"Please, Father, don't go!" Damian cried, wrapping himself around Bruce's leg in a feeble attempt to slow him. "Damian, Alfred and I will only be gone a few days." He promised, crouching to detach the boy. "And you know we always come back."
Damian couldn't argue this. Bruce went on trips for Wayne Enterprises and off-world missions with the League from time to time, and Alfred occasionally joined him on the former. "I'm hardly worried about that, Father." The boy scoffed. "There just may not be anything to come back to with Grayson in charge."
No matter how old his children got, Bruce had never left them home alone for more than a day. If he and Alfred couldn't be there, Bruce would call in Clark, Diana, or some other trusted ally to babysit. Unfortunately, no one had been available this time, and Bruce had had no choice but to finally allow the older Batkids to watch the younger.
"You're sure you can handle this?" Bruce asked Dick as he handed over a squirming Damian. "Wow, questioning the golden child?" Jason smirked as he and Barbara came in. "It's like he doesn't trust us."
Bruce ran a hand through his hair as he sighed. Of course, he trusted his oldest son. It was just that the boy had a habit of biting off more than he could chew. Hopefully, having Barbara and Jason share the responsibility would keep Dick grounded.
"We'll be fine Dad." Dick promised as Alfred honked the car horn. Bruce hoped he was right as he ruffled Damian's hair and ran off to catch his ride.
iii
Bruce, as usual, had been over-prepared. Tim and Damian were both double digits now and didn't need as much supervision. Cass had always been rather independent, although she had specific instructions not to let Stephanie talk her into any crazy schemes.
Alfred had done his best to set his young charges up for success on their time on their own. He had cooked two weeks' worth of meals to be warmed up at designated times. He had even made sure that they all had a month's worth of clean clothes.
Barbara was in charge of getting them all to school on time, while Dick would handle life around The Manor. Everything was going to be fine.
-------
"I expect a full apology from the old man when he gets back and finds all of us fine." Red Hood told Nightwing as they watched the streets of Gotham from the rooftops. "You should record it." The older hero smirked.
There was a beat of silence before he turned to his brother. "Do you think it was really a good idea to let Red Robin and Robin go off on their own tonight?" Red Hood rolled his eyes so hard it could practically be seen on his mask.
"Just when I get away from B's worrying, you fill the void. Both of you baby them too much. They are fully trained. They are fine." Nightwing was prepared to argue when the Batsignal lit up the night sky. He sighed as he and Red Hood grappled to the light.
iii
After a whole run around with the officers insisting that this was a job for Batman, Commissioner Gordon explained the details of a drug cartel trying to set roots in the city's underbelly. The GCPD couldn't infiltrate without tipping the bosses off or risking officers' lives, so naturally, they had called Batman for a no-nonsense takedown.
Red Hood grumbled as he stared through a high window into the drug den. Since when were they expendable soldiers for the police? He had half a mind to disable the stupid signal and let them handle their own problems.
"Hood, did you get that?" Nightwing asked, snapping him from his thoughts. "Yeah, yeah. Let's get this done." Nightwing nodded and broke off to slip in through an adjacent window.
On the mark, Red Hood threw in the smoke grenades and dived in. There was yelling coming from different parts of the room. The louder voices, probably the bosses, were demanding to know what the hell was going on. But through the din, Red Hood could hear something else.
Someone was coughing, choking on the smoke. As crazy as it sounded, something felt off; he could almost recognize something distinct about it. As he fired shots into the fray, a heap of black and blue on the ground caught his eye. Nightwing!
His rebreather was over his mouth, but he must have breathed in a good amount of the smoke to be crumpled over like that. Red Hood charged toward his downed brother, but a pile of crates toppled over in front of him, blocking the way. He swore as he fought his way over.
Most of the thugs were going to get away, but they could hunt them down later. Red Hood was prepared to lay down cover fire as soon as his feet hit the ground but stopped short. Nightwing's prone form was gone.
A car was revving just outside, and Red Hood bolted out the door, guns blazing, trying to hit one of the getaway cars and maybe even a goon who would give up intel. And, of course, they shot back, catching Red Hood in the leg.
Even as he went down, he emptied his clip but still only managed to blow out the tail lights and make holes in the back doors as the drivers swerved around the corner and disappeared.
-------
Red Hood ground his teeth so hard that by the time he made it back to The Cave, his jaw was all but locked.
Cass had tried to call Leslie, but Jason shot the notion down. She would call Bruce and Alfred, and with Dick as a hostage, Bruce would never leave them unsupervised again. The others relented, and Tim did his best to patch Jason up.
"I'm gonna kill Dickhead when we get him back." Jason grumbled. "Why the hell didn't he get his rebreather on before we went in?"
"He wasn't supposed to need it." Damian scoffed. "Like hell he wasn't." The older boy huffed. "He called for Sigma Omega. What did he think was going to was gonna happen?"
"He called for Phi Beta. I heard you guys over the comms." Barbara told him as she came over. "You weren't supposed to drop the grenades. You blindsided him." Jason swore under his breath. "Once we get him back, no one tells Batman. Got it?" He tried to swing his legs over the side of the examination table, but Tim pushed him back.
"Where do you think you're going? You got shot in the leg. You have a splint. You're lucky it's only soft tissue damage, and they missed the bone. You're gonna be on bed rest and then crushes for weeks. Going back out there right now will get you killed!" "We will get Dick." Cass promised. "You rest now."
"And just so we're clear, I will take no responsibility when Father interrogates you about your injury." Damian half smirked as he and the others went to track down Nightwing.
III
Red Robin would never complain about the tracking chips in their uniforms ever again as he, Orphan, and Robin loomed over an old apartment building near the edge of Gotham. "Nightwing is defiantly in the building, but walls are too thick for me to pinpoint an exact position." Oracle told them.
"Then we search the whole place." Red Robin instructed. "Iota Omega and rondeau back here. And stay out of sight. The last thing we need is another hostage." The young heroes split up to cover more ground.
Thanks to a few drops of acid on the already-rusted burglar bars, Robin was able to slip into the basement level with ease. His search didn't even take a minute as he spotted his brother chained in a corner in the second room he checked.
"What are you doing here?" Nightwing whispered as Robin picked the locks off his binds. "Rescuing you as usual." He declared. "Honestly, why didn't you get yourself out of these?"
"They said they had Hood and that he was in bad shape and that if I tried anything, they'd put him out of his misery." "Well, as smart as they were to play on your weaknesses, Red Hood is safe back in The Cave, probably coming up with a plausible story to tell Father about what happened to his leg."
The chains dropped to the floor with a clatter, and Nightwing stretched for a second before grabbing his utility belt and escrima sticks that had been tossed across the room. "Nightwing is secure." Robin reported only to hear the muffled pops of gunfire coming from above them.
"We have trouble." Orphan called across the line. Her search had yielded the rather peeved drug lords, who had immediately opened fire. "I'll cover her. You guys get out." Red Robin ordered.
The oldest and youngest boys gave each other the same look and dashed up the stairs. No one was getting left behind this time.
-------
"Bruce, sweetie, I'm sure they're fine." Selina said over the phone as she approached the front doors of Wayne Manor. The man hadn't been gone a week and would be home in 36 hours. Even though he had called and texted each of his children daily, he could feel in his gut that something was off.
"Alright. I'm here now, and I'll call you when I leave. But you owe me a nice night when you get back." Selina hung up as she rang the bell and smiled at Barbara when she answered.
Cass and the boys were all scattered around The Manor, but once she saw they were all safe and sound (Jason had called in a favor with Zatanna to heal his leg), she was on her way to report that Bruce should have more faith in his children.
They could handle themselves for a few days.