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kaylathekittykat225 · 5 years ago

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Bonds Across Lifetimes // Dick Grayson X Reader

Warning/s: death, pain, um, flirting? It’s a relationship based one basically

Word Count: 4,217

I thought this was cute, but then again, this is something I wrote almost two years ago and dug up out of my computer, so please don’t judge me too hard core about the corniness.

Here’s my Masterlist.

Enjoy.

—–

Bonds can span lifetimes. The bond of friendship is the foundation to every other bond known to mankind. No one can yet explain how a bond is formed; but whether through magic, other worldly intervention, or something as simplistic as the workings of human emotions, bonds are formed within the first moments of meeting.

Age 8:

Driving through on the outskirts of the city of Gotham is one mistake you would wish your parents never made, but at the same time is happy that you were on the snowy road on the Christmas Eve of 2007.

As you opened your tired eyes, you had to blink multiple times to get the clouds out of your eyes. You looked around, wondering when you fell asleep in the car, taking a while before you notice that the car your family had had as long as you could remember was shoved into a tree on your daddy's side of the car.

"Mommy?" Your young voice squeaked out, looking for your parents around you, not seeing them in the front seats. "Daddy?"

The front window was gone, where did that go too?

You reached for your seat belt, wanting nothing more than to walk around and find where your parents went off to and know why they left you in the car. But your car seat was in the way, pinning the buckle beneath the plastic seat.

"Hello?" All around you from what you could see out the window looked like a bunch of trees with the classic fluffy snowflakes of a Gotham winter covering the car and everything around it.

There were no houses or roads or anything to tell you where you were.

Or the better question, why you were alone in your car.

"Help," Your voice grew quiet, your lower lip began to tremble as warm tears in your eyes began to spill over and run down your cheeks.

A tree branch snapped loudly near you, your sobs stopping to listen for who, or what, was coming near you.

Was it a bear?

Were there even bears in Gotham? Or what if it was Joker, or Penguin, but why would they-

"Robin, really? A stick?"

"Sorry." Two voices began bickering at each other, one sounding older than the other. "I just wanted to get a better look."

Two figures stepped in front of your car; their shadows were all you could see through the heavy snow fall. "They look dead, both of them." The younger of the two voices spoke, the smaller shadow moving around and got darker as it got closer to the car.

"Robin, don't get closer, I smell gasoline." The older and scratchier voice called to the younger one, the shadow stopped getting closer and looked like it started to get farther away.

As the voice spoke, your nose agreed with him, the smell of a gas station whenever your dad would fill up your car filled your nose. You never did like that smell, it smelled like bad corn on the cob. "What if someone else is in the car, Bruce?"

"They would have been killed with the crash as well, there's no way someone could have survived a head on collision with a tree. We need to leave before the cops show up; I called them as soon as I saw the car."

"Wow, you think of everything, Bruce!"

"Robin, it's Batman when we're out on patrol."

"Oh, sorry." The two voices went farther and farther away from you, the shadows fading away.

You wiggled in your seat, trying again to get free from your seat belt keeping you stuck in the car, the gas smell started to like roasting marshmallows and burnt cookies, "Help! Wait! Please! Help me!" Tears rolled down your face as your fingers began to bleed, the plastic cutting into your skin; your screams and sobs now mixing with coughs from the smell and air chocking you.

How could a little one like you possibly understand what the two voices meant when your parents were dead? How could they be? You just saw them a minute ago when they were driving home.

"Help!" Your voice croaked, the loud screaming hurting your throat, the snot you kept swallowing didn't help either.

Something loudly boomed on the roof of your car, a blanket covered the window behind you, which somehow was still together after being shoved into a tree. The only thing now that allowed you to see was the fire burning from the front of your car.

Wait, fire?

"Hi." A face popped in front of your broken window out of nowhere, the hot yellow fire lighting up his black mask and the smile on his face. The sudden movement proceeded to cause you to scream again, leaning into the corner of your car seat with nowhere to go. "Hey, it's okay. I'm here to get you out." You nodded your head after noticing that he talked like a kid your age.

The boy took out a knife, the silver glinting in the fire light, oh right, the fire. You looked over at the front of the car and saw the fire coming closer to you. "You're free." The boy told you, grabbing your hand to pull you out the window and led you away from your car and the tree it was smashed into.

As soon as the two of you stepped behind a tree, a loud and resounding boom filled your ears, a shock wave shaking the ground beneath you.

You pressed your hands to your ears; all you could hear was ringing while you felt someone hugging you to them. Their breath hitting your face, their own heart beat pounding against your cheek, the rate easily out racing your own.

---

There you were.

Shivering in the cold snow up to your ankles, your purple dress torn and tattered.

Your right foot was cold, that shoe lost in the car you now stared at, the flames flickering and lighting up you E/C eyes, still wet from crying.

Your parents were dead.

Leaving you alone in the woods, cold, and with only one shoe.

"You okay?" The person who pulled you out of the car stood next to you, you noticed he was a little taller than yourself.

"Mhm," He nodded with you, wrapping his cape around your shoulders as you shivered. The Robin logo on his chest now visible to you, confirming that the masked person beside you was in fact Robin, one half of the Gotham Caped Crusaders your parents always talked about.

"Um, Batman is just calling the police, and then you can come with us if you want." Your eyes met the white lenses of his mask before you smiled at him. "I'm...I'm Robin by the way. But I bet you already knew that." He smiled down at you; your eyes being even with his mouth saw a missing front tooth, waiting for a new one to replace it.

"I'm Y/N," You said, giggling at the hole in his mouth, his own confused look contorted his face, questioning why you were laughing at him. "Your tooth is gone."

"Yeah," His smile grew wider as he showed off his missing tooth, proudly placing his hands on his hips. "I lost it last week and everything!"

"Cool! I got both of mine a while ago! See." You smiled like him, showing off your two big kid teeth. He looked in your mouth and his smile turned into a pout, crossing his arms over his chest to emphasize his unhappiness.

"That's no fair. I wanna have my big kid front teeth." You wanted to say more, but a big hand gently pushed the two of you forward, one on each of your backs. Your eyes followed the hand up and saw the masked face of Batman.

"Let's get you two kids home. Y/N, I have someone who's willing to take you in. Welcome to the team." His scratchy voice wasn't so scratchy anymore; it was like he cleared his throat of snot.

You and Robin met each other's stare and giggled, quickly racing each other towards the Batmobile, while the legal driver watched you two with a rare smile on his face, happy that Dick may finally have someone close to his age to be friends with.

Bonds can form from a single look. A single touch.

Science still can't explain how they are formed, or why they are so powerful to break.

But it is the challenges they go through that tests the everlasting strength of a bond.

Age 14:

You sighed loudly, but not loud enough apparently to interrupt Zatanna very openly flirting with Robin. Now you wouldn't be totally bothered by this, if it weren't for the fact that the two of you were dating.

A year long relationship with Dick Grayson was the best thing that had ever happened to you, but it was hard to conceal your feelings toward him when the two of you are in the field together.

At Gotham Academy, the both of you are the open couple, at least, open in the fact that the two of you were almost always seen together, holding hands, trying to out run the other in gym, where ever Y/N was, Dick wasn't far behind, the same way around. Having to go into the stoic, teammate only based relationship of being Robin and Y/S/N, you were slowly going mad.

"Aw, come on, Robin, just one date, like coffee, or food, or anything that will get you out of Mount Justice." Granted, you loved Zee, but not right now. Sitting across from the two as one flirted and the other tried writing a report for Batman wanted to make you sick.

"Ah, young love," Wally sighed as he flopped down onto the couch cushion next to you, his masked pulled down as he chuckled at how awkward his best friend was females. "Isn't it just beautiful."

You grunted in response, if you had the power of Superman's heat vision, the hole in Zatanna would be huge. "Hey, Y/S/N, hello." Wally snapped his fingers in front of your eyes, trying to get any reaction from you, he had just made the best joke and no one heard it! What wasted potential.

Shaking your head, you turned to the ginger, apologizing, "Sorry, was accidentally practicing my Batglare."

Wally hummed, turning back at the two awkwardly flirting teenagers, amazed that his ladysman friend wasn't jumping at the opportunity to go on a date with one of the hottest YJ members, "So why is it that Zatanna's the target for your glare?"

A blush quickly made its way up to your cheeks as you diverted your eyes away from the two raven haired teenagers, "She's not, I was just staring in that direc-"

"Oh. Oh, I get it!" Wally shot to his feet, a wide grin on his face as he became aware of what you were up to. "You like Robin!"

"Wh-what! N-no! What made you think that?" Ad hard as you tried to play off Wally's accusation, the ginger saw right through you.

"Oh darling, you've got it bad for him! How long have you liked him? When was it, have you made a move what about..." His lips moved a mile a minute, his words all getting jumbled together as his excitement built.

"Wally!" You screeched, jumping on top of him to firmly press your hand against his mouth to shut him up. "Stop that!" The two of you were not in a funky looking predicament, with you straddling his waist and your face hovering close to his.

"I will not!"

"Ew! Why did you just lick me!" You pulled your hand back, wiping the spit on your pants to get the nasty liquid off. "So, what if I like him?" You kept your voice low, hoping Robin couldn't hear or see the two of you.

"That means so much! You wouldn't believe how much he talks about you! It gets so annoying!"

"Wally! Would you shut it!" You tried moving your hand over his mouth again, but he was prepared, using his speed to flip the two of you over to have him straddling you, his hands pinning your above your head.

"Come on, Y/S/N, what's so bad about liking Robin, it's not like he's a dick or something." You rolled your eyes as the speedster giggled at his own immature joke, not knowing you fully knew Robin on both sides of the cape.

"Honestly Wallace, could you be anymore immature," You growled at him, his face almost immediately washing of any color when you said that. "I finally did it, silenced the ever-chatty Kid Flash."

But Wally didn't react to your jeering, he stared down at you in disbelief, his bright green eyes wide with shock, shock you didn't know you had caused. "Okay Wally, close your mouth before you start drooling on me."

He kept staring at you, almost in a trance while you tried wiggling out from under him. "Wally, don't make me use your...full..." Your eyes widened as you realized what you did. "Crap!"

You as Y/S/N never called him Wallace, you weren't even supposed to know his full name, Y/N, on the other hand, you and he were practically brother and sister with how close the two of you were. "Wally, snap out of it." You groaned as you tried pushing against his hands, but his entire body weight was pressing into them.

What do you do?

What can you do?

Groaning, you accepted defeat, "Uh, hey Robin." Your voice was kinda meek, not really wanting to pull the conversation of those two to you now, even if you were still sick of seeing Zatanna try making a move on your boyfriend. "Could I get some help?"

His head pooped up from the kitchen where he tried retreating from Zatanna to, even though she easily followed him, eyebrows raising when he saw the two of you. "Y-Y/S/N. Wh-what's this?" Even with the mask on, you could read him like an open book, he was confused and almost hurt seeing the two of you situated like that.

"Wally and I were having a wrestling match and then he froze. Just get him off me, I'm losing feeling of my hands." He slowly nodded and ran over to grab hold of Wally, pulling him up and off you.

"Holy...you weren't kidding when you said that he was frozen, he's like a ton of bricks!" Robin groaned as he shoved his limp friend onto the floor next to the two of you, reaching his hand down to pull you to your feet. "What'd you do to him?"

"Well..."

"Y/N?!" Wally decided that this was his time to wake back up from his weird trance like state, his arms flailing as he tried figuring out where he was instead of leaning over you like he was before.

"Wally!" You hissed back, your eyes couldn't be seen behind your black domino mask, but you were quickly glancing at Zatanna who was trying to hide in the kitchen.

"But...you're...the two of you...huh?!"

"Honestly," Robin gently wrapped his arm around our waist, pulling you closer to his side. Looking up at him he had his signature smirk on his face as he smiled down at you. "I'm surprised it took him this long to figure it all out."

You giggled at his comment, smiling at the thought as well. "Oh yeah, I mean, we are supposed to be his best friends."

Wally stood dumb founded before the two of you, his jaw about ready to drop to the floor as he realized this wasn't a joke. "What the hell! Why am I now just figuring out that Y/S/N is Y-" You once again reached forward and slapped your hand over his mouth.

"Wally, another talk for another time, we have an audience now." Zatanna had now fully stepped out of the kitchen, M'gann floating near her, Artemis also looking over her shoulder to see what was going on. "Well, the cats more or less out of the bag," You muttered, still feeling Dick's arm around you, the three girls were all staring at how touchy he was being with you.

"Wanna just come clean?" Nodding up at your boyfriend, you smiled and stood on your tiptoes to press your lips against his, his other arm finds your waist pulled you flush against his body while your arms went around his neck to keep you steady.

"Called it! Pay up!"

"Dang it, I thought I had him!"

"Wally? Hey, Wally you okay? Guys, I think they broke Wally."

The bond of friendship is the building block and foundation to all other bonds. Bonds are meant to grow over time, never staying the same, having the ups and downs. It's the ups and downs that make the bonds stronger. Bonds are always tested, always pushed to its limit, just to see if the bond will stand the test of time.

Age 20:

You sighed as you watched Tim type away on the main monitor of the Batcave in front of the two of you. You were happily sitting by yourself in the large bat like chair watching as the team patrolled around Gotham, you stuck in the Batcave with a busted collar bone, a hip still sore from being dislocated and the job of making sure Tim didn't die from that concussion he got last night.

Tim decided to push Alfred's buttons, who was making a late-night dinner for the crusaders, and sneak downstairs to the cave and use this grounded time to practice his hacking. And in order to get to the monitor, he needed to get you away from it.

"Was jumping me really necessary?" You groaned as you shook your head working on waking yourself up from being bopped over the head with a stapler.

"Sorry," He gave you an apologetic smile before turning back to the monitor, from where you were sitting you could see he had about fifteen different tabs open, all of them being used at the same time and somehow not slowing down the processor.

Tim began muttering to himself about he needed to out hack the Robin hacking system Dick installed to train hackers on how to hack and keep outsider hackers out. Honestly, you were surprised he didn't three more 'hacks' into that sentence.

"Timmy," You groaned as you tried pulling on the rope, your shoulder twinging in pain as you worked to free yourself. "You're going to make this all worse for yourself. You won't be able to go out as Red Robin for weeks if you keep looking at that huge computer."

"But I need to keep up my practice. I need to get better!" Apparently reasoning with a concussed teenager doesn't work well. Who knew.

"Tim, come on, just go back up to Jay's room, we put you in there to stop you from using any of your tablets or computers. You need to rest."

"Have you ever been in Jason's room, I think he left a tuna fish sandwich in there and forgot about it! It smells so bad in there."

You quietly whimpered in pain, you normally weren't this emotional, but with your arm being tied behind your back and your pain meds wearing off, your mind was going through the roof with the pain you were in.

"Timothy, Tim, Timmy, TimTim," Shutting your eyes, you muttered as many little nicknames you could as you tried blocking out the pain. "Can you at least give me ibuprofen?"

"Yeah, give me five minutes."

You gulped, knowing Tim had already forgotten about your request even within ten seconds of him answering you. "Dammit Dick, where the hell are you?"

To say you were angry was an understatement. Your shoulder was pounding, the boy you were told to babysit knocked you out and tied you up and was clearly loopy, watching him click on the same tab five times before realizing that he was clicking the wrong one.

Twenty minutes had passed, and Tim was becoming more and more confused with every second he sat in front of that computer, he wasn't even responding to you calling his name. You resorted to calling out to Alfred, but even he wasn't responding. "Holy crap Tim, did you knock Alfred out too!" Still no answer.

You tried pulling yourself to your feet, but your hip locked up, as if telling you to not even think of moving. "Remind me to tell Batman to never let me babysit Tim again when he's sick."

From outside, you heard the loud roar of the Batmobile followed by the quiet purr of Jason's motorcycle. Thanking every god you could think of, even if it took forever for them to get back, to sighed in relief as the two of them pulled in. "Honey I'm home!" Dick joyously cried as he hopped out of the shotgun seat of the Batmobile.

"Get Tim away from the computer!" You barked at him, leaving Dick confused while he looked for your voice. "Richard Grayson get Tim away from that computer." You ordered once again, not needing him wasting time looking around like the idiot he could be sometimes.

Bruce swished past where you were hidden and pulled Tim out of the chair, pushing him onto the medical bed just to the side to get him away from the bright monitor. "Y/N, why'd you let him out of the room?!" Bruce still had his Batman voice going as he checked Tim's eyes, while the teen weakly fought back.

"I'm sorry he jumped me with a stapler!" You screamed back, Dick finally able to find you, he himself quickly running to you.

"What do you mean he jumped you?!"

"He came up behind me and hit me on the head, with a stapler! How is that so hard to understand Bruce!" You screamed back at him, Jason was slowly sneaking upstairs to see if Alfred had any food ready, he wasn't really in the mood to hear his family scream at each other all night. "You trained him! You taught him how to pick any damn lock!"

"Y/N, babe, calm down." This was very out of normal behavior for you, sure you weren't the most level-headed person, but you were acting very rashly about this. He finally undid the rope around your wrists and helped you to your feet, slipping his arm under your legs and picked you up, keeping very gentle care of both your hip and shoulder.

Hiding you face in your boyfriend's shoulder, you finally had time to calm down, "How am I supposed to calm down when Bruce is blaming me for being jumped? Plus, my arm fricking hurts."

The blacknette sighed "When was the last time you had your meds?" He kicked the up button on the elevator, waiting for the pulley system to meet him at the bottom. He thought he heard you say when they left, but he must have heard wrong. "What was that?"

"When you left." Your voice was louder now, but still muffled by his shoulder, meek in having to confess that you were really in pain right now.

Dick groaned in annoyance, "Babe, no wonder you're so moody." Mumbling an apology, Dick stepped into the elevator and rode it up to the entrance out into Wayne Manor. He walked the two of you up the stairs to his bedroom where he gently placed you on the bed and walked into the bathroom.

You grabbed one of his pillows and shoved your face into it, smiling as his smell filled your nose.

The gentle shake of a pill bottle pulled you out of your pillow cuddle moment and you slowly sat up, seeing Dick had changed into sweatpants and one of his skin tight t shirts, hugging every one of his muscles, somehow making him look more muscular than he really was. "Let's get you some pain meds," He muttered, slipping two of the small red pills into your hand, and pressing a glass of water into the other.

Faster than he could do a back flip, you down the pills and the cup of water, handing it to him as a shudder ran through your body. "Honestly, Gotham needs a new water filtering system." You muttered while hacking, trying to get the metallic taste out of your mouth.

"Or you could just get used to it." He chuckled as he slipped in under the covers with you, sliding himself closer to you till he could at least wrap an arm around you.

You hummed as you considered his offer, "Nah, I'll just keep hating." The smile on your face was very evident as you felt Dick's chest vibrate behind you.

The two of you fell into small talk, asking him how the mission was, anything interest. Whether Bruce's car still smells like slushies from when the two of you bought said drink and spilled it everywhere. This slowly faded away as you felt your eyes get heavier as you felt sleep finally taking you over.

Well you were almost asleep.

"A stapler? Really?"

"Why don't I hit you over the head with one and you can see how well it works Bruce!"

Bonds are meant to be tested. To stretch. To grow. To twist and turn. Almost as though they were meant to be pushed past breaking.

But the best of bonds never break, they are strong through determination and the will of two young super hero legends, no bond between the two can break. It will only grow stronger. Stronger through every day spent together and every day they spend together.

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takaraphoenix · 5 years ago

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What are your favorite ships for the bat and super families? I know of Kanvers, BatCat, and SuperWonder. Do you have any others?

OOOH THAT’S A FUN ONE! Thanks for asking. Mh, let’s see. And let me apologize in advance for not knowing all Bats. There are just... way too many and only a fraction of them have ever made it into adaptations. Some, I only vaguely ever read the names of online. So, if someone is missing, it’s due to me never having officially met them. I WANT TO THOUGH.

The Supers!

Clark Kent:

Diana Prince. Total OTP. Impossible to beat

Lex Luthor. Very specifically only Smallville though

Oliver Queen. Also exclusive to Smallville. That show is its own thing

Kara Zor-El:

Kate Kane. Yes, OTP

Cat Grant

Nia Nal

Koriand’r (Titans version works, though I always imagined a teen version of Kara joining the Teen Titans and meeting Kory like that)

M’gann M’orzz (Young Justice, imagined what it’d be like if Kara joined them. Would also work for Arrowverse though)

Sara Lance (preferrably in an OT3 with Kate, but you can generally assume I imagined that Sara slept with every DC wlw at this point)

Barbara Gordon

Conner Kent:

Dick Grayson

Cassandra Sandsmark

Garfield Logan (Titans)

I’d love to get to know Tim because that ship frequently crossed my dash, but YJ barely gave him screentime, much less a personality so... someone get me an adaptation that properly introduces me to that ship?

James Olsen:

Chloe Sullivan

Alex Danvers:

Maggie Sawyer

Kelly Olsen

Winn Schott:

Querl Dox

Nia Nal

Clark Kent (it’s complicated. But I definitely headcanon that Winn has a very huge crush on Clark, even if I wouldn’t go as far as to ship-ship them)

(not entirely sure how far I’d extend the Super Family beyond blood and adoption, but James and Winn ought to be on the list.)

The Bats!

Bruce Wayne:

Selina Kyle, the one and only

Dick Grayson:

Roy Harper

Wally West

Conner Kent

Kaldur’ahm

Jason Todd

Jason Todd:

making good life choices (PLEASE, BOY, I AM BEGGING YOU)

Dick Grayson

Kate Kane:

Kara Danvers. The OTP

Nyssa al Ghul. GIVE IT TO ME

Renee Montoya

Barbara Gordon:

Luke Fox (don’t ask, I can’t explain it either, it just... came to me)

Kara Zor-El (vague on what setting, but probably preferrably one where Kara was raised by Clark, to be honest)

Selina Kyle:

Bruce Wayne

definitely also had a threesome with Harley Quinn and Pamela Isley at one point. Or multiple points (sometimes, I have ships that I ship in the “it happened in the past but it is important to me that it did”-sense)

Julia Pennyworth:

Sophie Moore. A ship that’s grown on me very quickly

Luke Fox:

Barbara Gordon

perhaps low-key Mary Hamilton. Waiting for how their dynamic is going to develop in season 2 of Batwoman though

Mary Hamilton:

Nia Nal (I think their personalities would fit sooo well, they would be very cute)

perhaps Luke Fox, depending on how their dynamic will develop in season 2 of Batwoman

Harley Quinn: (she’s part of my definition of the BatFam anyway)

leaving the Joker and burning everything that stands for him :d

Pamela Isley

had hook-ups with Selina Kyle

(Alfred Pennyworth, Damian Wayne and Cassandra Cain were not included in this list for a lack of ships)

#Shipping #About Me #Super Family #Bat Family #DC Comics #this is too long for me to tag all charas mentioned #Anonymous

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dottie-wan-kenobi · 5 years ago

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Kory! And Dick if you want to!!

!!!!!! yes yes I do!

Kory:

1: sexuality headcanon: I think she’s pansexual too!!! idk how it would work on Tamaran but on earth, her feelings/experiences don’t change dependent on gender2: otp: DICKKORY!!! look when I say DickRoy are meant for each other, I mean that, but Kory and Dick are foils!!! she’s the flamebird to his nightwing!!!!! they’re so healthy, sweet, tender, caring, comfortable, just a million other things that make me love them so much. they’re seriously one of DC’s best ships EVER. very few ships can top this one. they’re such good friends and really love and care for each other even when not together, and I adore that. ugh I’m gonna cry kdsjfhdskah3: brotp: DonnaKory, RoyKory, VicKory, JasonKory. All but the last are also ships of hers that I like too, but I prefer them mostly as friends?? she and Donna are just the most badass, cutest ladies in the world. her and Roy tease each other and have such a great sense of respect between them. she and Jason can be really fun together!! Kory and Vic mean the entire fucking world to me tho, listen. LISTEN. I’m going to write a fic of them bc @zitkaplushie and I were talking today abt how Vic has his insecurities about his robot parts, and then there’s Kory who is so obviously Other but so comfortable with herself??? and he’s like, proud of her, but also being around her makes him feel more at ease with himself. Also they’re so fucking sweet I’m going to cry?????? always teasing each other, playing around, sparring bc they (and Donna) are the Strong(tm) ones. plus I think u said it, Tyler, TALL GANG!!!4: notp: Jason/Kory. I like them as friends and that’s IT. any attraction between them in a world where Kory has history with Dick feels icky and weird and like the writer either hates Jason, Kory, or Dick, or all three! 5: first headcanon that pops into my head: she tries to cook and almost burns the house down, so after some experimenting, she learns the best place to cook is on the grill on the edge of her garden. this is esp at first!! eventually I think she gets better, but she still prefers there bc it’s so peaceful and calming and the smell of her flowers helps her focus on not burning everything lmao6: favorite line from this character: “I said I'd never let them beat me. They never did... and they never will!” 7: one way in which I relate to this character: TIRED OF GARFIELD LOGAN’S BULLSHIT8: thing that gives me second hand embarrassment about this character: this isn’t her fault but I hate how she reacted to the Mirage and Dick thing. like,,,, considering everything she’s been thru, reacting like that is just nonsensical and annoying and insulting9: cinnamon roll or problematic fave?

Dick:

1: sexuality headcanon: I think he’s bi, so like it does feel kinda different based on the gender of the person, and he’s canon demisexual, Action Comics said so2: otp: I have literally never had so many ships for one character before. DickKory, DickRoy, DickJoey, Dick/Wally/Artemis from yj, Dick/Kory/Roy, ummm I’m forgetting some dsjfshdak I love DickVic and DickGarth and DickShawn is fun, and DickTiger is amazing, and Dick/Bea could be so great if it was Dick, not Ric. but Dick is monogamous??? so almost none of these can exist at once??? do u see my problem dskjfhdshfdkshfskjajh3: brotp: Alfred! I adore their relationship and I think it’s so fun to explore it. they kind of have this father&son relationship, but also grandpa&grandson, and they’re friends too??? and they would kill for each other, I just know it4: notp: b/tc/st but also d/ckb/bs like I cannot even stomach that ship!!! they are so wrong for each other it’s incredible! and Babs is a lesbian!!!!5: first headcanon that pops into my head: he loves his kids so. fucking. much. like he is seriously one of the best dads ever. he draws from Bruce, both what B did and didn’t do, and also esp from Roy and Wally. he tries not to think about his own parents but sometimes he wonders if they would be proud of the way he’s raising his own kids. which also,,,, the Flying Graysons will live again mark my freaking words6: favorite line from this character: oh god there are so many good ones but let’s go w this: “My name's Nightwing! I may not be the gent you were expecting, but let me assure you... like him, I'm the stuff of nightmares. So don't get stupid! If you play it cool, you may walk away from here with all your teeth.”7: one way in which I relate to this character: *slamming the repression button until it jams forever*8: thing that gives me second hand embarrassment about this character: the mullet. listen. idc, I hate it. it’s ugly, it’s awful. all of his long hair is. I don’t judge others for liking it but I will never ever ever be able to look at his freaking ponytail without cringing9: cinnamon roll or problematic fave?

#tysmmmm this was fun!!#koriand'r #dick grayson #dc #asks #ask games #dukethvmas

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letgraysonsheart · 5 years ago

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Do you have any fic recs for Dick?? Just in general?? Because I feel like I've already eaten up the whole tag and I'm looking for some great emotionally charged fics.

OH BOY IF I DO

okay so, hurt/comfort & angst & whump ficrecs cause lets be real - thats mostly what i read, and ill try to mention fics that i havent seen much in other peoples ficrecs (also these are in no particular order) the links will lead to either tumblr or ao3:

first of all, @jinmukangwrites has written a series of hurt/comfort/whump one shots centered around Dick for Bad Things Happen Bingo! its so goood, though i would advise you to read the warnings/tags as it gets pretty dark at times, theyre also available on tumblr, but the link will take you to the all the one shots compiled in one fic on ao3

more Tim-centric, but features and deals heavily with my boy Ric Grayson, and the mess that was Batman #71, as Tim runs to Blüdhaven to find a still very amnesiac Dick because he doesn’t know where else to go, it’s called “Things That Don’t Kill Us” and is by Pols Voice on ao3, and has like all the angst and the emotions (and its finished!)

“forward” by anonymous, its the joker beating up dick in front of bruce, and it hurts, and it goes about as expected, (on chapter ½)

“All your resolve (dissolves)” by animegoil on ao3, it’s a season two YJ one shot, about Tim seeing how Dick is not dealing with everything thats happening, how much stress he’s under and such

SICKFIC TIME, this is by @camsthisky, called “A War Inside my Head” and its basically Dick being sick and the family caring for him

“When You Coming Home” is set in the DCU and written by salazarastark and it focuses on Bruce and Dick after the whole superman dies thing, very emotional, very good!

ill talk about one more, and its one of my all time favourites, one of the first fics that really got me into batfam fanfics, - its this story by @schweeeppess, and is about Jason finding out that Dick has some where unhealthy eating habits and reacting to it, very very good, it also has a prequel (?) of sorts, which is Tim finding out about it and tipping of Jason which you can read here

this post is getting long so imma stop there, i picked all these out from my #ficrec tag on tumblr and my ao3 bookmarks, and this is very far from all of my faves, so feel free to either ask for more or check those out

#I HAVE SO MUCH MORE BUT I DONT WANNA CLOGG ANYONES DASH UP #anon #ficrec #ficrecs for anon #ficrec lists

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dailytimdrake · 5 years ago

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Any ideas on what tim might like in a partner? Im writing a fic but I'm sorta hitting a mental block here

Another reminder that I don’t know much about canon, so feel free to drop your thoughts in the askbox about Tim. I’ll enjoy it immensely, don’t worry.

I’ll talk about how I see Tim and relationships in general, since I’m not sure if you’re referring to the crimefighting kind of partner or the romantic type of partner or platonic “partner in crime”, or both. Because when it comes to Tim, they could very well be one and the same.

1. Trust. With Tim, trust is one of the most important things. His partner needs to be consistent and readable. By readable, I mean that Tim has to know their intentions and be able to anticipate their response to changes and developments. Whether consciously or subconsciously, Tim doesn’t usually trust people alone, he trusts their intentions. There are a very select few that he trusts without question - Dick Grayson, for one - and that’s because he knows them, knows their motivations and their next course of action and the things they take into consideration before acting. That’s why he is able to trust them.

2. Closeness. To trust someone you first have to know them well. And that makes it important for Tim, because he needs to know, more than anything else. He needs the assurance that he is right about this person he has chosen to let into his life and behind his defences. As a partner, as a friend, as a lover - they all slide along the same scale. The closer one is, the more experiences shared and the more Tim trusts a person, the more likely he would be to see them as someone worthy of remaining in his life and close to him. (Honestly, he comes off pretty demi/aromantic to me, so make of that what you will.)

3. Tim and Compartmentalisation. To me, it seems like Tim likes to separate his life along specific lines. Conner is YJ/TT, Bruce and Babs are Bats, the people at W.E. are strictly Colleagues… It’s when the line between these blurs that Tim gets confusing feelings. That’s why Dick is special, because he transcends these lines - he was Tim’s childhood, Tim’s Bat elder, Tim’s TT elder, and just.. everywhere. Same thing with Tam Fox, because she’s part of W.E. life, but she’s also in on RR life. In RR Tim’s relationship with Tam is written explicitly as something possibly romantic - they kiss (kind of), they go for lunch together, they have charged moments - and yet, he’s never referred to her as his “girlfriend”. In fact, he has an entire train of thought dedicated to: What Are We? and How Does Tam Fit Into My Life Now? It’s only when someone can fit either into all of these aspects of Tim’s life, or none at all, that Tim can make a special place for them in his world.

In the end, though, Tim’s a very versatile character, and he does act a certain way to try and fit the standards and expectations of society - just look at all of his previous girlfriends - so I think if he were pressured enough, he could trick himself into thinking he had feelings for someone. Though that, of course, would inevitably end in misery.

#tim drake #red robin #tim drake headcanons #dc comics #headcanons #request #Anonymous #ask #queued post #apologies for the shortness. it's been a busy few days at work

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batfamily-trash · 6 years ago

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I Hate You, I Love You

Requested on Wattpad -

Summary: Reader and yj! Dick hate each other and it’s up to Artemis and Wally to hook them up before someone gets hurt.

Part 1 of 2

There was always shouting and something breaking in Mount Justice and the team was tired. No matter what they tried they would go back to trying to kill each other. Well, if it was possible anyway. Wally, M’gann, and Superboy think they won’t kill each other, Artemis and Kaldur, on the other hand, won’t leave them alone for a second. They are not taking any chances. No one is dying in their watch.

Usually, the screaming didn’t start until after someone messed up, but now it was just for merely existing. Robin was shouting at you because you were five minutes late, and you were yelling at him because he was yelling at you. Lovely. M’gann, Kaldur, and Superboy decided that dealing with Roy’s bullshit was better so they left you and Robin alone with an exhausted Artemis and a forever hungry Wally.

Wally was raiding the fridge while Artemis tried to do her science homework. Let’s just say that Wally was about to choke on something and Artemis broke her only pencil.

“That’s it!” Artemis said slamming her book down onto the ground.

“Babe, what are you going to do?” Wally asked as he zoomed to her.

“If all they are going to do is fight might as well get them together.”

“Isn’t that a bit extreme? I mean even for you.”

“If I have to hear y/n and Robin yelling at each other one more day I’m quitting. Besides they like each other they just don’t know how to deal with the feelings right?”

“Good point. I’ll go get the rest of the team.” With that, Wally left his girlfriend alone, with two angry teenagers. Now she knows why Gerard Way is afraid of teenagers.

So it turned out that the team wanted to live so they backed out after the first two tries. Although Kaldur did let Artemis use any means possible to get them to not hate each other. They were still failing. The first plan Wally and Artemis had was to get them to go on a double date with them… that didn’t work out at all, Wally had to go to the doctors to get a batarang out of his leg. They then went to the movies as ‘friends’. It was fine for twenty minutes before someone decided to start a popcorn fight. Least to say they got banned.

They tried everything in the book. Going to the park, swimming, gardening, going for walks, going to missions. I mean Artemis asked her dad and her sister for advice! Not that it would work either way. No matter what they did nothing would work. Eventually, Red Tornado advised the team to go to a local carnival as a team bonding exercise. Everyone but you and Robin agreed until Black Canary got involved and dragged you two there.

“Now, you seven take this time to bond. Get to know each other,” Canary said pulling you by your shirt.

“Isn’t Zatanna going to join us?” M’gann asked.

“She… she’s busy helping her dad with something. Besides! This should be fun!” Canary exclaimed letting you go.

“Gee so much fun,” you murmured. You looked up to see her glaring at you and Dick.

“I don’t care if he stole your cereal or if they crashed the Batmobile. You two are to behave.”

“Yes ma’am,” you and Dick said in unison. Geez, who pissed her off today. Oh right, you.

The seven of you stood at the entrance just staring at each other before Kaldur took the lead and lead you guys inside. After paying for tickets and splitting them you all decided to split into two teams. Wally, Artemis, you, and Dick would be one team and Kaldur, M’gann, and Conner were in another. Poor Kaldur.

“So where to first!” Wally asked.

“Is home an option?” you asked glaring at Dick.

“If you want Black Canary on your ass then sure!” Artemis said. You decided to stay put.

“Let’s go on some rides!” Wally shouted dragging Artemis with him. You groaned and followed after them with Dick behind you. You first got on a rollercoaster which you didn’t find at all amusing, but it did make Wally puke so there was that. The four of you got different before you all decided to group back up and get on the Ferris wheel. You wanted to get on with Kaldur but nooooooo Kaldur decided not to get on leaving you with the one and only Dick Grayson.

When you got on with him you sat as far on the edge you could. Every once in awhile you would glance at Dick to see what he was doing, and he was blushing? Why would he be blushing?

“So, um, y/n? Could I… I want to apologize for… The fights..”

“Huh?” you sat up and looked at him.

“I’m sorry for picking fights with you… I just… I don’t want you to get hurt during the missions..”

Now you were confused. Even if you were careful you would get hurt. “Apology accepted?”

Once the wheel stopped at the bottom you got off immediately and ran towards Kaldur. Why would he try to keep you safe? Once everyone got off you all returned to Mount Justice in complete awkward silence.

“Did everyone had fun?” M’gann asked.

You hummed in agreement and stared out the window of the bioship. You saw Dick looking at you from the corner of your eye. You spun your chair to face him and said, “Can I help you?”

The whole bioship went silent. Not another yelling match. “Uh, no..nothing… sorry.”

You spun your chair back to its place and continued looking at the window. The minute M’gann landed the bioship you sprinted towards the zeta tubes. Little did you know that a certain birdie followed you out.

“Y/n! Wait!”

You stopped in your tracks and turned towards him. “What do you want?”

“I.. I wanted… I wanted to know if… you would go on a date with me?” he said whispering the last bit.

The one person who ‘hated you’ was asking him out? Was this a joke?

“Umm, I don’t know.”

“Please?”

“Fine, I guess it wouldn’t hurt…”

“Meet me tomorrow morning at the docks in Gotham.”

“Sure…”

You walked into the zeta tube and went home. The next morning you let your parents know that you were going out with a friend and went to the docks. When you arrived you saw Dick looking thoughtfully out into the horizon. When you approached him turned towards you and smiled. That smile always got to you.

“Hey, you made it!”

“Uh yeah, sorry if I’m late,” you apologized.

“It’s okay.”

The both of you stood in place comfortable in the silence, for once.

“y/n, I… look I know I apologized earlier but seriously I’m sorry.”

“What happened in the past stays the past, right? It doesn’t matter now.”

He hummed before walking towards you and cupping your cheek. You looked into his eyes and saw admiration and something else. He leaned in to kiss you but you pulled away.

“I’m sorry! I shouldn't…”

You rolled your eyes and shut him up with a kiss. He stood there not knowing what to do before kissing you back. You broke the kiss apart and smiled.

“We should go before the team start looking for us.”

“Wait what does this make us?” he asked.

You shrugged your shoulders and replied, “I don’t know whatever you want to make us I guess.”

He smiled and followed you to a zeta tube.

“I’m not mentally prepared for their yelling anymore,” Wally said pacing the room, worried for his best friend.

“Wally sit down you’re giving me a headache,” Artemis told him. “Besides where are they?”

And on cue, the zeta tube announced your guy’s arrival to the team. The team expected yelling not laughter from the two of you. As you two walked towards the kitchen, the team just stood in there place and stared at you.

“Did something happen when I wasn’t here?” Zatanna asked.

“That’s what we’ll like to know too….” Wally and Artemis replied.

You and Dick just walked away from them without a single care in the world. Just wait until Batman finds out.

#i hate you i love you #dick grayson #nightwing #dick grayson x reader #nightwing x reader #young justice

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bigskydreaming · 6 years ago

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Comic book Zatanna is VERY different from YJ Zatanna. To such a degree that rather than look at YJ Zatanna as an adaptation of her, I pretty much just think of them as entirely different characters. Like YJ Zatanna is named after her older cousin or something, who’s too busy dealing with mystical threats to ever show up onscreen. Its pretty significant what a difference changing a character’s age and what generation they’re a part of can make.

(Its also why I don’t ship Dick/Zatanna in YJ. My go-to Zatanna will always be the comics one, who’s like....dated his DAD. Its like how a couple of adaptations have tried to pair Bruce/Babs as a nod to like waaaaaaaaaaaaaay early versions of Batgirl, when like...no, Babs has dated Dick, his son, in way too many comics and cartoons what are you even doing, I DISREGARD YOU, FALSE CANON. Anyway.)

So, in the comics, Zatanna is the same age as Bruce, or near enough. And she and Bruce have a long history together, (including at times a romantic one) because in some continuities, before he was Batman, when he was still traveling the world and learning from every teacher he could, he frequently visited circuses and carnivals and the like. They were where he learned escape artist tricks, picked up things from magicians’ acts like Zatanna’s (such as sleight of hand and misdirection, etc), and acrobatics. Its literally been given as a reason he was at Haly’s Circus the night Dick’s parents died - he was scoping out their act to see if there were any tricks he could learn from or incorporate into his own repertoire.

What I’m getting at is Bruce knew Zatanna even before he was Batman for the exact same reason he met Dick. He inserted himself into the circles both of them traveled in as members of performer families with a generations long history with circuses and Vegas and carnivals and the like.

Which means....take Bruce out of the equation, and there’s still every chance that Dick and Zatanna’s paths could have crossed while they were both still performers. And that their families could have known each other.

So! AU where Zatanna was in Gotham visiting friends at Haly’s the night the Graysons died. And rather than watch Dick get shoved into an uncaring system when they took him away from the circus and refused to let him stay with them, the Mistress of Magic spirited Dick away and took custody of him herself.

Leading to Dick being raised by Zatanna instead of Bruce, continuing to work as a performer alongside her but now her magician’s assistant instead of an acrobat - though he still kept up with his acrobatics thanks to Zee’s acrobat friends letting him train on their trapeze whenever he had the itch to fly again. Dick grows up learning escape artist tricks and all the misdirection and sleight of hand Bruce learned from magicians, but straight from the source this time rather than via Bruce.

And eventually, Dick - child prodigy that he is - discovers that Zatanna’s act is the equivalent of hiding in plain sight, the perfect misdirection to cover up that she is a real magician, a homo sapiens magi, born naturally gifted in the mystic arts and one of the most powerful sorceresses in the world. Dick might not ever have her natural aptitude for HER type of magic, but there are many kinds of magic in the world, and thanks to her work (both professional and as a reserve member of the Justice League and occasional superheroine herself). Zatanna knows all the best and most talented magicians and sorcerers in the world. And many of those, Dick CAN learn from.

All of which leads to him eventually sneaking out as a vigilante on his own, combining his acrobatics with things like knife throwing and flashy misdirection that disguises his actual conjurings and spellwork when in the midst of battle. His specialties are illusion magics, spells of disguise and manipulation of shadows, vanishing into smoke and conjuring temporary doubles out of mirrors, etc. Just enough of what he does isn’t real that villains never see it coming when he conjures a real fireball right after they’d identified enough of the previous ones as harmless illusions and thought it was safe to stop dodging. Instead of it being just about raw power, he builds upon his ability to craft and sell an act.

Eventually he forms the Teen Titans with other sidekicks like Wonder Girl, Speedy, Kid Flash and Aqualad...as well as Barbara Gordon aka Batgirl, protégé of the Batman. Even his best friends couldn’t say how much he’s actually capable of - though with them, its not because he doesn’t trust them though, merely because he’s a troll. He always dismisses any talk of him being a sorcerer or calling what he does magic. Instead he just grins and winks and says he knows a few tricks, is all. What he considers ‘a few’ or how far he stretches the definition of ‘a trick’, well, that’s anyone’s guess. His entire hero career and reputation spins out of the fact that he COULD be one of the more powerful sorcerers to walk the earth....or he could simply be a great actor who makes the most out of a relative handful of lesser spells within his capabilities. Even his own teachers can’t say for sure. Every time someone thinks they’ve got his range figured out, he mischievously pulls out a new spell his previous shows of power have never hinted he’d be capable of, just to keep people guessing.

And maybe Zatanna and Dick are back performing in Gotham one winter, and Dick’s off visiting Batgirl while they’re in town, and Zatanna takes a stroll through town and passes through Crime Alley. No particular reason, its just an expedient route and she hardly is someone to take its reputation as a reason she of all people should be concerned.

Which is when a homeless street kid named Jason Todd tries to pick her pocket. Naturally, it doesn’t exactly work out for him, given who she is, but Zatanna Zatara is one to appreciate the irony of someone trying to pick HER pocket...as well as impressed at how close he comes to actually managing it. She takes him to a diner to feed him, coaxes enough of his story from him to figure out he has no one to look out for him and will never trust Gotham’s foster system (not that she’d blame him, given what she saw of it when she first took custody of Dick and had doubts about whether she was doing the right thing for him)...and figuring since it worked out well for her the first time she went down this road, offers Jason a fresh start elsewhere with her and Dick.

It isn’t long before Jason’s intellect and skilled hands prove equally effective at sleight of hand and magician’s tricks, as well as an eager student for every bit of actual magic his new big brother shares, along with what he learns from the teachers Zee and Dick both introduce him to. Over time, he gravitates towards different tutors specialties than Dick though. Illusions and mindgames, smoke and mirrors...that fits Dick’s natural showmanship and performer’s nature, but its not Jason’s style. Oh, he can bluff the hell out of anyone, never play poker with him, and his natural bravado easily translates into working a crowd and playing a stage alongside Zee and Dick when working. Its just not his preference is all.

No, he goes more for practical magic, straightforward approaches to achieving his intended results. Cut out the bullshit. Spells of primal force or elemental magicks, charms and runes of strength, healing and protection to augment his capabilities when he wades into a fight fists first and just starts brawling. He’s not afraid to summon a demon or two and make a bargain to achieve his ends - he’s even got the names of a couple inked into his skin as tattoos, a summoning shortcut that lets him call on his personal faves in a moment of desperation. Even demons have trouble circumventing a summoning or breaking free of its parameters when those things are etched permanently onto his body.

Dick does tend to have a few elemental spirits always nearby and easily summoned without much notice or prep time, but Dick being Dick, in his case its just because he made friends with them. There’s a couple of wind sprites always hanging around on the off-chance he gets into a fight and might need their help. They find such instances to be extremely fun and exciting, and also they’ve adopted the fun little bird human who flies as a kindred spirit.

In contrast, Jason comes home one day and Zatanna catches him trying to change the coverings on a new tattoo without her noticing. She's not mad because he's fifteen and not supposed to be getting tattoos. She's not exactly thrilled about that either, but no, of greater concern to her is the fact that the tattoo is a name written in a long dead alphabet. A name she recognizes as that of a primordial demon she was extremely clear about being one of those forces beyond her teenage son's ken, and which he most certainly was not supposed to be messing around with.

Jason's expression tightens mulishly and Zatanna longs for the days when that was just purple prose she read in books sometimes while wondering vaguely how that even worked and what that actually looked like.

"Dick said I had to," her younger son says. He folds his arms across his chest defiantly. Zatanna closes her eyes and counts to five.

"I did not!" her older son yells right on schedule. The air shimmers like heat waves rising off pavement on a hot summer day and Dick drops the cloaking spell he's been using to eavesdrop. She's not sure why he even bothered with the thing; they both knew he was there the whole time. Not because his spell hadn't been text book perfect and beyond even her ability to pierce mystically, but because Dick tended to forget all the magic in the world can't keep predictable behavior from being predicted.

"You literally said Jason, you gotta do the thing," Jason insists, doubling down. Dick's arms flail like an anthropomorphic windmill tripping on shrooms.

"No, I literally said Jason, don't do the thing," Dick shrieks, cartoonishly outraged. Zatanna fights back a small smile despite the situation. She's seen her eldest smoothly engage a minor deity in a verbal chess match as the fate of his fellow Teen Titans hung in the balance, all without once breaking a sweat. One blatant lie delivered straight to his face by his younger brother though, and he went zero to sixty in two point five seconds, skipping straight past the realization he was being played. Zee still had every intention of grounding her youngest for the next decade for being so dumb as to ink himself with a mystical tether to a demon that once ate an entire civilization - yes, ate - but that didn't mean she couldn't also be impressed at Jason's attempt at finessing himself out of this situation. He'd jumped straight to the only thing that had even had a prayer of distracting Zee from his teenage idiocy - Dick at Defcon Five. Now if only she could get him to apply that same level of forethought to things like oh, the possible longterm consequences of giving a supernatural Being of Mass Destruction a direct dial up connection to him....

Dick turns desperate eyes on her. "Seriously Mom, I swear. I said the actual words 'Jason NO.'"

"See?" Jason flings his arm at his brother in triumphant vindication. "Have you met me? Everyone knows that's code for 'Jason YES.'"

"Oh my god, I will curse you to rot the pages of every first edition you touch," Dick hisses dramatically. Jason pales briefly, but rallies.

"And really, how is this any different from when you slept with Batgirl and I said that was a really bad idea and its totally gonna end up biting you in the ass, and then you said that I shouldn't have told you to do it then?"

"That's completely different," Dick howls, reverting back to Windmill, Drunk In A Windstorm. "You said 'Don't be mad, but that new scrying spell I was trying accidentally locked on to Batgirl instead of Batman and I saw her walking home from school out of costume just for a second before I shut off the spell but spoiler alert, she doesn't wear a wig while in costume, she really is a redhead even with her cowl off, which means now you gotta sleep with her, like, we all know its gonna happen anyway now. PS its Barbara Gordon, that's the punchline, you're already obsessed with her, oh crap now you're gonna be insufferable huh.' Which by the way, I so am not. Jerk."

"Yes," Jason says slowly and with exaggerated patience. Zatanna's migraine builds and builds. "And then I said, 'Dick, no, stop, I was making a joke, you don't actually have to...' and you said 'No, but I gotta'. Your shirt was practically already off by the time I finished saying 'redhead.'"

"Well, duh! Of course it was! Have you met me?" Dick volleys back in what Zee really hopes is her eldest making a deliberate callback to her youngest's earlier crack, and not some bizarre teenage superstition that has him actually thinking nope nope those thoughts are in the Bad Place, Zatanna, its absolutely believable that Dick is actually still twelve and the boys are just using embellishing language to feel grown up. C'mon, if you try hard enough you can milk a good thirty more seconds of denial about your son's sex life, you're literally magic, you can do this.

The ludicrousness of it all is so effortlessly identical to his brother's idiocy just moments prior, Zatanna has a brief, uncharitable thought that the Graysons had a second child they gave up for adoption and nobody ever told either of the boys. She opens her mouth to put a stop to the nonsense, but what comes out:

"You slept with Bruce's protégé?"

Dick pauses mid-rant and fidgets uneasily. His eyes dart around the room as if expecting the Batman to appear, summoned by the power of his name. "Umm. Only a couple times?" he says slash asks, warily.

"On several different occasions," Jason adds gleefully. Zatanna rubs her temples and rounds on him before Dick can return fire.

"And you tried to scry Batman?"

"Umm," Jason stutters. Stops. Aims an accusing finger at his brother again. "Dick dared me to!"

"That's it! Curse coming right up," Dick snaps, fingers crooking into arcane gestures.

"Enough! Both of you!" Zatanna feels slightly guilty when both boys fall silent and hunch over, metaphorical tails between their legs. Even when they were being obnoxious, it was still weirdly charming in a way - eww, who even was she right now? Maternity was a mistake. Still, she couldn't find it in herself to bring down the full force of her ire when all they were doing really was being....ridiculous boys being ridiculous brothers. She sighs and contemplates telling them just to go to bed, they'd discuss it in the morning after she'd had time to cool off and think about it....decides god no, that risks all of this happening all over again. Splits the difference and calls it a night.

"Jason, you're grounded for a month for whatever you did to even get someone to give you a tattoo while under eighteen without parental approval. And you're grounded from any spells outside of lesson plans and homework assigned by one of your tutors until you can tell me in detail why I'm concerned your choice of tattoo was an absolutely terrible idea, and you can present me with no less than three different wards or counterspells that prepare for the possibility of that absolutely terrible idea becoming an absolutely terrible catastrophe. Not a word," she finishes sharply with a pointed finger, when he starts to protest. He sulkily subsides again.

"Dick, one word answers only, no explanations, excuses or qualifiers. You made sure Barbara knew exactly who you were and that you knew exactly who she was before you both....made it extremely awkward for me to look Bruce in the eye at the next Justice League meeting?"

"Yes," Dick says wincing.

"You used protection....each time on each different occasion?"

"Yes," her eldest says, examining the floor as if weighing the likelihood of it opening up and swallowing him whole.

"You're not being every gross stereotype of teenage boys as normalized by Hollywood, using or objectifying girls in the name of toxic masculinity - you actually have feelings for this girl?"

"Yes," he says firmly, meeting her eyes again. Zatanna nods, letting that linger as she absorbs both his sincerity and the passage of time. Where did the last decade and that little eight year old with the baby fat and chipmunk cheeks go? But then, this is good too, she decides, and she nods, satisfied. Course, a little embarrassment is good for the soul, she figures.

"You understand that the world is full of other smart, beautiful redheads you could have chosen to pursue with far less complications?"

"Be right back, have to go die now," Dick announces loudly, and Zatanna chuckles and takes pity on him. Jason's paler Irish skin goes red at the drop of a hat, but it takes a much higher level of mortal humiliation for Dick's darker skin to betray any kind of blush.

"Nothing to get all red in the face about, sweetheart," she says because look, her kids had to get it from somewhere. Jason cackles, doubling over with mirth and Zatanna makes her exit while her youngest is too busy being amused at his brother's expense to remember he's ticked about being grounded.

She lingers on the other side of the wall, drinking in the sound of Jason's laughter and Dick's sulking, long enough that she's still there to overhear when Dick silences his brother's entertainment:

"Saved your ass, you manipulative little shit. Don't think I didn't know what you were doing there. You owe me for playing along."

"Yeah, yeah, all hail Benevolent Big Brother Dick," Jason grumbles, but there's gratitude beneath the grumbling. Zatanna's eyes narrow as she reflects on how much lighter a sentence Jason ended up with, compared to what her first instincts had intended. Well, crap. Dick hadn't been the one oblivious to all the layers of that little episode at all, had he? That was annoyingly humbling. Still, Zatanna shakes her head at herself and goes to bed with a smile. She respects the art of the con too much to be upset her children learned more from her teachings than she'd realized.

Well played, boys.

The brothers' respective preferences in summonings aren't the only places they differ. Where Dick has a half a dozen spells of invisibility or intangibility on stand by in case he needs to sneak into a heavily fortified place, Jason stays stocked up with an equivalent number of spells capable of just blowing the front door off its hinges.Of course, Tim Drake being Tim Drake, his inclusion into their little family happens exactly as you’d expect.

He literally follows them home one day.

His neglectful absentee parents are archaeologists, after all. Spending more of their time away at dig sites than at home with him. When they are home though, they make a show of caring, take him out to the circus and to shows, parading him in public so everyone can see what a nice family they all are and how much they dote on their only child. So just like in canon, Tim’s there at the circus too, the night the Graysons are murdered. And in the years to follow, he’s at a number of the Zataras’ magic shows, and easily puts together that Dick and Jason are the two masked mystical teen superheroes that spend as much time doing flips and punching and kicking villains as they do weaving actual spells.

And his parents, being the kind of archaeologists who grew up as rich bored white Gotham elites who picked archaeology as their field of study because its not like they actually needed to work and they’d watched Indiana Jones so often, they were like, yes, excellent, I will model my life adventures and career path after this movie and its depiction of archaeology....

Like, so clearly, they’re the dumbass kind of archaeologists who have no actual respect for the artifacts they dig up and just like how they look in their home or behind glass museum cases with plaques about who donated them.

Tim however, is not dumb, way better than his parents, and has a lot of free time and a hobby of researching EVERYTHING. So eventually he discovers the real origins of a lot of artifacts his parents have around the house, and determines that a) they really shouldn’t be here, and b) some of these have spiritual and even mystical reputations and power and are possibly very dangerous in the wrong hands or even just from being removed from their resting places or lands/cultures of origin, so they REALLY shouldn’t be here.

So the next time the Zataras’ magic show comes to Gotham, he (carefully) stuffs his backpack full of as many as he can carry, and sneaks out to go watch the show. And then he follows them back to where they’re staying, introduces himself and says he knows who they are and could they please help him return all these artifacts to where they belong and also hurry because some of them might blow up the world if they’re gone too much longer and that’s not WHY he wants to return them, like they should just because its the right thing to do, but he thought he should mention it because it seems like its an important factor. He’d do it himself, but he’s not allowed to go on a plane by himself, but he did write apology notes to go with each artifact for taking them without asking, and also could he have their autographs?

Dick blinks cartoonishly large eyes, sweeps the ten year old off his feet into a giant hug and announces, “We’re keeping him.”

Zatanna tries to do this in an orderly fashion, of course. “Tim, where are your parents? Do they know you’re here?”

Dick sniffs. “Irrelevant. We’re keeping him. Look how adorable he is, is there really anyone who could possibly appreciate his adorableness more than us? No. Ergo. We’re keeping him.”

Jason rolls his eyes. “He’s not a pet, asshole. And adorableness isn’t a word, stop making up words, I will punch you I swear. But also yeah, we’re keeping him.”

Tim’s heart is having a full on meltdown at the thought that two of his heroes want him to stay, but he’s a Drake and Drakes are very big on Proper and protocols and decorum, and he’s pretty sure this isn’t how things work. “I’m not actually supposed to be out by myself, so I definitely should be home before nine cuz that’s my bedtime...”

Dick takes him into his bedroom, drops him on his bed and says: “There you go. You’re in bed and its not even eight o’clock yet. Problem solved.”

“...I think it only counts if I’m in bed in my bed?”

Dick snaps his fingers and the headboard is mystically inscribed with “Tim” in a flourish of colorful sparks. “See? Its your bed now, it has your name on it and everything. This can be your new room and I’ll bunk with Jay. We can’t have you share a room with him, he snores and you’re too adorable to inflict that on. Growing boys need at least eight hours of RESTFUL sleep.”

Tim chews his lip. He’s not entirely sure the older boy’s logic is sound, but when laid out in that fashion, it doesn’t sound completely unreasonable, right? He makes one last token attempt to get up. Jason sits on him. Gently, but still.

“Oh no, we’re holding him against his will. We’ve officially kidnapped him at this point,” Jason says cheerfully. “Mom, you better go find his parents and tell them their son is missing and being held hostage and won’t be released until they can explain to the police why their son’s kidnappers had to notify them that their son was missing and had wandered all the way through Gotham at night alone.”

Tim protests. “Its not a big deal. I do that all the time!”

Jason and Dick look at him. Look at each other. Look at Zatanna. Arch their eyebrows expectantly.

Zatanna sighs. As ridiculous as her boys are being, this has played out about how she expected it would the second she realized the ten year old was completely on his own and used to it. And let’s face it. They’re only like this because she’s like this. She regrets everything except also she regrets nothing. Not that she’ll tell them that right now. They both look a little too smug in her opinion. Let ‘em sweat for at least a few hours. “I’ll go see what the situation is and figure out what to do next. Stay here and don’t let him eat too much sugar. And if you watch TV, nothing R-rated.”

Dick rolls his eyes. “We know. We’re not gonna scar the kid in like, the few hours you’re gone.”

“You made your brother watch The Babadook when he was eleven.”

“Well that’s different. He was being an ass. Timmy’s being adorable. Completely unrelated situations,” Dick says in the tone of someone who thinks they’re being reasonable. Jason scowls.

“Wow, are you seriously victim blaming me for the nightmares I got from that shit? Way to make fun of my psychological trauma, asshole.”

“Hey, I didn’t MAKE you watch that movie. I TOLD you to go to bed.” Dick idly examines his nails. "You’re the one who said you were too old to have a bed time and you could stay up as late as I could and anything I could watch you could watch too.”

“Oh please. That’s basic reverse psychology. You knew exactly what you were doing.”

“But Jay-jay, I thought you were too smart to ever fall for my tricks the way all my dumbass friends always do! Are you saying that’s not true? Did I actually manipulate my brilliant little brother who has always been much too clever and much too observant to ever be tricked into doing exactly what I wanted him to do? Is that what you’re saying?”

“Hey good news, Tim, neither of us will have to share a room after I murder this assface in his sleep.”

“Don’t worry Timmy, that’s just Jason for I love you.”

Zatanna sighs again and leaves before they can see her grinning. She enables their antics far too much as it is.

Within a week, the Zataras officially have custody of Timothy Jackson Drake. The boys are pretty sure that’s way too quickly for it to have happened legally, and there might have been a spell or two speeding up the process. But they don’t actually care, so. Yeah.

Unlike his brothers, Tim is the only one to fully embrace the titles of magician or sorcerer. His mind is his strength, research is his specialty, and its just inefficient in his opinion to waste time with acrobatics and brawling that comes naturally to them but would need to be acquired skills for him. Instead he just devotes all his learning to the mystic arts, learning from teachers of all kinds of specialties, but also just as much from his research of old texts and his theorizing on the natures of various forms of magic and how they interact. He happily spends hours poring over a dozen different translations and scribbling notes as he goes, distilling complex rituals into new forms that allow for the substitution of more commonplace ingredients and thus greatly widen the scope of his repertoire. He has a talent for doing all the legwork on a dozen different spells of incredible complexity and then leaving them ‘hanging’, with just the last bits incomplete, easily stored in his eidetic memory for him to call upon and trigger in mere moments as he finishes the last bit of any given spell with just a few words, thus doing in the heat of battle what other sorcerers would require hours to replicate.

All three end up gravitating to different superhero teams as they grow older, but all of them have their reputations with the hero community at large. Its generally expected that if you have a problem that needs a magical solution, and you’ve got enough time for preparation and planning - you call Tim. If you need to blow shit up and in a hurry - you call Jason. And if you’re just plain fucked and need a Hail Mary - you call Dick.

You’re usually gonna get all three anyway though, so whatever.

At some point when Tim's around fifteen or so himself, the Court of Owls ends up trying to get their Talons on Dick, because they suck and are terrible and entitled and their only real possible value comes from being a wasted potential metaphor for how often everyone seems to have their own ideas or expectations for what Dick should be doing or saying or feeling at any given time, with most of the things others get pissed about him for in the comics essentially boiling down to Dick doing or saying or feeling things that don't match up to their expectations or presumptions, and that people wouldn't bat an eye about anyone else doing or saying or feeling, its just Dick's supposed to be different, he's doing (x) wrong, ugh he can't even be traumatized properly without him usually ending up apologizing to other people for the fact that he was the one who was just screwed over, weird, its almost like these things are connected. I mean whoops, this is story time, not meta about all the thoughts and feels I, the dastardly fourth wall breaking narrator, have whilst butthurt on behalf of Dick. My badness.

Ahem.

Yes, when last we left our intrepid heroes, rich entitled bastards with a pervy penchant for nursery rhymes and child assassins had set their sights on claiming Dick and turning him into their mindless zombie bird-themed killing machine.

In all fairness, they did lead with the extremely persuasive argument of 'look we totally called dibs before he was even born, so.....step off??'

Then they kidnapped him and attempted to turn him into their mindless zombie bird-themed killing machine.

Compelling argument though that may be, Dick's brothers are not impressed. They are, however, magical, hyper-competent and extremely petty slash vindictive.

All of which is to say, Tim turns the Court into a bunch of actual owls. And then Jason summons a giant murderous hawk-demon from another dimension that eats all the owls.

And then they wait for Dick to wake up from all the drugs the Court pumped him full of in preparation for The Ritual of Zombie Assassin Making. And Tim just has to ruin it, that asshole.

"You know, hawks aren't naturally the enemies of owls," Tim says out of nowhere. Well. Not out of nowhere so much as out of concern, because Tim's natural physiological response to being worried is to get pedantic.

"What," says Jason flatly. Which is his natural physiological response to Tim being. Y'know. Tim.

Tim shrugs, his eyes intent on their older brother, who is still making like Sleeping Beauty and sooooo gonna get razzed by them for that later, once the Worry and Anxiety have all exited stage right. "It just felt like you were going for a theme. Which is fine, I'm just saying, owls don't actually have natural predators. One might occasionally get killed by a hawk, but usually that's more of a territorial dispute and still pretty much an outlier in terms of statistics."

"Why would you even say that to me right now," says Jason flatly. Not asking, because its a rhetorical question and he's currently glaring the answer to it straight at Tim's back, and that answer is ugh you are such an annoying little shit sometimes.

Which is why when Dick groggily starts to come to, he's greeted by a soundtrack of:

"God, I'm so sorry, I'm just the worst for giving you information that you didn't know before, since clearly if you had you wouldn't have gone with a hawk!"

"Well what the fuck should I have gone with, a demonic taxidermist? Like excuse me for being in such a rush to heap vengeance on the pretentious shits who kidnapped our brother, I didn't have time to go to wikipedia and figure out the most appropriate dramatic irony!"

"First off, why would you ever go to wikipedia as a source, we have literally had this exact argument several dozen times - "

"First off, are you seriously giving me bullet points right now. Seriously. Bullet points. Right now. That's a thing that's happening."

"You are such an infant. How are you older than me? I make one little critique and you bite my freaking head off - "

"What's happening?" Dick croaks out into one of the few synchronized pauses for breath. "Where are we?"

"The secret underground lair of an evil society of ornithologists who kidnapped you because your milkshake brings all the weirdos to the yard," Jason says crankily, still glaring at Tim.

Not that fuzzy, barely conscious but always guilt-prone Dick could possibly know that its not actually him Jason's ticked at. Tim face palms at his middle brother because what are bedside manners, clearly.

"A bird-themed cult calling themselves the Court of Owls pre-selected you to be turned into the general of their elite zombie assassin army," Tim recites quickly, predicting Dick's likely request for further information.

"Well that's rude," Dick frowns. He cracks open one eye experimentally, winces when even the dim lighting is enough to give his pounding headache a booster shot. Tries the other eye. Nope. Both eyes are in agreement. Light is the enemy of all that is good right now. Ugh. Definitely rude. He likes light. How dare someone incite this unforgivable betrayal from his BFF, light? "I don't think I care for their recruitment strategy. Although at least they wanted me to be the Boss Zombie Assassin I guess."

"Yes," Tim replies dolefully. "That does appear to be the silver lining here."

Despite their antagonism of thirty seconds ago, Jason snickers. They're nuanced like that.

"Well his usual priorities seem to be in place, so I think its safe to say we got to him before they could do any actual brainwashing," Jason says. "All in favor of blowing this popsicle stand?"

"Wait, there are popsicles?"

"No, there aren't popsicles in the evil cult's secret underground murder lair. Its a figure of speech, dumbass."

"Hey," Dick pouts. He coughs once, weakly, but Jason's eyes narrow in sudden suspicion of Milking It Syndrome. "Be nice to me. I was just kidnapped and almost made an Elite Zombie Assassin Boss and my head hurts and is all fuzzy and you know how I feel about popsicles. You shouldn't joke about them if you don't have any, that's just mean. But uh, should we be rushing? If the bad guys are coming back soon I do vote for the not being here option, like, just in case turning me into the Zombie Apocalypse is still on the evil cult agenda."

He would manage to latch onto the Elite and Boss part of that info dump, wouldn't he, Jason muses. What's the timeline for how long you have to express sympathy for your almost-brainwashed brother before you can yell at him for being insufferable about it? Is half an hour long enough?

"No, its fine," Tim assures their brother. "We uh....were slightly miffed about the whole kidnapping you thing, and so we were.....efficient? I guess you could say? About making sure they wouldn't do it again. I turned them all into owls."

"And then I summoned a hawk demon that ate them. You're welcome," Jason adds, not about to be left out. Even if he's going to have words later about being characterized as 'miffed.' The walking almanac knows more words in more languages than anyone in human history, pretty much, and he goes with miffed. The fuck, Timmy. The actual fuck.

"Aww, you guys, that's so sweet." Dick beams at them. Albeit at somewhat lower than his usual wattage. Then his forehead wrinkles slightly in confusion. "Why a hawk demon? Do owls not like hawks or something?"

Tim smirks at Jason viciously.

"I hate you with the searing intensity of a thousand suns," Jason tells his brat of a younger brother. "Also, gonorrhea."

Zatanna then teleports into the middle of the room with a flash of light and a hurried rush to the side of her lying-on-the-ground, suddenly flailing eldest son.

"Gah, evil light is evil! Curse your betrayal!" Dick wails dramatically, flinging an arm across his face despite the visible effort movement is still taking. Because he really is just that invested in keeping his Melodrama Game on point, willing to play through the pain if necessary. Jason rolls his eyes. If nothing else, he can at least respect his older brother's ability to commit.

"What happened here?" Zatanna wastes no time before asking, even as she begins running her hands lightly over Dick and muttering chants to divine for unseen injuries or influencing substances. Tim catches her up to speed with another dry recitation of the day's events. It doesn't sound any less ridiculous the second time around.

"And you two decided to just rush right into the heart of a criminal organization's secret headquarters with no plan, no way of knowing what you were jumping headfirst into and no back up?" Zatanna snaps out in a biting tone that's 70% Frantic Motherly OMG I Could've Lost All Three Of You I Don't Know What I Would've Done and 30% How Are You Seriously This Dumb, No, I Really Want To Know, You Boys Share Zero Genetics So It Can't Possibly Be Mutually Inherited Dumbness And Yet Here You All Are Being This Dumb, How, Why, I Strenuously Object.

At least, Jason's pretty sure its 70/30.

Eh. Maybe 60/40.

He looks at Tim and they both shrug. "We left a note," Jason offers lamely.

Their mightily miffed mother - and Jason totally gets it now, good call on that one actually, Timbo, Miffed can totally be intimidating, turns out - is not even slightly appeased.

"Yes, I did see your note," Zatanna says, slow and dangerous, an ominous cold front that's frosty enough to reverse global warming. Jason shivers. "The one that read 'Dick kidnapped by crazy bird freaks. Went to go get him. Somewhere in Gotham's sewers. Ugh why is it always sewers, I fucking hate sewers. Be back later. Love, Jason and Tim.' That note?"

Jason's honestly not sure what the problem is. All the relevant information was there. Tim glares at him.

"I knew I should have written the note," he hisses like an angry cat. Jason rolls his eyes again, because really, what other weapon does he have against his brothers' Drama?

"We had time for me to write a note, Tim. We didn't have time for you to write an essay with fully annotated footnotes all properly accredited according to MLA approved guidelines."

"I can be brief!"

"Name one time that you have ever been brief about anything. Ever."

Tim hesitates.

"Just because I can't think of anything right this second doesn't mean it didn't happen! You're just putting me on the spot," he sulks.

"Whatever. I'm not going to apologize for being in a rush. We had an older brother to save from evil brainwashing birdwatchers, remember? Would everyone prefer we took our sweet time and got here and found Zombie Dick instead?"

Tim wilts. Their mother thaws. Jason savors the moment. He so rarely gets to enjoy the moral high ground. Its nice, really. He can kinda see the appeal from up here, actually.

"That's Elite General Zombie Dick to you, peon," Dick chooses that moment to interject. Jason inhales through his nose. Five seconds. Five whole seconds that lasted.

"Seriously?" He asks his older brother. Dick blinks innocently.

"I am very traumatized by my near undeath experience," he explains. "That's just my coping mechanism."

Jason's eye twitches.

Later still, Jason somehow winds up getting into it with the Joker of all people, in Ethiopia of all places. Seriously, what, he still doesn't understand how or why any of that happened. His life, man. So fucking random.

But that's a story for another day. It doesn't end all that badly, all things considered, not nearly as bad as it could've. The moral of the story is essentially that six out of seven days, Jason is still the brother best avoided in dark alleys, but on the seventh day....Dick and Timmy are perhaps best avoided as well.

And later still, some jackass with a Wizard of Oz fetish decides that Tim-napping isn't just the worst colossally bad fucking idea any misfiring synapses have ever conceived. In this AU though, we stan brothers who check, double check and triple check before calling a time of death, because like the saying goes, fool us once, shame on you, fool us thirty seven times in just any single given decade, then yeah, that's probably on us at that point....

But non-brother approved Tim Tormenting is highly frowned upon in this universe, so Dick and Jason make like the Brothers Grimm, sharpen their spells and go questing down a literal yellow brick road that Dick conjures to lead them straight to the mysterious Mister Oz. And one of these days, Jason would really like to know where Dick gets some of his spells, he really would. Because. Yeah. Never mind, that's best unpacked another day, he figures.

Truthfully, that's all a story for another day as well, as Dick and Jason and Tim probably need to compare notes first and clear up a few things among themselves. None of them are entirely sure they even get what all of that was even about at all. It all seemed very strange and unnecessary, the standard villain monologues were a lot less explanatory than usual, nobody ever really satisfactorily explained Why You So Creepily Interested In Our Baby Bro, Bee Tee Dubs, and the deeper down the rabbit hole they all went, the more every reveal seemed to lead to an increasingly smaller Russian nesting doll hidden inside in the previous one.

And maybe the bad guy was Superman's dead dad from Krypton, which...okay, weird, whatever. And maybe he was just a patsy and the real monster all along was this giant glowing blue guy who seemed to have every power imaginable except for the power to put on a freaking pair of pants? I mean, everyone needs a gimmick, I guess. And then behind that funhouse mirror they found maybe the real villain all along was some rando in a toga who called himself Ozymandias and claimed to have been a hero, and nope, nuh uh, Jason isn't buying that for a second, he says you named yourself in reference to a line that literally says Look Upon My Works O Ye Mighty And Despair and you're saying everyone just went yup, that checks out, we've got ourselves a hero here, pure intentions through and through? Nope, sorry, not buying it.

And Ozy's face got as purple as the costume that would've gotten him in the door to any frat party but not much else, and honestly, as much as it flaps in a firm breeze its not even a step up from Dr. Moons Over Manhattan's permanent residency at a nude ranch he takes with him everywhere he goes, more of a lateral move really....

And he opened his mouth to say something suitably villainous and to do something no doubt dastardly, but that's when Dick cut him off with a yawn and a "Oh my god I have never been this bored in my life, I honestly don't care. Literally nobody asked." And he conjured up his yellow brick road again, told them he had no idea which of them needed the brain, which the heart and which the courage, but like...discuss among yourselves, and then he and Jason punted all three losers off to see the Wizard except Dick shrugged after shutting down the spell and said that guy died, like, five years ago. Its just no one else there has figured that out yet. Whoops. Oh well.

Look, its as clear and understandable a resolution to that particular adventure as anyone else might have doled out over an unnecessarily padded number of weeks until the patience of everyone involved was stretched well past the point of reason, so....whatever. That's what happened, the end.

And then Jason blows some shit up until he feels better about how obnoxiously pointless all that was and there's lots of yelling about worst bad guys ever, is there no vetting process anymore, are the inmates running the asylum, has the whole universe gone mad. Which somehow segues into Tim yelling about is Jason seriously upstaging him at his own Dramatic Rescue, how is this about him, oh my god, can't I even get five whole minutes to angst without you carjacking the family Waah-mobile.

Meanwhile Dick leans back contentedly against the one wall still standing as a convenient backdrop, and watches the baby bros go. And Mom says they don't have any family traditions.

He actually really enjoys these moments. At least the ones where nobody's yelling at him.

But again, as I said....really all that's a tale for another day. On this day, what remains of significance is the universal truism that no matter the universe, the timeline, the place or the time or the people.....

If there be a Bruce, then that Bruce is gonna Bruce.

And we all know what that looks like.

That is to say:

Meanwhile, back in Gotham, events unfold in strangely familiar ways. Even if some of their usual players are currently preoccupied sojourning their way back across the dimensions before they're late for dinner and Momma Zatara has their heads. Adopted though her kids may be, Zatanna is still an Italian mother. And you do not fuck with an Italian mother's family dinner plans.

That's how people die.

But fractionally less dramatically than Zatanna sits awaiting her boys' late arrival to dinner with a A Damn Good Explanation For That If They Know What’s Good For Them, Bruce meets Cassandra Cain and rescues her from her father.

He’s still Bruce Wayne, even if events played out differently for his first three canon kids. So he does what any Bruce would do and adopts her.

And then Cass brings Stephanie home and says she’s a runaway and her dad was a villain and well, what’s Bruce gonna do, not adopt her? Don't be absurd.

And then Talia shows up on Bruce’s doorstep and shoves a ten year old Damian at him and says "Congratulations, its a boy. Please take care of him while I go and try and kill my father and sister without getting killed by them first. I’m not sure how long that will take but my father has managed to last six centuries despite countless betrayals so I suspect it might be awhile."

I imagine these events all happen roughly in the span of a month, because there is no such thing as a world where Bruce knows how to pace himself.

There’s also no such thing as a world where Bruce knows how to gracefully ask for help. But even at his most stubborn he’s capable of recognizing when things fall outside his skillset and his best move is to seek advice from experts in fields outside his expertise. Like parenting.

And his old friend Zatanna has raised three boys who are well loved and respected by the entire hero community, so she must know what she’s doing. Yes, absolutely, his frazzled mind decides. Zatanna will have all the answers. His logic is sound. He's double checked his math and everything. Yes, he has equations for this sort of thing. No, they're not scientifically or empirically accurate, but just because one has arbitrarily assigned numeric values to various events, decisions and possible outcomes in order to justify to oneself that one's intended course of action is Endorsed By Data and Scientifically Derived Conclusions, like....that doesn't mean those values are all arbitrary and the conclusions and data that derive from them are fictitious and meaningless.

Shhh, shhh, don't question that last sentence, just nod and smile and accept that you're just not quite brilliant enough to understand the genius that is Brucenometry, and that's totally understandable and the real reason Bruce hasn't shared the math system he invented with the rest of the world. We just wouldn't get it, you see?

(And yes, he absolutely calls it Brucenometry in his head, because despite what the Batmen of other universes would have us believe, all the eight year old incarnations of Dick Grayson are naught but a scapegoat for the emotionally stunted manchild who absolutely devised the labeling system of 'what if I put Bat in front of every word tho and that's how you knew it was mine, yes, good, this is obviously the most logical and efficient taxonomy possible, its practically the Occam's Bat-Razor of nomenclatures, huzzah I am the smartest in all the land, eat my Batshit I mean guano I mean crazy I mean shut up no you're dumb.' And if you don't think Bruce sounds like that in his head you're just drinking the Kool-Aid, dear reader. Pick up any issue where Bruce is having an emotional fight with someone and skip to where he insists on having the last word before sweeping dramatically into the darkness, and substitute that last word with 'nuh uh, your face'. It reads practically the same, I swear.

Anyway, thus Brucenometry is only Brucenometry instead of Batnometry because he came up with the math first. The math is literally how he calculated that combining crime fighting with his fursona was by far the most expedient route for building a better, brighter Gotham? Duh? Like if you don't get it, he really can't explain it any more clearly than that, and this is possibly one of the reasons he doesn't let the Martian Manhunter in his head. Well, that and all the equally Scientific Ponderings on how accurate a label 'Buns of Steel' is for Superman's butt, and how might this best be tested. Y'know. For Science.)

It's possible I've gotten off track here. I blame Bruce. Bruce blames Clark's ass. Its this whole thing.

Ahem.

So Bruce decides Zatanna has all the answers to all his questions, clearly. Because you see, Bruce knows practically everything that's worth knowing, so anyone who knows something Bruce doesn't already know, ergo, ipso facto, must therefor in conclusion be smarter than Bruce. And if they're smarter than Bruce, as smart as Bruce already is and knowing as much as Bruce already knows, well then, they must know literally everything.

Bam. You've just been Bat Logic-ed.

Bruce sends a message. He waits. He's expecting something along the lines of a call back, but one minute he blinks and the next minute Zatanna's in the middle of the disaster his new brood of three have made of his living room, hands on her hips, shaking her head as she looks around.

“What did you do?” She asks, exasperatedly.

He really doesn't understand why so many people take that particular tone with him. All of his choices are excellent and backed by Brucenometry. He can show his work and everything.

Bruce would respond, but he’s distracted by the three unknown variables. He admittedly had not expected her to bring all three of her boys along with her. Then again, they're magicians and magic always messes up his calculations. Its the worst. Stupid magic. He keeps himself from glaring at the teenager, practically still a teenager, and fully grown man chugging down a Pixie stick while playing what sounds like Candy Crush on his phone with his free hand.

Zee just shakes her head at him when Bruce tries to turn her question back on her with a pointed look.

“They were with me when I got your message and they wanted to come. Given how non-informative and vague the information you gave me was, it seemed plausible they might have a helpful perspective. Don’t change the subject. What did you do.”

“In all fairness, I should clarify that we were mostly just bored,” Tim says dryly.

“Also, this sounded amazing,” Jason adds, smirking.

Dick bounces up and down. “I’m very excited to be here for this! By the way, what is this, what's happening, what's going on? I was not totally paying complete attention, maybe. Oooh, does this place have an indoor pool? I bet it has an indoor pool. God, I love how completely unnecessary old rich people houses are, its amazing.”

That’s when a ten year old mini-Bruce wanders in, parentage apparent in every premature scowl line on his face. “Father, who are these people?”

Dick emits a gleeful sound that lends credence to his spirit friends’ theory he’s not entirely human and just appears right next to Damian, sweeping him up into a hug. His brothers blink, unsure if he had a teleport spell they didn’t know about, or if his natural ability to seek out anyone in need of a hug like a heat-seeking missile could actually allow him to move faster than the eye can see. Could go either way, to be honest.

“Oh my god, he’s like a tiny baby bat, he’s adorable,” Dick says, words rushing out at a speed normally achievable only by speedsters.

Damian has frozen at the unexpectedness of his behavior, but the outrage swiftly sets in. “What did you just call me?”

“A tiny baby bat!”

“Not that, the other thing.”

“Adorable!”

“How dare you!” The ten year old produces a knife from somewhere and attempts a stabbing that results in said knife being transmuted into a Twizzler. Dick twists in that unnatural way only his body is capable of and somehow mid-hug still manages to eat the Twizzler, because why not, apparently.

“I’m keeping him,” Dick declares, right on schedule. "He is my new brother and also now my weekend favorite, sorry not sorry. Jason is now my Monday and Friday favorite and Timmy is my Tuesday and Thursday favorite. Wednesdays can be my me time."

"But Dick," Tim deadpans in a lifeless monotone, now absorbed in doing something with his own phone. "How can I not be your Wednesday favorite? On Wednesdays we wear pink."

Jason rocks back on his heels, rolls his head back on his neck and stares up at the room's high, vaulted ceiling despairingly. "I hate that I get that reference. I hate that so much. I just don't know if I hate Tim for saying it, Dick for being the reason he said it, or me for hearing it and getting it. Quick, somebody tell me who to punch, I can't make this decision, its too hard."

Zatanna pinches the bridge of her nose and exhales. Cass and Steph lurk in the doorway and stare at the scene, bemused. Bruce is statue still. It’s possible his complete inability to process anything that’s happening right now has computer-crashed his every system. See kids, this is what comes of spending too much time trying to emulate a robot. Don't do drugs. Stay in school. Emote.

“Dick, I know that worked out for you the last two times you tried that, but its not going to fly here. This child actually has an emotionally invested parent capable of providing for him, and I don’t believe the Batman is likely to relinquish his claim without a fight,” Zatanna says, her exasperation now redirected at her eldest.

Dick remains unphased; merely diverts his attention from Damian to the boy’s father, raking his eyes up and down Bruce as the older man reenacts the pose of Rodin's lesser known work: The Oh God, What Was I Thinking.

He sniffs. Once. Pointedly unimpressed. “I am willing to work out a shared custody agreement,” Dick says regally.

Bruce gradually twitches his way back into the realm of actual human activity and motion.

“What?” He shakes himself all over, a bit like a dog. Then he seems to reboot his higher cognitive functions as he draws up to his full height and towers over the younger man. “I’m not sure what you think you’re playing at here, but this is not why I called your mother and I do not need some boy barely out of his teens to tell me -"

Dick cuts him off, rolling his eyes even as Bruce, Steph, Cass and Alfred’s eyes all widen at the sheer novelty of that. Even Damian goes silent and still, no longer fighting Dick’s octopus like limbs as he’s too busy flicking his attention back and forth between Dick and Bruce like he’s a spectator at a tennis match, watching it unfold.

Jason and Tim just smirk knowingly. Zatanna regrets everything.

“Yes, yes, we’re aware the Batman has a million contingency plans for any given scenario. We’re all very impressed. Your IQ is huge,” Dick says flatly. “Quick question though, how many of those contingency plans involve hugging?”

Bruce blinks. “What?”

“That’s what I thought,” Dick continues smugly. “Now, in your history as a crime fighter and a benefactor of numerous children’s charities, do you dispute that all children at certain times need to be hugged?”

“No?” Bruce answers uncertainly. He…has no precedence for this. What is happening right now.

“Mmm,” Dick hums, nodding. “And in your personal self-assessment and in light of all your established behavior to date, would you say with confidence that you are capable of always recognizing when a child is in need of a hug, as well as being able and willing to provide that child with said hug yourself?”

Bruce frowns. Everyone in the room takes that as a no. Seals in Antarctica look up and take that as a no, without any idea why they just did that or what it even is they just did. Also, what the hell is a no, they have no clue. They still somehow know the answer to that question was no.

“Exactly,” Dick says. “So, to sum up, we’ve established that your children need hugs, you need to be taught when and how to identify when your children need you to hug them, and until such a time as you’re capable of that, your children still need hugs. In conclusion, my services are direly needed and I am willing to teach you everything I know about providing adorable children with emotional support in exchange for the role of their designated Hug-Giver for the time being. Do you accept my offer?”

“I…” Still stuck on the unprecedented feeling of being at a total loss for words, Bruce is slow to answer. Not that it matters.

“Trick question!” Dick announces cheerfully. “There was no offer, its already been decided. I can start immediately. You're welcome.”

He shifts Damian to his hip with one arm and raises the other to offer the boy his hand for a shake. “Hi Damian, I’m Dick, I’m your official Hug-Giver for now. Nice to meet you!”

Damian shakes Dick’s hand, more out of confusion than anything else. Clearly, nothing in his training or experience offers him any obvious alternate response to Dick’s behavior. “Father, who is this man? What is happening? I don’t understand.”

“That makes two of us,” the goddamn Batman says helplessly. They can all see his face spasming, his muscles twitching as if periodically glitching while he tries to compute and come up with a course of action that adequately counters Dick’s….whatever the hell you describe Dick and his entire….essence, as.

Gods have tried and failed to accurately describe Dick and his whole….Dick-ness. The Batman never stood a chance.

Tim takes pity on him. He’s mostly preoccupied hacking the Manor’s wi-fi on his phone, trying to see if he can backdoor from there into the famed Batcave’s computers. No real reason, he’s just curious. But even barely paying attention, he can still tell the difference between Dick’s more generic ‘oooh a squirrel!’ ADHD reaction to all adorable children or animals in his general vicinity, and the genuine emotional attachment his brother has clearly already formed with the confused child assassin. It’s too late now. Whether he’s even realized it or not, Damian stopped trying to escape Dick’s hug practically from the word go, even if he is unconsciously using his confusion to blind himself to how he’s already started to sink into it. Not even Superman himself could pry the kid out of Dick’s arms at this point.

“You can try all you want to come up with ways to keep this from happening, but you’ll just be wasting your time and energy,” Tim advises, still intent on his phone. Two passwords down, nice. Only….ninety more to go? Jeez. Oh god, if he’s this redundant about his cyber security, he’s gonna try and be stubborn about this, isn’t he? Ugh, how inefficient.

“Look, no matter how many plans you come up with, it doesn’t matter what you throw at him or how convoluted or well-crafted it is. At a certain point Dick’s just going to say screw it and dig his heels in, and no offense, but I’ve seen him out-stubborn demons. He once got a Duke of Hell to release a claim on Jason’s soul by committing to “I know you are but what am I” until the ageless being composed of pettiness and spite got frustrated and gave up. My brother on a mission to dole out affection is an actual force of nature. Like hurricanes. Even Jason lets Dick hug him. And Jason hates everything.”

“Die screaming,” Jason says conversationally.

“See a therapist about your Cain complex,” Tim returns, equally pleasant.

“I thought I told you boys to be on your best behavior,” Zatanna says. Either exasperated again, or just still. Hard to say.

Jason cocks an eyebrow at her quizzically before looking around the room. “Umm, we are, aren’t we? I mean, we’ve been here for at least five minutes and nothing’s on fire or broken yet. You gotta admit that’s like, a record for us.”

Zatanna sputters helplessly for a moment before collapsing onto the couch with a sigh. “The bar is too low,” she mutters. "And don't think I didn't catch that bit about a Duke of Hell having a claim on Jason's soul at some point. We will be circling back to that later, at home."

"Dude," Jason hisses, glaring at his little brother. "Spoilers!"

"Sorry," Tim says distractedly, with a distinct lack of sincerity. "In my defense, we lie about a lot of stuff and I forget to keep track of it all."

"You have an eidetic memory."

"Okay, so I forget to care about keeping track of it all," Tim amends, shrugging.

"That's just because you never get in as much trouble as me and Dick. Helps to be the baby of the family," Jason grumbles.

Tim hums softly in agreement, tongue poking out of the corner of his mouth as he peers intently at his screen. "The perks are nice."

Zatanna interjects as she eyes her two younger sons, a slight edge in voice. "Exactly how much stuff am I being lied to about? Ballpark figure."

Jason glares at Tim again. "You're a goddamn menace."

"I should probably be stopped," Tim agrees.

“Nonsense!” Damian’s aggrieved voice cuts over everyone else in the room. “I am an al Ghul, and heir to the Batman. If this tournament you speak of were truly a contest of champions, I would certainly have heard of it before now.”

Dick returns his glower with his usual beaming grin. “I swear by every being of both the higher and lower planes to ever lend me power or aid. Super Mario Kart is a test of manual dexterity, hand-eye coordination and reflex agility. Any true warrior should be more than capable of defeating all competitors at it.”

Damian stays trained on his face for a good minute, searching it for any hint of deception. Finally he turns and sweeps his imperious gaze around the room, jumping back and forth between his father to Jason and Tim, though the latter is still absorbed tracking to crack the thirty-sixth password to the Batcomputer. “Is this true?”

“Technically yes,” Jason says with the smirk to end all smirks. Sometimes his older brother is a total toolbag, but sometimes it really is like watching a master at work. How to Lie Without Telling a Single Lie by Dick Grayson-Zatara.

Damian harrumphs like the eighty seven year old that he is at heart, but with a secondary affirmation and no one speaking up to offer a counter-claim, his pride seems to allow him no alternative to accepting Dick’s challenge.

“Very well,” he says grudgingly. “I will engage you in this competition of supers and carts. But when I inevitably prove victorious, as consequence for your failure you and your babbling are to be banished from my father’s estate, never to return.”

“K!” Dick grins. “But if I win, you have to initiate three hugs a day for a solid week straight, at which point you may challenge me to a rematch and reclaim your honor.”

“Preposterous! One hug a day. No more.”

“One hug a day, but after two weeks I can challenge you to a rematch at my home instead.”

“I shudder to think what you might consider an acceptable abode. No, if I must vanquish you twice before you realize the folly of challenging an al Ghul, you shall return here only for the purposes of engaging in this ‘rematch’, and only after two months have passed, so that you may reflect on the futility of such.”

“One month, final offer.”

“Tt. Your terms are acceptable,” Damian decides at last. Dick’s already brilliant smile grows impossibly more blinding, as it is wont to do. The whole defiance of physics thing he does so well. Unprepared for it, the startled boy blinks, corners of his mouth twitching ever so slightly upwards before he regains his normal stern countenance. “Now lead me to these carts at once. I wish to see you defeated before supper, so I do not have to suffer your presence through my meal.”

“You got it, lil D!” Dick chirps happily, bouncing through the doorway and down the hall, where Cass and Steph exchange glances that condense an entire conversation to thirty seconds of back and forth facial expressions. They then race down the hall after the two. Damian’s outrage drifts back behind them.

“My name is Damian al Ghul-Wayne, you buffoon! It is a name of power and significance, heavy with meaning and intent. How dare you reduce it to a simple reference to physical stature!”

“Aww, I’m sorry bud! It was meant as an endearment not an insult. I give nicknames to all my friends and family. What if I called you Dami? Is that better?”

“….I suppose if my full name is too difficult for you to manage, Dami is at least marginally more tolerable. But only if it is understood that we are hardly friends!”

“Whatever you say, Dami!”

Their voices fade into the distance after that. Jason puts his hands in his pockets and strolls casually after them.

“That was amazing. My faith in humanity has like....risen reborn from the ashes. I might even believe in Santa Claus again? Not sure yet about that last part," he muses to no one in particular. "I’m so happy right now.”

Tim shrugs and trails after him. If everyone else is going, well. No reason he can’t finish hacking the Batcomputer from wherever they end up.

Bruce watches them disappear down the hallway before staggering over to the couch and dropping down onto it next to Zatanna. He stares blankly at the wall.

“What.” He utters helplessly.

Zatanna pats his leg. “You get used to it. Eventually.”

And that’s how even when Dick’s adopted by Zatanna Zatara instead of Bruce Wayne, he, Jason, Tim, Damian, Cass, Steph and those to follow all still end up siblings in every way that matters.

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anothertimdrakestan · 4 years ago

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Ranking My Thoughts On The Batboys/YJ Boys Flirting Skills (lol)

req: "Rank the BatBoys and Young Justice Boys on their flirting skills pretty please?"

HAAHAH YES ALRIGHT omg i love this ask

in no particular order,

Dick Grayson 8/10, i think of dick's flirting style is immaculate but he's kinda a flirtatious person in general so i knocked him down a point bc anyone he's flirting with will think it's just regular for him when he's really trying to put on the moves. The other point was knocked off because there's no chance in hell his brothers wouldn't interrupt his flirting as adorable as it is, 8/10.

Bart Allen 4.5/10, this is harsh, but it's bart. i mean his freakin name is bartholew and he's from the future. his version of flirting is probably blushing and giving you the nearest object to him then running away. we love him for it, but he's not smooth.

Jason Todd 9/10, god this man is smooth. i give him lots of points because i think his flirting strategies are immaculate and that he's less of a flirt than Dick so when he is flirting you know and it's fucking hot. -1 for Kory and Roy harassing the shit outta people hes crushing on.

Conner Kent 10/10, THIS IS NOT YOUNG JUSTICE ANIMATED CONNER KENT THIS IS THE HOT CONFIDENT SEXY STUDDED LEATHER JACKET DADDY LEX'S MONEY CONNER KENT THATS ALL I NEED TO SAY

Tim Drake 2/10, tim does not have the fucking time of day to be flirting and cutesy, he's a fucking business man and vigilante and depressed teen. the people tim dates either have been friends with him for a damn good while or put the moves on him and i stand by that.

Gar Logan 7/10, mf is smooth as hell but -2 because he's green and a movie star so like getting your average like coffee shop gorl would be a little difficult but other than that mans has game cuz he's dorky enough to be cute but confident and flirtatious too. 7/10 because he's one point below Dick.

Damian Wayne -1/10, this poor boi is so fucked up emotionally lets be real. he probably doesn't know he has feeling for someone until like 4 years into knowing them and then he would do the opposite of flirting. basically, it take special person (cough ris or jon cough) but him falling for them/getting them to fall for him is NOT flirting period.

Terry McGinnis 8/10, very comparable to Dick, fun and flirtatious and outgoing but i just don't think he has that jason todd swag yk? so 8/10 but he'd be like 8.2 because his smile is *chefs kiss*

Wally West 10/10, i cite both the Jinx episode of teen titans and his entire run on young justice GODDAMN mans is a flirt machine. he fucking invented flirting. all i'm saying is m'gann did not know what she was doing when she went with conner. end of story.

Jaime Reyes 5/10, he has more game than bart but that's about it. -3 for visible discomfort caused by the scarab, -1 for bart lmao, and -1 because he's a quiet little bean and though he could flirt like with a girl he's really really into he doesn't have that "pick you up off the street" mentality at ALL.

i feel like i'm forgetting character but this is my list however i am open to and interested in differing opinions lolz lemme know how i did!

thank you for the req!!! ily

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darkspellmaster · 6 years ago

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Young Justice Theory: Terra and Deathstroke’s relationship

Fair bit of warning, this is going to get a bit squicky, so a heads up for anyone easily upset by a comic nearly 30 years old that has some rather...nasty...implications.

That being said in my other theory post I was covering the likely hood of the Judas Contract coming into play. One of the bigger parts of that story line is the relationship between Tera Markov and Slade Wilson and how it affects them and her brother Brion later in the story.

As I said in my other post, I think that Slade Wilson, aka Deathstroke, is in charge of the LoA and probably sitting with the Light now. I also surmised that Tara is probably working with him out of a sense of loyalty or possibly infatuation, one that was born probably on a savior complex that she has thanks to the treatment she’s been put through due to her uncle.

Now while I don’t know exactly how this relationship will play out I do think it’s going to be darker than other versions that have been put to animation. However due to the factor that there’s some...less than ideal implications in this post, you’ve been warned once more about the history of these two characters and their relationship.

Exactly what is the relationship of Terra and Slade at this point?

This is not going to be an easy area to talk about because of the nature of the relationship in the comics. Tara and Slade have very complex issues both born out of desires and needs. Though with Tera’s we were never given the full story because she wasn’t supposed to have one, persay. We were supposed to like her and feel, much like the Teen Titan’s, betrayed by her, as her character was supposed to be a dark mirror to one Kitty Pryde of X-men fame, and a subversion of the bubbly teen girl that joins the older cast of characters.

However because Tera’s story and the complex emotions that this tale wrought with fans of the 80s, it’s been adapted several times over and in a lot of cases we got to see More of Terra’s story and how different forms affect her.

So in Teen Titans, Terra was given a more “I need you to love me as a dad” type story with Slade, which for the most part sticks with most cartoon adaptations of the story. However, with the recent movie adaptation of the Judas contract we get a Terra that is a bit more interested in Slade.

In this version Slade rejects her off and pushes her away, showing that he has a greater sense of morality and noting his other children in the story.

It’s important to understand where Slade is coming from in this tale, as his connection to the Titans runs deep, as it seems to run the same way with the core team in Young Justice. In comics Slade’s eldest son Grant became the Ravenger who worked for H.I.V.E, a group of assassins that worked for the H.I.V.E. Mistress who was Queen Bee (and later Adeline Wilson, Slade’s ex wife) and took on high profile contracts for murder and terrorism.

Grant, who was a fan of Deathstroke, not knowing that was his father, became the Ravenger after his apartment was destroyed when the Titans were trying to save Starfire. As Ravenger he intended to take out the Titan’s team and allowed for them to give him powers like his father. However, unlike Deathstroke who also was experimented on -and who wound up in a coma because of it but somehow that helped him, Grant’s powers were unstable and killing him. Slade warned him not to go after the Titans in his condition, but Grant did not listen. During a fight with the team his powers burned out and killed him. He died in his father’s arms, leading to Slade swearing revenge upon the Titans.

We know that Slade has been in the series since season 1, though his extent was limited there. It was only during the Season 2 time jump that we began to see a difference in the character and his expressing wanting to join the Light and sit at the table. (A small theory here though is that Slade maybe doing this in order to get revenge on everyone that ended up killing Grant, including Queen Bee, and YJ.)

The importance though here is that Slade has been shown to be a caring father, one that even when facing his son and daughter in battle has been willing to protect them from others even as he’s trying to defeat them. These two being Joseph and Rose Wilson (Jericho and Ravenger II respectively). If indeed Grant died in the in between of the seasons, than it becomes a clear cut case on what the hell Slade is up to. However we don’t know that for sure at this point.

Slade’s desire for revenge tends to override most of his own moral code, though in a lot of cases we’ve seen him show a desire to keep the kids out of it.

Regarding Terra though, in most cases the writers mostly ignored or changed over the relationship between these two, leaving it more along the lines of the movie where Slade doesn’t try things with her at all even as Terra throws herself at him.

Yet…given that Greg has said they are going darker, and given the ambitious nature of this Slade over his various counterparts, I wouldn’t hesitate to think for a moment that he would be willing to have a sexual affair with this young girl.

Yes, you heard right, Slade and Terra were having a intimate relationship while she was either 14 to 16 years of age. He was basically allowing her to have him physically as a reward for her work with the TT.

From what we know at least when Terra was first created by Marv and George the idea was to create the Anti Kitty Pryde who was a big deal at the time in the X-men. Terra held the charming sweet girl look around the Teen Titan’s and wound up getting close to Beast Boy.

However around Slade she was a rather different person.

(Of note in a specific scene where she is talking with Slade she specifically mentions camera contact lenses, and who on the YJ crew has been using those recently. If you said Dick Grayson, you are correct. On top of that the image of Terra that we see in Black Spider’s introduction has red eyes, making me wonder if it’s night goggles, her powers being used, or the contact lenses she mentions here.)

Anyway, Tera in the Teen Titans here came off as someone much older than her own age. She drank, smoked and talked like someone in her thirties. Or at least she was attempting to. We know at this point in time Slade and Tera were in some sort of relationship. Though Slade’s own feelings for the girl is a mixed bag.

Various writers tend to skirt their relationship, but in some cases they pretty much lay out what was going on. Tera appealing to Slade’s loneliness, though in a number of cases it seems like she’s the one pulling the string in the relationship.

On the one hand we can at least, due to some writers, know that Deathstroke may have not been at all comfortable with sleeping with an under aged girl at the time. However his own desire to make the Titan’s pay for the death of Grant over rides this in most written adaptations, or, more frequently having it become a case where he regrets his choices with Tera and connects it to his own issues and at least doesn’t exactly brush it off. Though a lot of writers seem to skip over this, and play it out as Slade just manipulating her.

The bigger question becomes, at least with this version of the story, given that YJ is allowed to show death and blood now, will they be allowed to cover this aspect of the Judas contract?

(Using TJC movie version here for reference)

Tera, as far as we know, hasn’t been fleshed out as of yet. We only have Brion’s word about wanting to find her. We know that she’s probably with Slade, and, let’s be honest here there may be some issues in regard to Tera seeing him as a savior figure. On top of that Slade kinda looks a bit like her dad, or an older version of Gregor in this version of the show.

So there may be more going on in her mind in regard to her feelings for this man over what we see in the comics. We know that, given what Sensei says, there’s the implication that Tera was unhappy at home and that Brion wasn’t helping matters in being off in his own world rather than realizing her issues before him. There’s also the added issue that, as we see with Terra later in the story, she has a mental break down when she’s betrayed by who she thinks is the man that she loves. (Namely this isn’t Slade it’s actually Jericho using his powers of possession to take over his father’s mind.)

The problem right now is how to actually show how they are around one another. As I said before most versions play it more either as a father/daughter like relationship now. Or if they do have the implications of her wanting him, Slade tends to push her away as he has in other media, outright telling her to get off, or put on clothing.

Yet we know that the show is going to get darker as the story goes on, and if Tera has chosen to be with Slade, there needs to be shown exactly why and what is keeping her there. A full on relationship with him would certainly be something, especially if it’s going to be used to counter the growing relationships in the show, such as Brion with Halo, or M’ggan and Conner. By using them as two very lost people using one another to fill holes in their lives, it does give us a look into how broken Brion’s family has become by this point and why it’s going to be hard for him to go back.

Likely too, if Tera did feel that she was being ignored and not loved, Slade’s romance with her may be filling a need that she has and allowing her to feel more secure. Again, if I’m right about her being “saved” by him she may feel that he’s the only person that understands her or truly loves her. This could come down to (since we don’t have Jericho in the show…yet) Brion and Slade vying for her attention to stay on their side. Brion begging his sister to come back and Slade offering the path to the possibly desired world that she wants. This could lead her to choosing her own death and having it were Brion can’t save his sister, and leading him to want revenge on Slade for her death.

Given how Brion tried to kill Slade in Final Crisis itself, leading to him to slit his own throat so that he wouldn’t be taken over by Slade, we can assume that Greg would not at the very least have a fight between these two men over his sister’s death. (Regarding this Geoforce chooses to do this in the very alley way that caused the near death of Joseph Wilson, and rendered him mute from a partial throat slitting from a villain that was after Deathstroke for his activity as an assassin.) Not only that, but one thing that isn’t discussed a lot is what Slade tells Brion about Tera and how close he was to her. Slade realized that Tera has a psychosis, something that pushes her to become irrational later and attack others when she feels betrayed.

During that time Terra pulls apart everything to kill Slade, the Titans and herself, not out of a feeling of guilt but because she felt like she was used and the fact remains that at least in the comics she was already insane.

Tera’s clear over confidence is something that can be seen in her brother as well, since he’s willing to go to Infinity Island with just a two others to save his sister. I have a hunch that M’ggan will be taking up the role that Raven had in this story at the very least, given that Deathstroke has had a run in with Megan before and knows of her and her ways of dealing with things.

It’s interesting to note that at least in the comic Tera always seemed to overestimate the Titans, and I have a feeling that this Tera is going to do the same for YJ, though exactly how or why remains a mystery to me. I can assume that she may do her trick for the Outsiders that we have formed here, with the ramifications leading to Brion to wonder if he’s going to be unstable like her due to the work that Dr. Jace did on him.

I’m also guessing that Tera probably will have to come to some realization over just being simply betrayed here by Deathstroke given how his personality is in this story.

How this all works out…

In the end there is no doubt in my mind that we’re going to see Brion taking more of Beast Boy’s role in this story. Changing it more to a found family aspect vs. how your real family is. I have a feeling that with that, we’re going to see Tera used as a counter to the love that Brion is getting from the other friends that he’s made, and how she treats him.

I’m also going to guess that, without Jericho to take over his father, and given how Deathstroke was in the last two seasons, we’re going to see him pretty much turn his back on Terra after he points out that she’s useless now to him causing her to cave in the LoA, but not before Slade escapes leading to probably the big fight between Slade and Brion later in Part two with the two clashing over Brion feeling that Slade helped murder his sister and probably hurting his new found friends.

I also feel like Tera will be the one that will fight against Halo and probably push her to the limit of her powers. I honestly think that there’s going to be a clash of wills, ideals, and psychology in this story. And I would not be surprised if we see a teen Joseph, and a young Rose, at some point to show that Slade is more than just a killing machine.

We know that there’s going to be a match between Slade and the others as we see Forager coming after him in the trailer.

Only question now is when will we get to see this, and will Tera join the team and if so…how long before she turns against them. Because she will, it’s just a matter of when and why.

Honestly I wouldn’t be surprised if word got back to Slade after the attack on Infinity Island that Brion is looking for his sister and he hatches a plan to use her to get to Team babysitter’s club. Betting also that between season 2 and 3 Grant was killed by YJ at some point, or at least their actions lead to his death and that may be what is driving Slade to make all the choices he’s making right now.

This should be a very interesting test to see how well Greg and Brandon handle this level of dark in the show.

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theimaginativebabbler · 6 years ago

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Hopefully My Last Rant About YJ Spinoffs for Now

Batman, BatFAM spinoff, please?

LEt’s see who we’ve got here.

Cassandra Cain, known as Orphan, Batgirl, Black Bat and other titles over the year. Bruce Wayne’s only adopted daughter.

Tim Drake, Robin, later Red Robin.

Then we finally have SPOILER! Stephanie Brown. She and Tim don’t seem to be a thing yet. Steph is Batgirl at one point and even Robin but Spoiler’s her main role. Her dad’s a villain, not top notch. She and Artemis would get along really well. Right now TIm’s dating Wonder Girl so it doesn’t seem like there’s anything with them. Guess he has a thing for blondes though?

Harper Row, later known as Bluebird shows up in a school in Happy Harbor. She’s a pro with electronics and is just really hardcore. I want more of her now please.

This woman and brilliant rep only showed up for a moment. Kate Kane, Bruce’s cousin, known as Batwoman was in the army. She’s dating her brilliant police officer girlfriend and is just amazing. She’s hardcore and badass, though a little less rough on the edges than her Wayne cousin. I really want to see more of her and soon!

There’s the OG of course. Bruce Wayne, as we all know. He’s delivered some good stuff this season so far. Can we all talk about that diss to Bane? And Batman Inc. is a thing! It’s a thing! And we know how he is about adopting kids. Dick’s just adopted several so now he has Grandkids! And he was already the OG YJ teams dad any way so he’ll have a few others soon by the way things are going.

There was this split second cameo. JASON PETER TODD! RED HOOD! HE’s remembering, and it’s his older brother that triggers it. I almost screamed! No white streak sadly. But his costume is like the newest one in the comics, though I’d love to see the leather jacket at some point. Just please reunite him with his family? Without the angst? We know that’s not possible but please?

Of course we have the original Dynamite duo as well. My all time favs, Nightwing and Batgirl, or Oracle now. Once Robin, now Dick Grayson is Nightwing and as I’ve been hoping for years seems to be dating Barbara Gordon! SHe’s been awesome as Oracle and they have amazing chemistry. I just want more of the two of them. They deserve they’re own show as well. Can that happen? Sign below!

Then of course there’s this! This made us all gasp and coo! It’s the tiny terror himself! The little Demon in the arm’s of the Demon’s Daughter! It’s Damian Al Ghul Wayne. Most know him as Robin. Batman’s only biological kid, at this point anyway, he’s only been around in comics for a little over ten years I think? We’ve all grown attached though. I can’t wait to see him making a connection with Dick Grayson. But then he’s gonna be so old? Can we de-age people and make age gaps like this smaller? I guess that’s what things like my fanfics are for. I really am excited to see Damian though. I love him so much.

Seriously. There’s so much potential here! We have most of the Batfam. We haven’t seen any Alfred yet this season, I can’t remember if we saw him last season either. There’s Duke, who’s pretty new to bring in, or Luke and his father Lucius Fox. More Jim Gordon would be great as well.

I want sibling fights! Nicknames and insults like Replacement and Dickhead, Demon child and all the others. I want Cass, Steph and Babara having girltime! I want them working together and sharing personal jokes! There’s so much that can happen with all of this. Family television shows are always amazing. Can you imagine watching the day to day lives of the Wayne clan?

Barbara being a computer expert or librarian and her fiancee or boyfriend working with her dad as a police? Damian trying to function in school and then with all his pets? Cass going to ballet? Jason arguing with everyone, maybe taking a little break to read and then terrorizing the criminal underworld? Tim going in to Wayne Enterprises and just completely taking it over with Steph there to cheer him on? Bruce just watching them all happily?

This is the content I need. Please make a spinoff happen! Wayne Galas, then patrols! Different sibling pairings working a case. There would be arguments, hugs and just all around chaos!

Say it with me! BATFAM SPINOFF!

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blakedawson76 · 6 years ago

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So, on canon stuff in Season 8

Okay, so here's the thing. I've never been much of a canon shipper. Not since I joined my first fandom when I was twelve. I was and still am in the Saint Seiya fandom since 2014 and nearly all my ships from there are based on me liking the characters and imagining interactions because literally, my one OTP there never even met and I shipped my favorite PJ, Aries Mu, with everybody for a long time (mortal enemy, the neighbor, the best friend, the annoying one, the guy my fav never met either). It didn't matter to me.

Same happens with DC 😂. My OTPs are jaydick and kondick and a whole other tons of ships with Dick. While some ships (with and without Dick) are actually heavily canon based (Brudick, in my opinion, has a lot of canon material to be interpreted however one decides, Talia and Bruce because they were actually canon, Midpollo, because they too are canon) there's also also my OTP of Conner Kent and Dick Grayson that makes zero sense and has zero canon material and a grand total of I dunno, five scenes together in all of YJ? I literally just went one day and said, huh, what if Dick and Conner just come in closer and... Oh yeah, I love this crack ship already! And that's fine, and I love what almost nonexistent material I have and just earlier I was looking at some stills from Young Justice season 3 and I went "OMG!!!!!!" just because Dick and Conner were standing next to each other. So yeah, usually I'm the one that says, "Canon? Who needs it? I love these two! Let's pair them up!"

But then there's Sheith. I swear, I have never cared and wanted canon material like I did for Sheith on Voltron Season 8. I have never cherished canon like I do with the seven previous seasons of Voltron. Maybe it was due to the reputation of the fandom and the shipping wars that I never actually participated in but watched from the sidelines. Maybe it was due to me being naive and hopeful. Maybe it was due to the huge amount of scenes we got between Keith and Shiro, the many moments of character development they shared and had with each other.

Maybe it was due to, oh let's say, Keith very obviously adoring Shiro and risking his life for him so many times and wanting Shiro to be in his life. Maybe it was due to Keith's canon "I love you" (and yeah, I am very aware he said "you're my brother" before, but from previous ships mentioned maybe you've noticed it makes no difference to me how he said it and that I'm a huge fan of evolving relationships, but that's another matter entirely). So yeah, while I usually don't care much about canon and what is 'viable' to ship and what not, Sheith was and is a pairing that for me began with their interactions in the very first episode and then wormed itself into my heart due to all the canon moments, all the canon content that it has. Because it does! Gosh, honestly, we've all seen all the gifs and vids and images and text posts about the sheer amount of canon potential Sheith had. We know how many episodes had precious Sheith scenes in them: the Rise of Voltron, Across the Universe, the Blade of Marmora, Blackout, Changing of the Guard, the Black Paladins, the first episode of season seven whose name I can't remember. And that's just the top off my head, but as we know, there is a lot more.

And so, why am I making you read all this nonsense of mine? Well you see, after fangirling and being so utterly happy just because my YJ OTP were standing next to each other and that means I have a spark to work with, I realized that Season 8 of Voltron hurt so much as a biased Sheith shipper because of how much I had had before. This point has been made a zillion times already, but I'll say it again. They took away all Shiro and Keith interactions. They cut their relatiinship off so abruptly, and it sucked and still sucks so much because of how much canon content there was before to have it all taken away. It felt unnatural, and harsh, and don't even get me started on the whole Zethrid almost killing poor precious Keith and Shiro just standing there. I'm surprised he even came out of the Atlas to get a closer look with how the season turned out.

So yeah, from a Sheith point of view, Season 8 sucked and nothing is going to change that. That ending card, wasn't nice at all either.

But still!

The seven previous seasons still happened. We still have Keith being soft with Shiro, Shiro being a guiding light in Keith's life, we have hugs, we have Kuron being a stammering mess when seeing older Keith and so much more. This season was bad, but the others weren't, so let's try and focus and enjoy all the good stuff, because it surely outweights the bad ones :D

#voltron #sheith #voltron season 8 #there are mentions of other fandoms too so #saint seiya #dc #brudick #kondick #dickkon #superwing #superbird #shipping

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daringyounggrayson · 6 years ago

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angst dialogue prompts: birdflash with 25 or 29? (your choice) (and only if you want to) :)

Hey @haunt-the-stars, thanks so much for the prompt! I’ve been looking for an excuse to write some YJ season two angst, and this fit the bill nicely. Basically, everything is the same except birdflash instead of spitfire and Wally isn’t filled in on the Secrets. And because I’m not that creative, the fic’s title is from the song Chemicals by Dean Lewis. Hope you enjoy the fic :)

From this prompt list: #29: “I’m not going to sit and watch you destroy yourself.” for birdflash.

Title: hold me (i’m falling apart)

Summary: Between Kaldur’s betrayal, Artemis’s death, and the League’s trial, it isn’t a surprise that Dick is struggling. But Wally knows that Dick has been hiding something, too. He might not know what that something is, but whatever it is, it’s killing Dick. Wally just wants to help before it’s too late. AO3

part 2

The alarm went off minutes ago, but aside from Wally’s fumbling hand to turn off his phone’s alarm, no one has moved.

Wally finally finds the energy to roll over, wrapping his arms around Dick the second he does. He’s awake and stiff beneath Wally’s hold, and he can so easily picture Dick’s expression: wide, tired eyes staring blankly at the wall, jaw clenched as if that alone will hold him together.

He kisses his temple. “We should probably get moving if we don’t want to be late.”

Dick brings the pillow closer to him and curls around it slightly. Wally can barely hear the whispered, “I don’t want to go.”

Artemis’s funeral is today. They had gone to the visitation yesterday for almost an hour—which Dick hadn’t wanted to go to either. It had been hard, almost annoying, to convince him to come. But. Wally is trying to be patient; Dick was right there when it happened, after all.

“I know. No one wants to. But we have to go for Artemis and her mom,” Wally tells him, rubbing between his shoulder blades.

In response, Dick rolls away from Wally and onto his stomach to hide his face in the mattress, almost as if that is the exact reason why Dick doesn’t want to go. Wally follows him, placing his forearms on either side of Dick’s back, hovering just a few centimeters above him.

“It’s going to be hard, but I don’t want you to regret missing it later,” Wally tries to persuade. When he gets no response, he sighs and says, “Please? I don’t think I can go alone.”

Dick carefully shifts onto his back to look up at him. His eyes are red and puffy, face pale with dry tear tracks on his cheeks. Nightmares.

“It wasn’t your fault,” Wally whispers, letting his head drop down to touch foreheads.

“Right,” Dick agrees, voice shaky yet sincere.

“You’re warm,” Wally murmurs.

“Because I’ve been sleeping next to a human space heater,” Dick half-heartedly quips back.

Wally pushes himself up into a sitting position. “You can get in the shower first. I’ll find some breakfast.”

Dick nods and, thankfully, gets out of bed.

An hour later and they’re walking into the funeral home about fifteen minutes before the service is scheduled to begin. Dick is practically glued to his side the whole time, talking as little as possible whenever someone approaches them. It’s weird when Dick gets like this, but Wally’s seen it before. It’s not unexpected at all, really.

Everyone who was close with Artemis as a civilian is there: a few friends from Gotham Academy that Dick knows, a few from Stanford that Wally knows, and then the original Team members (along with a few newer members like Tim), her mentors, and the small family Artemis had. It’s a short, emotionally-difficult service, with the hardest parts being the eulogies and the actual burial. When it’s over, Wally has dried tears on his face that match the ones Dick had this morning and the question of how he’s supposed to do this all over again in a few days for the Justice League’s memorial service racing through his mind.

They offer their condolences to Artemis’s mother after the burial is finished, and Wally doesn’t miss how hard it is for Dick. She hugs Dick and he apologizes through her cries, his face wearing a blend of guilt, shock, and grief as it happens. He looks like he’s on the verge of shattering, and Wally knows that Dick not only (unfairly) blames himself for Artemis’s death, but that the funeral also made Artemis’s death real. He needs time process—away from everything and everyone.

So when Dick asks to skip the luncheon after the burial, Wally lets him. He drives Dick back home where Dick shuts himself in the bathroom as soon as they arrive. Wally hears him puking and then the shower turns on. It’s so hot Wally can see steam coming out from underneath the door, and if he had super hearing, he’s positive he would hear the quiet sounds of Dick breaking down. But if he can’t hear Dick, that means Dick can’t hear him. So maybe he breaks down a little bit, too.

oOo

Since quitting the Team, Wally has only used his speed a handful of times. There have been a few times were Kid Flash has been brought back in as a “one-time thing” in emergencies, most recently emergencies involving Bart. But, outside of vigilante use, Wally has only used his speed three times since hanging up the yellow boots. The first time was when he and Dick were on a date and it started to rain so hard that he decided to pick Dick up and run them to his car, the second was because of a school project that he’d pushed off way too close to its deadline, and the third is now: running to get to the Hall of Justice’s hospital wing because Tim just called to tell him that 1) the Cave had been blown up and 2) Dick had been there when it happened.

He doesn’t stop until he’s in the room, staring at Dick half sitting up in a hospital bed.

“Babe, thank god,” Wally breathes, leaning against the doorway for support.

Tim is sitting cross-legged on the end of the bed with his head turned towards the door to look at Wally. The room feels a little tense, and Wally’s is 93% sure that he just interrupted an argument between the two. Over what, he has no idea, but he also doesn’t find himself caring. All he cares about is getting to Dick

He forces himself to walk over to the bed, paying no mind to Tim as he reaches out to hold Dick’s face with both of his hands. “Are you okay?”

Dick places both of his hands over Wally’s and smiles. “Course I am. Just swallowed a little water and freaked Connor and Mal out a little.”

“And by ‘swallowed a little water’ he means near-drowned.” Wally takes his hands off of Dick’s face and turns towards Tim when he pipes up. “He needs to be observed for a few more hours here, and then he can be monitored at home for the next forty-eight.”

“Any other injuries from the explosion?” Wally asks Tim, taking a seat in the chair next to Dick’s bed as he does.

“We just got caught in the debris field, not the actual explosion,” Dick says, but they continue as if they hadn’t heard him.

“A few bruised ribs, but luckily no concussion like Mal originally thought when he brought him in,” Tim says.

Wally nods, grabbing Dick’s hand and giving it a tight squeeze that doesn’t let up for a few seconds. “That’s good. I’m guessing we’re on pneumonia watch then?”

“Yup.”

“Look, I’m fine, and now that you’re here, you can sign me out, right?” Dick asks, and he sounds… eager? Yeah, definitely eager, and a little jumpy.

“I’ll sign you out as soon as you’re cleared,” Wally promises, anxious eyes glancing from the nasal cannula to the pulse oximeter still on his finger. “How did all of this happen? The cave is really gone?”

“Kaldur and his new friends raided the Cave. No idea why or how yet, but he took Bart, Gar, and Jaime with him,” Dick says darkly. Wally curls his free hand into a fist. “I really need to get out of here and start working on this before we lose his trail.”

That explains the eager-jumpiness Wally picked up on earlier, and maybe the reason for Dick and Tim’s earlier argument. But there’s something else going on that Dick’s not telling him. It’s something in Dick’s voice that Wally can’t quite pick out. He runs a hand through his own hair and lets out a breath. “Wow, okay. Listen, this isn’t on you. Understand? I’m sure you did everything you could.”

Dick’s eyes water a little and Wally swears his lip almost trembles. “Please, just—”

Wally holds his hand up. “But you’re no good to anyone if you make your condition worse. And I’m sure the others are already working on getting them back. Right, Tim?”

Tim nods once, fast and sharp. “Conner and Mal are on it, and I think they already sent a squad out.”

“See?”

“Conner was in the explosion, too. So if it’s okay for him to be working, I don’t see why—"

Wally’s eyes tighten. “Dick, he’s half Kryptonian. And he didn’t near-drown.”

Dick sighs and shifts to lean back against the bed. “Fine. I’ll stay here. What’s the plan for Gotham patrol tonight?”

“Babs is out right now. I’ll join her if she’s still out when we get back home.”

“You’re going to the manor?” Wally asks.

Dick’s lips quirk upward at the corners. “Alfred insisted.”

Tim scoffs, but it’s teasing. “More like Alfred yelled at him for being reckless and now Dick’s grounded for the unforeseeable future.”

“That is not what happened!” Dick defends, but he’s smiling too. That real, Dick Grayson, happy smile that Wally hasn’t seen in weeks. He turns back to Wally, smile already fading. “He worries. Besides, I have to fill in for a Wayne Enterprises meeting tomorrow morning anyway, seeing as Bruce Wayne is on vacation and all.”

Wally gives him a confused look. “I didn’t realize you were taking over for Bruce too.”

Dick shrugs. “The trial isn’t as straightforward as he initially thought. There are several projects at WE that he can’t push off any longer, so he asked if I could step in. And you know how Bruce is: if he asks he’s really ordering.”

“What about your day job?” And the night job, and the Team, and the other night job, and random JLA consults, and, you know, his ever-dissolving sleep schedule.

“I can still keep it. I’m not going to be working at WE full-time or anything, just a few meetings here and there that Bruce would normally have to attend.”

Wally doesn’t say anything, because he doesn’t know how to say that this is too much without causing Dick to get defensive.

“What?”

Wally shakes his head. “Nothing. Just worried about you.”

“I’m okay.”

That’s what you keep telling me. “I know.”

They talk until Wally catches Dick’s eyes slide shut and his breathing slows down. He guesses the evening’s events have finally caught up with him, and the painkillers definitely weren’t helping him stay awake. Wally and Tim sit in a comfortable silence, just watching Dick in this now all-too-rare moment of peace.

“He can’t keep this up much longer,” Tim says.

“Yeah,” Wally agrees. He doesn’t have to say anything else; Tim knows Dick is struggling. It’s been one thing after the other lately, with everything coming down around them at once. Dick’s workload (some of which he can’t get out of, some he tells himself he can’t get out of) is strenuous enough, but then you add on the emotional toll of Artemis and Kaldur and it’s all … too much.

“I don’t know what to do,” Tim admits, absently picking at Dick’s blanket. “He keeps telling me he’s okay and pretending that everything’s fine, and then he buries himself in work to hide the fact that he’s not fine.”

“You’re doing everything right, Tim. We just have to be there for him and try to help where we can, where he’ll let us,” Wally advises. Tim doesn’t say anything, merely nods slowly. Because, really, that’s what they’ve been doing. The thing is, it’s not working, it never was working.

Dick won’t talk to him about it, either, and Wally can’t shake the feeling that Dick is hiding something from him. There have been signs—sneaking out to who knows where under the guise of patrol, most casework coincidently being finished as soon as Wally walks into the room, Dick constantly seeming off and not himself—but no clues as to the specifics of what that something is. Whatever it is, one thing is certain: it’s killing Dick.

Dick is woken up and discharged about an hour later, and Wally decides to ride back with him and Tim. The second they’re in the Batmobile, Dick turns the autopilot on and starts working on his holo-computer. He inserts a USB that he pulled from one of his glove compartments, probably to pick up where he left off before the raid and explosion took place. He wants to say something, tell Dick that it can wait or even ask what he’s working on in general, but the look on Dick’s face convinces him otherwise. It’s a look Wally has been seeing a lot of these days.

oOo

They come across some luck and are able to rescue the Team members—along with some other teenage civilians—who had been abducted by the Reach. Other than that, however, things stick to their typical pattern and continue to get worse. M’gann has been kidnapped by Tigress, Conner is angry (at Dick, Wally thinks), the information they’re gathering on the Reach only grows more concerning (and that’s only the stuff Wally knows about), and to top it off, the trial still isn’t going in the JLA’s favor. Dick was being stretched thin before, and now with all of this extra pressure stacked on top, he can’t hide it anymore. He’s making more mistakes, sleeping less, and after interacting with him for even a few minutes, it’s clear that he’s going to snap any day now. He needs a break, he needs sleep.

So of course, he has plans to single-handedly stop Riddler’s latest scheme. Well, Wally’s not letting him go without a fight.

“Dick, please. Just look at you.”

Dick turns to face him, looking away from the live video feed on his laptop for the first time since Wally confronted him. “What? What about me?”

Dick has dark bags under his eyes that are so dark they almost look like bruises. His eyes are bloodshot in the corners from a combination of sleep deprivation and staring at screens too long and too often. Despite his tense muscles, he sways where he stands at the counter. His skin’s lost its natural tan, he’s in desperate need of a shower, and his body appears to be permanently stuck in a defensive position. He could go on, but all in all, it’s blatantly clear that he looks terrible and needed an intervention yesterday.

(But to be fair, this is the first time Wally has really seen Dick—and not just evidence of Dick being at the apartment or briefly passing by him like ships in the night once or twice a day—in days.)

“You need sleep.” Wally forces his voice to remain calm and even. His eyes flicker down to the stain on Dick’s red shirt that keeps growing, the one Wally is pretty sure is the result of a reopened stomach wound and not “spilled water”. “You’re hurt, you’re stressed. You need to take a few days.”

“Take a few days? Do you not get that there’s an alien invasion going on? God, I know you’ve decided to quit being a hero, but some of us still care about stuff like that.” His voice is cold, and the words sting. Wally thinks that was their intention, though.

He closes his eyes and exhales to calm himself; he can’t get angry right now. He’s about to say something, try to shift the conversation back to something calmer and more productive, but Dick continues his rant before he can.

“And I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but Bruce is still on a trial that he might never come back from. I’ve been working my ass off covering his Gotham and League responsibilities, and that’s on top of the Team and Nightwing work I was already doing. Don’t you think it would be weird if I wasn’t stressed?” He exits the video feed and closes his laptop a little harder than necessary before pushing away from the counter and towards their bedroom. “But Gotham isn’t accepting personal days, so I need to get over there and make sure the Riddler doesn’t destroy half of the city.”

“Tim and Babs can handle it,” Wally reasons without missing a beat as he follows him. He knows that they’re supposed to be leaving on a mission within the hour, but this takes precedence. Someone can cover for them.

“It’s my fault Riddler wasn’t obtained two weeks ago. I don’t need to get anyone else involved.”

See, Dick says things like that and it just confirms Wally’s suspicion that he’s been punishing himself. Wally has seen Dick stressed and overworked before, and he’s sure he’ll see it again in the future, but this time feels different. This time there’s this undertone of blame and guilt and secrecy that Wally isn’t used to. And he doesn’t think it’s just self-blame in response to grief or not fixing everything fast enough. No, this has been going on for too long and started too soon for that to be the case.

“What’s been going on with you lately?” Wally asks, the only thing he’s been wanting to ask. “Why won’t you let anyone help you?”

“If you really wanted to help me, you wouldn’t add to my so-called stress by arguing with me over things out of my control,” Dick says (lies), not even bothering to look at Wally as he tries to find a uniform without bloodstains.

Wally grabs Dick by the shoulder and turns him around before he can succeed. “Look, you can yell at me and be angry all you want, but I’m not going to sit and watch you destroy yourself.”

Dick’s eyes tighten into a glare. “Then go.” Dick pushes him off with strength Wally didn’t know he still had and makes for the door.

“Dick,” Wally tries again, using all of his will-power to not follow. “Just talk to me. You’ve been keeping something from me—for a while now.”

Dick stops in his tracks but doesn’t turn around, just curls his hands into fists. “Did Conner say something to you?”

“No. Nobody said anything—no one had to.” Wally walks closer to Dick. “We’ve known each other for so long, how could you think that I wouldn’t notice when something is bothering you so much? I want to help, but you have to tell me what’s wrong.”

Wally can see Dick shaking where he stands. “I can’t.”

“Yes, you can,” Wally encourages, finally reaching Dick and stepping in front of him. He gives him a brief smile. “How bad can it be?”

Dick’s lip trembles and he puts one foot behind him, likes he’s going to run away, but he doesn’t. He just stands there, frozen.

“Let’s just take a night off. One night.” Wally pushes Dick’s bangs out of his face, leaving his hand to rest against the back of his head by his ear. “You can get some sleep, something to eat, and we can talk. How does that sound?”

Dick wipes a hand across his eyes. “This is all my fault—all of it.”

Wally pulls Dick against his chest and runs his hand up and down his spine. “What are you talking about, Babe? What happened?”

Dick presses his face into Wally’s shoulder. “It was such a stupid plan.”

“Okay,” Wally doesn’t know where Dick is going with this, but it’s something. “Then let’s come up with a new one, yeah? You just have to tell me what it’s for first. Does it have something to do with the trial?”

It’s hard to tell when this really started. It’s difficult to differentiate the stress of Artemis’s death and Dick taking on the role of Batman so shortly after from the … well, whatever this is.

Dick shakes his head, hopefully saying no to the trial and not no to talking to Wally. Then he says quietly, but with little to no emotion as if he were merely stating a fact, “You’ll hate me.”

“I could never hate you, I promise.” It’s scary seeing Dick like this, the only thing scarier being the thing that caused it.

Dick takes a shaky breath, exhaling slowly, and then, “Okay, okay.” He pulls away from Wally so they can see each other’s faces again. “You’re going to be mad. Hell, I would be mad if the situation was reversed. But you can’t tell anyone else. Not yet. Okay?”

Wally hesitates, but after a few seconds, he nods. He needs to figure out what they’re dealing with and then how to get Dick out of it, but to do that, he needs Dick to trust him. If he has to break this promise later, so be it. “All right, I promise.”

Dick nods once too. “I’ll start with the most important thing: Artemis is alive.”

(continue to part 2)

#dick grayson #wally west #nightwing #kid flash #young justice #birdflash #elizabeth writes

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