"You ate the whole cake?" Bruce looked at the three of us.

Behind him, Jason, wearing only fitted spandex shorts, ran on a treadmill. His chest and arms were covered with wires to monitor his entire vital system, and a breathing mask was over his nose and mouth to supply him with air and to measure his breathing rates. Sweat gleamed on his bare torso and made the white streak in his hair almost glow.

"No," Tim took a plate from behind his back to present to his mentor/adopted father, "we saved you a piece."

Bruce looked down at the two-inch piece and the silver dessert fork beside it.

Tim smiled even as he blinked with the rush of sugar. Behind him, Damian swayed back and forth, making a noise between a hum and a sigh, his eyes wide and dazed. The sugar rush roared in my own ears, but to a lesser extent that it probably did for them.

"Not fair!" Jason complained behind the mask.

Bruce reached over to turn the treadmill up a notch before taking the plate. He set it to the side (Jason's eyes followed it hungrily), and he faced the three of us.

"That cake was supposed to feed all of us for at least two meals. Have you no control?"

"Come on," Tim shrugged helplessly. "It's cake. No one would have control around it, and we did save you a piece. Two inches, though Damian only wanted to leave you one inch."

Damian snapped out of his stupor. "He's lying! It was the opposite way and I-"

Bruce held up his hand to silence his son. "I don't care – you shouldn't have been that greedy. You didn't save anything for your brother." He motioned to Jason.

Even under the mask and still running, Jason registered gratefulness at Bruce's words of inclusion.

"If I made you start running now -?"

Tim blinked, looking sick, then groaned. "I'd probably puke cake all over the treadmill."

Bruce made a low noise of disapproval. "Timothy," he motioned Tim forward. "Bend."

Tim bent slightly to the side, still too full to move much. Bruce walloped him hard on the backside.

"Learn to control yourself," Bruce pointed to the stairs leading to the computers. "Go monitor Arkham. I want a scan done of the sewers and underground pipes."

Tim went slowly, but turned back to watch.

"Damian."

The little boy's face and body showed absolute misery as he approached his father.

"Bend."

I'm not sure how the kid managed it. He wasn't as big as Tim, but he had attacked his share of the cake just as ravenously as Tim had.

Bruce smacked him just as hard.

"Tt!" Damian made his usual noise of exasperation between his teeth.

"Don't be so greedy."

Damian straightened and tried to stand still as he looked up at Bruce. "I am sorry for disappointing you, Father."

"Go help Tim." Bruce turned to me, "Cassandra."

I came forward, but I opened my hands to let him, and only him, see what I had hidden against my body.

A smile hinted at the corners of his lips. He reached out to tousle my short hair. "Control your brother next time."

"I knew it," Tim gasped, still watching us. "I knew he'd go easier on a girl. So unfair."

Damian looked torn between agreeing with Tim (his arch-nemesis) and remaining loyal to his father (who hadn't dispersed discipline fairly). The boy settled for glaring at me.

"Both of you," Bruce snapped his fingers at the boys, "move."

They sulked away to another level, still swaying from all the sugar.

Bruce took the plate and ate the first bite of cake. I saw the look of bliss on his face – it was the best thing ever – but he schooled it. Pointing the fork at Jason, he ordered, "Keep running. You're doing a strength analysis next, then a stress assessment, a psychological review, a blood scan, and lastly we're doing a drug test. You're sleeping down here tonight with a ventilation mask to measure your REM cycles."

"I hate that thing," Jason panted, making white steam cover the inside of the mask he currently wore. "And that all sounds terrible."

"I know," Bruce took another bite of cake.

I angled in front of treadmill so Jason could see. I opened my hands to show him the napkin and the chuck of cake inside. It was about the size of my closed fist, a good amount of top and side with lots of icing. I had slipped it into the napkin when Tim and Damian weren't looking.

Jason looked at me, and his eyes blinked quickly at my unexpected kindness. I put the napkin on the table beside his folded clothes. I was too full from all the cake I had eaten, and I was glad I made the decision to bring him some of my part. And if it saved me a swat, all the better.

Bruce kept eating his cake as he watched Jason's vitals on a screen, keeping the monitoring charts out of Jason's view. "Your endorphins, hormones, and pheromones are too high. Have you been having sex?"

"No," Jason gasped as he struggled to keep up with the pace of the treadmill, "I swear!"

"Care to explain these high levels?"

Jason glanced at me, but he shook his head. "Uh, Lazarus Pit side effect."

Bruce frowned at he ate the last bite of cake, chewing thoughtfully. "I don't think it is. I could contact Talia, but I never heard of –"

"Oh, B, just let it go," Jason begged. "I'm dying here."

"You're not even wheezing," Bruce scrapped the last of the icing from the plate. "And you've only been running twenty minutes. I've seen you fight for hours."

"Yeah, but that's different. It's watching and acting and reacting, not running forever."

"You whined less at twelve," Bruce said, his voice quiet with the memory. "Then it was all 'Let me try, B. I'm big enough to drive. I can grapple from that building. No, these aren't bruises – they're superhero badges.' Your voice hadn't even dropped yet, but you swore you were all grown-up."

"Ugh," Jason made a face, partly at the strain of running and partly from the teasing, "I really do hate you."

"Good," Bruce turned up the treadmill. "Keep moving or I'm eating your share of cake, too."

"So evil," Jason swiped a sweaty hand over his face. "I'm being tortured . . ."

I moved away from the medical area. The words were still lying, but the tone behind them had changed. Jason would be fine tonight, getting exactly what he had asked for.