#bart sticks with jaime because he knows the possibilities and wants to be nearby

[swinging-stars-from-satellites]

wait while I'm already kind of comparing Bart to Dick — they're both always playing a role. Bart literally makes a comment about getting into character before he goes to the past, and we all know the Dick Grayson way of performing normalcy/okayness because it's what's expected of him, what he's always done. and more than that, Dick is hiding so much in Invasion, keeping layers and layers of secrets far above the baseline secrecy of his and the other Bats' identities — and then Bart, whose entire demeanor is an act to convince people to trust him, to convince them he's just a silly guy from the future and not a traumatized, borderline-desperate kid on a mission, comes in and lays him out flat, verbally speaking. one of the first things Bart does is telling Nightwing I know you I know who you are behind that mask and how you were trained and I know how you work. and the scene is played for comedy, like Bart doesn't know exactly what just did, but considering how tightly he plays the rest of his role all season, even after his real purpose in the past is general knowledge amongst the Team, I'd be surprised if him revealing two of the Bats' identities WASN'T a calculated move — because much like Dick, Bart is constantly performing his own age. considering the world he comes from, he's never had a normal childhood but is constantly acting like a regular, boisterous teen once he's with the YJ Team. it's a definite front, at first, trying not to let on too much about himself or why he's there, but one that falls apart over time the more he's ALLOWED to just act his own age, the more time he spends in relative safety (and isn't it heartbreaking that the life the Team lives is so safe compared to where and when Bart comes from?). Bart and Dick are both always putting on an act, and to some degree, they can both see through the other because of that. which probably affects far more than we actually see onscreen — because Dick is an authority figure whose default setting is "no one can know the true me" (both as Nightwing, hero and co-leader of Young Justice, and as Dick Grayson, pseudo-big brother and son) and here's someone who DOES know the true him, possibly in more ways than just one. and Bart is arguably the key to stopping the Reach invasion, and he's juggling his mission, his fears, and holding up a mask to prove he's normal and okay and confident, but Dick has BEEN there — IS there — and he sees straight through that. he gets it, and that shows.