Chapter Text
Sir? Sir, you haven't checked in in almost two hours, are you in need of assistance? Are the entourage with you?
“Alfie?” Bruce whimpered, “I- I don't know where- I'm in the city but I don't know.”
“Master Bruce?”
“Are you really real, Alfie? I- I hear you i-in this hat.” a sniffled, “Alfie ‘m so cold.”
“Master Dick, enough of these jokes- What channel is Master Bruce on?”
“Alfie please.”
“By Jove… I- I'm on my way, alright Sir? Sit tight. Miss Leslie is on standby.”
“I have an ‘ppointment?”
Alfred hesitated.
“Just a check-up, Sir. I'm coming to pick you up. I just need you to do a few quick things. Press twice on your ear, a car should approach you soon after, get in and say ‘Safe House B’. Any questions, just ask me. Do you understand?”
“Uh.. press on my ear,” Bruce murmured as he did it. He could hear Alfred rushing around, jingling car keys in the background. After a few long, scary moments, the Batmobile appeared. “Alfie, is this the car?”
“One moment Sir..” Alfred mumbled as he logged into the cowl's lens recording, “Yes Sir, pop yourself into the passenger seat for me.”
“‘Kay.”
“Very good, Sir. Just say ‘Safe House B’ for me. I will be there when you arrive. You are safe in that car. I promise.”
“S-safe House B,” Bruce said, jumping out of shock when the car began to zoom out of the alley he was in. “Alfie, it's scary fast!” Bruce cried.
“You're okay, Young Sir, I promised you, didn't I?”
-
“A-Alfie? The car stopped.”
“I know, Sir, I was just on the phone, I'm coming to get you, a moment.”
The second the door opened, Bruce threw himself onto the butler.
“Alfie! Alfie- I don't look right and I don't know where Mommy is and Daddy's at work and- and- and I kept hearing voices in this silly hat! And there's a bat on the car!” Bruce sobbed and wailed into Alfred's shoulder, having to hunch down just to achieve it.
“I know, I know. Come, let's get you changed out of this silly outfit, hm?” Alfred offered, voice soft and lacking in its usual judgemental and sarcastic tone. Bruce sniffled and nodded in response.
“Want my- my puppy pyjamas, Alfie,” Bruce requested with a deep sniff to rectify all of the snot and tears that had come from his crying.
Alfred froze, not a bit of him wanting to break the news to Bruce that his puppy pyjamas were long gone and also probably could not even fit the man's leg after the 30 or so years of growing since their last usage.
“I think we have some nicer, more comfortable ones for you, Sir. Your puppy pyjamas are in the washing at the moment.”
“But- what ‘bout the other ones Daddy got me so I could wear it? It's in my bedroom, Alfie- when are we going home? Why am I so tall? I wanna- where did Mommy go?”
“She's busy, Sir.”
“No! No- Alfie she was with me! We was in the kitchen!”
“I know, I know my boy. I'll get it sorted, We'll find out what happened.”
Tears began to fall again as Bruce's hands shook.
“Alfie… it hurts so bad- everythin’,” Bruce whimpered, coughing out his sobs.
“Shh, come along, let's get you changed and looked at, hm? Miss Leslie is just next door waiting for you.”
“Kay… T-then we find Mommy an’ Daddy?”
Alfred couldn't bring himself to answer that.
-
“Alfie, I don’ like it,” Bruce argued, backing away from the horrible satin material, “It hurts!”
“That is ridiculous, Bruce, it is merely material,” Alfred argued back, following with an exhausted sigh. “Fine, let me.. I believe you may have…” The butler trailed off, rifling through the sparse drawers of the Safe house before he finally found a plain t-shirt and basketball shorts. He just couldn't be bothered to fight over something so menial.
Bruce just about managed to dress himself, if not for the backwards shirt. Alfred sighed and approached the man turned toddler.
“Arms in,” he spoke gently, humming as Bruce listened to the instructions and he got to twist the shirt right way around, “There we go, arms out. Perfectly spiffy, Sir. Now, let us get you to your check-up.”
“‘Cause I'm all weird?”
Alfred sighed, memories about poor word choices over the years flooding his mind.
“Not weird, Sir, just a bit poorly. Come along.”
They went down a hall and to a small room with an old looking lift in it.
“Wha's this, Alfie?” Bruce asked, worriedly hanging onto Alfred's arm.
“Just a lift to take us up to Miss Leslie's, Sir. And there's a few friends to meet you as well, they’re going to help figure out why you’re so poorly.”
“What about finding Mommy?” Bruce asked.
“I will get right on that once I have determined that you are okay, dear boy.”
-
Bruce sat on the observation table as Leslie and a stranger made of metal and skin checked over him. There were stickers and wires on his forehead and he had to be put into an embarrassing gown. The man just sobbed and sobbed, begging Leslie and Alfred to take him home, but Leslie only continued to work and Alfred stood in silence with his head down at the door.
Leslie had barely gotten to do much anyways, any touch hurt Bruce. She made a small attempt to pinpoint the pain but the soft pressure and words ‘Does this hurt?’ were interrupted by Bruce sobbing and trying to kick her away.
“Stop! Stop- stop it hurts, Miss! Please!” Bruce blubbered and screamed, the man of metal and skin frowned and forced himself to look straight at the computers.
Alfred couldn’t sit still anymore, he hurried to Bruce’s side and held his ward’s hand.
“Shh, come on, my boy. You’re okay,” He softly murmured, wiping away Bruce’s unruly hair from the man’s sweaty brow. He turned to Leslie and Victor, “No more examinations. If you must then you will sedate him- I don’t… Have either of you figured out anything or is watching him suffer entertainment for you bastards?”
Leslie opened her mouth to argue, something she hadn’t done with Alfred in possibly years, but Victor managed to speak first, simultaneously working on putting a respirator over Bruce’s face, one that Alfred knew to be for putting Bruce to sleep.
“Yes, Mr Pennyworth, his mind has simply regressed to what he was thirty-five years ago. So, he’s, for what we know, a five year old. He has the mind, and unfortunately the pain threshold, of a child. I… You can tell him what you would like, this affects none of the past, we aren’t dealing with time travel.”
“I don’t understand what could have happened, he was in combat with bloody Killer Moth and the Riddler all night, how could either of them have done this to him?”
“I’ll look into what I can, Mr Pennyworth but I’m pretty sure it’s some sort of magic.”
Alfred just bit his tongue, knowing all of the sarcasm that threatened to pour from his mouth would help nobody and nothing.
Knock-knock
“Alfred? It’s Clark and Diana, may we come in?” Came Clark’s voice from just outside the medbay. Alfred knew they had already seen everything, Bruce had said something or another about them both being on the watchtower before he left for patrol and Alfred knew that if Bruce was there, Clark and Diana would find out.
“Yes, come in,” Alfred muttered, sighing and straightening up as Bruce finally went completely under sedation, “I suppose you both have already gotten the brief on what has happened,” Alfred said as they walked in.
“We have and I hate to say it but currently the JLD is unavailable,” said Diana.
“So he’s just going to have to be like this indefinitely? Until some stupid drunk and a sloppy rent-a-witch finally remember he exists?”
The room stiffened and all that could be heard was Bruce’s shaking breaths and the steady sounds of observation machines.
“All the stupid crap he pulls for you. A man being the saving hand of Gods and monsters. Bloody foolish is what this organisation is.”
Nobody answered the old butler. Frankly, nobody had seen Alfred get so emotional. Not enough to speak so much, not enough to shout or shake like he was. Alfred had always been such a rock, even in the worst of Bruce’s times.
Alfred let out a shaky exhale, he wasn’t used to being on the Watchtower.
“Alfred, go home, please. We can look after Bruce,” Clark reassured, taking a cautious step towards Alfred’s blazer that had at some point been discarded on the floor.
“Do not patronise me, nor my ward. You think just because you fight with him you can handle him? And which of you has the stomach to tell him his parents are dead, hm?” Alfred turned back to look at Bruce, “I’ll take him home, please, begin to cease his sedation, Miss Thompkins.”
-
Bruce yawned and frowned as he realised he was still in the weird room with Alfred, Miss Leslie, and the metal and skin man.
“I'm Victor, Bruce,” the man said with a smile, “How are you feeling?”
“Weird… an’ yucky,” was all Bruce could manage to conjure, his young mind fuzzy with sedatives, “Did Alfie find Mommy? I got-ta tell her I had a dream she was super bad guy an’ Daddy was a good guy.”
“Is that so?” Alfred asked, running a hand through Bruce's hair, the man nodded in response, leaning into the touch.
“Alfie?”
“Yes, Chum?”
“Am I feelin’ yucky ‘cause I ate the cookie you made? Like Alice?” Bruce asked, rubbing his eyes with the heel of his palm as Victor and Leslie got to work on unhooking him from his observational machinery.
With a shaky exhale and a forced smile to comfort Bruce, Alfred responded, “Maybe, Bruce.”
“Alfie, there’s a superhero and a p’in-chess over there! Like at Peter’s birthday!”
Diana and Clark offered awkward waves.
“Shall we go home, Sir?” Alfred asked, forgoing acknowledging Diana and Clark. He had never really appreciated the close relationship the two had with Bruce and to Alfred they had no right to know his boy at such a young age.
“Wanna say hi, Alf,” Bruce pouted, tugging on the butler’s sleeve, “The p’in-chess can help find Mommy!”
“Not now, Master Bruce. Come along, we must get you situated,” Alfred spoke, stern and with a furrowed brow. Bruce glanced back to Diana and Clark and then back to Alfred.
“Okay…”
“There's a good lad.”
-
Bruce nearly threw up the moment the zeta-tube opened to the sight of the Batcave. The squealing and squeaking of bats, the almost entirely dark place, the giant and unfamiliar technology–all of it sent Bruce’s blood pressure through the roof. He immediately fell backwards and curled up on the floor of the zeta tube.
“Alfie! Alfie- the bats!” Bruce screamed, pulling his arms over top his face in attempt to shield himself, just incase they decided to swarm him like they did (what was to him) a year ago. “Go back! Pluh- Please Alfred! I wanna go back! Alfred please! Mommy- Daddy!”
Somewhere between the exhaustive screaming and sobbing, Alfred made eye contact with Dick and Jason who were at the Batcomputer with Cassandra.
“Fuck–Duke is going to have my ass for this,” Jason seethed as he, Dick and Cass ran towards the curled up bulk of man on the floor, “I told him I’d make sure everybody was quiet tonight.”
“What’s happened to him?” Dick asked once they approached Alfred and Bruce.
“He’s five,” Alfred answered plainly.
Jason took a quick glance at Bruce before turning back to Alfred with a look expecting elaboration.
“Mentally. Some sort of bastard magic. Help him upstairs.”
Dick and Cass nodded dutifully and got to their attempts.
“Master Todd?”
After a few seconds of no answer, Dick scoffed, “Going to come help or not, Birdbrain?”
“Yeah, I get it… I’m going to sit this one out. You guys have fun, though.”
“Help him,” Cass spat, gently rubbing Bruce’s back, “Don’t be annoying.”
“Fuck that. I told B I’m not here for the long haul cutesy we’re a family bullshit. He has his menagerie, I’m not part of it.”
“Can you stop being a pain in the butt for two seconds!” Cass shouted at Jason, standing up and confronting the man who glared down at her.
“Both of you stop it!” Dick yelled, standing as well.
“Hate to crash the pile on Jason party, but your idol has, for a lack of a better term, dipped,” Jason snarked, pointing over at the empty zeta tube. Everybody cursed.
-
Bruce didn’t have too much of a clue on how to get out of the cave. He tried to follow what dimly-lit paths he could see but he kept coming back too close to the sound of those strangers and that seemed no better than getting attacked by bats. The boy just sniffled and praised whatever God his parents wanted him to believe in when he saw a door open.
A young man came through the door, that was a problem in and of itself, but Bruce knew once he got out of the cave, his home couldn’t be far.
So he ran.
And he ran.
Until he collided face first with his father’s leather chair. He huffed out his ache and dripping snot as he glanced around, not understanding why Daddy’s office was in such disarray. With tumbling legs and eyes, he finally found the grandfather clock that Mommy loved to watch tick away for hours, 4:28. His father had to have been in bed.
His fists collided with a wooden door that looked so weirdly new as he knocked and cried.
“Mommy? Daddy? I need you!”
With no answer, he hiccuped through a sob and tried his best at the door handle, not understanding why it was locked. His parents never kept it locked. He couldn’t understand why it was locked.
“Please! Please let me in! Ma- I’m scared!”
A few moments that felt like years passed, a light turned on somewhere down the hallway. Bruce felt spooked out of his skin and ran once more, this time down to his own room, barging in only to fall into the floor instead of his bed.
“‘S not…” Bruce could feel his heart in his throat, “not my room,” he croaked, looking around with eyes as wide as saucers, “Not my room, not my room, not my room- Daddy, ‘s not my room.”
The door creaked behind him and without thinking, Bruce stilled, eyes only moving to dart around, searching for somewhere to escape or something to throw.
“B? Yawn any idea why everybody’s being the loudest ever on the night I specifically asked for everybody to be quiet?”
“Please don’t hurt me,” Bruce whispered, unable to find any sort of escape or protection, “M-my friend Alfred will find out a-and he’ll tell my Mommy and Daddy–Martha and Tom Wayne.”
“Bruce? Are you like… okay?” Duke asked cautiously, tilting his head slightly.
“You could go to jail! It happened before! J-just leave me alone!”
Duke frowned at what that sounded like but shook it off, straightening up and running through all of his training in his head.
“Listen, I’m not clued into all of this, Bruce but I’m going to assume somebody knows what’s going on. Who is it?”
“M-my Mom-” Bruce choked out, crumbling in on himself, “Mom fixes everything. A-and I’on know where she is.”
“Shit… Bruce, is this a PTSD episode? Should I find Ace?” The man sucked his teeth as he anxiously looked around, “What about Alfred, huh? Um, come with me to find him.”
“NO! No- no no I’m not goin’ to the bats! Tell Alfie ‘m not- no stupid bats!”
“Jeez, never thought I’d hear that from you- but okay, yeah. I’ll just call him here… Fudge, man, my phone’s in my room… B? Will you be okay on your own for two minutes?”
With no response and no other choice, Duke had no choice but to go find Alfred.
-
“He’s acting real freaky, Mr Alfred- he’s talking about his parents and he doesn’t realise it’s me talking to him–”
“--His mental age has been regressed. All he knows is what he knew when he was five,” Alfred explained as he walked. Duke could only hastily take a few long strides ahead and have to wait and curse that Alfred was not in any similar sort of a rush. What good were appearances when his ward was clearly going through it?
“So he thinks the Waynes are alive?”
“Precisely so.”
“Well, do you have any plans to tell him they aren’t?”
“The first matter of action is trying to find him and get him to stop running and crying, Master Thomas.”
With every fibre of his being, Duke held back rolling his eyes.
“Hey, B? It’s Duke. I’m back, with Alfred. Nothing nefarious, right?”
“Alfie!” Bruce exclaimed, running to the man and engulfing him in a shaky hug.
“Okay, that’s enough, Sir. Now, what in Heaven’s name were you thinking running off like that? And hiding!” Alfred scolded, peeling Bruce off of him.
“I- I just wanted–”
“--Well you should have bloody thought. Should you not? How irresponsible, foolish, and utterly–” Alfred caught his tongue. He let out a harsh sigh and rubbed the bridge of his nose with exhaustion.
“Hey, Bruce, it’s okay. It’s all pretty confusing for you right now, huh? Don’t… I personally see things better after a nice warm drink. How about you?” Duke asked, stepping between Bruce and Alfred.
“I like- Mommy makes me milk an’ she makes it magic.”
“Yeah? I think I can handle magic. Let’s go make some magic milk, B.”
With a sigh Alfred murmured under his breath to Duke as Bruce began to walk away, “Strawberries and honey.”
Duke gave a small nod and caught up to Bruce’s sheepish shuffles down the hallway.
Alfred remained in the room. In Jason’s room. He inhaled deeply, though he knew he couldn’t find what he was looking for. There were no warm vanilla candles and no odd scented pens. No more nightlights and no more of Bruce’s Grey Ghost VHS tapes. This was Jason’s room. Bruce had ignored all of Alfred’s protests the evening before they brought Jason home. He ignored how Alfred had argued, rightfully that there were so many other rooms in the manor and that Bruce did not need to destroy one of the final reminders of how Bruce once was.
But Jason wanted the room. He wanted the room nearest to the main bedroom, Bruce’s bedroom, once the late Waynes’ bedroom. So Bruce gave the boy the room.
-
“Is it good? Can’t say I’ve ever made magic milk before,” Duke asked with a chuckle, leaning against the kitchen counter as Bruce sat at the island and sipped on the drink through a crazy straw Steph had left and a cup with Luffy from One Piece on it that Damian and Duke shared ownership of.
“‘S nice. Mommy puts dust on it though.”
“Dust?”
“Like shiny ones. Makes it rainbow."
“Sorry, B, I don’t think there is any of that around.”
A deep frown formed on Bruce’s face but he continued to sip on his milk.
“I’ll go to the store later and have a look for you.”
“Why you here? Alfie’s not tellin’ me an’ everythings so weird.”
“Hm. Well, how old are you, Bruce?”
Bruce took a moment to think about it, his tongue sticking out the corner of his mouth ever so slightly, just like Damian. “Oh, I’m big now I turned five old.”
“Really?”
“Mhm,” Bruce hummed with a nod, “Daddy says I gotta go an’ for war, ‘cause I’m big. Mommy said that was silly.”
“That is very silly. You know, you’re very very big for a five year old. Do you know why?”
Bruce shook his head.
“Well, I think it might be because of the magic milk,” Duke hummed, “It’s brought you to the future. I’m trying to find the right magic milk but in the future, your Mommy and Daddy are on vacation, so I can’t ask them.”
Bruce furrowed his brows, still frowning, but considerably less so by Duke’s standards.
“When they comin’ back for me?”
Duke forced a smile, “Well, you booked for them to go for a whole month, B!”
“I did?”
“Yeah, real big vacation. We all got super jealous. But you said they were being amazing grandparents so you wanted to give them a prize.”
“Hm… okay. How big am I in the future?”
“You are a whopping forty years old, Bruce.”
“Wow, that’s more than Daddy!”
Duke bit at the inside of his cheek as he nodded, “Sure is.”
Bruce yawned.
“Tired?”
“Yeah."
“Come on, let’s get you to bed then, hm? When you wake up, we’ll see if we can sort all of this out.”
“Mkay..”
Duke helped the man that always seemed so larger than life up and into his room, a harsh reminder that nobody else was around. He couldn’t bear to understand why it was him doing all of this. He appreciated Bruce to no end, of course, but the others were supposedly so much closer to him. Where were they?
Always so much larger than life. Duke didn’t know if Bruce had much life in him anyways. How exhausted could a man be after setting himself an impossible task? From fighting Gods and Monsters? From being held to a standard that he could never uphold?
“This ‘nt my room,” Bruce said as Duke fiddled with the weirdly intricate door-handle.
“Things have changed in the future, B.”
“But this is Mommy and Daddy’s room. I don’t have one anymore?”
Duke shook his head quickly as he finally got the door open, “No no, B, they let you have this room. Um, Mr and Mrs Wayne live in an apartment now.” Bruce cautiously took a step forward and into the unfamiliar room.
“Why?”
“I’ll… have to ask.”
“Oh.” Bruce’s expression dimmed and he curled in on himself, “Am I naughty? ‘M sorry, I didn’ mean to be.”
“No, Bruce, you’re okay. It’s all good, they just liked city centre better. Come on now, don’t you wanna go to bed?”
The man didn’t move from his place, anxiously squirming and looking around.
Knock-knock.
“Yeah?” Duke called out.
The door creaked ever so slightly as it opened and a small woman entered, holding a thick blanket and some other things.
“Found some stuff for you,” she explained, a heavy breath in her voice, “I’m Cass.”
“Cass,” Bruce repeated underneath his breath, as if memorising the feel of the name in his mouth.
“The attic is… vast. Alfred is weirdly unhelpful,” Cass murmured, mostly to Duke as she entered the room and shut the door behind her with a kick.
“What’s all the stuff, Cass?” Duke asked.
“Blanket. Teddy. Pillows. And…” The girl began to rummage through her pockets, “Aw, shoot. I think I left it upstairs. But, still, blanket, teddy, pillows.”
“Thank you Miss Cass and Mr Duke,” Bruce murmured, shy and fidgeting.
“No problem, Bud. How about we get you to bed now, though?”
“Yes please.”