A Chance

-10-

Dick was nervous.

He had every right to be nervous honestly, those GIW agents were still hanging around and could strike at any moment. So far he had no way of defending himself, Danny, AND Alfred until they struck. Sure Dick could defeat them in hand to hand combat, but as they have obviously shown, they're going to try to avoid that.

Dick wanted to leave actually, he wanted to settle in one of their safe houses on the other side of Gotham. But he decided they should stay, because 1. Alfred was technically in charge and he wasn't sure that the butler would appreciate abandoning the manor 2. It was way too dangerous to let the GIW have free reign of the Batcave 3. Their identities might be compromised and that's a big problem.

There, of course, was the question of calling Bruce in. Dick decided they could handle this on their own, Bruce put Dick in charge of Danny's safety and he wasn't about to back down because the agents got loose. But he should at least let Bruce know about that. So while Danny recuperated on the medical table he shot Bruce a quick text about the escaped agents but they were fine, and yeah of course if it got too much he'd call him, yada yada yada.

In any case, Dick had a fair amount of anxiety bubbling under his skin, but he bottled it up for the sake of the child whose trust in him was trepidatious at best. He couldn't afford to have Danny run off like he had earlier, the agents were here for him and weren't above murdering anyone in their path.

They managed to get to Dick's room without incident, not seeing hide nor hair of any GIW since the attack on Alfred. Which he definitely made it a priority to figure out how on earth Danny knew Alfred was in trouble, because that could come in handy. Also he really needed to figure out how the agents even escaped, but the fact that they could turn invisible was not lost on him. If they could do that, what else could they do? Bruce was the one decoding their files, Dick had been at school and hadn't been able to help much in that department. He was paying for it now.

Stupid school.

On the brighter side of things, the young vigilante happily noted that Danny seemed to be more content in Dick's arms. He rested fully against him instead of huddling tensely like he did the first time Dick ever held him. It wasn't much of a step up, in fact he still wasn't even holding onto him, but it was progress.

Speaking of progress, Dick needed info and fast. The acrobat didn't want to ask too many questions right after the stressful impromptu surgery they did on his leg, but being in the dark wasn't something he thought they could afford at the moment. But he did relent to a more easygoing, less 'interrogating' conversation. The last thing this kid needed was a broken promise from their tentative trust that he had to keep reminding the boy was there.

"Alright Danny, I'm going to set you down on the floor, I'll grab some paper and crayons." Dick said, looking behind him as he lowered the boy to the ground. Alfred was behind him, both silently agreeing none of them should be alone while the agents were still out and about.

Danny plopped gently onto the floor, sitting still and waiting as Dick moved off to scower his desk for some paper. Alfred settled into the chair near the balcony after having grabbed a book from one of the bookshelves. The acrobat found some discarded math homework, granted it was graph paper it might have to do. Thankfully he found some other papers, old assignments with print on the front but the backs were clean. He grabbed those and the pack of crayons in the drawer, keeping the graph paper just in case.

He returned to Danny and fell into a criss-cross, placing some white paper in front of Danny and himself then splaying the crayons.

He could tell Danny was looking at him, the boy grabbed at his pant leg and leaned away. Dick disliked when Danny did that, he knew it was probably because he was uncomfortable but he hated not knowing how to fix it.