Chapter Text
"Why did you even call us here?" Jason snapped first, voice sharp, venom laced in every syllable. "What, You wanna play ‘family’ for a night now that you’re done ghosting us?"
"I—" Bruce started, the single syllable already sounding like a defense. Already sounding weak.
"Shut up," Tim cut in, icy. "You don’t get to explain anything. Not after everything."
Bruce’s shoulders tensed just slightly. “I didn’t mean to ghost you. I was trying to—”
“Trying?” Tim interrupted again, this time standing up. “You don’t try, Bruce. You vanish. You disappear for weeks on end and then act like it never happened. You say you're protecting us, but all you’re doing is locking us out like we’re mistakes you’re ashamed of.”
“I never—” Bruce tried again, softer this time. “I never thought of any of you as mistakes.”
"Could've fooled me," Jason muttered, arms crossed. “You treat us like soldiers. We’re weapons in a war you started, and when we get burned out, you look at us like it’s our fault.”
“Like we disappointed you,” Tim added bitterly.
Bruce’s mouth opened and closed. He couldn’t argue with that. Not when the weight of it was already suffocating his lungs.
“I’m sorry,” he said finally, quietly. “I know I’ve made mistakes. I know I failed you all—”
“do you, father?” Damian scoffed. “You think one apology is enough? You think it erases years of incompetence?”
“I thought I was protecting you,” Bruce said again, almost desperately now. “Everything I did was to keep you safe.”
“Save it, Bruce,” Tim said coldly. “You were just afraid of feeling anything. Afraid of being a father. So you ran.”
Cass hadn’t spoken, but she was watching. Watching with that unreadable expression. Bruce didn’t even know what she was thinking. Maybe she hated him too.
“I didn’t know how to be a father,” Bruce admitted, voice shaking. “But I tried. I tried—”
“And you failed,” Jason growled. “You failed all of us. Especially Dick.”
Bruce’s eyes flitted to Dick.
Dick hadn’t said a word. Hadn’t even looked up from the table. But his shoulders were shaking.
"Chum—" Bruce tried, gently.
And then something cracked.
Dick shot to his feet so suddenly his chair screeched across the floor. “just shut up for a goddamn second Bruce!” he shouted.
Bruce’s heart stopped.
“Youre just standing there, pretending to be the grieving parent when you're such a shitty one to begin with!” Dick’s voice broke. “Do you have any idea how many nights I had to lie to Damian, telling him you'd be back? That you cared? How many times I had to patch up Tim because you wouldn’t even look at him after a mission? Or how many times I had to keep Jason from spiraling again because you couldn’t even talk about your own fuckin emotions?”
“I was trying to do what I thought was right,” Bruce said, voice barely above a whisper. “I was trying to do what my father would have—”
“You’re not your father,” Dick snapped. “And thank god for that, because even he probably wouldn’t have turned his family into a damn shithole.”
The silence stretched too long.
Bruce’s jaw trembled. His fingers curled inward, fists clenched so tightly his knuckles turned white. His mouth opened once, but no words came out.
He swallowed hard.
The tears were right there. Hot and pressing behind his eyes. But he refused. Not now. Not in front of them.
Because if he cried, it would be over. He’d break.
“You know what hurts most?” Dick said after a moment, his voice low, shaking. “That we kept waiting. Hoping. All of us. That maybe one day you'd realize we weren’t just your soldiers. We were your kids. We wanted a father. But you were never there.”
Bruce looked up.
The punch came fast.
Dick's fist connected with Bruce’s jaw before anyone could stop it. There was a sickening crack, and Bruce stumbled back a step, barely catching himself against the edge of the table.
He didn’t retaliate.
Didn’t flinch.
Didn’t even raise his hands.
He stood there, blood dripping from his mouth, staring at the floor. Shoulders hunched. Breathing heavy.
And silent.
Dick stood there, panting. Fist still clenched. Eyes wide like he hadn’t even realized what he’d done until it was too late.
No one said anything.
They were too angry.
Too broken.
Too bitter.
Bruce lifted his hand slowly to wipe the blood from his split lip, then just let his arm fall again.
He looked like a man who’d already lost the war.
He didn’t ask for forgiveness.
Didn’t justify it anymore.
He just stood there.
Swallowed the pain.
And said nothing.
——————
The front doors slammed shut one by one.
Jason was the first to leave, boots pounding against the marble like war drums. Tim followed in silence, not sparing Bruce a single glance as he passed. Damian paused at the door to throw one final, disgusted look over his shoulder before vanishing into the night.
Cass didn’t look back either.
Dick didn’t even wait to see if Bruce would say something. His breathing was still ragged, knuckles still red from the impact. He walked out last, jaw clenched, gaze distant. He didn’t slam the door.
He just shut it quietly with a soft click.
The echo of it was louder than any of their words.
Silence.
No more accusations.
No more venom.
No more footsteps.
Just the sound of Bruce’s breathing. Harsh. Strained. Rattling in his throat like something trapped and dying.
He stood still for a moment. Staring blankly at the table.
Their empty chairs.
The same table he’d once tried to gather them around during a forced family dinner after a mission went wrong. It had been awkward. Tense. But they had laughed. Just a little. Enough that he remembered it. Enough that he'd held onto it like proof that maybe he hadn't failed them completely.
But now it felt like a memory from someone else’s life.
Bruce exhaled shakily.
Tried to move.
His knees gave out.
He dropped to the floor hard, hands bracing himself against the polished wood as his legs folded beneath him. The breath that left him next wasn’t steady.
It hitched then broke entirely.
A low, gasping sound tore from his throat as he curled forward, hunched over like he was trying to hold himself together with nothing but willpower.
His shoulders began to shake.
And then the dam cracked.
He sobbed.
Silently at first, it stole the air from his lungs and made him grit his teeth. But it kept coming, wave after wave, until he couldn’t hold it in anymore. His whole body trembled as grief clawed its way out of his chest. Decades of mistakes, of guilt, of words he never said and the love he never gave properly.
They hated him.
He knew he deserved it, but it didn't make It hurt less.
He pressed the heels of his hands to his eyes, trying to stop the tears, to breathe, to do something, but it was too late.
He was breaking.
Alone in the silence of a house that had once held his family.
Now just echoes.
He stayed there, collapsed on the floor of the dining room, sobbing like a man who had no one left to fight for.
——————
Seven days had passed since the confrontation. since the words were flung like blades, since fists collided with skin, since Bruce had broken down alone on the floor.
The kids hadn’t come home.
The cave was still active. Their patrol reports were logged— efficient, professional, cold. But no one lingered. No one stayed longer than they had to. If Bruce happened to be down there when one of them arrived, they barely acknowledged him.
Just a ghost passing another in the dark.
The worst was Dick.
He hadn’t come back at all.
Bruce didn’t reach out. Didn’t try to call. He didn’t know what he could say that wouldn’t make it worse. He had shattered something he didn’t know how to fix, and the pieces cut deeper each time he tried to touch them.
He slept in the cave most nights now.
Eating was optional. Showering, rare. Breathing, just barely remembered.
The only constants were the silence and the guilt.
That, and the dull ache where Dick’s fist had landed.
It wasn’t the bruise that hurt. it was the silence that followed it.
——————
The justice League alert came late.
Bruce didn’t hesitate. He was in the Zeta before the full message even played.
A sharp flash of light. Then cold steel and flickering lights.
The Watchtower.
Chaos greeted him instantly. flashing displays, League members shouting over comms, holograms of Earth’s upper atmosphere showing something burning as it approached.
“Report,” Bruce said, his voice a tired but practiced command.
“Massive incoming object,” J’onn said grimly. “Unknown origin. Accelerating toward Earth at terminal velocity. Initial scans suggest an artificial structure, possibly weaponized. Estimated impact in less than four hours.”
Bruce’s eyes narrowed. “Do we have a target?”
“Central Europe. Civilian casualties could be catastrophic.”
“Then we stop it.”
The zeta beamed chimed in with names from other teams.
Bruce’s spine stiffened.
He didn’t look right away.
But the second the elevator doors hissed open, he felt his children stepping into the command center, all in uniform, eyes hard, silent.
*inserts all the teams since I'm lazy. Titans, outlaws etc*
“You're here,” Diana said, relief in her voice. “We need all of you. This won’t be easy.”
They nodded to Diana and some gave their thumbs up as they made their way to center of the room.
no one spoke to Bruce.
Not even when they passed right by him to take their stations.
It was like he didn’t exist.
Bruce’s throat tightened.
He stood a few feet away, eyes locked on the growing red target displayed on the screen. He listened to the mission parameters, gave input when necessary. But it all felt… distant.
Detached.
They didn’t bother to speak to him. Didn’t ask questions. Didn’t even spare him a look.
Not one of them.
Bruce said nothing because he knew he deserved it.
Because he’d trained them to survive without him, and now they were showing him how well they’d learned.
But as the mission briefing concluded and they were sent to prepare—
A quiet, sick feeling curled in Bruce’s chest.
He’d faced gods and monsters.
But he wasn’t sure he could handle this kind of war.
——————
The sky was on fire.
Burning metal and streaks of plasma lit up the upper atmosphere as the Justice League clashed with a massive alien warship careening toward Earth. It was chaos. Coordinated, professional chaos. but chaos all the same.
Batman was at the front, where danger was thickest.
The Batkids worked like a machine. Robin and Orphan disabling internal systems, Red Robin pulling up infiltration schematics on the fly, Red Hood clearing out hostiles with brutal efficiency. Nightwing, ever the field general, called shots, directed movements, danced through it all like a phantom in the storm.
And Bruce put himself between them and everything else.
Every blast, every swipe of a blade, every arc of energy. he took it before they could.
Because he could still be a shield if not a father.
He’d protect them with what little he had left.
And maybe that would be enough.
A mistake was all it took.
A single misstep in the midst of precision.
A beam of crimson light tore across the corridor, aimed for his kids. fast, searing, deadly.
Bruce didn’t think.
He threw himself in front of it.
The pain was instant.
Blinding.
A brutal hiss of molten heat as the blast punched through the lower left of his abdomen, slicing deep, tearing muscle and tissue like paper. The sound he made was a breathless, broken grunt as his knees buckled.
The others didn’t see it at first, not until the lights flashed again, and a spell triggered.
Zatanna’s voice echoed from somewhere in the comms—"Get them out of there! I’m casting the failsafe now!"
And then everything shattered into white.
——————
The landing was jarring.
It felt like being ripped sideways through time and space and thrown into a memory that didn’t belong to them anymore.
They hit the marble floor hard. Tim groaning as he caught himself, Jason twisting mid-air to land on his feet, Damian rolling instinctively into a crouch.
Cass was up before the others.
Dick caught himself with a grunt, turning quickly as his instincts screamed something’s wrong.
And that’s when they saw him.
Batman— Bruce— was on his knees, clutching his side.
Blood seeped through his armor. A lot of it. Fast.
He swayed once. Then fell forward with a harsh gasp.
“Bruce!” Dick shouted, racing to him, the name slipping out before he could stop himself.
The rest scrambled around him instantly, their training kicking in even if their emotions hadn’t caught up.
Jason tore open the utility belt. “He’s hit— Jesus, there's so much blood—”
“He threw himself in front of the blast,” Tim muttered, pale. “It should’ve hit Dick.”
Damian said nothing as he pulled off his gloves and pressed them directly to the wound, applying pressure. Bruce flinched violently, a cry tearing from his throat before he bit it back with iron-willed shame.
“No, no, don’t—” Bruce’s voice cracked, low and trembling. “Don’t… don’t be mad.”
They all froze.
Bruce curled in on himself like he could make the wound and himself disappear. Like if he just shrank enough, maybe they’d forget he existed. Maybe he wouldn’t ruin everything again.
“I didn’t mean to…” His voice was slurred now, weaker by the second. “I just didn’t want… didn’t want anyone else to get hurt…”
His breaths hitched violently, and a sob escaped him, half-choked, unintentional.
“I’m sorry,” he whispered, trying to curl tighter into the blood-soaked marble. “I didn’t mean to make you hate me more. I didn’t mean to ruin everything again—”
“Stop,” Dick said, voice sharp but trembling.
“Please,” Bruce rasped, eyes fluttering. “Just— I’ll be quiet. Don’t hate me. Don’t—”
“Bruce,” Tim said, cutting him off, “you’re bleeding out. You have to stay awake.”
Bruce didn’t respond. Or maybe he couldn’t.
His hands twitched as if to cover his face. hide his shame like a scolded child. but they were too weak now. They dropped with a dull slap onto the marble, smearing crimson across the floor.
Cass looked up then.
And that’s when they noticed where they were.
Wayne Manor.
But wrong.
Too clean.
Too quiet.
There were no signs of life. no clutter of half finished coffee cups, no stray training gear left in corners, no echoes of footsteps down the halls. The walls were spotless. The rooms seemed empty. Lifeless.
Like a photograph of what their home used to be, before it had ever really been lived in.
Cold.
Sterile.
Dead.
“What the hell…” Jason muttered.
“It’s not the real manor,” Tim said, gaze sweeping the room like he was trying to decode it. “I think the spell dropped us into something else. A pocket dimension, maybe. A construct.”
Damian scowled. “Why this?”
But Cass was staring at Bruce.
Still bleeding.
Still trying to be small. To be invisible.
She took a single step forward.
“dad,” she said softly.
He flinched at the word. Flinched like he’d been hit again.
“I’m sorry,” he whispered again, eyes glassy and unfocused. “I didn’t mean to mess it all up. You were happy. You were together. I didn’t want to ruin that. I just… I didn’t want to lose you.”
His head rolled slightly as the blood loss overtook him, and his voice became a murmur. “You hate me. I know. It’s okay. I just… I just wanted to keep you safe.”
Dick stared at him.
And for a moment, he didn’t see Batman.
He saw Bruce Wayne.
Wounded. Broken. Bleeding.
Begging not for forgiveness, but simply not to be hated in his last moments.
And something in his chest twisted so violently he couldn’t breathe.
He dropped to his knees beside him.
“Bruce—”
But Bruce was already slipping, going limp in their arms.
——————
The silence after Bruce collapsed was suffocating.
They barely breathed.
Tim was already pressing gauze to Bruce’s side, working quickly despite trembling hands. Jason crouched behind him, supporting Bruce’s weight, his grip tight like he thought letting go meant losing him entirely. Cass hovered near Bruce’s head, fingers trembling just above his temple, unsure if touching would comfort him or make things worse. Damian stood rigidly, fists clenched, eyes locked on Bruce’s paling face with unspoken panic simmering behind the mask of control.
Dick just knelt there watching the man who raised him curl inward like a kicked dog.
Watching him bleed out, whispering apologies between gasps of pain.
A Clatter was heard in the quiet of the manor.
The sharp crash of metal on marble startled all of them.
They turned.
A tray lay on the floor just past the archway into the dining hall, its contents scattered. tea, some kind of soup, and shattered porcelain.
Beside it stood a man.
Slender. Regal. Dressed immaculately in the traditional black and white uniform of a butler. His dark hair was neatly combed and untouched by gray. His expression was frozen in shocked confusion, eyes darting from the blood on the floor to the strange group of masked intruders crouched around a dying man.
It was Alfred.
But not the Alfred they knew.
This version was decades younger. Barely older than Dick was now. His hands trembled slightly, one still half raised as if to steady the tray that had long since fallen.
“What in God’s name—” he started, voice younger, smoother.
Before another voice cut across the air like a thunderclap.
“Who in the hell are you?”
They whipped around again.
Standing at the base of the grand staircase was a tall man in a tailored three piece suit, his presence commanding the room before he even moved. Dark hair swept back, not a strand out of place. A neatly trimmed mustache gave weight to the sharp lines of his face.
And his eyes.
Cold, blue and piercing.
They looked just like Bruce’s.
Jason took an unconscious step back. “No way…”
Tim’s mouth was dry. “That’s…”
“Thomas Wayne,” Dick finished, his voice almost hollow.
He didn’t need confirmation. They all recognized him. From photographs, portraits, even nightmares Bruce never voiced.
But seeing him alive, seeing the man who had haunted the backbones of every decision Bruce ever made was another thing entirely.
Thomas’s gaze swept across them with immediate disapproval. “I asked you a question. Who are you? What are you doing in my home?” His eyes flicked down to the man crumpled in their arms. “And what have you done to that man?”
They froze.
None of them knew what to say.
Cass instinctively moved closer to Bruce, protectively curling around his unconscious form. Damian took a step forward, eyes narrowed, body tense, ready to defend, not even realizing this was his grandfather.
Jason’s jaw clenched. “We didn’t hurt him.”
Thomas stared at him flatly. “Then explain why he’s bleeding all over my floor.”
“He saved us,” Tim said quickly. “There was an attack. He got caught in the crossfire.”
“An attack?” Thomas raised an eyebrow. “By whom? You lot look more like paramilitary operatives than victims.”
Alfred, still stunned, stepped forward, voice unsure. “Sir, I—They… I’ve never seen them before. But they appeared from nowhere. Just now. Like— like magic.”
Thomas scoffed. “Magic. Wonderful.”
His tone was clipped. Dismissive.
He approached slowly, deliberately, stopping several feet from them, towering presence radiating authority.
he hadn’t looked at Bruce yet.
Not really.
Just the blood.
Just the mess.
And Bruce who was barely conscious, trembling, trying to move, suddenly whimpered something so soft, it could barely be heard.
“I’m sorry, Father…”
Thomas blinked.
“…what?”
Bruce’s lips moved again, cracked and raw. “I tried. I tried to be good. I didn’t mean to disappoint you…"
The words weren’t for Thomas, not really.
They were echoes of raw pain bleeding through unconscious delirium, a child’s fear hidden in the voice of a dying man.
But it was enough.
Thomas’s eyes narrowed, slow realization creeping in. “What did he just call me?”
Jason stood abruptly, eyes hard. “nothing.”
“Answer me,” Thomas barked.
Tim rose as well, stepping in front of Bruce instinctively. “You won’t understand. You’re not supposed to know.”
“I won’t understand?” Thomas’s voice sharpened, his posture tightening. “You show up unannounced in my home, injured and armed, and this man— who clearly knows me is bleeding out on my floor, calling me ‘Father’? You better start explaining before I call the authorities.”
Cass’s voice cut through, quiet and cold, “You can't. He’s dying.”
That silenced Thomas for a beat.
She gestured down at Bruce, who now had more blood soaking into the marble beneath him. His skin was pale. His breaths were shallow. But his hands were still curled like he was trying to hide, to make himself small.
To not burden anyone else.
Even here.
Even now.
Damian’s voice was a low growl. “He threw himself in front of a blast that should’ve hit Nightwing. He saved us. He always saves us.”
Thomas finally looked down.
And saw.
Not just the blood.
But the man that looked older than him.
Covered in scars, in bruises, in armor torn and scorched. His face, though pale and soaked with sweat, was unmistakable.
It was him.
His own face, years from now. Broken.
“Who…?” he murmured.
And Dick, despite everything, felt his throat tighten as he answered.
“…That’s your son.”