Chapter Text
It was a simple mission really. Oracle needed some data from The Watchtower. Unfortunately, Batman was off-world on a deep space mission when his communicator had gone offline. This wasn’t much cause for concern as he was with Clark and Diana, and this had happened several times over the past couple of years. However, Batman’s off-world status meant he couldn’t retrieve the data that Oracle needed. Usually, she would just hack the system, but Tim had installed some new security measures, and Batman’s access codes were needed to bypass them with the bat computer. All of these factors partnered together into the outline for what should have been a straightforward mission. Keywords being should have been.
“Come on, Timmy!” Dick pleaded, “It’ll be fun!”
Tim walked faster away from his oldest brother as Dick sped up to keep pace.
“Hell no," Tim said, annunciating each word, "I’m not breaking into the Justice League headquarters on half an hour of sleep."
As the two turned the corner they were greeted with the sight of an incredibly unenthused butler.
“You most certainly will not Master Timothy. In fact, the only thing you will be doing for the next ten hours is getting a normal amount of sleep for a young man like yourself.”
“Augh. Last time I admit to sleep deprivation to get out of a shitty mission.”
“Language Master Timothy,” Alfred Chided.
“Yes, language Timmy,” Dick snickered behind the younger's back.
Dick approached Cass next, as she would be ideal for a stealth mission with her skill set.
“Hey, Cass! I was wondering if you would like to join me for a quick break-in of The Watchtower?”
Cass shook her head in dismissal.
“What why not?”
The sister sighed before starting to sign, “Stupid idea. Don’t want to.”
“I love stupid ideas!” a voice rang out from the other side of the living room. There, sprawled out on what was probably a designer couch, was Stephanie Brown. Who, notably, does not live here. She was stretched out over the couch like a cat. Cell phone in one hand, blue raspberry slushie in the other. The condensation from the slushie would collect at the bottom of the cup and drip onto the couch every few seconds. Each time, Dick cringed internally.
“Can I go?”
“Absolutely not.”
“What! Why not? It would be fun!”
“It would absolutely not be fun,” Dick stated, “Last time you went on a stealth mission it was covered in most major news outlets.”
“Yeah well Uncle Clark was working on that story, so I don’t know how you wanted me to hide from goddamn Superman, Dick”
“You know we have actual ways of doing that, right Steph?” Dick asked his pseudo-sister.
“We do?”
“I am the obvious choice,” Damian chimed in, interrupting the two's mildly concerning conversation.
“Does no one in this family know what a private conversation is?”
“No. However, I am clearly the best choice for the mission. I am second-best at stealth out of all of our siblings, and I have the layouts of the watchtower-”
“Memorized,” Dick finished, “We all do. You aren’t going, Damian.”
“Why not!”
“Because I’m not taking you to space without telling Bruce. I’m no moron.”
Damian scoffed, mumbling something like, "could have fooled me," before retreating to his room and a comfortable silence fell over the room. Well, it was mostly silent. Stephanie only tried two more times before she gave up and went back to whatever she was doing on her phone. Dick honestly didn’t want to know, he had his own problem. As he opened the contact he had been deliberating on for the past few minutes he sighed before hitting the call button.
“DONT STOP MAKE IT DROP DJ-” The song blasted from the kitchen. From the doorway which connected the two rooms, Jason Todd, in full Red Hood gear stepped out.
“Jesus took you long enough. I was starting to get bored.”
“Have you been here the whole time?” Dick asked, startled.
“Waiting for you to call me? Yeah. I was starting to think you were actually let Steph go.”
“Hey!” I’m not taking this from a grown man with TiK ToK as his ringtone.” Steph jabbed from her place on the couch. Cass only smirked, still entranced in whatever book she was reading.
“What’cha got there little sis’?”
“Big sister actually.”
“That’s debatable. Anyways Dickie, are you gonna pick your jaw up off the floor, or do I have to drag the both of us to the cave myself?”
“Cave, right,” Dicked pulled himself out of his chair and started with his brother down to the Batcave.
It was dark, as usual, but as the boys made their way to the bat computer they noticed it already displayed Dick’s mission plans. As the two approached the chair sitting in front of the computer, it swiveled to reveal their youngest brother, Damian Wayne.
“Todd, I see you will be joining us on the mission.”
“Not us,” Dick corrected, “Just me.”
“Scram kiddo. We have work to do,” Jason added.
Jason ruffled the younger’s hair as the boy stormed off, “Do that again and I shall wreak mighty vengeance upon you.”
“We weren't like that were we?” Jason asked.
“I wasn’t, but you were for like a hot minute”
“Eh,” Jason shrugged, “fair enough.”
The two looked over at the open files.
“So, Dickwing, what’s the plan?”
The plan was simple enough. The two would break in while Green Arrow and Flash were on monitor duty, as no one would be watching the cameras. Jason and Dick also were least likely to be persecuted by Arrow and Flash as they have prior relations. The mantle of Flash is filled with Dick’s best friend Wally West and Jason is the boyfriend of Green Arrow’s adopted son Roy Harper.
To enter the Watchtower, the two would use a zeta pad that was located in the hanger. They would then travel to the main hall and download the data needed from the main computer. The plan was to then retrace their steps back to the exit and remain unseen. The only danger of this mission was that they were going in costume, and Nightwing and Redhood’s affiliation to The Bat was not a well-known fact within the league. In fact, the only people aware of this within the league are Wally, Clark, and Diana. The latter two were actively off-world, so Wally was the fallback. They would depart in two hours.
“So we’re just in and out, right?” Jason asked.
“Yup,” Dick popped the p, “Pretty easy, but we cannot be caught. Is that clear?”
“Crystal.”