An AU where Bruce’s over protection and kinda jealousy of Dick making friends his own age ish manifests differently and rather takes them under his wing so he can teach them to be better at taking care of/protecting his buddy/bestie/son when he’s not around and also keep them around and keep an eye on them. Cause like, he can still protect Dick if his friends are constantly chilling out at the Manor and it seems like he’s not watching/butting in and gives them the perceived freedom to do whatever.
And then this manifests into him having actual relationships with these kids
There are not enough stories of the bat kids learning the kind of shit Dick and the OG titans used to do and are simply horrified. What do you mean you did this stuff at nine years old??? What do you mean you and your friends snuck out and went to space ???? What the fuck Richard???
Pairing: Platonic OG Titans; Garth, Dick, Roy, Donna, & Wally
Summary: Roy gets an unexpected text. There's only one thing he can do about it: Help.
Words: 2,442
Do you remember when we were kids and we all promised to help if we ever needed to hide a body?
It’s not the text Roy is expecting at 10:30 PM on a Friday. It’s especially not the text he was expecting from Dick No-Killing Grayson through their secure line. It takes Roy a solid minute to fully comprehend what the message means. It takes another minute to think about how he can respond. How he should respond. He’s a hero, but he’s not a hero first. First and foremost, he’s a father. Then, he’s a best friend. Then he’s a brother and a son, and then, and only once all of those obligations are satisfied, is he a hero.
So it’s not Arsenal that that takes over his brain, and it’s not the son of Ollie wondering what he should do. First, it’s Lian’s father wondering if this will negatively affect his daughter. They’ll need to wipe the text, obviously, get rid of any evidence. And he’ll need to make sure he’s home in time to take Lian to the amusement park she’s been wanting to go to early in the morning. And the body itself will have to be completely devoid of evidence of his involvement, at the very least. But that’s doable enough. Honestly, it’s something he’s thought about before. He doesn’t expect hiding a body to be too hard.
Five minutes after the first text, he gets a location. Also from Dick. Somewhere in the dumpster he calls a city. Not his apartment. Roy rubs a hand over his eyes. He’d taken a night off of patrol to be able to actually be awake at the park tomorrow. He’d been about to go to sleep early for once in his life. Lian is going to be so mad at him if he falls asleep on a roller coaster again.
It’s Roy the best friend who packs a bag and then makes a phone call. Ten minutes after Roy got that first unsettling message, he and Wally are poking around an alley near the docks.
“Hello?” Wally calls. He walks at a normal speed over to an alley and peeks down it. He kind of looks like he’s scared something will hop out and get him. Then, it is almost 2 AM in Bludhaven; there’s no telling what’s down those alleys.
“Dick?” Roy calls. “You here, man?” He chooses another alley at random. He can smell the nastiness of the brine from here. He really hopes they get to leave soon. There is nowhere in the world that the sea smells as nasty as it does in Bludhaven. It’s like dirt and oil and filth have been given a purely aromatic form and have bonded to the salt water. It’s in Roy’s Top Three Worst Smells, along with Ollie’s dirty socks and the fresh vomit of someone who just gorged themself on rotten fish.
Roy goes a little farther down the alley and nudges a bit of garbage with his boot. Would it have been so difficult for Dick to need their help in a building with an address instead of random side street? This is-
Oh. That looks suspiciously human-shaped.
Roy approaches the lump and finds that yes, that is a person. Not a homeless person, either. The blood-splatter indicates someone slit his throat. The clothes indicate wealth. The jaggedness of the cut indicates desperation. This is probably their guy.
Roy motions Wally over and does a careful inspection of the rest of the alley, keeping well away from the concentration of evidence. He’s not getting mixed-up in some ridiculous murder investigation. “Get Garth and Donna,” he says. Wally disappears in a faint breeze.
The alley has a fair amount of litter in it, and bits of discarded food. And there, folded so small into the shadows that Roy can barely see him, is Dick. Roy crosses to the dumpster Dick is huddling against and crouches down.
“Dick?” He doesn’t touch. He’s not stupid, and if Dick is hiding, it’s possible there’s more to this than meets the eye. “Are you hurt?”
Dick is slow to meet his eyes. From what Roy can see, Dick isn’t bleeding at all and has no obvious wounds. His eyes roam around their surroundings before slowly alighting on Roy. It takes another long, long moment for the recognition to settle in. As soon as it does, Dick starts to shake.
“I killed him.” Dick’s voice is a desperate, gasping inhalation. His whole body trembles under the weight of it. “I killed him.”
“You were right,” Roy tells him. That’s one thing he hasn’t bothered to question: if Dick was right or wrong in killing someone. Dick Grayson never kills, so if he does, there’s no doubt in Roy’s mind that he had a good reason.
And if he didn’t, well, everyone makes mistakes. Roy’s willing to forgive this one.
“No,” Dick says. “No. I killed him. I killed him.”
“It’s okay,” Roy says. He still doesn’t touch Dick. He doesn’t think it’ll help. He doesn’t know if Dick actually knows who he is right now. He doesn’t seem very contained to his own body, at the moment.
“No, no.” It seems Dick can only repeat a couple of things. Roy snaps his fingers a few times, above Dick’s head, until he looks up. In the dim light, Roy examines his eyes. His pupils are way too big, even for the late night smog of Blüdhaven. Either a head wound or high, and Roy has no idea which. There’s no blood, which discounts head wounds; they notoriously bleed a lot. And Dick is dressed for clubbing: ripped skinny jeans with fishnets underneath, a homemade off-the-shoulder crop top, a collection of jewelry. He’s dressed for a night on the town, so it’s possible he smoked a little weed; Dick isn’t tea-totaler. Then again, he could be dressed for a night undercover and this guy was his target, which makes the head wound and being drugged about equally likely, and means they’ll have a lot harder of a time covering Dick’s tracks.
Roy leans back on his heels. This blows.
“Can you get up?” Roy asks. Dick shudders and sort of collapses forward onto his knees. “Let me help.” Roy gets his hands under Dick’s elbows and together they stagger up. Dick leans forward, into Roy’s chest, and rests there, panting.
“Dick?” That’s Donna’s voice. She, like Roy, completely avoids the mess around the body and comes to where they’re standing. She presses a hand to Dick’s head and he leans into it like some kicked puppy. It’s honestly unfair how pathetic Dick can look sometimes. You wouldn’t think a guy as built at he is would be able to look so innocent.
“Are you hurt?” Donna asks. She pulls Dick into her arms and she only serves to make him look even smaller. Roy easily goes along with the transfer. Donna’s always been better at care-taking than he is.
“I killed him,” Dick says again.
“We’re going to take care of it,” Donna promises. Like those were the magic words, Dick starts to cry.
“I’m sorry,” he sobs. He tries to pull away from Donna and almost goes headfirst into the dumpster. “I didn’t mean to. It was an accident. I killed him. I didn’t want to. I didn’t want to, but it didn’t matter. It never matters. I’m sorry.”
Donna shushes him. Roy leaves her to do what she needs to, and joins Wally and Garth. He sighs.
“Alright,” he says, “I’ll see if there were any cameras around.”
“I’ll clean up the blood,” Garth says, letting a trail of water curl up and around his arm. “And any other physical evidence.”
“You guys are the worst,” Wally says, but the body is gone a second later. Garth begins to scrub the alley clean—but hopefully not too clean, that might actually be a bigger red flag in this shithole, and Roy does a lap, looking for cameras or potential witnesses. There are no less than four cameras, and just from a cursory once-over, Roy is pretty damn sure that none of them are functional. He still goes to cover his bases, and it’s while he’s investigating the third, the first two indeed proving to be duds, that he sees Donna guiding Dick down the street. She uses the hand sign they use in the field to mean ‘headquarters’ or ‘homebase’ as they go. Roy infers this means they’re all to meet up at Dick’s when they’re done with the cover-up and continues his chosen responsibilities.
They’re efficient. An hour later, and there’s not a shred of evidence of anything. What Wally did with the body, he isn’t willing to disclose. It’s better that way. Roy really does not want to know anything more incriminating than he has to. Also, it was probably unpleasant and Roy would like to have a good day tomorrow, not think about rotting bodies and viscera.
“Where’s Dick?” Garth asks. He’s looking around like he could have possibly missed him somewhere.
“Donna took him home,” Roy says. “Let’s debrief with them and then split.”
Wally runs them there in literally two seconds. Roy arrives to the scene of Dick sitting on the couch, hair wet, club clothes exchanged for oversized, soft sweats. There’s a steaming mug in his hands, and Roy can tell from the smell it’s hot chocolate. Dick is wrapped up in a blanket, and Donna sits beside him, keeping a careful distance.
“Rob?” Wally asks. He’s in front of Dick before he’s done speaking, kneeling on the floor like the world’s most loyal and annoying dog. “Is he hurt?” he directs to Donna when Dick doesn’t meet his eyes.
“He has a few bruises,” Donna says. She hesitates. “I think he was roofied. Not a full dose, but enough that he’s out of it.”
“Shit,” Wally says.
“It gets worse,” Donna adds softly. She looks up at Roy. “The bruises were on his hips, mostly. I think…” She doesn’t finish, but Roy can fill in the blanks. There are only so many reasons a person roofies someone.
“So it was self-defense,” Garth says. His voice is rough, but he clears his throat and keeps going. “Why ask us to cover it up if it was self-defense?”
“You think the damn Bat will care why he did it?” Roy snapped. There was vomit boiling in his stomach, rising toward his throat. Roy wasn’t one to hold a grudge, not really. His temper ran hot and fast, but once it was over, he wasn’t still mad about it. He’d held a grudge against Ollie for a while, but once he’d seen how good the man treated Lian, even that fire had banked.
Roy’s grudge against Batman, his hatred for the way he’d treated Dick all his life, had never calmed. Batman had always treated Dick like a servant or dog, someone to come when he called and always obey. He was entitled and arrogant and didn’t’ see Dick for the person he was or what he was capable of, instead only seeing what Dick could do for him. Roy had no doubt that if Batman found out Dick had killed someone, even if it was a cut-and-dry case of self-defense and attempted rape, he’d blame Dick. Maybe even try to banish him from Gotham or something equally cataclysmic to Dick’s sense of self.
“I’m sorry,” Dick says. “I didn’t mean to. I didn’t want to.”
Donna hugs him to her immediately. “I know,” she says. She presses a kiss into his wet hair. “I know. None of us blame you.”
“He’s gonna be so mad,” Dick says.
“He’ll never know,” Roy swears. He sits on Dick’s free side and presses in close. “We’ll take care of you, birdie.”
“Why do I always fuck up?” Dick asks.
“You don’t,” Donna tells him. “And you didn’t tonight. You did everything right.”
“No,” Dick says. “You don’t understand. I figured out I was roofied and left. I should’ve-should’ve called or something. Done something. Instead I got myself roofied and then walked down an empty in alley in the fucking ‘Haven.”
“That’s not your fault,” Donna says. “You were drugged.”
“I should’ve noticed before I drank it,” Dick says. He leans fully against Donna, apparently exhausted. “It’s always my fault.”
Roy hopes Dick will stop talking. Every word out of his mouth is making Roy want to kill someone. Unfortunately, the guy most eligible for it had already been dealt with.
Luckily, Dick just shakes between him and Donna, so Roy tries to be as comforting as possible. He’s a lot better at it than he was when they were teenagers. He doesn’t think teenage Roy would have been able to sit through Dick’s break-down without having a blow-out himself.
The five of them press together, a knot of limbs.
“I’m sorry,” Dick says eventually. “I shouldn’t have asked you to do this.” He sounds a lot more coherent and steady now than he did half an hour ago. He takes a sip from his now-cold hot chocolate.
“I’m glad you did,” Wally says. He wraps a hand around Dick’s ankle. Dick exhales, shuddering.
“I could have handled it alone. I didn’t need to make you a part of my mess.”
“You shouldn’t be alone right now,” Donna says. “And before you can say it, you didn’t deserve this.”
“I should have noticed it. I was trained by the Batman,” Dick whispers. “I’m supposed to be better than this.”
“Rob,” Wally says, but no more words make it out.
“Well, if you hadn’t killed him, I would’ve,” Roy says. “So you saved me a trip.”
Dick just sighs. It’s obvious to them that he’s not doing well. That maybe he wouldn’t be doing well for a while.
“Hey,” Roy says. “Lian and I are going to an amusement park tomorrow. Wanna come?”
“I don’t want to crash your day,” Dick says.
“Dude, do you know how psyched Lian would be if you crashed our trip?” Roy lays his cheek on top of Dick’s head. “You love coasters almost as much as she does.”
“I-I don’t know.” Dick clears his throat.
“I’ll come too,” Donna says. “That way, if you need a break, we can sit and Lian won’t have to leave early.”
“I guess,” Dick says. He barely smiles. It’s enough for Roy.
“Great.” Roy leans all of his weight into Dick. There’s still a few hours left they can sleep. “Good night.”
I like to think that when Cass first was introduced to the batfam she was always shy or just didn’t seem happy cuz she couldn’t hear or understand what they were saying.
This lead to 2 things.
1. The batfam started purposefully making their body language more dramatic and open so Cass could understand better (she could read them no matter what but the gesture really touched her). This lead to theatre boy Todd enacting on a full drama while in the middle of a heated discussion about why wearing soggy socks was a crime. It’s also become an unconscious habit when whenever Cass is around so all the other batfam can know more easily tell if the others upset or not doing well when Cass is present.
2. Bruce taught her sign language. It had helped him when he was younger and still does when he shuts down and doesn’t have the energy to talk. Alfred had always encouraged him to find a different medium to express himself when this happened so he’d picked up this nifty skill. It was torture at first, but her face when she realised they could actually have a conversation was worth it in Bruce’s eyes. He taught her how words could also be weapons, and that’s why every motion and thought should be precise. It makes use of her skills and feels like familiar territory for her.
Dick knows about sign language, and Bruce had taught him too when he was and still struggling to put some thoughts or talk in English rather than Romani. He still uses it on occasion, even when he’s upset. The rest of the OG Titans also picked up enough to get by to better understand Dick.
The only other person aware is Tim because after Jason died Bruce didn’t speak for months, and once when he was Robin and was having an intense argument after an exhausting operation Bruce repeatedly kept signing the words “STOP PLEASE NOT NOW” before walking away.
Clark knows about this too because sometimes when Bruce thinks no one is around he sometimes signs to himself. He says it helps him think, and Clark has even caught him signing the words while listening to his favourite songs. Bruce unconsciously also sometimes makes brief hand signs that can translate into what he’s thinking and how he’s feeling. It’s come in handy for battle, and if Clark also uses it to check in and see if Bruce is doing okay well the Worlds Greatest Detective can live without knowing a few things.
Dick and Cass both converse in sign language sometimes and when Damian entered the family they’ve both been teaching him pieces so he can better communicate and express himself.
