#might post more of my haul later tm

[bats-did-u-mean-assholes]

Habitual Arrangements

hi everyone! this is my first fanfiction ever! its set in the young justice (cartoon) universe just after the finale of season 2. the fic explores a relationship that we barely see on the show, and showcases my take on it. the relationship here is Mal and Dick’s , i don’t know why but i was drawn to these two. so please enjoy !

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It started not long after the invasion, at first it was barely noticeable, a bag of chips missing here or there and the window magically appearing to be unlocked, even after he was sure to check it a hundred times. Honestly he didn’t think much of it, he figured it probably just one of the kids playing a dumb prank and if it was, hey who was he to be upset by it. Hell after the year these kids have had they deserve some fun. So it continued like that for a few weeks, small things like snacks and loose change disappearing from his apartment. He really wasn’t sure what to make of it at this point, surely if it was one of the kids someone would have let it slip by now. Oh well, he was glad the team was bonding even if it was at his expense.

After about a month and a half had gone by he was pretty sure it wasn’t a prank. More than once now he had come home to a freshly used shower or a warm couch or both. Once again he didn’t really mind, but he was certainly curious. There were really only a few options as to who his mystery squatter could be, the list was as follows; Artemis: the grieving sort of widow trying to make her way in the world, Conner: his newly homeless friend with anger issues, Arsenal: his equally homeless and most spiteful acquaintance, and finally Nightwing: the man who had dropped off the face of the Earth in the midst of his grief over his childhood best friend. With his new list of suspects in mind he decided to more carefully analyse the actions of the enigma in order to determine their true identity.

Within about a week or so he had already crossed off half the list, it wasn’t Arsenal, he had been brought into league custody weeks ago after wreaking havoc on Lexcorp for the billionth time, and it wasn’t Artemis because she had apparently been visiting family in Vietnam with her mom since before the frequent break ins had begun. At some point he had just started leaving the window unlocked and the enigmas target snacks out on the counter before he left for work every day, he really wasn’t sure if he was more happy or confused when he started coming home to a cleaner apartment and post-it notes with various reminders and messages littered around the place.

A few weeks later he was finally able to definitively discern the identity of his pseudo roommate. He had eventually just grown the balls to ask Conner about it, the poor guy seemed genuinely bewildered, and had even offered to watch over the apartment to catch the thief for him, after plenty of reassurances he was able to soothe Conner’s inner guard dog, even then he still insisted that he take wolf home with him to keep him safe. So now he knew that it was definitely Nightwing visiting his apartment when he was away, which perplexed him more the more he thought about it, wasn’t batman stupid rich? Oh well, at least now he knew who he was dealing with, he could start to actually be more proactive. Instead of just leaving out snacks when he left for the watchtower, he began leaving out books that he thought Dick might like, as well as updates on the team and occasionally show recommendations accompanied with the password to his Netflix account (he notices a new profile on his account called big blue and smiles to himself a little bit).

The arrangement continues on for months, Mal leaving out snacks and entertainment and Dick leaving little notes and gifts for him to find, it soon becomes a familiar routine and after a while both of them get a little more comfortable with their predicament. Mal starts leaving self-care reminders and lush products with his regular stuff and in return Dick writes him little shopping lists and homemade meal recipes for him to try (he has no idea how Dick discovered his love of cooking, but he could deal). Eventually he just bites the bullet and leaves a spare apartment key behind. The next day he finds a cute little Nightwing keychain in its place and his heart swells just a little bit.

With the establishment of this new routine Mal finds himself oddly calmer than he’s been in a while, he’s no longer worried about the mystery guest in his apartment which means he can finally relax back into his life with some semblance of normalcy and structure. Since his inevitable breakup with Karen he’s had trouble with finding a balance, but with Dick around it’s … easier. Just easier. And god he knows it’s bizarre, he really does, but he can’t help but find it comforting to know that someone is looking out for him. He wished it could have stayed that way, but a certain self-sacrificing idiot vigilante had to go and throw himself into danger and ruin his Zen.

Just when everything seems to be going well for him, everything all of a sudden bursts into flames. He starts worrying after about a week goes by without any visits from Dick. He tracks the news for any signs of Nightwing and attempts to contact all of dicks friends to see if he’s popped up anywhere and nothing. Absolutely nothing. No signs of the idiot anywhere. He frets for a few more days before deciding to take matters into his own hands and go out to look for him, he barely makes it to the door before he hears a thump from somewhere in his flat. He rolls his eyes before sprinting to the source of the noise, and what he finds there is quite a sight to behold; Nightwing: the hero of Bludhaven , first protégé of batman and founding member of young justice, is curled up in a ball on his couch fast asleep (still in uniform, and coated in sweat mind you).

He stands there for a while, locked in a trance just watching the 18 year old sleep, he moves forward cautiously and the closer he gets the more his concern increases. Upon closer inspection it’s clear to see that Dick is shivering. Violently. That sets off a million alarm bells in his head and when the poor guy starts whimpering and moaning he realises that he’s never been this worried about anyone in his life (well that might be a slight exaggeration, but the point still stands). The sound of a sob breaks him out of stupor, if he wasn’t concerned about Dick before he definitely was now. He jumped into action, reaching towards Dick’s forehead only to discover that he was burning up, which explained the whimpering, because he was clearly delirious. He set to work attempting to lower the offending fever, wetting a wash cloth and laying it on his forehead seemed like a decent start.

After about an hour Dick’s fever had gone down significantly, but not nearly enough. The good thing was that Dick seemed to be coming to his senses, hopefully soon he would have a coherent and reasonable (well as reasonable as Dick could be) person who could explain this whole mess to him. Of course, because Dick really had impeccable timing, he chose this exact moment to wake up. This of course did not go very smoothly at all. Instead of waking up like any normal human, Dick woke up and kicked him in the face. He kind of felt bad for the kid: waking up in a strange place not feeling well and with a big man looming over him, but not as bad as he felt for his face right now. After about 15 minutes and a ton of coaxing and reassurances he managed to get the man to calm down enough to get him to come down from where he was perched on top of the fridge.

When Dick finally did come down he was sluggish, and considerably less alert than he had been 20 minutes ago. Mal was still slightly in shock about the events of the last few hours, but what shocked him more as the way the Dick seriously attempted to climb out the window, as if he hadn’t looked like death warmed over less than an hour ago (and to be honest he still did). Mal of course put a stop to this the second it begun, simply grabbing the man around the waist and hauling him back over to the comfy leather sofa (where he was quickly laid back down and covered in all the blankets Mal could find in his apartment) and trying to get information out of him, namely: what the actual fuck he had just witnessed.

The explanation he received was less than satisfactory, and left him with more questions than it had answered. Like how long had Dick been this ill? Why didn’t he come home sooner? And, when did he start considering this both of their homes? Those were all questions that could be answered later though, his primary concern right now was dealing with the heavily infected bullet wound on Dick’s shoulder. He was definitely not equipped to deal with this alone though, so he called in a “dealing with Dick’s bullshit and healing his stupidly advanced wounds TM “expert- The one and only: Tim Drake (he was so lucky that he was authorised to know everyone’s identities).

Tim arrived within about half an hour armed with common sense, disinfectants, and questions in spades.  At the sight of Tim, Dick visibly calmed and relinquished himself over to their duel care, allowing them to examine his wounds (plural because the idiot didn’t think the others were significant enough to mention), and help him clean himself up. Pretty soon they had their idiot cleaned up and disinfected (turned out it hadn’t been an infection, it had just been very close to one), and the man was now situated comfortably on the couch sleeping soundly.

With the room finally quiet, aside from the gentle snoring coming from underneath the mound of blankets on the couch, Tim finally let the questions loose. Explaining their weird situation had been somehow easier than he thought, but answering the barrage of questions that Tim had come up with was difficult. After clarifying that ‘no he had no intentions of hurting Tim’ big brother’ and ‘no he wasn’t on Mal’s lease’ and ‘yes of course Dick had the wifi password, he wasn’t a monster Tim!’ and most confusingly ‘no they most absolutely were not together (although he couldn’t help but think that he wouldn’t mind if they were), Tim finally thanked him for taking care of Dick, and took his leave, but not before promising to come and check in soon.

With that over and done with he let out the breath he didn’t fully realise he was holding and decided that it was time to turn in for the night. He looked towards the couch where Dick lay looking rather uncomfortable and couldn’t help but feel sympathetic for the man. Maybe it was the fact that it was currently 2am and he had yet to go to bed, or maybe it was the new found protectiveness he harboured for Dick but he couldn’t quite bring himself to leave the poor guy there. So he waltzed over to the couch, looking the picture of Nonchalance (although he was probably in reality being very chalant), and gently scooped Dick up into his arms, blankets and all. This elicited a tiny squeak from Dick accompanied by a very confused look, he carefully explained that they were going to bed, and that there was no way in hell that Dick was sleeping on his couch after today’s events. Apparently this seemed agreeable to Dick (either that or he was too tired to argue), because he promptly snuggled (yes, snuggled) into Mal’s chest. Five minutes later the pair were situated comfortably in bed, and Dick had yet to un-burrow from his chest, so that was where they stayed. In the morning there would be questions and conversations (and there most definitely would not be work) but for now there was sleep, and sleep was good.

 END CHAPTER ONE

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hi! i hope you enjoyed! whether or not this actually turns out romantic or not I honestly cannot decide. please comment your thoughts and feelings!

(this might become a series where i explore unseen and unexpected relationships that we don’t see on young justice, so please feel free to recommend characters)

@langst-is-my-unborn-baby first cut baby!