by Michele | Nov 4, 2017 | Chronicles
Dinah: I’d had some words to have with Alfred when I’d been up at the Manor earlier in the week. Not just about pastries, though… you see the man about pastries if you’ve got a chance. I am perfectly capable of cooking. I just don’t, most of the time, I don’t have to. There’s a fully operational bar downstairs, that despite being in the kind of neighborhood that seems more action that Black Canary is interested in than Dinah Lance, actually serves some decent food most of the time. Sure, my apartment over top of it has a kitchen, but it’s mostly for storage and bags of ice or frozen peas for knuckles and faces than something I’m going to make. The man’s an angel though, really. And I was perfectly happy to discuss some plans that may or may not have been overstepping some boundaries but you know what? No one else is going to do it, and I don’t really care. All while waiting for some baked goodness to take home to my place.
Really. It’s Dick’s fault. In a way, it was his idea.
Halloween.
It could be argued that tonight’s not the night for this kind of thing. There’s bound to be a whole pack of idiots out on the streets tonight, and the mood in Gotham is still a little strange. Makes it hard to know exactly what’s coming, more than normal anyway. Not even a bad argument against a little bit of merriment, but plans were just adjusted. It’s not even dark out yet. There’s time for fun, and patrolling. Both could technically count as ‘family bonding’ time, too. And I love Halloween. I always have. Even after I started dressing up as something else every night. Normally? I’d be wearing something covering tonight. Dressing to the opposite of what I am. Last year I was a terribly unexciting nun. This year?
I’m juggling an armful of shopping bags, which clank and rattle and make it pretty clear I’ve gone BYOB, but at least I plan to share, while I rap on the door, waiting for Alfred to open up for me. He makes a great co-conspirator. Even for Halloween Parties.
“Trick or Treat! I brought treats! Thanks for your help with the costume, I made it work.”
See, I did come as the opposite of what I am. The Robin costume might be said to not really fit me, but … by proxy it really fits, if what you were going for the ‘Slutty Sidekick’ look, like they actually sell online. I wasn’t going to spend the money. I’ve got the real deal to work off here. I mean. The top doesn’t exactly…close and the booty shorts are definitely booty shorts but…
“Pan boots. Super comfy. Who knew!”
Damien: Damien for the record would like to state that this isn’t his idea. Also, he never understood the understanding of Halloween. But, Dinah … insisted … that he come. It was more of an order than anything else.
Oh, and he had to dress up.
….Damien tried to argue. But, once again. Dinah ordered him. Normally he wouldn’t take orders from her. He was just trying to get by without getting more grief from the Bat-Clan. Since he also wasn’t allowed to come as Red Hood, He decided to dress as something he knew. Which, you know, happened to be what his grandfather ran. The League of Assassins. It was all black, with a face mask, hood, gloves… you name it. Damien had it. Walking up to the door, he sighed and knocked on it.
Thankfully there was a reason to wear this. It was getting cold and well, he preferred not to freeze. Unlike some of the other women he saw on his way up to the Wayne Manor footsteps. When Alfred opened the door, well, there was a strange silence that came over him. Usually, the man had something quite witty to say. But, it was the first time he’d seen Damien since Bruce died. In essence, Alfred was his other Grandfather. More of a father to Bruce than Thomas was. That was neither here nor there now.
Lowering the mask, Damien reaches out, putting his hand on the older gentleman’s shoulder. The two may not have always seen eye to eye. But, Damien had great respect for him. After the two exchanged a moment, he’d speak up. Loud enough for Dinah to hear.
“Ahem. Master Wayne. That is quite the, uh, outfit.”
“Thank you Alfred. Dinah said I had to come in costume.” and, well, what a costume it was. Walking past him, Damien walks over to the study. Fully intending on reading, instead of being social. Of course, that’s probably not what Dinah had in mind. Misery loves company, and all.
Tim: Is it strange that dressing up in to a costume is a problem for people like us? Me, I feel like a chump. I never did Halloween as a child, really. My Folks always wanted me too, but I didn’t appreciate dressing up as someone else. Which brings to mind the entire conundrum of my life as of late. I’m simply not good at being someone else’s character. Kind of feeds back, all the way to the beginning really, when Bruce asked me to be Robin. I’d turned down that initial offer, instead asking to put my own label on the Mantle. ‘Red Robin’ was born.
Dinah and I have had multiple discussions about this sort of thing, none of which was related to Halloween. It was still very relevant to the night. Costumes suck. I’m not good at this sort of thing. Unlike the rest of the Bat-Family, I actually live in the same place as Dinah Lance. So there was no way to get out of doing this. I’d had little choice. So I went with the only thing I could stand…
“I feel like Cobblepot is going to think I’m gimic infringing with this umbrella…”
I’m a little late arriving to the party. Simply because Dinah refused to let Alfred pick us up in the Limo. I don’t own a car. ( Actually, I probably do. Inheritance, lame. ) Dinah only owns a bike. So we’d taken a Taxi. Except the Taxi guy didn’t have change for a Hundo. Nor did he have a fork-lift with which to carry in the Keg that Dinah insisted on bringing from her Bar. So, by default I’m a big tipper -and- carrying my own luggage, so to speak.
“Sorry, I’m late,” having hooked the umbrella in to the keg, I’ve engineered my own make-shift dolly. “You made that Cabby’s night, Dinah.”
Dinah: Only I’m not miserable. Quite the opposite, and I’m hell-bent on dragging someone along with me on my night of not misery. Dick and Barbara may be onto something with their lead, Tim might be…not a perfect fit for Batman but he’s trying, and he’s done some great things. Not just for Gotham, but spreading out to the world around us and Damien? Well. Damien actually showed up. In a costume no less. Which puts him two points ahead of where I thought we’d be tonight. Also underselling a little that I know he’s at least making an effort, after our little Batervention the other week. It’s a lot of reasons for a celebration, with a Holiday built in for an excuse. Maybe too much of a chippy-cheery one for me to normally drag them all in for but…
I kind of felt like maybe a night that wasn’t just yelling or correcting, or lecturing one another was in order. And yes. I’m as guilty, maybe more, as everyone else. The study is a pretty default hiding spot. I may not have spent much time upstairs in this place, but it’s not that hard to guess. Good thing Alfred knows these boys better than probably anyone else and has set-up in there. It’s where I head with my bags of booze, waving Tim along with me once he manages to get the keg in through the door. See? Not always opposed to letting a man do my heavy lifting.
“He’s welcome to come try and take it up with you. Be a bad night for him. Unlike said Cabby. I think he was trying to decide if someone had slipped him some special candy or not.”
I, for once, am actually wearing an eye mask. Part of the Robin costume, obviously. It was also definitely not where the cab driver was looking at any point. I think he was barely looking at the road either. Strutting in to the study, I throw my arms wide as I take in… God, that has to be Damien. Who else would show up looking like that in this house?
“…Damien, you know what? Nice costume, and Happy Halloween.”
The gesture might have been the threat of a hug. If I were a hugger. Instead I deposit my alcoholic goodies on the table that had been covered with books last time I was here. There’s no hug. Just a punch in the shoulder. Except the only person in this house that I haven’t punched is Alfred. That’s more a friendly knuckle nudge.
Damien: “This is not a costume.” making the distinction to Dinah as he gives her a curious glance when she punches his shoulder. Then looks over her costume with a raised… well, brow. It wasn’t in judgement. Tilting his head at her. “I.. believe you require a larger outfit, Dinah.” offering honestly. Completely missing the point of well, the T&A of her costume “I am sure if you were to offer to Alfred. He would have made sure the old Robin outfit would have been altered to your dimensions.” Giving her a nod, he looks over at the table of booze before turning his attention back to Dinah.
“I assume you brought Timothy?” asking as he moved to seat next to the table where she dropped her booze. Damien wasn’t planning on leaving the study. Next time, maybe he’d hide in the den. Maybe there he could be left alone with the few hundred dozen books. But, here he was now. With Dinah. And Timothy supposedly coming in behind her. Though, he heard rustling down stairs as Tim struggled with the keg. Though, he didn’t come to think to help Tim out. Looking away from Dinah for a moment, he glances to the bookshelf and picks up a book that looks interesting.
It’s not that Damien didn’t appreciate T&A…just…he didn’t really understand it. And least to say, Dinah was all about that T&A tonight.
“How are you tonight, Dinah?” asking, not really looking up from the book. So, he was trying to be a little social.
Tim: “No. I mean. I handed him a hundred dollar bill, he said he couldn’t break it. I said keep the change. But. I think -you- still made his night.”
There’s no small amount of smirk here. She was dressed like she was. Whether because of the Humor at work or because she was tormenting Dick. Who cares? I sure don’t. The cab driver certainly doesn’t care about why. Only that she was, that he got the pleasure of watching it the whole way here from the City. Hell, he didn’t even complain about the keg when I was loading it in. ( An act that started as a manly gesture, but ended with Dinah laughing at me. )
Damien being here isn’t really a surprise. I would have bet on him being here if for no other reason than to heckle everyone else for participating. Him being in costume? That’s worth all the trouble of getting here. By itself. Seeing the costume, on the other hand, leaves me unsure of whether to heckle him just a little bit instead. How do you resist?
“Hey, I though we had to come in costume!” Going with the obvious teasing gesture to Damien. “He used to wear that all the time. One time he jumped out of the Grandfather Clock and Alfred almost shot him with the 9mm he keeps under his monkey suit.”
All teasing aside, I am quick to transfer a hand from the Keg I’ve been hauling along, to Damien’s shoulder as I get closer. “It’s good to see you Damien. You really should take a moment. To just appreciate the fact that …. you’re going to spend the next fifty years listening to me tell stories about how the best looking Robin happened during my tenure in the Cowl.”
“Just. Look at her, Man. For once, that’s really the sole point. Wait. Did I say for once? That’s always the point. Appreciate the tactical advantage she gets in your old suit.”
Dinah: “Today it is. And now that you’ve worn it as a costume once, there’s just no going back.”
With that ‘greeting’ out of the way, I’m adding liquor to the spread that Alfred’s already laid out. I’d say it’s probably above what was required when there was only going to be five potential guests, and himself, in the house, but I don’t know. I’m no mind reader, but I think that maybe ‘Penny-One’ was happy to have an excuse. While i don’t know exactly how cheery a group it’s going to be, we’re at least making the attempt. It had been made clear to me when I’d turned up to pick up my own ‘costume’ that I didn’t need to bring anything with. I wanted to, though. And alcohol is something I ‘own’ in spades with the bar. It was this or peanuts. That and the gift of my glorious presence.
“Oh, this is the old Robin outfit. And he did alter it a little for me. Mostly to make sure I didn’t rip out a seam putting it on.”
I feel like I ought to point out to Damien the whole point of the costumes are to wear something that you are not, and likely will never be in the future. That connotation, mixed with him being the one that put it on? Well. I’m smirking a little bit as I finish distributing bottles through the treats and appetizers. Last out of the bag is a small black box that I shake once to make the heavy sound of cards thumping back and forth inside of it, laughing at Tim’s story in a single, little too loud guffaw.
“…I’d say seriously but that’s about the most believable thing I’ve heard all day. Happy Halloween to the cabby. Maybe he won’t be so grumpy when he shows up at his next fare.”
Though. See commentary about costumed freaks being up to no good tonight, as much as any other night and maybe I don’t entirely blame him. Not in Gotham. Instead of his life at risk, he got an enormous tip and to look at me.
“Tim’s right. Is this how it worked for you? Did you get to curb stomp crooks because they were gawking, too?”
Damien: “I believe it started with you, Timothy. We were playing …” trailing off as he tried to think of what the game was called. “Hide and Seek? You told me to hide. And you would come seek me. I took the opportunity to frighten Alfred. Though, You never did find me…” trailing off, Did Tim ever look for him. Looking to Dinah once again. “I suppose she is … unique … in my old Robin outfit.” saying as he shrugged. It wasn’t that he didn’t think Dinah was attractive. Just he never really thought of her in that line. They were similar in age with some of the same life experiences. But, thought of her more as an extension of his family.
Helena on the other hand….
“Psh. I am not sure what you are referring to, Dinah. Father would not allow me to “curb stomp” in air quotes, none the less. “Criminals.” shrugging slightly.
“Timothy. I must applaud you on your .. costume … I would have never thought you to dress as one of Father’s most hated villains. Maybe if we are to do this again next year, I will come dressed at Joker. To continue tradition, if you will.” explaining, his tone even and cool. It’d be hard to determine if Damien was joking. Especially since he was wearing something that covered the lower half of his face.
Coming back around to Dinah, he looks her over one more time. She’d see the gears turning in his mind on how to compliment her.
“I suppose it is most likely a good thing father did not choose you as Robin. Maybe the criminals would have gawked a bit too much for his liking. And I am sure you would have gotten cold with your legs bare and your chest exposed during the winter.” giving her a nod. That was a compliment, right?
Tim: See the bright smile? You should focus upon that and not the way I’m stage whispering to Dinah, “… I never went looking for him. It was the only way to get him to stop telling me how to do everything. He nearly gave Alf a heart-attack. I made a GIF out of it. It’s what I send every year to Alfred with his birthday card.”
The drinks are for the others. I’m not having any for a litany of reasons, but the most major among them? I’m the official designated driver. Because we came by Cab, but we’re leaving with something a little different. Trading up, so to speak. That is really half of the reason I agreed to the cab ride, instead of the Limo. I need to procure nondescript transportation for something I’ve got in the works. The work that I’ve been doing with Coast City requires me to show up to work on something other than a pedal-bike.
“Wah wah waaaaaah,” shaking the umbrella at Damien. “When I saw what Dinah was wearing, I couldn’t compete. So I figured that I would go the opposite direction. Fat, Disgusting. I started to wear fishy cologne, but I was worried she wouldn’t get in the Cab with me if I did.”
Clearing my throat just enough to get Damien’s attention, “Damien. Buddy. Pal. Brother. Have you ever seen her Canary costumes? She’s wearing a cape right now. Which means she has more clothing on right this second, than she would have if you stitched two Canary costumes together.”
Dinah: “I think this actually covers more than my usual suit. I mean. The support’s a little lacking. Seems like it’d lead to high potential for wardrobe malfunction… a lot less shredding of fishnets though. Do they make pan-booties in a high heeled variety? Might be onto something with these at least…”
Plus, besides all that I’m fairly sure that Bruce already had a Robin at that point. The first versions of my Canary costume weren’t nearly this exposed, either. It was a lot closer to what Damien’s wearing right now, and just started to get skimpier. And skimpier. As the nights went on and I realized how much of a distraction being a girl was, let alone one who was much more mature for her age than most would have guessed. Setting the Cards Against Humanity box on the edge of the table, I’m left laughing once again at Tim’s comment. I was wondering if Tim hadn’t found Damien, or if he’d just never looked. And now I know.
“Poor Alfred. He deserves some sort of war hero recognition. Seriously.”
Snatching up a canape, followed by another when it gets promptly popped into my mouth, I cross the room to drop down in a seat near Damien.
“The cape is really the only thing I’ve got a complaint about. So impractical.” Says the girl wearing…what I’m wearing now, that normally goes out in boots and what amounts to underwear. “Where did you even get Fishy Cologne, Tim? Please don’t tell me you’ve made some sort of doohicky to manufacture it.”
Dick: “He doesn’t need to make something to manufacture it, Silly Canary. Bat-Shark-Repellent. It’s in the utility belt. Smells like rotten codfish.”
They’ve congregated in the Den, so when I make my entrance it’s with the flare of throwing open the doors. So that everyone can see that someone wore even less than Dinah did. There was really only one way to go with the costume this year. You might have guessed it. “Michael Phelps. Speaking of sharkes. He raced one earlier this year on History channel. Sorta. It wasn’t really a Shark. Nor a race. And he didn’t win, actually.”
There’s an immediate hug in-store for Timothy Drake and Damien Wayne in turn. They’re each getting one. “Barb sends her apologies, but her Dad was working late. So she’s taking him some Licorice. Heavy on the Liquor.”
Damien: “The cape is really the only thing I’ve got a complaint about. So impractical.” Says the girl wearing…what I’m wearing now, that normally goes out in boots and what amounts to underwear. “Where did you even get Fishy Cologne, Tim? Please don’t tell me you’ve made some sort of doohicky to manufacture it.”
“The cape controls ascent and can be used to block various kinds of elemental attacks. Also, it is reinforced with an early kind of kevlar. As Robin, I was to be the target instead of Batman.” giving a nod as Dinah has a seat next to him. Leaning back, he pulls the facemask portion down and then pulls the hood down. Watching the exchange between Dinah and Tim, he tilts his head a little in confusion. Why would he want to smell like dead fish? Shaking his head, he picks the book that he was reading and opens it back up to what he was reading.
“I would imagine Timothy would build a contraption to make something reek.” offering a bit of a jab, though not really paying much attention. “When we lived together. Timothy once took apart the microwave, a television remote and finally a remote control car. From it, He assembled a contraption that would heat his meals on the run. It had met its demise at the hands of Alfred who was none too pleased at the range of the Microwave Car.” explaining.
“He also used it to chase Ace around the house. As you can imagine, Father was also not very amused.” though, Bruce did little to squash their imaginations. Or, well, rather Tim’s. Bruce had a hard time inspiring Damien not to use his imagination for mangling the criminal underworld.
Looking to Dinah, he bares a smile. Though, it’s clearly strained and not in practice.
“I have pictures of when Timothy had a bowl cut, if you ever wish to see.”
When Dick enters the room…half naked well, Damien’s brow shot up, and also didn’t return the hug that Dick seemed to eager to give him. Instead, he looked like some sort of rag doll.
“Richard. I do not believe you. All you are doing is wearing trunks and nothing else. This is hardly a costume.” offering with a bit of a teasing smile.
Dinah: Do I doubt that there is such a thing as Bat-Shark-Repellent? Are you joking? I’ve worked with these people for long enough to know that chances are better that it exists than it doesn’t exist. Boyscouts and Batman had basically the same motto. Be Prepared. So there’s no commentary on it that’s the truth or not, or if that is in fact what it smells like.
“What the hell did you ever need shark repellent for?”
It’s not often I’m not the least dressed person at any event in my life. In a fight. At the grocery store… even squeezing myself into a boy’s old costume, I’m still not going to win a prize for Most Skin Showing tonight. Man. There should have been prizes… that would have made this all a little too official and forced I think. Though ‘forced’ is definitely the word I’d use to describe Damien’s reaction to the hug Dick gives him. Not that the attire, or lack thereof, is really probably even to blame. I’m still snickering as I kick green boots up over the leg of the chair I’ve taken.
“I was going to guess Baywatch. Is that Barb’s, or did you actually own a speedo that small already? Lucky Gordon. That is the best kind of candy. Clearly we should all go trick or treat at the Precinct once we’ve eaten all of Alfred’s food.”
Truth is, listening to the bickering, bantering and exchanging of stories about the awful/amusing/embarrassing things that have been done by one or the other of them is good. Not even from some kind of ‘togetherness’ angle but… good for me. It’s all actually been a relief that I haven’t had to deal with the kind of problem Helena thought would arise. She actually called me in because she thought there’d be a battle royale over who GOT to wear the Cowl. Not the opposite. Seeing them behave like…well… brothers? Is a relief no matter what else is going right or wrong.
“It can also be used to snare and/or strangle you with. Not a fan of capes.”
Damien: “The trick not to being strangled by your own cape is to make sure they never grab you.” giving a nod. Damien and Bruce went over many, many situations on what to do if your cape did get grabbed on. Looking to Dinah, then back to his brothers. It was an interesting family he thought himself in. His brothers, Tim and Dick. While Damien may not show it, he wouldn’t trade them for anybody else. They were his brothers in battle, in life. And he knew that if for whatever reason, he had to call for help. They would be there in an instant. And likewise, he would be there for them in an instant.
They fight, bicker and act like… well, brothers. Even if they aren’t bound by blood. Apparently family extends beyond blood.
“Dinah.” turning his attention to her. “I have heard that you are training a new recruit. A young girl. How is that going? I do not suppose I could come in and help?” Damien was trying to extend his field of friends to beyond family. Maybe by giving Spoiler some even tougher love and no quipping while at it. Maybe….maybe he could make a new friend. That’s how it works, right?
“I promise not to try and kill her. I am assuming you are going full contact?” asking. When they were younger, Damien and Dinah had often sparred going full contact. While him and his brothers often did what brothers did best. Fought, Wrestled, Argued. All at full contact. There was no holding back against your brothers. “I will offer pictures of Richard in his first Nightwing outfit. I believe it was an attempt to channel the Ninety Seventies. V Neck. Flair collar.”
Tim: Richard Grayson is not just the older Brother, but he is also the Senior Statesman now. As such there’s a level of maturity one would anticipate when expecting him at a function. That is thrown to the proverbial birds when Dick shows up like he is. It’s all I can do not to start laughing immediately. The only way I manage -not- to laugh, is when Dick gives first me and then Damien a hug.
Huuurk!
“Dude. I think he just hugged us while wearing a pair of Barbara’s bikini bottoms. I’m not sure how I feel about this, but I’m re-thinking my stance on the booze.”
There’s always time to ridicule Dick later, right now there’s something far more important to address. “Actually, that was my first foray in to drone technology. Model Two of that mobile microwave used a micro-transceiver from the sat-phone Damien used to use to call his Grandfather to relay to one of the Wayne Tech Satellites. Unfortunately the laser-torch kept burning all of my pizza-rolls.”
“For the record, I agree with Dinah. I hate capes. I acknowledge that they’re essential at times, depending on the situation. Their aerodynamic appeal. The ability to use them for stealth. Not to mention, like Damien says, you can layer them for additional defense. Right before everything went sideways, I was working on a new style of cape for my Red Robin outfit. Made out of tensile polyfilament, it’s light weight but can be deployed as -literal- wings to allow me…
Dick: “…to fly. You’ve been talking about this idea since you were twelve. He’s been obsessed with flying ever since he met the first Superman.”
There’s a slanted smirk in place right now. Nothing to worry about, normally, but I’m clearly enjoying the discomfort of my little brothers. They both seem equally put off by the Hugs, by the state of my ‘costume’. Added to my not answering about the origin of the thong I’m wearing? Well it makes this more of a ‘party’ than it otherwise would have been.
The Boy certainly like to tease one another, don’t they Mum? Should they get out of sorts, just remind them that the Manor has had internal surveillance since before they were born and that I am a meticulous keeper of secrets. Unless plied with wine and good cheer. In which case I would be happy to regail you with tales of their misadventures… like the time Ace stole Master Damien’s utility belt and buried in the Garden Maze. Or the time Master Tim spent the afternoon tasered in place, after he tried to disassemble -his- utility belt for the first time. Or perhaps the story of why Master Richard started the tradition of the Pan Booties to begin with…
“See? This is what happens when you let Alfred cater a party. He’s always upstaging the Guests.”
Dinah: It’s basically the same liability as my hair is, when it comes down to it, only I can’t be strangled with my blonde locks. Not long enough for that. I can’t really debate the technique of not letting it be grabbed in the first place, but sometimes things happen in the middle of a fight despite what you ‘let’ happen or not. No matter how good you are.
“Two. One’s more refresher training though, and he’s not actually new. Transplant from another city. Spoiler though. Spoiler’s definitely new. It’s going better than I expected though, honestly. I figured she’d give up or wash out after the first few days. She’s making progress though. I’m not sure she’d survive both of us going Hard Knocks on her. But if nothing else we can make for better demonstrations than she gets from watching me…well… she can’t really watch when I’m using her for practice. …you assume full contact. Pshttt. Who do you think you’re talking to?”
There’s always something about listening to Tim geek out over his gadgets. I mean, I patently refuse to let him do any of that stuff to my gear, outside of some good ‘old fashioned’ armoring, but the things he comes up with. Between his initial drone tech, apparently, to the wings he was apparently working on before his ‘suit’ change.
“Hey, now it’s almost necessity as much as dreams. Trying to make sure you can ‘hang’ with your new friends?”
Mind you, I don’t have a problem with being ‘stuck’ on the ground. It’s always served me pretty well. But I can see the draw, especially when you’re slowly amassing acquaintances who can all transcend normal transportation concerns naturally. And people say Gotham’s weird… I find myself grinning at Alfred as he makes his appearance in the room. The stories he has to have. Both living here, and as Penny-One, the man’s seen some things.
“Gotta admit, the last one sounds informative, and I kind of need to see the footage that surely exists of the tasering. Don’t worry, Dick. Alfred’s as much guest as you are, so he can’t really show you up. Hm. Actually. He does trump you. He’s feeding me.”
Damien: Damien didn’t hold the same social graces that the rest of them did. While he didn’t fight back against the social gatherings, he was much more comfortable in his own outfit and beating up criminals than he was talking with others. Giving a nod to Dinah “I will contact you at some point, then. If you do not mind.” looking back down at the book, he finally gives up on trying to read it and puts it on the table as he watches Tim geek out, Dick embarrass them all, and then Alfred being, well, Alfred.
“I am going for a walk.” There were memories he wanted to explore, a house that once was warm and welcoming, now felt cold and empty. Maybe he should come back… but the memories of his father were great. Pushing up off the chair, he puts a hand on both of his brothers shoulders. “It is a pleasure to see you both again, at once. I hope we can do it again soon.” offering as he turned his head slightly, nodding to Dinah.
Walking out the door, Damien would turn the corner to go explore and visit his old memories. Maybe in a way to try and attempt to reconnect with his father. To pay for the sins of his own past without witnesses. It was how Damien worked, always had.
Tim: The joking back and forth? Is not just good, it’s needed. We haven’t had something like this since we all came back to the City. This is exactly what we’ve all needed. At least, this is what I’ve needed. It feels good to just be here. Together. Maybe without Bruce, but we all seem more like a family now than we have since losing him. But, I knew if the group of us was in the same place for long enough? Business would come up as a topic of discussion. I hadn’t anticipated Stephanie being the ice breaker though. Hell, I wouldn’t have even wagered her as being one of those to even be spoken of at all.
“For what it’s worth. I think introducing Stephanie to any one else from our ‘Family’ is a bad idea right now. Ever since she found out that Dinah is the Black Canary, she’s been working things out. She saw my announcement about Coast City on the television the other day. Now she thinks I’m Red Robin. She’s got her Father’s knack from Clues, I’d prefer not to give her another. At least, not until I’m absolutely sure she’s not a pawn in her Father’s schemes.”
There’s a small shrug at the end of this, because ultimately I don’t feel like it’s my call. I brought the girl in, I’ve been taking her out with me as Batman, but I asked Dinah to get her ready. If Dinah thinks she can handle something, then that’s the end of the discussion for me. I just wanted to put that out there. I’m not comfortable with her knowing who I am, yet. Much less knowing who the rest of them are.
“I always assumed the pan boots were a call back to your time with the Circus, Dick?”
Dick: “It does, Tim, but Alfred’s actually referencing the fact that… When I first decided to go out in the Night, I… sort of put together a costume from bits and pieces of anything I could find around the manor.”
Including. Master Dick’s boots from his turn at Peter Pan, from highschool.
“At the time I didn’t actually know Bruce was Batman or anything. I was just going out on my own…”
Dressed. As Peter Pan. Whom Master Dick was convinced was real, at the time.
“I was like 10.”
We’re very lucky, he didn’t believe he could fly, because I’m quite sure he was sniffing pixie dust at the time.
“You. Are. Completely. Not. Helping. Alfred.”
Dinah: “Don’t get lost.”
There’s a jaunty, if sloppy little salute given in Damien’s direction as he bails on the rest of us. Not surprised, nor am I going to try to stop him. I’m actually a little amazed he showed up, but it’s probably testament to just how strong my annoyance game can be if I feel the need to direct it at someone. I might have implied there’d be suffering of the non-physical variety if he didn’t at least poke his head in. Or maybe the fact that they are still a family is more the reasoning.
“She does have that going for her, that’s for sure. And her Eavesdrop Fu would put most of you to shame. I don’t even think she does it entirely on purpose.”
The girl’s got a lot of qualities that would, on the surface, make her suitable to the life she thinks she’s wanting to join, even if just to get even with her Dad. What she lacks, other than skill and experience though, isn’t something any amount of time with me is going to teach her though. I’m just not entirely sure if she’s got fight in her. And no, it’s not the same thing as stubbornness or a goal that she’s trying to reach. It’s still early though. We’ll see. Hopefully before she gets herself in trouble with it. Or her lack of it.
“Jeeeesus. That explains so much…”
Because I’d been at a bit of a loss as to who could have possibly dreamed up this costume. Especially compared to Bruce’s Batman Aesthetic. My Canary get-up may be flashy of the skin variety, but it’s still almost all black, or darker colors. But meanwhile? I’ve devolved into laughter in my chair, hand pressed to my temple like I need to contain it. The guys may rib each other…but no one does it nearly as well as the one who knows them best.
“Alfred. You savage. You’re staying for the card game, though…somehow I think that might be a mistake on my end. You’re probably going to win…”
by Michele | Nov 3, 2017 | Chronicles
Dick: When Dinah came to the Manor, I’d promised her to speak with my youngest ‘Brother.’ At first I’d been resistant, because Dinah had been unwilling to actually tell me whether she thought I should do something or not. It was never about whether or not it was the Black Canary’s place to make a decision. I was looking for input. Tim hasn’t been at the Manor much since returning to Gotham. I haven’t left, quite so often as I would like either. We’ve been travelling different paths. All of us have been. What I needed for Dinah was an assessment. Given by someone that I could trust. Which wouldn’t be laden with judgmental bias, like I might get from others. She hadn’t been willing to outright tell me that I needed to take the Cape and Cowl off of Tim. In fact, Dinah hadn’t been overly willing to do much of anything but lecture me about my own inadequacies.
If she’d been having that discussion with Bruce, it wouldn’t have gone quite so nicely as it did with me. Though, the simple truth is, if Bruce was still here none of it would have been a discussion in the first place. What Dinah had done is make me aware that I needed to get my head in the game. I’d argued that my head was in the game. The truth was somewhere in the middle. I’ve been obsessed with finding Bruce’s murderer. The only comfort that I’ve found of late, has been that which I could get from Barb. Even that was tempered by how torn the two of us have been over everything else. All of which equated to Dinah being at least partially right. That might grate upon me, if it weren’t for the fact that she was also partially wrong too. Saving Graces.
This is the first time I’ve come to the ‘Robin’s Nest.’ Which is doubling as the Bat Cave these days. Among the list of things I hadn’t known, that’s one of the chief among them. No one told me that Tim didn’t feel welcome at the Manor. No one mentioned to me that he was taking over the mantle of the Bat. No one managed to inform me that he’d set up one of the store houses as a new central base camp in the middle of Gotham City. No one told me anything, but I should have known anyway. Because I should have been involved. I should have been out there. In the City. Doing what I’ve been doing since I was younger than Tim is now.
It took about an hour before I accepted that Dinah was right about that. That I managed to find my way through feeling left out and realized that I hadn’t been left out. I’m the one who withdrew. Damien and Tim followed my lead, because I’m the oldest. We all did what our Father would do. Pulled in. Formed ranks. Kept everything close to the vest. What we had all done wrong, is that we followed Bruce’s example. When Bruce wanted us each to be better. After accepting my part (not the totality) of the blame for being so out of the loop? I’d made a single call.
A couple hours later, I’m feeling a lot better about everything. You see. I didn’t come here to take the Mantle of the Bat away from Tim. I came here to tell Tim about the lead Barbara and I found. In coming here, I’d opened the gate, turned on the lights and invited Timothy Wayne inside. Because anything else would feel like I was punishing Tim, for doing what is right. You cannot do that. Tim did the right thing. He lead Damien to doing the right thing. He’s managed to somehow marshal these other kids against the forces aligning against them. He’s done all of these things, while carrying a burden that he was never meant to carry.
“Did you see this?” In my hand is a newspaper, one that has a front-page headline. “The Dark Knight and The Fastest Man Alive solve the case and save the City. Central City, that is.”
Dinah Lance doesn’t consider this a game. Neither do I, but I’d be lying if I didn’t say that if it was a game? Timothy Drake is winning. For now. That’s part of -my- problem. “Don’t get me wrong. I get it. He’s not ready. Neither is Damien. But, I just couldn’t take it away from him. He’s done so much. Managed to accomplish so much. I think that if I took it away from him, it would be a blow that he might not recover from.”
“Stop. Right there. I’m not through, Dinah.”
“What I mean, is that there’s a confidence level involved in all of this. You know it as well as I do. After accomplishing the things he’d managed, if I told him that he wasn’t ready? It could have lead him down a path of self-doubt, that he doesn’t deserve. Mentally, that kid is more ready than Damien or I will ever be. Physically? Like you said. He needs help. So that’s what I was planning to offer…”
“…and then he asked me how long he has to wear that damned suit. Tim says he almost chopped the horns off his cowl in the Batmobile,” there’s a rueful smirk, that isn’t quite teasing about time but recalling the way he made me laugh when he said it. “He’s never worn the Cowl, he didn’t know to compensate for the height. The cape is longer than he’s used too. He’s never been without his own tools. Tim asked me to take it. Hell, he told me that his plan from the start had been to talk Damien. Get Damien on the right path. Then talk me in to taking it so he didn’t have too.”
“Dinah. I just had a meeting with my little brother. A meeting you thought I needed to have. Why do I feel like my little brother planned all of this? Maneuvered you. Me. Damien. He tripped on his cape. While filming the entire thing for training footage. Convenient. All I want to know, is did you know or were you an unwitting pawn in my evil little brother’s scheme?”
Dinah: “That depends.”
On what it is he’s asking if I’d seen or not, but I straighten up from the bank of monitors I’m hunched in front of to give my chair a spin and turn it around to face Dick and what it is he wants me to see exactly. I wasn’t using the computers, mind you. They’re currently serving as a prop for a clipboard and my pen and papers. Most expensive desk in the city, unless of course I was in the actual Batcave doing the same thing. The clipboard is mostly for something extra solid to use to whack anyone who points out I could simply use the ‘writing surface’ to do this digitally. Kudos to Nightwing for bringing me a physical paper to look at though. Frankly, I’m kind of surprised it’s not just a digital representation on a fancy tablet or something along those lines.
“And without Wonder Woman, either. Normally I’d have some commentary to make about the lack of girl power in that equation, but since it’s a victory for our boy I’m going to save that for another time.”
Crossing one long leg over the other, I’m by far the most casual person in the ‘building.’ Mostly because once Spoiler walked in on me, or rather I guess I walked in on herbeing here, there isn’t anyone who comes down here that doesn’t know my real identity anyway. That means I do training, and basically everything else, in workout gear unless I’m planning to go do some ass kicking. Such is my current lot. But when it comes down to it, I’m actually far less protective of ‘Dinah Lance’ than any of the rest of them are of their names. I don’t have anyone that isn’t also a vigilante that I care about currently. And they can watch out for themselves. Or I can. Stretching my arms overhead like I’ve been interrupted doing something incredibly taxing, I cross one long leg over the other and look at Dick expectantly. He told me to stop.
The raised eyebrow says he’s got about five seconds to finish, and he better make it good, before I’m going to keep on regardless.
“Oh. He did. Did he mention the part where he made the ears longer in Version 8.6, because someone commented that he looked shorter? Mental preparation was really never the concern.”
I may not have been there for that conversation, but I don’t exactly need to be a rocket scientist to know who in the Cave would have said it. Without knowing to think through what i might lead to. Which was a taller hat, and thicker boots. There’d been much facepalming and grumbling behind his back about that one, while I felt that I couldn’t voice that complaint to his face. I’d told Dick as much at Wayne Manor. I’m ground floor cheer squad here. Tim already doesn’t think he can do this. Despite the successes. Having someone tell him that to his face isn’t going to help matters. It’d just undo the good he’s managed to bolster himself with.
Which is also why I wasn’t actually after Dick to tell him he sucked either. He doesn’t suck. That’s not really the issue.
“Normally, and in any other situation, I’d get squinty right now, think about what you’re telling me and go ‘oooh, that little asshole done played us.’ But there’s no way, and I mean none, that he would have intentionally tripped on his cape. As Batman. Out in public where someone might see it. Which is the actual core of the problem. He won’t risk doing something that Batman wouldn’t do. In his opinion. Because he’s preserving an image more than he’s watching his own ass. And the partner he’s been taking out with him isn’t up to the task of doing it for him.”
Don’t get me wrong, she’s actually made…a lot of progress. I figured the kid would have washed out by now. It’s actually training modules and schedules I’m working out for her right now on my papers. But she’s not going to be able to save Tim’s life if something happens that falls outside all that mental preparation of his.
“That was the original plan though, yes. I was more than a little shocked when he took it on himself in the meantime.”
Dick: “Mm.”
Let’s agree that I’m not convinced. My little brother has pulled quite a caper of late. Manipulations worthy of one of the Rogue’s Gallery, to be honest. I’m not so willing to believe that everything was happenstance. What I can’t dispute though, is what Dinah says about Tim’s dedication to the image of the Bat. I can agree that it would take a lot for him to actually do something out there. In the City. Which would, potentially, make the Batman look bad.
“I don’t want to split hairs with you, but … the detective in me? Is saying that while you’re definitely right about whether he’d blemish the Bat image. There’s a certain likelihood, that Tim left the footage in place. For you to find and me to see. Because he knew it would bring about certain logical conclusions.” Both hands come up, plaintiffly, palm up and open. “I’m just saying. If Tim didn’t want us seeing his blunders? We’d never know they happened, unless we saw them with our own eyes.”
That’s about where I roll my shoulders in a shrug, because it doesn’t really matter in the end. Whether it was a plan or unintentional, the result is still the same isn’t it? I found out, with an assist from Dinah and I -got- motivated to do what was apparently the original plan in the first place. “He wants to tie up a few ‘loose ends,’ but once he does we’re going to make a transition. Maybe more than one.”
With those last couple words, I cast a look around the new ‘Cave.’ I can see why Tim calls it the Robin’s Nest. This is nothing like the Bat Cave. Bruce liked his technology as much as anyone, but he was focused on iconography. There’s way too much light here. Too many -people- here. Dinah’s here. I know that I saw the girl she’s referencing down there fighting a wooden dummy when I came in too. Word is that Roy Harper found his way in to Dinah’s care too. All the while I’ve been hold up at the Manor, with Barb and Alfie… and books.
“You should talk to Tim,” a bit of a twist upon our last conversation, but there’s a much lighter tone to this than before. “He’s got big plans. Outside of Gotham. And if he’s not going to be hidden behind the Bat, then Timothy Wayne, head of Wayne Enterprises will need to be somewhere other than here full time. If he stays here. He’ll be in more danger as Tim, than he ever was as Batman.”
“The look on your face says you haven’t tracked Helena down yet.”
Dinah: Mm. That’s other people’s versions of ‘yeah, no I understand what you’re saying but I also understand you’re totally wrong. At least in this family. The Waynes are like, High Kings of Monosyllabic Disagreement. Which doubles as non-responses to anything you might choose to say that they’re not going to dignify with a response, while pretending that they are. The only part I don’t know for sure, is if they all picked it up from Bruce, or if he just managed to find people with similar mannerisms. Maybe a little of column A, a little of column B.
“There was no finding on my end. He actually gave it to me. Had to pull it up multiple times because I kept accidentally closing it out before I was done watching, so that I could take notes on all the things Spoiler needs ‘helpful correction’ on.”
In a way, their problems aren’t totally dissimilar. Both trying to do what they feel they have to, and putting things into play they’re too new with to be able to use effectively. I had the ‘benefit’ of being a trained fighter for almost a decade before I ever thought to go out and actually use it on anyone as a vigilante. It was long past muscle memory at that point. Stephanie can throw a punch. She clearly picked up some ugly version of playground brawling as she grew up, but fighting with someone who is just another angry scrappy kid is a lot different than fighting someone that can, and will, kill you. Her inexperience with it means she makes mistakes while she’s focusing on something else. And if Tim’s going to continue to fixate on what Batman would or wouldn’t do? He’s going to leave openings he never would as Red Robin.
“More than one? Listen, I know came up there all full of piss and vinegar and indignation, but I also wasn’t kidding when I said taking the mantle from one person who’s not totally committed and putting it on another wasn’t really a great solution. If we all need to think tank something else? Then we do that.”
I don’t want Tim to get himself killed, but I don’t want Dick to either. But frankly… it’s less of a worry for me. The suit’s not new on him. He’s not the third in line that was never, ever supposed to actually have to wear it. He’s more than physically prepared. It’s the mental part where it gets iffy.
“…no, the look on my face says you’re actually telling me something I already know this time. And they are big plans. Tim picked up on a thread that Bruce sent him out on, without knowing that’s what was happening, and he’s running with it. Seems to have made friends that can have his back outside our ‘fair’ city, as well. My money? Is on him joining up with them once this is all sorted out here. But until that happens, anyone that wants Timothy Wayne is coming through me, first.”
My lips purse, partly because of the seriousness of that last statement with the implied ‘I will fuck their shit up’ and…partly because…
“But no. I haven’t gotten her cornered yet.”
Dick: Okay. That is very clearly a surprise to me. Tim showed Dinah the footage? I might have actually blinked just then. Losing the mask of inscrutable passiveness for just a moment. Long enough for it to be seen, but only if the person was looking or as aware of their surroundings as Dinah. There’s no mental cursing at myself for losing control either. Such is the enormity of that information. Which I’m added to the list of things that have surprised me recently.
A list that includes Dinah Drake coming to my Home and giving me the lecture of a life time. One that got cut off at the knees because she wasn’t willing to tell me to pull the trigger. She clearly knew it needed to happen, but she wouldn’t say it. Now she also knows of these elaborate plans too. “You told me, at the Manor, that you were helping Tim. I thought you meant just with training the rookies.”
“You’re helping him, aren’t you? Wait. Waitwait. I mean, you’re really helping Tim. You’re not just doing everything for him or watching to make sure he doesn’t get himself killed. You’re helping Tim?” For the second time in as many minutes, I’m losing the mask of stoic distance. I’m surprised at this revelation. “Don’t get me wrong. I’m not surprised that you would help someone. I’m surprised that the angry little girl with a mean right hook, is helping my brother the Dreamer. You’re the most pragmatic person I know, now… No, offense, Dinah, but you’re like a hot wet blanket on the hopes and dreams of everyone around you. I couldn’t understand why you said you wouldn’t make the call, but…
“You’re invested aren’t you? You’re not ditching, to run off to another city again. You actually … mean that. You’re going to protect him.” A hand goes up in to my hair, brushing it back from my face as I soak this all in. “It’s what you do. You’re a hero. You’ve always been a Hero. You’re just…”
Whatever I’m rambling about, I bring it to a halt then and there. Drawing myself up, good and proper, I make a gesture to the sparring pads. “You can’t protect him against the unknown, so get some coffee. I think it’s time someone trains you for once.”
Dinah: The look on Dick Grayson’s face says shock, or maybe just a hair short of that. He thought he had it all figured out, that this was some genius mastermind plan of Tim’s (not really unbelievable) where he was arranging his pawns and higher pieces, so that they would just naturally fall into place, piece after piece, in a way that didn’t even look like he’d done anything at all. Tim’s a planner, and a plotter, sometimes inside of each other. And while I can’t say I really doubt he might have let something be where Dick could find it? I’m not sure he even thought Dick would be looking, and he’d seemed fairly earnestly embarrassed when I had pointed out the tripping. And head bonking. Which I had. As much as I don’t want to jar the guys’ confidence, he knows me well enough, to know that if I have a chance to call out and mock both him and Spoiler in a single breath I’m going to do so. Especially on a first viewing of ‘game footage.’
He probably would have thought something was wrong that I didn’t say anything.
I actually let Dick continue to work through his running list of realizations with very little input from me. I’m just all expectant looks, mixed with ‘uh, duh?’ and a little bit of ‘really, Dick? Really?’ on the side. I may have also rolled my eyes at him, a motion which lolls my head all the way over to my shoulder, and spins my chair around so that I can deposit the clipboard back on my desk/million dollar computer monitor, and finish the revolution.
“I feel like I should point something kind of important out here, since you are probably going to repeatedly bring this up. Again. Likely any chance you think you’re going to get a rise out of me for it. Your father and I had a very polite discussion almost three years ago. You know. The kind where he’s not saying overtly threatening things, but with the clear undertone of ‘if you don’t do what I think’s, I’m going to break your knees and windpipe and ship you off to someone that’s going to keep you out of Gotham forme.'”
Just imagine the kind of talk people he didn’t sort of like would get. In other words, no talk. Straight to the breaking and crating.
“I know what you’re thinking. But Dinah! That’s the kind of talk that gets a dude pimp slapped, kicked in the junk and then further emasculated for daring to tell you what you’re going to do or not do! And you’re right. Except that I actually agreed with him, and saw Bruce’s point. I’m a meta. Gotham’s got enough problems without my superpower arms race escalation. So I found a college as far away as I could get without crossing an ocean.”
Talk about your coast to coast trips, too. Really. Star City had its own problems, mind you, and it’s own vigilantes which I’d invariably hooked up with. And. Erm. Hooked up with. But I’ve changed a lot since I was that angry little girl, as he’s called me. I wasn’t angry anymore, before I’d actually left Gotham or it would probably have been a different conversation. I’d gotten what I”d been after. Not vengeance but justice, and I’d learned the difference. In a way, I hoped it was a lesson I’d be able to impart on Damien eventually. Because he’d been reminding me a lot of myself seven years ago.
“But this?”
I jab a finger at the floor, then spin a widening circle with the digit to encompass not just this room, or this building, but the city as a whole.
“Is my home, and this is my family. When I heard about Bruce I wanted to come back. When Helena called, honoring his ‘wishes’ kind went out the window. I like to think he’d understand, but frankly? This time I don’t really care. You want pragmatic? I can’t protect the only things I’ve got left to care about from Star City. You bet your ass I’m invested. I don’t go and give Superman an ear full for just anyone‘s schemes. What Tim’s doing is important to him. So I’m helping.”
Plus, as a side benefit, they’re looking out for metas in general. Which I am.
“We’ve been working together since we both got back. I was helping him with his Big Plan before he put on the cowl.”
I suppose I am a Hero, but I can pretty much promise one thing. Anyone comes at any of these ‘boys’ or ‘girls’ while I’m around to get in their way, they’re going to learn just how far into the grey area I’m willing and able to go in order to stop them. It becomes my turn to raise my eyebrows in surprise. Both of them. As I look from Dick, to the sparring pads, and back again like I’m double checking what he’s just suggested. Maybe asking if he’s crazy. Emotionally detached? Oh, I know I am. I don’t get involved in things like serious relationships because it’s idiotic. Not how my brain works, and there’s not enough time in the day for it. Fun can be had without anything else needing to come from it. But family is something different.
“Coffee huh? Is this about to be an enlightening experience for one of us?”
I’m not saying no, though. I’m actually willing to humor Nightwing because if he thinks he knows something I’m going to need in order to look out for his Brother, and all the rest of them? I’m going to at least listen first before I kick his ass for it.
Dick: Dinah’s reactions are extremely telling. She’s been involved, she says as much moments later. She’s been in the known, she says that too. True enough, she isn’t actually discounting what I meant by investment. What I’m stuck with when she finishes speaking? Is that Dinah talked a whole lot, but said very little. Kind of standard operating procedure with her. I’ve been seeing her do this for a long time and I get the implication of what she is saying but…
“He didn’t want you to leave,” comes the only retort that I even offer to what she has said. “You missed the point and before you get all righteous with me. I’m serious. Bruce didn’t want you to leave. If you had stayed and just concealed your power, it would have been enough. Bruce thought you needed to leave. The you wouldn’t be able to get your life in gear until you left and got a life in the first place. I think it hurt him, actually. Forcing you to leave. I also think he didn’t want you to end up like me, resenting him. Or Barb, after the Joker….” (Wince)
“Just like I also think he’d be very proud of you. What you’ve become. What you are. Most especially though. What you’re doing here, now.”
“As far as escalation goes. I think we may be past that tipping point,” there’s a sort of certainty to that, which suggests a lot more than ‘think’ in all of this. “I don’t have a whole lot more than what I told you before. Other than the simple knowledge that what took down Bruce wasn’t something or someone we’ve faced before. It’s old. As old, if not older, than Gotham itself. You saw all of the History books I’ve been reading, there’s a smattering of clues in them, but it’s a lot of time piecing them together. Frankly, it’s a lot of guess-work.”
“Except for one thing prevailing thing. When Wayne Enterprises announced that he was going to ‘Rebuild and Reshape’ Gotham, following the No Man’s Land debacle in the Narrows? I think he awoken something. Like I said, something big and something old. Bruce contacted Damien’s Grandfather just over a week before he died. He was researching old Gotham Myths. Ra’s Al Ghul answered Bruce’s request with one word: Hide.”
“I’m not sure how familiar you are with Ra’s, but let me tell you something. The man doesn’t hide from anything. So to have him say that? I’m convinced that there was more to Bruce’s research than just myth and legend.” Flicking my hands down to either side of my legs for the escrima sticks that settle in to nearly invisible holsters. “After Bruce’s death. Someone accessed the Bat-Cave’s computers. Even before you came to see me, I’d been planning to meet with Tim. I wanted to see if he could figure out why they were doing in the system. I also wanted to see if Damien could get something more from his Grandfather.”
“What I do know, for sure, is that if you’re going to protect my baby brother? You probably need to work with someone other than Rookies.”
Dinah: For once, I wasn’t actually trying to discount anything Dick was saying to me. Except, of course, the now repeated insinuation that there was a potential for me to just up and bail because something or someone was getting a little closer to me than I liked. Something and someone already did get close, and I ‘bailed’ on Star City to get back to it. I’ve lost an awful lot. We all have. There won’t be anymore on my watch, not if I have anything to say about it.
“I’m not sure if that plan of his was a success or not. Mostly what I figured out is that I’m never going to be able to toe the line, and a regular life lived during daylight hours is just not for me. But. Thanks, Dick. It’s nice to hear.”
And I suppose, now that it’s been brought up I really haven’t actually made use of those meta powers since I got back in town. Except on my little excursion to Metropolis. Still not sure that it counts as ‘repressing’ myself. I don’t think that resentment was going to be my issue. I’d already worked that through. I came into the Batcave already resenting Bruce, because he was curtailing my mission. That angry girl I was back then was full of negative emotions, and completely repellent to any good ones. I’d tried to wall off, because it seemed easier than gaining anymore people to lose. Clearly, it had happened anyway. Balance. It’s impossible to let go of something, without gaining something back in the process. Usually something opposite.
“Escalation? Are we talking… big and old like Tim’s new bestie the Wonder Goddess’ crowd or…”
That seems too big, honestly. And I’m not exactly sure how subtle that crew would be. Wrath is a word that you associate with Gods, and that’s not subtle in any of the stories. Or if you watch any of those people operate on Earth now. I’d think there would have been an example made, unless they just truly don’t want anyone to know they’re there and steering things.
“…or are we talking Illuminati level?”
Pursing my lips, because I know enough about the Demon to know that he doesn’t hide because he doesn’t have to hide. That’s telling enough even for me, and my usual want of something more concrete than superstitions and primal fears. Levering up out of my seat in one smooth motion, a hand comes up to gather my hair back in a ponytail while the other flicks the elastic that had been on my wrist into place, securing it back out of my face. When it comes to roughing up Stephanie, I don’t typically bother. Dick’s been putting foot to ass as long as I have.
“I didn’t think just someone could even access the Cave computers? I mean. I know basically the opposite side of zero about brick walls and D-Doos, but I was led to believe that unless you’re like…Tim, it probably wasn’t going to happen.”
Padding over to where the gear for sparring is currently housed, I am actually putting some on. Not a lot, mind you, though it’s infinitely more than I bother with most of the time. Thin, but effective armoring for my shins, and forearms because that’s where chances are I’ll be doing most of the blocking. And while I can fight with a weapon just as well, I opt to go without for now. You can always count on your fists, and the rest of your body, to be present and reachable if you get surprised.
“I do have Ted still, you know.”
Mind you, Ted Grant is eighty years old or so at this point. If you think that’s going to keep him from knocking your jaw off your face you’re sorely mistaken.
“But I’m happy to go a few rounds with a Rank 3 Old Man instead.”
Dick: Swirling the escrima sticks in my hands as we talk is more about getting my fingers limber than anything else. It’s second nature, using them as an extension of my body. It happens to be one of the many reasons I completely understood what she meant, when she told me that Tim wasn’t using his bo-staff. She didn’t have to explain it, because I know first hand what it is like to have to go without a tool you rely on. I’ve spent most of my life learning to adapt, to live a life in which my tools can and will be taken away. I like to think that’s one of reasons why I’ve survived as well as I have outside of Gotham. Out on my own. Bruce prepared me for a world where anything I have can and likely will be used against me. Tim got the same training, he’s just missing the time and experience he needs to put those lessons in to practice full-time.
Padding down the steps towards the training mats while Dinah preps. I’m not going to need the padding, since I came in full uniform. “Right now the problem I’m seeing is that the answer is a little more like ‘Both’ instead of one or the other. As near as I can find in all the research I’ve been able to do? They’re as old as that. Dating back further than written history. They’ve also spanned a good deal of the entire world at one point or the other.”
“However, I think what Bruce was dealing with is more centralized. I think we’re dealing with one section of a sort of Illuminati. A splinter group that came here. Settled here. I think this group sees Gotham as their ‘Foundation.’ They’ve cultivated just the right amount of corruption. Not so much that the city falls in to total chaos, but right on the brink. So that they can operate beneath it all. Undetected. That’s why I think they tolerate, maybe even embrace, the position of the Batman. He keeps the mixture right where they want it.”
“Think about it. I mean, really think about it. Gotham isn’t actually a completely meta-human free zone. Why hasn’t that group that Tim is struggling with set up shop here? Your Grandmother lives here, doesn’t she? What about Ted and her friend, Alan Scott. Doesn’t he have super powers? Aren’t they the same damn powers as the guy who caused the entire Coast City affair in the first place? So. Again. There were Heroes here, in Gotham, before Batman existed. When he came around he policed them, so Nowhere doesn’t have too. Sounds a lot like the Batman’s existence was exactly the right answer.”
“Bruce Wayne on the other hand. Had a grander scheme. He had plans to make Gotham Great again. He didn’t fit in the mixture.” As I finish speaking, I turn and center myself upon Dinah. Escrima sticks up, at the ready. Shoulders off-set. Feet taking a more balanced position on the mats. “Which brings me back to the Bat-Computer. That’s another thing that is bothering me. People like Tim couldn’t hack those computers. Because Bruce used fifty people like Tim to make it Tim-proof. No one gets as deep as someone got in to those computers. Not remotely. Someone was in the Cave.”
Dinah: If we were just going to be fighting bare knuckle to bare knuckle? I wouldn’t have bothered with anything other than the clothes that I’m already wearing. Which isn’t going to blunt any sort of blow, but it shouldn’t need to. In an ideal world? I wouldn’t be training Stephanie Brown in her Spoiler Suit. It does blunt a blow. Which is part of the reason why it probably looks like I’m being a little overly vicious with her. Anyone who has trained with me knows that I am ruthless when I spar, but pain is a great motivator to not replicate a mistake. Like a child who only touches a hot stove once and never wants to feel that cause/effect ever again. But she’s in armor. She hasn’t learned that the beatings hurt without it. The last thing she needs is to learn that she can afford to get hit, because she has that suit. Because someday? She might not, and that hit that her mind has learned she ‘can’ take may be the one that kills her.
I’m not about to tell ‘Nightwing’ to ditch his sticks. I want a fight, after all. I just also don’t want a fractured ulna. They’re not great, believe me.
“I’m not saying you’re wrong, I just have a hard time believing anyone would really want to cultivate…well. Gotham. Given any and all the options something that old, and that established and that powerful could put into place. They must want to stay under the radar badly to put this much noise into the world.”
My mouth pulls to the side, as I drop into a position that’s only technically defensive because I’m not moving yet. Fists up, up on the balls of my feet. As a general rule, I don’t like to do defensive, unless it’s to bait my opponent into a movement that I can punish them for. Works on Stephanie Brown all the time, and on pretty much every mook out on the streets. It’s also not going to work on Dick Grayson.
“My grandmother’s dead.”
That answer comes the moment before I move. It’s as good an opening as any, one of us has to start this off and it’s going to be me. In the middle of the kind of conversation that makes people turn awkward and apologetic very, very quickly. There’s no anger or hurt in my tone at his bringing it up, though. He’s brought it up as a part of a very good point. They were laying low, but they had been here already. An open palm, coming center mass at Dick, stiff armed momentum behind it as I lunge forward, a loose fist ready to follow up.
“And if they got in the cave once, and they are still here, they could do it again at any time.”
Dick: “No offense taken. I’d actually agree with you, ordinarily. Why Gotham? Well, it certainly can’t be somewhere like Metropolis. The supers there don’t actually keep to the Shadows and the last one could see through walls. Then you’ve got places like Bludhaven. Where the Criminals are actually too ballsy, they won’t let someone keep the status quo without a challenge for a week. Much less decades. Gotham is really the only city in the ‘New World’ where you really have a perfect mixture.”
“The GCPD and the normal Criminals are too complacent. What few supers we have don’t take part in the City politics very much. Batman keeps the Rogues from ever setting up shop for long. They keep Batman from rooting out the entire criminal element.” This is where I watch as Dinah gets set, but hold back because I’m not going to attack her. Not right now. Not when we’re actually discussing something important. “You’ve got a perfect storm here. Where you could, in theory, exist for decades without ever even being discovered.”
“Your Grandmother’s gone? I didn’t actually know that. Sorry to hear that. I mean it. Sometimes the sheer amount of loss that we have all endured is staggering to think about.”
The sticks aren’t just a weapon. They’re part of me. Allowing me to move with an enhanced reach. They function like batons, which I’ve been working with since I was a child. Even younger than Dinah, since the ‘Flying Grayson’ act with the circus. Acting as a fulcrum to enhance my balance even more than normal. I can’t say enough for how much they aide me, but they’ve never been a crutch either. Batman insured that right away. I went without them the entire time I was in the role of Robin. Everything we did. From training, to being in the field, was done without them to insure that I never suffered from their loss like she describes Tim being off balance without his staves.
When Dinah does finally attack? I go for the one thing I’m absolutely positive that she won’t expect. The Kill. A flick of one hand to divert her lunge, while the rest of my body contorts to the side. In time with this I bring the other hand down, but release the escrima stick at the last second. Sending it out of my grasp, down to the mat. Where it’ll ricochet back up toward her Jaw.
“Worse, Dinah. You’re not thinking bad enough. If they got in to the Cave. They got past security systems that span everything from key-code to eye-prints, to DNA registry. You cannot get -in- to the Cave, unless your DNA is on file. Not without sending off an alarm -or- battering your way in. Whoever did this got past all of the bio-metrics. Got in to the Cave, physically. Then past the cyber defenses too.”
“If they can do that to the Cave, then they could have been Here too or at Wayne Enterprises. Any of the Wayne Corp holdings.”
Dinah: “We’re a hot mess, for sure. There’s too much going on at any one time, that you’re usually playing whack-a-mole with the crooks. A sort of vigilante triage. The worst, and most threatening at any one time, which means you’re not worried about why that’s the status quo.”
I know I haven’t been. It just is. That’s how Gotham’s been as long as I’ve been alive. From the stories I heard growing up, too. The only thing you could count on was that Gotham’s crime was like fighting a mythological hydra. Cut off one head, and a few more would spring up in the same place. That didn’t slow me down any, back when my head was full of fire and rage though. Tim knew about my family, I assume Bruce did as well, but that’s because they were snoops that always knew more about anyone than you probably wanted them to. Dick had left Gotham before it happened, and it wasn’t as if I talked about it often. Or ever.
“It’s alright. I truly was not kidding when I said you guys are the only family I have left.”
But it is. Staggering. It’s why Bruce’s death was perhaps one of the cruelest, even though it should perhaps have been the most expected, given what he did with his life. What we all do. My grandparents at least had been the easiest of the deaths I’ve faced, though it really hadn’t eased my rage much at the time. Sometimes, having nothing to blame but being mortal only makes you feel that much more impotent and helpless. Never feelings I’ve coped well with.
“Tch!”
Clucking my tongue at him, the hand that had been cocked back to punish any block to my initial lunge is yanked in, accelerating the spin that he starts me into as I drop my weight, ducking the bouncing stick, and driving the arm he’d blocked back towards his midsection.
“No foreplay? I see how it is.”
Not thinking bad enough? I may not get the ins and outs of tech, but I do know about people being where you don’t expect them to be. About inside jobs, and festering corruption and what it can do when it’s not excised properly.
“What is the likelihood that someone has all of those things? Someone from Wayne Corp. Someone from R&D that these people have their hooks into?”
I don’t want to think it was any of the people allowed in the Batcave. That list is small. Very small. But as he says…they could get in anywhere. Know about anywhere. Which only makes me want to hole up in this little fortress here and make sure no one comes sniffing around, or hurts anyone else using the building.
Dick: A grunt of acknowledgement is Dinah’s reward for sleuthing through what she’s figured out. I gave her the clues, she made the leaps. Dinah has always been a good detective. She would have made an amazing Cop, if only she’d wanted that for herself. Knowing that she was able to find her way through the abyss of half-clues tells me that I wasn’t wrong myself. Maybe that is why I am here. Clearly neither of us really needed the physical work out. Perhaps I’d needed a mental sparring instead?
Rolling though and coming up out of the tumble also has another added benefit. I’m close enough to key the trigger in my gauntlet. Letting her see how the previously tossed escrima stick comes to life and returns to my hand. “The sad irony of all of this? I actually don’t think they knew Bruce was Batman. I think they know now, but I don’t think they knew before.”
“Barbara and I met with Helena. She gave us the first clues, the trail. That’s why I told you to hunt down the Huntress yourself. She and I don’t exactly get along famously these days. Given that I chose Barbara over her, there’s some… lingering …resentment.” The wince makes it past the little eye-mask. Hard to cover up anything with these silly things. “She didn’t give me everything she knows. Just enough to put me on the right path and warn me not to pursue it. Even though she had to know I would.”
“To set your mind at ease, I checked. The Cave keeps a log and a backup log. As well as an off-site secondary, third and fourth log. For every entry in to the Cave. All of them were erased. Which only adds credence to what you just said. Whoever killed Bruce? Made sure to take what they needed for access to the Cave. At least that’s the logical conclusion. Your partner had a very illogical one.”
I’ve no sooner said those words than I’m back in motion. Crossing the distance between us as quickly as possible. In motion, at the point of being nearly upon Dinah? I unfurl one of the sticks again. Throwing it just low enough to force her to move or take the escrima stick center mass. What she does to avoid the stick will determine, in mili-seconds what I’m going to do as a follow-up.
Dinah: Sometimes you need a sounding board, more than anything, and sometimes you need the fight. The way it gets your blood going, endorphins kicking and your reactions firing at peak efficiency. Never underestimate what fight or flight reflexes can do for your system. All the unnecessary things fade away, and that leaves you with only what you do need. Your mind and its ability to reason through tricky situations chief among those.
“And now they’re capitalizing on that.”
I’m not sure if the Joker would find that humorous or even more infuriating. That it amounted to an ‘accident’ that the Batman was killed, because someone killed Bruce Wayne. He’s already terrorizing the underground as it is, looking for someone to blame for the loss of his nemesis. How effective of a hound would he be for the actual foe we’ve got to deal with? And how much of Gotham would he destroy to get to them? I hate to say it, or in this case think it, but maybe his presence isn’t the worst thing right now. He’s keeping a lot of them in check from any huge and reaching schemes. They’re trying to not draw attention. Which means that we’ve got some breathing room to hunt the actual problem.
“Hell hath no fury, and all that. Maybe I just need to invite her to an after hours special party at the bar, get us both drunk and see if that makes her feel more like reconnecting and sharing. I’ll just have to banish Timothy to his room so he doesn’t lurk and look all judgey.”
His room being my living room and the couch, but hey. It works. I’m also more glad than ever that I ‘made’ him take it, instead of just hiding out somewhere nearby to keep an eye on me while he decided whether or not I could be to blame for his father’s death. I agree with his assessment of Helena though. That she had to know telling him anything would give him a course to act on. So did she tell him, aiming him as she would a crossbow bolt in the direction she wanted? Or was it to send him away from something else?
“Illogical? Tim? That’s shocking. What was it?”
Then he’s moving again, and my mouth’s turned up in a smirk as I watch. Not because I’m finding what he’s doing humorous. I’m enjoying myself. I haven’t had a fight with someone that’s even close to a threat to me in a couple weeks, and it feels good. I don’t avoid the stick at all. The roll of an arm as I start to rise has me snatching at it, while the other hand comes up again, using my upward momentum to aim the heel of it at his nose.
Dick: “Unfortunately, that’s where I hit the wall. After they killed Bruce, they found out he was the Batman. The reason that I think that caught them by surprise, is because their next move was to raid the computer. Then they orchestrated Joker’s release.” Lowering my voice, not for effect or secret, but because I am actually not sure how she’s going to react to what I’m about to say. “And your return. I’m pretty sure Helena reached out to you because they wanted her to.”
We’ve talked before. Many times. Most recently our talks have not been the most pleasant of discussions. Accusations have been thrown out. Implied or out right stated. This feels good. Right. Talking to her about a case, -the- case. Giving her details of it, then having her tell me her impressions. Seeing if she draws herself to the same conclusions. Each time she’s done so, up to now, has been a key for me to really buy in to what I’m seeing. She sees the details the same way. Which is why I know one of the conclusions she might make and I want to brace her against it, at least for now.
“Before you get your hackles up. I’m -not- sure she did it at their behest or because they put the breadcrumbs for her to follow. In fact that’s starting to be the most maddening part of all this. I can’t be sure that what I know at this point, isn’t specifically because they want me to know it.”
Dinah is good. No, that’s not even accurate. She’s better than good. In a fight on the ground, she’s better than I am. Maybe not even a little better either. I’ve gotten better over the years, but so has she. Where I’ve worked to encompass other techniques, like being in the air. Being mobile and agile. She’s focused on technique. That’s why I knew when I asked her to work out that I wouldn’t be able to fight her without the sticks. I also knew that I wasn’t wanting to teach her something, that she already knew. Which is why I lead with the sticks.
Even as she’s snatching the thrown stick out of the air, I’ve changed path. The natural way for me to take this would be up in to the air. So I take it to the ground. In that split second of seeing how she handles the stick, I throw myself in to a baseball slide. Legs parting midway through the slide, with the intent to scissor not one but both of her legs as I go right through them. How do I know this is going to work? Because I’m about to blow her mind.
“…he thinks Bruce is alive…”
Dinah: “A move that was more overt than apparently anything else they had ever done.”
And so makes sense as the next move of someone who was caught off guard, and dealing with an unforeseen snag in their ‘little’ plan. I could take what he has to say about my friend the wrong way. I don’t, however. Not with where my train of thought was already heading. For something to have existed so long, and so pervasively, and to have the resources and skill to pull on in order to make Ra’s scared of them they have to be manipulative. Not just brutal, or they’d be known.
“No. It makes sense. Helena thought, or had the bug put in her ear, that Bruce’s death would bring you all back here. And that you’d fight over who was going to be the next Batman. Something that would have played out in their favor in a few ways. Bat-Civil War not only gets their new Batman, to maintain the status quo, but has three of the best suited people to find out what really happened too busy fighting each other.”
I think better while talking, so the thoughts are coming out as they come to me. Working out much like our bodies are doing at the same time.
“She calls in me, thinking that the Cave needs a bully to make sure it doesn’t go too far, and that you all at least eventually come to some sort of conclusion. With the wagons circled, there’s still people that won’t let Gotham fall to utter chaos, while still working towards getting things back to normal. I’m not sure that they anticipated Joker playing ‘police’ as he’s doing, but he’s not taken off the board because he still serves their purpose. I’m not sure if they could have predicted that none of you would want the Cowl. I didn’t.”
And yet. Here we are with a Batman just the same. If I’d badgered Tim into doing so, I would actually feel pretty awful just now. But maybe his wearing it, since by process of elimination I have to figure maybe these people know it’s him, that might actually keep him safe. For a little while. Until, like any of the rest of the pieces, actions aren’t matching the agenda and the status quo any longer. Dick may also be right about what we’ve been ‘allowed’ to know. We’re going to have to read between some pretty thin lines here.
How I ‘handle’ the stick was about to be some blunt force trauma. It’s a weapon I’m comfortable with, even though I don’t go out with them myself. A motion that’s more wrist than arm, and therefor with more speed than force, would have sent the end to whipcrack him across his descending skull. But, by golly, he makes me proud, and actually manages to startle me. Bruce. Alive? Nothing Tim’s said, or done, has indicated anything like that to me. Maybe because he didn’t really want to spread that hope. Or in this case maybe it’s fear? Or because it wasn’t a fully formed thought. Either way, right now it provides Dick his opening. Because it is illogical and unexpected. Blue eyes widen, as legs get kicked out from under me. Getting hit, doesn’t mean you stop though. That’s how you get dead. Twisting as I drop, I tuck my torso so that shoulders hit about the time my knees do, and I roll. Onto the mat, since the reasonable assumption is that Dick isn’t going to stay beneath me for an enterprising knee or elbow into something breakable.
“…Bruce ‘broke’ into the Cave.”
He’d have everything he needed to get in. Definitely everything needed, including a knowledge of the codes needed to find anything, and erase that it happened at all. The big question though now, becomes did he do it to get intel he needed to track these people down? Or did he do it for them?
Dick: As soon as Dinah’s legs and mine connect there’s a series of movements. Her falling, but choreographing the fall in to an attack all of it’s own. Me gliding through the ‘baseball’ slide, then as she’s tucking in to the fall I’m nipping up to my feet. Reversing our stances entirely. Putting her on the low ground, with me above. No longer centered or entirely facing her, but I’m whirling around to correct that.
Meanwhile Dinah has connected all of the dots. Even a couple that had taken me a bit longer to accept. The revelation that Timothy Drake was convinced of our Father being alive? Stunned me. Dinah doesn’t seem quite so stunned about it as me. In fact she seems quite at ease with Timothy’s willingness to believe, to hope. I’m starting to think I’ve completely misread Dinah’s stance on my little brother. Which, in an of itself, makes me doubt a lot of other things I’ve been reading. Making Dinah’s assessment all the more critical for my own investigation’s foundation.
The next move I make is not an attack, but a single fingertip pointing at her. Fingergun. I see that look on her face. “Scary prospect. If Tim’s right then it answers a lot of questions. While creating ten thousand more that I can’t begin to answer. There’s one problem though. I was there. I saw the body. I was with Alfred when he ran the tests. I was with Lucius when he confirmed them. Bruce Wayne is dead. As much as Tim hopes for his illogical conclusion. I know for a fact that Bruce died.”
“I don’t know where to go from here, Dinah,” it’s an honest admission, maybe as shocking as the revelation had been. But not nearly as shocking as… “You really shouldn’t touch a man’s stick without permission.”
She’s really going to be steamed when she wakes up. Probably even more so when she realizes that in a place like this? There’s bound to be some footage of her holding upon the escrima stick as it tasers her. I don’t even -need- to be the best detective in the world to know that she’s going to make me pay for that when we spar next.
by Michele | Oct 29, 2017 | Chronicles
Tim: Those gathered in attendance range from political dignitaries to press box sweet hearts. When the Wayne Enterprises called a Press Conference the world tuned in. As one of the founding members of Gotham City the Wayne Family has a long history in the United States. In olden times they were among the front to come to the New World. One of the first to stake a claim in the Americas. The first brick ever laid in Gotham City was put in place by a direct Ancestor of Bruce Wayne. While in more modern times the Wayne Foundation has been a world-wide leader in charitable organizations. The Applied Sciences division of Wayne Tech has patent on well over a thousand different advances in the fields of medicine, electronics, technologies. Not to mention that with the divesting of Luthor Corp’s holdings by Lex Luthor, the Wayne Industries division now supplies more than fifty percent of the U.S. Militaries drone, flight, radar and anti-missile defense systems.
At the podium is Lucius Fox. Under Bruce Wayne he was the Chief Executive Officer of the company and has continued in that role with the three Sons inheriting the majority share of the publicly traded Wayne Enterprises. With the public accounting for a mere fifteen percent of the company, the will of Bruce Wayne was specific. In that it gave a slight majority of the company to Timothy Wayne. With the allowance that if his brothers were united against him, it would prevent the youngest, albeit more business oriented, son from running roughshod. Today marks the first time since the ‘Death of Bruce Wayne’ that any of the sons have spoken publicly. Another tick in the counter for why this would be a news worthy moment.
“Welcome, Ladies and Gentlemen. I won’t keep you in suspense this morning. Allow me to Introduce, Timothy Wayne.”
It’s easy to see as I step in to the podium and the microphone that I’m the youngest. Dick certainly cuts a far more handsome figure and Damien is far more imposing. What I’ve got going for me is a brash smile and a whole boat load of charm. At least, that’s what I tell myself when I’m standing in front of the mirror reciting my lines. At one point Dinah had offered me a drink, that I’d made it as far as bringing it to my lips before I detect a not-to-faint hint of scotch in the glass. She’d been intended to settle my nerves and prod me for information. Neither of which really worked. A rare failure on the part of the Black Canary.
“Hello,” the slight cricket of silence, other than a flashing bulb is enough to make me re-think my original pod-cast intentions, but I press forward. “As many of you know my Adoptive Father was an avid supporter of peace and justice. Like his Father before him, Bruce Wayne took to the streets in order to fight crime in the City of Gotham. He campaigned relentlessly for those he believed could help our city. He donated, held fund raisers and brought volunteers in to the field. Many of his initiatives are in place today to give those effected by the criminal element of our city a second chance. It gives homes to the homeless, food to the hungry. His anti-drug initiative is one of the many reasons Gotham was able to reclaim the Narrows from No-Man’s Land.”
“It is for those reasons and in his honor, that I would like to announce a new initiative to Wayne Enterprises. In time we hope to make it a global initiative, but for now we felt that it was time to take Gotham’s Strength and lend it first to the place that needs it most. The reclamation of Coast City. A project that has long been on hold. Held up in Senate Appropriations. Funding. And political agendas. This past week, with the assistance of Lucius Fox, Wayne Enterprises has begun buying much of the land in the former great city of our nation. With no intention of profiting from these purchases. We will begin the rebuilding and it will start first with a memorial garden.”
“Then it will take the shape of a single building. A monument to Hope.”
“I’m sure many of you have seen the News lately. A new generation of heroes has started to rise and if we ever hope to help them out perform their predecessors, we need to give them a foundation to build up. It is with that in mind, that I would like to announce in contingent with the memorial to the Heroes lost defending Coast City and in the Hope of teaching our new Heroes how to be better than those that came before? Tonight marks Day One of the first building in Coast City.”
“Tomorrow we will break ground on a new beginning. The first stone put in place, to provide the foundation for the future of our country and the healing these new Heroes can help us with. Tomorrow, Coast City will be the new home to a memorial Tower.”
Steph: You know, I bet there’s some classrooms out there somewhere that would actually have stopped with their usual scheduled function in order to share important news in the making. They just aren’t my school. First off, they would have to kick a couple sardine packed teenagers out of the room to make room to wheel in a television. No small, nimble little flat screen, oh no. We’re talking hulking CRT, with fuzzy off color picture that doesn’t get reception anymore, since the time the whole thing tipped on account of the wheel that’s been sticking since 1973 and no one cares to fix. It’d waste of a lot of valuable time, and effort, that could be used instead for yelling at all those sardine teenagers that are too irritable and hormonal to really pay attention anyway.
I pay attention. Because I’m no genius, but I’m smart enough to figure out that where I am now? Is not where I want to spend my life. I mean. We upgraded out of the Narrows a couple years back and all, but what can I say. I’m a dreamer, picturing myself somewhere that only has one drug dealer per block (down from one per corner like I’ve got now), and slightly less cramped quarters. My options for upgrading my situation are either working hard, or working the wrong side of the law. Option B is more attractive to most people I know, but I happen to know better. I’m not spending my life like my Dad. Or my Mom.
I don’t see or hear about the announcement until the 8th or so replay of the day. When they get done rehashing the 80 bad things that happened in the area since the morning news, and wind down into something good. I used to just turn on the news because it happened to be on right before the night’s Game Shows. Which I watch because I view it as a personal middle finger to my failure of a Dad, and because…learning things. It’s about the closest I’m getting to educational television on our channel selection. We do actually have a flat screen. I suspect my mom picked it up from someone skeezy, at a ‘Looter’s Special Discount Price’ sale. At least she didn’t steal it herself, I guess. Larceny wasn’t ever really her vice, though.
Working my way through my Math homework, with my head propped in the palm of one hand, I bounce back and forth between two papers. One with the assigned problems. One with the rest. We’re only supposed to do every third. Less for the teacher to grade. I need to do every one to make sure that I get it. I’m only half listening to what they’re talking about, the newscaster talking about one of the Wayne heirs and blahblahblah. Something about rebuilding and an example of getting stuff donecoming out of Gotham, to show the world that not everything that comes out of here is a giant garbage fire. Finished with the next problem, I lean back in my chair at the small kitchen table. Tipping it onto its back two legs, so that I can reach for the coffee pot that I’d whunked a few times to get going when I’d gotten home. Still balanced there as I refill my mug, replace the pot, and then start to take a sip.
The voice has switched, it’s a sound bite of the all important, not Garbage Fire announcement, made by the Wayne Heir himself (well, one of them), and I go still on my precarious perch, eyes wide as I actually look at the image on the television playing to the side of me in the ‘living room,’ i.e. space between front door and kitchen where the couch sits. Then look at the name on the screen. Timothy Wayne. Then back at the face. The name. The face. The quick parting shot of the entourage leaving afterwards, all suave and put together and in sunglasses before noon…
“PFFFSHHHHHTTaugh!”
That, boys and girls, is the sound that one makes when they’re spitting lukewarm coffee in a truly impressive sort of spray, the momentum of the movement sends them into arm windmilling (and flinging more coffee on themselves, the kitchen, and their homework). That doesn’t do much good either, and as the chair topples over backwards, I’m ass over elbows but by golly, I roll with it, coming up on my feet like some sort of semi-stunned gymnast who isn’t sure what just happened to get them where they are. I’ve ruined my homework. Stuck the landing though, so there’s nothing for it but a celebratory fist pump for my smooth moves that no one ever sees.
“Ow! Shit!”
Less smooth when you bang your funny bone while congratulating yourself. I’m still rubbing it and whining a little while I got change out of my now totally coffee soaked clothes, not proud to admit I’m wondering if I can salvage any of it. No sleep and no coffee makes Stephanie Brown an even easier target for her ‘combat’ teacher. Black Canary isn’t really where my head is as I get to scampering out the fire escape though. Despite the wrecked homework, and the still tingling funny bone, I want to get to the Nest or Roost or…whatever they call it (it seems to change depending on who’s talking). I realize about the time I’ve gotten to where I hide my Spoiler suit, and I’m pulling my hair back to put on the mask that I reek of Corner Store Crappy Coffee. It could be worse.
I could smell like Garbage Fire. Maybe it’ll be a better perfume than sweat, bruises and humiliation. And yes. Those last two things do have scents. It’s not too far of a run from there, to where I’m headed. Yes, run. Not walk. Then I get to say I’m warmed up, and more time is spent training. Which I do actually want to do. When training’s finished, I get to move on to other things.
Tim: Meanwhile at the ‘Bat Cave.’ Formerly known as the Robin’s Nest.
Once the announcement had been made it was time to get to work. There was so much to be done and we’ve only just begun really. The idea for the Tower had not been entirely mine. The location had been something that I worked out through discussions with Cassie and later Dinah, but also came as a revelation after meeting The Flash. Seeing the man at relative peace with demonstrating his abilities had come as an eye-opening experience to me. I’d begun to wonder ‘What if?’ we could come to the point where more of those sort of people could work freely within the United States. I’ve seen the pitfalls first hand, I was taught them by Bruce who wasn’t exactly fond of their kind, but understood the necessity of them.
You see, the world isn’t always a nice place. Good people can and do die for the smallest things. Things that a Superman could save them from. Things that the mere presence of a Batman could dissuade as the boogeyman. Many mundane things would be a worry no more if more people like the Flash could operate in public. The pitfalls are numerous, of course. Not everyone will be as responsible as the young Flash. Nor will they be as inspiring as the Wonder Woman. For every good apple we find there will be ten more that weren’t even considered low hanging fruit. But the alternative is that we are going to live in a world where an entire segment of the people must live in fear. Cower in the shadows and conceal the gifts that could better mankind. That isn’t a world that I want to live in and thankfully, I think a lot of others agree with me.
After the speech, I’d come here. To the make-shift Bat-Cave. Where I’d went to work on the designs for my idea. It would feature a large open-air memorial on the ground floor. Something for people to come and see. A tourist-like sight for people who sought a little inspiration. Then there would be the Tower itself. Built to endure, but not to intimidate. A modern marvel of technology set in the backgrop of a City that needed to be rebuilt. Enough land had been bought so that if this all went as according to plan, the Tower would be set apart from the rest of the rebuilding. Allowing it some comfortable insulation from being a danger to the population.
I’m starting to tackle to theoretical solution to a totally missing population when I notice the arrival of Spoiler on the internal sensors. This is the first I’ve seen her since the ‘Stake Out,’ and the first I’ve seen her since the Batman appeared on the News alongside the Flash and Wonder Woman. Maybe I’m expecting too much, but I’ve come to believe that Stephanie Brown serves a purpose in all of our lives. She is the voice of the voiceless. A spoiler for all those whom we didn’t know their opinion.
“The Canary is visiting a friend. She will not be here for your lesson today,” hopefully she’s not at the Manor breaking Dick’s face right now. “I thought this would afford us an opportunity to check on the trap we laid.”
Steph: I’m all jazzed up like I’ve had too much coffee, which isn’t the case and I’ll probably regret it later. I’ll have to stop on the way home and pick up more cheap, crap grounds to replace all the cheap, crap grounds I already used. Using up all the coffee in the morning? Fine. That’s normal person behavior. I don’t want to answer to why I’m guzzling it after school in an effort to keep myself awake and perky all night long. Perky isn’t usually a problem. Midway through the week, the awake part gets harder though. You can’t let Black Canary smell any weakness on you, either. It isn’t caffeine that has me going though, it’s the buzz of discovery and I’ve been running through ways to phrase it in my head, while physically running here. Part of the way with sensors running, and part of it without.
I’m kind of worried I might break something, but that’s not the real reason why I don’t go full time. They supply trajectories and height, tell me when I should jump and where I should land, and that’s awesome and all. Makes you look like a total badass when you pull it off with no hiccups, because you don’t have to worry about whether or not you can. Except I don’t want to get used to it. I don’t know when they’re going to just decide to take the suit away from me, or if they will.
I come skittering to a halt, for the second time tonight arms windmilling a bit for balance as my feet grip more quickly than I was ready for.
“Uhhhhhhi, Batman. Again. I didn’t …expect to see you here.”
I almost look for all the others anyway, even though he’s just told me Canary isn’t here. Those aren’t the only two though, sometimes Arsenal is here, and then there’s Red Robin. Who is who I really wanted to see.
“Where’s Red Robin, anyway? I wanted to ask him something about my suit and… it’s not important.”
Well. That sucks. All those mental plans, and inner maniacal giggling, all for nothing. But seriously. Where is he? One week he’s intruding on all my nightly activities and badgering/bribing me into coming here for training and then he’s gone. At least I know Batman isn’t a figment of my imagination. And very likely not a ghost anymore, since other people have seen him, in other states even. That part was kind of weird. But filled me with sooooooo many questions.
“That does sound more fun than Blocking Punches with Your Kidneys 101. They moved the van to another spot. Or maybe got a second van, but they look the same. Also over a manhole cover. Half block east and a full block north. I didn’t get close. I did get the plates though! Not that it’ll matter much because it’s probably stolen. Has that whole…vibe going on. You know…like someone at anytime is going to poke their head out and try and do something illegal with or to you? Uh. Anyway. So. Great. That’s a yes.”
Tim: There is no cant to the head, no smirk of appreciation for her being obviously off balance. Just a stoic gaze of the Batman that I’ve affixed her with as she babbles. This is something she has no doubt gotten used too, but now it’s all the more useful because I think she knows when this face means she’s babbling. Except that this is Batman’s always face. Ergo, she is always babbling. This time around though she has at least said something mildly interesting, that isn’t case related. She was looking for Red Robin?
“Robin is working a different case currently,” this might normally be all that I would offer, but there is actually something more to it that I think should be spoken of. “He is managing a project. Bringing heroes of youth together. Over the last several years the world has begun to see people of a certain ilk or those with powers as inherently evil. This ‘Wonder Woman’ and her ‘Superman’ have opened a door that we can’t afford for the world to close. We do not know when it might get opened again.”
“I’ve asked Red Robin to put his proverbial foot in the door. To gather potentials together. In many cases. Such as your’s, it’s simply a need of training. But others… others need rescuing. They need to be protected because their powers, without training, make them a target.”
The Batman does not usually spend so much time explaining, but that was Bruce. Keeping everything close to the vest. He didn’t trust people as much as he should. Then again he learned the hard way that sometimes even your most trusted friends betray you. I know why Bruce allowed himself to get so jaded to trusting people, but I’m not the same person as he is. Taking the ability to trust others away from me is akin to losing one of your major senses. I’m already behind the 8-Ball with this gig, I can’t afford any more handicaps. I have to trust people and it always starts at home.
“We spoke about what you would do after you’ve dealt with your Father. This door that the Red Robin is holding open? Will be there for you to step through. If that’s the direction you decide to go in. People like you are why he’s doing it.”
Sweeping past Stephanie as I finish speaking and making my way towards what is now an alcove for the Batmobile. It revolves, turning the car around so that we can exit the ‘Robin’s Nest,’ but also gives the illusion of my having driven it in recently. “Did you tag the van with the tracers from your gauntlets? Or have you not made it to the T-section of your manual.”
She’s a very observant young lady, so I’m also testing something. I changed the profile on the suit. Etching the ‘horns’ to be longer, more pronounced. Using them, in combination with thicker soles to the boots I’m wearing, to enhanced my height. Though it isn’t quite as much as Bruce, it’s as tall as I’m able to account for without sacrificing stability or movement. I’m learning, with help from Dinah, that everything I do to keep the illusion of being -The- Batman, that I’m also lowering my ability to actually survive as Batman. So the changes are cosmetic only, but I’m hoping that they serve some semblance of furthing the illusion.
Steph: “For powered kids? Or just stubborn ones with an axe to grind?”
A different case. Right. Because why would you need Robin on my case, when you have Batman working it and frankly I’m kind of shocked that it’s even getting that much attention at all. Honestly? I’d gotten the impression I was one blip on the condescension scale away from a head pat and a ‘yeah, sure kid, sure your Dad is ‘up’ to something.’ Not that it was going to stop me, I knew something was up, and I was right. They just know it now, too. Also… he’s busy because he’s been doing press conferences. A point of fact that I want to squeal about right now, but lets face it. Batman probably already knows, and I don’t know that I’m enough of an asset (or at least not a liability to their secrecy) to get shanked for letting him know that I know.
I guess that’s the reason for the whole Coast City thing. Which is so far away that it may as well be another country as far as I’m concerned.
“Fortunately for all of us, there’s a passing blip of a reference to them under ‘gauntlets’ so I skipped ahead a little.”
Also. Penny-One’s a lot more flippin’ helpful than the manual. Something they should probably work on if they’re going to continue passing suits out to shmucks like me. I’m flashing a double set of thumbs up as he looms past me, but I cock my head at the back of him as I get into motion so that I don’t get accidentally left behind now that he can find the van without me. I like to think my entrance into the passenger side is a little bit smoother this time, still not nearly as practiced and ‘with it’ as his is though. I mean. It’s his car.
“Soooo, doing a little something different with the cowl today? A little myyy, what big ears you have/the better to hear you with my dear. Or are we just using a little better posture?”
He’s taller. I assume it’s the ears ,though that make him look that way the same way I’d be on the five foot, closer to six if I fluffed up my hair and put it on top of my head. Not that it’d show with the hood. Or maybe heels but Batman clearly doesn’t wear heels I mean. That would be weird. Settling in, and fastening in, I don’t figure he needs me to tell him how to track the tracer on the van. Probably all goes to the same Batcomputer for easy access and information sharing. With the people that they actually want to share information with. The tiny little chip, which I’d barely been able to see on application and had thought at first that I’d done it wrong, or dropped, leading to a lot surrounded by a tall, wire topped fence, that’s filled with vans. All very similar, though some of them have decals for various trades. Legit ones, and a few that don’t match up to anything in the area. Some of them are also riding low in their parking spots, demonstrating weight of some sort inside.
“Soooo. You and Wonder Woman…?”
Yeah, I’ve got my arm propped up on the door, torso twisted towards the Bat like I’m sharing juicy gossip with a friend. What? I saw the news. Everyone saw that news, or read about it I’m pretty sure. The Batman, out of Gotham and working with her. Usually that’s Superman’s gig. Who was nowhere to be seen at the time.
Tim: “Having powers does does not make someone a Hero and it certainly does not make them a superhero.” Nor does it make them a villain, necessarily. “That is more a state of mind and being, than anything else. Heroes do things that make a difference. They come in all shapes and sizes. Super Heroes just do it more frequently. Red Robin is looking to cultivate that ideology.”
This discussion isn’t nearly as strange as you might think for me. Talking about my alt-ego is sort of normal at this point. Timothy Drake had to talk about his hero the Robin for years. Now it’s merely me talking about the Red Robin. Keeping up the charade is normal and I don’t think twice about the ramifications of insanity that it leans toward. None of us do, I’d wager. We have people in our lives that we want to protect. People who’s lives would be in imminent danger if word got out who we are. Dinah walking in unannounced had been unfortunate, but then I compounded it by referencing Tim in a discussion with Stephanie already. But we already trust Stephanie. Perhaps more than we should. Given her relations.
“There is nothing different with the cowl today,” I might just be using a Jedi Mind Trick upon Spoiler, if not for the way the top of the Batmobile’s canopy thumping the elongated ears, since I’m not used to them and forces me to scoot lower in to the seat. I don’t even make a sound, before punching the gas and sending us careening through the Nest’s subway entrance.
We have a few moments to talk during this and normally I would leave it to be done in silence. Silence from me, at least. I’ve yet to find her off-button. For once she’s asked a question that I’m passionate about. It is hard to resist opining. “Wonder Woman came out to the public months ago. We’ve been in contact. I believe her ideals to be sound, her principles to be in line with my own and her intentions are something I’ve been working toward on my own for a long time.”
“She believes in doing the right thing, solely because it is the right thing. That is a view that I’ve seen in very few people. No axe to grind. So far, no skeletons in her closet.” The cowled head never turns in her direction, but it would be hard to miss that my focus is more so on Stephanie than normal. “So. You and the Boy Wonder?”
Steph: “Definitely not a bad goal. I bet the logistics are gonna be a nightmare though.”
I mean. Look at the problems just in Gotham with stepping on each others toes, at least up until we were brought into the fold I guess. Now that I’ve ‘met’ Penny-One I assume there’s some organization among all the Batcrew so that doesn’t happen. Diversifying. Unless it needs to happen. But we don’t have superpowers. Or at least, I don’t think we do. Unless you count all the gadgets. Wrangling that many superegos, with a side of property destruction that comes when metas fight? I can’t really speak to my personal involvement. I’ve got a goal. I don’t know what I’m doing when I done because I was focused on one finish line at a time. I’m not totally sure that I’m a hero of any stripe though. Super or otherwise.
So, what I said about smooth entrances into the Batmobile? Today, I actually win the prize. I end up sitting there, eyeing the Bat sideways because…I think he just hit his head. No. His ears. On the way into the vehicle. So much could be said about that… and instead there’s just the sound of me sucking my teeth for a second.
“Whatever you say, boss.”
The forward acceleration presses me back into my seat, and I’m inclined to just let that one go and enjoy the ride. As I learned last time I spent any amount of time in this seat, his conversation skills are not quite at the same pace and speed as mine. Or alternately he just doesn’t want to talk to me. All business, no pleasure, makes Bats a scary, effective dude. So I’m a little surprised when he actually kicks in again, that gravely voice actually managing to sound excited about something. It’s weird. I kind of want to laugh over the ‘we’ve been in contact’ part because…obviously they have been, and it sounds so formal. I also had no idea that Batman had any ambitions outside of kicking the collective ass of Gotham’s underbelly. I don’t think I’d really ever seen or heard about him turning up outside of the city.
And I’d know. I keep an eye on this kind of stuff. Call it an interest inspired by a childhood experience in my living room.
“Well she sounds. Great. Is she really that sparkly in person?”
Camera can do weird things. I’m in the middle of thinking over what to tease him about to provoke more conversation, there’s the whole enthusiastic about Wonder Woman part (and I mean, every boy in my class is so who can blame him, apparently?), so when he asks about me and Red Robin in the same way I’d prodded about the spangly superblonde? I can’t help the little too loud snort of laughter, that gets to go a few beats before I cut it off.
“Me and Red Robin? Oh. Boy. What about us? I’m pretty sure Waynes don’t date chicks from the Narrows.”
…yeah so much for not spilling those beans Stephanie. Awkward. Ahem. Clearing my throat a little forcefully than really necessary I go back to the tack Batman had taken about Wonder Woman. Just. Less enthusiastically than he had sounded.
“Uh. I think he thinks I’m a pain in the ass, but clearly means well. In that thinks I’m going to get myself killed, and is trying to get me and my imaginary Dad problems out of the way kind of way. I don’t know. I haven’t exactly worked with him outside of one time. Not a lot to make a personal opinion off of, y’know?”
Tim: The logistics of such a thing -are- a nightmare, but that is why I’m doing it as Timothy Wayne and not as Batman or Red Robin. This is something that requires time, energy and money. All of those I have, but the resources of the Wayne name outstrip even those of the venerable Batman. I’m afraid a lot of Batman’s resources died with Bruce. The logistics of it aren’t really the scary part. It is how the U.S. Government is going to react. Luthor has all but embraced his personal Superman for the last year, but then Conner brought out the Wonder Woman. Not only did he unveil her, he said she was the leader of something big. Now you’ve got me out there, on television, legitimizing it for the Heroes all across the Country. This can’t be what Luthor wants. To have all of this spiraling out of his own personal control, after he’s stamped his name on it…
“It is my understanding that she is the Daughter of Zeus,” out of the corner of my eyes I’m awaiting how she reacts to that news before continuing. “Which sort of lends itself to glowing. The sparkles are from her costume. I’ve been meaning to ask her about that, now that you mention it.”
Stephanie’s response to my return query about her and the Red Robin goes about as I had expected. Other than, y’know, the moment when she says the Wayne name and I’m left thankful of my cowl to hide the way in which I’m narrowing my eyes at her. Although the Cowl is expressive, so she may notice that look anyway, but it’s dark and…
“You believe Timothy Wayne is Red Robin?” This is one of the times when I’m as well schooled as anyone else on the planet. I’ve been through conversations like this before. Keeping my focus on driving the car, putting us on the track of the Van’s GPS. “Spoiler. Tim Drake is not the Red Robin. I’m not protecting his identity. I’m telling you this with no reservations. I give you my word, he is not Red Robin. Nor does he have any qualms about dating ‘chicks from the Narrows.'”
“Honestly, your assessment is not that far off from my own. You are a well meaning pain in the ass. That is going to get herself killed if she isn’t careful -and- a good student to one of the best teachers on the planet. Where we differ in our assessments, is that I have seen your theories with my own eyes. You’re on to something. I could take over, exclude you from the investigation, but all that accomplishes is putting you in a position of desperation. You’d take chances that I don’t have the time to monitor and likely couldn’t prevent without putting you on a boat to Mexico.”
“I’ve met other pains in the ass, with something to prove and an axe to grind before. They proved to be invaluable allies, once they were tempered.” As well pull up a few buildings away from the Van’s location, I put the car in to security mode and make to exit. “Also. For the record. Wonder Woman is a goddess, but she’d still date a boy from Gotham. You’re selling yourself far too short. The moment you stop that, is going to be the moment you learn who you really are beneath that Mask.”
Steph: “… like. The Mythological God, Zeus? Huh. Well. Don’t know about all that, but I suppose their powers have to come from somewhere. Nuclear vat. Science experiment.Gods.” There’s finger quotes for that one. I don’t know that I’ve got a lot of stock, or faith, to put into something like that. People can say they’re from a lot of places. “I wouldn’t. I mean. Clearly she can take a hit, and it probably makes her a big distraction while you get to be all loomy and sneaky instead.”
Purple was totally my compromise. Doesn’t really show up in the dark, but I wasn’t going full Goth. As for his expression over my little revelation there, I was already looking away and out the window, covering up my own expression which isn’t nearly as hidden by my face mask and cloak.
“…uh huh, sure. He’s not the Red Robin. Gotcha.”
I’ve turned back for the exaggerated wink that’s going along with that. I don’t believe Timothy Wayne is Red Robin. ‘Belief’ implies some measure of faith and a lack of proof. I know that Timothy Wayne is Red Robin. I’m not going to get insistent about it, though, because again. Don’t want to be shanked and dumped in the harbor. Also because Batman in part gave it away, and I don’t want him to feel guilty, or shank me. Truth is, though? The name had just been kind of secondary confirmation. I recognized the voice, I’ve heard it enough in the Robin’s Nest, or when I ran into him on the street. This is also the reason why I’ve mentally mocked every hero I’ve ever seen with those little face masks on. They don’t cover anything that sunglasses don’t. And Red Robin/Tim Wayne has a pretty distinctive jaw. And a dimple. Right in the middle of that sculpted…ahem.
“What, you’ll discuss dating preferences on missions with the guys? I see how it is.”
I’m joking. Mostly. Seems kind of unfair. Not that I actually want to do so with Batman right now, or really. Any time. There’s more important things going on, it had just been so…absurd a thought to me that I couldn’t resist making the comment. The way Bruce Wayne behaved was pretty notorious, so it’s not real hard to guess about the same was true of his sons. Though who knows. Sometimes the apple doesn’t like the tree it dropped out of. As for being told I’m a pain in the ass, and all the rest. Well. I just shrug my shoulders. It’s not really defensive, or even dismissive. Not that I like hearing it. I’m trying. Even though trying mostly has consisted of some humiliation and a whole lot of bruises and very little sleep.
“Plus I don’t have a passport. Sounds like you’re making the right choice here all around.”
Allies? I mean. That sounds nice. I didn’t get into this looking for any, because I figured it’d just be me. I needed proof to give it off to the cops, and like most kids who grew up where I did? Knew they weren’t likely to be a whole lot of help anyway. Not unless I had something really solid, and that meant wrecking the plans myself. I’ve got much better tools now though, that’s for sure. So maybe a hand up isn’t necessarily a bad thing. Climbing out of the Batmobile, I make a much better hop this time than last time. See? I just need practice!
“Batman, anyone ever tell you you’re weirdly good at this whole fortune cookie of inspiration thing? I mean. You temper it with a dose of kid, you suck so my ego doesn’t get all big or something. Not really what I expected. But I mean. Admittedly I just had rumors to go off before. And that time when I was like. Six. But beeeeelieve me. What some boy, filthy rich or not, thinks of me and my dating potential has got basically less than zero effect of what I think about myself.”
Tim: “Yes. Zeus. Whether he is truly a god or just a being of such immense power and advance that he is akin to one? I think the point is moot. She is partially Divine Host. Deity. Whatever the case may be.”
Truthfully? Doesn’t matter to me. Like Stephanie, I’m not big on faith. Even less on omnipotent creatures claiming to have created the heaven and stars. I’ve written the code for entire Virtual Reality worlds, but that does not make me a god for creating it. I’m still pondering this when the comments about my alter ego are once again spoken of. It makes me pause long enough to turn to her, stiffly, but for one of the few times I’m not even trying to be ominous.
“Tim Drake is not any sort of Robin,” there’s no defiance or anger, it is simply a statement of fact. “Think this through. Why would I encourage you at every step, only to break you down here. You know Dinah’s secret. I even told you that there is a Tim in the Nest. Why would I lie about this to a woman trained to sniff out clues and spoil them? He is not the Robin, in any way. In fact you’re out on the town. Working a case with me. In the Batmobile. Right now, you are more Robin than Timothy Wayne is.”
“Typically, I don’t discuss dating preferences on missions with anyone. But given the circumstances. I’m willing to answer questions. If only to prove to you that I’m making no effort to deceive you. Because I know that I’m making the right choice, Spoiler. You deserve this chance and I’ve got no reason to deny it to you. You’ve trained with Canary as well as you can. You’re trying to learn the suit’s capabilities.”
“As long as you don’t continue to over do it, you’ll continue to work on this with me so long as it’s what you want as well.” Halting at the edge of the building we’ve hidden the Batmobile behind, I’m drawing out the grappling hook and taking aim. “You are, however, over doing it. We’re going to need to discuss that. Later. I won’t lose a partner, Spoiler. Especially not from their own lack of self-control and maintenance.”
There is a crook to my head that says I’ve listened to her thank you, but I’m not immediately rising to the bait of such an offering. I’m trying to inspire her, but also to inspire others. It’s gratifying to know that it is, at least seemingly, working out on some levels. There is just more to it than that. So before Stephanie reaches for her own grappling hook, I put my hand out to slow her for one more moment.
“You took the part about your self-worth slightly wrong, you know? Whether a rich boy would date you or not isn’t really the point. It’s that you don’t see the tools you actually do bring to the table. For every moment of humiliation at the hand of Canary, that you endure? You give yourself two others, because you don’t yet believe in yourself. Look at how you fell the first time you climbed out of the car, to just now. Look at how tagged the Van, when you wouldn’t have even thought to do so before. We all fail, it’s how we respond to failure that defines us. The Rich Boy and his dating preferences don’t define you, Spoiler. But. You suggesting that being from the Narrows makes you something less? Means that you’re not thinking about the advantages being from the Narrows gives you.”
“Now. Engage your suit’s stealth protocol. We’ll speak via comms only from here on.”
Steph: It’s true. Doesn’t really matter where her powers came from, she clearly has them. A lot of them. She can fly, hit like a truck, she’s strong and durable and fast, and has gravity control which may or may not be limited to keeping her costume up. Maybe that’s where the flight comes from, too. All I know is it’s superhuman. I’ve worn strapless tops enough to know damn well that it’s a feat to keep them in place just walking, let alone doing all the …other things she does while wearing it. At least from what I’ve seen on the internet and TV. Batman’s sharp insistence, his continued explanation, makes my bring my hands up, palms towards him to ward off the words, or maybe just a body language equivalent of a ‘woah, woah, down tiger, cool your jets.’ And quickly becomes a ‘woah, woah, no thank you!’ about the Robin part.
“I’m not swapping uniforms. I like this one. No offense, but skimpy boy shorts are kind of summer only wear for me.”
I still just don’t believe him. He’s trying too hard to prove to me something isn’t so. Why would Batman lie to me about who Timothy Wayne is or isn’t? Because he’s protecting him. Something I understand, and admire. Dinah’s identity getting ‘spoiled’ might have been a bigger deal but…honestly she actually doesn’t seem to care, like she’s got nothing to lose or gain in it. I also know fully well that trust comes in layers and levels. They all clearly know who I am under here, but the information was never offered in reverse. I’m kind of in the same boat as the Black Canary though. I don’t exactly have much to lose if someone finds out who I am, more than I’d lose any night something goes wrong out here with the mask on. Someone like that? With a big name and a known face? That’s a bigger deal.
“Is it. What I want, I mean.”
Overdoing it? Of course I’m over-doing it! How do you not when you’re doing the whole double life thing? Especially when you’re in high school, and there’s limited hours in the night where you can sneak out to pursue this brand of extra-curricular in the first place. I basically get a nap before I have to go to school in the morning, and maybe I can sneak in another one after Mom goes to work. If I came home straight away from class and snoozed she’d realize something was up. She did live with my father. She’s no genius, but she’s suspicious, and observant. When Batman lines up with his grapple, I’m getting ready to do the same. I mean, time to show off the practice I’ve been doing! Until he stops me.
“I am a bit of a learn by doing-er. And, thanks to the Narrows, what amounts to a bi-pedal cockroach. Takes a lickin’, keeps on tickin’. I’m pretty sure that’s why I still have my teeth after Canary Class yesterday.”
I can also thank that particular upbringing for the wide variety of ‘street smarts’ skills I’ve actually got to my name, and my left hook. The don’t know when to quit attitude. Also, emergency planning and food hoarding! Basically, it means I’m set for any future Apcocalypses’. I’ve already basically survived a couple mini ones.
God. I don’t miss that neighborhood.
“Roger that, Bat-leader.”
Snapping a half-assed salute, before I go to engage my…I have a stealth protocol? Stealth….stealth…stealth… fortunately my learn by doing-ness has kicked in enough that I know how to navigate the suit’s computer for the most part. A tap of the finger engages my HUD, and from there it just takes a little hunting. While I sing the Jeopardy theme in my head. Gotta find it before the jingle runs out…hah. There. Now. Grapple time. Honestly…this is the fun part. When it doesn’t lead to falling on my face, anyway. And climbing combined with daredevil acts of idiocy was something I already had going for me in the practical experience category.
It’s already here, the van. Obviously or we would have followed the helpful blip of the tracker elsewhere, and there’s a lot of them. More than I’d think would be hidden in a place like this. I guess it’s not hiding, the lot itself looks legit. A rental place, or just a paid parking/storage facility? Seems like an awful lot of vans to belong to one fleet, and from too many different businesses. Once I’ve scaled the building and scrambled up over the edge, I can hunker down and see it. Where the tracker leads. Squinting, and letting the suit give me a little vision ‘boost’ also says there’s not any plates on that van anymore.
“T-G-I-P-A-T-O-I.”
Tim: Allowing her to go up first is strategic. It means that if she falls I’m able to catch her. Not to mention, it allows me to watch how she handles this. I’m judging everything about her. Filming it too. This will all be something that Dinah gets to see later, so that she can use it against Spoiler in training. Emphasizing any weak points, so that they get better quickly. I wasn’t kidding about not wanting to lose a partner. I’m going to keep Stephanie from getting herself killed at the very least. By hook or crook.
She’s right about one thing. This is the fun part. It is also the part of being Batman that I can’t screw up, even if I did change my own aerodynamics. I’ve done this too much, too often, to not be able to account for some additional weight and height. Often I’m doing this with someone else in my arms. Saving them from burning building or gunfire or… when they’ve fallen on their faces from grapplehook failure.
“I never said anything about changing uniforms. Nor did I suggest that you were Robin.”
::Though you would most assuredly look quite fetching in spanks and pan-boots, Ms. Brown.::
“Penny-One. We’re in position. Are the drones ready?”
::Of course.::
Looking over the roof to the Van and it’s occupants. A hand is placed upon Stephanie’s shoulder, I want her to look where I point her. Not to the van, but to the nearest manhole cover, slightly down the street from the Van. Then to the storm drain at the corner intersection. “Send the Drones down the drain, PennyOne. Give us a visual on what they see down there.”
“The drones can go low, but we need to take one of the Van’s occupants for… interrogation.”
Steph: It probably also lets him look at my butt. I’d make a smart comment about that if this were Red Robin, or Arsenal. Not to Batman though. There’s a limit, clearly, where my filter kicks in just enough to not imply he’s doing such a thing. I mean. It’s about the only opportunity, since I’m all about the cape, but really not the point. Also? The grapple makes this so much easier than it used to be when I used a fully manual one. So much less work for your upper body. I can do it, and judging by the visible muscles so cat Batman, but why waste the effort when you might need those for…I don’t know. Punching people later?
“Not yet you didn’t. I figured I better throw it out there before you started getting ideas though. Cause I’m betting disappointment isn’t a great look on the Batface. Aw. Thanks, Penny-One, sounds kind of cold though.”
And way less effective at protecting me from mishaps, while simultaneously taking away a lot of pocket space. Neither of which are points I’d be excited about. Canary doesn’t need pants. I don’t want to copy her shtick. It wouldn’t be nearly as impressive of a show if I wore the corset, either. Not without a lot of extra help. … I guess that could be an area for replacement storage, and… head in the game, Brown. Down in the sewer there’s been some clear activity lately, judging by the pile of equipment. Most of it disassembled, likely because it had to be brought down through the manhole’s opening and that restricted the size. A metal drum, and what looks to be the rest of the parts for a small concrete mixer. Boxes of sealant, and Quikcrete bags. Or maybe this wasn’t recent activity, going by the condensation on the drum itself.
“Aw. It’s nice when they cooperate…Dibs on front!”
The sound of a door opening on the van heralds the cargo door on the back swinging wide, dislodging a man in nondescript coveralls from the back section of the vehicle. The driver still in place in the cab. Elevator, going down! Just as quickly as the grapple can bring you up? You can go down a whole lot faster. Mix of free fall, with stopping at the right time. I’m not up high enough to get going that quickly though. Plus, the suit starts telling me I’m being dumb about the time I engage the brakes.
Tim: It is probably for the best that Spoiler keeps her commentary to herself. It saves her from being coldly denied, as I would be honor bound to do in this particular suit. Oddly, the suit has impacted me in more ways than I’d ever thought. Because I actually haven’t scoped Spoiler out, not even once, since putting this on. Nor have I really made any sort of smarmy commentary to any of the others either. Maybe I’m starting to fit in to the role? Or maybe I’m doing exactly what Dinah said and I’m allowing it to define who I am. That’s a good way of getting myself killed, because I’m not the Batman despite the fact I’m wearing the suit. I’m Tim Drake, advocate of the little guy and the smarmiest smarmer in smarmville.
My only confirmation over whether I’m still me? Is when I spent half a second considering whether to cut her repel line when she leaps off to get in front of me. Lucky for her, I’m equally fast in deciding that would be a waste of resources, more so than a good lesson. I’m trying to empower this girl, but doing so is going to result in some situations like this. When she’s too confident. Now my only real choice is to make sure she doesn’t get herself killed. Hopefully while doing the same for myself too.
No repel line for me. I’m over the edge of the rooftop and in to the air. Extending my arms, unfurling the cape so that it catches the wind. Those same micro-fillament muscle fibers that enhance my speed and strength, also give the cape a sort of skeleton that allow it to temporarily become a glider. Spoiler and I arrive at the ground level at about the same time, but my descent is controlled, timed and tactical. Two booted feet will collide with the man exiting the back of the truck nearly in time with him trying to step out.
The recoil from that sends me backwards. If I weren’t in this suit, the effect would be this spectacular backflip that leaves me poising heroically. As it is I’m lucky not to land on my backside, because the cape is longer and ends up under my feet. Preventing me from sticking the landing. But. I’m at least moderately sure no one saw that slight stumble.
“Taser the engine, Spoiler. We don’t want them getting away.”
Steph: Gravity is both useful, and a cruel bitch. Fickle, too. She’s more on Batman’s side than the man exiting the back of the van, though. He gets a double helping, applied force and momentum transferred through the Bat-boots, and being off of his own center of gravity unable to really resist being kicked wholesale right back into the van. Halfway towards the ground as one leg was, his knee catches on the van’s floor lip. Serves nicely to shorten the distance he travels by sending him down, instead of back, with a van rattling whump as head hits metal.
Sadly? I miss the show. Both the kick, and Batman tripping over his own cape. Probably a good thing. I’d have to comment. True to my ‘dibs’ I was going straight for the front though. I wasn’t exactly worried about the man actually getting out of the van, so much as the one still in it. If the first saw me heading for the latter? Well. Batman was here, and I assumed he’d do what Batman does. The ass kicking. Not the tripping.
“..does that actually work?”
Okay. So I am questioning the Batman, but I’ve also already actually started to do it. It just wasn’t what I wanted to do. I’d been intending to demonstrate my super mastery of the knock out gas pellets that come in the suit by deploying one in the cab. I didn’t even accidentally get myself the first time I used it! (Yes, yes I did.) Instead of reaching for the handle of the cab, to open it and flick one in, I sidestep, aiming the taser.
“Ooomph!”
And promptly get knocked off my feet as the door’s thrown open. Jokes on you, asshole. Now I’ve got an even better angle, firing up under the wheel well with a satisfying sound of electricity. Victory that’s not exactly long lived as I get hauled bodily backwards by one foot, towards the driver who was apparently getting out when the door came open. Clearly, no one taught him about all the many reasons why that’s a bad idea. Like how he’s only got old of one of my feet. Which means that one is free to do a lot of kicking still. And that bending down to try to get hold of it only puts his chin in range a whole lot more easily for said other kicking foot.
Batman: A cursory glance inside the van will tell me that my target isn’t getting up immediately. While that might be a wasted effort judging by the initial attack, there are a lot of odd happenings in this city. The two seconds it takes me to get a cowl-scan of life-signs is well worth not having some cyborg jumping out of the van to kill us both while we least expect it moments later. Once that’s done I’m free to step around the side of the Van.
Frankly, Stephanie does far better than I would have anticipated. Of course I missed her being struck by the cab door, but she missed me stumbling on my own cape. That means we’re both alive and neither the wiser about the other’s miss-steps. Well, sort of. I’m getting a pretty good visual on her being drug across the ground by the driver. She is in no real danger, yet, but I’m unwilling to wait long.
The moment that her boot connects with the man’s jaw? I bring a heel down on the back of one of his knees. Then it’s time for the Batman to do what the Batman actually does. Another strike, this one is surgical and would likely make even Black Canary proud, to his C-6 vertebrae. Rendering his arms as useless as his broken knee. Leaving me to hope Spoiler didn’t break his jaw.
“The faster you talk, the less likely I am to break something else…” Hey, this is the Batman. I’m playing on the simple math here. People like this cheese their pants at the presence of Bruce’s Batman. So far I’ve done nothing to give anyone the impression that I’m -not- that same sort of Batman. Maybe I’ve been studying my brother Damien too much? “… why are you here? Who do you work for? Give me a contact name or I start with your other knee.”
Steph: There’s no one else in the van, at least not anyone with a heartbeat and the only movement is the swaying of some of the interior contents. By now gentle, since things have settled a bit from both the kick, the fall, and the other passenger jumping out. Rules out a killer robot making a leap at him, too. For the moment. As for the other poor shmuck, if I did break his jaw, I didn’t break it well enough to prevent him screaming like…um…well someone who has just had his knee kicked in and broken, followed up with the special kind of gurgle that comes from damage to your back and the realization that nothing’s really working like it ought to anymore.
I don’t really get to see the violence in full detail. I’m at the wrong angle, but I definitely see and hear the effect. Damn, Bats. Clearly I wasn’t blowing things out of proportion from my childhood memories with time, and darkness to inflate them. Hopefully they’re both distracted by each other, and not by me, because when I sit up I do so right into the bottom edge of the door that had knocked me over in the first place. The thunk, and the mewled ‘owie..’ not as quiet as I might have liked. I correct and roll over a few times. With one more for extra measure, before I try to get up again. A doubly good idea I see, and quickly yank my cape the rest of the way from the crumpled man who probably would love to clutch his broken knee. Or face. And can’t, and lacking those options has, in fact, pissed himself.
It’s a little pathetic, honestly. Or it would be if he didn’t have Batman looming over him. Can’t say I really blame the dude who apparently has no compunctions against sharing. Maybe a little unintelligible from fear and …well, I didn’t break his jaw but it looks like his dentist is going to have a lot of work in front of him. Through the slurring and stammering and begging, he definitely seems to be trying to be helpful. Insisting that he was just paid to put up a wall, given a place and a time.
“…did he say Drury Walker or … Darry? Barry? I can’t understand him…”
Tim: “Penny-One. Search the GCPD database for Drury Walker. Known alias, co-workers, friends, family. Everything.”
Even as I’m saying this, I take the man’s ankle in the same way he’d done to Spoiler. He can’t fight right now and that’s going to add to his humiliation while being pulled to the back of the Van. Once there, I’m able to take the other unconscious man’s other leg to pull him out of the Van like a sack of potatoes. One unconscious, one paralyzed, both of them are bound together with a zip ties. Neutralizing their hands and with one of them unable to walk they’re not going anywhere.
“Alert GCPD to pick these two up. They’ll find the crime scene once they arrive. The drones do not detect any booby traps. Have the computer begin to analyze the sewer images and recall the drones.”
True to my word I’m not interested in torture. Both men will live to fight another day. Even if that’s a day in the Police Holding or the Hospital at this point. Leaving only the mystery of whether I’d seen Spoiler’s thunking herself on the door. The answer to which is, whether I did or not, I’m not going to draw attention to it. She did what she was supposed too. Plus she defended herself amiably. Unlike the two mooks, I have no reason to humiliate her. Especially when I almost fell over my own cape a few moments ago.
“Drury Walker,” whether I heard the name properly or interpreted what was said through missing teeth, it seems that I’ve at least recognized the name. “Small time crook, with big aspirations that never pan out. We have a date on Drury lane, Spoiler.”
The Batmobile is actually already pulling up. No need for us to hike back to it or make some sort of dramatic disappearing act. “You will brief Commissioner Gordon enroute. Put your gameface on.”
Steph: “…huh, that’s an actual person? What kind of dumb name is Drury?”
I actually assumed I had to be misunderstanding the guy. It happens. Without your front teeth it’s clearly pretty hard to enunciate much of anything. It only got worse the more he tried to make himself clear, too. Probably fearing for his other knee. Or his life. He’s still babbling as Batman drags him around the back of the van, he just can’t kick like I could. Poor sap. No, actually I don’t feel bad. I just watch for a moment, before climbing into the cab myself. Kneeling on the seat and hanging upside down as I rummage around underneath it. It’s amazing how much junk ends up underneath the seats in a car and totally forgotten about.
“Sounds like someone else I know. Okay. Listen, Batman. I can’t even with …all of that. Like, do I riff off the Muffin Man thing because…God that was totally going to be my line and one of us has to be the straight man.”
Also. Date? I mean. Again. If this was Red Robin I’d be all over that, but it’s Batman. Batman was Batman when I was eight. And before that, too. Which means that dating? Yuck. No thanks. Leaning out of the cab door, I thrust out a hand with the spoils that I’ve found. Then cock my head, realize it’s not the hand I wanted and crumple up the fast food receipt and toss it back in behind me. Swapping to the other hand as I bounce out again, skipping gingerly to avoid the…general mess that was the area right outside the driver’s side door.
“Cell phone. Not even a burner. Talk about dumb. Or just really new at this. What’s company policy on trading up, cause…this is like. Two gens newer than mine…”
I’m kidding. Mostly. I’m also shooting him a blank look that goes basically completely unseen because my visor’s up.
“…wait. What? Why me? I dont’ have a gameface!”
Tim: Instead of answering her immediately, I’m waiting for her to slip in to the batmobile. This time there’s no screw up on my part and Spoiler has been getting better at this each time as well. Assuming no further misshaps that I’m going to have to hear about later, I’m going to put us in motion towards our next destination.
“We don’t steal from the criminals,” actually some of us do, Catwoman to be specific, but she’s something of a different animal. “For a lot of reasons. The most important at the moment has nothing to do with ethics. There is a serial number for that phone. Currently it is attached to his account. If you took it for your own, when the Cops get to looking in to him. They would discover a connection to you. Given your Father’s past…”
She likely wouldn’t want someone connecting her to organized crime. Not to mention it would also put her name out there. With the corruption in the GCPD, there’s no doubt in my mind that someone would connect Stephanie Brown to the account that was using the Cell Phone. Which would in turn tell them who the rookie was that stole it from them. She already lost her ‘Secret Identity’ to me when she let me get too many details after our first meeting. That took some effort on my part. This is as much about teaching her to protect herself, her family and friends, as it is about ethics.
The grim smile on my face tells of the pleasure that is garnered from stealing her line though. Straight man? God this kid has no idea what I’ve been doing for the last ten years of my life. All of my teen years. Being the wise-ass sidekick was my life. Whether being Robin or Red Robin. It’s taken a lot of effort not to give in to that old role. But like with my staves and fighting style, I’m working to keep the myth of Batman intact until Damien or Dick take it from it. One more step out of my comfort zone isn’t going to kill me…
“You’re making the call because this is your case,” there’s no hint of punishment to this, apparently what I’m saying is actually meant as some sort of reward. “Besides. If you’re talking to the Commission, it means you won’t be talking to me while I’m driving. Make sure to say something funny. He likes jokes. It breaks the ice.”
Steph: “…yeah, I was totes kidding. The whole Powerman5000 suit may be taking me a bit to get used to, but I know cell phones.”
And I know what’s likely to get confiscated by police who don’t care where you bought it from, or from who, just that it’s been stolen. Hasn’t happened to me, but I’ve seen it enough times. Leaves a lot of kids out the money, and double screwed because chances are they don’t want to rat out the person that sold it to them in the first place. That’s how you get your ass beat, or dead. You just learn step by step who not to buy from, and how to not fall victim to the next scheme. At least, if you’re smart.
I actually go to the effort of putting the visor down once more so that I can scowl at him just a little bit. Dude looks pleased with himself, and hell if I know what I’m supposed to do with that. Goes right in the bank of faces that I didn’t think could ever show up on Batman’s face. Expressions and my face are best buddies though. Eyebrows and eyes give away a lot, so even though my mouth is covered it’s pretty easy to guess I just went from grumpy at the line theft, to surprise at the reason why I have to talk to the Commissioner, and then right back into a little bit deeper of a scowl. So. Rude.
“…you just have to rely on your looks for that part, huh? Fine. I’ll call.”
Hi, Commish! Friendly Neighborhood Spoiler here. No. Not the car part like…Spoiler Alert! You don’t know me, but I know you and… there’s no way this is going to be humiliating or weird at all. Nope. I guess it’s just going to have to be time to play ‘professional.’ I think I’d rather go back to the kicking people in the teeth part. Maybe that’ll be what we get to after the phone call, and we run down the list of information that Penny-One gets us.
by Michele | Oct 26, 2017 | Chronicles
ST: Metropolis is the City of Tomorrow. That is how people see it all across the world. While other Cities might be the Hub of Commerce or Sport. Metropolis is the City that Lex Luthor built. Luthor Corp was founded here by the Luthor family over two hundred years ago. Lionel Luthor’s grand pappy put the first stones in to the foundation of what would one day be Luthor Tower. The shining beacon of the City. Center stage, right in the middle of New Troy. The island epicenter of the City of Tomorrow. Named for the Past.
You see Metropolis may be the City of Tomorrow, but it has never forgotten it’s past. Never forgotten it’s heritage. It’s creators had a very specific vision for it when they sewed those founder’s stone in to the bedrock. That tiny Island was, like it’s namesake, meant to be the center of the world. The modern Greek Empire. From which the font of all things should spring. Technology. Science. Literature. Culture. This was the plan from the beginning, yet it didn’t get there solely on the back of it’s founders. Nor the Luthor money. Metropolis was carried in to the Tomorrow, by it’s bastion. The Superman. Fashioned, even now, at the Peak, in the same honor of the Gods of old. With a statue that rises up and points to the Heavens.
New Troy isn’t the only place in the ‘Modern World’ that remembers it’s heritage though. As young Cassandra Sandsmark just discovered the seeds of Greece have been planted elsewhere. Fawcett City. It made no sense, why there? For all the questions, there could be no doubt as to the veracity of it. The little city that Time Forgot is shrouded in magic and mystery. So to then, is it difficult to deny the clues she has been given. As if the name itself did not give it away, it was easy to search the internet for Daily Planet news.
….seven years ago….
The United States was rocked by the news that a small portion of Gotham City had been rendered uninhabitable. Across the Globe, the Headlines ranged from muted to hysterical. As people raced to put blame on someone, something. Eventually they found their scapegoat. Not the deranged men who poisoned the water, but the man who sought to stop them. Many would herald it as the Batman’s fault, by sheer right of existence. His presence caused an irreversible escalation.
Later that year a similar situation brought the unassailable Superman in to question. Would there have been an Alien invasion, if they hadn’t come here looking for the Kryptonian in the first place? It all boiled down to that age-old question: What came first, the chicken or the egg? Was Batman or Superman the cause or the effect? That year would serve as a catalyst to changing the landscape of the world for ever. The History books say so.
Conveniently they say very little, Cassandra finds, about the incident that year. An otherwise quiet night, a swath of the Subway in New Troy erupted in chaos. The reports were never clear. The internet was still in it’s infancy. Lois Lane had called it a terrible tragedy. She spoke of the damage that was caused by two colliding subway cars as ‘inexplicable.’ There were little explanations. Even fewer that made sense. Until she looked deeper. Until Cassandra caught upon a clue that the authorities and Miss Lane lacked.
Teth Adam.
A stray photo caught the eye. He was a man she would never forget. But even recognizing him in a single photo only confirmed what Conner said. He had been there. It didn’t answer the question about why? That would require a trip. Excuses made to Mom, that only got accepted without scrutiny because Helena Sandsmark was distracted by the Amulet being put in to her hands. In to the air. Out of the burbs. Over to the middle of the Island. Down two flights of stares, down in to the interior of the world’s fastest subway system.
It takes but a casual search to realize that the Subway of today, replaced the Subways of before. The accident had only given opportunity to Upgrade, but isn’t that the way of this City? While plain clothing might be less conspicuous in the moment of getting to the Subways unnoticed. No one is going to overlook a young woman like Cassie, slipping off the guarded rails. Down in to the tracks, where she could get deeper. Down in to the cavernous underbelly of the Subway system. What does Cassie have to fear in the Dark?
Once she has found her way beyond. Managed not to be run down by an on-coming Rail. Carefully avoided stepping on the electrified third rail herself. She’ll eventually find herself far enough down, to see the closed off access hatches. Sealed off now, because they lead to the old station. The one that was at the center of whatever happened with Teth-Adam nearly ten years ago.
Cassie: I like to believe that I’m an open, earnest kind of person. For fifteen years of my life I had no reason for secrets. Not one. I spent all of those years traveling the world with my Mother, moving from one location to another, dig after dig, repositories of ancient lore and objects that I was allowed to see and experience first hand. It never occurred to me, not once, that everything wasn’t exactly what it looked like on the outside. That things wouldn’t always be like that. It was pretty naive, honestly. Then I got not so much uprooted, as rooted. Plunked down in St. Mary’s. In Metropolis.
The first secret I ever kept was from my Mother was when I was fifteen. I didn’t tell her how much I hated the place, because I promised I’d try. I didn’t tell her how cruel the other girls were, or how boring the classes got. No place teaches you what insecurity looks and feels like better than a school where the girls don’t have any boys to behave for. Whoever thought that was a good idea was…well. Stupid. When I was sixteen, my secrets got bigger and scarier. Until I had someone to share them with and that wasn’t my Mom. Eventually, Conner talked me in to spilling it.
It was then that I first learned that my Mother had been the one keeping secrets. A whole lot bigger than mine. And that my big one she already knew. Things have been…strained since then. Still mostly good, don’t get me wrong, but definitely not like our Wanderlust glory days had been. Secrets started to be more of a necessary thing. Secrets also lend themselves to lies, and I tell myself I’m not good at them but… it gets easier. Which is really crappy. Once you start keeping one or the other, you can’t stop. They lead to more. And more. Then you realize you’re not being open to anyone. Or talking with the people you ought to be.
This week? Apparently the week for changing that. For talking. Some of those conversations have gone a lot better than others if I”m being totally honest. The burning questions for my Mom, that didn’t entirely get answered how I wanted but… I could accept why. The talk with Conner, which turned into another talk with Freddy and Conner and… that is going to lead to even more talking. There were just other things first. Delivering the Amulet to Helena Sansmark for safe keeping for one. Excusing myself to slip off for another long, long overdue conversation. With someone that I”ve never talked to in my life.
It’s probably not a surprise to anyone. I’d talked to Conner about trying. Talked to Mom about how it would even be done. It’s time to stop talking about it and just. Do it. No time like the present, before something else goes catastrophically wrong with my week and it’s too late, right? New Troy isn’t far, not when you’re already in Metropolis. Ferry is usually the best way. It’s what I would have been told to do because someone’s mother doesn’t exactly appreciate flying like she does. I just don’t take the time. Up, up and over more than away. To the site that stuck out in my mind. I could have gone back to Fawcett but it seemed like a bad idea just now. New Troy was a name I’d been given. Easy to understand, with a little research why it might be a ‘special.’ Place. A site for Gods. New and old. Then there’d been the information my boyfriend had let slip at the library. About Black Adam, what he’d done and where.
Chances are he was after something. Did he get it? Would the place still hold power? Pulling the hood of the sweatshirt I’d grabbed at home, when I’d changed clothes while Con was talking to Mom, over my golden hair I’d slipped in. Moving quick enough that if anyone tries to stop me that I wouldn’t be caught. Through the tunnel before guards could be summoned to stop that darn teenager. Running, instead of flying, because I don’t know that there’s not cameras down here. They sure seem to be everywhere. What do I have to fear in the dark? Not much it turns out. If you think the flashlight function on your average iPhone is bright?
You should try Waynetech 9000. Serves me pretty well, as does not being electrocuted on accident, until I get to where I really shouldn’t be. No one should be, judging by the meant to be permanence of the seals on these hatches. Well. What are superpowers for if not getting where schoolgirls shouldn’t go? Reaching up, I wrap fingers around the old, unusable latch. Pulling with steadily increasing pressure until I can get it to come loose. A yank would be quicker. But it also might pull more free than I’m ready for.
ST: When this area was sealed, it was done so with the foresight that one day the City might need to re-open this area. It isn’t unheard of for the city to need to rebuild itself after a catastrophe. Nor is it unheard of for people of lesser scruples to make use of places just like this for some nefarious purpose. The result is that Cassandra finds herself without the proper tools needed to make this work easily. When all else fails there’s always brute force and she’s in luck, because apparently the real Superman didn’t help seal all of this off. The large duracrete seals eventually begin to give and she’ll be able to pry and lever them out of the way. Of course she could have just ripped them away, but she’s smart enough to avoid the collateral damage.
Speaking of Damage? The moment she is beyond the sealed off entrance, she’ll see -why- it was sealed in the first place. The Tram-Station has been preserved in the same state it was nearly ten years. The City repaired just enough to make the area stable, but otherwise they seem content to have simply insured this area never saw a visitor. It is a mess. The Dust and Spider-Webs are an actual improvement upon the debris that litters everywhere you can see with an iPhone camera’s flash-light.
At first it might seem like a busy. There’s very little here in obvious sight other than your standard Tram-Station that had been through a horrible fight with yet another Super-Villain. Cassie isn’t a Detective. She can follow a trail, but she isn’t trained to see the clues. That leaves her to rely upon something else. Her brains. Surely. Her strength. Obviously. But just before she’s ready to give up and go? Her eyes catch upon a years old newspaper. Preserved, in spite of the mangled bench it sets near too. The headline reads, ‘Freak Lightning Storm Hits Metropolis!’
That is when she feels it. For the second time today. That sense of the willies. Almost a sensation of deja vu. Though it’s impossible that she would have ever been there before. It beckons her. Calls to her. Just as it did during her lab class earlier when that sanctum door opened and Freddy stepped out. Only this time there is no immediate, obvious pay off. Not until she closes her. Not until she follows that feeling. That sixth sense that tingles as she nears it.
The world seems to tingle as she nears it. A small breach in the wall. To the naked eye it looks like an impact pocket.It looks that way, right up until Cassie’s hand nearly touches the cement. Perhaps she’ll recoil from the way the crater reacts to her presence. The way electricity crawls across the surface. Calling to her. Asking her to help. All she must do is reach in and pull it from …
Olympus.
The difference between abandoned subway platform and great Mount is stark. The transition instant. Gone is the Hoodie, in it’s place flowing robe and sandles. Gone is the iPhone, but instead there is gold and jewels. So too is gone pretense of being alone. Because for the first time in her life, Cassie is among the Gods. A sprawling city ranges in front of her, just past the altar she stands before. In the distance she can see people, multiple, fluttering through the sky upon winged feet. Children playing with their tridents in the streets. Fountains of gravity defying water. Everything glows. As if someone took the world and turned up the contrast.
“You shouldn’t be here.”
Cassie: The silence is eerie. Creepy. Enveloping. Nothing, and no one, seems to have been here since it was sealed up in the first place. As I step through the opening I’ve forced, I can hear the crunch of my shoes play the sound back to me, the little bits of rubble grinding under the soul of my sneaker. It’s like an accusation, or a recording of what I’m doing. It’s also like something out of a book, or a movie. The space itself. Swinging my phone this way and that to take in the room with the powerful spotlight. No one here but me and the spiders. And the remnants of what happens when something gets in the way of someone of power, and something that they want.
So what was he after? Did Raven stop him in time? How do we stop this from being a thing all the time? Not Black Adam. The destruction. Sure, Metropolis had made sparkling lemonade prosecco punch when given this particular lemon, like it was their intention all along to make something so much better and they were just waiting for the reason. That’s kind of what Luthor does, too. The whole this was my idea all along, thing. I go deeper, and deeper into the terminal, but there’s not much to find. Nothing really. Nothing to jump out at me until I see that newspaper. Lightning storms happen all the time. World over. They just aren’t called ‘freak.’ Three’s just some things I’m on high alert for right now. That’s one of them.
“…”
There it is again. That feeling. I pull up short as the hairs on my arms, the back of my neck, stand up at attention and I catch myself shivering in my sweatshirt, despite the fact that it’s not really cold. A little chilly down here, underground, but not cold. Not to me at least. I’m built a bit more….sturdy than most people. Twice in one day though. Did another door just open somewhere? Did Freddy get back into the sanctum? It lingers though. Exhaling, a sound that had been soft but the room makes it echo much louder than it was in the first place, I close my eyes and pay attention to what I’m feeling. That’s what I’m good at. Not clues and facts like Tim. Batman, jeez I’m never going to get used to that… mine’s a different sort of intuition. But I still follow it.
Hah. There. There it is. Unlike earlier, when the feeling had come and gone, this is getting stronger or at least more noticeable. Someone crashed here, but that can’t be the cause. Leaning in, I gingerly reach out to feel for a door, or some illusion and then pull back when it sparks and shifts. It’s not a warning though, it feels like an invitation. And you know what? I’m taking it.
“Hoollleee…”
I just about drop my phone in surprise. Shock really. Except it’s not there to drop anymore, and the peripheral edge of my hoodie vanishes from my view. I’m left blinking into the sudden light and it’s rather like in Wizard of Oz when they go from black and white to incredible technicolor. I don’t know where to look first. At the fact that my clothes are different and I’m dripping in more jewelry than I’ve worn in my entire life all at the same time. Usually it’s just a chain necklace, with a pendant and a ring dangling from it. Or to the people. No. Gods. Because that’s surely what they are. What catches my interest most are the children though. Obviously Gods have children. There’s me, for example though I’m half. Are these full? Is that why they get to be here? You don’t hear about them much in myths. Maybe for protection.
The voice’s, statement, accusation? makes me spin on a sandaled heel of my foot to face the source. Eyes getting even wider still, but there’s no apology in them for the intrusion, and definitely no guilt, either.
“You, as in no one should be here that doesn’t live here or you, Cassie Sandsmark specifically?”
ST: The world around Cassandra is buzzing with so many things. Sounds of the children playing. The tones of music in the distance. Wind whispering through the grass and trees. Not only does everything glow with vibrant life, but the hills are alive with the sound of music. Focus will tell her that there is nothing really different about any of the things she sees. Grass is still grass. Trees are still trees. The Wind still pushes at you. Scents still permeate the nose. Everything is just richer than the world she knows, from living in it her whole life.
The figure behind her is at the same time larger than life and withered with age. His stature is that of someone who, at one time, stood a head taller than most anyone Cassie has ever met. Age has left him with the slightest stoop, that is in itself offset by the presence of the enamored trident. That too is a mish-mash of your standard fair, but topped with a Lightning Bolt crescent. What truly sets this man apart though? Is the eyes. They are lacking the white you would normally associate with an eyeball. Where the white should be is the stars, orbiting the electric Sunstone in the middle. Added to the sweeping beard that sways in the gusts of wind and factored along with the crown atop his head and you can of course take a leap of logic or faith to whom she has appeared before.
“Both.”
Ask a dumb question, get the shortest answer in the world, right? If she was expecting more she isn’t likely to get it. He seems willing, and able, to stand there for a fortnight looking upon her with expectant patient. She is trespassing here, while this is his land and the set of his jaw all but demands upon her to ‘Explain herself.’ He doesn’t have to say it. He just wills it to be so and Cassie is going to find herself hard pressed to fight that compulsion.
Cassie: Oh, so that’s how we’re going to play it, huh? Apparently close-lipped behavior runs in my family. On both sides. And they seem to have cancelled one another out in order to produce me. Zeus hasn’t said so much as ‘boo’ to me my entire life, so I would have had to be dumb to expect any kind of effusive, long awaited reunion. That sounds kind of dour and woe is me but the truth? I spent sixteen years of my life not even considering who it might be. I’m not one of those kids who, missing a parent, dreams of who and what they might be. Why they might have left. I knew the story, from when it was told to me when I asked but I’d never missed his presence. I had my Mom. Ask anyone I know. She’s all that and a bag of chips. I didn’t need anyone else.
Fast forward to present day, and hey. Guess what? Turns out my Dad’s Zeus. The Zeus. Who isn’t, apparently like people think, just the Head God of the Greek Pantheon, but God of the Gods. All of them. I’m actually a little offended that I now have to care. Because of who he is. Because of what that makes me, and apparently what that also has landed me in. I may be Helena Sandsmark’s daughter… but I’m Zeus’ too. That’s not something that goes away.
“Sure, right. Both.”
This is so much more awkward than it probably ought to be. Or maybe it’s just the right level. If anything, I’m probably under awed but…don’t get me wrong. Still awed, because look at him. And being told who your father is. Coming to grips with that. That’s one thing. Seeing him live, in person, this figure of stories that you grew up on. About the only thing that actually surprises me? The stoop. The age. That doesn’t seem right. Sure, he’s unknowable years old I’d bet but… I was kind of led to understand that I’m probably, in all likelihood, immortal. I’m going to hit a point where I stop aging. I can pretty much feel the power coming off of him, it’s the power that I’m housing right now, too. I wonder though, if the stoop is because he’s diminished.
There’s no question. No demands, just declaration that I shouldn’t be here. The end. And a look that Mom gave me the few times I’d done something wrong, and she was going to make me squirm until I confessed of my own ‘free will.’ I can feel the urge to squirm right now, too. The urge to talk getting stronger, and stronger…and… that actually makes me narrow blue eyes slightly. But I came here for answers. I should get to the questions and…get out. Though a big part of me wants to see how long I can go without caving under that gaze.
Right to the point then. Points.
“If I help Freddy Freeman, does that count as cheating? I want to help him. I don’t want to screw up the whole…thing, though.”
That’s a yes or no question, too. Which I’m probably going to get a yes or no answer to and that’s fine. But. Part of me wants more than that. Jeez. I don’t actually want an explanation do I? I find myself pursing my lips, and absently rubbing my elbow. I’m here. For all I know it may be the only time I’m here, or the only time I ever speak to him. I better make it count. For the questions I need, and the ones I don’t think I do.
“Did… you love my Mom? Or is my existence more along the lines of a calculated ‘overseas’ investment for you?”
ST: “Yes.”
His single word answer is far more than just that though. It may seem a single word, just as she expected, but there is more to it than that. She merely needs to open her mind to what just happened. She was told, in no uncertain terms by the God of the Gods that she was not supposed to be here. Then he answered her first question. Then here second. What isn’t being said is as important as what is. She hasn’t been evicted, sent back to where ever she is. She hasn’t been asked how she got here, when she apparently shouldn’t be. Nor has she been told not to ask her questions. Point in fact, she’s not been told anything. What to ask. What not to ask. Here’s merely stood there, looking at her, expecting information, but not shutting down her efforts to get some in return.
However. The very moment that he answered a second question? His level of expectation rises. So too then does that compulsion. Like the rising of a tide, that will eventually overtake the beach. Cassie is strong willed. She stands in defiance of her boyfriend, who is a superman in his own right. A Luthor on top of it. He is not the Godking. The eye of the stars, ruler of the heavens. He is not the one whom made his father vomit up his siblings, so that they could overthrow him and take all of creation in their name. Twice.
“I love all of my subjects,” it seems like a hedged answer, but there is a certain, if faint, smile that touches his lips in saying it. “She is a strong Woman. The mind of a scholar, the strength of ox and she’s as stubborn as one too. Admittedly, you did enhance my portfolio.”
By the time Zeus has finished speaking there is a really nothing left for Cassandra to do but explain why and how she came to be here. One might think that the All-Father of the Heaven and Earth would be omniscient, but the way his presence comes to bear upon her? Is born from a lack of knowledge. The All-Father is apparently not All-Seeing. Perhaps the myths and legends are wrong. Or perhaps there is more to it than meets the eye.
Cassie: It just keeps building. That feeling. Why should I need to explain myself? It ought to be pretty self-explanatory… the answer I get is…brief but I expected it to be. Helping Freddy however, is not the same as hindering Isis. You don’t have to be some verbal mastermind at wordplay to figure that one out. Especially not when you were already present to watch him smite the heck out of her once. Even he can step in if she’s the one doing the cheating.
Of course he loves all his subjects… and the things he says about my Mom are all true. She’s incredible. I happen to think he’s underselling it but you know. Can never talk too glowingly about your exes. I guess. I wouldn’t actually know, I’ve never had one. The comment about the portfolio makes my lips purse in a bit of a scowl. That stings a bit more than I think it should have, especially since I framed my presence in those terms in the first place.
“You don’t make babies with all your subjects, though.”
By the time I’m done muttering that, I’m practically squirming with the urge to blab. I don’t owe him an explanation, he owes me one if anything, but lately I’ve learned you don’t just get those kind of things. You apparently get tossed into the deep end without your water wings, and get encouraged to sink or swim. The truth, again which kind of stings and really shouldn’t, is that he’s a bazillion years old. All those years of ‘ignoring’ me were basically an eyeblink to him in all likelihood. Half an eyeblink. The compulsion makes the words come out in a rush though. More of one than I’d like.
“…I have more questions that I have answers, and I don’t understand what’s going on around me and it feels like I should have some idea and I was just fine with the way my life was going until it changed, and now everyone’s looking at me like I’m supposed to do something great, and I want to. Not the doing something great really but the helping, and I spent the last sixteen years not even being a little curious about who you are and now I have to know, because I need to know what I came from, but I can’t know because you’re up…here and I’m down there and so I figured I should just cut out the middleman and….”
Yiiiiiiiiie shut up, Cassie. Clearing my throat with a little bit of a flush to my face, I try to slow down what was a steadily increasing speech pace until I was just about babbling.
Zeus: “Is living a Good life not enough for you? Are you disappointed in the life your Mother provided that you? Do you find it unworthy? Or is the opinion of others what defines you?”
There is a sigh that comes. It bespeaks of how trying this is for a man of such advanced years. Not that Zeus is old and feeble, but that there is need to have this talk with her. As if he, actually, expected more or better from her than that particular explanation. Though his immediate resignation is also plain, because for the first time he takes a step towards her and the altar to his Name that she arrived at. Ambling up, Zeus puts his posterior right upon the edge of the altar and sprawls across it lazily. The massive trident is put in to her hands, for safe keeping, while he settles himself upon the one place that anyone should probably be sitting.
“The Trial was Broken, Cassandra. Two of the Avatars of the Gods have been slain, by one not anointed by Shazam to take part in the Trials. He cannot garner the Blessings of those Gods, the Avatar for their trial has been destroyed. So moving against Isis is not cheating. The question you should ask, not to me but to yourself, is whether the remaining Avatars would find Freddy Freeman worthy of their Blessing, if you right this wrong for him.”
“No. Not with all my subjects, but you see Cassandra. I will speak to your mother, I cannot believe she has not had this talk with you. Oh, very well. When a Mommy and a Daddy love one another. When they find themselves voraciously attracted to one another. When their loins ache for that single moment of inseperable contact to one another. When the sky weeps from their longing to suckle upon one another’s Nectar… a baby Godling is born of their yearnings.”
Cassie: “…yeah sorry, it wasn’t really meant that way. Okay. It was maybe in part meant that way but I’ve had kind of a rough week. Passive aggressive isn’t usually my thing.”
The word presume is getting thrown around a lot right now. I suppose that’s fitting, because I have to do a lot of that. Presume, or assume, there’s a subtle but distinct difference. Mostly in the tone. And I do actually look embarrassed by my little outburst, or at least the method that I did it. I’m not sorry for how I feel, but my delivery could have been a bit more…well. Better.
“I can do what I want, until you don’t like what I’m doing. You’re the boss, I get that. But the only rule I really have been told is that Gods aren’t supposed to be directly intervening in the world, except I live in the world. I intervene by existing.”
Especially if I’m out doing superheroics. And boy…I really know how Conner feels now, but maybe that only applies to the full-blooded, and not a demi-god like myself. It’d make sense, the distinction, except Tim had said it was a bunch of demigods that had triggered the edict in the first place. Either he misunderstood (unlikely) or there’s something to that.
“Are you telling me that the Trials this time were made to be broken? Ugh. Talk about a headache… okay. Fine.”
What a thing to wrap your head around. Maybe that’s something someone else could parse better than me, but I’m pretty sharp most of the time and this is mostly making me feel like my head’s wanting to spin. It’d be easier to just take what he said as fact. Not try to sort out the truth or reality of it. I’ve learned lately, though, that nothing really is what it seems like on the surface.
“..that’s a lot of presuming but I followed. I think that’s… also one of the nicest things I’ve heard said about me.”
And Freddy laid out some pretty good compliments earlier today. It also makes me, in a little corner of my mind, suspicious. A feeling that I try to immediately squash down because it’s not going to serve anyone much good right now. Sucking in a deep breath, I puff it out again, ruffling blonde hair as I do.
“So. You can’t directly interfere or influence. Not just with the Trials, but with the world. What if it were… an exchange? Like. A favor for services rendered.”
Zeus: “I know that it isn’t your normal way, but you are under an awful lot of stress lately and you’ve under some pressure to be more assertive. Dreams will do that to a person. Drive them to be something that they aren’t necessarily. It’s why they are dreams. We must, at times, decide whether they are driving us to be the best or the worst version of who we want to be. But, it sure sounds like you were quite happy to be who you are. Until, suddenly. You weren’t happy with it anymore. I wonder what changed. Was it your mother’s decision to make you experience the life of an Average Teen Human? Was it that her Deal with me, meant you gaining access to your birthright at the age of Awakening? Was it the nightmares that your Brother gave you? Or the dreams you sleep with now? What was the catalyst that brought about your unhappiness. That is perhaps the only thing about you that I don’t know.”
“Who told you that rule? Certainly not I. If I were to have told you of such a rule, then I would have phrased it slightly different. The Gods are forbidden from Directlyintervening in the Mortal World. To use your words there are Loopholes to ever decree. Even ones from mine own lips. Strictly speaking, Cassandra, you are not truly a Goddess. You are born of a Mortal. One of your many Birthrights, is the right to take part in the world you choose to live in. Should you ever choose to ascend, to take your place here in the Heavens or descend to the fiery abyss of Hell. You would then be subject to the rule. As I said. You should not be here. You have not chosen nor are you ready to choose.”
“I did not say that the Trials themselves were made to be broken. I asked you, what would make you believe that one of the Gods that offer their Blessing had not chosen -this- as Freddy Freeman’s Trial? Your ability to presume is outstripped by your inability to listen. Look at what has occurred. Look closely. Freddy has gained three of the Blessings he needs. His rival has at least two. Thus there is but one blessing yet to be discovered. Who’s is left?”
Once again, the hand lifts from and then returns to Cassie’s shoulder, where it lightly squeezes for the effect of reasserting her focus. “Cassandra, I am Zeus. I can do as I wish. None can question me. I make the rules. I can break the rules. But having the power to do as one wishes, do not entitle them to do so. I play by the rules that I put in place, simply because it is right for me to do so. There is also something to be said about leading by example. My people see the sacrifices that I make, it emboldens many of them to do the same. As it also serves as warning to those who might seek to do otherwise. Would you not fear the Wrath of a God, if you knew he that his fury would be that much more keen for you having trespassed where he himself has not?”
When he chuckles it is a thing of full-bodied enjoyment. Almost as if she were watching a slim version of St. Nicholas chuckling over cookies. “You are a Godly little thing, aren’t you? Seeking another loophole. Having the Chutzpah to ask the Rule-Maker how to circumvent his own Rules. Very well, Cassandra. A barter such as you speak is not unheard of. There are manners in which such business could be conducted, that would not raise my ire. ”
“I should warn you, however, little Godling. It is less the Act and more the Meaning that might merit my notice in such things. Intentions make all the difference.
Cassie: I’m not sure what it was myself, either. Growing up is going to be filled with moments of unfairness or confusion. That’s life. I’m pretty sure normal people experience that kind of thing, too. Look at Tim Drake. He didn’t need a superpower, or any kind of higher power influence to make his life a total mess. Or to be a hero, but that’s a different matter. The things Zeus is saying tell me that yes, he was paying attention. Especially the part about my dreams. So what made the change? Was it the powers, the unleashing of them so I started to be what I’d actually been born to be? Was it all the things that had been kept from me? Or a sense of betrayal that nothing was how I thought it was. Not just from my mother, but the world. Life was simple before that. It’s easy to be happy when things are simple.
“You’re not kidding. Or wrong. It’s definitely been a rocky couple… wait. Wait, wait back up.”
Dreams will make a person more assertive? Maybe I’m still over thinking things here, as he’d already said, but I’m definitely listening. If you’re pursuing a dream, you have to push yourself to get there and achieve it. That means being more assertive. He mentioned it twice though. The second time, in tandem with referencing the horrors that Ares had been visiting on my unconscious mind. Most of the time? My dreams aren’t really remarkable. They’re pretty damn normal, in fact. Nothing that should really drive me to much of anything. My cheeks color slightly as I run through a mental list of them.
“What about my dreams? What pressure? And when you say Age of Awakening is that meaning my physical age when they kicked in, or the state of the world as a whole?”
No, Zeus hadn’t told me that rule because we’ve never spoken before. Not something I need to throw out there, because…like I said. I really am not that passive aggressive and we both already know that point. I’m also still listening, stopping the whirring of my brain to focus and absorb. Some of it I knew, or… presumed, and some? Talk about a heavy, larger than life kind of thought. I get to choose? I didn’t want to assume a Disney cartoon got any sort of important details right but… Birthrights. Choices. My place?
“Um. Yours.”
That would be an educated guess, even if I hadn’t spoken with my new friend about his Trials and gotten the explanations from him and Red Ro…er. Batman. Just from the way he phrased it. I guess I’d thought there would still be gaining gifts from the other Avatars but…as Zeus said. They’re destroyed. No longer able to bestow anything. The broken nature of the trial now, the cheating of Freddy’s rival. I guess it fits. And it also means that now that I know? I need to be extra careful. There’s no pleading ignorance, but the fact is I was never really ignorant of that notion in the first place. You can’t take someone’s driver’s license test for them. And I can’t overcome Freddy’s obstacles.
“It’d be an escalation of proverbial arms. And epic scale Monkey See, Monkey do. I. Understand. I do.”
It sucks, but I get it. Just like I hadn’t been happy with Mom’s explanations but…once she’d given them I understood. Why she wanted me to be a ‘real girl’ before I learned there was anything else to be. How would my perceptions be skewed if like Conner, I just came out into the world with all that power, knowing I could do whatever I wanted, whenever I wanted? That means I’m probably an entirely different Cassie. On the flip side, having lived the last …entire…part of my life without wanting anything from a Father I didn’t know, or want to know, means that finding out he could choose to act, or see me, but just doesn’t isn’t really quite the blow it could be. There’s a reason. It’s not just a platitude to say it’s one I understand.
Zeus’ laughter makes me blink, and then cock my head once more and watch his amusement. Well. It’s not smiting for being uppity. I’m not sure how I feel about being laughed at, but I don’t think that’s actually what he’s doing. He said it. I can do whatever I want. Until I make him mad by doing it.
“I just mean… I’m a big girl. I’m going to try to fight my own battles. But if I’m putting myself out there, and I let the world see me for who I really am. What I really am. I presume that may lead in a pretty dramatic uptick in belief. And so it might not be completely unreasonable in that case, if someday down the road I’ve got an epic emergency to…ask for a little help. Whatever that might be.”
I realize I’ve just kind of put myself out there like some kind of NASCAR racing vehicle, prime to have sponsor’s stickers slapped on me. An analogy I find instantly humorous in my head, and absurd enough that I let out a little giggle before I smother it down again just as quickly. It also might have come out like I’m trying to coerce the God of the Gods by saying I don’t have to claim him, or glorify him by proxy with my actions. That wasn’t my intention. Seems like a good way to get smote. Well. Maybe it was. At least a little. Maybe I should clarify.
“I’m going to keep helping people regardless. I don’t need some favor cookie dangling on a stick to make me do it. Just. Thought I’d ask since. I’m here and all.”
Zeus: For a lot of the next couple moments he sits there in silence. Watching Cassie. Seeing the wheels turning as she works through the things that she had asked and how the answers were given. Not just the words offered, but how they were offered. She’s examining everything said. Re-thinking them all. Over-thinking some. Under-thinking others. Most of all though, she searches for hidden meanings. Which once more drives a chuckle of mirth from the man before her.
“Your Mother does that all the time. She thinks about the double meanings of everything I say to her. I have learned that often times your Mother uses the adage about Gods and Riddles to convince herself that she has heard that which she wishes to hear.” White haired head canting off to one side, like a wizened old owl peering at a slow-moving worm it might pluck from the ground as a morsel. “If a Nightmare can scare you, then why can’t a Dream embolden you? Is the Nightmare all the worse, simply because it terrifies you? If a Nightmare gives you a fright, scaring you from doing the wrong thing. Is it not good? Then wouldn’t a Dream that emboldens you to the wrong ends, be equally foul?”
“Think, little one. Think this through. Would help from me, knowing it was given because you empowered me through the belief of others. Would that be Help you would truly want? Or would that make me just some genetic donor, who was seeking to enhance his overseas portfolio? If then I refused to help, would it mean that I was simply refusing or that I never saw you as an investment that might pay a dividend? Your question has painted me in to a pickle of situation, from which there is no way in which I can ever win.”
“Instead. Perhaps you should take a different path of thought. What if I have already helped you? What would you say to the certain knowledge that I have put all the tools you should ever need in place, well within your grasp? That I have done this, before you asked for help. Without any promise of payment what so ever.”
Once more there is a roll of the shoulders. Not so much a shrugging to suggest that I do not care for the topic, but to hint at the fact that this is not supposition. “Your life is your own. Your choices are your own. Fate has no hold upon my children, ‘cept that greatness follow them closely. When the time is nigh and the stakes are high, you will find what you seek, Daughter. This be no riddle to be figured out. I say it plainly. My help was given long before your birth. It lays in wait, in your world waiting to be taken. Some of it will find you, others will need to be found. Your Mother has been teaching you how to look for it your whole life. She has been preparing you, Cassandra. Guiding you, Shaping you. Molding you like Clay, in to the woman you are. You came here for answers, but in reality you already had them.”
“Most. Of them anyway,” lightly reaching out then to tap the Trident she holds, the touch gives it life and it begins to thrum in her hands. “You are not supposed to be here. But there is no punishment to be given. An Avatar must confer with their Patron, if they are to conduct the Trial as their Patron demands it. I told you, Cassandra, I chose you.”
“You must test him. You must judge him. In the end, you must choose whether Freddy Freeman is worthy of the Blessing that only you may bestow. Thus, it is not cheating for you to aide such a man in the Trials. For you are one of them. But you must remember, that he must pass a trial of your creation. He must prove himself worthy of the Blessing from the King of the Gods.”
Cassie: “Analyze twice, dig once. Sounds like Mom.”
Or more correctly, four times, get more sources, hunt down some locals, then measure twice and cut once. Not the locals, obviously. The site of whatever it was she was after. A passion that I now know isn’t purely an academic pursuit. Yes, it satisfies that itch but there’s more driving her than just simple discovery. As for my Mother thinking about the double meanings of everything he says to her, present tense, I want to seize on that and ask. The tiny part of me that feels so out of control of my own life shrieking over how unfair that is. And the talk of my dreams? I wouldn’t say Ares’ little love notes had been about scaring me away from doing something so much as trying to terrify me until I caved into doing what he wanted. Don’t get me wrong, what Zeus just said makes sense, but the application to my circumstances doesn’t entirely.
My lips purse and pull to the side and this time, it’s my turn to look amused at what he’s said. Right after looking a little chagrined about the ‘genetic donor’ portion, which tells me he does know my mind because that’s often how I thought of the other half of my biological makeup. Not a father. Just a necessary part of creation, whomever he’d been.
“It’d be more like two folks helping each other out, but your way does make you sound much more magnanimous and kindly.”
And if he really is all power, all knowing, it’s possible he did that. That he knew what I’d need, and arranged it all before I’d ever need it. Or he could be interjecting those things in the present. Who would ever actually know, besides him? Which came first, the chicken or the egg? I’m firming myself up to not dwell on that puzzle. Mom probably would. I’m just going to take him at the words that he says are exactly what he means. Especially because I’m very aware that he doesn’t actually have to tell me anything. It’s not like I’m in a position to compel the guy…God… Buying in to what he says isn’t really hard. Or a matter of buying in. I did know some of these things. Knowing and suspecting are different, but stories of Zeus’ children lingered through the ages. I’m already kicking at the edges of greatness. I don’t know if I could have helped it.
“Most of them?”
I don’t get to have an ‘aha!’ moment especially, because I’m distracted by the feel of the trident in my fingers, the other hand coming up to take hold of it as well like I’m concerned it’s going to wriggle its way out of my grasp, or I might drop it. The energy vibrates my palms, and fingertips. Like putting your hand on the casing of some giant turbine. Not so distracting as to keep me from hearing Zeus’ words, though. Blonde head rears back in surprise. When he said he Chose me, I didn’t think he’d meant for this. I had been thinking of it more along the lines of a representative in the world of…oh. Yeah. Nope. That makes, actually, perfect sense.
“I think I know a couple people that would probably agree I’m a bit of a Trial right now. Heh. I. I can do that.”
And now we’re back to heavy things. I’m a teenage girl, who barely has a handle on her own life and problems right now, I think most of the world might think was kind of a last resort sort of option for this sort of thing. I’ve also learned over the last few years, though, that my best and most important quality isn’t really the fact that I can bench a tank or fly, or put my teachers to shame in their own classrooms. It’s something else, that I think I’d probably have even if I didn’t have the muscle, the book smarts, or the looks from my Mother. Something special. And I think I already have seen hints of that in my new friend.
It takes guts, if nothing else, to do what he did earlier. Offering the trident back to Zeus, I actually smile at him, before letting my eyes wander over the scenery around me once again. Drinking it in because who knows when, if ever, I’ll be back here. I probably won’t get away with stumbling in half on accident, half on purpose again. And I don’t have to put deep thought into it to know that I’m not ready, or willing, to leave Earth right now, and leave behind the people I care about. Neither did he. I’d imagined I would come away from this like I had the talk with my Mother. More questions than answers, though I did get answers I needed. More frustrations to dig in. There’s a sort of sense of…ease… that probably is out of place with discussion that’s settled into my shoulders.
I’m not going to overthink that, either.
“Thank you. Really. Already having the answers or not, I feel a lot better about. Well. Everything. And I appreciate the explanations. I’ll get out of your hair now.”
Zeus: “Your Mother isn’t just an amazing Scientist, Cassandra. She is an amazing person. A wonder of a woman. That has raised one of her own.” Once she offers the Trident, Zeus simply touches it a second, before drawing back his hand. “What good would it do for me to tell you not to be too hard on her? You don’t need to hear that from your absentee Father and even if he said it what merit would it hold? So I won’t tell you to not be too hard on her. Instead I would tell you to look inward. Think about your situation. How hard is it to navigate this world you were thrust in to? Have you stumbled? Of course. But you’re doing the best you can, given the circumstances. You’re playing this game, without a handbook. No training. Blind, deaf, but thankfully never dumb. How much of that do you have to thank Helena for?”
“You have your Mother for support. She had no one. Think about your life and what would you do, if you were alone with all of this?”
With that Zeus rises from the Dais. His hand does not go to the Trident, but something begins to happen. The feeling of touching a live battery. That tingling sensation as the current surges through your topical flesh. The once lengthy, golden and ornate trident shifts. Losing it’s cohesion as it slowly becomes a single bolt of lightning. One that is not take away from her, but is left in her hands.
“Your blessing, bestow it upon the Champion if you believe him worthy. Though his trials are broken, I caution you, Daughter. Be very mindful not to give your blessing unearned. Power unearned is often times abused. Even if you believe this boy to be different, your heart and your head should be of one mind on this Trial. You will knowwhen or if he is worthy.”
“Most of them. You surprise me by not simply asking what Isis is up to or how to stop her. You didn’t ask me about the new dreams you’ve been having. Nor did you ask, even once, if you can contact me again.” Snorting softly, as he takes that first step to move around her. “I think I would be most insulted, if a child of mine wasn’t something of a Trial. Consider it this way. You’re the equivalent of a Godling Toddler. You only have one and three quarters more centuries before you’re out of your terrible twos.”
Still chortling even as his hand lightly clasps her shoulder. The squeeze is gentle, supportive and safe. After all she’s a known hugger. “This discussion was long overdue. It is to my regret that I could not allow myself to initiate it sooner. You won’t be able to return the same again, but there are other means. Similar methods.A creative young woman such as yourself, can surely think her way back to Olympus if you put your mind to it.”
“Cassandra. One final piece of advice. Other children were told stories of three pigs, wolves and riding hoods. You were told the sagas of the ages. Stories of Golden Bows, Fleece. Nemean Lions. Magical harps. My Aegis. The difference between the fairy tales other children were told and those you were given? Is that all of the ones Helena spoke of. Are true. They are the roadmap to all the help you might ever need. She even taught you how to seek them out.”
Cassie: I expect him to take the Trident away from me again, for him to instead switch courses and tell me, without telling me, not to be too hard on my Mother? Blue eyes narrow slightly, but it’s hardly a shocking thing to hear. He’s not even the first person to do it this month. I do have my mother for support. And while there was only so much support I could give her, I like to think that we were there for each other. I may be frustrated, but that’s a very normal sort of growing pains even when you’re not a demi-god. Hell, judging by the interactions I’ve seen between friends and their completely normal parents? Even when we’re fighting, we’re still on pretty good terms. And even if we’re not getting along as great as we once did, I can promise that if anyone messed with her? They’d get front row seats to seeing mild-mannered girl next door morph into raging Godpowered lioness.
“I’d go crazy. But I’m not alone, and neither is she. Not anymore.”
I felt something like this once before, a little bit of a science experiment though I forget where we were living at the time, where a bunch of other children and myself joined hands and made a circuit with the exposed battery of a men’s shaver. You could feel it go into your body, from one linked hand to the next, and the urge was there to drop hands and make it stop until you got used to it. That’s like this, and hang onto it, watching in wonder as the weapon shifts to a weapon of a different sort.
“Like you said. Broken world. Broken trials. I’ll figure out how to make it work.”
It’s a semi-flippant answer I suppose, but I do take it seriously. The charge, and what I’m being asked to do. I’m in love with a prime example of what power with no filter, and no effort to acquire can do to a person. I’ve also already met a few other examples of people who have power that I don’t agree with how they use it. It’s not something to let go into the world lightly, even for someone I like. I came up here in part to make sure I wouldn’t cheat Freddy of his experience, and his Trials. Being part of it now won’t change that.
“Frankly? I didn’t think you’d really answer, or it’d fall under the ‘you have the answers already’ clause. Isis, what she’s up to, and what to do about it? That’s something that can be figured out. And. You already warned me about the dreams.”
Biting the corner of my lip almost impishly, I turn to watch him move around me. One hundred and seventy-fve more years and I’ll still be a toddler? I wasn’t kidding about the eyeblink part. Waiting sixteen years for me to be allowed to have my powers by my Mother really was no hardship.
“Um. Well. There’s a saying about easier to ask forgiveness than permission. So if I haven’t been told that I can’t…”
Then I’m also not knowingly breaking the rules. I’ve had a lot of experience lately in things unsaid, or unasked, for someone else’s protection, or my own use. I could ask now about the things I hadn’t asked, but I realize now that I’m here…that I really wasn’t actually looking for someone to tell me what to do. It’s my world. I can figure out what to do with it, I think I’m actually supposed to. After a moment of hesitation, I bring a hand away from the lighting bolt to lay it on top of the one on my shoulder. The contact is… nice. A little weird how nice actually.
“Will anyone else? I’ll make sure to seal the hatches back up if they could. Thank you. For the advice. I won’t forget.”
I’m pretty sure no one would, it’s kind of been one of those ‘days you’ll always remember’ kind of deals. Honest to Goodness Olympus. And Zeus. My Father. I really won’t forget. And I’d like to think I won’t let him down, but more importantly, I’m not going to let myself down.
“Goodbye, your…”
Holiness? Godliness? Cripes, what do I even call him. Zeusness? So I settle for what I guess, coming from me, is going to be more respectful than the others, and certainly not something I thought I’d ever say.
“…Father.”
Zeus: “Oh. I would certainly have answered, but I would have thought less of you for needing a man, even a man such as me, to tell you what to do.” When his hand lifts from her shoulder, there is just enough hesitation that for a brief moment he is squeezing her hand. “Ahh, so you truly are my daughter, aren’t you? I find it always better to ask forgiveness, than permission.”
Once the contact of hands is broken, there is a feeling left behind. Not unlike touching the lightning, Zeus’ touch leaves the skin tingling. “While it is not the case for all manner of transport to Olympus, the door you used this day? Will never open again. You road a conduit of my power here. It was that conduit that Black Adam sought when he damaged your Metropolis. At the time he was searching for a means to bring back his deceased wife. Though he failed to garner one of my Bolts at the time, the residual energy left was able to interact with our mutual bloodline. Your divinity springs from my own. It brought you to me. Now that it is used, it is gone.”
“Or rather. As your scientists would say. Not necessarily gone, but it shall become something else.”
“Cassandra, there is one last thing you should know before you are on your way. You didn’t ask, but you are entitled to know that I do know you. I have always been there. Look back upon your life. Think about your own trials, though not as formal Freddy Freeman’s, each time you have faced a point of change in your life. How often has the inexplicable happened? Think it through. Your rational mind will tell you that there is a logical explanation. One perhaps. Twice even is luck. How many times have the inexplicable happened, just at the right time. If you look closely, you will see it.”
“Of course, your logical mind is also going to tell you the same as it did about what I told you about my gifts always having been there too. You can never really know if it’s true. If I was always there or if I am telling you something so ambiguous as to be unbelievable. The question you should ask yourself, is which would you rather believe.”
One fingertip lightly touches upon the tip of his own nose. Then with a simple snap of the fingers, Cassie is gone. Back to the Alcove beneath the City of Metropolis. In the same place she was before. Her hand still within the crater caused by the lightning. Only now there is a real bit of lightning in her hand. A single bolt. Was she ever really -in- Mount Olympus? Was that bolt really the Trident or was it the electricity that she felt when she put her hand in to the hole in the wall? The answer is not so difficult to come by. As she will realize soon enough that she is still draped in adornments of the Gods. Still clothed in silks, dripping in gold and decidedly lacking in concealing hoodie.
Cassie: I can’t really say this went incredibly better than expected. It’s hard to measure something you were trying to expect nothing from. Something you haven’t spent any amount of time building up thoughts of, because at first you weren’t interested, and then you weren’t sure if it would even be hostile. It could have gone one of a few ways, I suppose. Cool, distant, and GTFO. A warm welcome, worthy of some long lost Disney Princess. Or something in between. I’d say this actually ended up closer to option two, and that’s…pleasing. I wasn’t looking for justification. Or praise.
I feel like I’m coming away with it regardless. And a feeling that he did actually care. Eyeblink or not. He’s just Zeus. And a mind reader.
“I’m more of a bright side kind of girl, generally speaking.”
And that means benefit of the doubt for my ‘long lost’ Father figure. Which is actually the opposite of how I would probably have guessed I came out of meeting him feeling. A literal snap of the fingers and…I’m in what might be the most depressing place I’ve ever seen. It was empty and gloomy before. Coming out of Olympus to a world of concrete just makes it feel like color’s been sucked out of my life. True to his word the conduit is gone, instead I’m left holding the bolt, the feel of the hand on my shoulder still there. Like the thrum in my hands. it takes a minute before I look past the ‘souvenir,’ to realize what I’m still wearing. And not wearing.
“…that was my favorite sweatshirt…”
by Michele | Oct 25, 2017 | Chronicles
Dinah: Wayne Manor has a front door. Who knew, right? Me, if we’re being technical, but I can count on one hand the number of times I’ve entered the place through it, and still have some fingers left for a peace sign. Definitely for flipping someone off, or a thumbs up. When Tim and I had come to talk with Damian I’d feigned confusion about the road we were taking, to go along with the discomfort at the limousine transport. I knew Batman long before I knew Bruce Wayne in any shape or form. Didn’t exactly come from the same neighborhood, or walk in the same circles unless you looked only at our alter egos. I spent a lot of time in the caves below, and that’s an entirely different route. Years spent working with Bruce, training with him and simultaneously helping train his official proteges.
Different sets of lessons though. I needed help with direction and restraint. Sixteen year old me had already been training with Ted Grant for ten years, and I was hurting, angry, and had a nasty streak. Like turning Mean Girls into an R Rated action flick. I almost surely made for a brutal sparring partner or instructor because I didn’t think I had the time or patience for it. Price of admission, though. Stephanie and Roy don’t know how great they’ve got it. This place, and the souls that inhabit it, mean something to the city at large. No, people don’t know who’s under the masks, the cowls, or in my case the stage makeup, but they stand for something. For me? It’s family. Yeah, the other things too but I systematically lost everyone I cared about only to find a crew that could understand me better than anyone since my Grandmother.
So to say I get a little… touchy about things that effect them is an understatement. The Waynes are mine. Not in an official way, like the papers that tie them all together as a family but that doesn’t actually matter to me. I defend mine. Even from one another, if I feel the need. I don’t know if that’s why Helena called me in the first place, or if she just wanted backup of her own. Either way, I’m here. Both in Gotham, and flying up the drive on my bike.
One doesn’t just simply walk into Wayne Manor. You have to get past the gatekeeper. And if you think Alfred Pennyworth isn’t a very good barrier, especially with the kinds of enemies Waynes and Bats have, then you’re an idiot.
“Alfred! Looking handsome and suave as ever.”
He’s also not spared the way I talk to everyone. Outrageous wink, saucy grin and flirtatious tone as I lean in the door frame, propped up by an elbow.
“Dick in?”
I really want to ask after The Dick, but… it’s Alfred. Also if I’m too rude there’s a chance there might not be dessert for me to pilfer and we don’t want that.
Dick: Let’s take a moment to just acknowledge who and what Alfred Pennyworth is. He isn’t merely a man servant. Nor is just the patriarchal Grandfather-Figure. In fact the latter might well be something of an insult, given that Alfred is barely old enough to be Bruce’s Father. That does not mean he did not accept the role when Bruce’s Parents died. Bruce became the man’s Ward. Angry, Embattled, Bitter and Drive. Yet, a ward of Pennyworth in every since of the word. People look, rather looked, at Batman all of those years and wondered how the hell Bruce Wayne created such a figure when the steward of the Cave was such a kindly, if handsome man like Alfred Pennyworth. Always o prim and proper in his dapper suit and tie. Ready to arm the world with one pastry at a time, along with a cup of tea.
The answer is rather simplistic: Alfred Pennyworth once put a man in intensive car with a sugar spoon. All it took was threatening the suggestion of mugging the rich kid, while Bruce was in finishing school. People who under-estimate Alfred Pennyworthy’s humble, yet refined, pinache are soon to regret it. A simple background search wouldn’t even tell you half of the man’s story, but British Special Services and nearly a decade at MI5, would leave most people asking where he found the time to know how to get those creme puffs so proper.
I do my best with the tools the creator gave me, madame.
He also manages not to rise to the bait of Dinah’s behavior.
Isn’t he always of late, Mum? Right this way. I have some apple tart waiting for you in the social. Be careful, the tea is hot, but I added a touch of spiced rum to take the edge off. Of it and you, I should say.
Never one to miss an opportunity. For the dig over Barbara and I not being out in the City like some of our other family members or the opportunity to display his near-omniscient ability to predict visitor’s arrivals and anticipate their whims. Jack-of-all-Trades. Purveyor of comfort. Alfred Pennyworth is also quick to lead Dinah to the larger of the Manor’s offices. Where he’s equally expedient in abandoning his current charge, to the cutting figure of Dinah Lance. Leaving the two of us alone, without apologies for interrupting me.
Not that I seem to be doing much. There’s a stack of books far older than the Manor itself, in multiple stacks all across the desk. Some of which have found a spot on the floor or the couch. There are obvious signs of Alfred making an effort to tidy, only for a new mess to have been recreated or in the process of such all around. Despite the mess, it’s clear that something is going on here. Though a glance at various titles seem more to suggest History lessons than detective work.
“Hey, Dinah. You should have called ahead, I would have sent the car for you. I’m told you loved the limo.” Peeking out from behind the overly large desk, with a chipper wave of the hand and quick smile. “I’m sorry I wasn’t here last time. I was meeting with Helena.”
Dinah: “I’m not entirely sure that’s true.”
Because I’m pretty sure he could do a lot more with them, but that’s part of the charm. And the ruse. In a way, Alfred Pennyworth is my exact opposite. He’s the unassuming, humble one that could rip you apart with said teaspoon. I’m the freaking Black Canary and a lot more comfortable in that role, but even outside of it will unabashedly let someone know I could and will beat them to an inch of their life. And let them know that they’ll probably enjoy it while it’s happening.
“Ah, see, you always know just what to say to a girl. Thanks, Alfred.”
Isn’t he always? Hah. Well. Thanks for the tip off and confirmation, which get a quirked eyebrow and a hint of a smirk. He’s ready with sweets and booze. There’s a dig for Dick. And a dig for me, because clearly my cheery, flirty tone hasn’t completely hidden the look in my eyes that is purposeful and indignant. Then again, maybe I laid it on a little thick with my choice of wardrobe for the day. The Black Canary, and even just ‘plain Dinah lance,’ is provocative and in your face. She knows what she’s got and she flaunts it if it suits her. I’m as comfortable in faded, if tight, jeans and a loose teeshirt though. Motorcyle boots and jacket, that I’ve unzipped to display in happy, curly font the slogan of ‘What doesn’t kill me better run.’
It’s laundry day. It was laundry day three days ago. I don’t like doing it and so I was left with this or the Canary suit. I let Alfred have my jacket, without any fuss or argument because I do have manors for the people that are worth of a display of them. Blue eyes rove the architecture that’s a lot less familiar to me than what is hidden underground, as I slink after the Wayne family Butler turned Patriarch and let him lead me to where, I’m assuming, Dick is or where he’ll summon him to.
“You aren’t using the proper tone for the level of sarcasm Tim probably used.”
We had perfectly good bikes to ride. Or a less flashy car. Mostly, it boils down to the fact that I don’t like anyone else but me behind the driver’s wheel, or handlebars. Control issues, maybe. Or paranoia. Instead of building features now I’m taking in books. Clearly he’s researching something, but the subject matter is iffy to guess from what I can see in front of me. Instead of a chair, I park my ass on the edge of the desk. Better to loom and snoop at what he’s looking over.
“And if I’d called, then you would have known I was coming.”
Maybe conveniently also not been here again. We hadn’t come to talk to him the last time, but it probably would have been a lot better to have all the boys in the room at the same time. Boys. Dick’s actually older than me, but that’s a point that doesn’t effect how I talk to him in the least.
“Oh? How did that go?”
Dick: If Alfred Pennyworth agrees with Dinah’s assessment? You’ll never know from the way he has this humble ability to blush upon command. It’s enough to leave you wondering if he was as good an actor as he was at, apparently, everything else. Normal people just aren’t as polite as he is. Nor at they as good at predicting the wants, needs or whims of everyone around them. Alfred is dialed in. Not just to the one he’s serving, but to the people in that circle. He is the man in the chair, the man at your bedside and the man who picks you up when you’ve fallen. That isn’t to say he always dusts you though. Sometimes when Alfred picks you up, it’s for the purpose of knocking you back down to insure you’ve learned from your mistakes.
His ‘retreat’ from the room is as tactical as anything I’ve ever seen. Even going as far as to pull the two double doors closed, to insure we’re not interrupted. Or at least, not until Alfred himself is ready to permit that to happen. True to his word, there are goodies awaiting for Dinah. Along with a tray of other assorted pastries and a cup of Earl Gray that is luke-warm by this point. Yet more indicators for the savy mind that would tell someone of my lack of appetite -or- the fact that these History books have been important enough to keep me from remembering -to- eat.
Dinah’s outfit is almost a stark opposite of my own. A sports jacket is over the back of the main desk’s chair. With the vest hanging open loose and the shirt sleeves rolled up? It gives me a look of being sophisticated enough to have been out at work at Wayne Industries. Yet, also shows all of the signs of my hunkering down here to ‘work’ on whatever it is I’m researching. Even a sharp detective like Dinah is going to have trouble seeing the pattern of book titles though. The only common thread here is History. All of it is physical books, that haven’t made their way in to an online format. Hands to pages. No search feature. All put together it’s easy to see why I’ve been off the radar, because there’s just no easy or fast way to get through this much material.
“It wasn’t really sarcasm, so much as a sinister mirth. Apparently Tim’s got a flare for seeing you squirm. Something tells me he’s far behind on points in that particular game though.”
Rising out of the chair I’ve been occupying, in an effort to square the two of us up. Call it an old habit. You don’t face this particular young woman in a sparring session, any other way than head on. I liken it to facing off with a Tiger. They size you up for weaknesses before they even know if you’d be good to eat. It’s second nature. Showing weakness determines a lot of things before you’ve even said a word. This is about giving Dinah a clear look. There’s no shaggy beard. I’m not an unwashed heathen. Despite the appearance of the books from a Library, the sheer amount of them and the type of it. I’m not wasting away. I’ve not been hold up in the Manor, depressed and distraught. Nor consumed by anger, guilt or fear. There are aspects of those things in my life, but I’ve not let them consume or control me.
Clearly though, I’m as driven as the next guy. Apparently I’ve just decided to brush up on the History of Gotham, by way of the entire world. Circa the Dark Ages. “Ah, but that’s a misnomer. I knew someone was coming, because Alfred started baking. The number of potential Visitors was reduced by virtue of what he was baking and what he was brewing. The hint of rum spice he added, lowered the possibilities down to you or Selina. Alfred doesn’t dress up for Selina. Plus, he isn’t walking about muttering about Trollops. So that left you, Dinah.”
“About as well as you might expect. Games. On top of Games. Answers wrapped in cryptic riddles. She said she needed to make contact with you, too.” A thin eyebrow lifts just the tiniest bit, almost perfectly timed with the marginal smirk that’s forming. “Wait. You didn’t really think I was going to start sharing now. When I know you’re here to lecture me? Gosh, Dinah. You’re out of practice. You get to lecture me -or- talk to me. Not both. I’m not Ollie.”
Dinah: “Evil mastermind, and he does try, bless his little heart.”
The shake of my head is almost mournful at the state of poor Tim Drake, who tries very hard to put me off my game sometimes, but that isn’t entirely new. Dick had moved out of Gotham City by the time that Bruce had brought me into the fold. Which meant that twelve year old Tim had sixteen year old Dinah to deal with. Yeah. The score’s not anywhere close to even. I’d have to give up and let him gain some ground and I’m just not willing to do that. If girls can be said to be cocky? That would probably have been a descriptor for me for almost all of my life. Confidence comes with superpowers, apparently. It did for me. And combat prowess. I’ve always been hard to rattle, or put off.
His rising, and taking away my height advantage is fine by me and I don’t shift to regain it. It wouldn’t work. He’s taller than me. But I’d forced him to move, dictating our posture and positioning. Running a conversation is about so much more than just the words. Or the big desk chairs. The books are strange, and definitely not an area of my forte. I know the streets, I know the turns and who’s got fingers in what pies but history and I weren’t always fast friends. It wasn’t immediately applicable to my actual hobbies. I didn’t know that it was for him either, so that means there’s a point. Ideally a point towards all of our mutual problem. I think I’d be more irate than I already am if it’s not.
“I don’t know if I should be insulted or gratified that I don’t get that particular label. Kudos for the process of elimination though, and your end, and correct, conclusion.”
I can’t lecture and talk to him? Hah. Well. He can certainly think that. The smirk, the look on his face, I don’t actually rise to the bait in it. Instead, there’s a pause and actual honest to God silence, as I pick up my tea cup for my drink, and the booze that it’s got inside of it. Mostly the booze, frankly. A slow, delicate sip thanks to the warning of the heat, followed by a gratified sigh at how good it is. Heat, and then the kick of an entirely different sort down your throat. I don’t know that it’ll be enough to take any edge off me, but it’s delicious anyway. Carefully setting the cup down, with much more care for Alfred’s china than I show for much else in my best imitation of a prim and proper lady. Hah. Right.
“Oh. I know you aren’t Oliver Queen.”
Oliver Queen wouldn’t be holed up reading books in the study while someone else was calling themselves Batman. But for all I know, Dick’s wrapped up in what he’s doing with Barbara, and neither Damian or Tim has seen fit to clue him in on that fact.
“But I did come to talk to you. Funny enough, about the process of elimination and the only option left standing. Would you care to explain to me why your brother is being forced to put on the cowl? You should probably use small words. Simple terms. I’m no Rhodes scholar, and I just don’t seem to be able to understand.”
Dick: “One of the things I learned in the first six months of knowing Tim, back before he was brought in to the family. I’m talking about when he was trying to convince Bruce to bring him in to the fold. It’s that if you play a game, any game really, with Tim for any length of time? He eventually wins. It isn’t a matter of whether he will or won’t, just when.”
There isn’t any sort of chastising there. That’s friendly advice and a gentle reminder. If asked I’d give a very similar reminder about Dinah Lance. The Black Canary doesn’t need to always out-think her opponents. More time than not, she’s just better than they are. Made worse by the simple act of under-estimating her. That well cultivated image she projects, the air about her attitude and antics lead you down a very natural path with her. Even after years of her besting people all across the world? People see those fishnets, the legs under them. The breasts that she flaunts or the blonde hair she doesn’t have to dye. It is all as well crafted as a technological monstricity like the Batmobile. Put together precisely to get the job done and it works.
It won’t work with Timothy Drake though. The kid doesn’t think like the rest of us. He makes us all look like we’re playing checkers, while he’s playing three dimensional chess. A roll of my shoulders will tell her that’s all I have to say about it though. Dinah would probably dispute it, but she’s like a little sister to me. I’m always going to think in terms of protecting her, even when she doesn’t need it. Especially when she doesn’t want it.
“If I was you, I’d take the compliment and run. Al has softened towards Selina of late, but he doesn’t make her special tea. Or steal glances when he thinks she isn’t looking.”
Different dynamic entirely. Selina is the girl who did Bruce wrong. Even if she didn’t. Doesn’t matter what anyone else thinks. Even Bruce. Selina didn’t get married. Have kids. Take herself and Bruce away from this life. Give Batman a reason to actually be Bruce Wayne. Even if he’s forgiven, he’ll never forget it. She’ll always be ‘What could have been,’ no matter what. Especially now that it’s off the table for ever.
That’s a cool remark about Oliver, but I let it pass without comment. The way I invoked his name was meant to push her to something. Either in to the lecture I was going to get or make her shut down so we didn’t have to have that part of the discussion. Some things are tactical, some are practical. She made me move, I made her choose. Now we’re past the opening dialogue and getting to why she’s here. Why she’s really here. The ‘trick’ is that there really wasn’t a choice to be made. Both topics tie together and leave us with the same discussion. I wanted to know her priorities. The investigation or…
“According to the security feed,” disseminating, but also informative, that neither of them spoke to me about it, I found out another way. “It was his idea. No one forced him. No one is forcing him.”
Dissemination is the wrong tactic, but the one that came immediately to mind. I have to stop that, because it is both unhealthy -and- leads toward an untruth. I’ve got both hands up, palms out and open, to beg off the salvo that would surely come as a result of how I’ve just answered. A soft puff of air that is a mixture of sighs. Resignation mostly.
“Look, I could spend the next hour. The next day. The rest of the week, probably. Out lining how I’ve spent the last ten years trying to get out from under the shadow of the Bat. How I’ve made a life out of trying to step out from under the weight of it. I could draw pictures. Make a flow chart. Somewhere around here I have a power point presentation all ready to go. I even paid Morgan Freeman to narrate it, for effect. But…
“Let’s just assume, that for a second. That none of that is applicable. Let’s just take a second, Dinah,” reaching out carefully, to just simply put a hand upon her shoulder. “To consider. Maybe. For a second. That I’m not shirking my ‘responsibility.’ That there’s a chance that Barbara and I found something. And then I saw Him on the News. In Coast City. On the News. With a marvel of a woman and a man that moved like greased lightning.
Lightly, but importantly squeezing her arm to impress upon her that what I’m saying next is actually the truth. Not just hypothetical. “Let’s consider that for the first time. In my life. I wasn’t afraid of that Cowl, because I was too busy being inspired to think maybe Bruce’s legacy can be about more than scaring the shit out of everyone.”
“You think I missed how he spoke to Damien? Have you ever seen those two talk like that? Have you ever seen Damien inspired?” My other hand gestures to the desk mounted land line Phone. “Pick it up. Call Tim. Tell him to meet me in the Cave. I’ll take the Cowl from him.”
“If you make the call.”
Dinah: Eh. I’m not going to debate whether that’s true or not about Timothy Drake-Wayne. Because trying to insist that he won’t win is putting the guy down more than I actually like to do. There’s ribbing your ‘family,’ and then there’s dragging them down. Despite what some of them may think on occasion, and maybe not without cause, I don’t like to do the latter. Tough love? Sure. The blunt, and abrupt way I like to bring a matter to the fore to get it over and settled? Absolutely. Not that I can’t be roundabout. I do that sometimes. Blunt hurts more at first, but is probably less ego damaging in the long run. If I’m making a point and not making it overtly? It’s because I’m going to try and humiliate you with self-realization as I go.
“She always assumes people are looking. And by she, I mean me.”
They usually are. It works for me. It’s part of the whole thing. Besides. You make me spiked cider like this? And you can look as much as you want. According to the feed… ugh. Dick corrects the route he’s chosen to take, which is intelligent of him because I was getting ready to rear back and express exactly how wrong he is. I deal in facts, you have to to be any degree of detective, but more than that I’ve always favored motivations and drive. It tells you a whole lot more than facts ever can. Because people aren’t machines. No one forced him it technically, factually true. No one came up to Tim, held a gun to his head and said he had to do it or die. There’s no lingering blackmail that says if he takes the cowl off, someone he cares about is going to get that same treatment.
Gotham needs a Batman. That’s how they were raised, and what we were all taught. And if Dick wasn’t doing it. If Damien couldn’t do it, who did that leave? Tim. The one who was never supposed to be the Bat. Put in a position where the ‘actual heirs’ (not my words), weren’t doing what they were supposed to and he had to step up. Was morally obligated to, despite how much he didn’t want to do it. It’s noble. It’s not healthy though. I’m doing my best to help him, but… honestly I don’t think it’s me that’s helping him the best with it. See? It’s not all about me and how great I am. But I do actually let Dick ward off my verbal assault with just those hands. Him seeing the error there is enough for me. For now.
“If you actually think that scaring the bejeezus out of people is all that the Bat was about, then you missed the boat Grayson.”
My tone is more than a little tart, but I don’t dig in on that note any further because of what he’s actually said. About being inspired. Because in the cave, even as mentally I was going ‘wtf are you doing, Tim?’ I saw the way the two younger brothers were interacting. It wasn’t normal, but it was good.
“No. I’m not going to make that call. It isn’t my place.”
Funny enough, I think Helena called me in to try and keep them from erupting into civil war over who would be Batman. So color me shocked when the squabbling was a lot more in the lines of who had to draw the short straw and put on the cowl. They’re their own people. With their own formed identities. I’m not sure that Bruce Wayne knew how to be anything else except Batman, so I don’t know if he’d be disappointed or relieved for his children that this is the state of things.
“He needs help. Both of them do. Everyone feels like they’ve been chasing their own tails, instead of doing anything for Gotham or themselves. So I’m glad that some good came out of his putting on the cowl. Because he needed some kind of victory. We all did.”
And I’m holed up in the mini-cave, back to teaching the younger generation, but even I haven’t been able to chase anything down. It’s possible I needed them to have that victory more than I need one for myself. Maybe I don’t have a horse in the race, but I still adore the animals. I’m still tense under Dick’s hand on my shoulder, and the booze hasn’t been in enough quantity to lose the edge, but I’ve clearly changed tacks. There’s no ‘you’re right’ or ‘okay I see your point’ but I guess it might be assumed. Since I’m not yelling at him.
Dick: “You couldn’t bully me in to anything, even if you tried,” someone else might say that brashly or with an air of arrogance to it, but I’m putting it out there as surely as I stated the ‘facts’ about Dinah. “You could, however, convince me.”
As to whether she would have kicked my ass for being a pussy? That is less up for debate. In all likelihood she could accomplish that exact thing. On paper it might look like she and I would be a good match. Anyone’s game. Life isn’t determined by a score card. Dinah is committed to her craft. She bought in to the aspect of our lives that is violence. It doesn’t even bruise my ego to accept that she would very likely win in a fair fight. But the only one that would help, would be Dinah Lance. Even then, probably not so much. She knows, even as she’s said it, that she wouldn’t change my mind with fists.
She could, however, change my mind. I’ve provided her with one avenue, I’m sure there’s at least a couple more. “I’m proud of him too, but not just for what he’s done outside of Gotham. I really did see the way he spoke to Damien, but far more importantly? I saw how Damien responded. That was the first time I’ve ever seen those two communicate like Men. The stuff on the News only added to that pride.”
“Look, this isn’t some pity party here at the Manor. I’m not shirking my responsibility either. Hell, just to cover my bases with you? I’m not just being a pussy, Dinah.” Letting out a breathe that is far more about releasing some sort of pent up worry, than it is a sigh. All the tension releases with that breath and I drop my hands from her to the books on the desk. “The truth is? When Bruce died, I wasn’t ready to step in to his boots. I don’t think any of us were. We all needed answers, but there weren’t any to find. It left us all. You included. With this gaping hole, that none of us could fill. Barb and I worked the case on the ground. Damien took his own approach. I wasn’t even aware of the Joker connection until I saw the footage. Helena brought you back. Tim took to the air as the Red Robin.”
“We both know what Batman means. Or rather what it was meant to mean. We don’t agree on what it became, maybe. But we both know that this Country we live in? Batman lived long enough to become the villain. Luthor made sure of that. He did the same with Superman. I’m positive he did the same with the Lantern too. Tim stepped in. He took on something he was never meant to have to shoulder. He found something in Damien, to inspire. He found something in you too.”
“Then he went out there. On television. He put the Batman out there. In front of the world. With other Heroes.” Very very gently, I take one of Dinah’s hands and put it down upon the picture frame that lays on Bruce’s desk. It’s an old one. Of Thomas, Martha and Bruce the night of their trip to the Movies. “He’s pulling them together. He’s finishing what Bruce started. The weight of the world wasn’t meant to be on his shoulders, but he picked it up anyway. What right do I have to step in now, if I’m not absolutely positive the weight of it is going to crush him?”
“The thing I do know for absolute sure, Dinah? Everything happens for a reason. We’ve finally got a lead. We got a lead the same day Tim took the cowl. The same day Damien decided to be better. The same week Batman went on national news. The same time those kidsgave Lex Luthor the finger.”
“Dinah. Stop saying it’s not your place. It was your place the moment Helena asked you back. The second you let Tim bunk at your place. The very instance you started teaching new heroes. When you went to Metropolis and stood in Superman’s face. Or when you started trailing Joker. Keeping tabs on Damien. I’m not too much of a pussy to point out that you ran out on Ollie. Ran back to Gotham. You’re standing here, telling me that the one place you ran away to? Isn’t your place at all.”
“It’s your place. It’s always been your place. If you don’t know that, then you’re the one who missed the boat, Detective. Maybe it’s both of us sitting there on the pier, watching the boat sail away. How about you make me understand, now? Why do you keep running away… Pussy?”
Dinah: The hand that’s not holding my cup comes out, palm down and rocking slightly back and forth. The body language equivalent of an ‘eeeeehhhhhhhh..’ and declaring that hisdeclaration was perhaps a little bit iffy. But I’m not going to quibble with him over it. It’s mostly the same thing, in my line of thinking. Bullying, or convincing. The words and motivation are the same. The tone and approach are just different. I’m definitely not above switching tacks to get what I want in the end, though.
“It was pretty Twilight Zone-esque. I wasn’t sure what was going on. And I definitely didn’t expect the end result. Not any of it.”
It’s easy to say I wouldn’t’ have gone with Tim, or rather wouldn’t have taken him with me to have the discussion if I’d known what would happen ahead of time. But my means of communicating wasn’t going to do anything except for make Damien more defensive about what he was doing. At that point anyway. I was him, once. Too angry to see any better way of doing what I thought I needed to do with my life, what my purpose had become. I wasn’t really in the mood to listen to anyone back then, either. I hadn’t needed someone to order me around though. I’d needed something to belong to.
He keeps saying I could have convinced him, but I don’t want to. It’s not the goal. I wanted to understand, and I do. You don’t talk someone into doing what we do, let alone into being Batman. They’ve got to be in it 100%. My initial outrage was that I didn’t think Timothy was. And that it was going to get him killed. A fear he’s already actually expressed to me. I’m not about to lose anyone else, right now. When Dick speaks of this lead they’ve apparently finally gotten, I’m obviously interested. Eyes go over the books once again, because if they’ve got something, then this isn’t just random history essay information gathering going on. It’s towards something. I’ll be damned if I can guess what. But that interest keeps me from rising to the bait he’s throwing for me.
That and I don’t actually have a thing to be defensive about. Nor do I think I owe Dick Grayson any sort of explanation on the matter. Because I don’t even owe Oliver Queen one. The waggling hand moves to a singular uplifted finger. No. It’s not the middle one. Pointer.
“Not Gotham. Not what I meant. Gotham’s my home, and I was as much a liability to it as I was an asset. If we hit that point again? Then I’m going to leave again. I didn’t need Bruce to make that clear but…don’t get me wrong. He made it very clear. And Oliver Queen can handle his own shit.”
….eeeehhhhh…. he can handle it well enough. I hope. Star City wasn’t mine though, end of the day. It was his. No matter what drive I had to help them, and him, it’s not home. Gotham was. And that was always, and forever, going to trump the other.
Dick : Oliver Queen can barely tie his own shoes without tying them together, tripping on them and then telling the sneakers that they are the ones who failed his city. But. I’m not going to have that discussion with Dinah. Because even if she came here to lecture me, I wasn’t exactly looking to turn this in to a -fight-. Not the verbal sort. Nor the physical sort that is likely to result from constant Queen commentary. I’m going to let her have the final word on that much at least.
“No. Not Gotham. That isn’t what I meant either. Here.” Once again my hands open wide, encompassing far more than just books this time. “I’m not Damien or Tim. Not some kid off the street you’re training in the basement.”
“My parents died. Right in front of me. Tony Zucco took them from. Bruce went through the same thing. He brought me here. Took me in. He adopted me. Guess what? He did the same thing to you. Okay. I needed a way to keep the darkness that consumed Bruce at bay. You needed a focus for the anger that already took root. We may have come here for different reasons, but we left here with the same result. We’re family, Laurel. You’ve got the same rights, privileges… and obligations as the rest of us.”
The encompassing expression ends with my arms folding across my chest. I’m not one for ultimatums, so I’m not giving one. It’s implied though, isn’t it? The Lead is about Bruce. And that’s a Family matter. So what is it then? Am I wrong, about her being part of the family? I sure don’t think so. I’m pretty sure Tim and Damien would agree with me. Barbara, Alfred. I don’t know a single member of the ‘Family’ that would disagree. Except maybe, Dinah.
“It is your place. Own it. Don’t own it. It changes nothing, other than you came here to understand why I’m shirking a responsibility. Twinsie.”
Dinah: “You’re right, Dick. You’re not one of my kids.”
Stephanie may never, ever shut up and Roy may be not even close to a child anymore physically, but there’s an edge in my voice of ownership of those words. I may not have known one of them as long as the other, but I’ve been made responsible for them. As responsible as Tim felt for Spoiler if he let her keep doing what she was doing without help and training. They’ve been Mama Bird-ed just the same. Continuing on, my voice maintains an even tone. Not rising. Not getting louder. Which may actually make it all the more clear how impassioned I actually am on the matter that I’m going to the effort to modulate myself.
“You actually know what you’re doing. You’re a grown ass man, not a barely legal boy that’s only been in this game for a half-dozen years. Tim is a lot of things. He’s brilliant, a mastermind that’s very, very good at arranging things to go his way in the long term. Maneuvering people into the right positions, for the right results. Sees the connections in the world that he needs to find. And he is going to get himself killed. Worse, he knows it.”
I don’t want to say it out loud, honestly. Even voicing it makes me feel that raw anger again in my throat, or maybe that’s emotion. How terrible would that be? So I take a moment to refresh my tongue for more, with a sip of my boozy cider that I wish was just the straight stuff right now. Setting it down again, I carry on calmly.
“And if he does? I’m never going to forgive you. I’m never going to forgive myself. I’m never going to forgive Damien. He. Needs. Help. All three of us have been training as long, hell maybe even longer than, Tim’s been alive. Right now? He’s a guy in a suit that knows he’s doing the right thing, and hopes he can pull it off. He’s going out without his staves because Batman doesn’t use a staff, for Christ’s sake Dick.”
I even let the ‘Laurel’ go, even though he damn well knows that I hate being called that. Banter, for once, is more or less out the window in favor of that ‘real talk’ he seems to have wanted.
“We need to have his back out there. And that means no more of this left hand, right hand bullshit. I can’t keep him alive, and keep the other two from getting in over their heads by myself. How’s that for owning it?”
Dick: Well. I’m glad that we’re at least agreeing on that part. Because it sure seemed like she was trying to play the ‘Big Tough Guy’ role with me. When I know there’s more to this. I also happen to know that ‘It’s not my place,’ is a cop-out on Dinah’s part. That is her way of trying to not let the emotions out. I think she doesn’t want to admit that there is actually emotions involved here. Being worried about Tim, Damien or any of the other kids is one thing. She came here to understand why I didn’t take up the Mantle of the Batman. But. I’m pretty sure she also came here, because she wanted me to take it away from Tim.
“You should have lead with that,” comes the sober response, after a very pregnant pause.
This is the basic, core, difference between Dinah Lance and I. I tend to lead with my heart, she seems to think that she needs to disconnect from it. Taking the Cape and Cowl away from Tim, when all I’ve seen is how good he’s done? Seemed very much like the wrong move. No matter how much I know my ‘Little Brother’ is hating it. Sometimes the best people to entrust with power are the ones who don’t want it most. They’re the ones who handle it the best. Treat it with the most respect.
Dinah has finally given voice to the concern. To the genuine. Well thought out. Observed in practice. Concern. Genuine, because it’s actually the first thing I’ve believed Canary cares about saying since she walked in here. “He’s not alone. I believe he knows that, but I’ll make sure he knows. Today. I won’t take it away from him, I’m not sure it’s mine to take away at this point, but I’ll make sure he knows that I’m here. I’ll make sure he knows Barbara is here. We’ll talk. Today.”
Taking another breathe, I recognize that I’m steadying myself no differently than she did with her drink. Same objective, different methods. It’s enough to make me smile once more. “What do you know about the History of Gotham? The real History of Gotham, I mean. Not the stuff from the text books.”
“The answer is in the History, Dinah. I’m not crazy, I’m serious. Bruce wasn’t killed just because he is Batman. It’s the exact opposite of what we’ve all been looking for. Batman was killed because he’s Bruce Wayne. Bruce was the target. You’ve got to talk to Helena. I don’t know enough yet to actually give you an educated explanation. I’m still learning, but I can tell you this is deep. We’re not dealing with the Flavor of the Month. This is big and old. I think this goes back to founding of the City. To the original families.”
“The reason we’re struggling, is that this isn’t someone we’ve faced before. It isn’t something we’ve dealt with before. I can’t help but think it’s got roots that are deeper than the people Tim’s working against. Maybe that’s even tied to it. We’re researching, but this isn’t something Barb could just oracle up on a computer. That’s the only reason we haven’t called in Tim and Damien already. We don’t even know what we’ve got here. Not entirely.”
Dinah: “I shouldn’t have had to lead with that.”
Last week I wanted him to take it away from Tim. Part of me still does. Part of me also wants to punch him right in the face right now, but then I’d probably break something important. Like my cider cup, or Dick’s untouched teacup over there. Might send perfectly good apple tart tumbling onto the floor and cause a mess. But if Dick has been watching the surveillance, and is aware enough of what Tim’s doing to know about the kids in the basement, about his freelance work with heroes from outside Gotham’s borders? He should damn well have been aware of everything I just said. So my tone is suitable dry in response.
“Taking the suit away from someone who’s doing the right thing, and doesn’t want to do it and slapping it on someone that doesn’t want it and is only wearing it to keep someone else from wearing it isn’t really any better of a solution. Which is why I won’t tell you I think you should put it on. Not after what you’ve just said.”
It has to be someone who’s in 110%, or maybe we’re just going to have to figure out what Gotham is going to look like without a Batman, and explore how bad it actually needsone. Or if a smattering of other people acting in his name are just going to have to be enough. Divide. Conquer. Lean on one another. I’m going to take Dick at his word though, that they’re going to speak to his brother today. That this isn’t going to be put off any longer. Maybe it sounds callous but… Bruce is dead. Losing anyone else because we’re absorbed in who’s to blame is unthinkable. The firm nod of my head, and the pursed line of my mouth, say that’s good enough. That I’m satisfied for now. God help us all if I have to revisit this topic again later.
The smile on his face makes me cock my head, expression shifting to confusion. What the hell is he smiling about?
“The History? Not a lot. If it didn’t involve gyms, dojos, or the police precinct I probably just didn’t care. I know tunnels, and hidden buildings and old speakeasies from my Grandfather and Great-Grandfather’s days on the force. Little nooks and crannies and stories but… not anything I’d imagine would be useful to us.”
That heavy pause of Dick’s earlier had been one thing. My silence borders on stunned, and silence from me is a pretty damn rare thing no matter the reasoning. They weren’t killing Batman, they were killing Bruce? That might sound like an idiotic distinction to make…unless you knew the man. He probably stopped being Bruce Wayne when he was a child. Bruce was the alter ego, not the other way around. But the look in my eyes is like a light bulb clicking on. Of course. None of us would have ever thought that. With everything to be faced in Gotham, as Batman, why on earth would it have been anything but the Rogue’s gallery. How could something possibly have been in place and at least one of them not known about it before now?
“…I’ll go hunt her down right now.”
And maybe light a fire under Stephanie’s ass to get her going on her own case. No. That’s a poor idea. She’s raring to go, she’s just not ready. Tim said that she’d been trying to tell us something was up. It’s not that we didn’t believe her it’s just… well. Cluemaster. When he said it was something bigger than he’d imagined the man might have come up with? Tim’s got a pretty good imagination. That makes me worry.
“That explains the lull in the crime families. All of them. If anyone knew anything, I can’t believe they wouldn’t have squealed by now. To Joker. To Damien. To someone.”
Dick: “Dinah. You damn well should have lead with that. I’m willing to let you come in here and lecture me, but I’m not willing to take responsibility while you shirk it. Every single one of us puts our life on the line when we go out there like we do. If you thought Tim couldn’t do it, then you’re not just responsible for telling me. You’re damned well responsible for telling him.”
There is just a little bit of heat to my voice, but it isn’t truly anger. Not at all, actually. Which is why I’ve got to check myself. This is something else. Agitation. Irritation. Frustration. No, I know what it is… “You came here to blame me. To make sure I knew what he was doing. How he was doing it. You wanted me to ‘Help?’ Not only am I willing, able, and ready, I want to help. But you want me to make the decision. You want to skirt it off as not your place. Let me tell you something, Sister. Tim doesn’t talk to me about his decisions. He didn’t consult me. All I’ve known is what Alfred Pennyworth has told me.”
“Because he sees everything. Bruce didn’t even set up access to Tim’s base. The whole point of it was to be ‘off the grid,’ an emergency fall out shelter in case things went bad. I was asking you to talk to me. To give me your input, tell me as the one on the ground level what you think. I’m sorry if you think it’s wrong to want the input of a seasoned veteran, who’s got more information than I do. You don’t think it’s your place, but I’m pretty damned sure in this case? It wasn’t just your place, it was your responsibility.”
“Which… you’ve done. In like the most aggressive way possible. Outside of throwing punches. I suppose I should thank you for at least that much?” There’s a cross between a scowl and that smile from before, but I’m actually just glad she told me what she thinks finally. It’s important. “You know I’ll keep my word. We’ll talk.”
“Now. About this,” once more tapping on the books, before looking back at Dinah. “They don’t know. They really don’t know. At least. The actual Families. I think some of them suspect, but they’re all afraid. Because this is more myth, more superstition than fact. If even a tenth of what I’ve been reading is true? Then this is bigger than anything we ever faced and we had Batman.”
“Also. Ass. I think the person in the Batsuit might be the safest person in the City. Because I think what killed Bruce? Is after the City. And I think they’ll eliminate anyone who stands in their way. The Batman protects the people. Not the power. He’s not their enemy. But Tim might be. He inherited most of Wayne Industries. Damien might be, but he’s hard to find.”
“The Wayne Family might be a problem. So I thought. Maybe. The most helpful place I could be. Is right here. Where they can find me.” Clearing my throat pointedly at her. “While someone else kept the City safe for a bit.”
Dinah: “Dick. I didn’t have to tell him, he knows. And I didn’t actually know what you knew, or didn’t know, because we’ve had something of a communal communications breakdown. Which we’re all going to fix going forward.”
Something about being in Gotham City just brings out the inner noir protagonist in people, I guess. I don’t think it matters if he thought he was going to get himself killed, or didn’t think he was good enough to be up to par. The goal seemed to be making it work until someone else was ready, willing and able to take the cowl off of him. Maybe it’s just the ‘flaw’ of a good person that wants to do right.
“Yup, sure did.”
That confession is more than a little too cheery, given what I’m saying.
“But I was open to accepting it’s not anyone’s fault if properly convinced. Well. Except Damien’s. It’s always Damien’s fault. I’m feeling a bit trapped in the position of not being able to be Tim’s cheerleader and partner and critic all at the same time. I’m not enough.”
Words that have never come out of my mouth before, and likely never, ever will again.
“And it doesn’t mesh to tell him to his face, and confirm, the doubts about what he’s doing while also being the one who’s trying to get his head fully in the game so that he canmake it work.”
Spreading my hands with a helpless shrug, it’s my turn to return the wry smile.
“You’re welcome. I’d apologize, but we both know I’m not the least bit sorry. I can’t grab Tim by his little Batears and shake him, so I’ve got to channel the aggression somewhere. And apparently I’m already borderline too rough on the noobs in class, so I probably shouldn’t take it out on them. Congratulations, slugger. Designated most able to take the punches. Verbal and otherwise.”
Wrinkling my nose slightly because this isn’t my forte, the books that is, I reach over and turn one slightly on its cover. Not disturbing the pages, just getting a better look at what’s actually there. I can’t even refute people having a fear of superstition. Myths. His brother’s got a torch that he’s trying to put out for an honest to goodness goddess, and who knows what other things that we didn’t think were real actually were. Hiding in mystery, and the fear of the strange and unknown. If Dick’s right, then maybe Tim will be safe from this group, whomever they are, so long as they think Batman’s doing his job. And if they don’t… The look that I shoot Dick now is contemplative, both of what he is telling me, and what I’m understanding out of all of this. What he gets is me raising an eyebrow and smirking, like he had at me earlier.
“Should have lead with that.”
So maybe that sounded a little mocking. Only a little bit though. In good humor and friendship. Ish. Rising from the edge of the desk, the pointed finger gun turns into me cracking my knuckles like I’ve got some hard work I need to get to.
“We’re getting shirts. It’s official. You can get back to your research. I’m going to take my pie, get out of your hair, and pilfer a few more on my way out. I think I’m going to probably need my energy to work brow beating Helena into the rest of my lineup for the night.”
Dick: “Sorry. Couldn’t be helped. I needed to know something. About you. That you wouldn’t answer directly. Needed to provoke you.”
The way I shrug could literally be a pantomime of the way she did to me only a second ago. Except that it looks just as natural, because I do this all the time. The shrugging. Not the provoking. Or at least, I don’t do the provoking the way I did it with Dinah. I’m hoping she doesn’t approach everyone like she approached me either. Because if so? I might need to check on the health of those trainees. God lord.
Matching wry smiles may just break the entire world, but we’re managing it for the moment. I’m growing more and more confident by the moment though that beneath her’s is someone people actually should fear. There’s a darkness to her, a willingness to defend her family that I haven’t seen since she first got here. For the second time tonight, I do something that isn’t natural for people around Dinah. We’re alone here. It’s worth the risk of catching her once more by shoulder to give the woman a hug. Not your average sort of hug either. This is just about as manly as it’s even possible. Complete with patting of the shoulder.
“I miss him too,” comes out the solemn whisper for her and her alone.
When I step back, it’s with a very simple gesture to the tray of snacks that Alfred brought in for us. If it wasn’t already clear, they weren’t for me. Alfred was just being equal parts polite and hopeful. He doesn’t like that I’ve been holed up in here researching. Likes it even less than I’m trying, openly, to be the most publicly visible Wayne-son in the City. Alfred knows what I’m up to, even if I haven’t discussed it with him. I’m not even sure how, he just does.
The worst part of everything that Dinah has said to me tonight? Is that I actually agree with her. I even empathize. “Alfred once told me that he never feared Bruce and I going out in to the night like we did, because he Dynamic Duo could survive anything. Except each other. Because he knew it didn’t work if I was the only one in Bruce’s Circle of Trust. I couldn’t be Cheerleader, Partner and Critic. Not if I wanted Bruce to trust me as any one of those things.”
“Just remember one very important thing, Dinah,” the last thing I have to impart to her as I walk her to the door, where no doubt Alfred is waiting for her already, with a glass to the door in an effort to hear every word we’ve said. “You said you’re Tim’s partner. I hate to be the one that points this out, but… that makes you Robin. I’ll have Alfie deliver one of the suits to your Bar. You should wear it to your meeting with Helena.”
With that? I push the door shut, so that she is left with Mr. Pennyworth, his glass. A tray of goodies and the sound of my snickering from the other side of the door.
