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thejusticelounge2014-05-05 06:53 pm
bossymarmalade) wrote in thejusticelounge2014-05-05 06:53 pm
eyes on me in the centre of the ring
Dickiebird sits in the cafeteria surrounded by papers, pausing in reading to scribble down something on a yellow legal pad beside his nearly untouched coffee.
Ollie wanders into the cafeteria, looking vaguely towards the food, then at the tables. Then back at the food. He actually makes a start towards the serving counter before changing his mind and going to the tables, plopping down at the one Dick’s at. “Ngugh,” Ollie grunts. Dickiebird looks up, eyebrows raised in mild concern. “You OK there, Ollie?”
Ollie gestures at the paper mess strewn over the table. “Could ask you the same thing. Is this fallout from the thing that happened? I read the report last night, catching up.” He crinkles his nose. “Dirty cops and drugs, not a good combo.”
Dickiebird scrunches his mouth. “Not good at all. This is…” He looks around at the scattered papers as if they’ll give him a concise way to summarize them. “…Yeah, fallout, I guess, and new options. Or, potential new options. And…old options.”
Ollie blinks at him. “Huh?”
Dickiebird sets the papers in his hand aside. “I’m thinking about leaving the BPD, and maybe Blüdhaven altogether. Might not be permanent, but just until… Just for a while.”
Ollie picks up one of the papers, glancing at it but not registering the words, then putting it down again. “So which one’s the new option?” he asks. “As far as I know, you’ve been through those options before, haven’t you?”
Dickiebird snorts. “All of them. Gotham’s the fallback, or New York to meet up with some of the older Titans, or…. The new option is probably the oldest, in some ways.” He sifts through the papers until he finds the one he wants and hands it to Ollie. It’s a flyer for Haly’s Circus. “I still own it, I still know a lot of the people there, and… I don’t know, it just seems like a valid option at this point.” He gestures to his legal pad. “I’ve been trying to do a cost-benefit analysis of sorts to figure out if it’s actually a viable one. So far it’s pretty even, but I haven’t got too far.”
Ollie raises his eyebrows at the flyer, then sits up, forward, holding it with both hands. “Hang on a minute,” he says. “What would this entail? I mean owning it, yeah, that makes sense especially given the sentimental value, but what does that mean in terms of an option for what you’ll do when you leave the BPD?” He looks down at the flyer. It’s an older one, he can tell from the layout and style, probably from when Dick took over financing the circus rather than one of their newer ads. But the colour is still vibrant, the edges of the paper tremblingly crisp. “Not that I’m dissuading you,” he clarifies, gaze tracing the upraised trunk of the elephant. “But I’m assuming you’re not about to go back to trapezing under the big top.”
"Couldn’t really if I wanted to keep being Nightwing. But you’ve gotta admit, ‘Traveling Vigilante’ sounds pretty cool." He gathers a few papers, trying to organize as best he could. "There’s been some talks about trying to set up a permanent place for the circus. The travelling’s always been a big part of it, but if it had a good spot in a decent town, it could probably last. A big enough city and it should still make enough business. If it did, I could almost take over for Pop completely as manager."
Ollie hands him back the flyer. “Where does this option rank for you? In relation to the others. Moving back to the Manor or heading out to meet up with the old gang.”
Dickiebird sets the flyer gently down on top of a stack. “About second place, actually. The Manor’s number one, since I’m already there for now, but I don’t know how permanent that’ll stay. The hardest thing about the circus would be convincing everyone to settle down… and finding a good city. As much as Gotham would be good business-wise, I couldn’t ask them to move the circus there permanently. So that leaves me at the Manor or finding a different city for the circus, and pretty much right back where I started.”
"You mean Gotham would be good for you, business-wise? Or d’you mean that it would be good for the circus, monetarily?" He scratches his beard. "Anyhow, I think finding a different city isn’t a bad idea, Dick. There’s lots of real estate out there, money’s no obstacle, and you can choose somewhere that’s close to friends and also feasible for the circus folk. And let’s face it — anywhere you choose, no matter how much you start from scratch?" Ollie sits back and folds his hands over his stomach. "It’s gonna be less back-where-you-started than living in the Manor."
Dickiebird chuckles. “That’s true. Nothing like leaving your job to move back in with Dad.” He searched through a couple piles, ignoring the things that slipped off the table as he dug until he reached a stack of city maps. “I think a different city might be good. With the zeta pads, it’s not like I’m every really that far away from anyone, so maybe setting up in a different city…. If it is gonna be a permanent circus, we need some place with pretty constant good weather, which… is not really Gotham at all, now that I think about it.” He grinned. “Could Star use an ex-traveling circus by any chance?”
Ollie grins widely back. “Far be it from me to dissuade businesses from moving to my fairest of burghs!” he laughs. “But I wonder if you shouldn’t consider somewhere with more tourist draw? In Nevada, or further south in Cali. Let’s face it, unless you reach de Soleil notoriety, a circus isn’t gonna be a destination, and you can’t rely on the locals alone.”
Dickiebird laughs. “The only way to compete with them would be having the elephants up on the high wire, and we don’t have nearly the budget for those kinds of costumes!” He leans back, stretching his legs out. “A well-traveled area might be better, yeah. Maybe along one of the major highways, or outside of LA or Vegas or somewhere. Somewhere people’ll want to come out during the day. I hope Pop won’t mind staying on as, like, a managerial consultant. There’s a lot more business than I have savvy involved here.”
"It’s a good idea, keeping him on. Even if the old guy’s retirement age, it’ll give him something to do. Make him feel needed and give’im a hand in the business that’s got his name on it. That can be pretty important to the self-esteem, take it from me." Ollie looks over at the food, stomach rumbling. "I better grab something to eat before we get any further into this conversation. You want anything?"1
Dickiebird blinks, taking a second to check in with himself if he really did need food. He’d been going over things so long he’d gone into Bat-at-work mode. “Uh…yeah, actually, that sounds… Y’know what? I’ll come with you.” He grabs his coffee— his cold coffee now— and stands up to follow Ollie. “And how’ve you been? It feels like it’s been ages since we last talked.”
Ollie grunts, collecting a tray and starting to load up on danish. “No kidding. Last time I was up here for any sustained amount of time was … when that shit with the HSR went down, I think? Seems so long ago.” He shakes his head, ordering salmon and mashed potatoes and a side of meatballs. “I had to deal with Shado. I’ve told you about her. Can’t remember if you were still around here when she showed up, or if you were already entangled in your Bludhaven sting?…”
Dickiebird freezes for just a second as he dumps his coffee. “I think I read about her coming up in the log, but I didn’t— I wasn’t focused on it. What was she…? Did she track you down or did you invite her back—?” Into your life, is the obvious unspoken finish, but the way Dick’s mouth puckers means he’s upset at himself for even starting that sentence.
Ollie stops as he’s getting a fountain cup. “Invite her back?” he repeats incredulously. “Jesus, Dick — I’m not that self-loathing! And even if I were, there’s a bunch of people who’d object. /Strongly/. Upside my head.”
Dickiebird raises a hand apologetically. “I know, I know, I regret that entire question. It’s just… that was a little hard to wrap my head around.” He shakes his head and orders some tortilla soup. “So, she’s back and how’s that going? You need help with her or anything, or…?”
Ollie shakes his head, catching his empty cup as it nearly topples off his tray. “No, she — she wanted to cut ties with the League of Assassins. The whole witness protection type dealie, y’know? Change how she looks and whisk Tak off somewhere to start a new life.” Ollie watched the server ladle out soup, his tentacles strewing garnishes across the top with ease and efficiency. “The kids and me went to get Tak, and Kate and Bruce got to guard Shado. I /asked/ them to guard Shado.” He grimaced. “And you probably know how well that went.”
KSpenz has been chatting with Erikas, another one of her and Mar’i’s group, who’d been a politics student, not all that long ago, before he’d come out as a man and had to leave Vilnius in a hurry. As such he has a decided opinion about the situation in Ukraine…and plenty of other points. When it comes to Eastern Europe, though, he easily outscores Kate’s relatively limited knowledge, and she’s a bit wiped by the time she zetas up to the Watchtower to check the reports on Shado (not enough movement for Kate’s liking—too quiet) and get some lunch.
Dickiebird takes his soup, petting the back of a tentacle in thanks, which earned him an extra roll. “Guarding an ex-assassin while you retrieve her kid… Yeah, I can see how that would go well.” He’s almost finished getting his drink when things fall into place. “Is that why Bruce hasn’t been to the Manor, like, at all lately? Did something happen?”
Ollie comes up short again, and this time the cup really does roll off his tray. “Oh, man,” he says. “Yeah. Yeah, Shado shot him in the chest, with an arrow. He’ll be okay, though,” Ollie rushes to add. “You know our Bruce. Takes more than an assassin’s arrow to the heart to keep him down.”
KSpenz wanders into the cafe, looking a little bit dazed. She makes a note on her tablet to have some of the braised beef sent to the brig for dinner, but turns away from it with a wince, ordering jiaozi and a green bean/kai-lan stirfry along with (sorta disparate, but hey) coffee.
Dickiebird blanches. “She shot him in the HEART?!” He realizes a second later that that was really loud and Ollie just said Bruce is gonna be OK. Still. “Why did she—? How long ago? Is he up here? Oh god, somebody’s gotta tell Alfred.”
KSpenz turns at Dick’s exclamation, because even that can draw her out of reverie, before turning back to accept her plate and chopsticks with an embarrassed smile.
Ollie , fortunately, is never startled by loud exclamations and so he just bends to pick up his cup. “Alfred knows,” he assures Dick. “Helped with the patching-up duties. And Kate—” Ollie notices his wife collecting her food back down the line and waves at her. “Kate! Katie, c’mere! Dick wants to know how B’s doing!” He says to Dick as he fills up his cup with root beer, “She helped him get the chest armour and stuff off.”
Dickiebird sighs a bit when he learns that Alfred already knows. If Alfred’s taking care of him, Bruce really will be fine. He gives Kate a thin smile, still trying to process everything. “How bad did he get shot? Did it go through the armor or get stuck?”
KSpenz blinks several times before trailing over towards Ollie and Dick, lifting an eyebrow. “It was ugly?” she offers. “But he’ll be all right. The armor slowed it down a lot, meant things were more just ugly and painful than deadly.” Kate doesn’t really want to think about the armor incident while she’s eating, and settles down with her food and a slightly queasy expression. ”Through the armor. But only some, it wasn’t a through and through.”
Ollie says hastily, “Yeah, exactly, looked worse than it was. Good thing he was all suited up for it.” He drinks half his cup of root beer, a faint sweat breaking out over his brow. “And Shado’s, uh, in lockup. Up here.”
Dickiebird visibly relaxes as he puts that all together. “OK. OK, good, yeah, panic over.” He heads back to settle in at his table before Ollie’s words click. “Wait, she’s up here? Is that really a good idea? Is that where she was when she shot him?” He looks between the two of them and plops down. “Man, I’ve missed a lot.”
KSpenz teases out a green bean with her chopsticks, and has a moment of preternaturally sensing that somewhere, Kyle Rayner is making an ass of himself. She snorts and eats the veggie. ”No, we were in Star. And better she’s in the brig here than planetside. There’s nowhere good to keep her.”
Ollie plucks a frondy piece of kai-lan from Kate’s dish, munching on the stem end first. “God knows, things can go wrong with these LoA types in a heartbeat,” he says glumly. “Now we just gotta figure out what to DO with her. Especially since we’ve got Tak. And he’s a teenager.”
Dickiebird frowns in confusion. “He’s a teenager? How long ago was that that she… That…. Were you even Green Arrow then?”
KSpenz mutters, “Maybe try asking him what he wants from life?” She wipes the table where the sauce has splattered from Ollie’s theft. “Then plan from there.”
Ollie swipes his fingers over where Kate’s already wiped. “Well, yeah, I mean — he gets a say in what happens to him, of course. But he /is/ still a kid, Kate. He doesn’t get free rein in the situation.” Ollie starts to eat the rim of one of his danishes, telling Dick, “No, no — he got artificially aged up nine years. Some kind of craziness with Dr. Sivana.” He shudders. “Those mad scientist types fuckin’ creep me out.”
Dickiebird is used to mad scientist types and nods like this now makes perfect sense. “Well, that’s gotta be…interesting at home. I’m guessing he’s at home with you guys and not up here with mom.”
"No, but…" Kate makes a grouchy little noise, brow furrowed, and stabs at the dumplings. She’s not going to give Ollie grief about this right here and now. ”She doesn’t know where he is. Probably guesses.”
Ollie grunts, discarding the apple middle of his danish after eating the pastry rim. “Well, so be it. I’m not gonna try to hide Tak anywhere new. Mia’s watching the kid like a hawk, and she’s brilliant at it — his guard’s coming down, but hers isn’t. I’m sure Shado knows I have him. And she’s just gonna have to fucking suck it up, after all this time wanting me out of his life.” He folds the next danish in half and mows through it in three bites, scowling the whole time.
KSpenz steals the apple part because that’s the best part, god, Ollie.
Dickiebird gnaws on his roll a bit and watches the two of them. “How long are you planning to keep her here?”
KSpenz merely looks at Ollie, because this is his idea, after all.
Ollie coughs, thumps his chest, and drinks the rest of his soda. “I don’t know,” he mutters. “I should — I need to …” his eyes are darting, over their plates, over at the food counter, over the other tables, and it becomes very clear as Ollie plucks at his napkin with tight, stiff fingers: he doesn’t want to think about this.
KSpenz reaches out and puts a hand over Ollie’s wrist, gently. “Once we have a plan in place, we’ll know,” she says to Dick, because lawyer, and then eats some of the kai-lan with deliberate bites. "But probably not too long. She’s still recovering, physically, anyway."
Dickiebird nods. “And once she recovers, she’ll probably really want to get out of here, right? I’m guessing she’ll just be more dangerous not recovering, so… Yeah, plan.” He glances at the two of them. “But you’re two of the best at planning in the League. I’m sure it won’t take too long.”
KSpenz wipes her lips rather daintily with her napkin. “Not that I don’t think she could make a lot of trouble. More trouble.”
"I’m honestly not sure /what/ she’ll want when she’s recovered. I’ve never been real good at predicting her." Ollie pokes at his heap of mashed potatoes, then sighs and puts down his fork, rubbing his forehead. "Fuck. I just don’t know."
"We’ll figure out what Tak wants to be and should be doing. Then sort out where she goes from there." Kate’s expression is more than a bit determined, by now, and she eats another couple dumplings. "Unless it’s all an act, I get the feeling he wants to try being a normal guy for a little while."
Dickiebird pats Ollie’s shoulder. KSpenz makes some mental notes about things to talk about with Ollie and continues eating.
Ollie smiles wanly at Dick, patting his hand back. “You seem pretty set on this idea of letting Tak decide everything for himself,” he says to Kate, sitting back in his chair. “Is that seriously what you think is the best thing?”
"I don’t think he should decide everything for himself, because he’s got, at best, the judgement ability of a teenage boy. But I think he should have a pretty decent say in what he ends up doing, or otherwise he’ll end up unhappy and blaming you for it." And do we really need another trained assassin-type pissed off at us, is unspoken but heavily implied, as is Kate’s own experience of being moved from pillar to post.
Ollie frowns. “Isn’t that what I’ve been saying?”
"No, you’ve been calling him kid and acting like you don’t know what to do with him now that you have him." KSpenz looks up from her food, realizes that Dick and about half the side of the cafeteria are staring at her because she’s said that pretty loud, and winces. "Maybe we should talk about this later."
Dickiebird is just gonna sit here and eat his soup casually, nope, no arguments here, just soup. Mmm, soup.
"Asking him what he wants out of life and not knowing what to do with him aren’t mutually exclusive, Kate!" Ollie, as per usual, has no compunctions about talking about whatever he feels like, in front of whoever. "And I’m pretty damn certain that if I’d HAD a set plan in stone about what to do with the kid — and yeah, he’s still a fucking KID — you’d be scolding me about that, too! Jesus!"
"I’m not scolding you, jesuschrist,” Kate mutters, going to smouldering cold rather than explosive in her fury. “I’m sorry, Dick—please excuse me. I’ll send you updates on how Bruce is doing, or glare at him until he does it himself like a grown man.” She stabs one last dumpling and chews it violently before getting up from the table with her empty plates, and steals the last centre of Ollie’s danish before stalking out.
Ollie scrunches down more in his chair, folding his arms. “Yeah, sorry,” he grunts at Dick, not very graciously. “This whole situation’s kinda got me fuckin’ spinning like a damn tetherball, y’know?”
"Thanks," Dick says softly as Kate leaves, sitting back in his seat. "No, it’s all right. That’s… It sounds like an awful lot to handle all at once."
Ollie gives a tired, if real smile. “It kinda is,” he admits. “I just … I dunno, Dick. Seeing Bruce shot like that, it … for the first time, it really drove him what Shado’d done to me. All these years I’ve been saying that she wasn’t all that bad, that she’d /meant/ to miss my heart and not kill me so she wasn’t a stone cold murderer, but that. The bloody fucking mess it made of Bruce, and /he/ was wearing armour.” Ollie shuts his eyes tight. “I feel like I’m finally done with her. Done making excuses for her.”
Dickiebird grips Ollie’s arm in solidarity. “Good. I mean, that’s quite a place to get to, especially after everything, but that’s really good. That’s probably the best place to end up, all things considered.”
Ollie holds Dick’s gaze for a while. “Yeah. If I got anything out of this, I can say that. It’s shitty that it took her shooting somebody I love to make me stop.”
Dickiebird gives him a tight smile. “It’s amazing what we can forgive or ignore when it only affects us, but as soon as it brings loved ones into it….”
Ollie is quiet for a minute before saying, “…how’re you doing on that end?”
Dickiebird feels like he should’ve been expecting that question and yet. “I’m… I’m not thinking about it. Not in the ‘I’m gonna not think about it because then it means it didn’t really happen’ way, just… I don’t find myself thinking about it the way I used to. It’s more of a thing that happened, rather than a /thing that happened/. Maybe it gets easier when they’re dead.” He shrugs, then frowns. “At least, I think she’s dead. She dropped off the map once she got out of Lockhaven, and I haven’t really been in the mood to look for her whereabouts, so….”
"Yeah. I get you. And honestly, it seems like looking for trouble to go hunting." He stretches and then comes back to the table, scooting his chair in and picking up his fork. "Although I’m glad to hear it’s not ambushing you in the middle of sleep anymore, stuff like that." Ollie starts eating with a relish that belies how cold his food’s gotten, alternating salmon with potatoes with meatballs in quick succession.
Dickiebird nods. “Yeah, so am I. Besides, I’ve got enough new stuff to ambush me in my sleep. She can take a break for a while.” Dickiebird after a long moment, adds, “You said you read the report of the ‘Haven sting, yeah? Did I— Have you ever killed someone without meaning to? Is that the same?”
Ollie pauses in his aggressive eating, tapping the table with his finger. “So. Tell me if this affair with Selina and crooked cops is the main reason you’re picking up stakes from the ‘Haven.”
Dickiebird nods. “Yeah, pretty much. I’ve gotta go talk to my Captain, but… I’m starting to think it’s getting too hard to balance both lives, y’know? It’s not like I’m gonna quit being Nightwing, so I’ve only got one other choice.”
Ollie makes an agreeing harrumph around a mouthful of potato. “Being my own boss has been the best, easiest way to keep being an effective vigilante,” he proclaims. “And I mean, hey — everybody takes jobs in their youth that’re meant to prove something. No shame in realizing that it’s time to move onto something else.”
Dickiebird snorts. “So, what you’re saying is I should inherit a huge company and be my own boss.” He glances over at the papers covering the next table— a wise choice on Kate’s part to avoid that table, really. “Well, I guess that puts me back to the circus option.”
Ollie chuckles, wiping his mouth with one of the napkins he’d been tormenting earlier. “Don’t let me sway you, kiddo,” he says. “I mean, in the end, you go with what feels best for you. I’m just saying, you seem to be way more passionate about the circus lights than you ever were about the red and blue.”
Dickiebird laughs. “I guess it was one thing when guys like Peterson were running the PD, but now they’re rare, knock wood. I guess I did what I needed. Time for this roving boy to move on to something new. Or old. Old, but in a new way.”
Damian Wayne seats himself at the table with Queen and Grayson, carrying a bowl of diced chicken and bell pepper strips. “Has Father recovered?” he asks as he sits, interrupting whatever they were saying at the moment. “Has the assailant been punished?”
Dickiebird ”How did everyone hear about this before me? I’m losing my touch, man.”
Ollie takes a strip of pepper from Damian’s bowl, almost immediately. “He’s getting there, and no, not yet,” he says. “I hear /you/ had a little adventure of your own when it comes to getting pierced with sharp things, hey, Damian?”
Damian Wayne curls up the corner of his mouth and swipes one of Queen’s meatballs in retaliation, though he has no intention of eating it. “You have the assassin incarcerated somewhere, then? I would like an audience with her. A private audience,” he adds, spearing a strip of chicken between his incisors. “And— did Father tell you? Did Rayner? No matter. Yes, but it wasn’t nearly the debacle the adults no doubt made it out to be.”
Damian Wayne: Father is highly dramatic without cause at times.
Ollie bites back a grin at this declaration. “Well, I can’t argue with you on that point. Although one could make the argument that it’s in the blood, the dramatics.” He chomps down the pepper and adds, “The assassin’s incarcerated somewhere safe, and no, you can’t have an audience with her. If you like, you can meet her son, though.”
Damian Wayne jostles the table in his frustration. “I have no quarrel with her son! Not yet. And what do you all intend to do with her? She attempted to kill Batman. We cannot let it go unchallenged.”
Ollie ”I didn’t mean you should /challenge/ her son! Just that you two might maybe find some things in common!”
Damian Wayne makes a face at this suggestion. “I hardly need another ‘playmate,’ Queen. Is she on the Tower?” He looks around as if he expects her to stroll through the cafeteria.
Damian Wayne points his fork at Grayson, suddenly. “Grayson! Where is she?”
Ollie grunts. “You’re not getting to see her.”
Dickiebird holds up his hands. “I don’t know! I didn’t even hear about her until about fifteen minutes ago, so don’t look at me.” He gives Ollie a quick amused sort of grimace and stands up. “I’ve got some long thinking to do, so I probably oughta head out. Damian, please don’t try find the assassin. That never ends well for anyone.”
Damian Wayne kicks at Queen’s leg under the table as Grayson rises. “Are you going to ponder what must be done to the assassin? Good. It should be something dreadful.”
Ollie curses and swipes a heavy hand at the side of Damian’s head. “Keep it up and I’ll finish your little tattoo for you!”
Damian Wayne snaps his arm up against his ear to block the strike, ducking his head to the side with a whiny little noise of objection. “It would have been a fine tattoo! And I’ll have it done properly one day, and I don’t care if Father approves of it or not.”
Dickiebird makes a face at Damian and shakes his head. “Yeah, I’ll, uh, get right on that, Damian.” He puts away his tray and moves over to gather his papers, a little surprised at just how many he had spread out. “Make sure you come home tonight, Damian. I’m good to patrol, so you should come with me. And Ollie, I’ll let you know what I decide. Thanks for your advice.” He ruffles Damian’s hair, waves to Ollie, and heads out.
Ollie snorts. “If you’re old enough to have one, then you don’t /need/ his approval, bratling.” He points after Dick with his chin. “You doing patrols with Nightwing these days?”
Damian Wayne seems to settle somewhat now, idly picking at the pepper strips. “Well, maybe I won’t want to wait until I’m so very old. And yes, now that he’s recovered. But I lead on our patrol because I live in Gotham and he doesn’t,” he concludes with conviction.
Ollie nods, his thoughts leading him down another path. “Damian,” he asks slowly, “when you were living with your mom, did you wonder about what life would be like in Gotham? If you were living with your dad?”
Damian Wayne sucks his bottom lip in, eyes lowered as he considers. “Not about the city itself, really. I didn’t think about… daily life. I thought he’d have a castle somewhere, and that Mother and I would join him in it, and then we’d reign over everything.” He looks up, eyes tightening. “Why do you inquire?”
Ollie picks up his fountain drink cup, then puts it back down after remembering it’s empty. “Well. I’ve got my kid here now, and his mom’s the assassin, and I’m trying to get a handle on what I’m in for with him. So I figured, why not ask the resident son-of-an-assassin-mother? I mean, you turned out good. I wanna try and get Tak to follow your example.” He gives Damian a half-smile, curving his hands around the cup.
Damian Wayne raises his brows, eyes round and open beneath them. “He’s your son? Oh,” he repeats dully, having not previously made this connection. Suddenly the encouragement to bond with him makes more sense. “This is strange, that you and Father both have children by members of the League of Assassins. Why do you and Father both have so many children?” His face crushes together in anger as he asks it, but his temper is swift to dissolve on this front and he’s calm when he speaks again. “Was he raised as an assassin himself? Why would the mother of your child seek to kill Batman? Did she make any attempt upon you?”
Ollie says distantly, “Yeah, she did. Years ago.” He smashes his palm against his nose before continuing, “She shot your dad because he was guarding her and she wanted out, that’s all. It wasn’t because he was Batman. She’d’a shot anybody at that point, just to get out.” Ollie leans across the table and snags the remainder of Dick’s drink, slurping it down. “I don’t think he’s an assassin. Although he’s certainly been trained — he can wield a mean katana.”
Damian Wayne shakes his head, slowly, his gaze unfocused as he mentally constructs the scenario with the facts that he does have available. None of them seem quite as relevant as the fact that the mother was part of the LoA, however. “I knew Father was unwise to place any measure of trust in her. You all are. Whether she shot him to escape or did so later, she would have found cause to attack. You all have seen the way my mother operates. You know she cannot be trusted— what makes you think the mother of your child is any different?” He squeezes a napkin in his fist, tearing at its corners with his opposite hand. “If he’s been raised among them, he may have very different ideas regarding the value of human life than you do.”
Ollie doesn’t want to hear this. It’s exactly what he’s feared, when he’s managed to bring himself to think about it, the idea that Tak could have been raised from the sweet baby that Ollie vaguely remembered to a child capable of killing with as much efficiency as the little boy sitting next to him. But that thought melts the chill from his heart, when he looks at Damian, that fondly familiar set of his eyebrows and sturdiness of his body. “He might, at that,” Ollie admits. “You’re right. I should keep that in mind, no matter how harmless he seems.” Ollie reaches over and cups Damian’s shoulder, rubbing his thumb against the boy’s back. “I don’t think he had any other kids around when he was growing up.”
Damian Wayne agrees lowly, “Yes. Keep it in mind at all times.” He’s certain his own father does— something that fosters a sense of relief rather than resentment, in Damian’s case. He rolls his shoulder forward, pushing into the hand that squeezes it rather than retreating this time. He heaves a long sigh, as if resigning himself. “Yes, likely not. I suppose I can meet him at some point.”
Damian Wayne: Is he near my age?
Ollie takes shameless advantage of Damian’s acquiescing to physical contact by leaning over to kiss Damian’s head briefly before sitting back. “He’s eighteen, but he’s supposed to be nine,” he explains. “Got aged up by a mad scientist. Right now he’s sticking to Mia like glue, pestering her day and night with questions about everything.”
Damian Wayne groans and rubs at the spot on his head. “Queen, you are too fond of kissing. Aged up!” he exclaims, complaints over affection put aside in light of this concept. “How wonderful. Does the League have access to this scientist’s technology?”
"You ever come up against Dr. Sivana? It was him. I can’t stand the guy, he gives me the creeps." Ollie shudders. "And besides! We don’t know if him being aged up means that it’s shortened his overall life span. Mad scientist technology isn’t to be trusted any more than assassins are, Damian, you know that."
Damian Wayne frowns and shakes his head. “I’ve encountered some deranged scientist types, but none by that name. And I know,” he concedes with a slump of his shoulders. “But it seems highly unfair that he should be technically younger than me but is now an adult instead.”
Ollie laughs, uncrumpling a napkin and smoothing it out. “Shit’s unfair all over,” he remarks breezily. “Say, have you ever been to Haley’s Circus? The one Dick came from?”
Damian Wayne: Once, yes. Grayson took me to see his elephant.
Ollie makes an impressed noise. “Did you get to ride her? What’s her name again, Zeeza? Zebra?”
Damian Wayne snickers. “Zebra would be an odd name for an elephant, Queen! Her name is Zitka. She hugged me with her trunk and then I got to sit atop her while she walked slowly around the ring. I wanted to take her outside for a proper test of her stride, but Grayson and her handler refused.”
"Zitka! That’s it, that’s right." He spreads the napkin out and starts folding it in all kinds of tiny pleats. "You liked the circus? I wouldn’t imagine you’d’ve had much opportunity for that kind of experience, seeing that kind of spectacle."
Damian Wayne watches the pattern of lines in the napkin as if entranced. “It was enjoyable, yes. They seemed to treat their animals well, and they let me pet most of them. It was… interesting to see Grayson on the trapeze. He’s really quite good,” he says, a high note in his voice as if this still surprises him, this observation that admirable talent extends beyond crimefighting. “It was the first time I visited a circus, yes. Mother never— no, I had no cause to experience one before. Perhaps your son would like to see it too,” he suggests after a moment of hesitation.
"Maybe he would. Maybe showing him pleasant things would be a good idea, hey? Give him an idea of life outside of running from the yakuza and the League of Assassins." Ollie uses his thumbnail to press down the last of the pleats, presenting Damian with an elaborate fishtail folding. "Maybe we could all use a little more of the circus in our lives. You, me, Dick and Tak … elephant therapy."
Damian Wayne repeats “Tak,” slow and deliberate, assessing the boy through the hard consonant of his name. He examines the creased napkin as he folds it in front of his eyes. “He’ll find it odd, perhaps. He may not like it at first. But after some time— some time spent with you, with others, he might find his preferences altered in many regards. Or maybe not at all,” he thinks to add. “But a circus is as good a place to begin as any.”
Ollie wanders into the cafeteria, looking vaguely towards the food, then at the tables. Then back at the food. He actually makes a start towards the serving counter before changing his mind and going to the tables, plopping down at the one Dick’s at. “Ngugh,” Ollie grunts. Dickiebird looks up, eyebrows raised in mild concern. “You OK there, Ollie?”
Ollie gestures at the paper mess strewn over the table. “Could ask you the same thing. Is this fallout from the thing that happened? I read the report last night, catching up.” He crinkles his nose. “Dirty cops and drugs, not a good combo.”
Dickiebird scrunches his mouth. “Not good at all. This is…” He looks around at the scattered papers as if they’ll give him a concise way to summarize them. “…Yeah, fallout, I guess, and new options. Or, potential new options. And…old options.”
Ollie blinks at him. “Huh?”
Dickiebird sets the papers in his hand aside. “I’m thinking about leaving the BPD, and maybe Blüdhaven altogether. Might not be permanent, but just until… Just for a while.”
Ollie picks up one of the papers, glancing at it but not registering the words, then putting it down again. “So which one’s the new option?” he asks. “As far as I know, you’ve been through those options before, haven’t you?”
Dickiebird snorts. “All of them. Gotham’s the fallback, or New York to meet up with some of the older Titans, or…. The new option is probably the oldest, in some ways.” He sifts through the papers until he finds the one he wants and hands it to Ollie. It’s a flyer for Haly’s Circus. “I still own it, I still know a lot of the people there, and… I don’t know, it just seems like a valid option at this point.” He gestures to his legal pad. “I’ve been trying to do a cost-benefit analysis of sorts to figure out if it’s actually a viable one. So far it’s pretty even, but I haven’t got too far.”
Ollie raises his eyebrows at the flyer, then sits up, forward, holding it with both hands. “Hang on a minute,” he says. “What would this entail? I mean owning it, yeah, that makes sense especially given the sentimental value, but what does that mean in terms of an option for what you’ll do when you leave the BPD?” He looks down at the flyer. It’s an older one, he can tell from the layout and style, probably from when Dick took over financing the circus rather than one of their newer ads. But the colour is still vibrant, the edges of the paper tremblingly crisp. “Not that I’m dissuading you,” he clarifies, gaze tracing the upraised trunk of the elephant. “But I’m assuming you’re not about to go back to trapezing under the big top.”
"Couldn’t really if I wanted to keep being Nightwing. But you’ve gotta admit, ‘Traveling Vigilante’ sounds pretty cool." He gathers a few papers, trying to organize as best he could. "There’s been some talks about trying to set up a permanent place for the circus. The travelling’s always been a big part of it, but if it had a good spot in a decent town, it could probably last. A big enough city and it should still make enough business. If it did, I could almost take over for Pop completely as manager."
Ollie hands him back the flyer. “Where does this option rank for you? In relation to the others. Moving back to the Manor or heading out to meet up with the old gang.”
Dickiebird sets the flyer gently down on top of a stack. “About second place, actually. The Manor’s number one, since I’m already there for now, but I don’t know how permanent that’ll stay. The hardest thing about the circus would be convincing everyone to settle down… and finding a good city. As much as Gotham would be good business-wise, I couldn’t ask them to move the circus there permanently. So that leaves me at the Manor or finding a different city for the circus, and pretty much right back where I started.”
"You mean Gotham would be good for you, business-wise? Or d’you mean that it would be good for the circus, monetarily?" He scratches his beard. "Anyhow, I think finding a different city isn’t a bad idea, Dick. There’s lots of real estate out there, money’s no obstacle, and you can choose somewhere that’s close to friends and also feasible for the circus folk. And let’s face it — anywhere you choose, no matter how much you start from scratch?" Ollie sits back and folds his hands over his stomach. "It’s gonna be less back-where-you-started than living in the Manor."
Dickiebird chuckles. “That’s true. Nothing like leaving your job to move back in with Dad.” He searched through a couple piles, ignoring the things that slipped off the table as he dug until he reached a stack of city maps. “I think a different city might be good. With the zeta pads, it’s not like I’m every really that far away from anyone, so maybe setting up in a different city…. If it is gonna be a permanent circus, we need some place with pretty constant good weather, which… is not really Gotham at all, now that I think about it.” He grinned. “Could Star use an ex-traveling circus by any chance?”
Ollie grins widely back. “Far be it from me to dissuade businesses from moving to my fairest of burghs!” he laughs. “But I wonder if you shouldn’t consider somewhere with more tourist draw? In Nevada, or further south in Cali. Let’s face it, unless you reach de Soleil notoriety, a circus isn’t gonna be a destination, and you can’t rely on the locals alone.”
Dickiebird laughs. “The only way to compete with them would be having the elephants up on the high wire, and we don’t have nearly the budget for those kinds of costumes!” He leans back, stretching his legs out. “A well-traveled area might be better, yeah. Maybe along one of the major highways, or outside of LA or Vegas or somewhere. Somewhere people’ll want to come out during the day. I hope Pop won’t mind staying on as, like, a managerial consultant. There’s a lot more business than I have savvy involved here.”
"It’s a good idea, keeping him on. Even if the old guy’s retirement age, it’ll give him something to do. Make him feel needed and give’im a hand in the business that’s got his name on it. That can be pretty important to the self-esteem, take it from me." Ollie looks over at the food, stomach rumbling. "I better grab something to eat before we get any further into this conversation. You want anything?"1
Dickiebird blinks, taking a second to check in with himself if he really did need food. He’d been going over things so long he’d gone into Bat-at-work mode. “Uh…yeah, actually, that sounds… Y’know what? I’ll come with you.” He grabs his coffee— his cold coffee now— and stands up to follow Ollie. “And how’ve you been? It feels like it’s been ages since we last talked.”
Ollie grunts, collecting a tray and starting to load up on danish. “No kidding. Last time I was up here for any sustained amount of time was … when that shit with the HSR went down, I think? Seems so long ago.” He shakes his head, ordering salmon and mashed potatoes and a side of meatballs. “I had to deal with Shado. I’ve told you about her. Can’t remember if you were still around here when she showed up, or if you were already entangled in your Bludhaven sting?…”
Dickiebird freezes for just a second as he dumps his coffee. “I think I read about her coming up in the log, but I didn’t— I wasn’t focused on it. What was she…? Did she track you down or did you invite her back—?” Into your life, is the obvious unspoken finish, but the way Dick’s mouth puckers means he’s upset at himself for even starting that sentence.
Ollie stops as he’s getting a fountain cup. “Invite her back?” he repeats incredulously. “Jesus, Dick — I’m not that self-loathing! And even if I were, there’s a bunch of people who’d object. /Strongly/. Upside my head.”
Dickiebird raises a hand apologetically. “I know, I know, I regret that entire question. It’s just… that was a little hard to wrap my head around.” He shakes his head and orders some tortilla soup. “So, she’s back and how’s that going? You need help with her or anything, or…?”
Ollie shakes his head, catching his empty cup as it nearly topples off his tray. “No, she — she wanted to cut ties with the League of Assassins. The whole witness protection type dealie, y’know? Change how she looks and whisk Tak off somewhere to start a new life.” Ollie watched the server ladle out soup, his tentacles strewing garnishes across the top with ease and efficiency. “The kids and me went to get Tak, and Kate and Bruce got to guard Shado. I /asked/ them to guard Shado.” He grimaced. “And you probably know how well that went.”
KSpenz has been chatting with Erikas, another one of her and Mar’i’s group, who’d been a politics student, not all that long ago, before he’d come out as a man and had to leave Vilnius in a hurry. As such he has a decided opinion about the situation in Ukraine…and plenty of other points. When it comes to Eastern Europe, though, he easily outscores Kate’s relatively limited knowledge, and she’s a bit wiped by the time she zetas up to the Watchtower to check the reports on Shado (not enough movement for Kate’s liking—too quiet) and get some lunch.
Dickiebird takes his soup, petting the back of a tentacle in thanks, which earned him an extra roll. “Guarding an ex-assassin while you retrieve her kid… Yeah, I can see how that would go well.” He’s almost finished getting his drink when things fall into place. “Is that why Bruce hasn’t been to the Manor, like, at all lately? Did something happen?”
Ollie comes up short again, and this time the cup really does roll off his tray. “Oh, man,” he says. “Yeah. Yeah, Shado shot him in the chest, with an arrow. He’ll be okay, though,” Ollie rushes to add. “You know our Bruce. Takes more than an assassin’s arrow to the heart to keep him down.”
KSpenz wanders into the cafe, looking a little bit dazed. She makes a note on her tablet to have some of the braised beef sent to the brig for dinner, but turns away from it with a wince, ordering jiaozi and a green bean/kai-lan stirfry along with (sorta disparate, but hey) coffee.
Dickiebird blanches. “She shot him in the HEART?!” He realizes a second later that that was really loud and Ollie just said Bruce is gonna be OK. Still. “Why did she—? How long ago? Is he up here? Oh god, somebody’s gotta tell Alfred.”
KSpenz turns at Dick’s exclamation, because even that can draw her out of reverie, before turning back to accept her plate and chopsticks with an embarrassed smile.
Ollie , fortunately, is never startled by loud exclamations and so he just bends to pick up his cup. “Alfred knows,” he assures Dick. “Helped with the patching-up duties. And Kate—” Ollie notices his wife collecting her food back down the line and waves at her. “Kate! Katie, c’mere! Dick wants to know how B’s doing!” He says to Dick as he fills up his cup with root beer, “She helped him get the chest armour and stuff off.”
Dickiebird sighs a bit when he learns that Alfred already knows. If Alfred’s taking care of him, Bruce really will be fine. He gives Kate a thin smile, still trying to process everything. “How bad did he get shot? Did it go through the armor or get stuck?”
KSpenz blinks several times before trailing over towards Ollie and Dick, lifting an eyebrow. “It was ugly?” she offers. “But he’ll be all right. The armor slowed it down a lot, meant things were more just ugly and painful than deadly.” Kate doesn’t really want to think about the armor incident while she’s eating, and settles down with her food and a slightly queasy expression. ”Through the armor. But only some, it wasn’t a through and through.”
Ollie says hastily, “Yeah, exactly, looked worse than it was. Good thing he was all suited up for it.” He drinks half his cup of root beer, a faint sweat breaking out over his brow. “And Shado’s, uh, in lockup. Up here.”
Dickiebird visibly relaxes as he puts that all together. “OK. OK, good, yeah, panic over.” He heads back to settle in at his table before Ollie’s words click. “Wait, she’s up here? Is that really a good idea? Is that where she was when she shot him?” He looks between the two of them and plops down. “Man, I’ve missed a lot.”
KSpenz teases out a green bean with her chopsticks, and has a moment of preternaturally sensing that somewhere, Kyle Rayner is making an ass of himself. She snorts and eats the veggie. ”No, we were in Star. And better she’s in the brig here than planetside. There’s nowhere good to keep her.”
Ollie plucks a frondy piece of kai-lan from Kate’s dish, munching on the stem end first. “God knows, things can go wrong with these LoA types in a heartbeat,” he says glumly. “Now we just gotta figure out what to DO with her. Especially since we’ve got Tak. And he’s a teenager.”
Dickiebird frowns in confusion. “He’s a teenager? How long ago was that that she… That…. Were you even Green Arrow then?”
KSpenz mutters, “Maybe try asking him what he wants from life?” She wipes the table where the sauce has splattered from Ollie’s theft. “Then plan from there.”
Ollie swipes his fingers over where Kate’s already wiped. “Well, yeah, I mean — he gets a say in what happens to him, of course. But he /is/ still a kid, Kate. He doesn’t get free rein in the situation.” Ollie starts to eat the rim of one of his danishes, telling Dick, “No, no — he got artificially aged up nine years. Some kind of craziness with Dr. Sivana.” He shudders. “Those mad scientist types fuckin’ creep me out.”
Dickiebird is used to mad scientist types and nods like this now makes perfect sense. “Well, that’s gotta be…interesting at home. I’m guessing he’s at home with you guys and not up here with mom.”
"No, but…" Kate makes a grouchy little noise, brow furrowed, and stabs at the dumplings. She’s not going to give Ollie grief about this right here and now. ”She doesn’t know where he is. Probably guesses.”
Ollie grunts, discarding the apple middle of his danish after eating the pastry rim. “Well, so be it. I’m not gonna try to hide Tak anywhere new. Mia’s watching the kid like a hawk, and she’s brilliant at it — his guard’s coming down, but hers isn’t. I’m sure Shado knows I have him. And she’s just gonna have to fucking suck it up, after all this time wanting me out of his life.” He folds the next danish in half and mows through it in three bites, scowling the whole time.
KSpenz steals the apple part because that’s the best part, god, Ollie.
Dickiebird gnaws on his roll a bit and watches the two of them. “How long are you planning to keep her here?”
KSpenz merely looks at Ollie, because this is his idea, after all.
Ollie coughs, thumps his chest, and drinks the rest of his soda. “I don’t know,” he mutters. “I should — I need to …” his eyes are darting, over their plates, over at the food counter, over the other tables, and it becomes very clear as Ollie plucks at his napkin with tight, stiff fingers: he doesn’t want to think about this.
KSpenz reaches out and puts a hand over Ollie’s wrist, gently. “Once we have a plan in place, we’ll know,” she says to Dick, because lawyer, and then eats some of the kai-lan with deliberate bites. "But probably not too long. She’s still recovering, physically, anyway."
Dickiebird nods. “And once she recovers, she’ll probably really want to get out of here, right? I’m guessing she’ll just be more dangerous not recovering, so… Yeah, plan.” He glances at the two of them. “But you’re two of the best at planning in the League. I’m sure it won’t take too long.”
KSpenz wipes her lips rather daintily with her napkin. “Not that I don’t think she could make a lot of trouble. More trouble.”
"I’m honestly not sure /what/ she’ll want when she’s recovered. I’ve never been real good at predicting her." Ollie pokes at his heap of mashed potatoes, then sighs and puts down his fork, rubbing his forehead. "Fuck. I just don’t know."
"We’ll figure out what Tak wants to be and should be doing. Then sort out where she goes from there." Kate’s expression is more than a bit determined, by now, and she eats another couple dumplings. "Unless it’s all an act, I get the feeling he wants to try being a normal guy for a little while."
Dickiebird pats Ollie’s shoulder. KSpenz makes some mental notes about things to talk about with Ollie and continues eating.
Ollie smiles wanly at Dick, patting his hand back. “You seem pretty set on this idea of letting Tak decide everything for himself,” he says to Kate, sitting back in his chair. “Is that seriously what you think is the best thing?”
"I don’t think he should decide everything for himself, because he’s got, at best, the judgement ability of a teenage boy. But I think he should have a pretty decent say in what he ends up doing, or otherwise he’ll end up unhappy and blaming you for it." And do we really need another trained assassin-type pissed off at us, is unspoken but heavily implied, as is Kate’s own experience of being moved from pillar to post.
Ollie frowns. “Isn’t that what I’ve been saying?”
"No, you’ve been calling him kid and acting like you don’t know what to do with him now that you have him." KSpenz looks up from her food, realizes that Dick and about half the side of the cafeteria are staring at her because she’s said that pretty loud, and winces. "Maybe we should talk about this later."
Dickiebird is just gonna sit here and eat his soup casually, nope, no arguments here, just soup. Mmm, soup.
"Asking him what he wants out of life and not knowing what to do with him aren’t mutually exclusive, Kate!" Ollie, as per usual, has no compunctions about talking about whatever he feels like, in front of whoever. "And I’m pretty damn certain that if I’d HAD a set plan in stone about what to do with the kid — and yeah, he’s still a fucking KID — you’d be scolding me about that, too! Jesus!"
"I’m not scolding you, jesuschrist,” Kate mutters, going to smouldering cold rather than explosive in her fury. “I’m sorry, Dick—please excuse me. I’ll send you updates on how Bruce is doing, or glare at him until he does it himself like a grown man.” She stabs one last dumpling and chews it violently before getting up from the table with her empty plates, and steals the last centre of Ollie’s danish before stalking out.
Ollie scrunches down more in his chair, folding his arms. “Yeah, sorry,” he grunts at Dick, not very graciously. “This whole situation’s kinda got me fuckin’ spinning like a damn tetherball, y’know?”
"Thanks," Dick says softly as Kate leaves, sitting back in his seat. "No, it’s all right. That’s… It sounds like an awful lot to handle all at once."
Ollie gives a tired, if real smile. “It kinda is,” he admits. “I just … I dunno, Dick. Seeing Bruce shot like that, it … for the first time, it really drove him what Shado’d done to me. All these years I’ve been saying that she wasn’t all that bad, that she’d /meant/ to miss my heart and not kill me so she wasn’t a stone cold murderer, but that. The bloody fucking mess it made of Bruce, and /he/ was wearing armour.” Ollie shuts his eyes tight. “I feel like I’m finally done with her. Done making excuses for her.”
Dickiebird grips Ollie’s arm in solidarity. “Good. I mean, that’s quite a place to get to, especially after everything, but that’s really good. That’s probably the best place to end up, all things considered.”
Ollie holds Dick’s gaze for a while. “Yeah. If I got anything out of this, I can say that. It’s shitty that it took her shooting somebody I love to make me stop.”
Dickiebird gives him a tight smile. “It’s amazing what we can forgive or ignore when it only affects us, but as soon as it brings loved ones into it….”
Ollie is quiet for a minute before saying, “…how’re you doing on that end?”
Dickiebird feels like he should’ve been expecting that question and yet. “I’m… I’m not thinking about it. Not in the ‘I’m gonna not think about it because then it means it didn’t really happen’ way, just… I don’t find myself thinking about it the way I used to. It’s more of a thing that happened, rather than a /thing that happened/. Maybe it gets easier when they’re dead.” He shrugs, then frowns. “At least, I think she’s dead. She dropped off the map once she got out of Lockhaven, and I haven’t really been in the mood to look for her whereabouts, so….”
"Yeah. I get you. And honestly, it seems like looking for trouble to go hunting." He stretches and then comes back to the table, scooting his chair in and picking up his fork. "Although I’m glad to hear it’s not ambushing you in the middle of sleep anymore, stuff like that." Ollie starts eating with a relish that belies how cold his food’s gotten, alternating salmon with potatoes with meatballs in quick succession.
Dickiebird nods. “Yeah, so am I. Besides, I’ve got enough new stuff to ambush me in my sleep. She can take a break for a while.” Dickiebird after a long moment, adds, “You said you read the report of the ‘Haven sting, yeah? Did I— Have you ever killed someone without meaning to? Is that the same?”
Ollie pauses in his aggressive eating, tapping the table with his finger. “So. Tell me if this affair with Selina and crooked cops is the main reason you’re picking up stakes from the ‘Haven.”
Dickiebird nods. “Yeah, pretty much. I’ve gotta go talk to my Captain, but… I’m starting to think it’s getting too hard to balance both lives, y’know? It’s not like I’m gonna quit being Nightwing, so I’ve only got one other choice.”
Ollie makes an agreeing harrumph around a mouthful of potato. “Being my own boss has been the best, easiest way to keep being an effective vigilante,” he proclaims. “And I mean, hey — everybody takes jobs in their youth that’re meant to prove something. No shame in realizing that it’s time to move onto something else.”
Dickiebird snorts. “So, what you’re saying is I should inherit a huge company and be my own boss.” He glances over at the papers covering the next table— a wise choice on Kate’s part to avoid that table, really. “Well, I guess that puts me back to the circus option.”
Ollie chuckles, wiping his mouth with one of the napkins he’d been tormenting earlier. “Don’t let me sway you, kiddo,” he says. “I mean, in the end, you go with what feels best for you. I’m just saying, you seem to be way more passionate about the circus lights than you ever were about the red and blue.”
Dickiebird laughs. “I guess it was one thing when guys like Peterson were running the PD, but now they’re rare, knock wood. I guess I did what I needed. Time for this roving boy to move on to something new. Or old. Old, but in a new way.”
Damian Wayne seats himself at the table with Queen and Grayson, carrying a bowl of diced chicken and bell pepper strips. “Has Father recovered?” he asks as he sits, interrupting whatever they were saying at the moment. “Has the assailant been punished?”
Dickiebird ”How did everyone hear about this before me? I’m losing my touch, man.”
Ollie takes a strip of pepper from Damian’s bowl, almost immediately. “He’s getting there, and no, not yet,” he says. “I hear /you/ had a little adventure of your own when it comes to getting pierced with sharp things, hey, Damian?”
Damian Wayne curls up the corner of his mouth and swipes one of Queen’s meatballs in retaliation, though he has no intention of eating it. “You have the assassin incarcerated somewhere, then? I would like an audience with her. A private audience,” he adds, spearing a strip of chicken between his incisors. “And— did Father tell you? Did Rayner? No matter. Yes, but it wasn’t nearly the debacle the adults no doubt made it out to be.”
Damian Wayne: Father is highly dramatic without cause at times.
Ollie bites back a grin at this declaration. “Well, I can’t argue with you on that point. Although one could make the argument that it’s in the blood, the dramatics.” He chomps down the pepper and adds, “The assassin’s incarcerated somewhere safe, and no, you can’t have an audience with her. If you like, you can meet her son, though.”
Damian Wayne jostles the table in his frustration. “I have no quarrel with her son! Not yet. And what do you all intend to do with her? She attempted to kill Batman. We cannot let it go unchallenged.”
Ollie ”I didn’t mean you should /challenge/ her son! Just that you two might maybe find some things in common!”
Damian Wayne makes a face at this suggestion. “I hardly need another ‘playmate,’ Queen. Is she on the Tower?” He looks around as if he expects her to stroll through the cafeteria.
Damian Wayne points his fork at Grayson, suddenly. “Grayson! Where is she?”
Ollie grunts. “You’re not getting to see her.”
Dickiebird holds up his hands. “I don’t know! I didn’t even hear about her until about fifteen minutes ago, so don’t look at me.” He gives Ollie a quick amused sort of grimace and stands up. “I’ve got some long thinking to do, so I probably oughta head out. Damian, please don’t try find the assassin. That never ends well for anyone.”
Damian Wayne kicks at Queen’s leg under the table as Grayson rises. “Are you going to ponder what must be done to the assassin? Good. It should be something dreadful.”
Ollie curses and swipes a heavy hand at the side of Damian’s head. “Keep it up and I’ll finish your little tattoo for you!”
Damian Wayne snaps his arm up against his ear to block the strike, ducking his head to the side with a whiny little noise of objection. “It would have been a fine tattoo! And I’ll have it done properly one day, and I don’t care if Father approves of it or not.”
Dickiebird makes a face at Damian and shakes his head. “Yeah, I’ll, uh, get right on that, Damian.” He puts away his tray and moves over to gather his papers, a little surprised at just how many he had spread out. “Make sure you come home tonight, Damian. I’m good to patrol, so you should come with me. And Ollie, I’ll let you know what I decide. Thanks for your advice.” He ruffles Damian’s hair, waves to Ollie, and heads out.
Ollie snorts. “If you’re old enough to have one, then you don’t /need/ his approval, bratling.” He points after Dick with his chin. “You doing patrols with Nightwing these days?”
Damian Wayne seems to settle somewhat now, idly picking at the pepper strips. “Well, maybe I won’t want to wait until I’m so very old. And yes, now that he’s recovered. But I lead on our patrol because I live in Gotham and he doesn’t,” he concludes with conviction.
Ollie nods, his thoughts leading him down another path. “Damian,” he asks slowly, “when you were living with your mom, did you wonder about what life would be like in Gotham? If you were living with your dad?”
Damian Wayne sucks his bottom lip in, eyes lowered as he considers. “Not about the city itself, really. I didn’t think about… daily life. I thought he’d have a castle somewhere, and that Mother and I would join him in it, and then we’d reign over everything.” He looks up, eyes tightening. “Why do you inquire?”
Ollie picks up his fountain drink cup, then puts it back down after remembering it’s empty. “Well. I’ve got my kid here now, and his mom’s the assassin, and I’m trying to get a handle on what I’m in for with him. So I figured, why not ask the resident son-of-an-assassin-mother? I mean, you turned out good. I wanna try and get Tak to follow your example.” He gives Damian a half-smile, curving his hands around the cup.
Damian Wayne raises his brows, eyes round and open beneath them. “He’s your son? Oh,” he repeats dully, having not previously made this connection. Suddenly the encouragement to bond with him makes more sense. “This is strange, that you and Father both have children by members of the League of Assassins. Why do you and Father both have so many children?” His face crushes together in anger as he asks it, but his temper is swift to dissolve on this front and he’s calm when he speaks again. “Was he raised as an assassin himself? Why would the mother of your child seek to kill Batman? Did she make any attempt upon you?”
Ollie says distantly, “Yeah, she did. Years ago.” He smashes his palm against his nose before continuing, “She shot your dad because he was guarding her and she wanted out, that’s all. It wasn’t because he was Batman. She’d’a shot anybody at that point, just to get out.” Ollie leans across the table and snags the remainder of Dick’s drink, slurping it down. “I don’t think he’s an assassin. Although he’s certainly been trained — he can wield a mean katana.”
Damian Wayne shakes his head, slowly, his gaze unfocused as he mentally constructs the scenario with the facts that he does have available. None of them seem quite as relevant as the fact that the mother was part of the LoA, however. “I knew Father was unwise to place any measure of trust in her. You all are. Whether she shot him to escape or did so later, she would have found cause to attack. You all have seen the way my mother operates. You know she cannot be trusted— what makes you think the mother of your child is any different?” He squeezes a napkin in his fist, tearing at its corners with his opposite hand. “If he’s been raised among them, he may have very different ideas regarding the value of human life than you do.”
Ollie doesn’t want to hear this. It’s exactly what he’s feared, when he’s managed to bring himself to think about it, the idea that Tak could have been raised from the sweet baby that Ollie vaguely remembered to a child capable of killing with as much efficiency as the little boy sitting next to him. But that thought melts the chill from his heart, when he looks at Damian, that fondly familiar set of his eyebrows and sturdiness of his body. “He might, at that,” Ollie admits. “You’re right. I should keep that in mind, no matter how harmless he seems.” Ollie reaches over and cups Damian’s shoulder, rubbing his thumb against the boy’s back. “I don’t think he had any other kids around when he was growing up.”
Damian Wayne agrees lowly, “Yes. Keep it in mind at all times.” He’s certain his own father does— something that fosters a sense of relief rather than resentment, in Damian’s case. He rolls his shoulder forward, pushing into the hand that squeezes it rather than retreating this time. He heaves a long sigh, as if resigning himself. “Yes, likely not. I suppose I can meet him at some point.”
Damian Wayne: Is he near my age?
Ollie takes shameless advantage of Damian’s acquiescing to physical contact by leaning over to kiss Damian’s head briefly before sitting back. “He’s eighteen, but he’s supposed to be nine,” he explains. “Got aged up by a mad scientist. Right now he’s sticking to Mia like glue, pestering her day and night with questions about everything.”
Damian Wayne groans and rubs at the spot on his head. “Queen, you are too fond of kissing. Aged up!” he exclaims, complaints over affection put aside in light of this concept. “How wonderful. Does the League have access to this scientist’s technology?”
"You ever come up against Dr. Sivana? It was him. I can’t stand the guy, he gives me the creeps." Ollie shudders. "And besides! We don’t know if him being aged up means that it’s shortened his overall life span. Mad scientist technology isn’t to be trusted any more than assassins are, Damian, you know that."
Damian Wayne frowns and shakes his head. “I’ve encountered some deranged scientist types, but none by that name. And I know,” he concedes with a slump of his shoulders. “But it seems highly unfair that he should be technically younger than me but is now an adult instead.”
Ollie laughs, uncrumpling a napkin and smoothing it out. “Shit’s unfair all over,” he remarks breezily. “Say, have you ever been to Haley’s Circus? The one Dick came from?”
Damian Wayne: Once, yes. Grayson took me to see his elephant.
Ollie makes an impressed noise. “Did you get to ride her? What’s her name again, Zeeza? Zebra?”
Damian Wayne snickers. “Zebra would be an odd name for an elephant, Queen! Her name is Zitka. She hugged me with her trunk and then I got to sit atop her while she walked slowly around the ring. I wanted to take her outside for a proper test of her stride, but Grayson and her handler refused.”
"Zitka! That’s it, that’s right." He spreads the napkin out and starts folding it in all kinds of tiny pleats. "You liked the circus? I wouldn’t imagine you’d’ve had much opportunity for that kind of experience, seeing that kind of spectacle."
Damian Wayne watches the pattern of lines in the napkin as if entranced. “It was enjoyable, yes. They seemed to treat their animals well, and they let me pet most of them. It was… interesting to see Grayson on the trapeze. He’s really quite good,” he says, a high note in his voice as if this still surprises him, this observation that admirable talent extends beyond crimefighting. “It was the first time I visited a circus, yes. Mother never— no, I had no cause to experience one before. Perhaps your son would like to see it too,” he suggests after a moment of hesitation.
"Maybe he would. Maybe showing him pleasant things would be a good idea, hey? Give him an idea of life outside of running from the yakuza and the League of Assassins." Ollie uses his thumbnail to press down the last of the pleats, presenting Damian with an elaborate fishtail folding. "Maybe we could all use a little more of the circus in our lives. You, me, Dick and Tak … elephant therapy."
Damian Wayne repeats “Tak,” slow and deliberate, assessing the boy through the hard consonant of his name. He examines the creased napkin as he folds it in front of his eyes. “He’ll find it odd, perhaps. He may not like it at first. But after some time— some time spent with you, with others, he might find his preferences altered in many regards. Or maybe not at all,” he thinks to add. “But a circus is as good a place to begin as any.”