#it's more like i have fics that mention the conflict between dick and bruce but it's not the the main focus or anything

[hood-ex]

Hi, Em. Hope you're doing great. I was wondering if you had some recommendations for fics about Dick and his complicated relationship with Bruce, or like a character study of Dick related to his daddy issues

(I don't have daddy issues, I swear) that's a lie

I do... it's just hard for me to remember which ones they are alskdja. I'm gonna toss some at you and hopefully I'm remembering the conflict in them correctly.

[about-faces]

Last night, I was once again struggling to actually write smut for a Harvey/Bruce/Gilda fic, when I noticed a very timely new guest comment on my Gilda fic, Bust. It was the first truly critical response I’ve gotten so far, and while that sort of thing would normally send me into a depressive tizzy, I actually found it really interesting!

So instead of actually writing the ship, as I should have been, I wanted to take this opportunity to think about just why the heck I shipped them in the first place.

Here’s how I responded, with added scans to hopefully better illustrate my point, plus some additions that occurred to me upon drafting this post:

I’m actually glad you raised this point, because I would have felt the exact same as you just a few years ago!

I’m gray-asexual, and I used to be a bit bothered by the rise of Bruce/Harvey shippers, because it was their canonical platonic FRIENDSHIP that mattered so much to me. I gradually warmed up to the shippers, because 1.) I realized I was ace and they probably weren’t, and 2.) they at least understood the importance of Bruce and Harvey’s bond, which is more than I can say for LOTS of official DC media.

Still, something bugged me about the ship, and I realized what it was: the lack of Gilda from the equation. She’s always been deeply important to me, especially her scant older appearances, and erasing her for a Bruce/Harvey ship (even one I’d come to appreciate) didn’t sit right with me.

But like you said, it’s not canon, and I’ve always been deeply invested in canon, even the stuff that’s frustrating and contradictory. So yeah, the throuple would have bugged me too.

Except! It all depends on WHICH canon you’re talking about!

So over the past 15 years, I’ve been obsessed with tracking down the entirety of the obscure, forgotten Batman newspaper comic strip from 1989-1991. I’ve posted the entire thing at @batman-daily, and I strongly encourage you to check it out. A couple years ago, I reread it and noticed something really interesting: the remarkable relationship between Bruce, Harvey, and the latter’s wife, Alice, who is Gilda in every way but name. They are all mutual friends, with Alice even going to visit Bruce alone to help/bully him to take care of himself.

It all reads like a perfect long-game setup for a love triangle, or for Harvey—having become Two-Face—to go after his loved ones in a jealous rage, like he did in Paul Dini’s “Two-Timer,” a story which notably showed that Grace had feelings for Bruce.

With that in mind, consider the final story arc of the newspaper strip, wherein Bruce acknowledges his OWN feelings for Alice and PASSIONATELY KISSES HER, all in a hilariously roundabout way to save her marriage to Harvey! It makes sense in context and is frankly hilarious.

And it works! Because Harvey isn’t jealous! The love triangle conflict you expect NEVER HAPPENS! Because they all love one another! And that love saves Harvey in the very end!

Was it explicitly a throuple? No, but nor have Bruce and Harvey ever canonically touched dicks. And yet the love between Bruce and Harvey in canon is true and real enough that shippers who want to make it sexual are perfectly allowed to do so, because it’s the love that matters. At least, for those of us who aren’t afraid to acknowledge the love between men, platonic or otherwise. And that love is rooted in canon.

So consider this: the mutual three-way-love between Bruce, Harvey, and Alice/Gilda is ALSO canon. That comic strip has been officially accepted as DC multiverse canon in the “Crisis on Infinite Earths: Absolute Edition,” which designated it as Earth-1289.

Furthermore, there’s something else you need to consider: the fact that Harvey HAS been used in love triangles against Bruce in several stories in recent decades. I already mentioned “Two-Timer,” but there’s also Nolan’s “The Dark Knight,” the animated “Gotham By Gaslight” film, and the Telltale game. In various ways, these stories serve to throw a wedge in the friendship between Bruce (the protagonist, whose story serves him) and Harvey (the guy who is going to lose it all, the woman included). I hate that shit. I hate the contrived drama that’s meant to stir up needless added conflict between two men who love each other.

And then, on the other hand, you have Mariko Tamaki’s Gilda story from “Batman: Black and White.” Tamaki depicted Harvey and Gilda being in a distant, loveless marriage, where even on their wedding day, he was constantly ignoring her in favor of work. The only person who could actually get his attention was Bruce.

At the time, this felt an awful lot like that problem I was talking about with the Bruce/Harvey shippers: raising up the gay ship while throwing the woman under the bus. In this case, for the purpose of doing an avenging girlboss take on Gilda. I hated that too, especially when Tamaki didn’t even follow through with the gay subtext in her next, miserable Two-Face comic.

You know that meme of a bride, groom, and best man all kissing one another, while the bride flips off the cameraman in the end? @whipbogard redrew the Tamaki wedding scene as that meme, right around the time I reread the comic strip. And suddenly, everything clicked into place for me.

After a lifetime of never, ever having any serious fandom ships, I fell in love with the idea of Bruce/Harvey/Gilda. Take what the comic strip did and bring it into the mainstream canon I love to spite the canon I hate.

In those great old Gilda stories, she saw through Harvey’s bullshit and knew how to reach him, however temporarily. She could do the same with Bruce. She’d be a valuable third voice for the ongoing toxic relationship between Bruce and Harvey, the one who could love them both while also getting to be frustrated with how fucking stupid and fucked-up both these men are.

Before she was reduced to a ride-or-die killer housewife in "The Long Halloween" (which, I'll grant you, has its own appeal), classic Gilda would actually stand up to Harvey and tell him to cut out his shit or else. I love the idea that she can also see right through Bruce, understanding how very alike he and Harvey are, even if they don't want to admit it.

Writing Gilda this way speaks to me as a longtime fan of both men, while also wanting to try to develop her place, as a woman stuck in the middle of their decades' worth of conflict and angst. She sees these men at their best, worst, and most pathetic/ridiculous, and while she's got the nerve to stand up for herself and call them out as needed, she still loves them nonetheless. For me, Gilda has become the voice for fans just like me, who are helpless to stop Batman and Two-Face from continuing the cycle of violent, toxic friendship, but still loving them nonetheless, and always hoping for the best.

So, at this point, let’s say I’ve at least managed to make you grudgingly accept my reasoning for the relationship. Even if that’s true, I’m gonna guess that the mention of a threesome felt like it came out of left field. I can’t argue with that. I wanted to actually write that as its own smutfic but, being ace, I struggle with that. But I really liked the idea, and as I was writing this, it just really wanted to be mentioned, so I included it.

The response has been positive (until now), which indicated to me that I had been successful in introducing Gilda as a viable third into a slice of fandom which had only shipped Bruce and Harvey. This is fanfic, after all, such things are expected, even encouraged, so I leaned into it.

Now, if I were ever (un?)fortunate enough to write for DC, officially? I doubt I’d have the nerve to go that far. But I’d still want to at least embrace the polycule-coded relationship between those three that we saw in the newspaper comic strip. I think it adds a whole new, refreshing spin on their ongoing dynamics, while being rooted in relationships that were established all the way back in 1942 by Bill Finger.

Finger’s story, at its heart, was all about how love can save a life. How love is the only way to defeat the villain. For Harvey Kent’s part, Gilda’s love was every bit as important as Batman’s unwillingness to give up on his friend. So I’m just taking it one step further within the freedom allowed me by fanfic.

Sorry for the length of the reply, but as you can see, I only came to this shit after several decades of thinking about 80+ years of official material. I hope I have at least been able to lessen your feelings of being jarred out of a story you otherwise seemed to appreciate. For my part, I hope to further develop the potential of this fucked-up polycule in future stories, and maybe—just maybe—I’ll be able to get you on board too. Hope to see you then!

(art by ofossart)

[bloomeng]

I think this also relates to a larger— issue isn’t the right word I think disappointment is more apt— disappointment with how the parental relationships are discussed.

also typo from my prev post **emphasized

The batfam is messy, adoption is messy, fostering is messy, all of it is messy. I’m not here to preach that Bruce isn’t anyone’s father but I wish there was more acknowledgement that it’s more complicated than that. Dick was his ward and his partner in the field. Tim’s parents were alive for a good while. He had a relationship with them (good or bad) and that’s apart of his lived experience. His relationship with Bruce isn’t so cut and dry. Duke’s parents are still alive and if my memory serves he states in canon that he sees himself sort of outside the family. It’s not bad to acknowledge this about him. He’s his own person and it’s actually more interesting and less offensive to characterize him as his own person and not just the batfam’s resident nice son.

Canon flip flops on its stances on this which makes it tricky but since when has DC canon not been a mess.

I think it’s cute that they’re a family unit and he’s their father and there’s a time and place for it. But it’s also an integral part of Bruce’s character that he sees some of his kids as children versus him viewing them as a partner. He struggles to balance this. More subtly I think it’s interesting how he tries to pay respect to his kid’s biological parents by trying not to overstep but it comes off as him being standoffish.

This is also a huge part of where Damian’s conflict spawns from. Him being Bruce’s biological son makes him fundamentally different than the others and while that doesn’t make him more important than his siblings it sets his experience apart from them. It’s a new and contrasting perspective, which is makes his role so interesting.

And then there’s Kon and Clark. This is going to get heavy.

Clark is uncomfortable with Kon’s existent because he feels violated by Luthor. It’s one of those things that feels synonymous with very real issues that I’m going to dance around because that’s not my point right now. My point is that the relationship between him and Kon is complicated on both sides because his ignorance of Kon isn’t right either. You can think of Kon as Clark’s son but that also automatically makes Clark’s behavior way more reprehensible and harder to salvage the relationship.

I think the issue is we don’t really have a vocabulary to describe what a teenage clone of you would be. I think it’s equally valid to think of them as vague family members, somewhere between older brother or uncle. This is supported by the fact that it’s Martha and Jonathan who are raising him making Clark feel more like an older brother with a large age gap.

Both interpretations have value, but they carry different weight. When Clark is Kon’s father in a lighthearted fic (not like a one off mention like a factor that is emphasized) I personally feel this elephant in the room. I feel like people get so hung up on the perceived cuteness of “father/son” that they overlook the dynamic the obvious when the dynamic they actually want is just around the corner.

I want to be clear I’m not trying to police how people view and relate to any of these relationships. Both of them have individual value it’s just also me from the sidelines screaming “IT’S UNDER THE SAUCE!!!” (sorry tiktok ref I’m dating myself)

Head in my hands do people know they’re implying incest when they emphasize the parental relationships in superbat + timkon fics because these are the same people who are adamantly against shipping the robins.

Tldr: You’re limiting yourself by only looking at these relationships from the perspective of father/son.

Maybe I’m in the minority but I feel like there’s a way to have both have Clark/Bruce and Tim/Kon in a fic without making it weird. It’s totally a pet peeve but it’s been irking me because like it’s so easy to interpret Kon and Clark’s relationship as the complicated mess it is or acknowledge the nuance of Tim’s adoption into the Wayne family, that would automatically make the dual ships running in parallel less weird. But people flatten both relationships into father and son, which I don’t mind on its own, because there is a lot of interesting things to dig into there— especially with Clark and Bruce being in the unique position to understand each other’s version of parenthood. Again maybe it’s just my experience but I feel like I keep running into instances where both couples will be dating and then their parental relationships will also be empathized and suddenly it’s weird.

[her-world-on-fire]

Kisses in the Corridor {Tim Drake x Reader}

MASTERLIST

REQUEST HERE

Word Count: 3,604

Request: Could you please write a tim x reader fic where the reader is a superhero (I was thinking like Barry Allen’s kid and the new Kid Flash) and is also Tim’s s/o and maybe Bruce and/or the Flash catch them having sex? 💜

2s. “stop before someone sees!" & 4s. "ten? i only need five."

WARNING NSFW MATURE CONTENT 18+ Tim and reader are 18

I WOKE up to the sound of a loud buzzing. I moved away from Tim’s grip and reached on the nightstand for my phone. I looked back at Tim, he held the same peaceful expression. I squinted at the caller ID and immediately sat up. I tried to be as gentle as possible, not to wake Tim. He was normally a very light sleeper, but he was sleep deprived. I pushed the blankets off and moved out of the room. I gently opened the door and snuck out into the hallway. I looked down at the caller ID once more to be sure before I answered.

DAD

“Dad? It’s 3am, what’s going on?” I whispered, I heard a rustling in the background. There was some kind of conflict, but I couldn’t quite make it out. After a few moments there was silence, then a heavy sigh.“I need your help.”

“What’s going on?” I moved down the hall trying my best to be quiet. “I’m going to send you some files. I need you to get Tim to decrypt them.”

“Okay send them to me and I’ll have him look at them as soon as he wakes up.” I heard a pause from the other side of the line. “When he-” He paused. “He’s with you right now?” I hadn’t exactly mentioned that I had moved in with him. As far as he knew I was still staying with in the house with the others. I faked a yawn. “I gotta go dad, love you.”

I quickly hung up and moved back into the bedroom. I got back into bed and Tim shifted slightly. I moved closer and he put his arm around me again.

I woke up and found Tim looking up at the ceiling. “Did you sleep okay? I noticed you got out of bed last night.” He turned to me, and I sighed. “Sorry I thought I was being quiet.” He chuckled, “Work hazard. Don’t worry about it.” I sat up and grabbed my phone. “Well it was my dad.” He squinted his eyes. “Why did he call you at 3am?”

“He wanted me to send you some files he needs decrypted.” I handed him my phone and showed him the files. He hummed and sat up. “I’m sorry I know you just finished your project-” He shook his head and get out of bed. “I really don’t mind. I’m sure your father wouldn’t have asked if it wasn’t important.” Tim grabbed his laptop and connected my phone. We moved into the bathroom and got started on our morning routines.

Tim’s was straight forward, he wanted to brush his teeth and get to work. I on the other hand had a few steps. I tried to make Tim do them with me as much as I could. “Come here.” I grabbed his face and massaged a gentle cleanser. Wearing masks almost every night didn’t work wonders for out skin. He waited patiently until I was done. I applied some moisturizer, “All done.”

He smiled and pulled me in for a kiss. “I’ll get the coffee started.”

-------------------------------------------------

 Tim spent most of the day working on the files. When it was time to leave for patrol I had to pry him from the computer. “It’s time already?” I nodded and moved to get up. He stretched and then looked around.

I held out his suit and he sighed in relief. “What would I do without you?” He pulled his shirt over his head. My eyes raked over his toned chest. He had come a long way. He used to be lanky, but he had put on a lot more muscle in the past two years. Whatever shape he was in, I loved him.

Truth be told I was still getting used to his chiseled features. I gave him once last glance. “If I stay here any longer we’re going to be late.” I handed him his suit and moved out of the room. I grabbed my phone and noticed a missed call.

DAD: I’ll be by Friday afternoon, Bruce needs me to speak at his proposal. Looking forward to talking to Tim.

As if Tim didn’t have enough on his plate. I still had another 3 days to prepare Tim. I decided to tell him tomorrow. I put my phone down and Tim emerged from the bedroom. We met Dick at the coordinates he gave us. Dick left for the night leaving the two of us in charge. Tim had wired the police scanners to our headsets. The night moved slowly.

That was until the 3rd hour.

“10-44. Any units between 4th street and Palmdale?” Tim and I exchanged looks, stolen vehicle. We were only a few minutes out. Tim used his grapple, seeing as we were nearby. I got there a few minutes before him. “How bad is it?” The scanners had grown more chaotic. This wasn’t a normal stolen vehicle situation. We learned that there were children inside the car when it was taken. On top of it all, the driver was intoxicated. “Can you send out an alert and clear the next two blocks?”

“Done.”

I kept up with the vehicle, doing my best to move civilians out of the path. With the alert Tim had sent out. I was going to get inside the vehicle and stop the driver. “He’s approaching a construction site. You’re going in blind, the city hasn’t updated the maps.”

“Send an ambulance, and make sure the police don’t go into construction.”

“Y/N-” Tim’s voice said sternly. He was too far behind to do anything. “Be careful.”

“Always am.” Now that there were no civilians in the way, I was going to have to get the children out first. He was nearing the end of the map. I moved in and saw two children in the backseat. I needed to take them one by one. It was safer, their bodies weren’t meant to undergo high velocities. I needed to protected them from whiplash.

The first child was a beautiful chocolate haired boy. “Okay, where are you Tim?”

“Magnolia.” He replied immediately. I took the boy and ran him to Tim. By time his older brother blinked I was back. I left them both with Tim and rushed back to the driver. By now he knew that something was going on. He sped up. “What are you doing?” Tim’s worried voice came over the headset. “They’re safe.”

“He could get away.” I used every ounce of my stamina to catch up. I caught up and moved inside the car. I tried to take control, but he wasn’t giving up. The site was less than a mile away. As it grew closer, I saw it was the outline of a building.

If he breached the gates he wouldn’t have time to stop. He would drive through the building’s foundation, which wasn’t secure. It would crumble onto of us. His hand moved to the gun he had by his side. He slammed the gun into the side of my head. I felt the warmth trickling down the side of my face. I threw a punch and felt it connect. He fired a shot and moved my head back. He missed. I lifted my head back up and took the gun. and tossed it in the back seat. I looked up, it was too late. We were almost inside the building.

Tim was screaming in my headset. He heard the gunshot. I opened the door and pulled the driver out. I looked in front of us, the building slowly started to crumble. There was still a chance. There was a small opening where the building hadn’t caved in yet.

I had to make a choice. I needed to risk taking him and him slowing me down. Or I could leave him and get out, guaranteed. I had a fraction of a second to decide. I took one look at him and decided to risk it. I held on too him and used all my strength to reach the opening. I was exhausted. Just catching up to him when he was miles ahead had taken it out of me. Now I was bleeding, and drained. 

I thought about Tim. Memories of us flashed inside my head. I mustered enough strength to run. I threw the man out and then jumped out of the opening. On impact, I knew something wasn’t okay. I had landed on my shoulder. “Tim.”

He was just outside the gates.

-------------------------------------------------

Luckily my body worked hard to fix the broken bone. Being a speedster came with its perks. Fast metabolism, and healing. By the time Bruce’s proposal came around, my wounds were almost completely healed.

“Are you sure you want to go?” Tim asked once more, hands on either side of my face. “I’m fine Tim. I promise. I wouldn’t miss this for the world.” He sighed, he had seen the x- rays. Physically I was fine. “Fine but if you start to feel even just a headache, we’re coming back.” I nodded and he looked over my face again.

I stuck out my hand and he placed a kiss on it before intertwining our fingers.

We arrived right on time. Tim’s part of Bruce’s proposal was one of the first points. He had to go set up in Bruce’s office. “I’ll be right back.” He took his files and rushed up to the office. I joined Dick, Jason and Damien in the lounge. “Hello, boys.”

They looked up and Dick’s eyebrow’s knitted together. “Are you even supposed to be out of bed?” I laughed, “Dick it was just my shoulder. I’m fine.” Damian snickered at his brother. Dick looked at between his brothers. Jason had a smirk on his face. “What?”

“Speedster. They heal 20 times faster than us.”

“He got promoted to lead of the biotech department of Wayne Enterprises a few weeks ago.”

The boys bickered. My eyes scanned the room for my father. He was incredibly hard to miss. “I’ll be back.” The boys didn’t even turn in my direction. I walked to the other side of the lounge. He turned to me and then patted his college on the shoulder. He approached me, a big smile on his face. “Hey dad.” He opened his arms and pulled me in for a tight hug. I groaned, “Little too hard.” I gasped and he let go. “Sorry, I just haven’t seen you much.”

“I know. I’m sorry I’ve been meaning to visit.” He nodded and looked around. “Where’s Tim?” I pointed to Bruce’s office. “He’s setting up.” My father raised his eyebrows. “I didn’t know he was part of the presentation.”

“Wow. That’s fantastic.” He genuinely was impressed. After all he had a background in bio medicine. He knew how hard the work was. “We’ll I’d love to talk to him about it.” I laughed, of course he did. “You can come by our place after and I’m sure he’d talk your ear off.” He turned to me. His eyes narrowing.

Realization struck, and I cursed internally. Eventually I was going to have to tell him, but I was hoping back at home. In front of family and witnesses. Before he could say anything. There was an announcement on the overhead speaker. We were ushered as the presentations were about to begin.

-------------------------------------------------

Tim did fantastic as expected. He kept the crowd engages and said everything perfectly. He approached me as he walked off of the stage. I clapped along with the crowd. He greeted me with a kiss. “You did amazing Tim.” We walked to the back of the room. He didn’t want to interrupt anyone. He gestured for the door. He took my hand and I followed after him. We closed the door behind us and stood in the corridor. Tim let out a deep breath.

He still wasn’t used to speaking in crowds, and this was a lot larger than he was used to. “Are you alright?” He nodded, “I’m glad it’s over.” He moved to take off his tuxedo jacket. I watched as his arms contracted. He slowly rolled up his sleeves, revealing his muscular arms.

He put his jacket over his arm and looked over at me. A small grin on his face. “What?” I shook my head and sighed. “How much longer is this?” He looked at the clock. “We still have another hour.” I looked up at him. His piercing blue eyes were fixated on mine. His hair wast neatly parted down the middle, every strand perfectly combed in place. He moved closer and put his hand over the wall near my head. “What’s got you all flustered Y/N?”

I took a deep breath, my eyes fixated on his lips. “You, Drake.” He smirked and pressed his lips against mine.

Barry looked around the room, and noticed the absence of Y/N and Tim. He turned to Bruce. “Where are they?” Bruce looked around. No sigh of them. He looked at the cameras on his watch. He didn’t see them. Bruce shook his head. The two got up and moved into the lounge. Damian, Jason and Dick were there for security. He knew no one would get past them unnoticed.

“Have either of you seen Y/N and Tim?” Bruce asked. Dick and Jason looked at each other and then shrugged. Bruce sighed, so much for security.

“I think I saw them go-” Damian spoke nonchalantly. He looked in front of him, behind Bruce and Barry Dick and Jason were trying to tell him something. Quite frankly, they looked like idiots. They were shaking their heads violently waving their arms back and forth. Damien squinted as he tried to read the boys lips. Dick mouthed something he couldn’t quite make out. Bruce and Barry exchanged looks, they turned around and saw Dick and Jason conversing casually.

“Damian?” Jason motioned for him to keep his lips zipped. A smirk grew on Damian's face. He wanted to see it all play out.

Dick and Jason tried. They weren’t quite sure what they were up to but they knew it was nothing good. They tried to stay in Tim’s good graces, in the blink of an eye Tim could hack everything they owned. As for Y/N, they knew there would be no escaping. Y/N could catch up to them anywhere. In short, they didn’t want to piss either of them off.

They had noticed their brother couldn’t keep his hands off of his date. They were two hyperactive teenagers, it didn’t take rocket science to figure it out. They watched as Damian’s smirk grew. He hadn’t figured it out but he knew it would get Tim in trouble and that was enough for him. “They went down the hall and up the elevator.” Bruce gave a short nod and the two went off.

“Well, we tried.” Jason shrugged, and took a swing of his drink. He wasn’t going to deny that watching Tim get his ass kicked by a speedster wasn’t funny. “Should’ve choked the little bastard.” Dick sighed, the two could only wait.

-------------------------------------------------

“Tim.” I let out a shaky breath, trying my hardest to keep quiet. “Stop before someone sees!" We were in a building full of people, at any moment someone could walk down the corridor. Tim chuckled against my neck, “You really want me to stop?” I bit my lip, he was right. I didn’t want him to stop. I was just worried about being caught. “The next presentation starts in 10 minutes.”

"Ten? I only need five."

At this point I threw all common sense out of the window. I took his hand and we were in his office in seconds. I had closed the door behind us. Tim smirked, “In my office? You little-” I interrupted him by kissing him. My hands moved from his hair and down to his suit. I quickly unbuttoned his dress shirt, and my hands moved to unbuckle his belt.

Without breaking the kiss i discarded his dress shirt on the floor. His hands moved to remove my clothing. We broke away for a moment to catch our breaths. He picked me up and moved us to the couch. His lips reconnected to mine once more. I straddled his waist and moved against him for friction. My hands moved back down to the waistband of his boxers. I pulled them down and ran my hands up and down his length.

He let out a groan. “Fuck.” He got rid of the rest of my clothes throwing them across his office. I didn’t waste time in scolding him. I lowered myself down onto his length. We both let out a sigh, all of our pent up frustrations released. Tim’s hands moved back to my waist. He lifted me and then slammed me back down onto himself. I bit my lip, trying to stay quiet. His lips moved down to my neck, leaving wet kisses before moving to whisper in my ear. “They’re all down stairs, I want to hear you.”

Tim loved hearing vocalization, he couldn’t get enough. He knew every part of my body. He knew exactly what to do to get what he wanted. He speed up, and hit just the right spot. I gave in. “Oh god.” We were both breathing heavily. Sounds of pleasure overtook the room. Our bodies moved against each other hungrily. Tim smirked as he moved back to my neck. He moved right to my sweet spot. “Fuck,Tim.”

I dug my nails into his shoulders, leaving small red lines, He pulled away from my neck, satisfied by his work. His lips moved back to mine and speed up again. I felt a growing knot in my stomach each time he moved in and out. Sensing I was close he sat up and took control. He thrusted up into me, over and over, and I grew louder each time. “Please, Tim.” I could feel his thrusts becoming more sloppy, he was close. My orgasm came soon after, my body gave out. I shook against him. He helped me ride out my high. He came and I felt his warmth spread in my core.

“Y/N are you okay-” The door burst open, in the heat of the moment I had forgotten to lock it. Luckily Tim reached for his shirt. He quickly used it to cover me. “I thought you were hurt or dear god.” Barry looked at the ceiling, trying to avert his gaze.

“TIMOTHY JACKSON DRAKE!” Bruce’s voice echoed off the walls. Surely the boys down stairs were snickering. “In your office of all places.” He rubbed his hand across his face. Neither of us knew what to say. “Get dressed. Now.” Bruce said sternly before slamming Tim’s office door.

We moved off of each other and tried to find our clothes. Of course Tim in desperation had scattered my clothes. I was kind enough to leave his nicely by the couch. We quickly got dressed and opened the door. Bruce crossed his arms over his chest. Barry glared at Tim.

“Hey dad.” I smiled nervously, he sighed deeply. “I don’t even know where to start. I’m so-”

“Did you finish uploading the files before you-” Bruce couldn’t finish the sentence, Tim pulled the hard drive out his pocket and handed it over. “Go.” He waved us off and I watched as he placed a hand on my father’s chest. I motioned for Tim to go, and I approached my father. Bruce looked between us and nodded.

“I’m sorry.” He nodded, a silence washed over us. Neither of us sure what to say. Finally, he broke the silence. “So, you really love him?” I looked back at Tim who was having his talk with Bruce. I smiled and nodded. “I really do.” It gave Barry comfort. He had seen the strength of the connection when he first met Tim a year ago. He knew that they were growing up, it was inevitable. After all, he was a teenager once. He knew what it was like to be deeply in love. For now, all he could do was try and forget this ever happened. Tim approached us. I looked back and forth between the two. For a long moment there was just silence. The two held eye contact. “I expect to see you during the holidays Timothy.” Tim nodded, “Of course sir.”

We went back down stairs. Damian snickered, and Tim shot a glare at his brothers. Dick and Jason pointed to their youngest brother. “If either of you breathe a word...” Tim trailed off, his threat looming. His older brothers nodded. “And you,” He turned to Damian. “I’ll end you.” I placed my hand on Tim’s chest. He backed away and stood up straight. “You know he-”

“Thank you for the drive, you helped save a lot of people.” And with that he was off. Tim breathed a sigh of relief, “I thought he was going to kill me.”

“I know. In time, let’s just get through this.” Tim sighed, “Fine.”

MASTERLIST

REQUEST HERE

[forestlingincorporated]

Teen Titans #29

So, one of my favorite types of fics to read is Different First Meeting fics between Jason and Tim. I looooove reading Enemies To Caretaker, of which I fed handsomely on fairly recently. Big Brother Jason fics give me warm fuzzies, and Tim Drake needs a hug, and I feel like if these two actually got to know each other and worked past their preconceptions, they’d get along surprisingly well. And Still A Jason!Robin Fanboy Tim Drake is just a fun concept. 

Also, it just FEELS right for the middle siblings to band together after Damian comes along, lets get those abandonment issues in the party. 

So, for mysterious and very secret TimKon Week 2021 reasons, I was rereading some Teen Titans, and I stumbled over the Original Tim+Jason First Meeting, and I just sort of wanted to talk about some interesting things I found in there rereading it after several years. 

First thing right off the bat, when reading fics, normally it’s either the Core Four at the tower that Jason puts to sleep, or it’s Tim alone for the night. In the comic, none of Tim’s close friends are even at the tower, Jason waits for Bart and Cassie to leave, and Conner actually hasn’t come around for an in-universe month, because this is after the Superboy’s Birthright arc where Lex mind controls Conner. 

The people Jason knocks out were his own teammates when he was a Titan. He specifically says he never got to work with Beast Boy or Cyborg directly, so he doesn’t feel bad electrocuting them, but he feels bad putting Raven under much more gently because she used to worry for him. 

Tim has just gotten off the phone with Bruce when Jason shows up. It seems like Bruce might’ve been picking Tim up, but something’s come up with Martian Manhunter going missing, so Tim tells him he’ll catch a ride with Cyborg. 

This is actually really interesting to me, because it’s a small moment of Bruce letting Tim down. It’s a conversation he’s probably had with his biological father many times when Jack’s canceled on him. 

Gonna acknowledge this abomination real quick. This is So Stupid, and I’m glad as a fandom we just all agreed Jason didn’t do this. It makes me ask so many questions. Where did he get that oversized Robin costume? Why’d he tear off his perfectly good clothes? Why did he do this? Why the yellow tights? WHY? 

A lot of things are actually happening here that are actually Really Interesting if you just look past the stupid fucking outfit. Because this comic actually flew really close to greatness, they just ended up dropping the ball by not continuing to do more with it. 

First off, Jason doesn’t beat around the bush. He’s immediately like “yeah, yeah, yeah, Red Hood, whatever, I’m Jason Todd, bitch! Fight me.” 

Secondly, Jason’s done his homework. He knows A LOT about Tim. He knows his name, he knows he has a dad, he knows he went to prep school, and he knows the story of how Tim became Robin. How he GOT that last bit of information, I’d honestly like to know. But even HAVING the information isn’t enough; he’s still letting his preconceived ideas get in the way. The surface level information about Tim’s life only served to fuel his jealousy and anger (thanks, Lazerus Pitt!). He’s so focused on Tim’s privilege that he’s looked past evidence of hardship; if he’s done this much research on Tim, he’s no doubt seen records of multiple boarding schools, lengthy travel records, news reports, a death certificate.... He can’t even bring himself to BELIEVE parts of Tim’s story that aren’t lining up with his world view, like HOW he became Robin. 

Jason has convinced himself that what he’s discovered about Tim and the period of time when Jason was dead - the fact that Bruce was spiraling after his death, that his family mourned him, that Tim had to step up to the plate at a weird suicide prevention buddy system - is all a lie. Despite the fact that he’s beating Tim’s ass, he speaks to him with the assumption that Tim’s a child who’s been manipulated and lied to. 

Meanwhile, it must be SO PAINFUL for Tim to hear Jason say these things: I bet he said the same thing to you he said to me, didn’t he? That you have the talent to make a difference in Gotham. That he needed someone he could trust in his war on crime. That you were one of a kind. The light in his darkness.

Bruce never said any of that to Tim. Bruce rejected Tim, he didn’t want Tim, and begrudgingly accepted Tim. 

Going back to Jason waiting for Tim’s other young teen friends to leave the tower before going in, only drugging his own former teammates, is much of his anger seems directed at THEM, not just Bruce. To Jason, it looks like they didn’t mourn him either, he has no statue. I find it interesting that he smashes Donna Troy’s statue, who died after him, and I believe she came back before he did. 

Unless he was keeping track of the news from the League of Assassins, to Jason, Donna never died. 

And most importantly? Tim shuts Jason down. Tim “Bitch, Please” Drake out here like: you’re a fucking idiot, he loved you to death, he barely let me audition for the role. 

Tim shows some deep resentment towards Jason in this scene. I mean... earned, Jason literally came into his house and starting hitting him, but Tim’s relationship towards the Idea Of Jason has gone through a few changes. At first Jason was ROBIN! THE BOY WONDER! And if maybe Tim thought Bruce wasn’t AS happy with Jason as he was with Dick, there was still SOME hero worship early on. But it only takes Bruce and Alfred and Dick using Jason’s death as a cautionary tale a few times to get Tim to see Jason AS a cautionary tale - the kind of Robin NOT to be. But the more Tim craved Bruce’s paternal attention and approval, and the more Bruce withheld it or made Tim work for it, knowing that Bruce did that, in part, because of his love and grief for his dead son (Tim having an actual living breathing father plays a part, too), and those feelings towards Jason have started to fester.

Jason can’t let it go, though, he thinks the concept of Robin was a mistake and had always been a mistake, and if he can hurt Tim, so can Scarecrow, Penguin, The Joker. 

This is a good time to bring up that one thing I think Jason probably doesn’t know is Tim is injured. It is a little over a month since since Conner shattered Tim’s right arm. Tim is still healing from a comminuted fracture in his forearm. And looking at this picture that is - ah, yes, that is the injured arm Jason is swinging Tim by. Tim is probably healed by now, the cast IS off and he’s a child, but bones don’t fully return to full strength for 3-6 months. 

Jason is conflicted. This is clearly, in part, a fucked up way of “protecting” what he sees as a manipulated child, to convince him to leave Bruce. But there’s also clearly some deep, deep jealousy thrown into the mix to complicate matters and cloud his judgement. Ultimately, Jason isn’t there to kill Tim. Tim would be dead if he was. He’s there to “beat some sense into him,” and he ultimately fails, and fails badly. 

Tim is found by the older Titans, awake by now, though it seems Jason knocked him out to, uh, fuck with the memorial chamber, and Tim... does not beat around the bush. No secret identities here just “yeah, Jason Todd beat the shit out of me.” 

And their reactions are HILARIOUS. 

One more little sidebar, in the comic, Jason gets in with a D.N.A. check that never removed him from its permissions. Usually in fic this is a unique pass code. I’m not sure which version I like better, honestly. There’s something about Jason physically inputting a code that accepts him even though he’s supposedly dead that I really like, and just feels better than a dna scan. A dna scan sounds SAFER, sure, but there’s something about the Titans leaving in an honest SECURITY RISK out of sentiment that I like. 

Lastly, I really like how it ends. Jason honestly thinks Tim IS a good Robin, and it seems like Jason’s done some research on the core four, mentioning Tim’s “real friends” again while the “camera” is on Conner and Cassie, suggesting that Jason KNOWS about them and possibly that targeting the tower while they were gone maybe wasn’t an accident or out of convenience, but fully intentional. And again, Jason’s real problem is highlighted: he feels alone, forgotten, unmemorable, no family, no friends. 

Thank you for coming to my TedTalk. 

[innocentimouto]

Authors: Write 10 chapters about Jason going through the hurt and justified anger of Bruce replacing him and showcasing just how badly it affects him. Then have a few more chapters showing Bruce and Jason slowly reconciling.

Then for added tension and stretching out the storyline, let’s bring in some opposition or roadblocks, like say maybe Dick Grayson.

Let’s have him argue and fight against Bruce. And the poor parent is just a victim in all this who has to deal with his first ungrateful son throwing tantrums and wanting to be independent. So with all Bruce’s attention on Dick, there’s room for insecurity on Jason’s part and doesn’t that just add to the angst we all love.

Authors: Also completely ignores why Dick is angry in the first place. He has no justifiable reason obviously. Because we can’t have that. We can’t have it being written that Dick’s anger stems from Bruce never telling him he views him as his son, or not adopting him when he adopted another kid very quickly. Or worse, that he took away Robin even though no one made any effort to hide that fact.

Authors: We just spent half our fic writing about Jason’s feelings on losing Robin! His feelings of hurt and betrayal hinge on it being something he never anticipated! So we can’t write that Bruce has done this before, or it will seem really stupid. And that he did it to Favorite Son Golden Boy. It will seem  as if Jason’s every action since returning was driven by emotion which WE CAN’T HAVE. Dick IS THE ONE WITH THE TEMPER RIGHT? DICK IS THE ONE WHO’S BEEN THROUGH THE EMOTIONAL WRINGER WITH BRUCE FOR YEARS AND YET HAS TRIED FORGIVING HIM OVER AND OVER AND HAS MADE A NAME FOR HIMSELF AND HAS POINTEDLY STATED THAT HE DOESN’T LIKE USING BRUCE AS AN EXCUSE FOR HIS MISTAKES.

IF WE BRING THAT CHARACTER IN THAN OUR WHOLE PLOT IS GONE.

If you can’t tell, I’m so done with this.

Why is this so hard for people? The amount of similarities between Jason and Dick is HUGE. Authors have SO MUCH to work with in terms of finding ways for them to get along and connect. Why is there such a need to oppose them?

I can’t expect everyone to enjoy reading what I read. I can definitely say a lot of people hate reading about abusive Bruce while I feel like his abuse needs to be recognized. 

So if you want a character as a conflict, fine. I’m not going to read your fic just to complain about it. You write for whoever you want.

But if you write a character completely OOC, mention that he’s OOC. Or that this is an AU. Make it clear this isn’t the actual character.

Dick Grayson doesn’t have a temper. He gets angry like anyone else or when he’s being mind controlled.

Dick Grayson isn’t stuck up. He had parents before Bruce if you all bother to remember whenever you’re being judgmental about his circus upbringing.

Dick Grayson isn’t emotionally stupid. He didn’t raise Damian by constantly making him uncomfortable, or not backing off when it’s clear that he needs to, or randomly barging into his room when he’s not wanted. (The amount of times Dick does this to Jason in fics is unbelievable. A brick could see that Jason is at his limit and needs space.)

Dick Grayson loves his family. You can’t write him being the family person and emotional support and then try to shove down our throats that he doesn’t care about Jason.  Do you really think he’d look at Jason and be no way I’m accepting this street kid, but look at Damian and think Yes. This assassin baby who treats Alfred like trash and has no problem killing and has very serious racist and sexist beliefs will make a perfect little brother.

Dick Grayson loves Jason. He didn’t break his moral code and kill Joker for kicks, all right? And he didn’t have nightmares about Jason out of misplaced guilt. HE LOVES JASON.

You can easily have all your angst with them loving each other and having issues with their methods of saving people. Or Pit influence. Jason can still be insecure and hate Dick, but sibling hate him. Like he’s so perfect what a jerk oh he’s asking for my help well fine I’ll help and I’m in no way happy about it. It isn’t like you created Robin and were my hero and now you’re asking for my help. I am very INCONVENIENCED BY THIS OKAY?

Jason would still have the premise of being accepted by the family and his feelings on being replaced would still be valid. Joker would be alive.  All your things with Bruce are the same except Jason has a big brother to turn to who understands him. And isn’t that what we want?

Someone to understand and be there for Jason?

And it’s not like that solves the entire family drama. Canonically Tim never looked up to Jason and even if he did, the attempted killing is still a thing. Damian would hate him on principle and constantly anger him with comments about being the outcast or street urchin and just about being everything Jason would hate from rich people.

Cass wouldn’t like his methods. Steph would probably be cool honestly. They would chaotically get along.

Give me a Jason that doesn’t need an entire character to change for his emotions to be valid. Give me a Jason that has actual respect for Robin and for its creator, so that being replaced actually hurts because it meant so much to him. Give me a Jason with all his trauma, and all his emotions, and all his pain, and make him get the love and respect he deserves by growing and being his own hero and not by others’ nonexistent slights against him.

You’ve molded him into a character that depends upon others’ unjustness to him. And you think this makes him more interesting and loveable.

But in doing so you’re inadvertently admitting that without these invented abuses, Jason has no justification for his actions.

[bigskydreaming]

I agree with everything you said in the last post but especially the Damian part.

Like I don’t know why people treat it like Dick had to choose between two toys and he chose the shinier model. He was in a situation where a 9/10 year old child was going to go back to a murder cult if he didn’t find a quick way to sure he stayed. And no option was good if Damian left. It was either Ra is going to steal his body or would become a powerful supervillain who would resent the whole family and between that is a whole lot of child abuse. It not like Dick had all the time in the world to figure out a different way for Damian to stay he had maybe like a day. 

Also we never actually got to see Dick’s view on the situation only Tim’s because the only time we got to see that conversation was in Red Robin ( which might be wrong but I’m pretty sure I’m right). Tim was having a slight mental breakdown so maybe not the best narrator. 

Like, the ONE thing I'd love for people to keep more centered in the varying discourses about Dick, Tim, Robin and Red Robin, is that like.....

The writer himself had Tim and Dick reconcile and work together in the aftermath of Tim leaving because he was upset.

It really doesn't get mentioned enough IMO that at no point in the actual canon stories was Dick ever oblivious to Tim being hurt, uncaring of this, nor did the canon ever try to claim on Dick's behalf that he DIDN'T hurt Tim, y'know?

I talked earlier tonight about the importance of remembering that these are fictional characters who can not CHOOSE any actions for themselves, but rather are ruled entirely by what the writers choose FOR them.

And the thing is.....for all that Dick is often characterized in fanfics as being oblivious or uncaring to having hurt Tim, or say that he kicked Tim out of the house and the city, or that he called Tim crazy or that he chose Damian OVER Tim or all these other things.....

None of those things say anything about Dick or what kind of character he is, despite the fact that fanon and fics have made a huge deal OUT of running with the idea that THOSE acts in fact say a LOT about Dick's actual character or whatever.....

But like, the point is not just that none of those things say anything about Dick simply because they're not how the canon went....

JUST as important, IMO, is the fact that none of those things are even in the BALLPARK of saying anything about Dick's actual character.....

Because the actual canon was written the way it was for the sake of TIM'S story. It was never about trying to make Dick look good, the events played out the way they did because the writer INTENDED there to be conflict between the brothers about it! Dick didn't find some magical way of ensuring that he delivered the news to Tim in the absolute right way possible because he just didn't care enough about Tim's feelings to do so....Damian delivered the news to Tim in the absolute worst way possible BECAUSE the writer WANTED the chasm between Dick and Tim.

THE CONFLICT WAS THE STORY!

And just as importantly.....the same writer who caused the conflict also RESOLVED the conflict. In his own same stories. Tim and Dick may have never hashed over every single detail of Tim's issues with Dick, but there was CLEARLY a reconciliation. Tim showed his forgiveness, his understanding of why Dick had done what he'd done and the fact that he'd made his peace with it, in a variety of ways from telling Dick he still had his trust, joking with Dick in SPECIFIC ways that called back to personal in-jokes that they'd had since the 90s -

(and that in fact were originally written by the same writer....like, the Brady Bunch jokes are a SPECIFICALLY Fabian Nicieza thing, as in he's the only writer who has EVER had Dick and Tim having that particular in joke between them, and he established it when he first wrote Tim, when he and Dick were great during Tim's time as Robin in the 90s. Tim calling back to those jokes during Red Robin and specifically reinviting memories of some of his favorite moments with his brother HIMSELF, like was as clear a peace gesture as you can get, IMO.)

But point is....the conflict happened the way it did, because it was MEANT to happen. There was supposed to be conflict, so by that very token, Dick wasn't MEANT to find the perfect way to handle the Robin situation that made sure Tim didn't suffer any negative feelings about it.

The reason its lasted so long as discourse in fandom was that regardless of the fact that the writers and characters both showed a resolution to the conflict that was deliberately sown to BE a conflict in the first place....

Fans of Tim decided this resolution wasn't adequate enough.

And so the events of it have been tweaked endlessly, as has the fact that the brothers reconciled itself, in order to keep this conflict extended far beyond the parameters or duration of the ACTUAL canon conflict its based on....with Dick further exaggerated into this uncaring instigator because the conflict FANS wanted was one in which Tim was Dick's victim in a way that he was never intended to be by the initial source conflict, which wanted BOTH characters to be somewhat sympathetic but now turned into a one-sided thing where only ONE character is 'deserving' of sympathy.....

But the problem is....that wasn't the story. And this wouldn't BE a problem, due to it being fanfic and fanfic being innately transformative, if not for the fact that people keep trying to point to canon actions as the proof of conclusions they're drawing about Dick's actions in the FANON conflict.....when the only thing the canon actions are meant to serve as the foundation for, is the conflict which ACTUALLY happened AND was resolved in canon!

And the thing is, a lot of fandom have done a lot to compare this situation to Dick losing Robin in the first place, but without actually leaning into that comparison in order to examine how Dick truly felt about that then, and ACTUALLY make it the comparison they're raising it as.....

(people can't claim that they've done this if they themselves are calling the situations parallel and yet clearly holding Tim and his feelings as innately more sympathetic and deserving of understanding than they're willing to even retroactively apply to Dick in the very situation they themselves have invited comparisons to....like if you're STILL calling for Dick's head for what he did with Robin here in a way that you're not having any characters anywhere, even just in reference or passing say that Bruce deserves being chewed out for to similar degrees.....your comparison is rigged from the start, it just is)....

But ultimately at the end of the day, there IS an answer for why Dick wasn't more careful and studious in his handling of the Robin situation....and that answer, for better or worse, is that he wasn't MEANT to be. The handling exists the way it played out, because it was meant to engender a specific conflict, one that was then resolved to the satisfaction of the story's writer.

If that wasn't to the satisfaction of fans, that's understandable! No story ever satisfies all fans!

But the problem is, the transformative nature of fanfic cuts two ways. And this is what people so often conveniently overlook when they cite that you can do anything with fanfic and that its subject to everyone's personal wants and agenda.

Like this is all perfectly true. But what people CAN'T do, is forbid others from drawing conclusions based on what decisions you do and don't make with fanfic.

And the problem with the Red Robin discourse, is we have a conflict that was engineered from the start, and negatively impacted a particular character aka Tim.

And the resolution the canon offered didn't satisfy the itch a lot of Tim's fans had for that particular conflict.

But the thing is.....there's two entirely different ways to tweak a conflict with fanfic.

You can make it BETTER.

Or you can make it WORSE.

And nine out of ten times - with this being especially obvious when you keep in mind that the canon itself DID CREATE RESOLUTION TO ITS OWN CONFLICT - its very apparent that a lot of fans just were not interested in making the resolution of this conflict even BETTER than what we got in the canon.

See, because the reason it happened in canon at all was NOT in fact because Dick was just as uncaring and neglectful as FANON of this conflict makes him out to be....since the reason it happened that way at all was ONLY because the writer needed it to happen in SOME way that sowed conflict between Tim and Dick and sparked Tim's solo journey of self-discovery.....

The only real way to BETTER resolve the conflict of the Robin mantle transition...

Would be for Dick to specifically approach Tim in such a way as to take his feelings about the matter into account and make his argument for why he felt Damian needed this now.

And that's something that's ABSOLUTELY easy to do, because the only reasons things DIDN'T happen that way in the first place, was circumstantial! Because the story was PLOTTED to have Damian spill the beans before Dick even had an opportunity to talk to Tim one on one. Changing a story's direction born of circumstance is one of the easiest things to do with fanfic since all you have to do is write different circumstances! Nobody's character even needs addressing there, because no character is inherently flawed for that story happening the way it did....that's why the story WORKED, in canon! Dick just circumstantially wasn't given even an OPPORTUNITY to be as conscientious about the matter as we would have liked him to be.

Easy, EASY fix with fanfic.

But that's not what fanfic tends to do with this particular story point, is it?

Instead, we get constant worsenings of Dick's motivations, Dick's choices, Dick's reaction to Tim's response, etc, etc.

The slant is entirely one-sided, aimed at making Tim not just more sympathetic, but Dick LESS sympathetic. Making it a nuance-free example of not even two brothers fighting in the face of their mutual grief, but one being VICTIMIZED by the other's willful ignorance of their feelings and loss, while simultaneously demonstrating none of the same himself.

And that's a choice that tons of fanfic writers have made, and they GET to make that choice, but what doesn't get to happen is making everyone else pretend that this was the only way the story COULD have gone, the TRUE resolution it deserved and the thing that ACTUALLY said something indicative of Dick's character.....

When not only were there these other opportunities to resolve the conflict in ways better for BOTH characters....the resolution of the actual conflict is considered irrelevant even though creating a conflict that could be resolved in story was the ONLY reason for the characters making the specific choices they made in the first place!

The discourse is literally all just born of people using the slight against Tim's character as an excuse to make Dick's character look worse. IMO to distract from the fact that this happened at all, because the real gripe was with Tim not being Robin anymore but there was no way to unilaterally decry that WITHOUT making the case that Damian should never have been Robin, and most fans I think recognize that would have been a nonstarter, discourse wise. There’s no rolling the clock back on a new Robin EXISTING, that’s been proven conclusively in the past. Once a character has been a Robin, you can’t argue away their right to ever be one period. If it couldn’t happen with Steph, despite the shortness of her Robin tenure and the smaller size of the girls’ fanbases relative the various Batboys (and let’s not pretend a disparity doesn’t exist there), then it wasn’t going to happen with Damian. So fans made their displeasure known in another way - venting it on the character that precipitated the changing of this particular guard.

And the thing is, ultimately, for all the comparisons made to the Bruce and Dick Robin debacle, they all fall short of being valid given two fundamental differences:

1) Canon has one hundred percent refused to ever fully address the conflict Bruce created in story when he fired Dick or just gave Robin away to Jason, with the only time its ever really been addressed in the comics being when Dick came to confront Bruce about it and Bruce made no form of actual apology or recourse, but instead ultimately just yelled at Dick about missing him and then told him to go. Which umm. Yeah. Oh, the resolution of it all.

2) The other key difference being that while there are certainly fans who have used these story points simply TO make Bruce look worse, the same as I'd argued happened with Dick in the Red Robin scenario.....it is still undeniable that there are a sizable number of fans such as myself who have always insisted we only raise this particular story element because we WANT to see better or actual resolution of the conflict raised in story - aka Bruce firing Dick or just giving away Robin - AS WELL AS being very clear on a perfectly easy way TO showcase better resolution: just having Bruce fucking OWN HIS ACTIONS AND APOLOGIZE FOR THEM.

So even with the awareness that while ultimately both Robin turnovers only happened because the writers chose that conflict happen, they remain incomparable in my mind purely because only one of them was ACTUALLY resolved or treated as resolved in canon, and like.....the other one is the only one that actually has fans continuously making the point of what story actions can actually be taken in meta, headcanons and fics, TO create the resolution we want.....whereas the other conflict will never be resolved any better than it is in canon, because the people who keep raising the conflict don't even want to acknowledge that it even WAS resolved in canon at all, because that would defeat the entire purpose of continuously worsening the conflict specifically TO create reasons for a continued grudge against Dick's character.

And you flat out just can't ever resolve a conflict that people ultimately WANT to exist.

[imaginedcreaderinsert]

You know you are your own assassin — Bruce Wayne x Reader x Jason Todd

SUMMARY: /the promised quadruple/. You were eighteen and in love. You have been for the past four years with his figure, what he meant and what he represented to the rest of the city – more importantly, what he represented to you, everything he was in your little world. Even so, you are very aware of your position as one of his adopted dear children and never try anything, neither public nor in private…  And it would have stayed that way had you not insisted on patrolling alone, being exclusive. Sure, Tim and Damian could come up – from time to time in the same areas you both chose, but you were made for him. You were incredibly protective of Bruce, Batman – to you they were the same person. He rescued you and he opened HIS world to you. You are still trapped in that room, you are still in that cruel position, with your arms trembling and your head down to the floor, offering your bare back to a stranger who uses the skin left unmarked to put the fire down, make himself a new one with-

WORD COUNT: 6810 (almost 7k of smut lol)

TW:  Smut (more explicit than usual, I believe), swearing, some light angst and implied abuse (not sexual). No one is here related by blood, thus it is not incest, but to each it’s own. This four part fic it’s not for the faint-hearted.

A/N: I kid you not 2810 of context/angst/explanation because I can’t do PWP and then, the rest, all NSFW/LEMON with Todd. There’s a bit with Bruce -- things will escalate as the chapter advance. There will be a total of four, if things go right! As mentioned on the Trigger Warning, it can be considered that it is some kind of incestual lowkey relationship, but none of them are related and they try to break from the frame. Again, this is pure dirty indulgence. You have been warned twice!

People that asked to be tagged: @sarcasmismyfirstlove, @dora-the-grownup

You were not normal, not like the rest. Maybe that is why Mr. Wayne —Bruce— had never forced a strict education upon you, contrary to the others. Even Todd had attended at some point Gotham Academy before being expelled; but it was not your style. Maybe your past-self dreamt of glory, trophies and competitive environments in a very possible future with other Ivy League material, but not this time, not in this life. You had gone through enough, and it was just not in you to continue with that path. You were mediocre at best, nothing really catching on your interest save the occasional English class (some books caught on your attention. Not for too long, but it made Alfred and Mr. Wayne feel better).

           At first it had been thought that it was just typical teenage behavior, but then the visits to therapy became increasingly longer and more preoccupying; your memories and attitude had gotten worse the older you got. You came from a rough background (more than the rest, arguably; close to Jason one could say); mom OD’d, and dad left for a better family, someone who was less broken, less problematic. You had served as an ashtray to your mom’s ex-boyfriend (between some other little things) after she had died for some time, and it had ended quite badly, but for the better. The night you rebelled was the night Batman found you, and quite literally saved you. You had blown the ashes straight into his eyes, and he, while crying, had tried to pin you, strangle you, hit you. He had managed to do the two first ones, but you never thought you would die. It didn’t come to your head at all, you knew you had to fight, survive somehow – as small as you were you understood some things, such as pride and stubbornness. Your father who victoriously thought he ran from you both, you little psychopaths, was not going to be happier, was not going to fuck up your entire life. And maybe this other temporal dude did for some years, but you would make it, you would, you would-

           Your lungs burnt as he flew from your little body and the Batman came into appearance, broken windows, magnanimous appearance. It was brief, it was easy:  you spit into the ground, blood and air making their way through your mouth. You couldn’t imagine how much your life would change.

           He adopted you, and as you become older, he saw it as the most inevitable invitation, option for him to try.

           “Do you want to train with Jason and Richard sometime?”

           …

           You were eighteen and in love. You have been for the past four years with his figure, what he meant and what he represented to the rest of the city – more importantly, what he represented to you, everything he was in your little world. Even so, you are very aware of your position as one of his adopted dear children and never try anything, neither public nor in private…  And it would have stayed that way had you not insisted on patrolling alone, being exclusive. Sure, Tim and Damian could come up – from time to time in the same areas you both chose, but you were made for him. You were incredibly protective of Bruce, Batman – to you they were the same person. He rescued you and he opened HIS world to you. You are still trapped in that room, you are still in that cruel position, with your arms trembling and your head down to the floor, offering your bare back to a stranger who uses the skin left unmarked to put the fire down, make himself a new one with-

           “Batgirl, with me?”. You hope it’s his first call. He is meticulous, perfectionist; he won’t take any less from anyone.

           “Yes, a hundred percent. Was checking the other entrances.”

           …

           “Let me guess, another perfect mission?”. Timothy asks, taking off his mask, slowly getting his cape off. You help, humming to yourself happy. “I don’t know why I still ask.”

           “Because you care. He still prefers me.” You gloat, taking a look at his back: some bruises that will last for days, but nothing that cannot be fixed with a warm bed and rest. You slap his back, making him groan. Damian scoffs. “What, something to argue?”

           “He does not prefer you. He just won’t say no because you are a soft spot. And well, no one else wants to go with him. You just always call it first.” The atmosphere is different. Damian is not hurt per se, but you can tell he’s pissed off about something.

           “Jealousy does not suit you, Damian. I thought your thing was being cold and brief.”. You are unsure and a bit wary of where he wants to take it to. Damian and you had never been on the best terms, as much respect as you had him (so young and so good, lethal; you wished you could have started sooner, have his gifts. Maybe Bruce would like you more that way).

           “You did not understand me. I’m saying you are father’s weak sidekick, not that you are his. That’s why he concedes, so that he can take a better control on you.”

           There’s a brief silence in the cave. If Dick had been here, if Jason was here they would have stopped him already; Tim is not one for conflicts, thus can’t think one anything to start with, to comment on. He hopes Alfred or Bruce will appear so that he can’t stop what he can foresee is a catastrophe.

           “You are wrong.” But you are late answering. You took some time, you considered; that’s what you’ve always been afraid of, not being enough – good, strong, courageous, dexterous to follow his pace. It’s eaten you since the first mission you both went to together. He always chose you, not the other way around. “He prefers me, I’m his favorite because I know what I’m doing, I’m-“

           “You never talk back to him, you always obey, you always follow his directions without offering any feedback, any refinements to the plan”. Damian lists, perfectly, without missing a beat like he has been harboring it for some time. “You are father’s-how was it that you said, Tim? Father’s little girl?”. Tim looks mortified as you look at him, incredulous that he would say something so hurtful behind your back. Surprised that they both have been having those opinions to themselves. “In fact, this is, I believe, the most I’ve heard you use a first person in public. As I’ve said, you comply with anything he says. So, if that’s being a good Batgirl then yes, you are the best, (Y/N).”

           You are astonished. You are not weak; you voice out your opinions you-you can be more than a little girl afraid of little Daddy not liking her anymore. Bruce has made that abundantly clear throughout the years – he adores you, he would do anything for you. He won’t abandon you, he won’t leave you for something better.

           …

           So you plan to help the next big hit; Damian and Tim are included, seeing as it is a big one, but all the trust that Bruce has had on you vanishes as soon as the mission starts. You are not moving in your element, too insecure, shy almost when giving orders and unable to command the Robins. The mission goes out okay, but nothing more than that: barely acceptable, as he tells you as soon as all of you are out, incredibly exhausted and beaten.

           The desperation to show him you are the one has been too apparent, has ultimately fucked everything out. The stress and impotence is completely eating you out as you rest in a roof, not too far from the building you’ve destroyed not too long ago (which was not supposed to happen, but it has been your last resource).

           “Drake, Robin, home: now. Batgirl, stay.”

           Damian scoffs while Tim tries to give you a pat, which you evade, still bitter because of his comment some weeks ago. Yes, it has been proven that you can’t, you are unable to-

           “What were you thinking? This has-I’ve never taught you anything like this, Batgirl. You have always been-“

           “Good? Obedient? Compliant?” He seems slightly shocked at seeing your response. You have always looked at him straight in the eye, honest and slightly (always, since a child) terrified – that he will abandon you, that he will leave you in a dark room, prohibit you from his spare attention.

           “Capable, discreet, intelligent. Specially quick in your feet, and had I not moved you aisde-“

           “Is this going to be you telling me everything I did wrong? Because I know, believe me, I am-“

           “No, this is me being angry at you for mixing feelings in this mission”. Your face goes white. He is serious, cruel almost in his eyes even when you can’t see him because of his mask. Is he going to think of you as something disgusting, as- “You were trying to prove a point to Robin? Drake? That was not the purpose of the mission, Batgirl. You let your feelings get in between and because of that-“

           You sigh, almost in relief to yourself, this time looking at him straight in the eye. He’s not sweaty, but rather tired. His shoulders are still tense, his figure incredibly marked because of his suit, his jaw perfectly-

           “You are not taking the lead anytime soon. You are better following me.” And you would agree some years before, but you are 18, you are not his brat, to be scolded and ordered to follow without a say in anything as easy as it has been before. Damian was right.

           “We are partners! That means that-“

           “We are”. He says softly, stopping you momentarily from getting more and more angry. It calms you, you almost smile before his cruel mouths gets opened once more. “But we are not equal. And I mean it by far. You are far from acceptable Batgirl level.”

           It feels like a slap in the face. Did he meant it to light a fire down your ass? Because you grow desperate, as he turns around, maybe planning to leave you alone to fume, wallow in your own sadness – which you would if jealousy didn’t surge in your chest. Incredible jealousy, terrible green jealousy which creeps it all out and eliminates any rational filter from your mouth.

           “Is it because of Barbara?”. You’ve heard that speech a lot of times in soap operas. He’s not even his-nothing! She is nothing, but still she can’t get her head around him taking in another Batgirl. Specially that redhead. “Is she your new protegée? Are you going to fund her to college, get her into the Ivy League you couldn’t get me because I’m such a big fuck up?”

           He stops, noticing it goes far beyond a simple mission or a simple riled up from the Robins. But he has seen something tonight that he has never been able to teach you before, too afraid of being too much on you, too strict and harsh when you’ve had it bad already with such authoritarian figures in your life. He has missed the point completely, and he feels frustrated because of it.

           “This is only because of how soft I have been on you, (Y/N).” The name is a stab to the heart. He has never used it, save for a soft reprimand. Never like this. “How childish your behavior has been, putting our lives at risk just for proving what? That you can lead a team, me? You’ve clearly showed you can’t, you are lost, just a girl trying to make herself bigger, stronger than she really is, because all you really are is-“

           “Shut up!” You irrationally explode, afraid of him continuing, saying the final ‘you are out’. You won’t let him. You will do anything before going that way.

           “You are off duty, case closed!”. He has never raised his voice, almost making you flinch, afraid of his tone but the meaning of his words. No! Love me, don’t abandon me!

           “No. No! I won’t have it, no! No, Bruce, wait! No!”

           There are tears in your eyes as you ran behind him. You try to grab him twice as you shout the same words, trying to make him look you. If you do that, if he does-maybe you have a chance. Maybe you still-yes. Yes, you will. He won’t leave you, he can’t. You will die before he never looks at you again, before he drops you out like you are nothing, like you are just another obstacle in his life like your father considered you. He won’t!

           “Bruce, no!”. You are using names, maybe hoping he will at least shout you, as your voice gets higher and higher; more desperate. It doesn’t work, and your hands start to tremble, out of pure fear and desperation. “No! This is not about me, it is about us!”. It’s the first time you’ve voiced it, getting in front of him. His eyes get slightly bigger, clearly surprised as well. “It’s you getting overprotective with me, again! I’m not a small child, I’m not immature, I have been a woman since long before anything changed, since before we had to change our suits or-anything, really! I won’t have it, I won’t abide by your rules, I won’t-“

           “Then leave. No one is stopping you.”

           It breaks your heart. You know what it is: it’s Bruce pushing people off, aside. You’ve seen it done with some other women, his own Robins, out of fear of losing another one, being too closed, too attached again and not recovering. You understand him better than anyone and he’s letting you leave? He WANTS you to leave? No, he has never done that, save J. But J. is a special case, it’s not you, you are-you are special, you are his, inevitably his. He loves you, he-

           “No! How dare you!” You shout, furious tears running down your face. “Everything I have done, I have because of you! Because you wanted it, because you praised me, valued me for doing things right, good for you! You made me into this, you gave me an identity and now you are taking it from me!” You start punching his chest, getting in front of him again; this time he brushes you aside harder, you taking his arm and taking him with you, moving it. It starts getting violent. You’ve never sparred with him, never have fought seriously with him. “I’ve fucked it up, but surely, surely-“

           He fights, maybe stopping your hopeful words, eyes: does he really NOT know? He punches you, you evade, easily enough; but then you start hitting each other hard, grabbing each other, letting the other fall into the ground and then trying to kick, seriously. You are not afraid, if anything, you are invigorated to prove him right: you are worthy, enough.

           You finally sweep the floor with your right leg, making him jump to evade it, just so that you can kick him in the middle of his chest, making him retrocede. He grabs your feet but you manage, miraculously, to make him fall into the ground, with great force. It doesn’t seem like he’s getting up any time soon, but still, you struggle, getting on his hips, his broad chest and still defiant, furious.

           “No!” You shout, blocking his attack, pinning his legs and arms to the ground. He can’t fight, he won’t fight. And it takes you a few extra seconds to see the position you are in, alone and panting in a random rooftop, alone.

           There’s a silence, where you think he thinks you’ve calmed down. But to the contrary, your heart is beating extremely fast. You don’t think, not really, after almost losing him. There’s an acknowledged look on him of you being able to pin him down, having the abilities. Bruce thinks he might use it as a speech to reassure her, maybe retract himself.

           But then you kiss him. You furiously grab him by his jaw, stopping him from struggling or moving you aside. He stays frozen in his place, hands still as you have let them go, your hips grounded on his abdomen, making her gasp as she grinds, almost tentatively, virginally, making him finally react. This is it. It’s the moment of truth, of never going back to being the same.

           “I have loved you since I was fourteen. You saved me when I was twelve, and you have been everything my father never was. I have not once seen you as a paternal figure, Bruce. Take it or leave it. Hate me or love me. I can’t do grey areas.”

           …

           Damian might not be very observant of personal relationships, but he can sense there is something off. Well, there has been for some time; and he doesn’t know if Timothy has deliberately decided not to comment on it, or if he doesn’t really see it, but something has changed in the dynamics. It’s not only that you are now rotating (each of them get to have one night with Bruce when patrolling), but something is… Off whenever Bruce glances (Y/N) or she does it back at him. They can’t keep it for long, and he can only wonder what has happened since the last mission. It’s been some weeks, but he hasn’t seen much interaction around the house.

           Father does not come down for breakfast, and (Y/N) did the same for a week. Then, after her first patrol after announcing they now had a rota, she had started occasionally coming down for a fruit or two, then going back up.

           So for once he decides to break the rules and follows them. He abandons a part of Gotham where tonight anything could happen – but his interest is on them, which seem to almost playfully get as far from each other before getting closer again and changing positions as they move. Almost as if they want to lose him, but he’s too clever. He sees a pattern and not in her, but in father.

           And he really wishes he knew better, he didn’t follow them. Because he can never unseen her, opening slightly, in the front, her suit, showing cleavage and bronzed skin under the moonlight, seductive lips opening up as her hands rest on his chest, stoic as he is. Is he giving in, are they-? No, they couldn’t, father is-

           Yes, he pushes her. Softly, but does so. And that’s enough for Damian, that’s enough for him tonight on things he did not really want to know.

           …

           “No, it is pretty quiet. Maybe the cold makes villains hibernate or something.” She playfully says as they stop in a rooftop, not too far from the worst neighborhoods in Gotham. He can sense a tone, something foreign and somewhat wrong but-but still as she zips down her suit he can’t stop her. His eyes are glued to skin, the marks they reveal slowly. Beautiful, not shameful like she has made them appear for years. “Do you maybe want to… Today?”

           She tempts. She gets closer, on her toes, almost reaching him-but he can’t let that happen again. The first time was too hard, and this time would be impossible, alone. Worse than that, they could be see, heard: Drake and Robin are too clever, too smart for their own good. Maybe they already-do they? Will they? He softly pushes her as he can feel her in his mouth, hot and wet, like she promised other parts would be if only he-

           “I told you not to do that ever again, (Y/N). It won’t happen. Ever.” There’s a moment of fragility in her eyes as she lowers down, offended, hurt. He can see it all over her face, breath becoming labored and eyes worried.

           “But I-you, you let me-“

           “And that was my fault”: She will do it again. And it will only become more aggressive, assertive, as time passes. “I assume it. Now you have to do it. And I’m going to continue on patrolling, but don’t think of going of your own. Go to the Manor now, seeing as you can’t control yourself tonight.”

           It sounds strangely erotic to her, and he can see the flutter in her eyes, but he is dominant in that aspect as well. He won’t let her tempt him. And as he moves to jump, escape almost the uncomfortable feeling in his abdomen, he can hear her groan and metal kicking.

…

           You felt like crying. He had grabbed you back that night, and you had felt closer, different to him the last nights. You though you had broken every familiar tie he ever thought he had with you, but it seems he doesn’t even know how to react. And as pathetic as you sound, you’ve been starving for too long, too much; he was your sexual awakening, the first man you thought when you first masturbated, and also the first name you moaned as you came with your own hand. Sexuality was a thing you were not lost in, that you controlled; and you had almost offered yourself to him that night and he had turned you down. What was it that could tempt him them? Something that could break him, that could make him like you, give in-because he WANTED to give in. You had felt it that night on the rooftop: for the very first time something hard between your thighs, surprising you and making you tentatively grind on that, which he had stopped you shortly after, almost harshly. He was afraid of wanting you – but he did.

           “What is a kitten like you doing all by herself in such a cold night? Have you lost Daddy Wayne?”. He teases, making you sigh as soon as you heard him, making you hide your head between your legs, trying to get the starting tears of your eyes off. “You are going to get cold like that. He won’t like it, kitten.”

           “Fuck off, Red.” You call him, making him smirk. At least you can come up with something back. Jason Todd, Jay or Red. He had been a previous Robin but after his death/not death he had joined the Outlaws and-shit, you have lost count or can’t really say where is right now. The thing is, he had been the closest to you: everyone thought it was Dick, seeing as you were always hanging together in pictures and places, always cuddling or giving each other some “sibling” love (it was not. I had never been. Dick had something on him that resembled Bruce a bit, but you had never told him that). But no, it was Jason: he was the one you shared the most with, the one who understood the fucked-up feelings and thoughts that you had. He was probably the first to know about your little crush on Bruce, but he never judged. “I’m really not in the mood.”

           “Not in the mood because he rejected you? Don’t you want to get naked anymore and show off your tits?”. Fuck, he saw you. You close your eyes, groaning still with your head in between your legs; darkness embraces you, and somehow you feel more comfortable, until you feel a jerk from your hair, which you complain about quite quickly. It’s him, forcing you to look at his eyes. “Are you not wet anymore, prepared for him?”

           “Dumbass, you are being really gross, what is really going on with-“

           “I’m not Daddy and because of that you can’t respect me? You won’t respect me like you do to him or Dick?”. Yes, he has always been a little jealous of both: the stars that glowed in your eyes as you talked about them. You might have known of this but chose to ignore it at times. It was not convenient to you as you needed to rant on someone. “Were you thinking of throwing yourself at Dick? Maybe him taking your virginity, your tight little pussy?”. You blush at the words, your back against the wall firmer, like you are trying to fuse with the stone. He is keeping you in your place, taking you by your chin and forcing his eyes on yours, scrutinizing and harsh. “Because you are, right? Still saving yourself for his cock. And trust me, kitten; everything about him is big.”

           You are hot and bothered in your place. Your knees are pressing themselves together in your position, and you can feel the wetness out of your pussy getting your underwear uncomfortable. It’s not a pleasing sensation, more so than that, someone else (your half-brother) causing you that while thinking of your adoptive paternal figure.

           “Have you tried to spy him in the cave? The showers?”. He tries. You don’t answer as he gets closer to your mouth, and when you whimper and nod, he laughs. Instead, he redirects himself to your neck, making you gasp and move, almost fight, against him. Almost, being a key word because you don’t really try. “Have you ever touched yourself thinking about him? Pressed in a little finger inside your cunt to-“

           “I have only played with my clit”. You say, too quickly, writhing under the pressure of his body against the firm marble behind you which is making you shiver (it has nothing to do with his hot lips on your jaw, doing down on your neck and leaving marks, lapping and kissing like you are something delectable. He is taking his time). “Jay!”

           You grab onto his shoulders, and his figure, bigger than that of Dick’s, almost can make your imagination go far, almost can make you think is someone else the one that’s taking you: which immediately makes you open your legs, giving him access to your body and his cock to rub off on your core, tight on your skin, leaving little to nothing to anyone’s imagination.

           “Smart girl. Have you had someone else’s fingers on you?”

           “No.”

           “You are in for a ride, princess.”

           Red Hood and Batgirl were allies, had been partners in more than one occasion (whenever Batman needed the help, they had started to rely on each other. You had been a great meeting point). Jason and (Y/N) were friends, confidants of each other. They had been something deeper, and you couldn’t deny the attractive he posed in comparison with Bruce. You have had a wet dream or two with him more than once; big guys just did something to you that you couldn’t explain, Jason being the perfect example. He grasps the zipper in the front of your suit and slowly takes it down, making you gasp and shiver against the coldness of the city against your very hot skin. It’s unbearable to wear such a skin tight suit when your body is so hot, horny and desperate for contact. You almost take, harshly, the upper part of your body off you, with a little chuckling help from him – but he is controlling the situation, never letting you get ahead of yourself.

           “I think I can feel a wet spot. Are you wearing-? Oh, yes you are. How cute” He murmurs into your skin, his skillful fingers getting into the lowest part of where his fingers can trace, having gone down your chest with his fingertips down your body. “Jackpot. Fuck you are so wet. I thought I would have to eat you out, but you are lubing yourself quite well… And I wanted to so badly, princess. But it looks like you can do something else for me, can you? I’ve made you hot enough. Light me up, I want to burn.”

           You kiss him, desperate enough. Fuck him, he started it anyways; why shouldn’t you follow? Are you going to stop yourself again, maybe rejecting the one person that desires you? No, no way. You kiss him desperately, moving your hips against his and he corresponds: you feel him hot, big, against your core; your legs are almost out of the suit, almost naked in front of the whole Gotham. You feel wild, unleashed for the first time and you realize that’s what you’ve always been with him. He has never restricted you, tried to tie you down to some cliché or bounded you to the morality of society.

           He gets up and you sit better, your back straightened up. Eagerly, making him laugh, you take him out of his pants: commando, of course he is. It springs out, almost slapping you in your face: like a cheap porno, honestly. You still lick him up slowly, unsurely. Jason is, after all, your first sexual contact with someone more or less your age, a real man. You’ve never had a pulsing cock in your hands: maybe a dildo, a silicon one or something that you’ve tried to get into you (you’ve never gave in, too afraid of doing it on your own, being too loud); but never like this, so real and hot, veiny and hard. It’s soft at the same time, as you move your hand on his shaft and fap him slowly, letting him rest his tip on your hot tongue, offering it in a slutty way for him to use. He doesn’t give in, letting you explore him, maybe knowing it is your first time doing that as well.

           Slowly, at your own pace, you take him into your mouth. You first suck him in taking more than just the tip, then a bit more, a bit more after that until you are halfway there and-well, you choke. Your gag reflex kicks him, something unknown to you until then: but it didn’t feel bad, it just tells you to go slower, no rush to get it all in. You suck him, looking at him directly and giving him sweet eyes while you look for his approval, his praise which you get in the form of pats in your head, caressing your hair until he grabs it with more force. Eventually you are sucking him out, hot and hard in your tongue, your pussy getting wet by each ticking second, but he’s fucking your mouth as well. He keeps a normal pace, not too slow but not too unforgiving while you open more your legs, grinding a bit on the floor like looking for relief; he chuckles and promises something after you finish him, which you more forcefully try to do.

           But he stops you.

           “Such a bitch in heat, I swear I didn’t know you had it in you. Did you try to touch yourself while sucking me off? Bad move. I come first, just as I did to you before.” He is dominant, clear, taking himself off your mouth. You whimper, crawling to him half-naked, almost completely getting out of the suit, left behind like some dead skin. “On the floor, lay down. I’m fucking your mouth. Properly.”

           You shiver, doing as he says; it is cold, and you shiver, protesting almost, until he gets on top of you, moving slightly up, his legs pinning down your arms, to both sides of your body, close to it, so you can’t struggle or stop him. He is serious about it, and you are close to dripping on your own underwear so much it will get stained. It’s a pool, to say the least.

           “Open up. I’m not stopping, so breathe in.”

           You nod, vigorously and he gets in. He starts slow, letting you get used and breathing by your nose, but he quickly takes up the pace. It’s unforgiving to your throat, but he seems to have caught on the limit of your reflex: he always stops before it’s too much, even if he triggers it a bit at time, making you choke – tears form around your eyes, and as much as you try to struggle against his arms to push him slightly off, control him a bit, he doesn’t let go. His legs are huge, thighs muscular: you won’t make it.

           “You are taking each inch of it, gorgeous. All by yourself. You are going to make daddy cum.”. The kink sends you crazy. You close your legs, trying to squeeze them into giving you pleasure, even when you can’t properly follow it. You are frustrated because of it, but perfectly know how good it’s going to feel once he starts giving it some attention. “Daddy is going to cum, okay kitten? And you are going to take it all, drink down my milk and ask for more. You are my perfect kitten, aren’t you?”

           The pet name was not a kink you knew you had, but you want to be perfect for him, for everyone. But specially him, so special and unique in so many ways. You’ve never really thought of Jason that way, but now that he’s fucking your mouth, you can only think of him fucking your pussy, at that same pace and kissing your neck. The thought makes you shiver, close your eyes in pure bliss.

           “So close, I’m at it, gorgeous, I’m there”.

           He warns, and you can prepare for it a bit. Just a bit, before it gets too much on your mouth and he quickly moves, cumming on your face as well. He paints it white, making you close your eyes: he wipes the rest on your eyelids almost delicately, smirking.

           “My kitten looks good in white, but she made a bit of a mess, didn’t she?”. You are gasping for air, too tired on the ground, too cold almost suddenly, wetness uncomfortable on your underwear. “You got it easy, I’m not going to make you-“

           Still you lick him out. You get on top of him this time and lick his cock out, the remaining’s until it’s clean and soft in your hand. But you can sense it’s still interested, as you touch him a bit up and down, try and and elicit some reaction from him.

           “Fuck me”. You almost beg, above him, incredibly frustrated and wet: but his mobile starts ringing up and you know it’s trouble. It never announces nothing good. You don’t even have to see the ID, as he gets kisses you and gets up, giving you his jacket to cover yourself a bit.

           “Just a second, princess”. But you know it will be more than just one second. That was the attractive part of Jason Todd: his unavailability which had been so present in your life, as Bruce had been such a busy man all of his life. Jason being emotionally and sometimes physically unavailable had been such a big attractive on you. “Yeah, I know. No, I wasn’t-okay, yes, I’m going.” He hangs up, dejectedly turning himself around and looking at you, on the rooftop and with your legs closed together; probably not letting your wetness expand. “I have to go. Believe when I say I would rather stay here, gorgeous, and fuck you out in this same rooftop until someone had to come up to see who the fuck was I killing, cause that’s how much I’m going to make you scream”. He crouches down to kiss you, almost too sweet for how he normally is. Maybe he does really care about your first time. Is it all an excuse? “Hey, don’t go there. I see you are thinking, angel. I really really want to fuck you. And make you cum again… And again… And again”. He says, getting to your neck and kissing it repeatedly as he mumbles the same word over and over again. Like he’s lost on it, on your essence, how sweet you smell to him. “It’s just orders, okay? Keep the jacket and give me a show next time we are alone. I’ll come back for it, I swear… But I have to take something in return to keep me warm in this cold night. Can I?”

           Your breath hitches as his eyes go down on your legs. You nod, unsure of what he is really going to do, until he grabs both of your legs and easily opens them up, revealing a very dark spot in your grey underwear, making you pant excitedly. He makes his way in, kissing your ankle and moving upwards until he’s on your knee. His mobile starts to ring up again and he growls almost: it really must be urgent. He almost urgently takes off your underwear, and with a grin, smells it. You blush, getting your suit closer so that you can dress up slowly, legs still a bit weak.

           He disappears, getting your knickers into his pocket casually, and jumps off the roof. You really want him to go back to you and properly do what he has promised. You don’t want anything more tonight than him.

           …

           “I still think you were too rough on her.” Batman begrudgingly comments, almost mutters under his breath: too ashamed, too angry? Jason can’t really say.

           “And here I was thinking you enjoyed the show. The protectiveness now doesn’t help much, B., to be honest.”

           He grunts, closing his arms and looking at the rest of the city, almost hovering it. But Jason knows better, smirking almost under his red helmet.

           “I just said you had to redirect his attention onto you, Jason. Make her forget about me.”

           “And I did, but believe me, she wanted it. You can’t believe how much she was dripping.” He says too quickly, impossible for Bruce to cut off. He learns too much, he didn’t want to. “Trust me, as long as I’m on the scene he won’t bother you. And if it weren’t for you, I would be pounding her virgin pussy right now.”

           There’s an acknowledging silence between them. Both of them know why he called at that precise moment: he thought they would really do it, take her first time, in the middle of a rooftop. He really thought Jason would take her in front of him, break her and pound on her while he was looking.

           “Just-“

           “Just nothing, Bruce. You’re fucking jealous, you have a type; she checks every box. Why are you making me do this? Why don’t you give in? I’ve seen you with younger models clinging onto your arms.”

           He sighs, almost tiredly; has he been explaining that a lot? Maybe Dick knows of it as well? He takes a note to call him later, put him up to date on what the Batman has been up to. And how incredibly naughty he has been.

           “I can’t have something happened like what happened to you, Jason. I-“

           “Yeah, yadda yadda yadda. Your cock, your rules I guess – but hey, catch!” He throws him something, quickly, while already making an escape for it. “Brought you a little something. Enjoy, they are still wet and warm!”

           And of course it had been her underwear, heat and covered in her juices, dripping on them. Some of it was still wet, a little pool of sticky self-lubricant on the core of it. Had she cummed without knowing? There was enough there to make someone like him think she did. It looks so delectable, so edible when he’s grabbing it so close to his own mouth. It’s too easy to stick his own tongue down, take a bit and groan onto the feeling, the flavor: it’s hot, it’s slightly salted more importantly, empty. He knows he will cum onto them later, in private; he knows he can jerk off all the times thinking on her cute little pussy on his mouth, eating her out until her body can’t take him on anymore, but it won’t be enough. It will never be her legs opened up around him, moving and dripping around his head, making her cum again and again and again…

             BONUS for next chp.

           “U must be kiddinf”

           “Shit you not”

           “pics or it didnt happe”

           “Jaybird has sent unknown.jpg”

           “fffff u really did take em. so u fucked her?”

           “bat wouldn’t let me. And why the fuck are you writing

           Oh, nevermind. I’m so naïve. Are the pics the ones I sent you when she was drunk with Roy, the vid or the ones still from the mission?”

           “both.”

           “Oh, fuck off. You’re such a degenerate, D. And to think she stills thinks of you as her dear big brother… And here you are, jerking off to her in a suit, drunk and a vid of her tits moving. Pathetic.”

           Some minutes pass on without an answer. Jason grows more disgusted by the moment. Fucking horny dog.

           “If it’s open season I’m going next, J. Two can play this little game.”

           “Are you threatening me?”

           “I’m promising you.”

[fishfingersandjellybabies]

Favors of Fiery Wits - fic

Characters: Damian Wayne, Dick Grayson, Jason Todd, Tim Drake, Ra’s al Ghul, Maya Ducard, Kathy Branden Pairings: robinpile, MayaKathy Summary: Despite all warnings and threats, Ra’s cashed the favor they all hoped he wouldn’t. A/N: This was never meant to be a series, but then it was and now it’s over. Damian is roughly 30 here, Tim around 40. Dick and Jason are obviously both older by various amounts. I don’t mention it but the older two are probably starting to gray a little bit. They don’t bang at the end, but just cuddle until like noon and then get delivery for every single meal after that. Let’s pretend it was a Saturday or something and they’re all lazy losers. Kid’s name is bad but I’m bad at character naming haha. I made a joke about Dick’s butt and I’m so sorry. Thanks for reading this garbage of a series! :)

All For One, One For All

~~

It was Jason who heard the phone buzzing on the nightstand. One of four, and he waited a minute to listen to the pattern, before lazily calling:

“Damian.”

He blindly slapped around for the phone until he felt his fingers wrap around it, then picked it up and flopped over, holding it in the air over the three lying next to him.

(Tim huffed when Jason’s elbow accidentally hit him in the face.)

A second later the phone was taken, the bed shifted, and Damian quietly mumbled, “This is Damian.”

Jason curled into Tim’s side, trying to drift back off even as he heard the mumbled voice on the line. But without warning, the bed jolted, and he opened his eyes to see Damian, only a shadow in the midnight darkness, sitting straight up.

The voice on the line mumbled for another few seconds. Then there was silence. But when Damian spoke again, it was soft, but wide awake.

“I’m on my way.”

Jason tried to blink away his sleep as Damian stood up. Dick, whom he’d been wrapped around, moaned at the loss, but curled into Tim’s other side to maintain his warmth, probably assuming Damian would be back in a few moments.

But judging by the fact that his first stop was the dresser, where he pulled out multiple sets of clothing, then disappeared into the closet and came back with a duffle bag, Jason doubted that would be the case.

“Dames?” He whispered. He saw Damian stiffen. “Where’s the fire?”

“It’s nothing, Todd.” Damian returned as gently as he could. “Go back to sleep.”

“Where are you going?”

“…Nowhere of importance.” Damian offered. “Go back to sleep, Jason. I’ll…be back in a few days.”

“That sounded less than confident.”

But before Damian could answer, Dick asked sleepily, “Who was on the phone?”

Damian didn’t even offer an excuse.

“Damian?” Dick tried. Tim shifted between them, trying to push up onto his elbow. “Who was on the phone?”

Jason’s eyes were adjusting to the darkness now, and he could see that Damian had turned away from them, refused to look in their direction. He glanced at the clock on the nightstand: 3:41am.

“Damian?” Dick asked again, almost in a whine. He clearly wanted to go back to sleep. Wanted Damian to return to his side. “Who called you? Was it Bruce? Does he ne-”

“It was Ra’s.”

Tim became rigid under Jason’s hands, and Dick jerked up just as fast as Damian originally had.

“No.” Dick growled. “You’re not going.”

“I have to.” Damian pushed back, resuming his haphazard packing. “You know that.”

“You don’t.” Dick shook his head.

“Oh, so you want him to come collect Drake instead?” Damian spit, already stressed and frustrated. “Just let me go take care of this. I’m not asking you to come with me. In fact, I’d rather you didn’t. Now go back to sleep, all of you. It shouldn’t take me more than a few days. When I return, we can celebrate finally being free of that twat of an old man.”

Dick shook his head again in anger, clearly biting his tongue. He glanced back at Tim and Jason. “…What’d he ask you to do?”

“He didn’t say. Just said he was redeeming his favor and to arrive in his company posthaste.” Damian explained, throwing his clothes in the bag. “So the sooner I get this done, the sooner I’ll be home.”

“Yeah, pass on that shit.” Dick hissed, throwing the covers off himself and standing. He stomped over to Damian and took hold of his elbows. The two stared at each other in the dark, Dick’s face stern, Damian’s guilty, silently conversing. Eventually, Damian sighed and looked away, and Dick gathered him up in his arms.

“Damian’s going to finish packing, and I’m going to go get the jet and gear ready to go.” Dick called over to the bed. “Jason, I’ll trust Tim to you, along with any other previsions we may need.”

Jason nodded as Dick released Damian and quickly left the room. Then, after a second of hesitation, he rolled practically on top of Tim, apologetically kissing his cheek. “…You doing okay?”

“No.” Tim said shortly, leaning into Jason’s face. “I hate this. I hate Ra’s.”

“We all do.” Jason soothed. “But we can’t let him go on his own. And, you’re going to be mad, but I agree with Damian – we can’t not answer the call.”

He felt Tim swallow. “…What do you think he’s going to ask him to do?”

“I don’t know, love.” Jason admitted. “I just…have no idea. So, we’ve just got to…hope for the best and prepare for the absolute worst, I guess.”

Damian suddenly appeared next to the bed, yanking the drawer of the nightstand open and digging through it. Jason carefully rolled off of Tim, allowing him to sit up, and reached out for Damian’s wrist.

“I’m sorry I gave you the phone.” He whispered.

Damian smiled sadly, and leaned down to kiss them both.

~~

It wasn’t like the last time they arrived at the compound. The assassins weren’t poised to strike this time. Instead, they just lined the walls, hands on weapons. Welcoming them, but cautiously.

Also unlike last time, it wasn’t Damian storming through the halls like an angry bull, but Dick. Fists tight to his side, and every step a stomp.

Damian didn’t try to comfort him. Just walked side by side with him, glancing at him every few minutes. He understood the other’s anger, obviously.

Jason and Tim brought up the rear, leisurely holding hands.

As they approached the doors, two League members silently opened them. When they crossed the threshold, Damian gently hooked his fingers into two of Dick’s, and gently tugged him to walk behind him. Dick begrudgingly allowed it.

Ra’s was slowly standing from his throne as the four made their way across the floor. Dick, Jason and Tim stopped about three-fourths of the way, watching as Damian stood at his grandfather’s feet.

“Damian.” Ra’s sneered.

“Old man.” Damian returned just as rudely. He crossed his arms. “Let’s get this over with.”

Ra’s chuckled, but turned back to his chair and picked up a folder that had been tucked along the arm. He flipped it through the air and Damian caught it with ease.

Damian opened silently, skimming the front page. Suddenly, his head shot up. “You’re not serious.”

“Very.” Ra’s nodded gravely, like the task upset him.

“What?” Dick stepped forward, trying to peek over Damian’s shoulder. “What does he want you to…”

“I need him to steal a child.” Ra’s called cheerfully.

“What.” Tim called.

“No.” Dick declared. “He’s not doing that.”

“Ah, ah, Mr. Grayson.” Ra’s raised a finger. “You remember the stipulations of the deal – he cannot refuse.”

“And you remember what I promised.” Dick growled, stepping towards the thrown. “If you cashed this favor, I would-”

“Grayson.” Damian called. “Relax.”

Dick spun around. “We’re not stealing a kid.”

“We are not.” Damian agreed. “I am.” A pause, to glance back at the file in his hands. “And it’s not a child. It’s an infant.”

“Damian-”

“Richard.” Damian shot back. “I made an oath. For Timothy’s life and for my own. I have to do this.” Then softer. “Trust me.”

Dick stared at him. God, he wanted to. Trusted him in every other aspect of his life.

“Please.”

And he didn’t know why, but he thought he saw something in Damian’s eye. A secret? Or a plan, perhaps?

He glanced back to Tim and Jason. Tim was just as frustrated as him. Arms crossed and turned away. Jason had his hands in his pockets, watching the scene quietly.

“…Fine.” Dick sighed. He gave one last furious glance to Ra’s before storming past Damian back towards the doors. “Let’s get going, then.”

“Safe travels, dear grandson.” Ra’s hummed. “To you and your lovers.”

He didn’t need to see Ra’s to know he was smiling.

~~

There was silence on the plane.

Dick and Tim refused to speak. Too angry at Ra’s for the favor he’d chosen for Damian to complete. But then conflicted all the same. Because Ra’s didn’t ask him to kill the child, or even the parents. Just steal the child. Steal the baby. No murder, no bloodshed. Just…theft, if they got down to technicalities.

But. Still.

Jason wordlessly flew the jet. Damian sat as his copilot, reading through the file Ra’s had handed him, over and over.

“…I know the other two are pouting.” Jason mumbled after twenty minutes or so. “But you mind giving me the deets on this job at least?”

“Certainly.” Damian sniffed, sitting up slightly. “A baby boy. Almost a year old. Located in Russia.”

He glanced to the back of the plane. Tim was glaring at a wall as he twirled a spoon in a cup of tea. Dick was sitting in a seat, staring blankly out the window.

“Would you two like to hear the next part? It might make you feel better about what I’m doing.” Damian called.

Tim shook his head. “I’m just…you agreed so quickly, Damian. It’s like you didn’t even think about what you were agreeing to.” Tim looked over at him, and looked anguished. “And I know you love me – I do. And I understand you’re doing this to keep me safe, and by extension yourself. But…I’m not worth ripping a child from his family. I’m not.”

“It pains me to say it, but I agree, Beloved. None of us are worth someone else’s pain and suffering.” Damian said plainly. “That’s why I want you to listen to me. Will you do that?”

Tim looked at Dick, who hadn’t looked away from the window, and sighed, stepping towards the cockpit. “Hit me.”

Damian held up the file, like he was reading a storybook to children. “The lab his bio-chamber is being held in is in Chernobyl, along the Ukraine-Russia border.”

“…His what.” Tim whispered. Damian glanced up, and almost smirked. Dick was watching him now, with wide eyes that matched Tim’s.

“His bio-chamber. Like the womb I was grown in, or the tube your friend Kon-El was.” Damian tugged a picture from a paperclip and turned it for the others to see. A long vertical tube, with a tiny baby inside. Scientists standing around it. It was dated almost a year ago, around when the baby would have been born.

Dick stood and rushed forward now, taking the photo. Damian gave it to him, and pulled out another photo. A baby lying on a medical table. More scientists standing around. A needle dragging blood from his arm. It was dated a month or two prior.

“The intel Ra’s gave us seems to think the baby is still at the same lab, being raised underground, more or less.” Damian continued. “And being trained as I was – to be a master in everything.”

“Fuck.” Tim breathed, taking the second picture from Damian.

“Who runs the lab?” Jason growled. He hadn’t attempted to look at the photos, and Damian assumed he wouldn’t. Not when his own anger was growing now. “Or funded the project to create a baby?”

Damian flipped through the pages again. “My guess is the funder is the paternal DNA donor.” He held it up for the three to see. “Lex Luthor.”

“He’s trying to create another human-Kryptonian hybrid.” Tim declared. “Just like Conner all over again.”

He reached for the paper – a DNA test – but suddenly Dick reached out and snapped it away first.

“Damian…” He gasped. Eyes round and sad as he glanced up. Damian watched him expectantly. “The mother…”

“Yes.” Damian nodded. “I saw.”

“What?” Jason glanced back from the controls. But then he looked at Damian, and his gut told him what the answer was.

Tim leaned over, as Dick’s shoulders slumped and he said, “It’s Talia.”

Tim gaped and stared at Damian, who gave him a tired smile. “Now you see why I didn’t need to think too long about retrieving the baby.”

Dick stared at the paper even as Tim pushed past him and dragged Damian into his arms. Damian allowed the gesture. Appreciated it, truly, and thanked Tim for it with a soft kiss to the corner of his lips.

“But why?” Dick asked. “They both tried this decades ago and it didn’t work. Why again, after all these years?”

“If at first you don’t succeed, try, try again.” Jason huffed bitterly. “But with Luthor? That’s out of left field.”

“She’s got the brawn, he’s got the brain.” Tim thought out loud, shifting to let Dick take the whole file from Damian’s hands. “Objectively, their chances for raw talent is good.”

“And it was a consenting deal.” Dick read out loud as he skimmed the folder. “There’s a contract here that they both signed.” He furrowed his brows. “With a pen and blood.”

“Okay, I’m real over these fucking blood oaths, have I mentioned that?” Jason snapped. “God, you al Ghuls are fucking ridiculous.”

“So what’s the end game?” Dick wondered aloud.

“At this point, does it matter?” Damian asked wearily. “Neither of them are suitable parents, not that I believe either of them are actually there. And whatever they created a life for can’t be good. Nothing that an innocent child deserves, at least.”

“So, in a way…” Jason almost sang, smirking as he reached out to squeeze Damian’s knee. “We aren’t stealing anything at all. We’re rescuing.”

“You can’t turn this around and make us the good guys, Jay.” Dick scolded, even as Damian returned Jason’s smile. “It’s just an…overall bad situation.”

“Because we might be getting a baby out of a lab…” Tim sighed, leaned his head on Damian’s. “But remember who we have to give the baby to afterwards.”

Damian leaned his weight back against Tim’s, reached up and squeezed the hand on his shoulder. “I have a plan for that.”

Tim looked at him expectantly. But Damian said nothing more, sliding out of Tim’s embrace and turning his attention back to the plane’s mechanics.

~~

It was decided that Damian would be the one to do the proper heavy lifting. The actual stealing bit.

The other three got to do the fun part. They got to beat up the guards.

And they had fun with it, like they always did whenever they got the chance to work together in the mask. They laughed and hollered. Kicked and punched. They even flirted, and snuck kisses between knocking the gunmen unconscious or breaking their legs.

They were surprised, though, about the true lack of guard. Sure, there were twenty or so for the small lab. But their weapons were average. And even the scientists who appeared mid-battle seemed to have no fighting skill whatsoever. Just watched in fear even as they ran for their lives out of the building.

There were no injuries on them. Damian seemed to have spared them, or they gave up without even an inkling of a fight. Which, in the end, was probably for the better.

Still, by the time they were done their task, Damian had not returned, and there’d been no cry of a baby either, or even any hint that one existed.

It was about ten minutes of waiting before Jason gave it up with a huff, calling out for their fourth as he began to explore the area. Tim and Dick followed, with Tim deciding to dismantle and destroy any machine they passed along the way.

Eventually, in a lull of silence, Dick held his hand out for both of them to stop and listen. There was music. Soft, but coming from nearby. A lullaby, it sounded like. Something sweet and twinkly.

Tim pushed the others out of the way and took lead rushing towards the sound. There was still no childish cries, or voices. Just the music.

It was a room around the corner, right in the middle of the hall. The door was open, they could see soft light spilling out of it, spinning in shapes of animals and stars against the opposite wall.

They slowly walked towards it, their hearts in their throats.

What if they were wrong? What if Talia or Lex were here? What if there’d been more guards around the child? What if Damian had been struck down again? What if this was all a ruse – there was no child?

What if…what if…?

But no. An instant relief washed over them as they reached the nursery. Because Damian was there, right inside the small room, a tiny child looking eerily similar to him in his arms, cooing as it reached up for his nose.

The music was coming from the spinning nightlight on a nearby table, and Damian was swaying to it lightly as he smiled to the baby.

They watched for a moment, and now it was Dick’s turn to lead, as he stepped into the room, and sandwiched the baby between himself and Damian.

“Boy?” Dick whispered. The baby glanced at him and squealed in greeting.

Damian nodded in confirmation. “No name. His caretakers informed me they just called him by pet names.”

“Jesus.” Jason growled. “Any signs of mom and dad?”

“No. They check in every six months. Apparently they’d visited two or so weeks ago, so weren’t scheduled for another visit for ages.” Damian glanced up at Dick, who was looking at the baby in awe. “He has…things. I couldn’t carry him and them, so was waiting for you.”

Dick smiled at him, kissing his forehead. “You got it.”

The other two entered the room as well. Jason took Dick’s place in front of Damian as Dick and Tim began to gather toys, clothing and baby supplies.

They left the small weapons they found on a corner table.

“…He looks like you.” Jason noted quietly, wrapping what he hoped was a reassuring arm around Damian’s waist. Damian was concerningly quiet. Smiling at the child, but showing no other emotion otherwise. That probably wasn’t a good thing. “…You could be his dad, even.”

“I know what you’re implying.” Damian shook his head, even as he leaned into Jason’s half-embrace. “But no, we are not raising this child ourselves.”

Jason sighed, brushing the baby’s hair off his forehead. “We can’t give him to your grandpa, Damian. We can’t. You and I both know what he wants him for. He’s no better than Talia.”

Damian nodded. “That’s why I have a plan.”

“Gonna share with the class?” Jason asked as Tim came up beside them, diaper bag in tow.

“Later.” Damian hummed, twisting out of Jason’s hold and out of the room, as Dick grabbed the last few things. Jason huffed in annoyance as the three followed him out.

The guards were all still down as they reached the outer room once more, but Damian paid them no mind anyway. He was utterly relaxed, and it had the other three on edge.

“We are…saving him, right?” Tim asked as they got outside.

“I have a plan.” Damian repeated simply.

“…Okay.” Tim sighed, coming up to Damian’s side. “Can we…give him a name, at least?”

“It’s not our place to.” Damian hummed. “He’ll get one soon enough.”

As they walked to their plane parked in a clearing nearby, they suddenly came across the huddle of scientists that had run. Damian stopped as they walked by them, looking at them with an emotionless, almost regal, glare.

“When Talia al Ghul and Lex Luthor come calling.” He announced. “You tell them who stole their newest pet project.”

A pause, to let that sink in.

“You tell them Ra’s al Ghul sent his assassins to destroy his daughter’s work and steal the child for a new vessel.” Damian explained. And then, to everyone’s surprise: “And you tell them that the assassins made a mistake, and the child died in transit.”

Everyone, from Dick, Tim and Jason to the scientists stared at each other, bewildered.

“Tell them that, or I will come back and personally haunt you the rest of your days.” Damian promised. “Understood?”

The scientists, some still crying in fear, nodded vigorously.

Apparently satisfied, Damian nodded, and continued his leisurely pace back to their jet.

The rest of the walk was silent. It wasn’t until they were back on the plane, the doors shut and Dick, now piloting, was getting them off the ground, that Dick murmured: “Damian…”

“I have a plan.” Damian sighed as he plopped into the copilot chair once more, the baby still tight in his arms, almost asleep now.

“You’ve said.” Dick snapped. “And now you need to tell us what that damn plan is.”

Damian seemed to consider for a moment, staring out the front windshield. Jason was leaning against the wall beside Dick, and Tim was leaning against him. It was clearly a three-against-one situation, despite no one actually saying so.

After the silence, Damian clicked his tongue, and hit a few buttons. A second later, a screen popped up on his side of the window. Within it, one Jonathan Kent, covered in dirt as he climbed down from a tractor.

“Howdy, D.” He grinned, readjusting his baseball hat. A dog barked in the background. “Whatcha need?”

“Are they still in Costa Rica?” Damian asked.

“Far as I know, living right outside the capital.” Jon sniffed. “That’s where my last letter came from, anyway. Though you said you’d gotten yours from Vancouver…”

“Yours months came after mine.” Damian reminded. “And on mine they said they were on vacation.”

“True.” Jon nodded. Then glanced around and frowned. “Damian, are you holding a bab-”

“We must go. Tell Conner to expect a call from Drake soon.” He reached forward and hit a button. Jon disappeared. “Set a course for Costa Rica.”

“Why?” Dick demanded.

“Because that’s where we’re taking him.”

“What?” Jason barked. “Why are we taking him to Costa Rica?”

“Ra’s is expecting him.” Tim added. “I…kind of thought your plan would be to take the baby there and then fight Ra’s for him. That way he couldn’t say you broke your deal…”

“I’m not breaking my deal.” Finally, Damian smiled. Warm, genuine and so him. “As far as I’m concerned, I’ve completed my owed favor. And now Drake and I are both free of any hold my grandfather and his league have on us.”

The baby suddenly grumbled, and Damian looked down to tend to him. The others waited patiently.

“…Grandfather demanded I steal a child.” Damian said almost cheerfully. “He never said I had to bring him said child.”

Dick, Jason and Tim were all silent, mouths open in shock and realization.

Then, Jason: “You fucking little shit.”

Damian grinned wider, glancing to Dick. “That’s why I was trying to make you shut up when he told me what he wanted. I didn’t want to give him the chance to include that stipulation.”

Tim pushed from Jason’s side, slowly walking up to Damian as he talked. He stared down at him, eyes darting between the baby and the man holding him.

“We stole the baby. My favor has been completed.” Damian said proudly. He looked up at Tim, reached out to tenderly take his hand. “Now we will take the baby to where it will be safe, and then enjoy the rest of our days together.”

Tim continued to stare at him, before mindlessly blurting, “I have never been so attracted to you in my whole life.”

Damian laughed, and kissed his knuckles.

“Yeah, but Costa Rica?” Dick asked. “Who do you know in Costa Rica? Who does Jon know in Costa Rica?”

“Friends.” Damian said, tugging Tim downwards to kiss him proper.

~~

They had almost reached their destination when Damian’s personal cell phone rang. Dick glanced first at the phone sitting on the dashboard, then the chair to his right – where Damian was fast asleep.

Jason had taken the baby – also asleep – a while ago, and frowned at the caller ID. “It’s gramps.”

Dick was going to ask if they should answer it, but Tim appeared from the back of the plane and hit the button to do so before he could.

“Ra’s.” He hummed.

“Timothy.” Ra’s returned, already on speaker. “When should I expect your troop?”

Tim smirked. “Whatever do you mean?”

Ra’s sighed dramatically. “I’m in no mood to play, Timothy. I’m a very busy man.”

“As are we.” Tim sneered.

“Where is my child?” Ra’s pushed.

“We don’t know where Talia is. Didn’t run into her.” Tim mocked. He leaned against the arm of Damian’s chair, softly glanced at him and reached out to run his fingers through his hair. Damian didn’t wake, but shifted unconsciously to lean into Tim’s presence.

“The infant.” Ra’s snapped. “The one you’ve been tasked to deliver to me.”

“Oh?” Tim asks curiously. “Last I checked, our mission was only to steal an infant. Not deliver.”

There was a pause of silence on the line. Tim kept the grin on his face. “Timothy-”

“Think about what you said, old man.” Jason called, almost too giddy. “Think about exactly what you said when you explained what you wanted him to do.”

Another moment of quiet. They could feel the Demon’s anger growing, even through the phone.

“Damian completed his promise.” Tim whispered. “He stole a child.”

“And if you come after him or Tim now, you break your oath.” Jason reminded. “Your motherfucking blood oath.”

“…You bastards.” Ra’s hissed. “You dirty, honorless street rats-”

“Sticks and stones, Ra’s.” Jason yelled over him. The baby stirred and began to cry. “And don’t think for a second that I won’t shoot you in your goddamn face if you break that oath and show up in our lives ever again. That I won’t do it every single time, no matter how many times you throw yourself in that stupid Lazarus Pit.”

Another moment of waiting. Dick forced himself to keep his eyes on the sky around them. Jason turned away to shush the baby. Tim stared at the phone, absently rubbing at Damian’s shoulder.

“…Tell my grandson congratulations.” Ra’s murmured. “He has never been able to beat me. Not ever, in his whole life. Always too weak.” A low, bitter chuckle. “But there is a first time for everything. And I supposed he saved his victory for when it mattered to him the most.”

Dick, Jason and Tim all smiled to themselves.

“I will keep my oath.” Ra’s declared, but with a tone that suggested maybe not always. That the four of them should always be on their toes anyway, just in case.

Then the line clicked, and the call was ended.

~~

It was sunset by the time Dick landed the plane on a grassy hill in the middle of nowhere. The skies were a deep, bloody red, with tinges of a fiery pink and golden yellow.

Damian departed the jet first, the dozing baby tight in his arms. The others exited in a line behind him, looking around the area in awe. Rural, full of hills and animals and just pure, blissful beauty. A perfect getaway from the stresses of the modern world.

There was a single, small house nearby. A livestock pen and vegetable field close by. A few growing apple trees. Damian walked swiftly towards the front door, and paused when he reached it, before knocking loudly.

A few seconds, enough for the others to catch up to him, then the loud twist of an old door knob, and it was swung open.

A woman stood there. Dark skin, short black hair held back by a headband. Taller than Damian by a head or so.

Damian smiled up at her. “Maya.”

“Damian?” She asked, a mixture of confusion and honestly-not-really-surprised-at-all. At the name, there was the sound of someone else moving in the house. “What are you doing here? And why didn’t you call?”

Another woman appeared around the corner. Blonde, with freckles. A single braid draped across her shoulders.

Jon’s old friend Kathy Branden.

“To ask a big favor.” Damian glanced behind Maya, and nodded to Kathy as she approached.

“No Jon?” Kathy asked.

“Not this time.” Damian said apologetically. “Kathy, I don’t believe you’ve ever met my…boyfriends.” He gestured behind him. “Dick, Jason and Timothy.”

“Call me Tim.” Tim offered when it was his turn to shake her hand. “I think we met at Jon’s birthday party a few years ago?”

“That’s why you look familiar!” Kathy laughed.

“Beloveds, this is my old friend Maya, and her wife Kathy.” Damian offered.

“Long time, Maya.” Dick smiled. “Didn’t know you moved down here. Or got married.”

“Eloped. And we travel a lot, but really like it here.” Maya waved off. “But that’s not important. What is important is why Damian Wayne is currently at my front door holding a baby.”

“Long story short, we need you to take him. Hide him and keep him safe.” Damian cut to the chase, shifting to give the women a better look at the infant in his arms. The boy blinked sleepily. “…You two did always say you wanted children.”

“…Whose baby, though?” Maya asked, even as Kathy reached out to take the baby’s hand. The infant wrapped a tight fist around her finger. “I mean, I can’t imagine he’s yours…”

“My mother’s.” Damian said matter-of-factly. “And Lex Luthor’s.”

Kathy’s eyes flashed. Maya frowned.

“He was raised like I was – artificially. Starting to be trained to kill. And my grandfather wants to harm him.” Damian said, even as Kathy stepped forward and held her arms out. Damian instantly handed the child over. “So we stole him from the laboratory and ran away.”

Maya stared at him, even as Kathy began cooing instantly. Her dark eyes silently darted to the three men behind him, questioning.

“He doesn’t have a name.” Damian murmured. “And even if you and Kathy decide you cannot help him, I’d love for the honor of giving him one to go to you both.”

Maya let her eyes settle back on him, then her face relaxed, and she sighed dramatically. “Alright, alright, get your asses in here. Better to talk over a beer or two than on a front porch, no?”

Damian smiled as Maya gestured to the four to come inside, and stepped forward to hug her even as the others followed Kathy into the abode.

When the others were far enough away, Damian squeezed Maya as tight as he could, relishing in her return of the embrace, and whispered a warm, “Thank you.”

~~

It was Tim who heard the phone buzzing on the nightstand. One of four, and he waited a minute to listen to the pattern, before lazily calling:

“Damian.”

He blindly slapped around for the phone until he felt his fingers wrap around it, then picked it up and flopped over, holding it in the air over the three lying next to him.

(Dick huffed when Tim’s elbow accidentally hit him in the face.)

A second later the phone was taken, the bed shifted, and Damian quietly mumbled, “This is Damian.”

Nosy, the other three, in various stages of not-quiet-sleep, listened. Jason flopped his arm across Damian’s hips, nuzzled into his waist. Tim curled around Dick like an octopus, as Dick stretched his arms above his head, dropping them onto the pillow.

There was a time, not so long ago, just like this. Where Damian was handed the phone for an early-morning call, and had to go face his grandfather for both his and Tim’s lives.

But this time, after the pause, Damian…laughed.

“Oh, is that so?”

The voice that answered was female. When Dick glanced over, he saw a smile plastered to Damian’s face.

Another laugh. “You only call him my little brother when he’s in trouble.”

Jason gave a little groan and tugged on Damian’s waist. Damian, surprisingly, fell back into the mattress, turning into Jason’s embrace.

“Well sure, but I should warn you – Todd is incredibly naked.”

The next second Damian’s phone binged, and he held it up, revealing a video call of Maya, holding the baby she and Kathy gladly accepted from him – on the condition all four of them remain in the child’s life as well.

Samuel Cobb Ducard, they named him. Little Sammy.

“Hi, Sammy.” Dick called, leaning on Jason’s shoulder. He waved, and the toddler waved enthusiastically back. “How are you?”

“He’s terrible.” Maya said, but warmly. Kathy walked by in the background. Tim leaned across the pillows to also be in frame. “Kid can barely walk and he somehow snuck a goat into his nursery. A goat, Damian!”

Damian laughed again. “I don’t see how this is my fault.”

“Same DNA, little bro.” Maya scolded. “I’m assuming he also has your love and mystical ability of obtaining animals. So I’m going to need you to tell me how to turn it off.”

Damian snorted.

“…Nah, really we didn’t call for much.” Maya laughed herself. “Sammy was just missing his ‘uncle’ Dami and wouldn’t stop screaming until we called. So,” She glanced at her son. “Happy now?”

Sammy clapped and giggled.

“You boys get back to sleep. Sorry we woke you.” A quick wink. “Please use condoms if you decide to have some morning fun instead.”

“Goodbye, Maya We’ll call later.” Damian groaned. Maya cackled as she ended the call.

“…I like her.” Tim decided, shifting back into their cocoon of a blanket.

“Hm.” Damian mumbled, dropping his phone to the floor and curling into Jason’s embrace, throwing his arm over Jason’s waist. “I like this better.”

“What?” Jason sighed.

“Freedom.” He whispered. “You. This.”

“Don’t get sappy.” Tim mumbled in a whine. “I’m too tired to be sappy.”

“I like to be reminded that you’re all safe, and we’re rid of my grandfather.” Damian continued. “Sammy’s calls always remind me of that.”

“All thanks to you and that brain.” Jason kissed his forehead as Dick silently took Damian’s hand. “You know what I like best?”

“Dick’s butt.” Damian and Tim said in unison.

“First off, no, I’m not a butt guy, you know that.” Jason scolded, squeezing Damian and slapping at Tim’s arm. “And second off, what I like best is the fact that there are no more goddamn blood oaths.”

Damian snorted, and Tim groaned at the bad joke. Dick laughed, as he wrapped his free arm around Tim’s shoulders, gave a quick kiss to Damian’s knuckles and leaned his face against Jason’s shoulder.

“Together. We’re together, safe and alive.” Dick hummed, closing his eyes, tightening his grip on Damian’s hand on the last word. “That’s what I like best.”

None of his lovers could disagree with that.

[zmediaoutlet]

you saw endgame! please share with the class! assemble!

haha, okay, well–here’s some thoughts, since we’re far enough out that I don’t think this will be too spoilery for people – but it’s gonna be super long, so it’s under a cut, either way:

Well, it was–spectacular! In that it was literally a spectacle, for one thing. I had pretty lowered expectations after not particularly enjoying Captain Marvel (it was fine, but boring) or Infinity War for that matter (better-made, but the stakes were obviously nonexistent because we knew something was going to be done). Here, though… I just really, thoroughly enjoyed it. It was thoughtfully done, well-executed, and just as a moment of payoff for those of us who have been here all ten years… It was just really something. I saw Iron Man on opening weekend in 2008 and fell in love, and even if I haven’t loved every single movie since then, I feel like Marvel just sent me a love letter, and I was so–glad. What a good movie-going experience it was.

I say all that having seen SO MUCH rending of garments and gnashing of teeth from the !stans and shippers, but all of that’s so very much missing the point. This is the story of *this series*, this great arc that led to this point. The thing to remember is that the MCU is fanfiction itself–it’s based off of characters who are based off of characters from a canon that’s been rebooted and re-blended about a billion times. This is the story this group of fic-writers, essentially, chose to tell, and I think they did it pretty damn well. You can write your own fic where Steve weeps into Bucky’s hair for 70 years if you want to. This story isn’t that, and that’s okay. (Genuinely, if fandomites could take like half a step back they’d be much happier people. I know it’s hard–I’ve been in a process of letting go with SPN that I haven’t really managed to do well–but c’mon. Don’t get so het up about it.)

Some things:

1) I was genuinely impressed with the time travel mechanism, especially as it bounced meta-ly off of other examples we’ve seen in pop culture. Finally, a story that allows ACTUAL alternate-universe time travel instead of boring-ass time loops. I’ve always thought it was spectacularly dumb when the worry is “but if I kill myself in the past, I’ll die now!” Nope! Avoided! Thank you, folks. It’s kind of weirding me out that so many people online seem confused about how the time travel worked, but it was incredibly clean and I just want to high five the people involved. The one thing that seemed like a plot hole was Old Steve at the end, with the implication that he was co-existent in this timeline for 70 years (and did nothing about Hydra??)–but then the Russos said that they assume he went to an alternate timeline, and then came back to this one to give Sam the shield. It wasn’t on screen either way so you can make your own headcanon, but I’m good with that. So: successful time travel. Hoo-fucking-rah.

2) Thor. This was the one real spoiler I had going in, that Thor Got Fat. All this weeping about how he’d been mistreated by the narrative. So, I was pre-emptively worried… and then ended up not thinking it was that bad. Look, I’m a chubster, I’m well-aware of how sensitive that can be for people. What I found interesting about it was that it was, yes, kind of a visual joke, just because The God of Abs was a pudge, but it was actually treated remarkably kindly by every character for whom that would be in-character. Meaning, sure, Rocket makes fun of him, and Rhodey’s kind of a dick (because Rhodey’s like that with Tony, even)–but Bruce, Steve, and even Tony all deal with him quite gently. That scene where he tries to volunteer for the gauntlet and Tony carefully holds him back was so sweet and sad. Poor guy. It was a good exploration of the depths that the last ~10 years of his life have pummeled him into. It wasn’t that he was fat, it’s that he was broken. People will make up their own minds about the equivalencies there and what’s being implied, but it was a good visual metaphor as far as I was concerned. If he were “just” a sad drunk no one would have believed that he wasn’t ready for what was coming, and he wasn’t. But he got better, because his friends really were there for him. (Also, Korg was wearing Taika’s pineapple shirt! I hope there are nice fics where Korg and Maik gently just play XBox with Thor because that’s all they can do for him.) 

Also on Thor, re: Thor/Loki – more rending of garments about how he didn’t go see Loki. Let’s think about this: you’re on a top-secret time mission to save the universe (Time Heist!), and you go see your trickster god little brother who, yes, you miss, but who also hates you at this point in his life. That’ll go well. I completely understand why there wasn’t a scene. The scene with Frigga was all I needed there.

3) Steeb: I’ve never been the… biggest fan of Steve. I mean, he’s fine. His character is caught awkwardly between the man, Steve Rogers, who abhors bullies and will break rules to do what’s right, and between The Man, Captain America, who kinda Is Rules and needs to do what’s right but also represents an idea greater than himself. There’s a lot of wonderful tension there, but the movies haven’t particularly capitalized on it, and when they’ve tried it’s been in a lip-servicey way.

That said, this movie deals with it really, really well, I think. At the beginning he’s trying to live, and isn’t doing a great job of it. The plan they come up with is simple, perfect heroism – he’s not representing an Ideal, but he is one: he’s the man and the ideal simultaneously, that striving toward right will eventually create a more just, fairer world. If sacrifice is required he’s willing to make it. That scene of him standing alone against the massed forces of Thanos with his broken shield strapped tight to his arm is like a distillation of who Captain America should be. I’m so glad we got that, at the end.

As someone who doesn’t invest in Steve/Bucky but who completely understands it, I also see no issue with the thing where he goes back to Peggy. Bucky understands, too. That moment where they hug and he tells Steve, so-softly, “I’ll miss you,” oh man, oof. Bucky knows. I hope there’s a lot of pining!Bucky in that fandom, y’all are missing out on a STELLAR opportunity if not. Especially pining!Bucky where Steve knows and can only do his best to be Bucky’s friend. Steve going back isn’t out of character, either, despite the clamoring. He misses Peggy, he misses peace. Who knows what they got up to in that alternate timeline–maybe he and Peg went and routed Hydra early, maybe they saved Bucky, maybe they had a WWThreesome with Buck, whatever. But Natasha and Tony both told Steve to “get a life,” and he finally got to. He’d done enough. He earned it.

4) OH MY GOD, NATASHA. What a character arc. I friggin’ adore the mirroring of her and Clint’s stories. The brutal assassin who gained a family and learned what it meant to love something so much she wanted to sacrifice herself for it–those scenes on Vormire were heartbreaking. I’m also super glad that the movie paused, after that. Someone called her death “fridging” – wow. No. She was a hero, as much as Tony was. Whatever it takes.

5) Tony. Holy shit. In a lot of ways this was his movie–in a more meta way, it was RDJ’s movie, and Favreau’s, and Feige’s. It all started with Iron Man, and that’s where it ended. There wasn’t a stinger scene because we got that funeral and then the moment in the credits with the originals signing the screen, and of course they saved Robert for last. The success of this movie is really a testament to the risk everyone took, way back then. It sure as hell paid off.

“You wouldn’t lay down on a grenade to save your men,” Steve said. How many different ways can Tony prove him wrong? At least once more. ;-;  I’m just super emotional about the whole thing. So many good moments all leading up to what happened. Little Morgan in his helmet, Pepper’s faith. Steve’s faith, for that matter. (I still have a tiny pocket of my heart reserved for Steve/Tony, no matter how non-canon it is. What a great relationship they have.) The panic and misery when Carol brought them back, calling Steve a liar, and Steve just–gentle with him, again, and how there was no anger there anymore. Argh. 

That’s the thing that I think I appreciated about the movie most, in the end. Despite all the craziness, the spectacle, the easter eggs slinging at you left and right (”Hail Hydra.” !!!!!!!!!!!!!), what I loved most is that in the face of this ultimate goal, this literally universe-saving moment, the stakes were actually felt because the characters (and actors, and script) sold how unimaginably important it was. Interpersonal bickering fell by the wayside; any dumb conflicts just washed away. No drama for its own sake, or manufactured arguments. Just–working together. The Avengers we hoped to get in the aftermath of the first team movie. We got ‘em, finally, even if we lost a lot too.

This all sounds super elegiac, I guess. It sort of is. It wasn’t a perfect movie by any means, but it might be perfect for what it meant to do, and what it set out to do. There were a couple of little nitpicky things that I might change, but they’re so small so as not even to be mentioned. And so many more tiny moments that I loved, loved, loved. It’s the first one of these movies that I’ve wanted to rewatch in literal years, and that’s making me really happy all on its own. I’m just left with this utter… satisfaction. Not sad, just happy that they made it worth my while.

Put another way: when I was leaving Shazam I felt like I’d spent about 4 hours wasting my time. When I was leaving Endgame, I felt like it had been an instant. Just yay, all ‘round. I loved it three thousand.

What did you think?

[scandalsavagefanfic]

You are my thoughts fuel right now. Can't stop thinking about your aus and fics even when I'm working! Like your werewolf Ra's and turned hunter Jay: What if after a while Ra's gets intrigued by Tim? How Jason would react? Or Once he is left alone at the base in wolf form and the Hunters Bats break in and take a random wolf for interrogation. The shock when they see its Jason and is pregnant! And that just for that one!

Hello darling! I wanted to answer this so much sooner but I had to get to this point in the story (which didn’t start as a story, just some smutty fun, until I got so many amazing asks with such amazing ideas).

Anyway, I was so flattered that my fics were on your mind! You are so sweet and amazing! Thank you so much!

Words: 1626

Rating: T? M? (I don’t know… there’s no sex in this part either… what’s happening to me?)

Read the previous chapters on AO3!

Jason knows something isn’tright when Ra’s tries to send him away with Talia and Damian.

Ra’s usually likes to keephim close, especially when he’s this far along. Jason takes some comfort fromthe fact that the Alpha didn’t seem to realize how attached to his omega hewould become. Those unwanted instincts and feelings to make one’s mate happyand protect them are apparently a two-way street. Ra’s gets particularlyprotective and territorial toward the end of Jason’s pregnancies. And he onlyhas a few weeks before he gives birth.

Again, he thinks bitterly. On the one hand, he’s grateful that hedoesn’t have to spend 9 months pregnant like a human (though he would muchprefer the 65-day period of wolves) and on the other he despises that the 4month pregnancy and short recovery time means Ra’s has kept him swollen withhis spawn practically all year.

He wonders if that’s normal. Humansand wolves usually only mate once a year and though his first year with thepack is past, he was pregnant a third timebefore it ended.

He’s also a little bitterthat he’s going miss his change by about a week and he is going to have to popthe new ones out as a human. He had his first litter as a wolf and the secondas person. He much prefers going through it as the wolf. It’s less…embarrassing? Certainly less painful.

And even though he loves allhis pups, there’s already too many for him to handle on his own.

Jason sighs. He doesn’t mindgoing off to wherever Ra’s wants them to go.

With Damian.

Damian’s still a pup and asthe oldest child he’s actually been pretty helpful wrangling all his littleaunts and uncles. Jason knows that much of the kid’s motivation is to make surenone of his grandfather’s new children supplant him in the pack hierarchy, toestablish his dominance over them early. But Jason also knows who Damian reallyis, that Damian feels the same pull to Jason’s pups that his little ones felttoward Bruce and Dick, that they’re pack twice over. No one had to tell him,and no one has. But he can see so much of Bruce in Damian it’s almost scary.

But Talia? He knows Ra’strusts his Alpha daughter as much as he trusts anyone. But he doesn’t think hismate sees the way she eyes him sometimes. He’s the only omega in the pack(apparently it’s normal that only the lead Alpha takes a mate) and she’d beenaway on a mission when Ra’s let everyone else have a go at him after hisill-fated escape attempt. He gets the feeling she thinks she missed out. It’spretty unlikely the opportunity will arise again. Even if Jason were to try torun away… at this point, Ra’s is too invested. He has no doubt the Alpha wouldpunish him severely. But it would be private. Ra’s won’t share him now. Regardless,Jason doesn’t really want to be alone with Talia.

So he’s grateful when hisAlpha changes his mind and says he can stay. That it ‘actually works out betterthis way’ which then puts Jason right back on edge.

Their current keep, a remote Gothic castle somewhere in northern Germany, is strangely quiet as Jasontiptoes around. Something is going on, he has a sick feeling in the pit of hisstomach. And it’s not however many pups are in there this time.

Ra’s had told him to staywith the kids. But that’s always been a given so the fact that he had felt theneed to say something… well, it makes it impossible for Jason to resist leavinghis pups with Damian to go snooping around.

The few people he does runinto don’t try to stop him either so the rest of the pack must not know what’sgoing on any more than him. Though he does disappear into a shadow to avoidTalia.

As he creeps deeper into thelower levels he hears speaking coming from a room at the end of a long stonehall. Jason recognizes Ra’s’ soft, low tone easily and spares a moment to hate the way it immediately calms him.The other voice is too quiet to make out.

“—my eye on you since youstarted looking into his disappearance,” Ra’s is saying as Jason carefullymakes his way to door, “You’re very nearly as good a hunter as your ‘father’.What you lack in his physical prowess you make up for with intellect. Too badintellect only gets you so far when you go off on your own.”

There’s the sound of chainsclinking together and little grunting noises that indicate a struggle. Thensomething is mumbled too gently for Jason to hear.

“No they won’t, son,” hisAlpha drawls, “They do not know where you are and they believe he is dead.”

More garbled words, most ofwhich he can’t quite catch. He hears ‘found you’ and ‘babies’ and ‘you’re sick’and finally ‘knows the difference’ but not much else. However, there’s a smallnote of familiarity in the way it sounds. It pulls at the loose ends of faraway memories.

“Ah, yes. Thank you forconfirming that it was your meddlesome family who broke into our last home. Asfor Jason, I’ll have to have a word with him about it, I suppose. After all,family should come first. And Jason’s family is no longer your’s. It’s mine.”

Jason freezes. One of hisbrothers is chained up in that room with Ra’s. Just as he had been once.

Suddenly his Alpha’s desireto send away the only omega for miles makes more sense.

The wave of conflictingemotions that flood through him are debilitating. He’s hurt and angry that hismate would try to make another, especially now, while he carries yet anotherlitter of their pups. But he’s also terrified for…

Tim… that’s who’s in there,that is whose voice he hears. Restrained and at Ra’s’ mercy.

An internal war rages as hisinstincts clash. He hadn’t really had much time to get to know Tim before hewas captured by the Shadow Pack. Tim had been new, only been with them forabout a year. Bruce had taken him in after a lone wolf killed his parents.Jason had liked him but Tim hadn’t had a chance to come out of his shell yet.

Regardless, Tim is part oftheir clan. He is family. Who does Jason protect when both parties are pack?

It’s harder than it shouldbe, to choose Tim, and he hates himself for how long it takes him to stumblethrough the doorway begging “No, please, Ra’s don’t—“.

But it’s nothing to theself-loathing he feels when he sees Ra’s pull away from Tim’s limp body, teethbloody, and realizes he’s too late.

Jason’s knees hit the flooras Ra’s turns and smiles down at him.

“What… what did you do?”Jason asks softly, staring at the drop of blood that drips down Tim’s claviclefrom the bite in his neck until tears sting his eyes. He doesn’t expect andanswer. It’s obvious.

Ra’s slips his fingers underJason’s chin and tilts his head up before cupping his cheek. Jason meets hisgaze and the tears fall.

“You need assistance, Beloved,”Ra’s explains. Jason closes his eyes at the term of affection and leans intothe warm touch. “There is no appropriate option within the pack. So I’ve madeyou one.”

Jason glances back to Tim,still hanging unconscious against the wall, already starting to sweat profuselyas his body begins facilitating the changes to come.

In that moment he’s struckwith a sense of clarity. He won’t let Ra’s do to Tim what was done to him.He’ll help Tim get away before the bond that keeps Jason at his Alpha’s sidemore than anything else can be established. He’s relieved to find that it hasnothing to do with jealousy, nothing to do with Ra’s finding another, or a new,mate, nothing to do with being replaced. But everything to do with protectinghis brother. Ra’s will never touch Tim the way he’s touched Jason.

As though he can read Jason’sthoughts in his expression, Ra’s chuckles and leans over, pressing their lipstogether. Jason opens his mouth without complaint when Ra’s’ tongue prods athim for access.

When the Alpha pulls away andstraightens he cocks his head, regarding Jason with an odd warmth.

“Do not worry, my dear. Youare not being set aside. It did occur to me that two omegas would give me moreoptions in the future. But the pack has no need for another, not to mention theadditional temptation and distraction of an unmated omega, or the resentmentthat could build under a greedy Alpha with two mates. Our kind do not take wellto such departures from protocol.”

Jason tries to suppress thetingle of relief he feels. Focuses instead on his confusion because the packcertainly doesn’t need another Alpha and an Alpha wouldn’t be much help to him.He also tries to focus on that streak of fear he feels for Tim; the anger hefeels toward Ra’s.

“Timothy is much bettersuited to being a beta anyway.”

Jason frowns. He has neverheard of betas.

But then Ra’s’ fingers are inhis hair, his nails scratching lightly at his scalp.

“Come, Beloved,” Ra’s growlsdarkly, tugging him to his feet and pressing him back into the door frame, “Yousmell delicious. I want to spend the rest of the night inside you with yourneck between my teeth.”

[bigskydreaming]

Making this its own post because replying to the ask got so weirdly formatted I can’t even. Oh tumblr. You work so well.

@themessofthecentury  asked:

jsksjf my tumblr notifs are bugging and i didnt see your post but!!! The patron Saint of Robins?? I am much intrigue!!

(This is from this ask game, just....gotten to late, lololol. And I still have more I’m getting to, no worries. Just had a rough couple days is all, laid me up a bit.)

Okay, so The Patron Saint of Robins is kinda like the situation at the end of Grayson, except also not at all. And actually this is one of my older WIPs, and according to Scrivener I started it in 2015 afhislfhalhfalf, so it really has nothing to do with that. Also, its Young Justice-verse, but for two specific reasons:

1) YJ-verse is my go-to for Good Dad Bruce Wayne, when I don’t want to actually tackle the issues I have with his and his kids’ dynamic in comic book canon. I don’t carry over things like the adoption issue or the Robin succession into YJ fics, as I don’t think there’s anything that suggests they’re ever a specific issue in YJ and I don’t feel a need to make them one. So pretty much anything and everything I write in YJ goes with the backstory that Dick’s already adopted by Season One, and he’s the one to grant each later Robin permission to use the mantle, with no conflict over that, and more of a pre-Crisis transition to Nightwing than the post-Crisis firing from Robin. And this fic inherently needs Good Dad Bruce Wayne to work, lol.

2) I needed Klarion the Witch-Boy. Who of course exists in comic book canon, but is muuuuuch different there, and I just needed him to be a little demonic evil shithead, who sets everything in motion to get payback on the heroes for thwarting the Light in Season One, and he targets Robin due to being the oft-cited ‘first of the baby brat heroes’ and the ‘heart of the cape community.’

You don’t really need to be familiar with YJ canon at all for this one, as it goes sharply AU from after Season One, and only faintly and vaguely references specific events from that season. And I use my own YJ-ized version of the Titans as much as the actual YJ Team.

So basically, the plot of this one is to take revenge on the heroes for spoiling his game in Season One, Klarion plays a new game, by putting a chaos curse on Robin. It essentially erases him from peoples’ memories, though he’s perfectly able to make new ones. If he re-introduces himself to someone ask Dick Grayson, for instance, they don’t suddenly remember who Dick Grayson is or was, but they don’t forget about him again from that point onward, its like they meet him for the first time as a stranger.

But the curse part of things is only Batman can break it and restore everyone’s memories of Dick and his actual history, and only by identifying him for who he really is. And Dick can’t be part of breaking his own curse or else it seals it and makes it permanent and unbreakable forever.

Which of course leaves Dick completely miserable at first, understandably, and Bruce (and everyone else Dick knows, to varying different degrees) feeling some kind of loss but with no idea what it is they think or feel that they’re missing. Dick makes some half-hearted attempts at starting a new life for himself in Gotham, and in the process befriends a street kid named Jason Todd, though Dick introduces himself to Jason with just the name Robin.

The way the curse operates is it restitches together peoples’ memories to cover up the gaps where memories of him would go. So for instance, even though Jason never knew Dick before the curse, he was familiar with Batman and Robin just as much as any Gothammite was.....but due to the curse, the name Robin, upon meeting Dick, had no special meaning to him or anyone else. As far as he knew, Batman had always operated on his own in Gotham, the first teen superhero was that Speedy kid in Star City, etc. So when Jason first meets Dick, he just thinks he’s some dude whose name happens to be Robin.

Eventually, because Dick’s been kinda torturing himself by spying on Bruce just to ‘keep an eye on him’ and still watch his back, and he’s recognized by now that Bruce is mourning his loss without even knowing that he’s missing something....so Dick, who has also kinda come to see Jason as a little brother figure due to watching out for him as well....decides to kill two birds with one stone, unfortunate pun not intended. (Jason doesn’t die in this one, lol). Basically, Dick puts in motion the chain of events that lead Jason to stealing Batman’s tires, because he doesn’t know EXACTLY what Bruce will do but he knows it’ll get his attention in a big way and Bruce will take it from there.

One thing leads to another, Jason ends up living with Bruce and when eventually he wants to be trained by Bruce so he can do what he does and protect kids like he used to be.....when asked to pick a name....Jason names himself after the guy who always looked out for him, and who led to him being found by Bruce in the first place. He doesn’t know that his friend ‘Robin’ steered him towards those tires deliberately, just to bring him and Bruce into contact, but he does credit him with making the suggestion that ‘inadvertently’ (as far as he knows) enabled his and Bruce’s introduction, and so he names himself in honor of the boy who helped him and who he tried to track down again to similarly help, after Bruce adopted him, but was never able to find again.

Over the years, Dick also ends up steering Tim, Cass, Duke and Damian to Bruce in different ways than comic book canon (Steph and Babs’ debuts remain their own, as family adjacent but not family specifically) and thus is integral to the forming of the Batfam and has a connection with them even before the curse ultimately ends up broken and he’s able to reclaim his full identity. And each of them end up Robin at least briefly, like Steph is never Robin in this AU, and sticks with Spoiler, whereas Cass IS briefly Robin before becoming Batgirl after Babs. I did this for a few different reasons...

One, I really like that Cass is never Robin in main continuity as it creates a different dynamic between her and Dick than most of their siblings have, BUT I’ve always been curious to play around what Cass-as-Robin might even be like, just for an AU. Two, part of the Black Bat and Batgirl but never Robin sequence of mantles for Cass in the comic book continuity is like.....although it doesn’t get explored nearly enough, Babs was as much a kind of mother figure for Cass as Bruce was a father figure, despite Babs’ young age. So it makes more sense for Cass to stick more to just Bat-mantles than to ever be a Robin in the comic books. But in YJ, Babs is even younger, and just way too young to have the specific kind of dynamic that leads to that in the comic books, so its not as unreasonable IMO for her to have a different dynamic in her early days in the family here, before becoming closer with Babs and taking up the Batgirl mantle after she moves on to become Oracle.

And then also, and this is also the primary reason for making Duke a Robin briefly, before Damian is old enough....I got hung up on the title and it just didn’t work as well if it was Robins + Cass and Duke, lololol. See, in addition to helping steer the family into the points of introduction that make them a family, over the years he also acts as like, a guardian angel figure to the various family members, looking out for them and interceding in times of extreme danger, like when Jason is almost killed by the Joker. He’s always in disguise, but the kids eventually compare notes and realize there’s a singular figure behind each of their introductions to Bruce and the guy swooping out of nowhere to save their behinds whenever they’re most in danger, and Jason eventually connects this back to the guy who apparently NOT so coincidentally suggested he go after the Batmobile’s tires that fateful night, and the kids end up jokingly/not-so-jokingly referring to this figure as the Patron Saint of Robins. (Shout-out to the occasional mentions/allusions of Jason’s Catholicism).

They never tell Bruce about this figure (at least before Bruce starts to put together clues on his own), because they all figured out that for whatever reason, this person despite wanting them all to meet Bruce seems to want to avoid Bruce himself, and they kinda want to respect that as a kind of payback for his help, and also like....Bruce, even a kinder, gentler Bruce, is still Bruce. And when Bruce is gonna Bruce, that means Batparanoia. And all of them for various reasons DO trust that this guy has nothing but good intentions towards them, and so they don’t want to like....ruin or tarnish the positivity they associate with his intercession in their lives with paranoia or treating him like a bad guy. Which ultimately is really just smoke and mirrors for saying that he’s kinda a ‘just for them’ secret. Its a Robin thing.

(Until its not).

Because meanwhile, Dick, in between meeting the various Batfam members and pulling strings and looking out for them from the shadows, at first travels the world looking for ways to break his curse. But when ultimately its clear that the only way to break it is the loophole built into it already, Bruce identifying him for who he really is, but without Dick doing anything to steer him towards the answer, Dick settles into a new hero identity as Nightwing, and forms the Teen Titans, a public group of young superheroes (minus Roy and Wally, unfortunately, but still with Donna, Garth, Raven, Kory, ignoring season 3 Vic and also Terra because AU redemption arc what what, etc). And the Teen Titans avoid both the Young Justice Team and the Justlce League with EXTREME measures, much to the other heroes’ confusion and aggravation, because in the early days of the Titans, in a moment of what he’d term weakness, on one of his ‘bad days,’ Dick tells them enough of his story that they’re able to put together a good sense of what happened and who he really is by reading between the lines and what he leaves unsaid....

BUT as a result, all end up extremely committed to not mixing and mingling casually with the rest of the cape community because they don’t want to risk dropping any hints about the guy under Nightwing’s mask, in case that might count as steering Batman towards clues and seal the curse for good. So I have a lot of fun with having the Titans just nope out of the scene the second the bad guys are defeated even when they have to team up with other heroes, leaving the other heroes confused as hell and trying not to be all ‘WHY DON’T YOU LIKE US??”

Anyway, so yeah, that’s the gist of this one, lol. With it of course following the eventual plot that like...the Batfam starts to Detect and put things together.

ANYWHO!

Snippet

Damian versus Klarion: Round One

“Aww, its adorable that you think you’re in my league,” the Witch-Boy cooed in an absolute mockery of sympathy. Damian bristled, but before he could do anything more than that, he was faced with a much more pressing matter as reality completely lost its mind.

The walls of the cavern fell away in an instant, only to be replaced with a whirling dervish of winds all around them, as if they now stood in the center of a cyclone that bled red and silver and black. It shrieked and wailed in a chorus of voices just on the other side of being comprehensible, a symphony of the damned that set every nerve in Damian’s body aflame with a primal instinct to get out, to find silence, to be anywhere but here.

He’d barely staggered a step backwards when the ground erupted beneath him, splitting apart into jagged obsidian shards that bobbed precariously in the sea of magma barely glimpsed through cracks now spiderwebbing their way across the floor. Spears of lightning burst upwards through them, stabbing impossibly at the heavens rather than raining down from them. They hissed and crackled as they flickered like forked serpent tongues of electric violet and black. The forks becoming branches, the pillars of sky-shattering light transforming into the trunks of great trees that grew upwards and outward, weaving a canopy overhead. One that wept violently red leaves that fell gently to the ground, only to hiss and bubble like acid once they did.

“See, normally this is when I’d hit someone with a little razzle-dazzle like this,” Klarion called out over the song of madness he’d created, as it crooned and careened wildly all around them. He snapped his fingers, and in the span of a second it all ceased. Reality reaffirmed itself, and all was right with the world once more…except now the two of them stood at the end of a hallway in Wayne Manor.

Damian stumbled, the sudden reappearance of firm ground paradoxically being the thing to challenge his balance. The demon boy standing beside him crooked his thumb and forefinger in the semblance of a gun, the smile pasted across his face one of wickedly gleeful malice.

“But you, kiddo, you’re special. Cuz there’s nothing I could do to you now that could top what I’ve already done, so why try when I can just savor the moment instead?”

“What are you babbling about?” Damian demanded roughly. In the wake of what the Witch-Boy had just conjured up with nothing more than a gesture, he was keenly aware of how flimsy a shield his bravado made. He just had absolutely no idea what else to fall back on.

Klarion only threw back his head and laughed though, skipping merrily down the hall as he did.

“I know something you don’t know,” he sing-songed and Damian lost what little grasp of his patience he’d managed to hang onto.

“You overestimate my need for an answer. Attempt to intimidate me all you wish, but I have no desire to indulge your little game any further.”

Klarion jerked to a stop and spun around, his face screwed into a childish pout. He stomped his foot, petulance personified. “I’m not intimidating you anymore, I’m gloating! Ugh, you’re so stupid! They’re completely different, how can you not tell?”

Every light in the hallway flickered and fizzed abruptly. The walls wavered, bubbled, momentarily molten as if made of wax.

Again Damian was reminded just how mercurial this being he was faced with was, and how dangerous. Perhaps, as Father would say, this was not the time to indulge his own instinctive inclinations. Or as Todd would put it, just because you’re already fucked, that’s no reason to fuck yourself over more than you have to.

Crude as his older brother was, there was occasional merit to his…pithiness. Not that he would be admitting that any time soon, of course.

“Fine. What is it you wish to gloat about then?” Damian grated out. The appeasement, such as it was, tried its best to stick in his throat before finally clawing its way free. But at least it proved worth the effort when the godling’s mood reverted back to impishness as readily as with the flip of a switch.

“Well. Its like this, you see.” Klarion said. He dragged it out as he folded both legs underneath him to sit cross-legged in the air, plopping his head into his hands. “I did a baaaaaaaaaaaaad, bad thing to your family, a loooooong time ago. And none of you have done anything about it, because you don’t even know! Isn’t that funny? Doesn’t matter how big a hero Daddy Bats is if he doesn’t even know what needs saving huh? Little Catch-22 there, you might say.”

“Yes. Quite hysterical,” Damian said dryly. “So what is it you claim to have done then?”

The Witch-Boy just sat there, regarding him with amusement, and the seconds marched on into minutes. Damian’s skin crawled. Prickling with impatience and possibly something…more. He wasn’t quite ready to name it anxiety or something as melodramatic as all that yet. In fact, he’d rather not put a name to it at all, but today did not appear to be a day for configuring things to his liking.  

Klarion’s wicked grin grew as if sensing his thoughts, though to the best of his knowledge (and Damian did quickly ransack the library of his memory just to be sure) there was no indication telepathy was included among the Chaos Lord’s many, many powers. And still that detestable smile stretched slowly wider all the same, in perfect synchronization with the rising tide of Damian’s unease. Perhaps the Witch-Boy’s file was in need of annotation.

“How many doors would you say are in this hallway?”

“What? Seven.” Damian snapped out his answer, annoyed by the non sequitur. Not to mention baffled. Was it too much to expect even a semblance of linear thought from the Chaos brat?

“Are you suuuuuuure?” The Witch-Boy stretched his query out obnoxiously. “Maybe you should count again. Just for kicks and giggles.”

Damian throttled back each and every retort attempting to spring to his lips, stuffing them back down and cramming a lid on everything he most dearly wished to say to this most vexing of…shitheads. Once again, it appeared as though nothing less than Todd’s preferred form of nomenclature would suffice. Wonderful. On top of everything else Damian had to deal with today, he seemed to be finding common ground with the man all over the place. Was there no end to the indignities he must suffer?

But marshaling his own formidable willpower, Damian took a deep breath and indulged the Chaos Lord, glancing his eyes down the length of the hallway and counting out each doorway one by one. There was his own room of course, with Cassandra’s to the right of his, and the room Brown used when staying over to the right of hers. That was three. Then there was Thomas directly across from his own room, with Drake to his right and Todd just beyond that, with Father’s room at the very end of the hall, his master suite staggered and with no direct opposite like the others. Seven.

Except all of a sudden there was a door directly opposite his father’s. For a total of eight.

Damian’s brow furrowed in consternation. The faint whispers of uncertainty already seeded throughout him bore fruit, ripening into poisonous stabbings of doubt.

“That’s not real,” he stated with as much conviction as he could muster.

The Witch-Boy’s smile only grew wider still. “Isn’t it, though?”

“There’s never been a door there before,” Damian persisted, striding confidently down the hall towards it. The Chaos Lord flitted ahead of him, inverting til he was upside down and skipping merrily once more, though this time from the ceiling.

“Or has it been there all along?” He sing-songed some more.

“I would think we might have noticed if it had been,” Damian growled.

“Yes, you’d think, wouldn’t you? You are all supposed to be a family of detectives, I thought. Makes you wonder…if you could miss this, what else might you have failed to notice?”

Damian snarled to himself and did his best to shut out the demon boy’s prattling. He quickened his strides, eating up the length of the hallway in his haste to reach its end. He wasn’t sure what opening the door would prove, let alone what bewilderment the godling had conjured on its other side, but it appeared the only end to this game of his was through it, so let there be an end to it already.

And yet, for all his certainty - or best facsimile of it - he couldn’t help but pause once he reached the door in question. His hand hovered within reach of its brass knob, but some instinct, some…caution, held him at bay. As much as he wanted to dismiss all this as just one more of the Chaos Lord’s inane charades, there was a tension in the air that felt too weighty to be the product of just magical conjuring. Something more was in play here. Real forces were at work. His father might disdain magic, but Damian had been around enough of it himself to know when true power had been raised. And the span of empty space between his hand and this hither-to-unseen doorknob held more of it than Damian had felt throughout all the mad warpings Klarion had made of reality thus far.

“Are you sure you want to do that?” Klarion asked from somewhere overhead. His voice, usually pitched to carry, was so soft for a moment Damian mistook it for his own inner doubts. “Some doors are easier to open than to close again, you know.”

Even knowing the goading for what it was couldn’t stop Damian then, and with a simple breath to fortify himself, he reached for the knob, spun it once, and shoved the door open all in a single sharp movement.

The Witch-Boy giggled up above.

The door swung wide, a forceful arc that should have revealed anything and everything within it all at once; the better to react quickly to whatever that might be. Fine in principle, perfect in execution, but thwarted by one small detail:

There was nothing on the other side.

And not in the sense of it being just an empty room, but true nothingness. A pitch-black abyss darker than the deepest night, yawning forth from the doorway in a vast, impenetrable shroud. Nor was anything hidden in the darkness, Damian knew, even if just intuitively. He could feel it, that he stood on the edge of an impossible cliff, that there was nothing beyond this threshold but an aching chasm of emptiness and loss. The surety of it hung in the air, thick and heavy, a miasma that seeped through to his side of the doorway and clung to him like the moisture of a fog beads upon the skin.

Klarion’s head suddenly popped up alongside him, hovering just over his shoulder.

Albeit still upside down.

“Well that doesn’t seem right,” he mused, tapping at his lips with a forefinger. “What do you suppose is meant to be in there?”

The last of Damian’s brittle patience shattered.

“Enough! What is the meaning of all this, demon? Speak plainly, for once in your miserable existence!”

His self-preservation instincts and the reminder of just who it was he was shouting at kicked in too little too late, but he wouldn’t take his exasperated fury back even if he could. He was who he was after all. But fortunately, that described the Witch-Boy just as accurately, and rather take offense or perceive any actual threat from Damian’s rage, the Chaos Lord just shrieked with laughter and sprung backwards. He flipped right side up, still hovering in mid-air, and clapped his hands with glee.

“Oh, I should have done this ages ago,” Klarion sang out. “Why, you’re almost as fun as he used to be. Back before he got all droll and serious, that is. He’s no fun at all anymore, nothing like this. Never wants to play, always just running back to his tower with that little bitch of a demoness.”

His face soured like he’d just sucked on a lemon. But rather than stop there, his countenance kept morphing into an increasingly savage scowl, the longer he ranted. The hallway was suddenly sweltering, baking with unseen heat that twisted the air into shimmering ribbons. The small horns sprouting from his forehead burst into scimitars of flame that cut through those ribbons and set them similarly ablaze.

“Always putting on airs like she’s some kind of royalty, just because her Daddy Dearest put the fear into a few peasants back in the day,” the Witch-Boy snarled viciously. “As if that’s enough to put her on par with the likes of me. No one is the likes of me. NO ONE!”

Reality itself quaked with the force of his shout. White-blue flames spat forth and crescendoed down the length of the corridor, splashing against its walls and searing them to a crisp. Damian braced himself for all the good it would do, keenly aware of the void still gaping hungrily behind his back, but before the fire could become an actual danger to him as well, all was quiet once more.

Silence hung in the air much like the demon boy, poised yet motionless. Suspended. Waiting.

And then Klarion simply inhaled and brushed his hands down the front of his garments, smoothing out the wrinkles as he reclaimed his calm. The corridor restored itself to its former self, curtains of vintage reality unrolling from the ceiling to the floor as though papering over the damage. Damian felt rather than saw when the portal behind him swung shut and was replaced with the expanse of ivory paint and ornate sconces he was used to seeing in its place.

“I am one of a kind, after all,” Klarion finally remarked. It was a casual drawl offered forth almost off-handedly, as if more a reminder to himself than uttered for anyone else’s sake. He used one hand to spell out letters in the air. They appeared and vanished again in bursts of fireworks and fluorescent flame. “U-N-I-Q-U-E.”

“As I, apparently, am not,” Damian said, seizing upon the Chaos Lord’s restored calm and good cheer. “Who is this ‘he’ you mentioned? If I’m to be pitted against him as entertainment in your eyes, might I at least know his name?”

“Nuh-uh-uh,” the Witch-Boy scolded. He wagged his finger at Damian. “No spoilers. That’s not how the game is played.”

Keenly aware of the boy’s power once more, Damian gritted his teeth and pressed on. “Well, if there are to be rules, shouldn’t I at least know what those are?”

Klarion sucked in a deep breath, drawing himself up along with his inhalation as though preparing for some great speech…and instead just toppling backward, flopping onto an extravagant fainting couch that suddenly appeared beneath him, though similarly floating in the air.

“I can’t recall at the moment.” His now-faint voice drifted up from where he lay buried amid a mountain of pillows. “I’ve had a terribly exhausting day. But you’re supposed to be a detective, remember? Go…I don’t know. Detect things.”

He flapped an arm at Damian dismissively, and then crooked a finger into a twirling motion that set his divan to spinning in lazy circles.

“Isn’t life grand?” Klarion sighed fondly. “With all its twists and turns, its eddies and swirls. I mean, take the two of us. Scant hours ago, we were mortal enemies, and just look at us now.”

The Witch-Boy lazily rolled his head to the side as the couch drifted to bring him face-to-face with Damian. His lips spread wide in that malevolent, wicked grin of his once again, but somehow it managed to be even wider than any he’d shown off before. His eyes blazed with a hellish inner light, and his voice, when next he spoke, dropped deep into a demonic register. A bass that boomed forth and set Damian’s very bones to rattling.

“Ain’t we got fun?”

[bigskydreaming]

what are your favorite and least favorite tropes in fanfiction regarding dick grayson?

Most of these I feel are probably a given with me given that I am apparently physically incapable of being subtle and am donating my body to science upon my demise so that this phenomenon may be studied. For Science.

(But also like, the funny thing about me is as much as I rant about a few specific topics its only so frequent because there’s actually only a few specific things I gripe about its just that they’re eeeeeeeeeeverywhere.)

Thus, in no particular order, my least favorite Dick Grayson tropes in fanon and in canon because I can’t read apparently OR AT LEAST I CHOOSE NOT TO FOR THE PURPOSES OF THIS EXERCISE, JEEZ, LEAVE ME ALONE....

1) Police officer Dick Grayson

2) Dick hated Jason pre-death and/or judges and is incapable of understanding or empathizing with Jason post-his return

3) Police officer Dick Grayson

4) Dick’s loved ones and friends all making jokes and insults out of the nickname he keeps in memory of his parents and Dick being all like lol this is fine, this isn’t debilitating to my self-esteem at all hahaha oh man that was a good one, I AM a Dickface, you nailed it!

5) Police officer Dick Grayson

6) Dick’s loved ones and friends all punching Dick every time he puts a foot out of place and then everyone both in-universe and in-comments being like NO PROBLEMS DETECTED, and also WOW, CHILL OUT DG, TEMPER MUCH?

7) Police officer Dick Grayson

8) Dick fired Tim and callously kicked him out of his home and the city UMM METHINKS THE FUCK NOT

9) Police officer Dick Grayson

10) Only addressing conflicts between Bruce and Dick when using the framing device “when you think about it though isn’t it still like at least half Dick’s fault that Bruce fired him and kicked him out of his home and hit him and guilt-tripped him into doing what he wanted.”

11) Bonus round - sub Dick Grayson. Like, I barely ever read smut in this fandom because I’m like ‘mmm, no thx and also hard pass’ to rape and incest as fetish or porn, and its like....hard enough to find any mature content with Dick that doesn’t overlap with at least one of those so I just kinda stopped looking ages ago, but even just when glancing my eyes past tags while browsing, I just DON’T GET THIS. I tend to be a variety is the spice of life kinda guy and thus usually can make a case for any character going any which way in any number of things, but this is the one character where I’m like, I do not see any angle in which he has a submissive bone in his body. Yeah he has control freak tendencies and there’s that trope about people who spend most of their time in charge wanting to give up control and let go at times, buuuuuut that only actually works with people who don’t fully WANT to be in charge or control to begin with, not people like Dick whose control freak tendencies IMO are directly born of how rarely he gets to be in control of even his own personal life in the first place. Just doesn’t compute for me.

And in no particular order, top ten most favorite Dick Grayson takes in canon and fanon, with these weirdly just being the direct inverse of things I hate because I mentioned the Not Subtle thing and also the Not Actually As Picky As I Often Come Across As, right?

1) Anything other than police officer Dick Grayson

2) Dick and Jason being bros who get along and confide in each other about the stuff they can’t/won’t share with anyone else because they understand each other in ways most others never will, and also also them having Secret History as Brothers BECAUSE THEY ARE BROTHERS WITH HISTORY BUT I FUCKIN’ DIGRESS

3) A Tim who respects and appreciates Dick’s contributions to his life and happiness and the amount of time and effort Dick has put into being there for him often at his own personal expense, even if there have been like one or two times in the grand scheme of thirty years of comic book content when Dick wasn’t able to put Tim first because he felt he had to put someone with directly competing needs to Tim’s first in this particular time and place instead, just like he had so often before put Tim’s needs ahead of others who had competing needs at the time

4) A Bruce who acknowledges his fuck-ups with Dick and actually apologizes instead of just being like “I am going to look at you solemnly with my Apologetic Eyes but its on you to read the Apology clearly present in my Apologetic Eyes cuz that’s the only one you’ll ever get as I am a genius and a renowned playboy but I do not do the words good except for when I am being genius-y and renowedly playboy-y and not Apologetic.” And who also puts in actual work to actually fix things with Dick when he fucks up in that over-the-top-I GOTTA BE THE BEST THERE EVER WAS, POK-E-MON!! kinda over-achieving way in which he does everything in life.

5) An extended Batfamily and hero community who actually ACT like Dick is someone they respect and appreciate and are in awe of for his position and accomplishments in the hero community and the fact that he’s been out there risking his life day in and day out for people almost as long as any other hero out there, and who has in fact been doing this for a FAR greater percentage of his lifetime than any other hero, period. Rather than an extended Batfamily and hero community who just SAY that Dick is respected and appreciated by everyone and this is why actually they resent him and think he’s over-rated, with no actual sign or evidence of Respect, Appreciation and/or Awe on display anywhere at any time ever.

6) A Dick Grayson who is allowed by the narrative to be as hyper-competent and intelligent and multi-skilled as any member of the Batfamily, without feeling a need for qualifiers about him being second best or a good acrobat but not as good at the detective stuff as the others, etc, etc. Noooooope. Nerp. Nuh-uh. Someday I will rise from my death-bed amid my death-throes one last time just long enough to gasp out “The Batfamily’s entire high concept is that they are a family of literal Mary Sues and thus all of them are every bit as intelligent and hyper-competent as the plot demands and its stupid to try and rank them and telling when Dick somehow always ends up ranked bottom last despite being the kid whose very existence as a hyper-competent little genius troll boy is what jumpstarted the kid hero trend in universe in the first place, which is the kind of thing that could ONLY happen if he was impressing and making second-guessers of nay-sayers left and right BUT I FUCKING DIGRESS, GOOD NIGHT NEW YORK, AND SCENE!” At which point I will expire, my work here done.

7) A Dick Grayson who is allowed to get mad and yell when people DO FUCKED UP THINGS LIKE HIT HIM AND BLAME HIM FOR SHIT THAT ISN’T HIS FAULT without this being viewed as a “flaw” and him Being Dick Grayson Badly. Extra points for a Dick Grayson who is allowed to stay centered in his own traumas and tragedies without everyone else around him somehow making it out to be that they’re MORE victimized by the things he is most directly the victim of.

8) A Dick Grayson who eats more than just sugary cereal because he was literally raised from birth even pre-Bruce as a world class athlete and show me one single person that description matches who doesn’t know how to actually keep to a nutritious diet. Yes, by all means have him eat the occasional sugary snack as a treat, that’s fine, but when the take is that this is all he exists on or would be the only thing he exists on if not for the intercession of Actual Adults being like eat your veggies, Dickie, like.....mmmm, but whatcha doin’, fic?

9) A Dick Grayson who doesn’t actually even HAVE to get mad and lose his temper when people do fucked up things like hit him and blame him for shit that isn’t his fault or do nothing but mock and insult him and make him feel bad, because there’s actually other friends and family present who make a point to be like WHOA, HOW ABOUT I SHUT THIS SHIT DOWN LIKE AN INTELLECTUAL, BECAUSE THIS SHIT IS NOT OKAY? I’m just saying, how is it that every single fic and their grandma posits the existence of a swear jar because Alfred will not tolerate uncouth language in his domain, but it coooooooompletely flies over everyone’s head that Alfred of all people would be okay with people casually disrespecting his eldest grandson for the sake of a yawn-worthy punchline every single time someone opens their mouth to say “Dickhead” without even any kind of “Swear jar!” follow-up, let alone a “I don’t know who gave you the idea it was alright to disrespect Master Dick’s memories of his parents, young sirs, but I assure you most assuredly...‘TWAS NOT I.”

10) The existence of literally any other plot for Dick Grayson than one involving or relying on brainwashing. Like, just spitballing here but maybe people would have less trouble acknowledging and remembering the hyper-competence and skilled and genius qualities of the first Batkid if he was able to more often put those things on display instead of just running around 24/7 either brainwashed or brandishing pom-poms in enthusiastic commemoration of the hyper-competence and genius of everyone BUT him.

11) Bonus round - literally any other career choice besides being a cop.

[bigskydreaming]

What are your takes or opinions on Mr. Haley? He knew abou the court of owls didn't he? I honestly can't remember

He did. I know a lot of people don’t like that aspect of the Court of Owls retcon because they prefer Dick to still have that kindly uncle/grandfather kind of figure from his childhood to remain untarnished by that association. But its better than it like, having been his parents in the know, and I do feel like it just wouldn’t work narratively to have the Court have this association with the circus stretching back several generations into Dick’s family, without ANYONE from Dick’s childhood having any idea. Not only does it strain suspension of disbelief purely on a logistical front, it kinda....wastes the narrative opportunity of a personal betrayal/revision of a character’s understanding of their own history, that’s kinda....the POINT of doing a story like that in the first place.

So I’m fine with Mr. Haley having known and being a reluctant/intimidated functionary of the Court who knew what Dick’s fate was intended to be, because frankly, someone had to be and it might as well be him. He’s more of a cipher/plot vehicle than a character most of the time anyway.....the point of him is the impact/role he has in Dick’s life, and again, when personal betrayal is the point of the story, like....someone’s gotta take the fall.

But then, I know a lot of people don’t like the Court of Owls retcon in the first place, because of the way it makes it Dick’s destiny to always become embroiled in violence or the superhero/villain fight one way or another. That it further angsts up his backstory, etc, etc.

First off, my opinion on that last part will always be: bah humbug. Dick’s backstory is the tragic loss of his parents and everything familiar to him. Its already angsty as fuck, and if you think that adding the Court of Owls makes it extensively MORE angsty, its likely you weren’t giving his original trauma/angst as much deference as it was due all on its own, and unconsciously or not, you’re still just leaning into the idea of Trauma Olympics in general, the idea that there even CAN be rankings to trauma on this scale, or at least, that there’s any practical reason for TRYING to rank things in that matter.

So that, much as with the juvie origin, I say is irrelevant.

Now in terms of how it makes Dick’s future ‘destined’ to be painful even without the loss of his parents, if the night of their murder hadn’t happened......I mean, I can kinda understand that a little more, but I don’t really agree with that notion because like.....the point is, in everything other than random AUs.....Dick’s parents DID die that night. We already KNOW his fate. The POINT of his character is that happened, and this is how it shaped him.....so the fact that he was already ‘destined’ for more hardship and tragedy isn’t really a deterrent to adding this retcon because.....he already ended up with more hardship and tragedy anyway, so ‘avoiding’ taking an alternate route to hardship and tragedy doesn’t really....actually avoid anything or add or keep anything in Dick’s premise or narrative.

But then there’s the argument that it diminishes the power of Dick’s choice to be a superhero, if he was always going to be destined to end up in this conflict one way or another....that he’s not really an everyman who voluntarily takes up the fight if the fight was always inevitable for him. That’s a bit more of a compelling argument for me, since y’know I’m always about the power of choice and yada yada yada.

But the sticking point here is that.....Dick’s archetype and narrative have NEVER been him as an everyman who could choose an ordinary life for himself but instead is a hero. Like, to me that’s just a very superficial reading of the fact that he’s not actually superhuman. But in no other way has Dick ever been an everyman. Pre-his parents’ murder he was a professional acrobat and showman from early childhood, of international renown. Post-his parents’ murder he was raised by a bona fide superhero who moonlights as a ditzy billionaire playboy by day.

Nothing about Dick Grayson’s skills or life was EVER that of an ‘everyman.’

Additionally, I think this notion also only comes from comparing him directly to Bruce, and focusing on the similarities in their backstories and the common bond of their parents’ murders, and the fact that he’s more of an everyman in comparison to Bruce because of how Bruce sticks out as a billionaire from birth, accomplished at everything, a master of all trades by the time we ever really MEET Bruce on the page, with his own origins largely told in flashbacks and backstory.

But, this is also why personally, I focus on the differences in their backstories....on using that shared experience they have as the BASIS for their relationship, like the reason Bruce sees him as especially standing out as a victim he has empathy for given that it brings to mind his own past trauma and hurt......but not like....using it to juxtapose Dick and Bruce directly, as I think that really doesn’t work.

Because Dick’s archetype, all of his narratives, IMO, are those of the fish out of water.

The culture clash, I’ve always maintained, is every bit as much a trauma as his parents’ murder, because it was like living one life until he’s eight or ten or whatever, and then just being told all in one day, or one week, hey, all of that is over now. This is your new life, even if it has NOTHING in common with your old one, and you just have to suck it up and make your peace with the fact that everything you knew is gone and you have to start over from scratch. New city, new routines, new family, new future, new everything. Even how you act around other people and expect or take as a given they’ll act with you is going to be different from now on.

None of that is anything that Bruce can relate to, because its not Bruce’s archetype. Those aren’t his narratives. And I think there’s a tendency to focus overmuch on Dick and Bruce’s similarities at the expense of acknowledging that Dick Grayson is no more a knock-off of Bruce Wayne than Robin is a derivative of Batman. Robin’s Batman’s junior partner or protege or sidekick or whatever you want to call it....but Robin has never stood in anyone’s mind as “Batman-lite” because he’s ENTIRELY different from Batman even just on a CONCEPTUAL level. They’re linked, but they’re not the same. Robin follows where Batman leads, but Robin does not derive from Batman directly.

Same with Dick Grayson and Bruce Wayne. They’re similar in places, they’re linked by shared experiences and stories, but Dick’s no more Bruce-lite than he is as Robin. And I think focusing on him in terms of who his character is SEPARATE from Bruce, like....goes a long way towards making him distinct in his own right, even when standing right next to Bruce.

So I’ve always felt that whether in canon or fanfics, the key to developing Dick as his own character in his own right, not dependent or derivative of anyone else, is to determine what his core archetype is regardless of all else around him, and lean into THAT.

And for me, that archetype is the fish out of water, so my inclination is always going to LEAN INTO the fact that like....the point of his character, his entire character premise, is and always was going to be that of the guy who was plucked from one life and dropped into another entirely, and had to find a way to adapt to that, survive and even learn to thrive despite all the obstacles this presented, and the inherent tragedy of him having to do it at all.

So that means acknowledging the culture clash, building on it, emphasizing the class distinctions between his origin and Bruce’s, just focusing on the fact that he was NEVER Bruce-lite....because he always arrived on the scene, came into the picture, with his own entirely separate and distinct backstory, origin, and beginnings, just with his narrative journey then merging with Bruce’s at that point of OVERLAP, that shared experience where they both lost their parents in similar ways.

So coming at the character from that direction - the Court of Owls retcon doesn’t really change any of that for me at all. Because when the premise of Dick’s character is that he had to learn how to survive and overcome being forced into situations and a life that he wasn’t prepared for and didn’t even want in the first place.....well, then, the parallel path of him being taken from the circus by the Court of Owls instead, again....doesn’t actually force anything new on his character or take anything away from his character. It just....presents an alternative course for the same essential narrative journey.

So despite me not being a fan of Talon fics because of all the reasons I’ve mentioned before (plus the fact that it bothers me that so many people feel a need to make Dick literally superhuman but in no other way operating on a different level from his family’s general capabilities when.....his character has never required being superhuman to do anything on that level before, HMM. Or if people do focus on making him different, its usually just in terms of showcasing his healing, which...kinda tends to end up turning him into a human pincushion every other scene, with an additional decrease to how much other characters even notice this or wonder if he’s hurting because oh well, he’ll be fine again in a paragraph. Which again I say, I Object)....despite that, lol, I have no problem with the Court of Owls retcon even though it nominally takes away some of Dick’s choices to say that he never really had a choice in getting involved in these larger than life conflicts.

*Shrugs* Because it only does that in theory. In practice, we’re all reading the adventures of Dick Grayson as Robin and Nightwing and Batman. Not the daily life of Dick Grayson, adult circus acrobat with a nice, happy life.

Instead, the Court of Owls retcon IMO actually just adds directly to Dick’s premise as I see it....both with the fish out of water archetype AND as the fact that like....his core struggle throughout all of his stories is that he’s the guy determined to chart his own destiny no matter how much circumstances or society or even his own loved ones try to force him down specific paths or pigeon hole him in specific boxes. Limit him or take away his options or force him to act or make choices from a place of having less avenues he can go.

Like, that’s who he is to me, so the Court and his ‘destiny’ as the Gray Son just.....if anything, bring that into even sharper focus.

If anything, my biggest issue with the Court of Owls retcon is that it didn’t go FAR enough.

It was basically the first major story of the Batfamily in the New 52, when we were introduced to these familiar characters in different ways, so I would have taken that and run with it, and in the process opened up a LOT more doors.

What I mean is....instead of this having been a revelation to Dick ALONGSIDE the rest of his family and readers when it occurred in the present day....I would have had the present day storyline reveal this as the secret history of Batman and Robin, and build on the idea that the Court had already made a move to claim Dick as the Gray Son right after or soon after his parents’ death, and Bruce had rescued him/defeated them, and then they’d kinda just buried this ever since.

First off....it cleans things up logistically. Having them seize upon an already existing tragedy and capitalize it, either by taking him directly then or maybe being the cause of him going to juvie/a bad foster home and using that to present themselves as his saviors when they introduce themselves to him, or anything similar to that.....its always going to make a lot more sense than the idea of a secret society pulling the strings of the city like....having no option to prevent an infamously irresponsible young bachelor from taking in this traumatized boy, and then just waiting a decade or more while their target becomes more and more ingrained in the public eye and consciousness before trying to....disappear him. Umm. No. Make it make sense.

Secondly, it goes a long way towards addressing the problems in child superheroes/sidekicks at all....which is definitely something DC already had on the brain when they rebooted their universe. Given that they....tried to claim Dick was like sixteen when he met Bruce, and that the other Robins since then all came and went in a span of like, a year each. Endless sigh of endlessness. Hey, DC, if your big priority is keeping the ages of your more famous characters down, is the best move condensing the timeline and simultaneously aging UP many of those same characters before they even debut? Umm. No. Make it make sense.

However. Keep Dick the same age he was when he and Bruce met pre-boot (which, lbr, most fics and even canon stories ended up doing anyway).....and suddenly, you get a lot more options. 

Because say you’re Bruce Wayne, and you just took down the Gotham chapter of this globe-spanning shadow organization and rescued a traumatized boy you empathize and relate to, who had been taken by this organization with the specific intention of raising him up to be a merciless killing machine they then made an immortal, obedient weapon out of. And you know that other chapters of this organization are still out there, they still want this kid because they literally believe they own him and his destiny, and no other foster home or group home or placement is ever going to be able to understand what this kid has already been through and might have to face again if they ever try and take him again? 

And on top of that, this kid has already like...imprinted on you from saving him from this fate, trusts you despite having major and understandable trust issues up the wazoo now, and probably will NEVER open up to anyone the way he might to you? And oh yeah, he also wants to learn to do all the stuff you can do so he, like you, can MAKE something of his tragedy, find a way to give it reason or purpose he can use to hopefully move on someday, he wants to defy the people who viewed him as nothing more than an inevitable killer by learning how to be a protector and defender instead, by CHOICE?

What do you do in THAT case?

You take that kid in. You train him, teach him everything he needs to know to be able to defeat them the way you defeated them, if they come back for him in the future. You keep him by your side, not to control him, but to protect him, or at least make him feel that he’s protected, that he has someone who WANTS to protect him, be there for him, WITH him, that despite having his own life, wants to be just one grapple swing away and the first person able to do something about it if the threat always lurking just around the corner someday reappears. 

You introduce him to the others in the hero community, maybe even build connections where you previously stayed aloof, so that he’s PART of something, feels connected to something other than the fate tied to him by a bloodline he can’t shake or do anything about, that he has family and friends that aren’t just his much hated Great-Grandpa Billy Cobb Thornton. You make sure he has people who will be there for him even if you can’t be someday, if that Court tries to take him again, you won’t be the only cavalry riding to his rescue.

You probably don’t advertise any of this, at least not beyond a few trusted friends like Diana and Clark. Even as others start to emulate you, training proteges of their own and assuming they know your reasons, you still respond to people criticizing your debut of a young, child partner, no matter his skill level, by brusquely telling them its none of their business. Because there’s really no other way to justify it without telling the truth, and the truth is not something you want to hide not just to keep secrets or because you don’t trust others, but purely for HIS sake. You take it and lock it away and bury it as deeply as you can for no other reason than because it HURTS him. Because the truth is PAINFUL. 

Its inherently connected to a time and a space and a part of Dick’s personal history that will never be anything other than a trauma whose shadow he’ll spend the rest of his life trying to break free of no matter what you do. But at least what you can do is minimize the number of times and places and people which require he face it all over again. That bring it all bubbling back up to the surface to confront and shove back down each and every time someone might feel like reminding him his own ancestor wanted nothing more for him than to be someone else’s obedient weapon, so why should they care anymore than that about his opinion, or plans, or viewpoint. You bury this secret not because its shameful, but because you know people will try and use it to shame him anyway, and you can’t banish the shadows looming in his past, but you can help him stand in a spotlight of his own choosing, where people can’t easily see those shadows amid the glare of his own highlighted role and mantle and self.

And its not always easy, raising this kid, because you WANT that blight on his personal history to be gone, for HIS sake, so you focus maybe more than you should on the stuff you CAN relate to, even though its not always the reason for his latest nightmare. And sometimes he’s bound to resent that, he’s going to want to yell because you’re saying you understand and you honestly don’t, you truly never will, and you’re going to fight about that and its going to hurt but its not because there’s anything wrong with either of you, or either of you are bad people.

And you’re bound to be overprotective, almost paranoid about his safety, always looking for the monster lurking in the dark for him, because that monster is REAL, you’ve already met it, you know its name, and its not paranoia when you know exactly what it is you’re afraid of and why. And he’s going to bristle at this, and its going to chafe, because you taught him well, you prepared him just as well as you prepared yourself, and he’s as ready as he’ll ever be to face that monster when it comes back, but that doesn’t mean you’re any less afraid of what that will do to him no matter how ready he is, not when you were the one to see what it did to him, what it wanted to do to him, that first time. 

And you’ll be so preoccupied focusing on the monster, the Big Threat, the DANGER, that you forget sometimes about the other ways you and he are different. About all the other things he’s lost or had taken from him and that the monster isn’t the only one whose ever tried to put him in a box or confine him to the limits of someone else’s choices. So sometimes you fuck up, you think he’s being unreasonable or reckless when really he’s just trying to say its worth it to risk it all sometimes just to have a CHOICE, because the very act of having that choice, even the freedom to make the WRONG choice, is so much more precious and valuable to him than will ever make sense to someone who has had so many more choices respected and allowed and allotted in life.

But as long as you remember to rein yourself in after these times, as long as you never try and shirk the burden and responsibility you willingly took on when you willingly took him in, you never forget that that was YOUR choice, and that means the onus will always be on you to stop, take a breath, and try and see things from his shoes, be the one to try and bridge the gap in your life experiences and reach across the aisle instead of impatiently waiting for him to adapt and change and stretch himself to accommodate you and the choices and life and expectations you’re used to....as long as you do that, he’ll be able to look at THAT. And see that its not because you’ve just stopped caring what he wants at some point, so he’ll forgive you even when his friends don’t understand it, can’t make sense of why he puts up with stuff they never would, because they’ve never had that monster hiding in their shadow and don’t see it in his because he’s not quite ready to point it out to them yet, draw their attention to it yet. He’s still trying to become HIMSELF clearly enough that he can face it head on and look at it and then look back at himself and see without a doubt that the two are not the same.

And when you take in more kids eventually, for other reasons that are different but no less important, there are going to be problems here too. Maybe some of them think you favor your eldest, care more about him or are more worried about him when its really just that there’s something specifically TO be worried about, to keep an eye out for and always be wary might be lurking in the dark. Maybe when the truth finally comes to light, there are hurt feelings and resentment because you’re supposed to be a family, you should have trusted them with this, and it’ll take time to impress upon them that it was never that you WEREN’T a family, never that they weren’t trusted or confided in by their brother because they didn’t matter, but rather it was just because part of this monster in his past is ALSO his family, whether he wants it to be or not, and that’s CONFUSING and its hard to face and not something he WANTS to face and so maybe it just was easier, HAPPIER, to try and pretend it wasn’t there or didn’t matter for as long as he could because deep down he always knew it’d come back and there’d be an After that he had to adapt to all over again anyway, so at least he wanted to try and make the most of the Before. And maybe that’ll be a mistake, and maybe it won’t be, but what it will be is HUMAN. RELATABLE. REAL.

And 100% not anything that anyone in this family is to blame for, or unreasonable for, or because anyone loves or cherishes anyone else more than the rest.

And bing, bang, boom, you’ve just cleaned up a WHOLE mess of junk, strengthened and clarified several core premises and characterizations and seeded entire fields of potential conflict of all types, interpersonal and story-wise and everything in between.

All with ONE. SINGLE. STORY.

And no brain cells had to be harmed in the reading of it.

But nah.

*looks at how it played out in canon*

Sure. 

That’s much better.

[bigskydreaming]

You're totally right. I literally cannot read "Jason finds out about Tarantula" fics anymore. I find the way they generally filter what's considered in fandom maybe Dick's biggest trauma, through the lens of " isn't Jay just so awesome for caring (even though Dick's always been such a dick to him)", rather that Dick's needs, pretty gross. And why does Jay's revenge on Tarantula usually matter more than Dick's feelings on the matter (like, Dick could have revenge himself if he wanted, you know?)?

This is DEFINITELY a thing and it bugs a ton.

Like, I get the projection element of using Jason killing Dick’s rapist to act out or process the revenge fantasy of wishing someone would do that for you with your rapist, for writers or readers for whom this is part of the catharsis, and so this isn’t like, a moral judgment of him for doing so, the problem is it never in ANY story has ANYTHING TO DO WITH DICK OR WHAT HE WANTS.

Never have I ever seen a single story about Tarantula or Mirage where Jason kills them after ASKING Dick if that’s what he wants, if that will help him, bring him closure or comfort or relief.

Its just Jason going off and doing his thing, and that’s 100% entirely about Jason, and that’s....annoying, in a fic and an issue that’s supposed to be about hurt/comfort for Dick for something that happened to him.

Like, if Jason was actually acting on Dick’s behalf and fulfilling his wishes, that’d be totally different, but there’s not a single thought ever spared about the fact that if Dick blamed himself for Tarantula killing Blockbuster and thought HE failed HER by not putting her on a better path, then how in the hell do you think he’s ACTUALLY going to feel about Jason then killing Tarantula, supposedly on his behalf?

I’ve talked extensively about how I think Dick has a lot more nuanced and complicated perspective on killing than most people assume of him, and I’m not refuting that here.....but even Dick being willing or tempted to kill someone who’s hurt him or taken someone from him like he was with Zucco and later with Two-Face and then with Joker.....like, this is not remotely interchangeable with how Dick might feel about killing being done in his name, and I don’t for a second believe that’s what he’d ever want from any of his siblings, and thus this would IMO only make things WORSE for his mental and emotional state, rather than bring him any sort of catharsis at all.

Like, its not even about the morality of killing itself even....there’s so many other factors such as Jason’s complicated history with Bruce on this very issue, and like, the last thing in the world Dick would want is to be the reason for even further conflict between Bruce and Jason because Jason killed someone on Dick’s behalf.....ESPECIALLY when its not even on Dick’s behalf because at no point, as I said, is Jason shown thinking through the thought process of ‘is this actually what Dick would want and would it make him feel better, or is this wholly about making myself feel better and venting my anger and aggression about my brother being hurt on the one who hurt him, regardless of how he’s going to feel about it if and when he finds out.’

Like, say what you will about Dick killing the Joker in Last Laugh, but there was never any illusions about him going that far and beating the Joker to death because he thought it would bring either Jason or Tim (who he thought at that point the Joker had killed too) back, nor did he ever during or in the aftermath express any kind of idea that he was doing it because its what they would want. Ironically of course, this ended up being exactly what Jason DID want, just not from Dick specifically, but the point is, this never came up as part of Dick’s thought process either during or after. It was always 100% clear that this event, that moment, was about Dick and his hurt and rage over the Joker taking away his loved ones, just like with Zucco it’d been about his hurt and rage over him taking his parents away and not at all because he was of the belief that his parents would actually want him to kill Zucco. 

Even with Two-Face in R:YO, Dick being tempted to kill Two-Face was less about him having been hurt by Two-Face when he almost beat Dick to death....it really was about him holding Two-Face and that whole situation to blame for Bruce firing him and in Dick’s mind no longer needing or wanting him....he wanted to kill Two-Face not because of what had been DONE to him, but what he blamed Two-Face for having lost, what he felt he’d taken from him....even while knowing full well that this would in no way make things better or right with Bruce, and its the last thing Bruce would want Dick to do.

There is a difference between avenging and revenge, and one of the interesting things about Dick’s stance and history on killing has always been that it always ONLY comes up in the latter. Like, there’s never any point in Dick’s history where he views killing as a valid way to avenge a loved one......the times when he struggles with the desire to, its 100% about his wanting revenge on a personal level.

And that’s the honesty and directness I’m missing from so many Tarantula or Mirage fics these days. Its the disconnect, how Jason is framed and even celebrated as though he’s AVENGING his brother and acting on his behalf, justice for Dick being hurt by these people.....

But the reality is, there’s little to no thought or attention paid by Jason or the narrative as to what Dick’s ACTUAL wishes in this matter are, and what he actually wants and needs in order to be helped along in his recovery.

Its really just about Jason getting revenge for someone hurting someone he cares about and thus feeling hurt and pain by proxy......just twisted and made to look like something it’s not, by saying its FOR Dick even though its likely Dick would actually be worse off for knowing what Jason was doing/had done, as Dick’s guilt complex makes it all but inevitable that he’d now additionally blame himself for being the reason Jason felt he had to do that.....when ironically and obnoxiously, the reality is Jason did it in those stories because its what Jason wanted and what Jason felt HE needed to cope with his feelings and emotions about what had been done to his brother. It really ultimately has nothing to do with Dick, he’s just the excuse, but he also just so happens to 100% be someone who would shoulder the burden of guilt and blame and remorse for even just being the excuse for someone going to those extremes.

If a story is about Dick’s trauma and Dick’s recovery, leaving out Dick’s actual expressed wishes or Dick’s feelings about what other people do or want to do as a result of this is a huge, gaping, annoying as hell oversight.

And for the record, I’m trying to keep this general and not speak to specific fics because I’m aware that for many survivors, the act of projecting onto Dick and what he suffered there can and does mean that for some people, Jason’s actions there are viewed as almost actually being on behalf of the readers/writers who project themselves into Dick’s position in that narrative. I get that, and that’s why this issue is always going to be messy.

As with most things, my true gripe is the overwhelming SAMENESS of the takes on Tarantula/Mirage stories, and the fact that no room is hardly ever left for those who ironically are NOT projecting onto Dick so fully that they feel avenged by whatever Jason does here.....but rather who are simply relating to Dick and thus are actually just looking for the catharsis of him being able to seize back control over his own life and what happens to him and because of him, by the narrative prioritizing the other characters focusing on what HE wants and needs for HIS recovery rather than going off to enact revenge of their own.

Sorry not sorry, but I am always gonna be hardcore gung-ho about the fact that I think that stories that are ABOUT a specific character’s rape should always center and prioritize THEM and what THEY want and/or do, rather than just use them and what happened to them as a catalyst to then showcase someone else acting out a revenge fantasy in their name.

The desire to avenge a loved one, the desire for personal revenge against someone who hurt a loved one, and the desire to act as little as possible on your own personal feelings about what happened and instead be there to help enact whatever that hurt loved one says they want or need to help get better....

Each and every one of these desires has validity....the problem is, depending on the characters involved, they absolutely ARE at times mutually exclusive and not compatible, and thus not keeping a firm awareness on the distinction between these and which are the primary motivations for which characters, like.....it often brings these into direct conflict....but without a lot of writers and readers ever perceiving any conflict exists, because they’re completely centered on Jason’s actions and choices rather than Dick’s wants and needs, to the extent that in a lot of fics, the latter never even comes up for a mention.

And that’s the part that just will never work in my eyes. If its about what happened to Dick, it needs to be about what he wants or needs as a result. There can be other elements in play as well, by all means Jason and others can absolutely have their own conflicting views about what happened and wants/needs for revenge that are at odds with what Dick himself wants, and this doesn’t make them bad or wrong, but there’s so much room for intricate and complicated dynamics and insights there....whereas there’s just none of that in narratives that use harm done to Dick as a catalyst for character choices.....just without Dick’s character choices ever then entering the narrative as being considered at all relevant.

[bigskydreaming]

I feel like people think we complain about how the Batfamily treats Dick in canon and most fics just to like, complain or bitch about them. Its like no, we hate when stuff is written this way, but more than that, we hate people just refusing to acknowledge it even when we provide blatant proof, because if they did, maybe they’d...STOP DOING IT.

That’s the big agenda here. Yeah, I admit it. Me and a bunch of other Dick Grayson fans would love it if people stopped writing him in certain ways and with certain dynamics with his family and friends, and we keep pointing out what exactly it is we’re talking about and WHY its such a problem, because shockingly, due to the not-as-great-a-distance between fiction and reality as a lot of people like to pretend.....there is OVERLAP in how the ways Dick is written and his dynamics have a FUCK TON of relatability to stuff many of us experience in real life AND ARE THE WHOLE REASON WE PROJECT AND RELATE TO THIS CHARACTER SO MUCH.

So ultimately, we’re not even complaining about these specific ways and dynamics Dick’s often written with just because we want our favorite character to be seen and written the way we do and no other way ever.

We’re complaining in the hopes that some of you will sit up and notice how the things we’re talking about are actually just NOT GOOD TO OVERLOOK in fiction or real life, and its actually really. Fucking. Easy. To just like, say, not write Jason constantly hitting Dick when he’s upset and in the narrative having people just shrug about this because ‘that’s just how Jason is.’

Like, if your story is all about highlighting that and calling it out and Jason eventually moving PAST that? Sure, great, that’s not the issue.

When you aren’t even AWARE that you’re constantly writing an abuse survivor casually abusing his brother or brothers, with nobody regarding this as even being worth mentioning or objecting to within the narrative, just saying oh that’s just how he is?

THAT’S NOT GOOD, SCOOB!

There’s no spin to that. There’s no other angle with which to look at it. Its just bad, flat out, no matter WHAT character it is, WHAT character it hurts, its just.

You all say you come here for the found family, but even in stories where the family otherwise is pretty close, DICK STILL GETS HIT.

And the worst part is I don’t think many of you are even doing it on purpose, it just feels organic to you. AND THAT’S THE PART WE’RE TALKING ABOUT.

Our complaints about Dick Grayson in fic ultimately aren’t about ‘oh all stories should be about showing how Bruce is abusive and everyone calling him out for that.’

Its that EVEN WHEN YOU DON’T WRITE THAT, even when the family is supposed to be HAPPY, things constantly seem to get slanted to be at Dick’s expense with this habitually just shrugged off as inconsequential.

Its not.

No matter your reasons, that is not a healthy happy family dynamic you’ve just written there. Its just not. When we can predict chapters ahead of time that the fallout for a particular conflict is going to land on Dick most of all, when he’s not even in the fucking chapter itself, that’s BAD. It means you are stuck in a rut of predictability where something is so natural to you in the back of your mind you don’t even notice anything wrong when you’re writing it, but for people who its in the FRONT of our minds, we very much DO notice.

And we’re complaining not just to complain, the whole reason we cite examples and provide panels and go into detailed explanations is so that MAYBE some people will take a closer look at how they write Dick and his interactions with his family, take a few beats to bring that FORWARD to the front of THEIR minds too, and try and see what it is we’re seeing.....

Because hopefully, if you do that, you might see WHY we object so strongly to it, and when facing the problematic dynamics head on, you might go ‘oh shit, that ISN’T a happy family I’m writing here, cuz I keep writing this one guy as not actually on the same level priority wise as the rest of his family and that’s NOT happy or healthy for the family because HE IS PART OF THE FAMILY.

Dick Grayson doesn’t have to be everyone’s favorite character. And hell, you don’t even have to LIKE him! But if your goal is to write a happy, healthy, functional Batfamily....whether you like him or not, he has to feel as much PART of that family rather than in service to that family or the family scapegoat, because otherwise....what you wrote is just NOT what you claim you intended to write.