devinwolfi | fic: secrets' flame

Title: secrets' flame
Fandom: Batman & Robin (1997)
Relationships: Dick Grayson & Bruce Wayne, Dick Grayson & Barbara Wilson
Length: 648w

Summary: Dick wonders how Bruce kept his head while they were under the influence of Ivy's pheromones. (aka my gay bruce agenda)

Read on AO3

The dining room was quiet, save for the clink-tink of ceramic and silverware. Bruce insisted Alfred take, at the very least, the rest of the evening off to regain some of his strength. Not even Alfred could shake off a terminal illness in a weekend. Barbara was, as far as Dick knew, showing off her new bike to the racers downtown. The rest of Gotham was still recovering from the whole city-wide ice age thing, for the first time since Dick could remember, Gotham was quiet. Unless something tripped an alarm on the monitors in the cave, Batman and Robin were planning on taking a well-earned night off. But even still, something had been bugging him. “So,” Dick started. “How’d you know about Ivy’s pheromones?”

“How do you mean?” Bruce asked, lifting a cube of steak to his mouth.

“I mean, I know she whammied us both but…” The prong of his fork sank into the meat. “Like, I couldn’t see past the pheromones, past her. I don’t think there’s a lot I wouldn’t have done, y’know. But, not you. You knew better. It felt so real, how did you know it wasn’t?”

Bruce’s face betrayed nothing, not that Dick expected it to. When he finally spoke though, he put on what Dick called his movie star face: amused and unassuming. As much as Bruce liked to distinguish between Bruce, Bruce Wayne, and The Bat, it was times like this when Dick was keenly aware of how much they were all some facet of the same man, and those lines were faint on even the best of days. “I’m sorry to say you get used to it. Between Dr. Isley’s pheromones, Joker’s laughing gas, and Tetch’s fear serum, you can differentiate between real and concocted feelings. To know when your mind is no longer your own. It comes from experience, knowing your own mind and having strength in your convictions.”

“Just believe in myself? That’s it?”

“That’s it.” Dick couldn’t help but feel like there was something he was missing, something Bruce wasn’t letting him in on. He knew why Bruce kept things from him, logically. It happened less and less these days, as they learned to trust each other, work together. But early on, even before the whole your new step-guardian-guy is thee dark frickin’ knight reveal, Dick had become very familiar with Bruce’s hiding things look that was less an actual expression, because Bruce never let his body language give off anything that wasn’t extensively reviewed and pre-approved, but more of a vibe. A well-honed sixth sense. Brucedar.

When Dick later shared his latent frustration with Barbara during a break from sparring in the cave, she had, to his surprise, laughed in his face for a little longer than he personally thought was warranted. “What’s so funny?”

She laughed harder at his failure to see the joke. Maybe the smoggy Gotham air was clogging her brain after spending so long in England. Eventually, when she sobered and swept a finger under her eye to wipe away an imaginary tear, she coughed. “I just mean, it’s kind of obvious why it didn’t work, y’know.”

“No, I don’t know.”

“Really? I mean, he’s kind of…” She shrugged and her glossed lips stretched across her face.

“Kind of what? If there’s something you know about Bruce that I don’t then you better tell me. I don’t want it coming back to bite me in the field.”

She cocked her head for a moment, a crease formed between her eyebrows and she looked at him with that curious face for a couple of seconds before she shrugged again. “If Bruce had something he wanted to tell you, he would have. Trust, partners, all that stuff you talked about, yeah?”

“Yeah, sure.” He rose from his seat and assumed a defensive position, “Whatever you say, Batgirl.”

She smirked, “En garde, Robin.”