More fic!
I'm am somewhat excessively happy that my 'net is working again (we'll see how long THAT lasts), and so I am putting up the first bit of the next House of El fic.
Also! For anyone reading these, would people object to getting pieces of two storylines set in the same universe at the same time? By which I mean, I'm not finished writing the below fic, but another fic in the universe is gnawing on my leg, and--does anyone care about getting the fics in whatever order I write them in? Because if people want whole fics at a time, there's going to be a long wait, but if I can post whatever I've written lately, it makes my life easier and yours more confusing.
Anyway. On to fic!
Title: Leaning On
Series: House of El
Fandom: DC comics
Pairing/Characters: gen; Dinah, Kal, Kara, Roy
Rating: PG-13
Continuity: Ollie’s just smacked Roy and kicked him out.
Summary: Even the strongest people need help when the going gets tough.
Disclaimer: DC owns them, I’m just playing in their sandbox.
Author's Notes: As usual with this series, I hadn’t really planned on this, it just kinda-happened. It was a one-shot Dinah-Clark friendship thing, and then it expanded, and now it needs more than one part. ARGH.
Word Count: 2,287
It wasn’t the first time Dinah called Clark in tears, and it wouldn’t be the last, but it was the most gut-wrenching.
"Hello?" After a day tailing and then fighting Toyman, all while fending off Lois and her constant, prying questions, even Clark needed at least a few hours of solid sleep. He flung out a hand and felt around his nightstand for his phone.
"Can you-can you come over?"
Dinah crying. He was awake. Blinking, he sat up and tried to focus past the sudden fear. "What’s wrong?"
"It’s Roy. Can you-in front of the house?"
Roy? Speedy, Green Arrow’s ward, Dick’s best friend. Dinah’s maybe-son.
"Yes, I’ll be there, hang on." As fast as he could move-Roy, Rao, was he hurt? Had something happened to Speedy, or was he just sick? No, Dinah crying worried him, if Roy was sick he was very sick. Maybe she needed him for quick transportation?
It didn’t matter. Dinah called, so he was coming.
*
Taking a deep breath, Dinah tried to still her shaking hands as she put the phone down. Tip-toeing through her own living room, she did her best to stay quiet and let the boy on the couch sleep. He’d only just managed to fall asleep, and even now he was twitching and sweating. Though the house was silent, Dinah still felt like she could hear Roy’s moaning in her guts, echoing around her ribcage and battering her heart.
She closed her front door behind her and stepped away just in time to feel the warm wind peculiar to people moving at superspeed. A blur from above and Kal landed in front of her wearing jeans and a t-shirt without his reporter glasses.
"Dinah, what’s-"
She couldn’t help it; he was her best friend and she desperately needed someone to cling to. Kal wrapped his arms around her, resting his cheek against her hair. Dinah held on and pressed her face against his chest, where she knew beneath the fabric of his shirt lay the S that wasn’t an S, the symbol of the House of El, Krypton’s hope for a better world. If she ever needed a little of Kal’s strength, his optimism . . .
"What’s going on?"
Dinah took a shuddering breath and kept her forehead pressed against his chest. "Roy’s inside. Hal dropped him off and went to find Ollie." God, she couldn’t get it out of her mouth. The boy she’d been haphazardly taking care of since she started dating his guardian, the loudmouthed redhead who hit on her the first time they met (like father, like son, only-so complicated), the kid she shared jokes with and taught to fight, was lying on her couch too weak to stand, moaning in pain and throwing up on himself when she couldn’t get him to the bathroom in time. How did this happen?
"Dinah." Kal pulled back far enough to look down at her face, though he kept his hands on her arms. "Breathe. Tell me."
Taking a deep breath, Dinah felt the whirl in her mind slow. Another, and she could take a step back from Kal, though the warm weight of his hands was comforting. "Hal brought him to me. He said he’d-found him in Chinatown. He was-" the words choked her throat, that her boy, her student came to this-"looking for a fix."
Shock passed quickly over Kal’s face, and then the faraway look in his undisguised blue eyes that meant he was using more-than-human senses. "He’s-Dinah, his heart is racing, he can’t lie still, he’s-heroin withdrawal? Rao, Dinah, heroin?"
He shook her a little and she nodded, closing her eyes. Kal muttered what sounded like Kryptonian swear words under his breath and hugged her again.
"I just-I have to be strong, for him, to get him through this, but I’m breaking, Kal. I-I love him, this kid, and he’s so screwed up. Ollie’s running around the country with Hal, I didn’t even think to check up on him, the Titans disbanded . . ."
"Dick," Kal said suddenly. "Dinah, Dick’s his best friend. Do you think-?"
Dinah desperately wanted to say yes. Someone else who cared about Roy as much as she did, someone to help her-someone who could relate to Roy on another level, who he wouldn’t be ashamed of-No. "Kal, I-no. As much as I would appreciate his help, I don’t think Roy could handle anyone else seeing him like this. Hal and I are already bad enough, and Dick-Dick’s Robin, Kal, not just Roy’s best friend. Roy’d never get over thinking his leader saw him weak."
Kal shook his head and wiped a tear off her cheek. "Alright, I’ll trust your judgment. Dick’s going to have my hide when he finds out I knew and didn’t tell him, though."
"I’ll ask Roy if he wants to call him once he can do more than lay on the couch. Right now he-he can’t do much of anything but retch-" Dinah cut herself off, cut off her helplessness and anger. "Kal, what am I going to do about Ollie?"
There was a bruise on Roy’s face whose shape she knew too well, having seen it more times than she could count on the criminals Green Arrow put away.
Roy wasn’t a criminal. He was supposed to be his son.
Kal stood in her front yard holding her and shook his head. "I don’t know, Dinah. I don’t know."
They stayed that way, together in the darkness, and Dinah let her worry and her desperate fear drop away. Here was Kal, Clark Kent, Superman, her best and oldest friend. They had done a lot together, called on each other in all manner of situations. He believed in her from the word go, encouraged her and trusted her. For a moment here, she could let it go.
Then he pulled back and wiped the tear tracks off her cheeks again. "He’s waking up, I think. You are the best, strongest person I know, Dinah Lance. And Roy is strong. He’ll get through this, you can get him through this. Never doubt it." He met her eyes. "It’ll be all right, citygirl."
"Sure, farmboy." Dinah finally let Kal go, stepping back and standing straight. "I’ll tell you when Roy’s told Dick-I doubt Robin will want to talk about this with Batman. Keep an eye on him, will you? These kids-they’re us, not that long ago, and they need us more than we’ve been giving of ourselves." Hesitant, then, "Thanks, Kal."
His smile was sunshine, bright and scouring. "Always, Dinah."
*
Kara started staring off into space when Clark hit the point in the story when he realized what was going on. She also let go of her mug of tea, and Clark could see tiny cracks in the handle where her fingers had nearly broken it. She’d taken off her Dr. Sorrel glasses and pulled her hair down out of its bun to let it hang messily around her face. Clark pocketed his reporter glasses as soon as he walked into her house, knowing that being able to see his face without effort calmed Kara the same way it did Dinah. His parents were used to the glasses, the women in his life-not so much.
Clark sat and waited patiently for some kind of response. He knew he couldn’t keep this from Kara-she’d skin him alive when she found out and then found out he knew. He also couldn’t ask her to keep it from the other JSAers, but he could and had asked that it go no further.
"We have to do something," Kara breathed. "That-that man is incapable of taking care of a child."
"Speedy’s hardly a child still, Kara."
She glared at him, eyes flaring red before she got herself under control. "Just because he’s a teenage superhero does not make him capable of taking care of himself. Martha and Jonathan taught me that, when I wanted to take care of you. Rao! Kal, we can’t just let this go!"
Clark reached out and took one hand in his. "What could we do? Dinah’s getting him through the withdrawal, and what happens next should be up to him. If he wants to go back to Green Arrow, there isn’t anything we can do about it. Besides, what right have we?"
"Concerned citizens!"
"You've never even met Speedy, Kara. None of the JSA have been in close contact with the new generation of heroes or their partners. Just Dinah and I, because we’re family. Neither Speedy nor Green Arrow are going to think you have a say."
Kara’s eyes narrowed, looking at the table without seeing it, focused on something in her head. "We can talk to Dinah."
Clark started, his hand moving out from under Kara’s. "Talk to-cousin. You’re not thinking what I think you’re thinking, are you?"
"Why not?" Kara turned an intense look on him. "She’s already taking care of the boy. He’s what, sixteen or seventeen? Not too much longer before he goes off to college."
Clark thought it best not to mention how unlikely Roy and college was.
"It’s only a few years, and it’s not like she’ll have to hide anything from him. He’s already a superhero, he can just-switch mentors. The problem will be convincing the law that his guardian’s girlfriend would make a better guardian."
Shaking his head, Clark leaned back in her kitchen chair. "I’m going to let you and the others fight this out with Dinah. I’ll support whatever she decides-and she’ll support Speedy."
"Kal!" Kara turned around all the way to face her cousin, a shocked look on her face. "You have a responsibility to the child, too! He’s your sister’s almost-son. That makes him family."
Clark shook his head again and stood. "I’m not going to try to talk Dinah into this if she doesn’t feel she can do it, Kara. She’s much younger than I am-if she were in college she’d still be in school. If this isn’t what she wants to do, I’m not going to ask her to."
Kara crossed her arms over her chest and glared. Clark hugged her rigid form, kissed her on the forehead, and headed out. He could feel her eyes on him until he floated into the sky and away.
*
Roy was groggy, aching everywhere he could feel, and-he hauled himself up and found a shoulder under his, getting him to the bathroom before he-
Ugh.
The cool tile floor and white porcelain were too familiar at this point. Roy rested his forehead against the edge of the toilet and let himself shake. What a way to wake up. His whole body felt encrusted with salt, dried sweat and tears. He could vaguely hear someone moving around behind him, but-Dinah’s small hand rubbed the small of his back, and Roy clung to the toilet as best he could, enduring his body’s rebellion.
*
Someone was-cooking?
Okay, so in theory cooking had to happen. He wasn’t starving-he couldn’t remember the last time he ate, but-so there had to be food, and Dinah had to eat. Blinking, Roy tried to make sense of what was going on. He was on Dinah’s couch-those were her fingers in his horrible sweaty hair, ugh, he was going to shave it all off-and there was the smell of someone cooking.
Probably not Ollie.
For the first time, he wasn’t so nauseous on waking that he had to run to the bathroom. He could just lay there.
". . . believe you told her, Kal."
That was Dinah’s annoyed voice. He’d heard it directed at himself and Ollie often enough to recognize it even in this state. Nice that it wasn’t coming for him this time.
"Would you want to lie to Kara?" A man’s voice, not one he knew, but-familiar. "You’re not going to be able to hide this from the others. You know there are no more rabid gossips than superheroes."
Roy felt Dinah’s hand clench in his hair and then she slowly extracted it. "You could have put it off. I can’t deal with anybody looking over my shoulder right now. If it were Dick like this, would you want our aunts and uncles involved?"
No-Dick, God, this shit never happens to Dick. Perfect fucking life with his scary Bat-mentor and regular patrols and butler. Dick’s Robin, Dick’s together, not some screwup junkie detoxing on somebody else’s couch.
". . . just the messenger!"
Dinah snorted in response to that, and Roy knew that snort, too. It was the You’re being idiotic, and also irresponsible and annoying snort.
"God dammit, Clark Jerome Kent, you can fucking stop licking Aunt Kara’s boots and take some responsibility for yourself! Your little spat ended years ago. Grow up and stop doing whatever Kara wants in some kind of-of mistaken attempt at penance."
Fuzzy-brained or not, Roy recognized the hurt silence that usually followed one of Dinah’s impulsive outbursts. Dinah’s hand returned to petting his head, and the cooking noises grew louder in the absence of conversation. It might have been one minute or half an hour later when Roy felt Dinah’s hand leave his head, heard her footsteps walk to the kitchen. Timekeeping not so easy when your body is just trying to keep things together long enough to get through this.
Rustle of fabric on fabric, and Dinah sighed.
"Look, Kal, I’m worried and pissed off and freaking out, alright?"
"Helping isn’t the only reason I came over, Dinah," the man said, and Roy had a moment where he was sure he’d missed something. "Kara got an idea into her head, and I wanted to warn you before she and the rest of them pounced."
"Oh, God, Kal, what?"
"She thinks . . . guardian . . . Ollie . . ."
"She what?"
Roy faded back into sleep.