Fic: More Questions Than Answers
**ALMOST NON-EXISTENT SPOILERS for the Nightwing storyline beginning with issue 93. Sorta.**
Title is a wee bit random, but hey, I wrote fic. :D
Title: More Questions than Answers
Rating: PG for implications of things
Characters: Dick Grayson, Bruce Wayne, Barbara Gordon. Mentions of Catalina Flores.
Disclaimer: New Earth would be a vastly different world if I owned it... :( ALSO, the first couple of lines, plus Barbara's "comment," are direct quotes from the comics. The rest of it--a.k.a. the stuff that makes sense--is all mine.
WARNING: I don't really think this part needs a warning, but the other parts do/will contain explicit references to eating disorders and rape. So if that sort of thing bothers you, I wouldn't read any of this.
Notes: This is a pseudo-sequel to "Welcome Home," which was a pseudo-sequel to "Broken Glass." I guess this can work okay as a stand-alone as long as you know the events of Nightwing #93-96-ish, but I would recommend reading "Welcome Home" first at the least.
Synopsis: Batman and Nightwing have a talk.
-
“Recommendations?”
“I… I kind of owe her this. A chance to prove herself, to get back on the right… path…”
“Are you out of your mind?”
Nightwing blinked, caught off-guard by the condemnation in Batman’s voice. Whatever had set him off, it was just another thing he could add to the list of things he’d done recently to shame and disappoint his former mentor.
“Well, you asked,” Nightwing finally grumped.
“I was being polite. I was also expecting you to recommend that I put the suspected murderer who has been stalking you in a prison cell.”
“She’s not as bad as you think. Really. She just needs a little guidance, you know, the same way you guided me.”
The Dark Knight fell silent. Nightwing drummed his fingers nervously on his thigh.
“Is she blackmailing you?”
“What? No!”
“Then what’s wrong?”
What’s wrong. The question hung between them, awkward and alone. Dick opened his mouth, desperately wanting to say “nothing,” but he’d already done that and he wasn’t sure he had the strength to lie to his father yet again.
“I just think you should go a little easy on her, that’s all,” he ended up saying, a bit weakly. “I mean, if you hadn’t taken me in when you did, I’d probably be in her shoes now. Doesn’t she deserve the same opportunity you gave me?”
“That is not what I asked you. But if you don’t want to talk about it, I’ve got other things to be doing. Batman out.”
Click.
Nightwing stood there a while, not moving, not even really seeing, just thinking, wondering, trying to figure out why Batman would say such terrible things about Cat. Sure, she had made some mistakes, but it was like he’d said. It was just because she hadn’t had a Batman to teach her right from wrong. If she had, then she never would have pulled the trigger. Maybe she even would have stopped touching him when he asked.
No. No time to think of that right now. He had to find Cat, see how she was doing… and warn her to be on her best behavior. He was sure that Batman would use even the slightest slip-up on her part as an excuse to throw her in a prison cell.
-
Batman easily knocked out the last of the drug dealers he’d been fighting and turned on his comm.
“There are five unconscious dealers by the north entrance to Gotham Central Park. Get the police down here to pick them up.”
“Roger that,” the Oracle acknowledged him. “And if you’ve got a minute, there’s somebody we need to discuss.”
“You mean Tarantula.”
“Bingo. So, why, exactly, is she not in jail yet?”
“I was talking to Nightwing about that earlier.” Here Batman paused ever so slightly. He knew he wasn’t going to like Barbara’s response to Nightwing’s comments. “He said we should give her a chance-”
“What!”
Right on schedule.
“Has Dick completely lost his mind?! Oh. I know. It’s because they’re ‘together’, isn’t it? It wouldn’t be above Dick to be protecting her just because they’ve slept together.”
Once again, Batman paused, this time to keep himself from starting a fight with the feisty Barbara Gordon. Still, he could not let that insult stand.
“This is not the time to let pettiness cloud our thinking, Oracle. If you want to be bitter, do it on your own time.”
He heard Barbara suck in her breath, as if she was about to argue the point, but then she simply let it out in a long, tired sigh.
“You’re right,” she said, and there just enough regret in her tone that Batman would have felt sorry for her if she hadn’t been questioning his son’s integrity moments earlier. “And I apologize. I know Dick wouldn’t do anything like that.”
“In which case, something is obviously wrong.”
“Obviously. Any idea what?”
“Not yet. But there’s a tracker in his communicator. I’m going to use it to find out where he’s been staying and have a talk with him.”
“Yeah… yeah, okay, then. Let me know how it goes?”
“Fine. Batman out.”
He didn’t give her the chance to say anything else before ending the call and removing the grapple gun from his belt in one fluid motion. He was always quick when it comes to shooting out the line and getting where he needs to go, but tonight, he was even quicker than usual.
He needed to find his son.
--
I'm hoping to turn this into an ongoing series, but updates are gonna be slow. There should be more eventually, though.