Locked to Batfamily only

[simply_alfred]

I don't know if any of you will see this. Nonetheless. Oddly enough, it is easier to say these things this way. Despite what you all may think of me, I have never been good at saying things face to face, and recently even less so. For that, I apologise. I have been too caught up in my own ... in my own grief, and in being so I have allowed you all to carry on in pain. I am sorry, my boys, my girls. I am so very sorry.

However, and painful as this is, there are things I would say to you. From what I have seen of you, in this place and at home, there are things that need to be said. And most of them are about ... they are about Bruce. Please, I believe this is important. Please listen. And yes, I am going to be partisan, and direct this in particular at Master Dick, and in a different way at Master Jason. Forgive me, but I never shied from speaking my mind to Bruce. Do not believe I will be any easier on you.
 

Bruce was, in every way that mattered, my son. He was my boy, and I loved him with everything I had, even as I love all of you. Losing him has been ... it has been perhaps the hardest loss I have ever suffered in my life, and I have lost many, friends and family both. This has been as hard as losing Jason, and harder. Bruce was my son. I do not believe I will ever fully be the same after his loss.

But Bruce was more than my son. He was a man. A good man. A hero, even, in all the ways that counted. The Batman was something Gotham needed, much as I have ever been loath to admit it, much as I have hated at times the damage it has done to my son and this family. And Batman has damaged this family. In many ways, it has torn us apart. And that is what I must speak to you about. That is what I want you to understand.

I have been with Bruce from the start. From the very start, from the birth of the Batman in his parents' blood. I have always understood what drove him to do what he did, even if I was never wholly fond of the idea. But I understood. I understand. I am ... not sure that you do.

Bruce was not the Batman. The Batman was Bruce. The Bat was not a mask Bruce wore. It was part of him. It was who he was. The costume ... it is nothing without him. Please, Dick, don't turn away yet. Listen, please. I don't say this to hurt you. I need you to understand, before you tear yourself and others apart. 

Batman was not a distant hero, or a monster, or an urban legend. He was a man. He was Bruce. You all know that. You all were there, you all fought beside him, fought with him, ran up against his ... his stubborn adherance to certain concepts. *smiles sadly* Bruce was ever stubborn, and all of you have found that out to both your cost and your advantage. He was a man. He made choices, mistakes. He had reasons, Bruce did, for all that he did. He had reasons for his Mission, reasons for the way he chose to carry it out. They were good reasons, and I supported him in them. But. They were his reasons, and his alone. They need not be yours.

That is what I most want you to hear. That Bruce's choices need not shape yours. Richard, you don't need to emulate him as you do. You don't need to become him. That was never what he wanted. *shakes head* In fact, I can say with near complete certainty that the last thing he ever wanted you to be was him. He knew his own mistakes, Bruce. Admittedly, often after he'd had them pounded into his stubborn skull, but he did learn from most of them. He tried. He tried to fix the mistakes he had made with each of you. Jason, particularly you. And Timothy, if you're listening. All the mistakes he made that cost you, they ate at him. And if he could see now how you are making the same mistakes again, it would kill him all over again.

When he was alive, when he was there, every single one of you fought him at times, over choices he made that you believed were wrong, over choices you made that you believed were right. Sometimes, you reached an agreement. Sometimes, you went away firm in the belief that he was as wrong as he could possibly be. That was right. That was the way it should have been. The way it is no longer.

Richard. You have the right to think he was wrong. You have the right to make choices he would not have made. That mask, that costume, it was never his legacy. The Batman was never his legacy. That was always, always, you and your brothers and the family. In time, Bruce did learn that, and I know that it would hurt him now that in never telling you that, he allowed you to believe that you had to be the Batman, his Batman. You don't, my boy. Be your Batman, whatever that means. Be Nightwing, if you want to. Be Officer Grayson. Whatever you choose, we will support you. You know that. Whatever the consequences, we will find a way, as we always did with the choices Bruce made. Trust me, my boy. We will win through, and we will keep you Richard Grayson in doing so.

Jason. Bruce chose to do things a certain way, live by certain rules. That was his choice, and he had his reasons. But it is not the only choice. What you have suffered, what you have been through of late, it has changed you. I understand that, and in time I believe the others will too. But your heart is still the same, still a good heart. Whatever you need to do, my boy, I have faith that it will be the right thing. And ... if it helps any, know that in my time I have killed men for what I believed was right. Some of those choices I regret. Some, I do not. That was a long time ago, and a different war, but I faced those choices in my time, and came through. I know that you will make your own choices in good time, and whatever happens, we will face the consequences of it together. This I do promise you, barring ... well, barring the unexpected.

Timothy. There is light. Let it come.

Miss Barbara. You keep right on doing what you're doing. But perhaps you might consider taking more time to yourself. Don't run yourself into the ground trying to look after the rest of us idiots. Give us a little time, and we'll make it.

All of you. Don't drive each other away. You all are hurting right now. You are all struggling to find what you think is right in the wake of what we have lost. That's right, and only to be expected. Bruce was someone we loved. His loss ... we cannot be expected to walk away from it unscathed. But we can walk away from it together, as a family. We may dislike each other, we may never agree with each other's points of view, we may never be able to fully let go of the past and all that has happened to us. But we can move on. We can love each other, and do our best to understand each other.

I know ... that I have not exactly doing the best job of any of this myself. I am sorry. You would think, after all this time, that I would have learned to look after the living before mourning the dead. The dead can wait, after all. Bruce can wait. He was ... ever good at that. Always waiting, for one thing or another. I know he will not mind waiting some more, if it allows us to recover. *tries to smile* 

I can wait, too. And I will be, for whenever you are ready to come home, to move on. I love all of you. I'll wait as long as you need.