#dick: FUCK you i am going to do the opposite of that actually bludhaven is MY city and if it blows up in my face (😳🥶) that’s
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one thing i absolutely admire about dick grayson as a character is the battle between his perfectionism/need-to-please and intense independence because it yields the willingness to make mistakes ONLY if someone else is trying to protect him from making them
#*makes mistakes spitefully*#bruce: withholding information from dick and using underhanded means to promote what he deems is Best for dick#dick: FUCK you i am going to do the opposite of that actually bludhaven is MY city and if it blows up in my face (😳🥶) that’s#MY decision to make!!!!!#dick grayson#dc#elle text
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hae interrogationes multae respondeant quia demens .
if you read this entire ask post you deserve a gold star and financial recompensation
Um, Obviously because when you’re adopted by a white guy you automatically become white duhhh
this is about this post lmao and yeah youre absolutely right, you have to hand your poc card in when you get adopted by a white guy.
Do you think Cass would listen to Yanni, the YouTube channel epic symphonic rock, or some other stuff? There's some cool mashups but idk if that's up your alley, I kinda feel like I'm pushing it with my weird taste of music by recommending an orchestra cover of metal, but i just love that sort of thing and mashups :P @harvestyourcherries
i haven’t heard of that? but in my personal (correct) opinion steph listens to classical music, and then both modern and older, and then also stuff like black sabbath, iron maiden, but also hardrock and hardcore. i like the idea of cass just liking the most extreme screaming songs full of noise and then also listen to pachelbel’s 370th sonata yanno? THANK YOU for the rec tho
speaking of ur cass playlist hc...reminds of the time (yesterday) i found 2 playlists randomly on spotify from the same user. one was abt 3 hours of instrumental/classical "dark" & "nostalgic" music. the other almost 11 hours of nothing but hardcore bass/synth/electronic music. just an incredible tightrope act to put on in public. the synth one was also called like "psalms for synth sluts" which is Also incredible
tbh i LOVE synth SO MUCH like for no reason at all but then also cannot handle a poppy electronic beat lmao. but this seems like the kinda thing i’d do but just in one (1) playlist bc i just sort songs by vibe instead of genre? that’s how i end up with britney spears and billy ray cyrus in the same playlist.
Oh, I want Kate Kane playlist next! It would be amazing if you could do one when you have time and will 🙏
how rude would it be of me to just say no? like sorry kate but idk you and also you seem way too keen on the us military for an institution that homophobically targeted you? (and also commits war crimes) but let’s unpack the fact that the institution that caused the death of your mom and sister and also got you blacklisted for being gay is still one you align with???
'yes i am' 'no you're not' 'yes i am' 'no you're not' 'yes i am' 'no you're not' 'yes i am' 'no you're not' 'yes i am' 'no you're not' 'yes i am' 'no you're not' --- when i tell you i fucking screamed LOL!!!!!!! i can imagine the cameraman not knowing if he should cut to commercial or keep it on these two weirdos fighting on stage (bruce definitely ruffled dick's hair/noogied him right??
about this post but yeah lmao. this cameraman just turns to like the audience to get a reaction and it’s just multiple moments of CLEAR shock.
you are the only funny person on this hellsite
how egotistical is it for me to say that i get this ask multiple times a month? bc it literally happens so often it’s hilarious to me.
Wish there was more john/Bruce content 😔😔😔 was so hungry I actually looked at canon media 😔😔😔 (Justice League Dark babeeeyyyyyy)
check out batman: damned for some mediocre content but at least it’s john/bruce (also very interesting story and stuff, just got very >:( over this weird part where harley quinn tried to r*pe bruce or something? it’s not for everyone)
dick grayson but he's nicki minaj
his anaconda don’t want none,,, unless......
Dick Grayson was never a cop, he played Marshall on Paw Patrol
you are SO right. also paw patrol is a fucking good show idc. that shit could’ve been the new steven universe on this hellsite.
https://www.instagram.com/p/CS1lI0bLI7-/?utm_medium=copy_link
...
why do people keep reposting my CONTENT. if you are not funny yourself don’t just grab shit off of tumblr and post it on insta,,, get a life. sidenote: should i start an insta and get all these ppl to take my content down that would be funny as hell.
Might I suggest for a Gotham City Meme: something about the true crime fandom thirsting for the rogues gallery
ok can i just say something slightly controversial?? no? i don’t find true crime ppl who are into criminals funny, that shits disturbing irl im not gonna bring that into my very chill universe.
i may have never seen a 'jason cleaning guns in sink' fic but i do know he WOULD
THANK YOU
bestie im sorry to say this to you but while you can, and people do wash their guns in the sink, that is a lot of lead in a very vital part of the kitchen.
people tend to do it in the bathtub.
WHY???? like damn why do you even have guns
i dont think i read many gun sink fics exactly but i have read lots of fics where jason cleanes his guns in the living room. usualy dissembles them and cleans them with a rag i think
lmao fair enough, like i think that’s a large part of what i remember as well.
if you say you've seen/read gun sink fics I believe you. I think those of us who didn't see them are lucky or maybe didn't search for fics by tags or something idk
i mean ive never sought them out but i HAVE seen them,, like definitely i know almost for certain.
saw your tags and I'm interested in Steph/Kara now. They would be the most chaotic couple <3
literally thoooo, i have a wip where they get together in a zombie apocalypse and like UGGGHhhh i am so in love with them.
I am the Breece anon. Thanks for the recommendation; am reading now. I’ve always been a hardcore Superman fan because I love my pure himbo farm boy. My logic is, if one Bruce is a Broose, then multiple Broose are a herd of Breece. And this is a hill upon which I will perish.
fair enough,,,, like moose, meese, goose, geese, bruce, breece. i get your logic and i stand by it as well. (glad you enjoyed the comic recs!!!!)
It's a beautiful day in Gotham, and you are a group of horrible Breece
OH my god dude lmao
there only being 42 fics on ao3 for tim and bernard is honestly so sad i need more
it’s like twice that now!!! we did it lads. (tho very sad that my fic isnt number one but like number 4 :(((( )
i'm too late you already did the poll lol but may i suggest bethy (bernard + timothy)
shit dude that wouldve been so fucking funnyyyyy. think ppl have just stuck to timber tho, tim/bernard kinda died down recently and i think it’s too bad, they’re a great couple and i love them.
Wait, hear me out
Bernothy @redlightofdawn
great recommendation (lmao this ask is from like a month ago) but very sorry to announce that NARDTH is the superior shipname
Wait, we know that bernard likes milfs (Tim's step-mom) but what about dilfs? gilfs?
Wait no, I regret sending that ask
these were two seperate asks and they’re HILARIOUS. in my personal opinion tho,,, milfs, gilfs, dilfs are just about vibes and bernard is just attracted to sexy ppl who may sometimes be milfs, dilfs, or EVEN gilfs.
crime in bludhaven would drop to half if nightwing had a boob window. in this essay i will-
WHERE’S THE ESSAY ANON, WHERE’S THE FUCKING ESSAY
Wait if Barbra and Tim r at opposite ends at all times what happened to Barbra once everyone’s Tim’s ever love before started dying lol
she won a lottery ticket and spent 2 weeks on a resort in the bahamas before returning home and finding out that the joker was arrested for tax evasion and then spent a month staying at her big tiddie goth girlfriend’s house before conner came back to life and she broke her pinkie playing table hockey.
Why is the opposite end thing so funny and compelling to me. Tim comes back from his depression quest for Bruce and Babs is now a literal god
lmao when tim loses his spleen barbara reaches nirvana.
Are you still taking music recs because I have three songs that remind me of Jason that I think you'd like
send to me or lose a toe
🌸 ⭐ put this star into the inbox of your favorite blogs. it’s time to spread positivity! ⭐🌸😋
thanks, i wont tho on account of i wont.
https://vm.tiktok.com/ZMduBy3Sr/
⬆️
This is the whole of Blüdhaven and everyone anywhere.
Nightwings ass alone saves more people in a calendar year and does more for so society than most heroes do their whole career.Also u are one of the funniest tumblr pages out there. The vibes are unmatched and the memes and tags ✨send me✨.Thank u and goodnight @julia-flow
fanksss also lmao.
That's going to be a little bit difficult to explain, but
There's some music that you listen to and you think, "oh my gosh, I can perfectly imagine Dick Grayson singing this song, with the same voice as the singer because that voice matches with Dick Grayson"?
oh yeah totally lmao. i have a lot of songs that i think are just entirely dick grayson yanno? kind of all of my playlists have that vibe, but i really find bleachers to fit with dick? idk.
"Lois lane/Superman" fics this, "Lois lane/Clark Kent" fics that, (/lh) let's get into the real good stuff. Some people ship Lois, Clark, and Superman as a throuple. Most popular fic tag for sure
yes totally, i think they’d be absolutely killer on ao3 and clark gets so fucking embarassed about it.
I miss your post, hope you’re doing okay!!
haha this was like 2 months ago, but i was doing fine then too! just didn’t have a lot of inspiration in terms of content.
Doot doot!
noot noot
I’m confused. What did DC do now? Like with nightwing? And another sibling? Please spoil everything for me
lmao they gave him a secret sister plotline where they had his dad cheat on his mom with tony zucco’s wife, bc dick’s life wasn’t traumatic enough yet.
sorry but it's so funny that batman is called "the dark knight" when the gotham city baseball team is called the gotham knights. it'd be like if a vigilante was running around new york called like "the scary yankee"
lmaooo no. but like yankee comes from dutch names or something so wouldnt it be HILARIOUS if gotham knights came from like german names and bruce would be running around called the dark KLAUS UND NIEK @graysonnightwing
(not a batcest shipper) it’s so funny to me that the responses are “i’m a batcest shipper because i can differentiate fiction from reality and and it doesn’t bother me personally, but i understand why you oils think it’s weird” to “i wish all batcest shippers a very fucking die”
yeah lmaoo. i personally basically flipped my entire stance around to ‘i dont care please leave me and everybody else alone’ bc i think there’s really no point in starting a moral dillema over some fucking fandom bullshit. Please just,,, go home,,, log off, find a nice forest to have a little walk in and remember that somewhere in history, somebody probably died in the place you’re standing. and you will also die someday, and somebody will have to look at your internet usage and see you fighting multiple people anonymously while being named ‘nightwingsbuttchin200186′ like... calm down, we’re all gonna die this is not the thing to worry about.
so since like "wards" don't really exist in modern society almost all the batkids are foster kids, right? i used to work in the system and imagine: monthly visits from social workers and guardian ad litems, bruce having to get permission to take the boys anywhere out of state, calling their social worker at like 8 a.m. like "yeah dick broke his arm again... a gymnastics accident this time...." their poor social worker. bruce send her a huge bouquet and box of chocolates every month to stay on her good side
i imagine the social worker just getting into the case like ‘yeah let’s get this kid a good guardian’ and then ending up having to work with 22 y/o bruce wayne and his 50 y/o dad. and so this social worker is like ‘okay we can work with this, this is the best home i can find’ and then like it ends up landing on its feet and then the kid gets adopted and then they get a call a year later like ‘uhm so hi, this kid tried to steal my tyres can i adopt him?’ and like 3 years later. ‘okay so basically, my neighbours’ kid imprinted on me and now they’re dead, can i keep him?’ two years later it’s like ‘okay so this assassin child-’
ever since I saw that one post of yours, the meme that's something like "I know that abba's backup dancer got me" with a picture of discowing, I've been haunted. Every once in a while I'll be minding my own business then the image of abba's backup dancer dick grayson aka nightwing aka discowing will flash in my mind and I'll be frozen in place. Today at work I was in the middle of folding clothes and suddenly once again discowing entered my mind and I suddenly lost the ability to see anything except He. Thank you.
wow. the IMPACT.
Braver than any US marine man props to you🤝
this shit is about the time i wrote an article on batcest, like man,,, the fact that i didn’t get cancelled is MIRACULOUS. also like,,, uh if anybody on here did gossip on me,, send screenshots i’d love to see it.
Hello, just wanted to say your article was great. Thank you for taking the time to provide an unbaised answer. It should provide people with nuances they couldn't possibly conjure on their own.
May I ask where your username originates from?
yes you may (also thanks!!!) i thought it up when i was trying to find an original username bc i didnt want to be called like ‘timdrakes something something’ or ‘jason todd something smoething’ or ‘dick grayson something something’ yanno? so i thought batarangs, they sound so dumb and that’s my username story... now it’s my whole entire brand lmao.
yno that bit in kick ass where red mist asks kick ass if he wants a hit of his blunt, was that the inspo for stoner tim
no? it’s bc i think stoners are hilarious and drugs are great. (dont do drugs tho)
How would u feel if someone actually wore one of those bruce or ollie pride shirts u edited
fenomenal next question.
Dick as lil huddy and Jason as James gave me radiation poisoning and now I’m screaming crying throwing up so thx for that
(Rico suave as Tim is perfect tho literally no changes needed)
i was so funny for that shit wasn’t i??? lmao i loved those weird ass fancasts
You're doing the Lord's work by providing us with all these Gotham/Metropolis citizens memes, thank you for being so relentlessly funny @nellethiel-aranel
you’re welcome!! i really enjoy making memes, but getting validation for my content and my memes is REALLY nice.
Bruce is such a slut in your memes and honestly i love that for him @rhodey-rhudert-rhodes-main
he’s that much of a slut irl too dw.
Bruce and Alfred have an emergency pride flag for the batkids. Oliver Queen printed an emergency "I love my gay son" t-shirt and as soon as Roy told him he was dating Jason, Oliver started wearing that shirt everyday and Roy always cringes when he sees it. Oliver also has an emergency "I love my lesbian daughter" shirt just in case for Cissie.
lmao YES i had a post like this bc like all of their kids/family members are so gayy
stop bringing back batfam fancasts it is not real it is not real it is not- 😀😀😀😀😀😀😀😀😀😀😀😀😀
oh yes it is my darling.
did discowing burn down the notredam because he hates the bees? @allulily
no he did it bc fuck the french.
im gonna beg for 1 thing and 1 thing only. please please please put physical by olivia newton john on dick's playlist
okay then beg. bc i wont. physical reminds me too much of glee and that hurts me mentally.
your playlist is sorely missing some Madonna. Specifically Into the Groove, Like a Prayer, and Vogue
i’m scared of madonna that’s why she’s not on there. she haunts me in my dreams.
suggestion: son of batman by aaron dews for dick’s playlist🤩
sorry, i listened to it and the vibe didn’t agree with me.
Hear me out, metropolis citizens sending rare pair fics of Clark Kent x Superman fics to Lois to edit
yes, absolutely hilarious. even more funny if they send like physical copies, no address attached and lois sends it back marked with red ink, SOMEHOW
Imagine all the smut Clark must of read editing the fics
clark reads smut confirmeeed
NOT LOIS READING SUPERBAT PORN AND EDITING IT A 2AM
NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO
hc that alfred is a meta that boosts healing factor of the people around him. if the bats are injured as much as they seem to be they would be doing bat stuff MAYBE half the year. no one including alfred knows about this. whenever the kids move out they inexplicably dont recover from injuries as fast and feel better whenever they visit the manor they just chalk it up to homesickness. bruce just thinks he heals really fast. alfred thinks everyone doesnt take care of themselves properly @finchcollector
that’s actually such a great idea, but i think that alfred would find out and learn how to concentrate it better so he can help more people, bc he’s great and i love him.
One of your dickfast posts reminded me of that tweet that goes: 'so you've had sex how many times? Yeah technically that's not a bromance' lol that's dickwally or dickroy
literally tho. like that’s all of dick’s friendships. once it gets past a certain time dick is like ‘wow i wonder what it would be like to make out with wally, wally come make out with me’ and wally’s like ‘we’ve done this like 40 times, dick, you know what it’s like’ and dick is like ‘sorry are you complaining?’ and they just make out.
superfam and batfam associations??
-batman and superman
-dick/barabara and supergirl?
-conner and tim
-jon and damian
pls enlighten me I am confused
nope,,, uhm batman and superman, but dick and superman as well, and then conner and tim, jon and damian and steph + babs with supergirl
I came across a fic in which Wonder Woman calls Batman "Stella" (like Stellaluna, the children's book) and I can imagine the batkids hop on the trend and maybe copies of the book appear at random places (aka, everywhere Bruce frequents)
sorry can’t reciprocate that was the name of my high school chemistry teacher and it gives me nightmares to think about.
good human what are your pronouns?
wouldn’t you like to know?
I need me some gothamites preferring harley over joker memes
everyone prefers harley over joker youre just very fucked up if you dont
don't understand why people try to add like veteran policy to the batfamily
dick pulling out his veteran batfam member card so he can eat first: step aside, peasants
Do you know the song Simmer by Haley Williams? It (the first verse anyways) reminds me of Jason? It's about rage.
damn yeah i LOVE HAYLEY!!!! youre right thoo
Okay so I like listen to your stoner Tim Drake playlist 24/7 but would he listen to skegss? Also I keep adding songs mentally it’s killing me 😩✋🏼 Anyways,, I literally love and worship your playlist 😃🤞🏼 And uh yeah have a good day ✨
stoner tim drake playlist is lyfeeee. also dont know who skeggs is? i’m stupid? have a good day!!
All the Robins (and Batgirl) decide to trade costumes for one night just to fuck with Batman and all the villains in Gotham. @subspacecadet
batman knows it’s them youknow but like,,, what does he call them? he’s like ‘red hood?’ and 3 people answer and he’s not about to compromise some identities so he’s just Pissed.
I aspire to treat cops the way my dad treats them. This man is a 45 year old Asian immigrant to the US and the treats them like his pets. He talks about them like unruly children. Sometimes he pays off local cops to shut up and stop acting racist. And usually it works. I don’t know why but I can see Oliver Queen doing this
vibes... and also yes? oliver queen handing a local cop a donut to shut the fuck up lmao. but yanno i commit enough crimes to not really want to ever see a cop ever, so they kinda scare the everloving fuck out of me.
seeing as tim hasn't aged in years, that means he was 17 at peak emo tumblr era. im back on my emo tim bullshit and im not letting it go
emo tim had a wattpad account send tweet
People seem to think that batman is so dark and serious when the rainbow batsuit is right there. He wore it with no shame.
dude the 60s were a DIFFERENT TIME
dick grew up in a circus, jason grew up on the streets, and tim was probably raised by the internet
all of them cuss every other word and you cannot tell me otherwise
bitch i KNOW but dc has to change to an 18+ rating if they want to sell comix with swear words in them so we gotta deal with imagining the swear words in ourselves
thoughts on teen titans and young justice
haven’t seen teen titans on account of havent seen it and young justice was LITERALLY my favourite thing ever, tho i do gotta admit it’s not at all similar to the young justice comics unfortunately. i really wouldve liked to see timmy bart kon cassie and cissie animated on tv!!
ew ew ew how to delete batcest shippers I genuinely digust them
log off tumblr?
Okay as poc who was called racist for calling an Italian pastabrain: in the batfam are Italians bit Damian just yells various insults about the others being Italian. Just him yelling “What are you doing you moronic spaghettihead!” At steph etc
huh? i meant real italians. homeboy is telling steph he hopes she chokes on her fucking garlic.
I think it's dumb as hell to pull the batman is the best fighter in the batfam argument because like it's just irresponsible of Bruce to let his kids fight when they couldn't possibly be on his league or something
fair enough, but also like who cares they could all kill you just sit down and take a beating.
lady shiva, thalia al ghul and Selina Kyle are all milfs @notanothertimburtonenthusiastugh
unfortunately, i have to admit,,, you’re right
why tf didn't someone give joker a death sentence already? like he's a mass murderer...give him the electric chair treatment wtf
idk i think plenty of people would have tried to murder him already (boring answer is: he is a popular character so they can’t kill him off bc he brings in lots of money)
There’s no such thing as “ copaganda”.
all american media is propaganda. happy to clear this up for you
is it bad that I find lady shiva owa owa
no. find her as owa owa as you want.
aight I'm guessing the order of your favs in batfam:
1. tim
2. Steph
3. dick
4. Duke
5. the rest
you’re wrong but it’s cute that you tried, i generally don’t have favourites, but i have a special place in my heart for steph, tim, dick and cass. bc they were like my introduction to batfam. but damian, jason, duke, bruce, babs and alfred are NOT FORGOTTEN OR UNLOVED
oh my god i was literally just readily willing to believe that italians werent white ty for clarifying it was a joke im so dumb sdkvjskdfs
i mean some italians aren’t white? italian is a nationality as well as an ethnicity, so like ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
since I saw so many people doing headcanons about the nationalities of batboys, I see Dick as an Italian.
dont know if youre serious or not, but sure.
super random but
jason 🤝 damian
old english
lmao fair enough.
tim absolutely has 1 gay uncle and his parents shit talk said uncle all the time so after bruce adopts him he specifically reaches out to this uncle to be like "heyyyy just so you know you majorly influenced my life yes i know i havent seen you since i was 5 and at the family reunion yes i know you dont remember my name idc thank you im gay too" and then they never talk again.
yuppp lmao that’s definitely something that could happen. i can also consider tim having no family members, like none. until he does like a dna test and he realises he has like an aunt living barely 2 miles away from him who’s like some illegitimate child of his grandpa.
I dare you one of them sends clark superman/clark fic and clark corrects the shit out of it and then goes like ps his dick is not that big, just telling as someone who has seen it. internet either explodes or goes who tf did he not fuck at this point.
i think everybody would call clark a buzzkill and try to cancel him over that.
so you're telling me Tim Drake wouldn't buy Starbucks?
no. dunkin donuts all the way
One of my favorite things is imagining people finding out jason came back from the dead and being like "oh no does he have magic powers now?!?!?" and he just pulls out a gun and tries to shoot joker
now he doesn’t even have the gun :) lmao
my favorite batfamily fanfictions are the ones where they use their shitty codenames, unironically, in any context
bruce gets codename ‘ugh’ everytime. he hates it.
crazy that tim being a 17 y/o ceo and a stoner who does brand deals are all actual canon things written in detective comics comics and not made up for shits and giggles by you, tumblr user batarangsoundsdumb @rowdeyclown
SO CRAZY HUH?
batman au where everything is the same but his utility belt is bright pink
absolutely, but i raise you, his boots light up like sketchers when he kicks people.
unbeknownst to the superhero fandom writers in the dcuniverse, clark and BRUCE are one of the most prolific fanfic writers in the superhero rpf tag on ao3. clark writes the best lois x superman angst, full of unhappy endings and scenes that are a so detailed you'd think you were in the middle of a superhero beatdown. bruce made an ao3 account to fuel "the do the butts match" thing, and makes batman/bruce fics from time to time. he wrote a superbat fic as a joke but ended up making it REAL porny. @concrastinator
dude they’re WAY too busy for that. Oliver Queen and Hal Jordan on the other hand are the most prolific fanfic writers in the superhero rpf tag writing what is Mostly porn.
When the dining table topic gets to politics, Steph says "eat the rich" as the solution
bruce just silently takes away her fork and knife while she’s talking.
#literally if you got through this i just respect you#this is mainly just for the people who sent me an ask in the past few mask#i hope your ask is in here :)#sorry for everybody else#ask#bataranswers#this took me 4 hours to do so i hope youre happy#also sidenote#does anybody know the latin translation for 'to become'#bc i just used future of 'esse' but it could be a different verb#who cares tho latin is a dead language#big congratulations to everyone who translates my sentence#here's a bonus sentence: tuam matrem futueram
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Sleep, Red Bucket
Summary: Tim and Jason work together on a case. Just that, Jason had a hard week and maybe just 3-4 hours of sleep.
Characters: Jason, Tim, Alfred (mentions), Avalanche (no, not from X-men. It’s an original enemy for a man named Snow here)
Warnings: Child drug rings, Drugs, Wild night terrors, Unconscious self-harm, Vomiting, Blood, Injuries, Swearing,
Additional Notes: I used way too much references from The Crown and this is a sickfic
Word Count: 2,233 words
***
Tim stretches a little from where he's sitting on the couch, running his hand through ebony locks as he tapped away on his laptop. He was secretly glad that he managed to sneak out of the Manor, after being ratted out by Jason for not sleeping. He had barely escaped after being coddled by Dick (that man in spandex sure can hug) and hovered over by Alfred. Sighing contently, he closed the webpage he was on and gave a quick glance at the clock.
It was still eleven, nearing towards twelve actually. He knit his eyebrows in slight annoyance, Red Hood and him had arranged to meet at twelve and he wasn't here yet. Tim assumed Jason probably had a run in with some bitch of a gang or seeing the kids or whatever he does at Crime Alley. He had long learnt not to touch that area, last time saw him with a batarang held against his throat.
Ironic for someone proclaiming to hate Batman. Tim snorted.
He was well into his thought loop when he heard the sound of metal against his window. Tim's head shot up and he hastily grabbed his bo-staff laying on the couch opposite him. Silently, he crept towards the curtains and laid to wait. The sound grew louder and he heard irritated whispers or the wind, he couldn't exactly pinpoint.
The window opened and Tim nearly smashed the intruder's head from behind when he heard a panicked yell.
"The fuck?!"
Tim breathed a little before yelling back. Oh thank fuck, its Jason only.
"And you couldn't use the damn door like any other human?"
Jason allowed a snort to escape before walking resolutely to the couch where he sat down rather heavily and let out a small sigh.
"I died, I'm technically not human or I mean does that count?"
Tim rolls his eyes and settles back on the couch where Jason was laying stretched rather lazily and flipping through the case files, with his hood still on.
"So, as far as I know. Snow has multiple bases in Bludhaven. Wonder how Dickface hasn't run into him yet."
"Dick knows him as Avalanche. That's what he calls himself. Different street names."
"He'll fall eventually."
Tim almost laughs but he cannot exactly tell if Jason was joking or just plaintively didn't give two fucks. It also sounded a tad more tired.
"Mhm. Anyways, his largest base is pretty near your territory. I think you know it like the back of your hand."
He offers tentatively, trying to rebalance the edge of tension in the room.
"Yeah. Got it."
"Do you need-"
"No. He's on my turf. I get to take him out."
Jason takes slightly longer than he does to get up. Tim sees it but doesn't call him out on it. He really doesn't want another stab mark. he watches Jason climb out of the window.
"Oh and Jason?"
Jason turns, in zero mood right now because the small throbbing in his head has grown a little.
"What?!"
"Get some shut-eye."
He scoffs and leaves.
—
Some hours in, Tim decided he wanted coffee so he gets up to go make himself.
He hears a faint rustle and pin drop silence. He quietly grabs the dang bo-staff again. As he creeps along the rooms, he hears the sound getting louder. It sounded like someone was having trouble.
He almost shits himself when he sees Red Hood asleep. In his apartment.
Tim narrows his eyes and does a quick surveillance of Jason's things. He sees empty cartridges and shell casings lying at his feet
The only physical response was Jason's head tilting at an angle and soft snores filtered by the Hood.
Huh, he's back and asleep. Already?
"Jason?"
Tim raised an eyebrow at Jason.
"Mm?"
"Oh good. Just checking if you're alive."
Jason turned on himself, curling his legs under himself.
"Al'wys am, Replac'ment. F'k off. Lemme sleep."
Tim frowned slightly as he inched his hands towards the hood but a gloved hand comes out of nowhere and squeezes Tim's wrist tightly who now lets out a yelp.
-
Tim pours the coffee but the thoughts of Jason doesn't leave his mind. Something wasn't so right about Jason. But then, nothing was ever right with Jason.
Was he bleeding? He did return late from whatever he was up to. He did slur his dreaded nickname. He refused to take off his hood. Was he sick? Did he eat?
He hears a loud scream that interrupts his second thought loop of the night. Tim almost spills the coffee on himself and half stumbles-half runs to the source.
Jason.
"J..Jason?"
Erratic breathing greeted him. Tim steels himself as he nimbly types the correct combination and takes the hood off against Jason's order. He isn't about to let someone die in his apartment.
Why does everything have to end up so damn difficult?
Tim barely glances at Jason as he shakes him.
"Jason. Shh. Jason?"
Jason doesn't comply, the thrashing increases in intensity as he yells his throat raw. He claws his forearms, scratching the scarred skin in nightmare-delirium. He manages to draw blood which gently falls onto the white couch, turning the area into a crime scene wildly in contrast to the source of blood. His eyes were tightly shut, thick black lashes glued to his sweat covered cheeks
Tim restrains Jason, tries to grab his hands but he manages to fucking fling Tim across the table. He crashes at the bookshelf, wincing when his arm whacks against a particularly thick encyclopedia.
Ah, he thought, the pain of knowledge.
He quickly gathers himself and sees Jason thrashing on the couch, whimpering like a wounded animal.
"What the fuck. Jason? Can..can you hear me?"
The whimpers alternate into raw screaming, it leaves Tim's heart cold and skin prickled. He doesn't have to know what Jason is thinking. He needs to snap the nightmare loop before he decided his throat was next and he-
Focus, Tim.
Tim rummages everywhere in the apartment, heartbeat loud in his ears. He knows it was best to wait it out but it was almost like it was a loop. He spots a whistle, one from the Charity Games Bruce hosted. Yeah, he remembered that one pretty well. Grayson won the race and he blew the whistle right in his face. Jason laughed and Barbara poked fun at him later on it.
He quickly blows the whistle at Jason who shot up with a frightening velocity. Tim literally held Jason down, stunned into silence.
"Jason?"
He only pinched his nose-bridge, other hand clenching the couch tightly.
"Do you want water?"
"No"
He barely croaked, turning on himself like a wounded animal.
Tim fetches a glass anyway. He also brought some bandages to wrap his forearms. Quietly, he does so, rubbing alcohol into it alternated with small flinches. When the procedure was done, Tim stepped back a little.
Jason turned on himself again, shaking. His eyebrows were drawn in pain, breaths almost wheezing. His face was now alarmingly pale and eyebags almost like bruises cover below his tired eyes
Tim didn't know what to say to him. Jason might shoot down all chances to talk about it.
"I'm going to take your temperature, is that okay?"
No answer.
Tim awkwardly fumbles around, he needed distraction to come up with a way to talk about it. There was no way he was leaving Jason in that terrifying loop he saw.
He knew he had the latest state-of-the-art thermometer that took temperatures in seconds but he chose the mercury one to buy time he needed to calm himself. He returns back to Jason who sat up again, hand resting under his chin.
"I'm not sick."
A whisper barely above the rattling of the heater.
"I still need to check, I haven't ruled out fever dream. You look like shit."
"Course."
Jason lets Tim do it as he quietly counts to the 180th second. Tim removes it and sees it at 96.
"That's cold."
"Anemic."
"Oh, that wasn't in your files. I'll add that in later."
Jason lies down again and his eyes flutter closed. Tim properly gives Jason a onceover, he looked almost vulnerable underneath the glinting armor.
"You haven't eaten, have you?"
His eyes open slightly again, eyes squinting at Tim's undisguised worry.
"Won't stay down."
Tim bit his lip. This was bad.
"Can you handle some soup?"
"Try to, can't promise."
Tim gets up to reheat the soup Alfred left for him two nights ago but something in him nags to not leave Jason alone with his thoughts. He puts on The Crown and unpaused at where Queen Elizabeth hears about Jackie Kennedy's unflattering comments about her.
Tim quickly takes the soup out and shoves it in the microwave. His work could wait another day or two. He had checked the camera feeds momentarily and saw zero sign of the target.
The microwave beeped and he takes it out, carefully pouring into two bowls and bringing it to the living room where he now sees Elizabeth doing the foxtrot.
Tim places the soup at the table and gives one to Jason who cradles one in his arms, eyes unseeing at the television. Tim carefully watches Jason's face. His cheekbones had hollowed slightly and were clenched. Probably an aftereffect defense mechanism. Tim thinks.
"Do you feel like throwing up again?"
An imperceptible shake as his eyes glue at Philip yell at Charles while dangerously maneuvering the plane with tears streaking down Charles' face. Tim sees something momentarily shift in Jason at dad yelling at son.
Oh shit, trigger, trigger, trigger.
Tim abruptly switches off the television. This time, Jason properly turns at Tim.
"Why?"
Tim narrowed his eyes.
"Its..nothing, Jason. Not letting you go through that hell I saw."
"Funny you say that, been happening for two weeks straight."
Jason spits it with vitriol. Tim physically feels the force of the words. Biting, cold, hard. He moves back, as if the force displaced him. How the hell did Jason still have enough strength to do that? a half of Tim wondered.
He tried to open his mouth but settled to stretching his lips into a thin line.
"I said don't-"
"I'm not about to fucking ask or clarify anything remotely related to what just transpired. Listen to me carefully, all I want to know is whether you're sleeping enough. Yes or no?"
Tim hissed, chin dipping down with practiced ease. Jason seemingly curls onto himself more before grumbling, this time lacking the usual bite.
"Three in four days. Fuckers won't stop fucking recruiting kids on my territory to sell drugs. The hell am I supposed to do? Sleep while the kids get roped in a sick fuck of a game?"
Tim nods in understanding, clearly regretting his outburst. He watches Jason sag heavily against the couch and tip his head back. His eyes were pinched shut this time with his jaw tightening with more of the earlier tension Tim noted. He laid a hand on Jason's temple and carefully, he inched his hand throughout his head, warm fingers making their way through. He hears small sighs of relief when he reaches the sides. Tim slowly maneuvers Jason onto his lap and continues to stroke his sweaty bangs. Jason only winces again at the bright, florescent lights
"Headache?"
"Mhm."
He turns on himself, groaning quietly. he places an arm over his eyes. Tim continues to massage his temples, rubbing reassuring circles.
"How bad?"
"..."
"Want painkillers?"
Jason shakes his head, lights glaring in his eyes and everything spinning.
"Hate..meds. You know..that."
Tim seemed to consider that but got off the couch.
"Be right back, I'll dim the lights."
Jason almost whimpers again at the lack of heat of Tim's fingers as the dull throbbing increased and pounded behind his eyes. Jason wished he could will the damn thing to stop, if he could only sleep it away without the fucking nightmares. He curled on himself for the umpteenth time that night, wishing he was dead again.
He feels a dip in the couch and then firm fingers return, pressing hard. Jason gasped out.
"T..Tim."
"Sorry. Is this better?"
Tim apologetically whispers as he decreases the pressure against the wild throbbing. Jason silently hummed in agreement and leaned into the touches.
"Sorry, I overstayed.. I should go."
"You would, if you slept enough. How many hours did you get just yesterday alone?"
"Got here right after the run-in with Snow and be'fre was the druggists."
Tim narrowed his eyes while Jason closes his, worn out by the small conversation.
“What about you?”
He smiles a little at that, always caring about someone else before himself.
"Alfred made me sleep two nights ago at the Manor. I hid out here to find that intel."
"T'hts n'ce."
Tim places his hand on Jason's shoulder and watches as Jason's breathing evens out into soft snores. He threw on a blanket and quietly took his laptop to begin work, the soft blue glow illuminating the room.
“Tim?”
Jason sleepily opens one eye to where Tim settled down with his laptop. He motions Tim to join him who hesitates before lying down beside him. He presses a quick kiss on Jason’s forehead before adjusting himself under Jason’s neck. Jason only let a small hum of approval before encircling Tim with a soft hug.
“G’night.”
#dc#red hood#jason todd#jason peter todd#red robin#timothy jackson drake#tim drake#tim#jason#hugs#vomit warning#blood tw#vomit tw#drugs tw#mentions of drugs#drug mention#sleep deprived af#sleep deprivation#they need self-preservation#hoodedwing#reblog#alfred pennyworth#alfred#angsty#but more fluff#hurt/comfort#hurt#not incest#its brothers
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[jaydick] Before That, And Colder
Chapter Four
AO3
Previous Chapter
Dick kicks his foot in the air repeatedly, inspecting the pink flowers on his white Oxfords. He’s pretending to ignore the people around him — possibly, he is actually ignoring them, as the outlines of their bodies blur around his fancy footwear. He leans farther back on Jason’s desk, conjuring the picture of ease. To his left rests Jason’s Red Hood helmet in a gargoyle-fashion. Everyone here knows Jason Todd is the Red Hood, but Dick is just Richie Grayson, D-list celebrity. The sleeves of his pretentiously silk bomber jacket, embroidered with colorful roosters, slip slightly down his shoulder.
“Is this really the best time to be hiring people? Specifically this person?” This question comes from James — or “Wingman,” as Jason earlier informed him of. James is up-and-coming, bat-themed, Gotham-based vigilante who believes the Red Hood is absolutely critical to public safety. Dick has not yet shared this detail with Batman, having only received it an hour before this current meeting, but he’s hoping they’ll share a good laugh over that.
“No time like the present,” Jason says without much concern. He stands beside the desk, a few feet from Dick.
Dick catches James crossing his arms from the corner of his eyes. The defensive body language convinces him to focus more on the arrangement of people. Suzie Su still sits on the recliner, seemingly indifferent. Her sisters, one of which Dick recognizes as the waitress who intercepted him and Miguel earlier, flock around Su either on the couch or near her armrest; all except for Night, Dick’s blackjack dealer yesterday, who now occupies a distant corner of the room by herself. Miguel sits in the recliner opposite Suzie Su, playing with his tie. James stands the closest to Dick and Jason and busies himself with looking like he eats nails for breakfast.
“The son of Bruce Wayne is hardly a sound addition to the Outlaws,” James points out.
Suzie Su’s head swivels towards Jason. “Oh, no,” she says, suddenly invested, “Whatever ‘the outlaws’ is, count me out of it. I’m going legit, you promised!”
Jason takes a page from Dick’s book and seats himself on the corner of his desk. He grips the edge, knees spread, so that he looks like he’s riding a horse. For an unstably diverse crowd, he’s rather at ease at the head of it, Dick notes. Jason holds up a silencing finger and begins his address, “Firstly, the Outlaws are too legit for any mere mortal to handle, that includes you, Su, so stuff it. Secondly, James, you can also stuff it because no one’s inviting Richie Rich onto the team except you, it would seem.”
So, does that mean I don’t get to see the Super Secret Clubhouse and make friendship bracelets? Dick almost says. Instead, he receives a text alert and checks his phone to see Bruce left him a message.
What is your plan of action? it reads.
Dick quickly shoots back a non-committal text, wary of Jason sensing Batman’s concern through the phone. Luckily, Jason doesn’t pay Dick’s texting any mind, preoccupied with his stand-off against Wingman.
James persists, undeterred by Jason’s skilled dismissal. “Batman isn’t exactly in your corner, Todd. He is, however, in Wayne’s pocket. As is Richie Grayson.”
Dick frowns; his current persona is apparently no longer a good fit. He will need to adjust accordingly. Dick sits up straighter on the desk and tucks his legs. “I have my own funds, as a matter of fact,” he speaks up. Jason’s eyes slice into him — oh, right, Dick’s not supposed to talk while meeting the in-laws. Oh, well. He continues, “I work for the Bludhaven Police Department.”
Dick touches his jacket collar and inspects the interior fabrice. “I try to dress nice when there might be cameras so I don’t make Bruce look bad, but most of it’s bought off-price at Marshalls.” This last part is a lie as he rarely buys his own photo op clothes. Bruce has a personal stylist who keeps everyone’s wardrobe at the Manor stocked. Dick hit up his old bedroom on the way to the hotel.
“You’re a cop,” James repeats.
Dick holds back a wince. So much for Agent 37’s kick-ass undercover portfolio. “Every cop’s a little dirty in the ‘Haven,” he says, hopefully smoothly.
Unfortunately, James does not find this comforting. “So not only are you a cop who knows about the Iceberg’s business, but you’re not even a good cop?”
Dick points at Jason. “He murders people,” he deflects.
Jason sighs obnoxiously loud. “Richie has information and contacts,” Jason increases his volume when James looks like he wants to say something else, “neither of which are anyone’s business at the moment but mine. Believe it or not, but I’m pretty attached to my life, in both a literal and figurative sense, and so if I say the guy from that one lady-service Pantene commercial is going to keep my organs safely inside my body, rest assured, I have done my research.”
This standing ovation inspires Dick to wonder whether Jason saw that commercial on cable or some other venue. He tries and fails to imagine Jason watching Friends reruns. Maybe he caught it off some gun review video on Youtube. This is the kind of media Dick assumes Jason consumes.
“Great to know,” says Suzie Su flatly. “So, Richie, who’s trying to whack our boss?”
“No one yet. There have been no attempts on his life thus far,” Dick responds. Then, “Also, you can just call me Dick.”
“Shouldn’t be too tough,” Suzie Su remarks.
“The situation will escalate, though,” James states, “There is no doubt that Red Hood is the final target.”
“Correct. Which is why it’s important that we trust each other,” Dick says. He levels a gaze at everyone in the room except for James, which should indicate to him that he’s the object of criticism without presenting Dick as outwardly hostile. “If we are too busy suspecting each other without any evidence, we allow for outside threats to slip past our radar.” Dick can only hope they will take this to heart; it will be harder for him to investigate Jason’s people if they’re also investigating him.
“Truth,” Miguel agrees as he stands to his feet and walks towards Dick. “Although it kind of worked out for us this time, right? You following me, us following you?” As he approaches, he extends a hand and Dick dismounts from the desk. “Welcome to the team, Dick,” Miguel says, clapping Dick on the shoulder as they shake. His smile is warm and sincere. Dick feels an equally genuine grin spread across his face.
“Alright, alright,” Jason says, leaning from his spot on the desk to bat an arm at them. “What did I just say about teams, dude,” he gripes. Miguel shrugs rather blithely before he returns to his chair. Dick appreciates what he hopes will be the one easy-going personality in this tense bunch.
Jason claps his hands together and stands. “Okay, here’s the deal: I want someone always watching my vehicle for the next, fuck, two weeks, I guess? One week?” He looks to Dick for confirmation. Dick mouths, ‘longer.’ “One week to start, cool,” Jason locks in his answer. “I don’t mean from the cameras, as I really am hoping to catch this person ASAP and get back to my regularly scheduled gangbanging.”
Dick watches the crowd: Miguel gives a whoop, Suzie Su rolls her eyes, one of the sisters not standing in the corner laughs.
“So, that means I need you,” Jason flourishes his arm in the air and brings it dramatically down like a hammer, finger pointing sharply at Miguel, “to physically be in the parking lot.”
Miguel looks around in bafflement. “I’m the owner. That would look weird,” he says, gesturing towards himself.
Jason rolls his eyes. “Yeah, I’m sure everyone is lining up for your autograph, too, now come off it. No one here is instantly recognizable except for me, and that’s mostly to do with the helmet,” Jason pats the helmet beside him emphatically, “giving me serious red Darth Vader vibes.”
Dick suppresses a laugh. Jason hears him anyway, but that turns out to be not so bad. Jason’s eyes flicker towards him but they’re absent of reproach, which is how Dick realizes he had expected to be growled at for his humor. But Jason made the joke, didn’t he? He goes so far as to smile, not threateningly, but pleasantly. Dick wants to call it soft even.
Jason’s eyes are back on the ragtag team within the second. He explains properly his reasoning to Miguel. “The subject’s abilities and target range are unknown to us. You’re our safest bet for handling whatever he might be capable of. And you can wear whatever you want.” Dick assumes that last bit is weighted with the implication of a supersuit, although Miguel’s secret identity may very well be known considering the lack of visible confusion on anyone’s face. Of course, that could just be indifference; no one in this room seems particularly interested in each other.
“If you see someone snooping, wait it out. If you see someone put something on my bike, apprehend them and bring them to me where I can then proceed to shoot their brains out,” Jason instructs. Dick tries to say something, but Jason says over his attempt, “If they’re guilty.”
“Not really the problem,” Dick mutters.
“The Su Brigade can, I don’t know, keep doing what you’re doing, I guess? Keep an eye on suspicious figures.”
Dick chimes in, “This time, however, immediately report to Jason or myself. Don’t rush in unless the threat is urgent. Don’t,” he motions to James, “text James, or whatever it is you guys did. That was sloppy and uncoordinated.”
James shifts his weight more evenly. Dick instantly recognizes the implicit challenge and straightens his back. “Text you, huh? What, you the boss now?”
Dick files through his possible responses, weighs the best tone to take, the stance to adopt. Should he pick up the gauntlet and try to assert dominance, or go for diplomacy? He doubts this will come to blows, but the direction he takes this could have later consequences, could affect Jason’s safety even in the long-run.
Dick almost misses the change in Jason’s posture, but it’s instantaneous. “He’s close enough,” Jason has already spoken, no longer leaning against the desk but standing with his hands deceptively plunged into his jeans pockets and his searing green eyes locked on James. “More the boss than you are, at any rate, so yeah, I’d text him.” He sounds almost casual, accent set in a lazy Gotham drawl, yet there’s an angered click to how he sets his teeth. He’s intimidating, alright, the sharp cut of his cheeks complementing his strong jaw. He’s quite Hollwood-esque actually, Dick thinks — at least before he realizes Jason is looking right back at him. Jason raises his eyebrows and spins his fingers in a prompting manner. “Well? Anything else you’d like to derail the meeting with, Dick?”
And just like that, Jason manages to personally undermine the power he just gave him. Dick is bordering on impressed, restrained only by his sudden irritation. Dick simply smiles and says, “You’re the boss.”
“Fantastic. James! How do you feel about interrogating people you can’t beat up?” Jason proposes to the next member of the non-team.
Dick thinks James could question people without beating them up just fine, especially after the practice he got in while interrogating Dick. James doesn’t comment on whether he’s up to the task, however, but replies, “Who am I interrogating?”
Jason grins and quickly bows his body. “A witness. Exciting, right? Unfortunately, no, not exciting. This will suck for you. Daniel Garcia, the second victim, should be at Gotham General Hospital — fingers crossed he has insurance, because otherwise you’ll have to find out where he lives and talk to him there.”
Dick could be projecting, but he thinks James puffs up his chest at this. “I can find anyone anywhere,” vows James.
“I’ve no doubt, buddy. I just would prefer he not have to relive everything the second he gets home because a stranger wants to hear the gory details,” Jason explains. His tone is slightly scolding. There might be some decency in him yet. Dick immediately feels guilty for being surprised. Jason is a good guy. A good guy. He’s said as much to Bruce. Did he forget to tell himself the same thing?
“Bring some flowers to soften things,” Dick suggests.
“Flowers don’t soften a crowbar, Dick,” Jason disagrees. Still, he adds for James, “But yeah, bring flowers. The family won’t like you for it, but they’ll hate you even more if you don’t.”
“Do we have to do anything?” Suzie Su asks, a little unhappily, it would seem. Dick doesn’t trust her. Then again, would she be so openly disloyal if she was double-crossing? The only person in this room Dick trusts is Miguel — and even then, if there’s one thing Batman has been trying to drill into him for half his life, it’s that trust is a liability. Anyone here could logically be a mole. Anyone here could be loyal, too.
“No, Suzie Su, I expect absolutely nothing from you and that’s why I dragged you to a staff meeting, so you could sit on your ass and pick at your nails,” Jason intones. Suzie Su drops her manicured nails to her lap and glares at him. Jason sticks his tongue out in response. “You and your lovely sisters of questionable bloodline are my ears to the ground.”
“So, same as before?”
Jason cocks his head, shakes it up and down as if weighing the question, and says, “K-i-i-i-i-nd of? It’s like what you were doing before, but not complete garbage. Need I remind you that you let this idiot into my office.” Jason jabs his thumb in Dick’s direction.
Miguel raises his finger. He’s properly relaxed in his cushiony recliner, legs crossed and arms spilling over the back. “Ah, but you let the idiot stay,” he reminds Jason.
Dick twists his lips. “Thanks, Miguel. Or whatever.”
“Or whatever,” Jason decides. “Alright, everyone out of my office and onto the things I demand of you. Dick, you’re coming with me.”
The crowd is already dispersing. Dick hops off the desk and pats the wrinkles from his pants. “Why’s that? I thought you didn’t want me breathing down your neck.”
Jason’s back is to Dick as he fastens his Red Hood helmet over his head, which tips Dick off that some of his people outside the office might still not know who’s under the mask. Jason’s response is rougher than before. “You saw the tapes, didn’t you?” The energy from only a minute ago has melted from his voice. The helmet lights up then and Jason’s next words are modulated, shrouded in static. “That makes you the expert.”
Dick does not miss the irony of this statement.
___________
Dick has Jason drive him to Bludhaven. Jason has many cars and not a single one is worth less than $80,000. “How do you blend in?” Dick asked on the way to his shitty apartment across the pond, Jason looking absolutely put-upon by the half-hour drive. His Red Hood helmet has been stowed away in a personally customized, hidden compartment. “I don’t,” Jason simply replied. Dead guys, according to Jason, don’t need to feign poverty. Especially if those dead guys are better known for their underground empires and resort casinos. However, two rich men in a luxury vehicle don’t have much business commiserating with the family of boys like Terry Weind. So, the two stop by Bludhaven to pick up Dick’s Saturn and allow him to change into less flamboyant clothes.
Dick chooses a threadbare BPD t-shirt and jeans. Jason stays in his signature ensemble of leather jacket and combat boots. He raises his brows at Dick’s outfit, but Dick insists it’s a good choice. Even if they don’t like the police, he’s still out of uniform and unarmed, and they’ll know this isn’t his territory. He’ll seem like a commuter, which might even win him some subconscious sympathy; many people in downtown Gotham have to commute to Bludhaven, albeit usually for a fishery job and not the police department.
Jason waits in the car for Dick to come out. Dick invites him in, but secretly he’s relieved. The place is a mess. If how he keeps his office is a hint, Jason’s habits are immaculate. They would put Dick to shame. Dick taps Jason’s window to signal they’re switching to the Saturn. Jason takes an excessively long time to part with his car, all but cooing at it, but does eventually make it over. He settles into the passenger seat, looking Dick up and down.
“What?” Dick asks, perhaps defensively. He should’ve said something like, “Like what you see?” but it’s too late for that.
Jason shrugs casually, but his eyes flicker to Dick’s hair. “Nothing. You just look normal now.”
Dick jams his keys into the ignition, because he has to be rough for the car to start, and rolls his eyes. “You mean my hair’s not gay?”
“Eh. Less gay.” And then Jason is reaching out and ruffling his hair, fingers curling through the still-damp waves. Dick stuck his hair under the bathroom sink’s faucet before putting his shirt on. He got water everywhere, but he needed to get the product out. He weirdly hopes Jason doesn’t feel any lingering stickiness, that his hair is soft to touch.
Jason’s face abruptly screws up in confusion as if he isn’t sure how he got here. Slowly, he retracts his hand and sits straight in his seat. Dick didn’t notice how open Jason’s body language was just a moment ago, but he notices how it closes. His knees no longer point towards Dick but to the windshield; his arms, once extended towards him, now fold across his chest. Dick stares at him for a moment, trying to piece together the puzzle he suspects they almost had.
Jason’s presence always has that mystifying effect on him, however, like he’s a monument to all the almosts they’ve been. When Jason was Robin, they were almost friends. When he was the Red Hood, they were almost enemies. Then they might have been brothers, could have been, maybe. There had been that night on the rooftop when Dick had managed to slip through Spyral’s many fingers — when Barbara had run away and Damian had embraced him and Tim demanded why, why — Jason had drawn blood as his voice broke because you don’t do that to your. Almost.
They are always on the verge of some new meaning.
“Well?” asks Jason. “Are you waiting for me to set up the GPS? You know the address, let’s go.”
Dick quickly recovers and begins edging out from his spot between two other parked cars on the street. “What are we, drag racing? Jeesh.” They avoid traffic for the drive over but do swing into a corner store once they’re in Gotham again. Jason buys the most expensive bouquet available while Dick fiddles with a rack of playing cards. Pokémon? Magic? Would Terry care about either of those games? He sees Jason head to the counter and grabs a random card pack to check out. His phone buzzes in his pocket just as he finishes counting off the dollar bills. He hands the cashier $16 and unlocks his phone. It’s from Bruce.
Any progress?
Dick begins typing out an answer when he remembers the boundaries he agreed on with Jason. He said he wouldn’t share any details with Bruce unless Jason okay’d it. He could let Jason know Bruce is asking, but even mentioning Bruce tends to sour him. Dick would rather get through this meeting with Terry Weind first. He makes a mental note to inform Jason later and give Bruce a non-answer if he says no.
Ten minutes later and they’re standing on narrow porch steps. The wooden planks are dark and splintery and covered in cigarette butts where an ash tray has been knocked down. Dick squats down and picks it up; ceramic, woodsy-green and leaf-shaped. He sets it atop the paint-chipped banister while Jason knocks on the door. The walls are thin enough that Dick can trace the sound of someone walking down the stairs. It’s summery outside today, the earth baked through by the sun, but he’s thinking of winters down here. Even with a good furnace, these walls must let the chill in.
A woman opens the door in her nightgown, one hand on the knob and the other on the frame. Her eyes are red and the skin beneath them sags. Her skin is almost ashen. She looks tired. She is tired, she’s exhausted, Dick can feel it when he looks at her. Her exhaustion is a heavy substance that spreads out and sinks into his flesh.
“Are you Terry’s mom?” Jason asks. He has the flowers already at his chest. His voice is stiff with emotion. Dick recalls his comment about Daniel reliving trauma and wonders if that’s what Jason is doing right now.
The woman nods and says that, yes, she is, but little changes in her expression. Dick had been expecting confusion, but she accepts the flowers without hesitation. Evidently, they are not remotely the first ones to share condolences. “My name’s Laura,” she says, touching the waxy petal of a calla lily. Her voice is soft and deep as if it’s been anchored to the bottom of the ocean.
“I’m Jason.”
“Dick,” Dick says after him.
Laura opens her mouth silently for a few seconds before carefully telling them, “I appreciate you boys coming here and wishing us well. It’s been hard, but we’re grateful to the community’s response, it’s been wonderful. I hope you don’t mind me not inviting you in, it’s just that I work grave and don’t get much sleep, and Terry’s resting.”
“We understand. But actually, we’re not just here to offer our sympathy — though you do have it, of course,” Dick conveys. He rushes the words of each clause so his speech comes out in quick, nervous chunks. He’s dipping head, taking up as little room as possible while moving closer to her. Jason takes a step back to accommodate him. He wants to represent himself as sincere, perhaps too sincere to the point of being clumsy. People often think inept and trustworthy are the same thing; the logic goes, you can’t be hiding any tricks up your sleeve if you’re more likely to spill them on the floor.
“If you turn us away, we get it, don’t worry,” assures Dick, “but this is our city and our kids are getting snatched.”
Laura begins shaking her head. “Oh, no, he’s not answering any questions — ”
“We won’t ask as many questions as the police,” Dick hurries to say. “We don’t need to. We,” here, Dick breaks off his speech and looks uncertainly at Jason, feigning hesitance. Then he takes a galvanizing breath, readying for his big leap, this information he’s sharing only with Laura. “I work part-time at the Park Row Memorial. I’m a guard, similar work to what I do with the Bludhaven Police. We have it monitored 24/7 so it doesn’t become a high-crime area again.” Dick sighs in frustration and bites his lips. “Laura,” he says firmly, staring into her eyes. Her pupils have dilated along his story. Good. “I saw Terry that night. The police haven’t even asked Park staff yet, they don’t care. But I saw it happen and I think I can do something about it.”
The best cover story is always based in reality. The best lies are true.
Laura’s eyes drop the ground as she thinks. She’s also biting her lip. Dick ponders over whether she does that often and Dick got lucky, or if she’s mirroring him. Either way, he’s won her over. She shuffles to the side and waves them in, her movements less languid than before.
She leads them to the stairwell and says, “If he doesn’t want to answer questions, he doesn’t have to. I’m not going to force him, you got it? Get what you can and hope it’s useful.” With this, she climbs the steps to the second floor, Jason and Dick following at an appropriate distance. They pause at the top step while she enters Terry’s room and explains in hushed tones his guests. She relates Dick’s reason for being here and then there’s a long pause before Dick detects a faint, “Sure.”
Dick and Jason share a look that confirms: they’re in. Laura places a light hand on Jason’s bicep and guides them to the door. “I’ll stand right here,” she says firmly and waves them forward. Dick looks around for a chair, sees none, and settles on the windowsill facing Terry’s bed. He’s faired better than the next two kids, all injuries considered. He was out of the hospital in a month. He lies in his twin-sized mattress beneath a crisp sheet, a blue comforter shoved to the foot of his bed. A square bandage covers his right cheek, there’s stitching over his right eyebrow, and there’s more stitches on the right side of his skull. His right arm and knee have been set in casts. Dick remembers him curling onto his side at one point in the video.
In the wake of the other victims’ hospital records (courtesy of Oracle), Terry’s assault had been carried out with perfunctory brutality. Dick recollects the scene but recalls no hesitation in the attacker’s swings, yet their violence has clearly increased. Perhaps they are doing someone else’s dirty work and the job has just now awakened a taste for pain in them. Or maybe it’s one guy after all and they’re adjusting to the role.
“So, you know the fucker who did this?” Terry speaks up first. His voice is a little rough and definitely fatigued. Despite his current infirmity, Dick can tell he’s a sturdy kid. He’s got the same build Jason had at that age, youthfully broad with natural muscle in the absence of training. A body with room to grow in.
Dick shrugs. “Not personally. But we hold out hope. What did his face look like? Any defining features?” he attempts, even knowing that Terry’s report claimed to make out nothing from the night of the attack.
Terry was looking at Jason beforehand, which Dick can’t blame him for. Jason takes up most of the room as he stands by Terry’s feet, stock straight with his massive arms folded. Dick has a habit of downsizing Jason in his head. In general, Dick’s guilty of subconsciously diminishing certain people’s threat levels, letting his familiarity with them obscure the danger they still pose. He does his best to put himself in Terry’s shoes and see what he might see; he accomplishes this by summoning the first night he encountered the Red Hood before he was also Jason Todd, fallen boy wonder. Even without the vigilante get-up, the man’s intimidating.
Now that Dick has asked a question, however, Terry’s eyes appraise him. Dick once again folds in on himself, tucking his arms closer to his sides and leaning back so he’s as out of Terry’s space as he can be. Then Terry’s eyes stray to the floor and he mumbles, “Looked like nothing. It was dark.” But he doesn’t say it like it was nothing.
“You saw something,” Dick contests. He’s not going to wheedle or coax, he decides, because that would just leave Terry room to equivocate. “You don’t know what you saw, but you saw something, and whatever that is will help us more than pretending there weren’t streetlamps.”
Terry grimaces. The twitch of his battered face reminds Dick of his age and his heart aches. There should be a grace period for children, an exception made for those still new to this earth. He hates that pain is one of the first things they learn. “He was white, I guess,” Terry supplies. His good fingers have found a loose thread on the hem of his pushed-down sheets. He picks at it. “He never said a word the whole time. It was quiet. He — I saw his hands. I thought, I thought the police would find his thumbprints or whatever, on me, but that’s not how it works, they said. They were all fucked up.”
“The hands or the police?” Jason interjects.
Terry doesn’t look up from his loose thread, but one half of his mouth pulls up into a faint, flickering smile. It manages to be bright even so. “The hands. There were old scars all over the knuckles. Dry, too, like he never heard of lotion.”
Dick supposes the attacker could work in manual labor, but it’s unlikely if there were truly that many scars and all old. “Just the knuckles?” he asks.
“Yeah.”
Dick guesses he’s experienced with combat. The ugly, close-up kind. Still, just the knuckles, that sounds more like punishment than accident. And the dry skin? That could easily be eczema, although wouldn’t a seasoned killer think to cover up, prevent skin follicles from falling into a lab tech’s hands? It is summer, but Gotham runs more humid than dry, so perhaps they’re dealing with a foreigner. “And the face?” he prompts.
Terry abruptly drops his hand from the nervous thread and sighs raggedly. “Nothing, man. I couldn’t see anything, okay, it was,” Terry falters, “confusing.”
“Confusing how?” Jason asks.
“I don’t know!” Terry’s voice pitches in frustration. “It was weird, all swirly and shit.”
Dick can hear the criticism leak into Jason’s tone when he curtly repeats, “Swirly.”
Terry backpedals. “I said I don’t know,” he mutters.
Swirly voices sound familiar to Dick. He used to have one for a time when he played James Bond for Spyral. “I think we might have a contact, Jay,” Dick muses.
“Really?” Jason says with noticeable surprise. “Swirly’s our big break?”
“Emphasis on the might and ixnay on the big.” To Terry, he says, “Tell me, does tsuchigumo ring any bells?”
Terry’s face scrunches up. “Does what huh?”
Dick will take that as a no. “Oh, well. Still worth looking into,” he says. Dick stands and retrieves the card pack from his plastic bag. He holds it up for Terry to see before setting it down on the bed. Terry takes it immediately and brings it up to his face for inspection. “Your mom has the flowers. I wasn’t sure what to get you, but let me know if you need or want anything. Oh.” Dick swivels his head around the room. There’s not much to it aside from a bed, a dresser, and a box T.V. collecting dust. “Do you have something I can write my number on?”
Jason chooses that moment to step forward, sliding between Dick and where Terry lies. He leans across, a crisp, laminated paper balanced between his index and middle finger. “Here’s my card. Let me know if you have any more information or if either of you need help,” he explains. Terry sets Dick’s gift down and gingerly accepts the card. He flips it over: no logo, just a phone number.
“That’s it?” says Terry. “What contact? Who did this?”
“It’s too soon to tell. I wish I had more to give you two,” Dick says sympathetically to Terry and Laura, the latter of whom hasn’t left her post by the door. She rests her cheek on the frame and watches on.
Terry has more questions though and he’s edging on excited. “Are you P.I.’s? Why do you even care? I bet you fucking did this, or one of your boys — ”
“I understand your distrust,” Dick says over him. He glances nervously at Laura to gauge what she thinks of the accusation and if she’s about to step in. She’s a little straighter, body no longer depending on the wall, but her face is still impassive if alert. Dick hurries to smooth this over. “You don’t know us well enough to understand why we care. We have to prove ourselves, I get that. And we will. Until then, you’ve got nothing to lose, right? All we know is you didn’t see anything.”
Terry stares at him silently, suspicion darkening his eyes. There is risk in coming here, of course, depending on how well Terry’s attacker can trace Jason’s footsteps. But Dick has already weighed the risks and he’s betting that Terry’s part is done here insofar as the criminal is concerned. Luckily, Terry can’t identify what he’s got to lose or how much he has told them between the lines, so the charges drop like that.
There’s a few beats of silence before Jason starts fidgeting. “Yea-a-a-h, we’re going to go now,” he announces, pointing over his shoulder towards the window. Dick could cringe, he’s so awkward.
“Thanks to both of you,” Dick says and smiles as warmly as he can. He trails closely behind Jason who shuffles towards the door, his body too tall and too broad to fit comfortably in the modest room. Unthinking, the pads of Dick’s fingers feather over Jason’s back as if to guide him forward. As Jason moves, Dick lets his fingers linger in the air, covering up the touch with empty space. He curls his fingers in and tucks them behind his back. Laura follows them out.
“Thank you again,” Dick says at the door. “We’ll be in touch if anything develops,” he promises. And he will be; if not as Dick then certainly as Nightwing.
Laura thanks them half-heartedly. Dick suddenly feels self-conscious about the Pokémon cards. He may as well have given them a box with nothing inside it or a flashlight without a bulb. He heads back to the car, feeling Laura’s heavy gaze on his shoulders the whole way.
Dick is buckling himself in when Jason opens the passenger door. “Mind sharing with the class what information was so decisive you had no further questions?” he asks as he climbs into the car.
“No questions Terry could answer. This is the best we can do for a lead,” Dick explains. He needs to make a call, but that will have to wait until they’re on the road and not idling outside a victim’s house. Maybe he can take them to a restaurant, buy Jason a drink, a friendly gesture. Would Jason want to drink with him though?
“Yeah, about that,” Jason says as the car shoots off, “what lead?”
Scratch the drink; neither of them are lightweights, but on principle, they shouldn’t drink during an ongoing investigation. Still, he could buy them some sub sandwiches. He used to buy food for Tim all the time back in the day, as a reprieve from the typical Batman and Robin style of accidentally fasting until the case is resolved.
They reach a redlight almost immediately. Dick drums his fingers on the steering wheel. “Spyral uses this tech called ‘Hypnos 2.0.’ They slide in kind of like contacts? They’re eye implants basically, but they transmit information between your brain and the brain of whoever’s looking at you. Their most common application was hiding your identity. If someone looked at you, they’d just see a scrambled mess instead of a face.”
Jason’s face scrunches up as he stares out the windshield. He scratches his head. “Scrambled like Picasso or.”
The light turns green. “More like a spiral,” Dick says lightly, nodding conversationally.
“Thematic,” Jason comments.
“Very. And the uniforms weren’t too shabby either.” He adds the joke more to test the waters than anything, gauge how delicate a topic Spyral is between them. Everyone in their family has a slightly different relationship with Dick’s double life. Bruce and Damian’s have been the easiest, marked by faint curiosity about his activities and begrudging acceptance of help from associated colleagues. The others have been noticeably more dodgy and uncomfortable regarding for Spyral. Dick’s stint as as Agent 37 has made everyone evasive, even for bats.
If Jason would normally have an emotional reaction to Spyral, he’s too preoccupied for one now. Dick can practically see the gears in his mind turning as his eyes narrow and his chin falls to rest on his hand. Dick feels simultaneously relief and shame; of course, Spyral is just a lead. Spyral may have been Dick’s life at one point, but to Jason, it’s just an organization. At best, contacting Spyral could save his life. At worst, well, Dick’s not expecting Jason to unpack whatever baggage Dick left in Gotham.
Dick resists the urge to grimace at his own thoughts. He’s overthinking. Can one overthink a ruthless spy agency that up until a year ago controlled his every movement?
Jason’s voice, slow and thick with the sound of a city that’s always been his, reels Dick back to shore. “Dare I ask what the uniform entailed?”
“Cargo pants,” Dick answers simply. He’s watching the road ahead, but he can hear Jason make a pleasantly surprised noise. They pass a fire hydrant painted to look like a sunflower. Dick thinks it’d be nice for Bludhaven to do that and makes a note to push the idea at city hall after the case.
“So, you think that this guy is from Spyral?” Jason asks.
Dick shrugs. “That, or he’s connected enough to snag some tech. We should check first with the other two victims, see if their descriptions match up with Terry’s. If they do, it’s probably Spyral and not some low-grade black market street vendor. Nine of out ten optometrists do not recommend mind control contact lenses.”
Jason slams his hand down on the middle compartment. “Mind control?” he exclaims. When Dick glances at him, Jason’s expression is mostly shock with a sliver of what might be plain rage. But that would be an overreaction considering all the other crimes Spyral is guilty of. All the crimes they’re guilty of, especially Red Hood, although making that argument would be more trouble than it’s worth.
Dick tries not to let Jason’s sheer judgment weigh on him. Dick has far more pressing guilt elsewhere to torture himself over. Still, it’s hard not to feel righteous rage on Jason’s behalf. He often forgets this part of Jason’s character, this abrupt sense of justice that powers him, but it’s no less prominent than it is in Bruce or himself. It might actually be stronger in Jason, a little left of center, but bleeding red nonetheless. Unfortunately, car safety dictates Dick not be on the receiving end of justice, so he replies as casually as possible, “Well, that’s what Hypnos is, essentially.”
“No way.” Jason points an accusatory finger that Dick sees from his peripheral. A street corner features a hot dog stand. Dick nearly pulls over, but the finger might kill whatever buzz a chili dog can offer. “Don’t ‘that’s-what-Hypnos-is-Jason- obviously ’ me. You just said it transmits info.”
Dick did not think his tone had come off condescending in the least. But if that’s what Jason got from it, then perhaps he missed casual and landed on dismissive. Bludhaven must be eroding his tact already. “Sorry. When I said it transmits information, I meant it as a blanket statement for everything it does. Hypnos can alter memories, which is more-or-less how the identity protection works, by modifying one’s memory of a face. It can send someone a location address or really anything you have stored in your own memory, which is helpful. It can also send orders.”
“Yeah, I bet that’s helpful, too,” Jason derides. He looks like he smelled something bad. Was Dick this perturbed by Hypnos when he first joined Spyral? He doesn’t think so. He had been so quickly embroiled in so many terrible things. What was a little crowd control in the face of cold, efficient, and constant murder?
The guns. The feel of one is his hand like death itself, how they loomed in his bedroom and among his gear, beckoning him closer to an edge everyone wanted to push him off of. The guns had overshadowed all else for him.
“Either way,” Dick carries on, “it’s unlikely this guy has his hands on Spyral tech without Spyral knowing something about him. They keep close enough watch over people that have nothing to do with them, let alone people that have access to their technology. He could be anywhere from an engineer to a passing contact, but he’s no ghost.”
“Terrific. Exactly what I need, a mind-controlling stalker from an quasi-omniscient spy organization hellbent running around on the streets of Gotham.”
Dick shrugs. “Gotham’s had it worse.”
“Have I?”
“I don’t know. Have you?” Dick retorts.
Jason scowls. “Wouldn’t be my first assassination attempt, I suppose,” he concedes.
Dick perks up and offers him a grin. “And it won’t be your last!” he crows.
Jason just stares at him, utterly perplexed. His brows are furrowed and his mouth is curled above his teeth in bewilderment.
“Because you’ll be alive,” Dick hurriedly explains. “You know, like, woohoo!” He takes one hand off the wheel to pump the air triumphantly.
“Woohoo,” Jason repeats hollowly. “Insanity.”
“What?” asks Dick. They will be coming up on the grinder shop soon. Should he suggest lunch to Jason or just drag him in? He’s leaning towards dragging. That seems more effective.
“That we’re all just living to hopefully get killed a day that’s not tomorrow,” Jason observes.
It’s not more cynical than funny, but something in Jason’s tone — the utter resignation, perhaps — makes Dick laugh anyway. “Everyone on earth’s on borrowed time, really,” he says, not unhappily. Death hasn’t frightened him since he was young. Exposure therapy, he called it once during some Titans mission that feels a lot farther in the past than it is. “The reckless and foolhardy like us, we’re just more aware of it.”
Jason blows air out from his nose in a mix between a snort and a laugh. “And here I thought vigilante-types were less aware of their own mortality.”
“Are you kidding? You have to know you’re walking towards death to find that exact path each night. Snatched purses, drug rings, elitist assassins dressed as owls, fear gas and escaped convicts and murderous clowns — and we run right towards them with open arms,” Dick says, irony guiding his grin as Jason smirks back at him.
“And open chest cavities, half the the time,” Jason tacks on.
Dick nods fervently. “Yes, let’s not forget that,” he tries to say seriously, but laughter trips him on the last word. “I don’t know. I think it’s all very sane, actually, to see what’s going on and get involved, do what you can to make everything a little bit better. But too much sanity can look like insanity, for sure.”
Jason does snort this time. “Keep moralizing like that and you’ll sound straight out of a conversation between the Joker and B.”
Dick wrinkles his nose. “Ew. I hope not.”
“‘We’re the same, you and I,’” Jason croons in a wispy, sing-song voice. “‘Sane and in-sane.’”
Dick can make out the small, white-background-red-letters sign of Hester’s Grinders a few yards down the road. There’s just enough room before the fire hydrant — this one plain, chipped red — to safely park. “Alright, alright, I get it. I’ll keep my philosophies to myself. And so long as we’re changing the subject — hungry?”
Previous Chapter
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I was thinking of an AU were Star and Nightwing started dating like Dick and Kory. It is perfect because both live in different cities (Jump and Bludhaven) so it's more easy to cover up the other life. They didn't wanted to fall in love, especially because they live in different places and risk their life everyday, but they can't help it. And after an afternoon of welcome back sex, Richard starts to cook dinner and Kory finds the mask.
Ya know what, I’m still not doing requests (she says, pft i am trash) but fuck yes to this being written as a oneshot. It makes me smile.
Okay, so they don’t know who the other are then? A bit like Miraculous Ladybug where it’s painfully obvious bc they work together and stuff and yet with no masks or anything, then are like ey friend when normalcy kicks in?
Ite, anon, lemme’ know if I do your wonderful thoughts justice.
Edit post-writing this: I did not see the updates messages until now so it is what it is kinda thing. Hope it’s still iteee.
Discovery
It was steady and it was soothing. Warmth radiated against her cheek as she let go of a content sigh.
Her rouge hair was draped across her shoulders like a blanket, her surroundings acting completely as a cosy haven; one that she didn’t particularly want to move from anytime soon.
Kori smiled as she felt his fingertips dancing across the skin of her bare back, drawing random shapes. She inhaled his scent and rested a hand against his chest.
“I’ve missed this.” He rumbled,
Kori gave him a giggle, “Sexual interaction or…?”
He echoed her laugh, “All of it. You. It’s been some weeks since we’ve seen each other.”
A frown tugged at her lips as she eyed the silver ring around her middle finger,
“I apologise for that, Richard… I believe I have been… busy.”
He gave her waist a squeeze beneath the sheets, “That’s okay. I know we’ve both had things going on.” Dick replied, gulping.
The two remained in silence for a few moments. Kori chewed her lip as the fading sunlight shining between the curtains ricocheted off of her ring; the thing that kept a barrier between them in some sense.
She withheld a sigh. Kori hated being unable to tell him more about her life; who she really was and let Dick in on that part of who she was and what she did.
But, it was tricky. Being Starfire of the Titans was a bit of a surprise to tell someone she had only recently started getting serious with.
She gnawed on her bottom lip as she also considered how much cosier she had been getting with one of her teammates. Nightwing and her had always been close, as far as teammates went but recently… there seemed to be moments between them where whatever they shared was seeming like more.
This was niggling at her too. She didn’t want to mess anything up with Dick who was now idly playing with strands of her hair. He was so gentle and so caring and she could see things between them lasting for a long time, if she was being honest with herself.
He tapped his fingers against her back, “It’s getting kinda late in the day… you hungry?”
Kori glanced up at him, smiling brightly, “Famished.”
Dick grinned and leaned in, brushing his lips against hers briefly.
“How does pizza sound?”
She giggled, “You are so lazy.”
Pouting at her, he tilted his head, “I have no energy to cook for you, m’lovely. You took it out of me.”
Kori rolled her eyes and then smiled reassuringly at him, “Pizza sounds wonderful.”
He dropped a kiss on the tip of her nose before detangling himself from her and slipping from the bed. Kori smirked as she watched him slip into a pair of boxers and shuffle into the kitchen.
She closed her eyes, rolling around in the sheets and collecting the heat from where he had just moved away from. Kori inhaled a deep breath as she heard him speaking on the phone, presumably to the pizza parlour.
Swinging her legs over the edge of the bed, she stood and slipped her own underwear back on. She knew human females were supposedly quite modest regarding nudity and whilst Starfire had no problem with it and actually embraced being free from clothing, she had a feeling her “human” counterpart Kori would be expected to do the opposite.
She hummed a quiet tune to herself as she pulled Dick’s “Gotham” jersey over her head, loving the way the material felt against her skin and how it smelled so much of her lover.
Kori happily skipped from the room, really looking around his apartment. It was simplistic but very homey. He had few photos around and there wasn’t much colour but she liked it. There was almost a modern style about it.
As she walked past one of the large windows, she ran her fingertips against the back of the navy sofa, sending tickles through her hand. It was soft and was calling out to her; the lazy feeling within rearing it’s head again.
She grinned and threw herself down on the couch, accidentally knocking a pile of magazines from the coffee table with her feet.
Kori pulled a face, “Oops…” she muttered, immediately sitting up.
Shifting the magazines and collecting them up, she raised an eyebrow at an unusual object that had fallen amongst them.
Setting the magazines on the sofa just beside her, she leaned down and picked it up.
Her eyebrows furrowed as she sat staring at a black domino mask with sharply cut edges. She narrowed her eyes. Why did this seem so familiar?
“Okay, Kori, pizza’s gonna be 20 minutes or so. How would you feel about a shower-”
He trailed off and froze as he re-entered the main room. She quickly turned around, mask still in hand and held it up in the direction of his face.
Kori dropped it as realisation struck and she took a step back, suddenly beginning to feel very self-conscious.
“You…” She murmured, trying to understand why Dick looked so much like Nightwing with the piece of material held up to his face.
“Kori… I… uh…” He stammered,
She shook her head, “Why… why do you have a mask like that?”
“It’s… a… uh… for a halloween?”
“It is May.”
“I like to be super prepared?”
She cocked her head to the side, “Dick?”
He sighed and rubbed the back of his neck, “I can explain… I promise.”
Kori took a few steps towards him, “Please… are you… Nightwing?”
Running a hand through his ebony hair, he offered her a sheepish and nervous smile,
“Um… guilty?”
She blinked before pacing back and forth, “Oh no…” She muttered, more so to herself than him,
Dick defensively held his hands up, “Okay… wait, I know this is a lot to take. Kori, I just-”
She turned to face him again, a sheepish smile of her own painted across her features, “That is not it.”
“Then… what is it?”
Kori bit her lip before scrunching her face up in apprehension, “I… just… please do not do the freaking out…”
His brows furrowed and he slowly nodded.
Keeping eye contact with him, she slowly removed the silver ring from her right hand and barely registered the gasp that he emitted. Her heart was hammering away in her chest and she could barely hear anything else but that.
“Star...fire?” He uttered from where he stood, blinking in disbelief,
She cringed, “Um... surprise?”
“What... how...” Dick spluttered,
Kori shrugged and walked up to him, taking his hands with her own.
“Please... I do not wish for this to change us...”
He took a deep breath, “Of course not, Kori... uh... Star... um...”
She giggled, she couldn’t help it. He smiled a little and rubbed the back of his neck, nervously.
“I guess we have a few things to talk about over dinner, huh?”
Kori smiled up at him, “I believe the expression is ‘just a tad’...”
In a quick movement, he took her chin and gave her a kiss. It was brief and it was nice but ended way too soon for Kori’s liking.
“What-” She began,
Dick smirked, “I’ve been staring at you for weeks wondering what it might be like to kiss Starfire.”
“I believe you now know a lot more than just what kissing me is like.” She purred, glancing up at him through her lashes.
His cheeks tinged pink but he smirked, “I believe you’re correct there, Princess.”
#asks#requests#teen titans#dc#dickkory#robstar#starfire#nightwing#koriand'r#kori anders#dick grayson#oneshot#fanfiction
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