Halloween comment fic thing
It's Halloween. Bats are scary, Gotham is a nightmare, good guys blanch when they enter Arkham, villains tell each other Joker stories to scare one another, and criminals are a supertitious and cowardly lot.
Let's do a Gotham-centric comment fic fest stuff. About Halloween or fear or things like that. *handwave-y* Or, you know, not Gotham-based. ( Read more... )
Let's do a Gotham-centric comment fic fest stuff. About Halloween or fear or things like that. *handwave-y* Or, you know, not Gotham-based. ( Read more... )
Bruce was turning slowly in front of the foot-length mirror, a corner of his cape clasped in his hand. Unbidden, Tim recalled images of little girls trying on princess dresses and clutching the fabric as they swirled.
Tim’s brain wanted to curl up and die.
“It could be worse,” Bruce said.
That it could’ve been the original Robin costume didn’t bear contemplating.
“You let Barbara choose our costumes,” Tim pointed out, in a futile attempt to stall. Either the moment he run away screaming, or the one they had to go and face the others.
Stephanie and Cassandra had both been in the Cave when Barbara had informed Bruce.
It was a sign of how unfair the world was that Tim hadn’t been there, and so had had no hopes of changing Barbara’s mind, but had still been subjected to their mocking. When Tim had arrived in the Cave, held back by a family dinner with his father and Dana, the girls had laughed.
They hadn’t let it go for two weeks. Sometimes they’d be on patrol, and Steph would look at him and chortle. It was disturbing enough when they were running across rooftops; it was worse when they’d been interrogating one of Penguin’s henchmen, Tim laying down the menacing aura, and Steph had had to turn away, in a fit of giggles as sudden as it was deadly, her shoulders shaking.
And that was just Steph. Tim has been going out of his way to avoid Cass. Batgirl’s quiet mirth was more than he should be asked to endure.
Bruce looked at him, like Tim had just proven his point. “Yes.”
Tim had also been doing his level best to avoid Barbara, this past two weeks. Of course, avoiding Oracle was hopeless. She’d been particularly gleeful. Tim was seriously considering begging for forgiveness, whatever it was he’d done.
He was not looking forward to mixing with the other guests. He’d been given to understand that the Daily Planet might send reporters; and if Lois Lane was hunting after the same drug dealers they were, she might be the one present.
“I think Dick might get a laugh out of it,” Bruce said in a light tone, finishing to gel his hair into two curls over his brow.
If confronted, Tim would deny that he’d whimpered. Any audio evidence implying otherwise had been tampered with.
He caught the thinnest curl of Bruce’s lips as Bruce turned around, and glared. Bruce had no right to be so undismayed about the whole affair. He was wearing a green and red and yellow nightmare of a costume, split-toe boots and reversible cloak included. It looked the very opposite of dignified, and Tim wondered if Bruce wasn’t somehow doing something to achieve that effect. Certainly Tim didn’t look quite so much of a dweeb in his costume.
“You’re taking this way too well,” Tim accused, aware that he was rapidly squandering the awesome points the Bat suit automatically awarded its wearer.
Bruce raised an eyebrow. The domino didn’t make interpreting his expressions any easier. Tim hadn’t expected it too - the mask Bruce relied on the most was his own bare face - but he’d thought maybe. There was a rule that Robin’s mask highlighted emotions. Maybe if Bruce had worn the original costume that might have worked; Tim had never fulfilled that criterion.
“Holy role reversal, Batman,” Bruce deadpanned.
Tim closed his eyes and wished for the floor to open up and swallow him.
Reply
Reply
Leave a comment