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blueikeproductions · 2 years

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Still observing BotBots since there’s been a bit of time to better gage people’s reactions to the show.

General consensus I’m getting is mostly “S’ok, BUT…!” with the buts typically being art style quibbles and observations on the humor. One comment that stuck out described the humor as “early-mid SpongeBob” but with too much shouting and overexplaining the jokes after setting them up.

I’ve noticed some shows do that a lot lately, and I don’t get why. Is that a new hip thing to do? Am I that old? (I’m in my early 30’s as of typing but still). Either way, if you have to explain the joke constantly, that’s not a great indicator of your show’s humor to me. Screaming your lines isn’t much better, bad TUFF Puppy memories, and I was mostly ok with TUFF otherwise.

Art style quibbles are what I see most of in my orbit, and even I’m kind of questioning what was going on here. Going by Instagram posts promoting the show, it seems changing the art style was the first thing they focused on, with different experiments on the Lost Bots. Burgertron at one point was very muscular, having Launchpad McQuack and Optimus like proportions (I guess someone was having fun with Grade A Beef Cake jokes at that stage). That design seems to have been repurposed for a french fry BotBot though, and for some reason he makes me think of TFA Sentinel… Must be the chin.

The female Lost Bots‘ final designs, similar to their toys, use an androgynous look, but concept art had both with really defined hips and comically tiny waists that I can’t help but laugh at after some factions complained about most female TF body types being too sexy. (Even then that always felt like a double standard to me going by some of the same people being totally fine with Prime Arcee’s bikini get up...). Even then Kickme still has really long legs still (perfect for kicking naturally) and has this X-J9 as a Crash Test Dummy vibe so far removed from the Mamemon looking toy I‘m surprised it’s just not a separate characte called Goalie or Kickstart.

Dimlit had a phase where he looked like a robot from Dexter’s Lab, and Clogstopper at one point was closer to his toy but had a scuba gear motif I kinda wish was kept. I’m actually not even sure what they were going for with Clogstopper’s new design. He looks like a Family Guy character in crappy Iron Man armor and if you weren’t already aware of his toy, he looks like he Transforms into a tube of Krazy Glue instead of a plunger. Dave the security guard kinda weirds me out because he looks like a disheveled middle aged Flint Lockwood (not helped is he specifically reminds me of the animated series version visually. -shudders-), and my first thought with him is he’s the Mr. Crocker/Gargamel of the show out to get the BotBots. And while he still… more or less is this, surprisingly he’s actually a nice guy and when put into a position to prove the Bots exist, he doesn‘t and assures them they’ll be ok. This backfires of course because an earlier panic call to the authorities leads to, surprisingly, a Sector Seven agent to drop by to investigate the tiny robots.

Sector Seven is a surprise since that organization had never really made the leap from the movies to other major non movie media (it was honestly right there in Prime and other Aligned media had it tweaked its direction. Even Cybervers’s first season easily could’ve been Bee on the run from Seymour Simmons and other nosy Sector Seven agents for awhile instead of just Slipstream’s jets). It’s also a surprise the show could potentially have a plot beyond “lil’ TFs partying it up in a shopping mall”, dare I say a revelation as to how the Energon gas came to be and created the BotBots? That’s always been a weird detail to me since A it’s a surprising lack of the Allspark, and B Energon as life giving stuff hasn’t really been played up since, well, TF Energon, and C the toys’ storyline seems to imply the regular Transformers don’t even exist beyond an in-universe product. I had a Cyberverse crossover bit where the BotBots were the result of Cheetor and BlackArachnia dropping the Allspark in a mall they were passing through and the impact sent a wave of Energon that birthed the BotBots, but the possibility the show could go with its own elaboration to the origin of the Energon gas is interesting. Easy answer is Sector Seven obtained a sample from the regular Transformers fighting over a chunk, and upon studying it, accidentally detonated it, the resulting mist bathing the mall. But even then that’s wishful thinking, and there’s really no reason for them to do so. Sector Seven being a go to alien investigation government antagonist once again works just fine. Still Sector Seven being in a new cartoon makes me wonder if they have a role in EarthSpark and will have a more solidified role in future cartoons.

Still the show itself largely just seems to be ok, and that’s all good. It WAS trending on Netflix yesterday a little later in the early afternoon so more people were checking it out than I was expecting. The only TF stuff that’s been constantly popular and trending were RotF and DotM, meaning people were far more interested in the movies than BotBots for a moment. What does that tell you, lol, but either way, seems BotBots is being watched now. And as much as it seems I’m ragging on it, I DO genuinely hope it (and EarthSpark) do well to encourage Hasbro to experiment more with the brand again and to stop reheating stale ideas (Prime Wars, War For Cybertron and Cyberverse were all heavily tethered to G1 nostalgia and slightly unpopular modern ideas and IDW tendencies and offered very little new ideas. Not to mention both pretty much expected you to be already be intimately familiar with TFs going in to fill in gaps, that it’s no wonder the current kid audiences tuned it out but main stay adult fans latched on to both). BotBots is entry point friendly for new kids, and I especially hope that’s the case for EarthSpark as well.

One last observation. As noted before, the voice talent is the Nelvana cast popular for shows like Medabots, Bakugan and Total Drama, so fears of having the somewhat unpopular voice talent and direction from WFC and Cyberverse return so far isn‘t an issue, with a much welcome return to better voice acting. I’m wondering if EarthSpark might also be made up of Nelvana voice talent, and if so makes me curious who in the talent pool would be a good Prime, Bee and Megsy. The guy who voiced Metabee is currently the French fry BotBot, so I wonder what Transformer in EarthSpark could be given the Metabee treatment~! Prime, RiD15 and Rescue Bots shared the same talent pool, and similarly Cyberverse, WFC and RBA shared their own distinct voice talent, so it’s not out of the realm of possibility! However if not them, considering EarthSpark is a Nick show and those shows mostly keep to the same talent pool for their own stuff, what are the odds we could get Tom Kenny to reprise Starscream~?

#botbots #blueike productions #transformers #maccadam #transformers botbots #botbots spoilers #blueike

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flannelpunkcalum · 4 years

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Twinkle Twinkle Little Bat - Chapter 3

last chapter

cw: death but also there’s like a lil hot stuff in the middle to even it out? I realized when writing this chapter and the next one this is gonna be p dark but i guess Aspen got kidnapped and tortured last time so you guys will be fine. i saw a moose today.

tdwk masterlist

ttlb masterlist

* * *

“I gotta come over for dinner more often.” Aspen said, spooning more spinach on her plate. Spinach. What the fuck was Alfred’s cooking doing to her? She never ate her vegetables. “Actually, I should have you guys over for dinner one of these days so you can truly appreciate what Mr. Pennyworth does for you. A terrible little palate cleanser.”

“You flatter me, Ms. McMichael.”

If Aspen didn’t know better, she’d say Alfred was blushing. They were all eating around the kitchen table, feasting on homemade turkey meatballs, spinach, brown rice, and sweet potato, all topped with some kind of sauce that she just wanted to bathe in. It was healthy, sure, but it was good. “I’m telling the truth. I feel like I’ve been trapped in a culinary version of Plato’s allegory of the cave, and I’ve finally left the shadows on the wall behind.”

“High praise indeed.”

“Indeed.” She grinned.

“I think it’s good, too.” Dick piped up. If Aspen looked down, she could see his legs swinging under his chair. When she had come into the manor, he had immediately pulled her over to the kitchen, competing with her to scoop meatballs out of the pan while Alfred wasn’t looking. He’d used any time when he didn’t have his mouth full to tell her about his day at school. Calum hadn’t tried to pull her away; they both knew they could talk about the meeting in depth after dinner and before patrol. The looks he kept giving her out of the corner of his eye made her think he had noticed something was wrong, but for now, especially in front of Dick, they were leaving it be. Aspen was starting to really get attached to her new dysfunctional nuclear family.

“Thank you, Master Grayson.” Alfred nodded.

It was moments like this that Aspen regretted letting Calum into her heart. What if things went sour between them and she lost this? The good food, the company, Alfred’s buttoned-up love, Dick’s easy devotion. It was supposed to be better to have love and lost, she knew, but this was the first time she had felt like this in years. If Calum tried to ice her out, she’d lose a family on top of everything. She wanted to believe they were both too mature to let that happen, but sometimes she had trouble having faith in that.

“Aspen?”

“Hmm?” She looked up to find all three of the boys staring at her. “Sorry, I zoned out.”

“Dick was asking about how the meeting with the DA went today.” Calum said helpfully. Aspen could see mischief in his eyes - evidently, that bastard was proud of how long he had managed to weasel into her meeting.

Aspen took a deep breath, collecting herself. “Well,” she said, “after a diplomatic compromise had been reached where your guardian would accompany me to the meeting to say hi, but not - not - insert himself into it, he of course went and did that anyways.”

Calum’s eyebrows furrowed like he was hurt. He wasn’t. She wasn’t going to fall for it - butter wouldn’t melt in his perfect mouth. “Finch invited me in. I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“I dunno how you’ve kept your identity a secret so long, you’re a terrible liar.” Aspen turned to Dick and Alfred, gesturing with her fork as she spoke. “He deliberately used language that would make Finch, who is already eager to please him based on status, feel socially required to invite him in. And then he was smug about it.”

Cal ducked his head, smiling sheepishly. He liked being caught by her. “I wasn’t that smug.” He said to the rest of the table.

The implicit confirmation of Aspen’s accusation didn’t go unnoticed by anyone, as far as she could tell. Good.

“You were smug enough.” Aspen said to him before turning back to Dick. “But the rest of it went fine. We talked about the two trials. They’re probably gonna offer Liam a plea bargain to testify against Falcone, which I’m fine with. It’s whatever. I mean -” she said, realizing that that flippant language showed how much she was bothered, “- I don’t think he’d, like, try to kidnap me again, so it’s something I’m comfortable with.”

“You look nervous.” Dick said.

Fuck kids and their openness. Aspen was starting to think that Dick knew he was a cute young man, and was using his innocent look against her. “...I am a little nervous.” She said after a minute. Under the table, Calum’s hand found her knee and squeezed in support. She took a deep breath before continuing. “It’s still kinda fresh, and I found out that some stuff happened while I was knocked out today that I didn’t know about, which is fun to deal with. But from a logical point of view, I know that Liam’s unlikely to do anything criminal with Falcone out of the way, and our best chance to get Falcone out of the way is to use his testimony. So.” She sliced a meatball in half and stuck it in her mouth so she didn’t have to talk about it anymore.

Calum’s hand left her knee as he leaned in towards her. Aspen mourned the loss of its warmth, but she knew with Dick around the gesture was really risky anyways. “What was it you found out? You didn’t mention anything.”

Aspen took her time chewing and swallowing. “Um. It’s just - you know what, I’d rather not talk about it at the table. It’s not a big deal in the grand scheme of things, it’s just new, you know?”

To her surprise, Dick nodded sagely. “I know.”

“...I guess you all would, huh.” Aspen commented, surveying the table for a moment. There was probably no other group that would understand better than the one she found herself in. She was lucky. Group therapy with catering. “Thanks.” She said, and she meant it.

“We’re all here for you, Ms. McMichael.” Alfred said, and affection in his voice made Aspen feel close to tears.

“Alright, alright, don’t make me cry at the table.” Aspen finished the spinach on her plate and laid her cutlery on her plate with the handles together. “Gangin’ up on me, the whole Batfamily, not a merciful bone in your bodies. I don’t know why I bother to come by.”

Alfred started to gather the plates, but as Aspen stood up to help Calum laid a hand on her arm, stopping her from reaching her water glass. “Come up to my office? I want to know what happened at the meeting after I left.”

Aspen tried not to get evasive. She knew what that meant. “Sure.” She chirped, drawing her hand back. “Call me for dessert, alright?” She said to Dick as she followed Calum out of the kitchen. He saluted, which she paused in the doorway to return.

“Aspen?”

“I’m coming.” She said, hurrying to catch up to Calum. Every so often he’d do his fast busy-CEO-with-places-to-be walk again, and she’d have to rush after him like it was her first day all over again. It was rarely a good sign.

She didn’t try to talk to him on the way to his office. She just followed in his slipstream until the heavy oak door was closed behind them. Before she could sit down in one of the cushy leather armchairs, he grabbed her hand, spinning her around so she was facing him. He held one hand at her jaw and the other at her waist, so she couldn’t move, couldn’t even turn her face away from him. He was going to press her for details, now. Interrogate her.

“You should have said something sooner.”

Wait, what?

Aspen met Calum’s eyes, startled out of her apprehension. He brushed his thumb over her cheekbone, looking at her... tenderly. Was this a ruse? Good cop sans bad cop? “I didn’t realize you were that shaken back there.” He continued.

She flexed her shoulder in the tinitest shrug possible. “It didn’t need to get in the way.”

Calum tilted her face in his grip, and she let him. She didn’t struggle as he looked her over, like he was trying to see through her. She wanted to, but she didn’t. “It’s important to me that you feel safe. I could have ended the meeting, I could have gotten you out of there. That’s why I went in the first place, right? Not to bother you. To look after you.”

Aspen blinked. She hadn’t really thought about it that way. “I didn’t need to end the meeting. I did fine. I mean, sure, I had my moments, but - that’s not important.” She smiled a little. “But thank you.”

She tried to crane up for a kiss, but Calum’s grip was unyielding. What? “No. Don’t try to distract me. This is important.” He said sternly.

She sighed, and with his tight grip on her she knew he could feel it. “No, come on, I’m vulnerable. Give me some creature comforts here.”

“Soon.” Calum said, sliding his arm around her shoulders and tucking her into his side.

He lead her towards the couch, and once she sat down he adjusted her so her head was resting on his shoulder. “Bossy.” Aspen squirmed, but he only kissed her forehead in response.

“Tell me about it.”

Aspen took a deep breath. Exactly what was she gonna say? She could stall by willfully misinterpreting him, that was a start. “Well, I’m gonna be very generous and not wax poetic on you being a control freak, and a-”

“Quit stalling.”

“Fine.” She sighed. Might as well rip off the band-aid. “I didn’t know that Liam had put me in his trunk. I didn’t really think about the logistics of him driving me at all, but I just - learning that he just shoved me in the trunk kind of shook me for a second. So that wasn’t great.” Wait. Maybe she should have resisted his interrogation further. He was the one who had brought that up, not Finch, and realizing that - he’d probably feel like shit. “Like I said, it wasn’t a big deal.”

This time, it was Aspen who could feel Calum sigh. “I forget you never watched the footage.” He said, by way of apology.

“It’s fine. I’m especially glad I didn’t, now, but…” Aspen tried to laugh, but Calum didn’t budge. “I got through it fine, I really did. It was just hard to think about for a minute.”

Calum turned his head to kiss her forehead again. She politely did not take this opportunity to jump his bones and distract him. “I have something else you’ll probably want to know, but you’re not gonna like it.” He didn’t even shift nervously under her, but she could feel tension in him grow. “It’s not that bad.” She said to soothe him.

Calum laughed at that. “Whenever you say that, I get really nervous.”

“Fuck off.” She said,but she was smiling bravely. At least they weren’t so distressed now. “You can’t, like, go on the warpath about this, okay?”

“Tell me.”

Aspen braced herself. “After you left, Finch asked me to go to Blackgate and try to convince Liam to take the plea.”

Calum didn’t move.

That was worse than him sighing. Aspen twisted in his grip until he let go of her enough to let her turn sideways and pull herself into his lap, like a heroine on the cover of a romance novel. “I said no, of course, and I told him I wouldn’t tattle so you can’t go ballistic on him the next time you see him, alright?”

He shook his head. He wasn’t looking at her, now, eyes focused sharp like he was going to set a lampshade on fire with his glare. “I should have stayed.”

“No, you shouldn’t have. It’s his job to ask, Cal, and this way we know something about him we wouldn’t have otherwise.”

Calum was shifting now, like he was gonna get up and head after Finch right this second. “That he’s a rat bastard who doesn’t deserve to -”

“No, that he’ll do anything to get Falcone charged.” Aspen said. It was her turn to grab his face and make him look at her. His jaw felt like it was throbbing in her hands. “He goes after the big dogs. Maybe he’s a bit, um, obtuse about it, but we can use that.”

She was right. Calum had to admit that. But now he was avoiding her gaze. She hadn’t seen him mad like that since… one of her stupid escapades, maybe. Somehow it was worse, seeing him all worked up over someone else.

“I know it’s frustrating to not be able to do anything about it.” She said after a long moment of his silence. “But hey, on the plus side, I’m not lying to you about it.”

Calum snorted despite himself. “I would have found it out.”

Aspen smiled, and pressed a kiss to his still lips. “No, you wouldn’t have.”

He didn’t smile back against her lips, but he did bring a hand up to cradle her face. “I wanted to be there so you’d feel comfortable, so this would’t -” He cut himself off, looking at her as softly as he could manage. “Now would be a good time for you to try that distracting thing you do.”

She could work with that.

Aspen pushed on his shoulders, and for once Calum fell back easily, twisting so he was lying flat on the couch. She straddled his lap, taking a moment to look at him. On a whim, she tried reaching out and smoothing the wrinkle in his forehead. “You worry about me too much.” She said.

“I worry about you just enough. Now come on,” he almost whined, reaching up for the back of her head, “get down here.”

Her lips were on his before his hand could tangle in her hair, and for the third time that day, Aspen kissed him like she wasn’t his secret and they had all the time in the world. He brought his other hand down to her waist, dangerously low, and for a second she wondered if they had time. If they could fall apart together on this leather couch before dessert. They didn’t have the time, she knew that, but with the feeling of his lips on hers and the soft glide of their tongues she almost didn’t care.

Calum sighed and shifted underneath her, and she lifted one hand from where it was supporting her to cup his face and direct the kiss a little more. Yeah, he was gonna break it off eventually, but she was going to make it as hard for him as possible. In fact… Aspen rocked gently on her knees, drawing herself over Calum’s groin, whimpering into his mouth just a little so he’d know how much she wanted him. Calum moved fast, grabbing her hips with both hands tight enough that she couldn’t do it again. “Don’t,” he warned. “We don’t have time.”

Aspen made another little sound and rested her forehead against his, relaxing in his grip. Calum didn’t budge. Damn, he saw right through her ruse. “Jus’ wanna feel you,” she whined.

“So feel me here.” He craned up to kiss her.

“It’s not enough.”

Calum sighed so big she could feel his chest rise against hers, then moved his hands to pull her in. One travelled back to the back of her neck, pushing her to nestle her face in the crook of his neck. “We’ll figure something out eventually,” He said. He was so close he only needed to flex his lips to kiss her neck. “But just this for now, okay?”

“You know you’re only building the anticipation.” Aspen grumbled, squirming a little in his grip until she slipped down on one side of him. Her leg was thrown over his, and if she had been desperate she could have bucked her hips to taste a little friction that way. She wasn’t desperate, though. Not so much, not yet. “It’d be better to let it out in a controlled setting.” She grazed her fingers along his chest, feeling the warmth of his skin under his shirt. “I know you like to be in control.”

Calum caught her hand in one of his, holding it tight enough Aspen barely tried to tug it free before she gave up. “Why don’t you ever behave, then?”

Aspen kissed his cheek. “You gotta earn it.”

With that, she rolled away and stood up, leaving Calum on the couch. It was getting dark out now, and she used her reflection in the window to brush her hair back into place. In the slight warping of the glass, she could see Calum stand up behind her and make his way over, wrapping his arms around her waist to hug him into her.

“Oh, you really are distracted.”

Calum laughed a little, meeting her eyes in their reflection. “Can you blame me?” He cuddled her closer, and for once Aspen didn’t try to rub herself up against him. She could feel him pressing into her ass, hard enough to feel through their clothes. “You have no idea how much I want to bend you over my desk right now.” He continued, voice dropping low. “You’d be quiet for me, wouldn’t you, baby?”

Aspen pulled herself out of his grip, face warm, and wheeled around to face him. He was smug, again, smirking back at her as she tried to regain her composure. This wasn’t fair. “Who’s teasing now?”

“I guess you’re rubbing off on me.” Calum grinned.

“You - fuck off.” She tried to tuck her shirt in, although it hadn’t been before - she needed something to do with her hands. “I would be rubbing off on you right now if you weren’t such a fucking spoilsport.” She grumbled.

Calum grabbed her hand and squeezed it once before letting it fall back to her side. “Let’s go downstairs, Penny. Dessert’s probably waiting.”

“Coulda had dessert up here, but no, Calum wants his fuckin’ souffle.”

He was still pleased with himself behind her, she could hear it in his voice when he said “Call it payback.”

“For what?”

As she opened the door, he pulled the knob from her hand so he could hold it for her, and maybe fix himself behind it. “Everything.”

Aspen laughed, and she was still laughing when she caught sight of Dick coming down the hall. Fuck. She didn’t try to rein her laughter in, that would have just looked suspicious, so she just asked “Is dessert ready?” to signal to Calum that they had an audience.

“Just about.” Dick said. He waited for them to reach him before they all started down the hall together. Even though she was a little miffed that she couldn’t keep flirting brazenly with Calum, it was nice to have all three of them walking down the hallway, almost like they were in slow motion. Almost like they were a family. Not that she was ready to be a mom to Dick, or anything - fuck, he’d been through enough, she didn’t need to inflict herself on him.

But she’d stay as long as they asked her to.

* * *

“I can’t believe you’re allowed to be up this late on a school night.” Aspen grumbled from her place at the control panel.

“I’ve got all As.” Dick said evenly into his hot chocolate.

“Yeah, well, when I was your age I had A bedtime.” Dick didn’t reply to that, and it took Aspen all of fifteen seconds of him giving her that serene yet challenging look he did for her to cave. He had almost definitely learned it from Calum. “I’m just fussing because I would have loved to do this when I was your age. I’m, like, retroactively jealous.”

“Sure.”

Aspen pretended to glare at Dick, which finally got him to crack a smile and break his own facade. “You have whipped cream on your nose.” She lied, just to make him check.

“Are you two playing nice in there?”

Calum’s voice came through the comms they both wore, making them both sit up a little more in their chairs. When he was out on patrols, he had the option to tune into their channel or not, as he saw fit. They had the same option back at the cave, but they never really turned his feed down unless he was, like, eating a granola bar on a safe rooftop somewhere. Aspen knew she was powerless if things went sideways, of course, but it made her feel a little bit better.

“Always.” Aspen said, at the same time that Dick said “No.”

Calum huffed a little under his breath. That was as close as he got to a laugh on these nights. “Alright.” They heard wind brushing past the mouthpiece, a tiny grunt as he settled on some surface. “‘S quiet tonight.”

“Too quiet?” Aspen asked, looking at the little red dot showing where he was in the city.

“No. Like the last few nights.”

“Do you think it’s because Falcone’s in jail?” Dick pipped up.

Calum took his sweet time answering. “That, or something’s coming.”

Aspen rolled her chair over to the police scanner and turned it up a little. She didn’t want to think about that. She was sure she’d be able to handle whatever came her way, and Calum was too, or else she wouldn’t be allowed down here. She poked her tongue into the inside of her cheek, a nervous tick she’d developed when she was getting used to her scar healing on that side.

She could handle a lot. She just had to remember that.

“You could go break up a brawl at Amsterdarn.” She suggested after a moment of listening through the static.

Calum snorted.

Aspen didn’t blame him. Amsterdarn was one of those flashy mixology bars, which she could only assume was full of designer party drugs and weird things to smoke. Right now, Venom was more of a cheap, dangerous fix for those with nowhere else to turn, so there was nothing there to interest him. Just trust fund kids getting scrappy and giving each other bloody noses.

As opposed to her trust fund kid, who did almost the same thing but in body armour.

Whatever. If the GCPD couldn’t handle some rowdy financial analysts, they didn’t deserve to have the Batman risking his neck against the supercriminals out there.

“I’m going to use this time to monitor a few active targets I’ve had my eye on.” Calum said finally.

“Man, I’m sorry I’m stuck back here.” Aspen deadpanned.

Dick laughed, but tried not to. “I’m glad to be here. I’m learning.”

“Yeah, yeah, boy wonder.” She rolled her eyes.

“It’s late.” Calum interrupted. “You should go home.”

Aspen had been thinking about it, but now that he had said that she was staying. “I’ll be fine. I only really need to be awake for an hour or two tomorrow, anyways, the only important thing I have planned is that meeting with the hospital.”

“Oh, no big deal, then.”

“It’s a school night, you can’t talk to me.” Aspen fired back to Dick, and pretended to listen to the police scanner again. Maybe she should make gels tonight. Keep herself busy. She hadn’t had much need to run any DNA analysis gels, other than doing a few test runs and cute science experiments with Dick, but it would be good to be prepared. Shouldn’t make Gotham’s Caped Crusader wait on agar to harden.

That was pretty much how the night went. Aspen made agar gels to keep herself awake, and Dick drank hot chocolate and monitored the console just in case. After an hour or two of listening to Calum breathe in her ear she looked up and realized the kid had fallen asleep, so she took a moment to go off coms and shepherd him into bed. She wasn’t sure if Alfred was awake or not, but she did feel confident that he’d appear if anything did go sideways so she didn’t mind looking after the cave herself. Just her and the bats, and she liked the bats.

It was late - one? Two? When the call came through. Well, not call. Calum just said, very suddenly, after an hour of comfortable silence - “Did you hear that?”

“Hear what?” Aspen’s stomach twisted.

“Police scanner,” was all Calum said, and Aspen set her erlenmeyer down to hurry over to the little radio box.

“...car 62-4, could we get a 10-9? Over.”

“10-100 near pier 72 at Port Adams, over.”

“Car 57-2, we’re about eight minutes away, over.”

“10-4 57-2, forensics is on its way. Over and out.”

Aspen hadn’t memorized the police codes yet. She had a cheat sheet nearby - somewhere - fuck, she couldn’t find it. “What does that mean?” It wasn’t a shooting, it wasn’t a psych patient, a riot was a 10-34…

“It’s a dead body.”

Aspen bit her bottom lip. “Oh.”

“I’m going to check it out. Might be able to get some good information before the CSI team tramples all over it.”

Now was not the time for Aspen to argue with Calum over his disrespect of her (unknowing) colleagues, so she just nodded, even though he couldn’t see her. She knew a lot of trade went in and out of Port Adams every day, and a lot of it was underground. Cal was probably hoping this body would help him crack into a smuggling ring somehow, and she knew he loved racing the cops on almost every occasion. Aspen was still just getting used to responding to that kind of thing.

Calum got there first, she could tell from the blip on the screen and his little pant of triumph as it got closer to the docks. “I see it. I’m setting the cowl to photography mode.” He said.

“Sounds good.” Aspen said, like she was excited to look at pictures of a corpse.

“I’ll upload them to you as I - oh, no. Is he there?”

Aspen’s stomach twisted. They didn’t use names on the comm, but she knew who he meant. If he didn’t want Dick to see the body, it must have been bad. “No, he went to bed.”

She heard Calum let out a long slow breath. “Good.” Another pause. “Shit.”

Aspen could hear sirens now through Calum’s mic. He had to get out of there before the Bat became a suspect, but before she could remind him the first of the photos uploaded to the console in the Batcave. It was dark, but her eyes didn’t even need a minute to adjust before it hit her like ice cold water - “Oh my god.”

She was a child.

#welcome to the plot bitches #as always lmk what you think!!!! how you're feeling!!!!#happy monday #and what have y #my wriring #ch blurb #ch fic #calum hood series #calum hood fic #5sos fic #5 seconds of summer #5 seconds of summer fic #ttlb 3 #ttlb #this would have been up sooner if my network had let me upload the pic

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