(Untitled)

[twiceahero]

Barbara rolls into the bar, and automatically looks around.

She spots a young blond woman behind the bar's massive length

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[i_spoiled_it]

Being alive. It means you need to take bathroom breaks.

Especially if you saw Babs rush in there, anyway.

Steph puts her head around the door, cautiously. "Barbara?"

[twiceahero]

Barbara stiffens. She recognizes that voice, of course. She wipes at her eyes with the back of her arm. It doesn't really do much to help hide the redness in her eyes, or the slight streaks running down her cheeks.

So she doesn't turn around. Maybe Steph will think that Babs is busy... staring vaguely at the paper towel dispenser.

But she does speak. "Hey, you."

[i_spoiled_it]

Steph takes a few cautious steps in, and puts a hand (small, alive, warm) on Barbara's shoulder.

"... is everything ... okay?"

She hasn't seen her since - before. But she spoke to her on the phone what feels like just a few hours ago.

[twiceahero]

"Don't I look okay?" Babs asks with a slowly widening smile at that touch.

[i_spoiled_it]

"Honestly? Nope." Steph smiles a little, still uncertain of her place with Babs. "But ... you sound it."

[twiceahero]

"Well, I am it."

Barbara finally feels like she has herself under control enough to glance over her shoulder at the girl that hand is attached to. "Hey, you. You're looking better."

[i_spoiled_it]

"That wouldn't be hard."

Considering Babs last saw her as a beaten, bleeding mess.

"Doors, Babs?"

[twiceahero]

Babs positively beams.

"Doors," she agrees.

[i_spoiled_it]

"Hell of a coincidence, you talking to me and then me turning around and being here," Steph says suspiciously, reaching for the paper towels to wipe a bit of TotallyNotTears from Bab's chin.

[twiceahero]

"Sometimes that's how things go," Barbara says, reaching up to take the paper towels, and taking a moment to revel in the feel of warm flesh under her fingers.

[i_spoiled_it]

Steph blinks rapidly, trying to keep her own face straight.

Maybe a tiny lip-tremble is okay.

"I nearly forgot - everything. It's still hard to remember. But - Babs, I was dead?"

[twiceahero]

"Was."

That was the operative word.

"And nearly."

But she hadn't forgotten.

[i_spoiled_it]

"You saved me?"

It's not quite a question. Who else would have?

[twiceahero]

"Well, I had some help."

A lot of it.

[i_spoiled_it]

Steph swallows down the lump in her throat.

"... Why?"

The other Steph had had six years to learn to live with burning Gotham down, killing all those people. It's still terribly fresh, for this one.

[twiceahero]

"Because I owed it to you," Barbara says, still smiling even as her eyes darken slightly.

She'd lost track of Stephanie in all the chaos. Hadn't even thought to look for her. And look what had happened.