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It’s not even something big that makes Tim start thinking about it, that’s the thing.
They’re all back at the Manor after a mission. It doesn't happen often, but it was the most convenient solution, or so everyone has tacitly agreed on.
When everyone’s done with breakfast, Dick says he has to rush to work.
He still takes time to hug Damian, ruffle Tim’s hair, kiss Jason, and then he’s out the door. It’s nothing that hasn’t happened before.
Nothing out of the ordinary, really, but when Tim looks at Bruce there’s something… off about him. For just a few seconds, Bruce’s face is completely blank, seemingly frozen, and his hand is clenched so tightly at the edge of the marble countertop that Tim half expects to hear a crack.
They’re all attuned to even miniscule twitches in facial expressions, and when it comes to Bruce, that’s more involuntary emotions he’s shown in quite a while, so Tim decides to investigate.
***
He takes some time analysing the breakfast issue. Interactions with Damian and himself he crosses out almost immediately. He briefly entertains that it was being left out that caused Bruce’s reaction, but he abandons that as well. That leaves Dick and Jason, but why would Bruce react that way?
Dick and Jason’s relationship is not exactly new, and Bruce never seemed to have a problem with it before.
Unless.
***
“That’s ridiculous.” Dick says.
“I know, I get it. At first I thought the same thing, but. Have you ever told him you’re…” Tim hesitates just as Dick says ‘Dating?’ and Jason says ‘Fucking?’
Dick punches Jason’s arm lightly.
Tim tries again. “Was he ever actually told?”
“What, like bringing your boyfriend over for dinner to introduce him to the family?” Jason asks, mockingly. “Wouldn’t work here, Timmy.”
“Besides, World’s Greatest Detective, right?” Dick adds. “He probably knew before we did.”
Right. Obviously.
***
“Bruce, what do you think about Jason and Dick?” Tim clears his throat. “You know, them being together?”
Bruce’s grunt from under the Batmobile is one of approval. Huh.
It takes at least twenty minutes and several issues solved before Bruce asks “Are Jason and Dick working on something?”
Tim is momentarily confused by the change of topic.
“Not that I know of, no.”
Bruce grunts in response, again, and goes back to whatever he was working on underneath the Batmobile. Great. Guess the conversation’s over, then.
***
“He can’t not know. It’s just not possible. He’s probably just playing some weird mind games.” Jason says.
“How can you be sure that he knows, if you’ve never told him?” Tim asks.
Jason gestures to Dick’s legs in his lap, before Dick nudges him with his foot to continue massaging his calves.
“Well…” Dick starts and then hesitates. “It’s not like we ever tried to hide it.”
“He walked in on us having sex in the Batcave last week.” Jason adds.
Ew. Gross.
“So why is he… is he in denial, or something?”
“Told you, he’s probably playing some weird mind games. Wouldn't be the first time.” Jason scoffs, arms now crossed. Dick digs his toes into one of them.
Dick’s tone is more gentle. “Tim, what do you think is more plausible - that he hasn’t noticed we’ve been dating for years, or that he was thinking about something else, and it got him upset enough to crack marble?”
***
“Bruce. I don't know how else to put it, but it’s important that you hear this.”
Bruce, to his credit, puts down the device he was working on and sits next to Tim.
“I’m listening.”
“Dick and Jason, they’re in a relationship.” Bruce’s left eye starts to twitch slightly. Tim takes a deep breath to settle himself. “As in, they’re having sex.” When Bruce doesn’t react, Tim presses forward. “Which, you should know, because you apparently caught them recently.”
Bruce’s face does the weird smoothing-out thing, before he dons a fatherly smile.
“Tim, walk with me?”
“Sure.” He agrees, feeling completely off-kilter.
They stop at the costume displays when Bruce speaks up again.
“Tim. I know you’re at the age when you’re starting to have… these kinds of thoughts…”
“I’m twenty-three.” Tim mumbles.
“...but it wasn’t that. They were sparring.”
***
Tim leans back on the Bat-console before relaying the conversation to Dick and Jason.
“Look, I don’t know what kind of ‘sparring’ Bruce does when we’re not around, but...” Dick starts and then stops.
“Bruce caught us just as we were about to fuck on the console. Pants down, dicks out, you couldn’t mistake it for anything else.” Jason adds.
Tim rips his hand away from the console with disgust.
“Relax, it’s probably been sterilised ten times since then.”
***
“I still don’t know what you see in him.”
“There’s a lot to like.” Dick says, wistfully. “He’s a big softie. The whole ‘tough guy’ thing is just an act.” Dick says, latching onto Jason’s arm and looking at him completely enamored. Jason just looks constipated. “He’s all about romance, really. If we agree to meet up on a rooftop, I’ll get there as Nightwing, and Jay is dressed up to the nines, actual fancy suit and all. Flowers all around, gourmet food, all that. ”
Jason chooses this moment to make eye contact with Tim and hack-spit on the ground. There’s no way he even takes a shower regularly, Dick is clearly going insane.
***
Jason has planned to spend the entire afternoon on the couch, but. There’s a knock at the door.
“You open it.” Dick says, because of course he does. He only adds “please and thank you” after Jason gets up.
There is no one outside the door, which obviously means that Bruce is doing his ridiculous disappearing routine, but there’s nothing left on the doorstep either.
A muffled yelp makes Jason turn around in a second, and within three more, he’s taken out his gun with a finger on the trigger.
Batman is halfway through dragging Dick out of the window when Jason fires the shot.
“You shot him. You shot our dad.” Dick says, looking down on the fire escape where Bruce is lying, spread out like a starfish.
“Non-lethal. Plus, I aimed at the cowl.”
***
Dick’s apartment reeks. Tim wrinkles his nose and goes to open a window.
“You could’ve aired it out before I got here.”
“Sorry, we just finished.” Dick says with a wink.
“Also, you weren’t invited. And I wouldn't sit there.” Jason adds, when Tim is about to sit down on the couch. Ugh.
Anyway. He’s here on a suspicious errand, and he’s not even sure who he would like to ally with, because they’re all equally annoying.
“Look, Bruce wanted me to bring you guys an olive branch, as it were.” He says, before pointing to the cake tray. "Even though Jason shot him. I’m not sure you should eat it, though. I assume it’s laced with a sedative.”
“Sounds like B.” Dick says. “But there’s no way he made the cake, and it smells delicious.”
“So, do we eat it or...” is what he hears before he loses consciousness.
***
It takes a while for Tim to wake up completely. He’s sitting on a chair, limbs immobile - arms tied behind the back, legs to the chair. He's in the Batcave, that is certain.
Dick and Jason, next to him, are in the same predicament. As far as he can see, they've mostly managed to untie themselves already.
Bruce, standing in front of them, is wearing the Batsuit. Seeing how there’s a bead of sweat just under the cowl, and his clenched left hand, the conversation while he was unconscious must’ve been rather difficult. He’s halfway through one of the knots when Bruce starts talking.
“I just don’t understand how you can continue. Dick, we talked about this.” Bruce says.
Jason seems about to hurl himself, chair and all, right at him. “Bruce. If you call me a ‘just a little boy’ again I swear I’ll kill you and everyone you care about. Not you, Dickie, obviously.“ Jason says with a wink. “Timmy might get it, though.” He adds. Dick turns to Tim to mouth ‘he’s just joking’ at him.
Bruce ignores that. “Dick. He’s just so young.”
“Bruce. Do you even know how old any of us are?” Tim asks weakly, without expecting an answer. Halfway through with untying himself.
Jason pipes up. “Dick, I didn’t want to say it, but I was completely sure the gift for your thirtieth was from Alfred. No way B had even thought about it.”
Bruce sighs deeply “I’m trying to keep you on the right path.”
“You tried to drug us with cake. That you said was a peace offering!" Dick has ditched all the restraints in order to gesture.
“I didn’t put any sedatives in the cake, I knew you wouldn’t fall for it. The cake tray had a release valve for the sedative gas.” Of course it did.
“We’ve been together for years, Bruce!” Jason says.
“Five years.” Dick says.
“Five years, two months and three days. If you’re counting from our first kiss, which, I do.” Jason adds.
That’s so embarrassing. Dick, however, is positively starry eyed.
“Jason…” his bottom lip wobbles. “That’s so romantic!”
“Yeah, whatever.” Jason mumbles. His ears are pink.
At least he gets some blackmail material on Jason out of it.
“Look, Bruce. Could you take something out of my jacket pocket since, you know, my hands are tied?” Jason gestures with his barely bound hands.
“Is it-”
“It’s not a bomb, Bruce.”
“Well, you shot me.”
“Because you tried to kidnap Dick like a creeper at a playground!”
It’s just a little box. Bruce clutches his chest as if having a theatrical heart attack.
“Can you look at the receipt? Tell us how long ago it was bought?” Jason asks.
“...Five years”. Bruce barely manages to say.
Tim tries to mouth ‘what’ to Dick, but Dick is staring at Jason, completely oblivious to anything else.
“I bought it a month after we became official, but there was never a good time, and…” Jason tries to hunch down to make himself smaller, and he somewhat succeeds, which is pretty impressive on its own.
“Jason…”
“Would you make me the happiest brother in the world…” Jason starts. A loud, pained wheeze from Bruce’s general direction “and marry me?”
An even louder, more pained wheeze from Bruce.
He’d look, but he can’t tear his eyes away from the trainwreck next to him. Jason and Dick are desperately clutching each other as if they've just survived a life-or-death encounter, as if this was some big revelation. Jason looks like he might start crying.
Bruce, meanwhile, has collapsed to the floor. They should probably check if he’s still alive at some point.