-The first part in a spooky series!! Whiches, ghosts, and skeletons stay tuned!-
Lighting flashed, allowing a short still of the lone, macabre, manor; one window lit. Thunder then took her turn, growling like a bear as she rumbled through the clouds.
"Dad, can I go out?" the twelve-year-old begged, waiting for the next flash to illuminate the sprawling lawns.
"No, Jason." His father sighed, face illuminated by the screen of his laptop. The storm had knocked the power out almost an hour ago, in which time a heavy fog had rolled in around the house, ensuring no repairs would be made until the morning at least.
"Why?"
"It's not safe."
"It's just rain! I'm not gonna get struck by lightning!" He pleaded over the roaring orchestra of the outside world.
"I'm unable to find any more lights for you." Alfred said, carrying a candle holder, as the boys had claimed all the flashlights. "I shall search upstairs next."
"Thank you, Alfred." Bruce sighed, glaring over his laptop. He forced a neutral expression. "I thought you were too old to play in the rain."
"Yeah, but this is exciting!" Jason gestured towards the window as the garden lit up, bright white. "See! It's awesome! I'm not scared like Dick!"
The eight-year-old, hearing his name, crawled out of his blanket fort. "I am not SCARED! I'm cold!" Thunder growled and Dick ducked back into his fort,presumably to continue making shadow puppets with his faux candles.
"See? I just want to go out in the rain for a few minutes."
"I said no, Jason."
"How about you join me and Dickie?" Tim asked, sitting outside the blanket fort, holding a book the youngest brother had picked out. Even though he was small for your average teen, it was still tough to fit in the fort.
"Please! I'm twelve!"
"I'm fifteen."
"Yeah, but you're a coward!" Jason proclaimed. "You're too scared to learn parrallel parking!"
"Jason, shut up." Damian ordered, not looking up from his textbook.
Jason huffed, grabbing his flashlight and storming from the room. "FINE!"
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"Jason? Jason!" Bruce paused at the shoe rack and, sure as he's expected; Jason's boots were missing. "Goddamn it..." he ran a callassed hand through his hair. "Damian, go get your brother."
"How about you go get your son?"
"I just got back from work." Bruce said, as if it were obvious. "Now, please."
With a huff, the eldest rolled up off the sofa and stuffed his phone in his pocket, slipping on a pair of boots.
"Jacket." His father reminded.
"Christ! I Know!" He didn't bother zipping up the coat; shoving threw the door and into the inky rain.
"I'll leave a flashlight on the pourch for you." Bruce called. "To find the way back."
"Oh thanks." He spat, shaking droplets out of his hair already. "TODD! JASON?"
Bruce snapped the door shut against the wild sprays of rifle-fire rain.
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CRACK!
Bruce looked up from the screen at the unmistakable sound of wooden blinds hitting drywall upstairs; a gust of cold gripping the manor. Tim, who'd been reading to his brother, paused breifly before continuing.
Bruce glanced back down at his exel sheet and his eyes fixed on the digitabl time. "Goddamn it. What are they doing out there?" He grunted, standing and stretching. "Tim. watch Dick. I need to do this myself."
"I dunno, Bruce. This doesn't feel right." Tim admitted, breifly leaving the accumulated warmth of his kid brother's fort to face their father. "They've been gone almost ten minutes, and the fogs gotten pretty thick..."
"Well what do you suggest?" Bruce sighed. "We let you become the oldest sibling and forget about Jason?"
"I wish." Tim muttered. "But I have a bad feeling, you know. Damian should have found him withen four minutes."
"Enough of what should happen, alright?" Bruce asked, irritated. The room flooded with a fridgid chill, that cut through Tim's skinny arms and straight to his bones. "Ah damn." Bruce's voice spat from out in the hall.
"WHAT?" Dick asked, refusing to exit the safety and warmth of his fortress.
"NOTHING, DICKIE!" Bruce called back. "Just the light on the pourch went out. They're probably lost."
"Should we put one out for you?" Tim asked.
"No, conserve the flashlights we have."
"But what if you--"
"Tim, I've lived here long before you were born, I can find my way back." The door snapped shut and the icy draft was finally interupted.
"...Okay, Bye." The older boy muttered, crawling out of the fort.
Ten icy little fingers clasped around his ankle. "Tim! Where are you going?"
"I'm just putting a light outside for Bruce."
"You can't leave me alone!"
"I'll only be, like, ten seconds." Tim assured him. "And then we can watch a DvD on Bruce's laptop."
"No! I'm coming!" Dick squirmed out of the 'door' to his fort, and followed on his brother's heels, throw blanket wrapped around his shoulders.
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The storm raged on around the solitary manor. The fog was now thick enough that Tim couldn't see the magnolia tree, less than fifteen feet from the house.
More importantly, he couldn't see his siblings. Nor could he see his father.
The laptop was quite dead by now, and Dickie had his nose pressed flush to the window, sticky with the cold, his breath steaming up his view. "When will Bruce be back?"
"I don't know, Dickie."
"You should call him?"
"He left his phone here."
"Oh." Dick went back to staring out the window, silent. He was worried.
Tim was worried too, but he was better at hiding it. Still, he couldn't disguise the constant glances at the door, or the eager flinches when the wood on the pourch creaked. They were running out of flashlights, and the candles wereburnt down to their holders.
"Dickie, you seen Alfred?"
"He's still looking for batteries upstairs." The youngest said, eyes stuck to the chilly glass.
"Oh." Tim shifted in his seat, freezing despite his best efforts. Alfred had gone to find batteries an hour. Why was he still up there? Maybe he'd gotten distracted, but that wasn't like him...
"Tim?" The eight-year-old asked, his voice barely above a whisper.
"What's up?"
Dick paused, deep in thought, before finally pulling his face away from the window."Are you worried?"
"In general?"
"About them." He replied.
Tim thought over his reply. He wasn't eighteen and responsible, like Damian, nor was he twelve and honest like Jason; He was fifteen and doing his best. "Only a little... I might go out on the pourch and wait for them."
"NO!" Dick exclaimed, leaping off the loveseat and tripping over his trouser legs, running to his brother. "That's dumb! Don't! The other's aren't back! It's stupid! It's not safe!"
"I know, But I'm not going out, I'll just stand on the pourch where you can see me."
"But what if you're killed?!" Dick ordered. "What if they're all killed and they'll kill you next!"
"That's not happening, Dickie." Tim said, praying it didn't make him a liar. "Look, I'll stand where you can see me." Dick didn't seem impressed. "Look, you can hold Bruce's phone. if at any point you can't see me from the window, I want you to call the Gordons. Okay? And-- uh-- don't open the door unless you can see that it's me, okay?"
"Why? Is someone else out there?"
"No, it's just for safety! You know, Me and Jay aren't supposed to do that when we're left home alone."
"Tim. You can't go." Dick begged. "Please? Don't leave me home alone!"
"You aren't! Alfred's upstairs, remember?"
"But. But he hasn't--"
Tim cut him off, desperately trying to suppress that idea. "I'll be just outside! You can watch me from the widows, but PLEASE Stay inside for me?"
Dick looked up at him, eyes wobbling, but nodded. "fine."
"Be brave, okay?"
"Okay."
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"This is Vikki Vale, reporting on the events that transpired last night in and around the residence of billionaire philanthropist Bruce Wayne.
Just last night, a storm severed the power to about half of Gotham, including the area just outside Gotham.
"At eleven pm last night, Commissioner Gordon recieved a personal call from Wayne's youngest ward, eight year old Dick Grayson. When paremedics arived, they found Wayne, his son, and two of his wards disperesed throughout the nearby woods, as well as the family butler collapsed upstairs.
"Only eight miles outside gotham, a containment lab, responsible for disposing of the excess of bio weapons in the city, experienced a breach due to the outage. This breach caused a cloud of The Scarecrow's fear toxin to escape and form around the surrounding mile.
"Thankfully, there are no aparent Fatalities, although early this morning the Waynes were taken to Gotham General hospital for inspection and treatment. We are still awaiting an updatefrom the staff, though it seems they are in stable condition.
"We request that none of you venture down highway fourteen until the containment crew confirm that the air is safe to breath. Stay tuned four our update at eight am eastern standard time, and stay safe."