Whenever Bruce thought of that possibility, regret and guilt overwhelmed him.
So when Tim later came to him of his own accord, Bruce turned him away. When he heard that Tim wanted to become the new Robin, he refused him again and again. In the end, he even imposed a training regimen harsh enough that he hoped it would make Tim give up.
Later, the arrival of his biological son, Damian, left him even more conflicted.
Damian was too young. He had been only ten when he came to Bruce, and before that, Bruce had not even known he existed.
Of course Bruce did not want all his children to follow in his footsteps. After more than a decade as Batman, he understood just how high a price that path demanded. He had also tried to persuade Damian to give up becoming Robin and live as an ordinary child.
Unfortunately, Damian's circumstances were too unusual.
Born into the League of Assassins, Damian had never had a normal childhood.
While other children were still clutching milk bottles, Damian had already been artificially "matured" through certain methods. At four, he had to cross snow-covered mountains and keep training with a broken arm dragging at his side; at six, he could breach the North American Department of Defense's firewall; at eight, he could already wield a Tang sword and cut down whole groups of the League of Assassins' ninjas and killers.
Taught by the League of Assassins to "stop killing through killing," Damian possessed intelligence and combat skills utterly beyond his peers. From childhood, he had been indoctrinated with a mission to control the world, along with a hair-trigger temper and the twisted belief that "trash doesn't deserve to live."
To keep his child from becoming a remorseless executioner at such a young