Brothers Until Time Shatters

13

Jason woke up blearily as he felt someone lift him off the floor of the Bat Jet and carry him out. "I don't need to be carried," he mumbled blearily. "I can walk."

"I know you can, Jay," Clark, for it was Superman himself, said kindly. "But you can sleep. It's ok."

Jay muttered something to himself, but he fell back asleep before he could do anything about it.

Dick watched Jay be carried away as Jon helped him walk out of the plane. "I can't believe how much I missed because of Talia."

Jon shrugged as best he could. Dick was actually supporting himself pretty well, but he was still leaning heavily on Jon. "Mom always says everything happens for a reason. Because you were incapacitated, Tim and Jason and Dami actually learned to get along. Not that that will probably last long now that you're back."

Dick chuckled. "Probably not. But I'm glad they at least had each other. Even if they were at each other's throats."

"They actually seemed to get along pretty well."

"Ooooh, spooky."

Jon just laughed. "You bet it was! I'd never met Tim and Jason before, but from Damian's stories, and yours too, I imagined they would be terrors, but they're actually pretty nice."

"Pretty nice?" Tim asked from behind them, sounding offended. "We're extremely nice." He glanced at where Jason was being carried into a room by Superman. "Well, most of us are anyways."

Dick nodded, but his mind was elsewhere. A picture on the wall of the Watchtower had made him remember something. "Has Wally snapped out of his coma yet?"

Tim looked stricken. "I'm afraid not, Dick. They're talking about declaring him brain dead and unplugging him from life support. I'm sorry, Dick."

Dick just shook his head. "Then there's not a moment to lose. Tim, I assume you guys found the Devil's Notebooks?" When Tim nodded, Dick continued. "Good. Look, the list of ingredients isn't actually what I put down in the notebook. Go to the bank and find lock box number 1982. That's where the vial is that I made when I was trying to fix Wally. Give it to him IV and wait a couple of minutes. It should work. And if it doesn't . . ." a tiny grin spread across Dick's face, "he certainly can't get more brain dead than he already is."

Tim shook his head, but turned back to the Bat Jet. "The things I do for you."

"Love you too, Timmy!" Dick hollered before Jon finally got him into a room. "Wait a second, you're not going to stick my in this room all by my lonesome self are you? I was practically dead for a year, give or take, and you're just leaving me?"

Jon, who was halfway out the door, grinned. "Only until Jason and Damian are patched up. Then we'll put all of them in here with you."

"Oh goody." Dick surveyed the room as Jon left. "This is fine." He walked over to the bed and groped underneath the frame for a moment before he found it. He cackled quietly. "You guys should definitely not have put me in the room that I used as a kid. Amateurs."

******

"I still don't get it, Bruce." The entire room groaned at Hal's interjection. "Are you trying to tell me that the guy we've been working with for, what, five years? wasn't you?"

Bruce, who was examining his cowl and trying to decide whether the fabric was salvageable, didn't bother to look up. "Yes, Hal. As I keep telling you, I was under Talia's control for most of the last five years."

This was the exact same conversation they had been having for the past five hours. Jon had entered briefly to tell them that Damian was out of surgery and doing fine. He had needed extensive stitches as well as fluids, but other than that he had been fine. He was now resting easily in Dick's room along with Jason. Tim was still out doing whatever Dick had told him to do, and Jon was raiding the fridge.