au for the ask game, cass starts to romantically pursue dick trying to model after the repressed feeling in Bruce (trying to be like batman) and not fully understanding the emotions, bruce sees this and becomes jealous and so dick is caught in the middle of the two bats fighting for his love but he sees them both familiarly (like brother and sister)
for the ask game!
OOOOOOH. yes yes yes. i love how much Cass truly wants to *embody* Batman. like that is her goal. to embody the Mission, to put her whole life into the symbol, the work. so it's fun to play with the grey areas where she misunderstands what is Bruce and what is Batman, and attempts to emulate his more problematic behaviors.
so I just. I love the idea of Cass perceiving this as normal. like, that is just how being Batman works because for Bruce, his love for Dick *genuinely* is so integral to being Batman. like it's undeniable even to an outsider, how much Bruce needs Dick as a moral compass, as a true north, as his family. Cass just happens to pick up on it being entangled with a romantic longing that Bruce has *zero* interest in pursuing. until of course, he sees Cass pursuing it. bc i think Dick gets flirted with so much, he sort of tunes it out. he doesn't notice, immediately, that Cass is trying to flirt with him, especially bc Cass isn't the best at it. she's trying tho! but Bruce. Bruce notices instantly and at first, he thinks it's the same sort of hero crush Tim has for Dick and that it's no real issue. until Cass starts genuinely pursuing Dick. they start with an awkward standoff. the fun thing about Bruce and Cass is they don't need words to argue, they just need pointed stares and clear actions. Cass flirts with Dick, Bruce makes a point to not have them work together on the latest mission, all while staring her down. Dick can tell there's some kind of tension going on, but no matter how much he prods, he can't *quite* figure it out.
Dick slowly realizes when Cass gets more bold. at this point she's both doing it to spite Bruce and to be Batman, but along the way, there are some real feelings. Dick tries to... gently turn her down/ he doesn't want to hurt her feelings, but Cass doesn't have the best understanding of romantic vs familial love, so she can tell Dick loves and cares about her and she just assumes he's a little shy about it and she doubles down. besides, that's what Bruce does at Batman, and that's her real goal here. meanwhile, Bruce has never acted on his feelings before, but he'll be damned if Cass beats him to Dick. so he also starts. dropping hints toward Dick. becoming more romantic toward Dick with gestures and gifts. and now Dick is caught between the two of them both lavishing him with attention and compliments.
Dick being kind of at a loss of what to do is fun. like how do you even navigate two people who you view as family both deciding to start a small war over courting you. he's flattered, but he just wants things back to normal. and whenever he rejects one of them, it just spurns on the other to think they're gaining ground. logically, Bruce is aware that Dick doesn't reciprocate for either of them. but he's driven by such an angry possessive streak over Cass' actions he's not exactly thinking with his brain. Bruce can be the goddamn king of petty, when he wants to be. the ante just keeps getting upped, until i think one of them even gets bold enough to come onto Dick sexually. probably Cass first.
on one hand, i do sort of like the idea of Dick finally caving and agreeing to date one of them just to make it stop. i think he'd go with Cass, just because she's closer in age and far more agreeable than Bruce is. i rlly love a fic with an unhappy hurt/no comfort ending where Dick sacrifices his happiness for his loves ones because it's so in character for him. if it makes Cass happy, he'll go with it, bc he really does love her and maybe he can trick himself into being in love with her. but i think the more realistic route is that probably with Tim and Alfred's help, Dick stages a serious intervention where he laws down the law in no uncertain terms. Bruce and Cass agree to back off, but it's does take months before their standoffish behavior with each other subsides.
and as a hilarious ending, i think it'd be funny if the cycle starts again when Bruce gets eyes for someone else. bc this whole thing is what convinces him to move on from Dick and try to focus on himself, so he starts getting feelings for someone else and of course Cass is going to jump on it. i think the funniest option here is Minhkhoa Khan, bc that is a man who would take one look at the situation and fucking *preen* over the attention and lean right into that shit, just to see how far he can take it.
