Jason and Tim are arguing, Jason brings up how Tim stole his mantle
Tim, yelling: I did what I was supposed to do!! I got an adult! It's not my fault the adult wouldn't help! I had to take matters into my own hands, I will not be shamed for that! If you want to be mad at someone? Don't be mad at me. Or Bruce. Or Alfred. You wanna be mad at someone? Be mad at Dick Grayson, because when I saw that Batman was falling apart at the seams, I went straight to him! I asked him to help, when Batman was going to tear Gotham apart, piece by piece, in his grief, I BEGGED Dick to help, and he said no, so I had to step up because otherwise no one would.
Jason, not angry anymore: Wh- Tim, you were, you were 13! It wasn't your job to fix a grown man, you didn't have to be the one to save him...
How small must the world be for both Bruce and Tim to witness John and Mary Grayson's deaths
Or for 10-year-old Duke to crack the Riddler's puzzle before Batman swoops in and saves the day, long before his powers came into play
Or for Sheila Haywood to leave her son only to end up assisting his killer a decade and a half later
Not to mention the popular fanon concept of Jason knowing baby Damian in the League of Assassins
Now imagine how many other invisible strings could've tied them together
Like what if Tim and Jason went to the same school when Jason was Robin but all they shared was the occasional bump and "excuse me" in the busy halls
Or what if Babs was a tutor and helped an elementary-aged Steph finally understand her homework only for the Browns to cancel after a couple sessions because they couldn't afford it
What if the first person to buy Cass a hot meal was Kate on one of her travels
What if Alfred witnessed young Selina shoplifting groceries but chose to turn a blind eye
What if Jason lived on the same streets as the Row siblings and gave little Harper tips on how to use tools and defend her brother
What if Steph and Duke shared the same school bus, only he sat in the front while she was toward the back
What if the first person to teach Tim how to tie his shoes was Bruce at a gala because Jack and Janet were busy talking to someone important
What if Bette did a DNA test for fun and found a connection in Nanda Parbat but just assumed the results was faulty because she knew her whole family, right?
What if 8-year-old Dick, the day before his parents died, stayed at a cheap hotel near Crime Alley and found 4-year-old Jason wandering alone and said, "I'll be your big brother for tonight"
What if the universe knew they were made for each other and wouldn't rest until they realized it too
supernatural movie reboot but its a ghostfacers mockumentary about their attempt to make a “serious film” about sam and dean winchester. opens on ed and harry going “CUT!” and the camera pans to a guy that looks kind of like jared padalecki pulling off a party city wig. turns out the finale was actually part of the ghostfacer’s retelling of supernatural. Sam Dean and Castiel spend the entire movie chasing after ed and harry trying to stop the thing being made. (its a huge commercial success and they screen it at the destiel wedding)
“This is Bruce's true legacy--not the avoidance of loss, but the willingness to let more people in and helping others to overcome that desire to close themselves off. To offer connection to help others…”
thanks i’m never going to be able to think of anything else </3
This is Dick Grayson right here. You can't separate his rage from him, you can't separate the chaos gremlin from him, but at his core, he is kindness and caring and compassion. He tells Iko the truth, that it never really stops hurting, but that you'll have other people who love you just as much. He tells Iko's uncle how to start dealing with this--comfort and routine, reassurance.
Read him stories.
This is Dick Grayson sharing the things that made him feel comforted and allowed him to come out the other side of his loss still intact. This is Dick Grayson saying that Bruce (who read him stories as a kid) and Alfred (who gave Bruce the book to read to him) never replaced his parents but he loves them just as much.
And this is Dick Grayson sharing himself with the world, this is who he is at his core--kindness and care. Because that's what Bruce Wayne allowed for him, that Bruce still struggles with sharing himself with others, but he helped this boy become someone who didn't fall as deeply into the same pit as he fell into.
This is Bruce's true legacy--not the avoidance of loss, but the willingness to let more people in and helping others to overcome that desire to close themselves off. To offer connection to help others, just as Alfred offered him connection, just as he offered Dick connection, now Dick offers so many others that same connection. This is who Dick Grayson has always been, but it's also who Bruce gave him the security and love to continue being.