miss maggie (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
bossymarmalade) wrote in ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png)
thejusticelounge2014-03-29 04:06 pm
bossymarmalade) wrote in thejusticelounge2014-03-29 04:06 pm
sand and charcoal
[Ring Txt to Dick] Hey! Where you at? I’m in Gotham, you got time to meet up for lunch? I wanna ask you something
[Ring Txt to Dick] Gotham’s a good place to ask, idk why but it is.
Dickiebird jumps as his phone chimes in his ear, realizing too late that sleeping on your phone is a terrible idea no matter what it seems at the time. [TEXT] Yeah, yeah gothams’s god. partifc place?
Dickiebird goes to wash his face and wake up a little more, turning down the phone’s volume, oh lord, his ear.
[Ring Txt] AHAHAH Gotham’s god. Freudian slip? Where?? Kyle is a little surprised that his ring is working okay right now. It seems to only work when…no that’d be ridiculous.
Dickiebird feels much more together now and groans at his previous texts. [TEXT] Dude, you don’t even know. I just woke up, man. Idk, man, anywhere’s good. What’re you hungry for?
[Ring Txt] Soup. Ramen? Tell me a good place in the Big G and I’ll meet you there.
Dickiebird [TEXT] Wow, OK, will do. Hang on.
Kyle gets the name and coords from Dick and then spends a while finding it, after trying to ask a few different belligerent Gothamites. His ring has decided to be useless again, so Kyle hoofs it on the subway. Which actually proves to be kind of fun; like the NY Subway system, only more frustrating and with angrier people. Good times. Kyle gets to the ramen shop and waits outside, since it’s cold but rather clement.
(Hoodie is good at what he does. He doesn’t make himself obvious as he walks behind Kyle as he exits the subway. The wind stirs up the leaves and particulate debris around their feet, as he shuffles in the crowd, emerging up out of Gotham’s underbelly.)
Dickiebird arrives on his motorcycle (the non-Night Bike, sadly) and grins when he sees Kyle. “Hey, ‘mano! You like it?” He gestures at the restaurant: “Ramen Are Created Equal”. “It’s my kind of place!”
(Hoodie stops at the bodega on the corner of the street, bending to look at the front page of the Gotham Gazette.)
The area Dick’s chosen is a rather eclectic-looking shopping/entertainment district of Gotham. So still dark and musty and seemingly covered in industrial-era soot, but with coloured Christmas lights and families cruising the sidewalk. And about 46.7% less shady-looking individuals on the street corners. Awesome. He grins when he sees Dick and then looks up at the awning with the ramen shop name.
"Oh my god, that’s hilarious." They hustle in, the windows of the shop already steamed up. "Woo, I forgot how cold it gets on the East Coast, man."
Dickiebird chuckles. “I know, right? I think I’ve been spending too much time in Coast. I’m starting to feel it.”
The ramen on the menu are listed by region, so Kyle opts for the Kyoto one, as well as some gyoza to share. He also gets a Japanese beer, because why not. When in Gotham…only that doesn’t really make any sense, but whatever. Kyle dismisses his meandering (avoidant?) thoughts and drums his fingers on the table. “How’s the Haven? Still dealing with the crooked cop sitch?”
Dickiebird groans and nods, ordering his own. “So far no more leads in-department, but I’ve started looking into it on my own. On the side, as it were.”
(Hoodie enters the shop after a few minutes, the Gotham Gazette in his hand—Bruce Wayne is on the cover, all smiles as he cuts the ribbon on a youth center in the East End—and settles in at the bar. He doesn’t order anything but takes part in the free hot tea that the server puts in front of him.)
"Ha ha, on the side. Like french fries. Nightwing the side-dish." Kyle toys with the little dish meant for soy sauce, quiet for a moment. "You ever hear from Damian? I know he’s training and all, but you ever phoned him up or anything?"
Dickiebird shakes his head. “Not recently. When I was at the Manor more, I talked to him for a bit, but it wasn’t much more than talking about his training.” He cocks his head. “Why?”
(Hoodie looks over at the two of them when the subject changes, something piquing his interest.)
Kyle looks vaguely relieved. “But you have chatted with him now and then. And he’s okay, right? Other than being grouchy, as per usual,” Kyle smiles a bit, looking up with a breath of thanks to the server when she brings his beer and pours it into the small glass for him. “I just wanna know if he’s doing okay.” Kyle’s eyes slide past Dick to the bar, where a flap of newspaper hangs off. Bruce Wayne’s beaming face is there on the cover and it takes Kyle a moment to realize that that Bruce Wayne is the one that Kyle knows, professionally and otherwise-ish. And Dick Grayson is his…son?
"Can I ask you a personal question? Are you legally, like…Bruce’s kid?"
"Yep, he’s just been Damian as far as I know." He takes a sip of his water, glancing back following Kyle’s gaze until he sees the picture. "Yeah. A few years ago, Bruce legally adopted me. When I was a kid, I was just his ward, ‘cause I didn’t want another ‘father’."
Kyle thinks about Dick, and then Roy. And Tim for that matter; when he first became GL, Tim was the Robin he’d met. “Cass too?” Kyle asks cautiously, not knowing if this was icy ground or not, Batfamily inter-relations. The gyoza comes next and Kyle taps at it with his chopsticks, indicating for Dick to dig in.
Dickiebird nods, eagerly taking one. “Yep. She’s a legal Wayne, too. Y’know, actually, it’s funny to think about it, because I think Tim’s the only one who’s really used the Wayne name in public.”
Kyle dips the gyoza, effectively soaking it in the sauce. “Oh yeah? How come?”
Dickiebird shrugs. “He’s used to Wayne’s World, I guess. His family went in the same circles, so it’s just kinda fitting, I guess. The rest of us are just too stubborn to fit in nicely.” He grins. “Plus, it’s easier for us to pass on work if we feign ignorance of everything Wayne related.”
(Hoodie is watching both of them, out of the corner of his eye, when the waitress finally approaches him again. Her smile is still in place when she asks if he wants something to eat—she notices that he hasn’t drank the tea, not really; his hand curls around the short, beige porcelain cup—and he looks up and over at her, from under the rim of the maroon hooded sweatshirt.)
"Wayne’s World, Wayne’s World. Party time, excellent," Kyle sing-songs, like the movie. He laughs, because it’s the first time he’s connected Bruce Wayne to that 90’s skit-turn-movie hit. The ramen comes quickly, but it’s still quite hot. "Yeah. Anyway."
Dickiebird laughs and shakes his head. “Bruce was so glad when I stopped putting that on after every gala, let me tell you.”
"Heh…" Kyle looks down at his ring for a moment, twisting it against his finger. "Must’ve driven him nuts, huh."
Dickiebird ”In a loving sort of way.” He points his chopsticks at Kyle’s ring. “Is that still acting up?”
Hoodie reaches over for the chopsticks that had been laying on the counter, and wraps a fist around them, resting the heel of his palm against the counter. Rising up in the stool, he grabs the back of the girl’s ponytail and jerks her head forward—her hands fly out, fluttering in midair, the shock of the sudden movement leaving her unsure of where to hold on—before driving his arm down, elbow pistoning, onto the top of the wooden utensils. He doesn’t watch as the soft swallow under her chin rupture, wood sinking through her tongue and up into her skull, and instead, focuses the black of his eyes on the two men in the booth, nostrils flaring slightly at the smell.
Hoodie moves up, when the girl’s arms jerk—booted foot planting against the crackled pleather seat of the stool— and up, onto the bar surface. He roots his sole against the back of her neck, forcing the chopsticks further in until the movement stops, and it isn’t until he’s up and walking across the length of it, that someone—another waitress, seeing the slick of crimson across the wooden counter as the first girl falls—screams.
His eyes flit to the sudden movement at the bar, mouth dropping open in shock as he watches the individual do that to the server. The newspaper flutters to the floor, Bruce Wayne still smiling blandly up. It’s the only thing moving once the chopsticks plunge into the poor girl and everyone else in the restaurant has the same expression that is likely on Kyle’s face. The thing is - Kyle doesn’t move. He stays put, staring dumbly like any other harmless civilian, jaw clenching and Kyle finds he almost wants to go back to eating. “Dick—” he manages to say, his voice strangled, pleading with Dick to react. Another girl screams and it’s that noise that sends the rest of the restaurant into chaos.
Dickiebird furrows his brow at the expression on Kyle’s face until he hears the scream. He springs up from his seat, holding his chopsticks like eskrima sticks. People are panicking and starting to move, but it doesn’t take a detective to figure out who the calmest person in the restaurant is. It just makes him harder to reach. “You! Stop!”
Kyle doesn’t really care at this point who sees him change from himself to Lantern; and honestly at this point, no one would remember seeing it - he stands up as well, a large green hand shooting out from his ring and pulling the other waitress away from Hoodie. The hand grabs her by her ponytail and Kyle makes a noise. “No, dammit!” - but still, it is getting her away from the killer.
Kyle doesn’t like using his powers in public in his civvies; it still feels uncomfortable; but right now his uniform isn’t cooperating. Kyle keeps trying to get the patrons and serving staff to safety, for those who haven’t stampeded out. This is Dick’s old stomping grounds, he can handle chopstick killer.
Every step on the counter makes the glasses and dishes vibrate across the nearly sticky particle board surface, and when he launches himself at Dick, the speed is fast—too fast—to be a good sign. Training. Extensive training, and by someone good. When he moves, every dish, cup and glass, on the counter goes flying off, shattering and smashing in every direction, pelting more than just one bystander. There is a stampede of people attempting to leave.
Kyle creates little shields, each emblazoned with ASoIaF crests to protect people from the onslaught of dishware-turned-weapons. The Hoodie is now on Dick, and Kyle shouts at him. “You got him, dude?”
Dickiebird throws up an arm, catching his attacker in the side of the neck, while his other hand reaches to grab his arm and pull him over onto the table behind them. This guy’s good and once again, Dick’s glad to have his excuse of being a cop to fight back.
Hoodie goes liquid, every bone in his body shifting down and into his chest, so he pulls his arms and legs out from under Dick’s body. He jumps up, onto the table, and kicks Dick in the face, the ridged sole of his foot out, bones back.
With the restaurant empty of employees and patrons alike, Kyle approaches the girl slumped on the counter, blood everywhere. It’s clear she’s dead. She couldn’t withstand what Hoodie did to her. He grits his teeth, and with a growl, he turns towards Dick and the Hoodie. Kyle uses a large anvil - heavy, Acme - and sweeps it across the room, catching Hoodie in its wake. Unfortunately, it also catches Dick, and both men go slamming hard against the opposite wall, Hoodie even crashing through into the kitchen.
Hoodie seems to disappear when the dust from the rubble clears.
Dickiebird reels back from the kick, but not enough to fall clear of the anvil. He groans as he pulls himself of the floor from where he’s slumped, shaking his head slightly to clear it. “Where is he?” he yells, his ears ringing.
Kyle has flown over, ready to attack, but he sees…nothing. “Ring scan for traces, I wanna…” He hears Dick, vaguely and looks over in surprise, as he he didn’t realize Dick was also caught in the anvil’s sweep. “Hey. Are you okay? Hoodie’s gone…I don’t know he disappeared, like smoke. Meta.” Kyle snorts, almost sounding disgusted.
"Ring - sweep the area for paranormal activity and—" Kyle looks down at the ring, then smacks his hand in anger, as if it’s the ring’s fault.
Dickiebird rubs his jaw. “No kidding….” His muscles are still tense, ready to move if a surprise attack comes. He looks at Kyle’s ring. “Guess that answers that question.”
Kyle flares momentarily at Dick, “Shut up!” he says, covering his ringed fist with his over hand, in some weird parody of the Robin-stance. “It’s just acting up, that’s all. We’ll - I’ll - find him. We need to call for an ambulance and—”
Hoodie reappears behind Kyle, near the kitchen, but it isn’t an instantaneous snap of motion, instead, it seems as if he materializes—like a zeta transport without a pad—out of nowhere. He slams his hand against the counter, the blade of a large knife slinking against the wood, and plunges it between the man’s shoulder blades, from behind.
Dickiebird reaches to knock Kyle down, grabbing a fallen chair with his other hand and tossing it at the attacker.
Hoodie moves, leaving the knife in Kyle as he jumps up against the seat cushions of a booth, up onto the backing and against the wall. A forward tuck balls him up, and he slams down next to Dick, wrapping his arms around his throat and chest. He drops his mouth to the edge of Dick’s ear and whispers: “Where is he?"
Kyle freezes, momentarily confused. It’s like a thin hard thing against his back, something Kyle wants to irritably bat away, except when he moves his arm there is an excruciating pain. “Wha—” Kyle says, still uncomprehending as he staggers forward, pushed down by Dick as a chair whizzes over his head. “Wh—”
Dickiebird grasps at the man holding him with his fingers, trying to dig them into anything he can reach. “Who?” He squirms, trying to find relief for his throat.
Kyle can’t hear them but even hunched on his knees (still confused by the feeling in his back and why it wasn’t going away) Kyle can see them. He tries to think - vice, gun, baseball bat - anything to get Hoodie off of Dick. All he can construct is a large feather, which ends up…tickling Hoodie. It’s embarrassing, to say the least. He feels dizzy but he still refuses to acknowledge the pain, hoping the feather is enough to distract Hoodie and give Dick the upperhand again.
Hoodie closes his arm around Dick’s neck, tighter. “I can smell him on you—both of you, but him—” He looks to Kyle, where the thick river of blood has started to course down his back, pooling under his bent knees where he lays. “—in particular—” The man’s voice is serpentine, low and inhuman, as is the strength of his arm and it turns thick when he digs his nails into Dick’s hairline, as if he means to scalp him with only that, as the feather works its way over. It provides a moment of distraction, and—unbelievably—when he reaches out he is able to work his hand around the feather, binding it around Dick’s neck like a rope.
"Magician!" He bellows, at Kyle, the swarthiness of his countenance making the black of his eyes brighter.
Dickiebird gags, his mouth opening and closing like a fish as he writhes in the hold. He drives his heel down onto the man’s shin. “…’s not… ‘ere!” He really needs Kyle to get up, to get his ring working again, because Dick can’t reach his pockets to activate his comm to call for help.
Kyle stares again, shocked for the second time in the short amount of time, and stymied yet again, as he had multiple times this afternoon. His concentration is shot, and he’s disoriented and by god he’s glad he isn’t in GL uniform right now, because he’d be making a mockery out of it with his current behavior. Kyle feels the blood wetting the knees of his jeans and he wonders for a moment if it’s his knees that are busted up. He gasps, extending his ring towards Hoodie when the man screams out that word, that name Damian used to use to address Zee.
"SHUT. UP!" A large rabbit appears, takes Hoodie’s hood into its large buck teeth and pulls him upwards off of Dick. The bunny mauls him in the air, making a deathly, rabbit-scream noise.
Hoodie disappears into the bunny, consumed by it. Even the soles of his boots disappear and he is gone, inside of the construct, the room settling into silence. A few seconds later, however, in the belly of the rabbit, blackness begins to spread. It seeps from a dark patch on its fur, like cancer, and it doubles, triples its cell, wrapping seeping through capillaries and veins, the animal jerking and spasming in a pantomime of agony.
Dickiebird drops to the floor, panting, as the attacker is grabbed. He crawls to Kyle, touching his shoulder. “We need…. You need to get to the Tower.” He looks back at the rabbit, staring in horror. “We need back up.” He grabs a shard of a broken bowl, tucking the smooth edge of it against his palm.
It’s not just the construct that the Hooded creature is seeping into. That construct is sketched out from Kyle’s will, his own concentration and imagination. His drive and motivation. To watch it become corrupted before his eyes isn’t merely audience, it’s participation. Kyle gags, almost feeling the blackness clogging his own throat. For a moment, he remembers Cachement - the Heliodrome, the liquid sucking him and Damian into drowning, filling them both up. Except that liquid was golden and bright. This was rotten and hopeless.
"Damian…" Kyle burbles, and he does one last thing, waving his hand at Dick, to make him stand back. Kyle staggers up to his feet, one hand supporting his ring hand as he wills the rabbit - blackness and all, back. Back in. The construct doesn’t dissolve, it’s pulled back into Kyle’s ring, willfully, by force. It belongs to him, and it’s still his construct and his creation, even warped and blasphemed on by this Hooded monster.
Bruce crackles in, on the comms. “Has the situation been neutralized?”
Dickiebird grabs his comm, shoving it in his ear. “NO! Maybe. Kyle’s hurt bad. What the hell is that?”
Kyle sucks in a breath, blackness filling his eyes, overlapping the glowing green with a thick viscous pitch. The knife still protrudes from his back, Kyle’s half-curled slump accommodating for it as he stays upright.
Hoodie murmurs, softly, into Kyle’s neck, inaudible to anyone else: “..you."
Bruce pauses, only long enough to keep his tongue in check and then utters, over the comms. “Sending the Batmobile to your coordinates. If you haven’t been seen yet, don’t start now.”
Kyle expels a breath hard, and collapses onto the ground, face first into his own blood. His teeth crack and shatter on one side of his mouth as he hits the linoleum, passed out.
Dickiebird taps his comm again. “We’ve destroyed a restaurant, I think we’ve got ‘seen’ covered.” He crouches at Kyle’s side, propping him up on his shoulder so Kyle’s not drowning in blood.
[Ring Txt to Dick] Gotham’s a good place to ask, idk why but it is.
Dickiebird jumps as his phone chimes in his ear, realizing too late that sleeping on your phone is a terrible idea no matter what it seems at the time. [TEXT] Yeah, yeah gothams’s god. partifc place?
Dickiebird goes to wash his face and wake up a little more, turning down the phone’s volume, oh lord, his ear.
[Ring Txt] AHAHAH Gotham’s god. Freudian slip? Where?? Kyle is a little surprised that his ring is working okay right now. It seems to only work when…no that’d be ridiculous.
Dickiebird feels much more together now and groans at his previous texts. [TEXT] Dude, you don’t even know. I just woke up, man. Idk, man, anywhere’s good. What’re you hungry for?
[Ring Txt] Soup. Ramen? Tell me a good place in the Big G and I’ll meet you there.
Dickiebird [TEXT] Wow, OK, will do. Hang on.
Kyle gets the name and coords from Dick and then spends a while finding it, after trying to ask a few different belligerent Gothamites. His ring has decided to be useless again, so Kyle hoofs it on the subway. Which actually proves to be kind of fun; like the NY Subway system, only more frustrating and with angrier people. Good times. Kyle gets to the ramen shop and waits outside, since it’s cold but rather clement.
(Hoodie is good at what he does. He doesn’t make himself obvious as he walks behind Kyle as he exits the subway. The wind stirs up the leaves and particulate debris around their feet, as he shuffles in the crowd, emerging up out of Gotham’s underbelly.)
Dickiebird arrives on his motorcycle (the non-Night Bike, sadly) and grins when he sees Kyle. “Hey, ‘mano! You like it?” He gestures at the restaurant: “Ramen Are Created Equal”. “It’s my kind of place!”
(Hoodie stops at the bodega on the corner of the street, bending to look at the front page of the Gotham Gazette.)
The area Dick’s chosen is a rather eclectic-looking shopping/entertainment district of Gotham. So still dark and musty and seemingly covered in industrial-era soot, but with coloured Christmas lights and families cruising the sidewalk. And about 46.7% less shady-looking individuals on the street corners. Awesome. He grins when he sees Dick and then looks up at the awning with the ramen shop name.
"Oh my god, that’s hilarious." They hustle in, the windows of the shop already steamed up. "Woo, I forgot how cold it gets on the East Coast, man."
Dickiebird chuckles. “I know, right? I think I’ve been spending too much time in Coast. I’m starting to feel it.”
The ramen on the menu are listed by region, so Kyle opts for the Kyoto one, as well as some gyoza to share. He also gets a Japanese beer, because why not. When in Gotham…only that doesn’t really make any sense, but whatever. Kyle dismisses his meandering (avoidant?) thoughts and drums his fingers on the table. “How’s the Haven? Still dealing with the crooked cop sitch?”
Dickiebird groans and nods, ordering his own. “So far no more leads in-department, but I’ve started looking into it on my own. On the side, as it were.”
(Hoodie enters the shop after a few minutes, the Gotham Gazette in his hand—Bruce Wayne is on the cover, all smiles as he cuts the ribbon on a youth center in the East End—and settles in at the bar. He doesn’t order anything but takes part in the free hot tea that the server puts in front of him.)
"Ha ha, on the side. Like french fries. Nightwing the side-dish." Kyle toys with the little dish meant for soy sauce, quiet for a moment. "You ever hear from Damian? I know he’s training and all, but you ever phoned him up or anything?"
Dickiebird shakes his head. “Not recently. When I was at the Manor more, I talked to him for a bit, but it wasn’t much more than talking about his training.” He cocks his head. “Why?”
(Hoodie looks over at the two of them when the subject changes, something piquing his interest.)
Kyle looks vaguely relieved. “But you have chatted with him now and then. And he’s okay, right? Other than being grouchy, as per usual,” Kyle smiles a bit, looking up with a breath of thanks to the server when she brings his beer and pours it into the small glass for him. “I just wanna know if he’s doing okay.” Kyle’s eyes slide past Dick to the bar, where a flap of newspaper hangs off. Bruce Wayne’s beaming face is there on the cover and it takes Kyle a moment to realize that that Bruce Wayne is the one that Kyle knows, professionally and otherwise-ish. And Dick Grayson is his…son?
"Can I ask you a personal question? Are you legally, like…Bruce’s kid?"
"Yep, he’s just been Damian as far as I know." He takes a sip of his water, glancing back following Kyle’s gaze until he sees the picture. "Yeah. A few years ago, Bruce legally adopted me. When I was a kid, I was just his ward, ‘cause I didn’t want another ‘father’."
Kyle thinks about Dick, and then Roy. And Tim for that matter; when he first became GL, Tim was the Robin he’d met. “Cass too?” Kyle asks cautiously, not knowing if this was icy ground or not, Batfamily inter-relations. The gyoza comes next and Kyle taps at it with his chopsticks, indicating for Dick to dig in.
Dickiebird nods, eagerly taking one. “Yep. She’s a legal Wayne, too. Y’know, actually, it’s funny to think about it, because I think Tim’s the only one who’s really used the Wayne name in public.”
Kyle dips the gyoza, effectively soaking it in the sauce. “Oh yeah? How come?”
Dickiebird shrugs. “He’s used to Wayne’s World, I guess. His family went in the same circles, so it’s just kinda fitting, I guess. The rest of us are just too stubborn to fit in nicely.” He grins. “Plus, it’s easier for us to pass on work if we feign ignorance of everything Wayne related.”
(Hoodie is watching both of them, out of the corner of his eye, when the waitress finally approaches him again. Her smile is still in place when she asks if he wants something to eat—she notices that he hasn’t drank the tea, not really; his hand curls around the short, beige porcelain cup—and he looks up and over at her, from under the rim of the maroon hooded sweatshirt.)
"Wayne’s World, Wayne’s World. Party time, excellent," Kyle sing-songs, like the movie. He laughs, because it’s the first time he’s connected Bruce Wayne to that 90’s skit-turn-movie hit. The ramen comes quickly, but it’s still quite hot. "Yeah. Anyway."
Dickiebird laughs and shakes his head. “Bruce was so glad when I stopped putting that on after every gala, let me tell you.”
"Heh…" Kyle looks down at his ring for a moment, twisting it against his finger. "Must’ve driven him nuts, huh."
Dickiebird ”In a loving sort of way.” He points his chopsticks at Kyle’s ring. “Is that still acting up?”
Hoodie reaches over for the chopsticks that had been laying on the counter, and wraps a fist around them, resting the heel of his palm against the counter. Rising up in the stool, he grabs the back of the girl’s ponytail and jerks her head forward—her hands fly out, fluttering in midair, the shock of the sudden movement leaving her unsure of where to hold on—before driving his arm down, elbow pistoning, onto the top of the wooden utensils. He doesn’t watch as the soft swallow under her chin rupture, wood sinking through her tongue and up into her skull, and instead, focuses the black of his eyes on the two men in the booth, nostrils flaring slightly at the smell.
Hoodie moves up, when the girl’s arms jerk—booted foot planting against the crackled pleather seat of the stool— and up, onto the bar surface. He roots his sole against the back of her neck, forcing the chopsticks further in until the movement stops, and it isn’t until he’s up and walking across the length of it, that someone—another waitress, seeing the slick of crimson across the wooden counter as the first girl falls—screams.
His eyes flit to the sudden movement at the bar, mouth dropping open in shock as he watches the individual do that to the server. The newspaper flutters to the floor, Bruce Wayne still smiling blandly up. It’s the only thing moving once the chopsticks plunge into the poor girl and everyone else in the restaurant has the same expression that is likely on Kyle’s face. The thing is - Kyle doesn’t move. He stays put, staring dumbly like any other harmless civilian, jaw clenching and Kyle finds he almost wants to go back to eating. “Dick—” he manages to say, his voice strangled, pleading with Dick to react. Another girl screams and it’s that noise that sends the rest of the restaurant into chaos.
Dickiebird furrows his brow at the expression on Kyle’s face until he hears the scream. He springs up from his seat, holding his chopsticks like eskrima sticks. People are panicking and starting to move, but it doesn’t take a detective to figure out who the calmest person in the restaurant is. It just makes him harder to reach. “You! Stop!”
Kyle doesn’t really care at this point who sees him change from himself to Lantern; and honestly at this point, no one would remember seeing it - he stands up as well, a large green hand shooting out from his ring and pulling the other waitress away from Hoodie. The hand grabs her by her ponytail and Kyle makes a noise. “No, dammit!” - but still, it is getting her away from the killer.
Kyle doesn’t like using his powers in public in his civvies; it still feels uncomfortable; but right now his uniform isn’t cooperating. Kyle keeps trying to get the patrons and serving staff to safety, for those who haven’t stampeded out. This is Dick’s old stomping grounds, he can handle chopstick killer.
Every step on the counter makes the glasses and dishes vibrate across the nearly sticky particle board surface, and when he launches himself at Dick, the speed is fast—too fast—to be a good sign. Training. Extensive training, and by someone good. When he moves, every dish, cup and glass, on the counter goes flying off, shattering and smashing in every direction, pelting more than just one bystander. There is a stampede of people attempting to leave.
Kyle creates little shields, each emblazoned with ASoIaF crests to protect people from the onslaught of dishware-turned-weapons. The Hoodie is now on Dick, and Kyle shouts at him. “You got him, dude?”
Dickiebird throws up an arm, catching his attacker in the side of the neck, while his other hand reaches to grab his arm and pull him over onto the table behind them. This guy’s good and once again, Dick’s glad to have his excuse of being a cop to fight back.
Hoodie goes liquid, every bone in his body shifting down and into his chest, so he pulls his arms and legs out from under Dick’s body. He jumps up, onto the table, and kicks Dick in the face, the ridged sole of his foot out, bones back.
With the restaurant empty of employees and patrons alike, Kyle approaches the girl slumped on the counter, blood everywhere. It’s clear she’s dead. She couldn’t withstand what Hoodie did to her. He grits his teeth, and with a growl, he turns towards Dick and the Hoodie. Kyle uses a large anvil - heavy, Acme - and sweeps it across the room, catching Hoodie in its wake. Unfortunately, it also catches Dick, and both men go slamming hard against the opposite wall, Hoodie even crashing through into the kitchen.
Hoodie seems to disappear when the dust from the rubble clears.
Dickiebird reels back from the kick, but not enough to fall clear of the anvil. He groans as he pulls himself of the floor from where he’s slumped, shaking his head slightly to clear it. “Where is he?” he yells, his ears ringing.
Kyle has flown over, ready to attack, but he sees…nothing. “Ring scan for traces, I wanna…” He hears Dick, vaguely and looks over in surprise, as he he didn’t realize Dick was also caught in the anvil’s sweep. “Hey. Are you okay? Hoodie’s gone…I don’t know he disappeared, like smoke. Meta.” Kyle snorts, almost sounding disgusted.
"Ring - sweep the area for paranormal activity and—" Kyle looks down at the ring, then smacks his hand in anger, as if it’s the ring’s fault.
Dickiebird rubs his jaw. “No kidding….” His muscles are still tense, ready to move if a surprise attack comes. He looks at Kyle’s ring. “Guess that answers that question.”
Kyle flares momentarily at Dick, “Shut up!” he says, covering his ringed fist with his over hand, in some weird parody of the Robin-stance. “It’s just acting up, that’s all. We’ll - I’ll - find him. We need to call for an ambulance and—”
Hoodie reappears behind Kyle, near the kitchen, but it isn’t an instantaneous snap of motion, instead, it seems as if he materializes—like a zeta transport without a pad—out of nowhere. He slams his hand against the counter, the blade of a large knife slinking against the wood, and plunges it between the man’s shoulder blades, from behind.
Dickiebird reaches to knock Kyle down, grabbing a fallen chair with his other hand and tossing it at the attacker.
Hoodie moves, leaving the knife in Kyle as he jumps up against the seat cushions of a booth, up onto the backing and against the wall. A forward tuck balls him up, and he slams down next to Dick, wrapping his arms around his throat and chest. He drops his mouth to the edge of Dick’s ear and whispers: “Where is he?"
Kyle freezes, momentarily confused. It’s like a thin hard thing against his back, something Kyle wants to irritably bat away, except when he moves his arm there is an excruciating pain. “Wha—” Kyle says, still uncomprehending as he staggers forward, pushed down by Dick as a chair whizzes over his head. “Wh—”
Dickiebird grasps at the man holding him with his fingers, trying to dig them into anything he can reach. “Who?” He squirms, trying to find relief for his throat.
Kyle can’t hear them but even hunched on his knees (still confused by the feeling in his back and why it wasn’t going away) Kyle can see them. He tries to think - vice, gun, baseball bat - anything to get Hoodie off of Dick. All he can construct is a large feather, which ends up…tickling Hoodie. It’s embarrassing, to say the least. He feels dizzy but he still refuses to acknowledge the pain, hoping the feather is enough to distract Hoodie and give Dick the upperhand again.
Hoodie closes his arm around Dick’s neck, tighter. “I can smell him on you—both of you, but him—” He looks to Kyle, where the thick river of blood has started to course down his back, pooling under his bent knees where he lays. “—in particular—” The man’s voice is serpentine, low and inhuman, as is the strength of his arm and it turns thick when he digs his nails into Dick’s hairline, as if he means to scalp him with only that, as the feather works its way over. It provides a moment of distraction, and—unbelievably—when he reaches out he is able to work his hand around the feather, binding it around Dick’s neck like a rope.
"Magician!" He bellows, at Kyle, the swarthiness of his countenance making the black of his eyes brighter.
Dickiebird gags, his mouth opening and closing like a fish as he writhes in the hold. He drives his heel down onto the man’s shin. “…’s not… ‘ere!” He really needs Kyle to get up, to get his ring working again, because Dick can’t reach his pockets to activate his comm to call for help.
Kyle stares again, shocked for the second time in the short amount of time, and stymied yet again, as he had multiple times this afternoon. His concentration is shot, and he’s disoriented and by god he’s glad he isn’t in GL uniform right now, because he’d be making a mockery out of it with his current behavior. Kyle feels the blood wetting the knees of his jeans and he wonders for a moment if it’s his knees that are busted up. He gasps, extending his ring towards Hoodie when the man screams out that word, that name Damian used to use to address Zee.
"SHUT. UP!" A large rabbit appears, takes Hoodie’s hood into its large buck teeth and pulls him upwards off of Dick. The bunny mauls him in the air, making a deathly, rabbit-scream noise.
Hoodie disappears into the bunny, consumed by it. Even the soles of his boots disappear and he is gone, inside of the construct, the room settling into silence. A few seconds later, however, in the belly of the rabbit, blackness begins to spread. It seeps from a dark patch on its fur, like cancer, and it doubles, triples its cell, wrapping seeping through capillaries and veins, the animal jerking and spasming in a pantomime of agony.
Dickiebird drops to the floor, panting, as the attacker is grabbed. He crawls to Kyle, touching his shoulder. “We need…. You need to get to the Tower.” He looks back at the rabbit, staring in horror. “We need back up.” He grabs a shard of a broken bowl, tucking the smooth edge of it against his palm.
It’s not just the construct that the Hooded creature is seeping into. That construct is sketched out from Kyle’s will, his own concentration and imagination. His drive and motivation. To watch it become corrupted before his eyes isn’t merely audience, it’s participation. Kyle gags, almost feeling the blackness clogging his own throat. For a moment, he remembers Cachement - the Heliodrome, the liquid sucking him and Damian into drowning, filling them both up. Except that liquid was golden and bright. This was rotten and hopeless.
"Damian…" Kyle burbles, and he does one last thing, waving his hand at Dick, to make him stand back. Kyle staggers up to his feet, one hand supporting his ring hand as he wills the rabbit - blackness and all, back. Back in. The construct doesn’t dissolve, it’s pulled back into Kyle’s ring, willfully, by force. It belongs to him, and it’s still his construct and his creation, even warped and blasphemed on by this Hooded monster.
Bruce crackles in, on the comms. “Has the situation been neutralized?”
Dickiebird grabs his comm, shoving it in his ear. “NO! Maybe. Kyle’s hurt bad. What the hell is that?”
Kyle sucks in a breath, blackness filling his eyes, overlapping the glowing green with a thick viscous pitch. The knife still protrudes from his back, Kyle’s half-curled slump accommodating for it as he stays upright.
Hoodie murmurs, softly, into Kyle’s neck, inaudible to anyone else: “..you."
Bruce pauses, only long enough to keep his tongue in check and then utters, over the comms. “Sending the Batmobile to your coordinates. If you haven’t been seen yet, don’t start now.”
Kyle expels a breath hard, and collapses onto the ground, face first into his own blood. His teeth crack and shatter on one side of his mouth as he hits the linoleum, passed out.
Dickiebird taps his comm again. “We’ve destroyed a restaurant, I think we’ve got ‘seen’ covered.” He crouches at Kyle’s side, propping him up on his shoulder so Kyle’s not drowning in blood.