+1 – the Batcave

Pulling up to Wayne Manor's intricate wrought iron gates, Tam Fox was no closer to having any idea what she would say to Tim once Black Bat showed her to the Cave. She sighed and began rolling down her window for the intercom, but this proved unnecessary as the gates opened smoothly before she could say a word. Shrugging, she shifted back into gear and headed up the long driveway.

Maybe the couple more minutes until the house would give her an inspiration.

Finally she cleared the avenue of trees and pulled around the circle drive, parking without too much thought—surely if she were in an inconvenient spot they would just ask her to move the car. She locked it, probably unnecessarily, and walked up the steps. Before she could ring the doorbell, however, the door swung open, revealing the petite form of Black Bat. The vigilante stepped back to let her in and silently shut the door behind her before leading the way down the hall.

"I am Cassandra Cain."

Tam blinked in surprise at the sudden words. Before she could come up with a good reply, Cassandra continued.

"You asked about my relationship with Red Robin. He is my brother because Batman began my adoption before his supposed death. He plans to finalize it this trip."

"Oh," Tam replied, intelligently, "I see. Um. Thanks for clarifying."

"He is also my brother by choice. He is hurting. You need to talk to him."

She winced. "Yes, I know, I have already let it go too long. Hopefully tonight can set things right."

Cassandra gave a sharp nod as she halted, reaching up to manipulate the hands of the large grandfather clock before which they were standing. On a perfectly silent track it slid sideways, revealing an open doorway and a flight of concrete steps. Tam took a deep breath.

This was it. She was finally seeing the Batcave.

She stepped through the door and started down the steps, hardly noticing Cassandra close it behind her and then slip past her down the stairs. She slowly descended, gazing around in wonder. Directly ahead was the main platform and computer monitor, where an incongruously tuxedo-clad man nonchalantly cleaned with a spray bottle and cloth—Alfred, the Wayne family butler, her brain supplied belatedly—and there were counters everywhere, spread with various piles of vigilante gadgets.

Just as her foot touched platform level, the man deposited his supplies on one of the nearby counters and came forward to greet her.

"Miss Tamara Fox, I believe? I am Alfred Pennyworth, Master Wayne's butler. I am afraid your hosts have run into a spot of trouble; I would venture to suppose that is where Miss Cassandra is going right now." Indeed, as he was speaking, she heard the mutter of a powerful but muted engine as Black Bat shot down a long tunnel on a black bike. "Do make yourself comfortable while you wait for them. Have a look around, if you wish. But have a care before you touch anything unidentifiable: you would not believe what dangerous equipment and artifacts I have found lying around completely unmarked!"

He shook his head disparagingly. Tam snickered. "Thank you, Mr. Pennyworth. I'll be careful."

"Just Alfred, please, Miss Tamara. Let me know if you need anything; I'll be upstairs but the clock will be open. Call at any time."

She smiled at the butler before turning to explore the vast cave before her. She headed first to what seemed to be a trophy collection combined with the closest thing the Cave had to a sitting room. She shook her head at the animatronic T-Rex and giant penny. What even was this stuff? The oversized plaid couch seemed out of place, as did the bean bag chairs, but she supposed even a hard-core ninja-family needed a place to crash, sometimes, without using the Manor upstairs. She was just examining an incongruous stack of books on a table just below the dinosaur's left hind leg—Gotham's court records from ten years back really seemed to have little connection to some tome called Thermonuclear Astrophysics: An Introductory Primer, and the Scarlet Pimpernel surely must have been left there by accident—when the cave's speakers suddenly pinged and the computer announced an incoming call.

"Batman to Batcave."

Tam looked wildly around the cave, hoping Alfred would appear to answer, before running over to the monitor and hunting for some kind of "accept call" button.

"Come in, Cave." Batman sounded gruff and vaguely impatient.

Suddenly she realized the computer was touchscreen and tapped "Transmit." "Uh, this is Batcave…Tevmesia speaking."

"Tevmesia." Batman's voice, if possible, grew harder, and Tam flinched at her own incompetence. "Get Agent A immediately and tell him to prepare the med-bay for a blood transfusion for Red Robin, and suturing for a through-and-through pistol wound to the right thigh. Nightwing is bringing him in the Batmobile, ETA four minutes. Do you understand?"

Tam let out a horrified breath and scrambled to reply. "Yes…yes. Uh…Copy that." The computer announced the call terminated, but Tam was already running up the stairs into the Manor shouting for help.

"Alfred? Alfred!"

The butler appeared in the hallway. "Miss Tamara? What's happened?"

"It's Red Robin!" She latched onto his arm and began dragging him urgently toward the Cave, relaying as fast as she could what Batman had said. By the time she finished they were back in the Cave, clock-door shut tightly behind them, and Alfred was quickly but competently selecting and arranging medical equipment while Tam stood to the side, breathing heavily from adrenaline, hands twitching aimlessly. Eventually she headed back to the main platform where she paced nervously until a deep roar sounded through the tunnel and a black streak shot out, jerking to a stop terrifyingly close to where she was standing.

Immediately Nightwing in his iconic black-and-blue jumped out, cradling in his arms what was to her a much more familiar cowled figure. Brushing past her without so much as a glance—not that she was offended; he had much more important things to tend to, after all—he ran to the medical bed Alfred had prepared and quickly relayed specifics as they both began injecting and monitoring and transfusing and connecting and stripping and suturing.

For a few moments Tam stood nearby with a vague idea of offering to help, but soon she realized that even the offer would be inconvenient at this point, and if they needed anything they'd surely call out to her. She returned to the computer console where she sat in the biggest chair, drumming her fingers on the desk and worriedly chewing her lip before she realized what she was doing and forced herself to stop. She had not broken that habit just to start it up again because of a wounded vigilante!

She got up again and wandered aimlessly for a while before grabbing some towels from the laundry room near the med-bay and cleaning up any blood that she could find in both in the Batmobile itself and on the cave floor. Just as she was finishing up and trying to decide where to put the soiled cloths the computer pinged again, announcing another call.

"Batman to Batcave."

This time Tam responded without hesitation.

"Batcave, Tevmesia speaking."

"As soon as Red Robin is stable we need Nightwing back in the field. Tell him the number of hostage situations is exceeding what our operatives can address. He should contact Oracle for specifics as soon as possible."

"Copy that."

She quickly made her way back to medical where the two were just finishing their care. At her hesitant relaying of Batman's message Nightwing closed his eyes and sighed, running a hand through his sweaty hair before leaning down to kiss his unconscious brother on the forehead and murmur something in a low voice. He then began striding back toward the Batmobile, pausing to lay his right hand on her shoulder.

"Stay with him, alright?" he asked gently before pulling on his gauntlets and heading out of the Cave.

Slowly Tam approached the bed where Alfred was cleaning up used laundry and medical supplies and studied the still figure lying much to pale against the stark-white sheets. Her forehead creased in sympathy and continued worry.

Tenderly she reached out and brushed back a lock of dark hair that had fallen haphazardly across his face, then suddenly caught her breath and drew her hand back as if burned, having startled herself with the affection and intimacy of the gesture. She glanced quickly away and sat down into the chair that Alfred had drawn up behind her.

She settled herself in to wait.

She was dozing, a little—the Cave's chairs were infinitely more comfortable than anything she'd ever sat on in a real hospital—when a movement next to her startled her back to full consciousness. Immediately her attention was on the bed, where Tim was blinking open lucid blue eyes and shifting a little under the blanket. Tam leaned forward, smiling to see him awake. His lips twitched upward in a returning smirk even as his eyes clouded in confusion.

He opened his mouth to say something but his voice came out dry and raspy. Tam winced in sympathy and handed him a water bottle from the counter. He shifted himself into a slightly more upright position and took a large swig.

"What are you doing here, Tam?" he asked as he screwed the lid back on.

She glanced at the floor, unaccountably shy. "Your sister brought me."

"Cassandra?" That was obviously not what he had been expecting. "Why? I mean, I'm glad to see you, but I don't envy her explaining your presence here to Bruce. Then again, she is his only daughter; she'll probably get away with it," he added under his breath.

Tam giggled, then immediately sobered as she glanced back at his too-pale features and thought of the bloody pad of gauze bound to his leg. "She…well…she wanted me to talk to you," Tam began hesitantly, then upon hearing what she had said quickly corrected herself. "I mean, I was going to talk to you anyway, at least I was planning to ever since Nightwing showed up and made me thing about it; or, actually, I wanted to even before that but didn't know, well, anything, but then later I couldn't seem to find the time, and it always seemed so awkward, figuring out what to say, I mean, and I just kept putting it off, and then Cassandra showed up and told me...told me…"

Unable to proceed, and suddenly realizing she had been rambling dreadfully, Tam blushed and turned away. Maybe the floor would swallow her before she had to confront the fallout of that messy speech…

"You...wanted to talk?"

"Well, yes." She stole a quick glance at him through her hair. "I mean, only if you want."

"Of course!" he breathed.

She risked a real look at his face, seeing there such mingled hope and insecurity in his hesitant smile and open blue eyes that she threw all caution to the proverbial wind and reached up to lay one trembling hand on his cheek, rough with evening—or in this case, early morning—shadow. "Oh, Tim."

His eyes had grown even bigger at her touch, and he did not reply.

"You didn't think I actually hated you, did you? I was angry, sure, but, well, I thought," she snorted at herself, "I thought you would come by with flowers and chocolates in a few days and, and…" she stumbled a little over her words, trying desperately to convey what she suddenly realized was the most important point she'd ever had to make to someone. "I don't…I don't want to lose you, Tim! I want us to be…normal, well, normal for us, again, and go on unrealistic-action-movie dates, and share bad cookies in the break room between WE meetings, and I can tease you about being health-nut Ninja Boy and you can laugh at Foxy Lady's afro and our mutual coffee addiction, and maybe, maybe there's something more going on and…and…" She trailed off. How could she possibly convey, at this point, that the single dearest wish of her heart was that her little white lie to Vicki Vale would one day be the truth?

She swallowed and looked down, unable to meet Tim's eyes.

But then she felt a strong and callused but oh-so-gentle hand tuck her hair behind her ear and stroke her cheek, coming to rest under her chin where it unthreateningly but insistently raised her head. Its mate surreptitiously swiped from beneath her eye the tear that had squeezed out under her lashes during her impassioned speech.

"Look at me, please," he whispered.

She hesitantly lifted her gaze, taking in his eyes now softened in understanding and the small but beautifully real smile curling his lips upward.

"I didn't realize. I thought," he shook his head at himself, "you truly wished me out of your personal life, after everything that happened. I'm sorry for being such a blind moron." He smirked.

An unexpected laugh escaped Tam's throat, and she laid one of her hands over his where it rested on her cheek, leaning into his caress. She smiled up at him. "I'd still like to talk about what information is necessary to share with your girlfriend, even a semi-faux one. But don't worry, I'll work on my acting skills, too, so I can feign sorrow if you ever need to fake someone's death again."

His smirk widened into a full-blown grin. "I'm sure we can come to a mutually-beneficial agreement, Miss Fox, concerning our present situation. Let's see…" he ticked off his fingers as though enumerating a list of conditions for a contract. "Mandatory discussion concerning proper information transfer, free acting lessons from Alfred master of all subtlety and Bruce master of all heavy-handedness…is there anything else you will require, Miss Fox?"

"Well, Mr. Drake-Wayne-Draper," she leaned forward, remembering her stolen impulsive kiss after their escape from the League of Assassins, wondered if this would be the same, or something unique, "I can think of one or two more conditions…"

The deep-throated rumble of the quickly-approaching Batmobile echoed suddenly through the cave's med-bay, and the two jerked apart, blushing furiously and looking anywhere but at each other. Batman, Nightwing, and Robin jumped from the sleek black car, followed by Batgirl and Black Bat pulling up on motorcycles as different as their personalities.

The vigilantes quickly converged on the med-bay. Nightwing and Batgirl were talking over each other in asking Tim how he was doing and relaying exactly what had happened that night; Black Bat was smirking at Red Robin and Tevmesia as though she knew exactly what they had been about to do when interrupted; Robin was retrieving Agent A and demanding information; and Batman was placing an incongruously tender hand on his son's shoulder while glowering mildly at the young man's girlfriend, her integration into the eclectic vigilante family already begun.

Through the din and bustle, Tim and Tam's eyes met, and they shared a smile. Perhaps, despite the ninja, missing spleens, intimidating families, and informational debacles, they could make this work, after all.

A/N: And so it ends! Thank you, my dear readers, for coming all this way with me. I hope you enjoyed my little tale about Tam Fox's introduction to and the beginning of her integration with the Batclan. Please do leave your thoughts about either this chapter or the story as a whole!

By the way, this was my first real attempt at writing sappy romance; I honestly don't know how it worked out. Was it sweet, or just eye-rollingly cheesy? And yes, I know I used the clichéd "hero gets hurt and this initiates heart-to-heart with heroine" storyline, but whenever I tried to write the chapter any other way I ran into some serious brain-blocks. Actually, this whole story would have been up several weeks sooner if I had been able to get this chapter written directly after the others! (As I said in the first chapter, I didn't want to take any chances with not-finishing, so I made myself write the whole thing before posting any of it.) And speaking of injuries, I deliberately glossed over any technical medical information or techniques: as I said in my Author's Note to Batgirl's chapter, I have basically no medical knowledge, and in this case I didn't want to just make something up. So instead I went with vagueness to cover for ignorance ;).

Thanks again for reading and reviewing! Your support means a lot to me. Have a lovely day!

Blessings,
Sophia the Scribe