his head. Titus also sniffed the air, sneezing. Dick touched the dog's fur. The flurry of …what was this?

~ The Great Grandson of William Cobb, head Talon. And yet, he knows nothing of his birth rite. ~

For a decade. No, that voice was Cobb's, so he started to hear it. Titus stood to his four legs and growled at the wall just left of the hearth. The cinders blew in their faces, the dog whining back as his dazed expression was not common to ashes. But an intoxicating effect, to a human.

Dick coughed; his lungs clearing up long enough to see Titus on the ground, body limp and drugged to stay out of the way. This was an invasion, so Dick got ready to signal his troops.

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"Well, you've grown indeed. The last time we spoke, was not long."

He wasn't Cobb. Out of the shadows, stepped a man in a cowl to cover him, face and all. Gauntlets of brass and silver. Fingers as talons and yet, he was not them. He was not an underling by how he walked.

"Why did you come, why not your soldiers. The talon? Why aren't you staying behind your drones."

"Yes, you expected a rematch. I see that…" The man, if he was one, singled out Dick's words only to twist the other man's depth into what he was actually going to do next.

He walked, even Slade could appreciate, slowly. Meticulous in every step, before he returned to glance at Dick, his teeth shown in a greedy grin as he looked towards those four walls. The furniture. He exhaled, feeling lightened as the tension evaporated.

A Ra's type. Rattlesnake. Dick took note of this enemy's temper.

"For years, this place has caged you both. You and the last son, of Gotham. Do you know who it was that helped to found this city from the bottom up?"

"I don't care who's who anymore, that's ancient history. I want to know what you did with my family. Who has Bruce, and the bats."

Dick snarled, avenging poor Titus by embodying his dear companion- if only for a few hours since his arrival back home. Home, as in what this person was attempting to twist.

"He loved each and every one of them, his children. The Wayne line however was never complete. They didn't have him first. Because I was the last to hear about it." His hand to the fire, the fire already put out, the man pulled at a switch that was hidden and so the wall opposite them, opened up. In it was a vast array of dusted objects.

Treasures and….wait. There, glinting back…

The figure had Dick wondering what he was going to do next. Such timing, but why? In his pocket was an S.O.S to Slade! This was their chance, but…

Richard walked over, mesmerized by the intruder's story. This intruder he knew about this place, all of its lines and gaps. He KNEW.

BUT….

A lump formed in Dick's throat and he knew it was the strange powder from the fireplace, now causing his body to shudder.

"With this, I unveil to you, little Gray Son…"

The stranger pulled a wide grey tarp from over the face of a rather large portrait. Decorated in cobwebs, Dick stepped back. His hand to his ear as he let the sound go through the link by it, Slade stiffened as the camera's eye came on in the cave.

"Dear God.. .it can't be." Selina leaned over and could only drag herself to zoom in closer.

The man unveiled the portrait. A baby Bruce in the arms of his mother Martha Wayne, while his mother's other hand gripped the downturned eyes of another, troubled young man. A boy, with the same eyes and every feature exactly as his….Bruce's father's.

"Why do you know about….who is that?" Dick pointed, demandingly at the mask wearing people. " Tell me who you are!"

"You may already know." The man removed his mask, his hood removed as eyes like Bruce's struck back out. "I'm right now called in high society, Lincoln Marche. We've met at the last Gala you ever attended. And as Dick Grayson, I didn't forget you anytime soon." The man grinned, Slade's knuckles bleached to chalk as he readied to fire.

"But you may see me as, the missing piece that your billionaire mentor never talked about from his past. The reason why he was everyone's favorite topic for a decade. Well," Scoffed the man, who was clearly not holding back, "Call me Uncle Thomas. I'm glad we finally could meet in person. Even when I was happily, napping…."

The tarp revealed that a second portrait was also hidden away in the mountains of memories kept stashed in the manor's thick walls. As a domino effect took place, Dami sharpened his senses.

"AND after…. YEARS AND YEARS. OUR FATHER TOOK His last BREATH. YOU DON'T EVEN KNOW WHAT KIND OF MAN CARRIES OUT THE CURSE ONTO HIS OWN OLDER… Son! THE TRUE WAYNE, THAT YOU SHOULD BE SERVING….GRAY SON…. ? IS. ME ."

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