“Legacies”
Chapter One
“I don’t belong here.”
The
melancholy words, spilled with lost and exhaustion,
alarmed Barbara Gordon. A single desk lamp cast soft light in her dark office,
and when she turned, she only a dark silhouette against the even darker
“I don’t belong here, Barbara.”
“Dick…” She waved her hand dismissively, and whatever weakness she showed, she hid under bravado and a tense face. “Sometimes we don’t get choices in our lives. Accept what you have and move on.”
He stepped down from the windowsill, and Barbara swiveled toward her desk. She wouldn’t look into his hypnotic eyes.
“Barbara…”
“Dick, just leave it alone.”
“Tell me I didn’t imagine it.” His voice was pleading, almost begging in a way she’d never heard before. “Tell me if things would have been different…If the world hadn’t pulled us apart…Tell me I’m not wrong.”
Still, she couldn’t bring herself to admit the truth. “You’re wrong.”
Silence
greeted her before she felt his breath just above her head. “The world cannot
be so cruel.
Barbara whirled, ready to give the younger man the truth in scathing reality, but her breath caught in her throat at the sight of him. The low lighting in the room illuminated his wounds and slashes. He was without his mask, and his shoulder-length hair dusted across his torn suit. Blood flowed freely from a wound in his side and the large gash above his left eye. Emotion ran from the tortured look in his eyes.
“Dick, sit down,” she ordered, getting out of her seat.
He shook his head reservedly. “Tell me I’m not crazy. Tell me you feel it.”
Shock. The man must have been in shock. “Dick, I’ll tell you anything if you sit down.”
He moved away instead, heading back toward the window. “I’m tired, Barbara. I’m so tired of this. Of knowing the truth and being denied even the satisfaction of realization.”
“What are you talking about?” She rushed forward. “It doesn’t matter. Sit down, and I’ll call Bruce or Terry. Get them here to—”
“They’re dead.”
The cold, spat words shook Barbara to the core. “Dick…What…? How…”
Dick shook his head as if denying his own reality. “Does it matter?”
Barbara almost attacked him. “Yes, damnit! Of course it matters.”
He took a step onto the windowsill, the cold, winter air whipping his hair about his face. “Ra’s al Ghul found out the truth about Terry and thought the only way to finally rid himself of Bruce forever was to kill any legacy. Kid fought hard, but in the end, he was no match for the League of Assassins.”
Barbara felt the bile rise in her throat, felt her lungs cut off from oxygen. She couldn’t imagine how the man across from her felt. He’d been ripped away from his family for thirty-two years, and now that he’d returned and found a new brother…
She pushed off her desk.
“Bruce…He never saw the bullet, or so I hope, and…” His voice trembled, and she knew he was crying. “Matt…Terry’s little brother. Did you know he was Bruce’s, too? I didn’t even know the kid. I’d met him maybe twice, and …they just…”
She laid a hand upon his shoulder and coaxed him away from the edge, though she truly doubted if ever came down from it. Tears stained tracks down his face, despite his want onto stop them, and she lifted his head up with a hand upon his chin.
He tilted his forehead down upon hers, dripping the tears from his cheeks to hers.
“He was eleven, Barbara. Eleven. How could they do that to a child?”
She pressed her lips into his.
For a moment, he refused to reciprocate until she leaned into him. She was almost double his age with gray hair and stern eyes, so much colder than she was all those years ago, and yet, he absorbed her energy, held onto her like she was his lightning rod, and refused to let go.
After what seemed like an eternity but wasn’t nearly long enough, she pulled away. “This is where you belong,” she whispered, his words soothing his trembling nerves. “Right here. In my arms.”
A single
shot echoed through the silent
*^*^*
“I was wondering when you’d come.”
Richard Grayson’s youthful face held no emotion as he stood in her dressing room doorway, a pair of opaque sunglasses upon his face. A leather jacket covered his torso, while jeans and boots made him look almost gangster—or rich, depending upon his location.
She, too, was young still, a magic trick of some sort for sure.
Zatanna looked back in the mirror’s reflection as she whirled a hat about her white-gloved finger. “Wow. Really channeling your mentor there.”
He said nothing for the longest time. He simply stood in her doorway until she swung in her chair to see him.
“Dick, what’s wrong?”
“You were part of Project: Batman Beyond.”
The magician stopped short in her chair, her head slowly drawing back. Her hat fell with a thump to the floor. “You…You don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“Really? Because the way I see it, you helped Waller collect Bruce’s DNA.”
“Okay, stop right there.”
“You agreed with Waller.” Dick entered the room and slammed shut the door behind him. “You knew how effective Bruce was against the criminal element, and—”
“Pots…”
Dick didn’t. For some reason, her magic never affected him. He placed his hands on either arm of her chair and leaned close in her face.
“So Waller came to you, told you about Project: Batman Beyond.” His eyes were scarier hidden behind the glasses. “To have any part of Bruce’s future, to be connected to him in some way, was too good an opportunity to pass up. So, you helped Waller steal some of Bruce’s DNA, so she could inject it into Warren McGinnis.”
“Pots!” Her eyes glistened.
“And you know what they did to Terry, don’t you?” Dick’s voice sounded too much like Bruce’s, dark and void of emotion. “Waller tried to kill his parents, Zee. They wanted to put him through hell, and you would have let that happen.”
“I didn’t know!”
“No, even worse, you didn’t care! You let your own son—no, sons—be used in a sick game of manipulation, and instead of doing something to save them, you looked the other way.”
“KCAB!”
Dick flew back suddenly, slamming hard against her dressing room door. Sobbing, Zatanna looked like a broken figure, clutching to a sanity she never had.
“I didn’t know what was planning to do!” she shrieked. “Waller said she wanted to save some of Bruce’s DNA, maybe help him live longer. I didn’t know until it was over what happened, and even then, I never thought they’d try to make another Batman!”
Dick slowly picked himself off the floor, grunting from the pain pounding the back of his neck. “Well, congratulations. You’ve helped to destroy the lives of two innocent boys.”
“What are you talking about?”
“Terry and Matt are dead.”
“No…” Her mind refused to accept it, and she shook her head once, twice, three times. Her flushed face deepened in red, and she buried her face in hands. “No…no…”
Hesitantly, Dick wrapped his arms about her shoulders and drew her close. She wet his shirt at his chest level, and despite his injuries, he held onto her almost as tightly as she clung to him.
“Zee…I can fix this.”
She shook her head, but he leaned away to see her sniveling face. “Zee, please. Listen to me. What you did was wrong. There’s no getting around that, but the boys you helped to birth were the best there was. But so many things went wrong, and so many things went unsaid by all of us.”
“What…What are you saying…?”
“I don’t belong here, Zee.” He bent down on one knee to be eyelevel with her. “I never belonged here, and you can send me back, can’t you?”
Zatanna shook her head. “No…No, I can’t. Don’t ask me to.”
“Zee…please. You know you have to. It’s the only way to save us…to save any of them.”
A crash sounded not too far away. Glass shattered; shrieks of fear sliced down the hallway.
“They’re here, Zee! Please!”
Zatanna looked at the doorway. “Dick…I…It’ll…”
A kick at her door, breaking the wood.
“ZEE!”
Zatanna snatched his desperate face in her hands. “I wasn’t the female donor.”
Dick blinked. “But if you weren’t…then who was?”
The ninjas broke through the door.
“PMUJ KCAB!”
Silence.
“Dick?”
Dick blinked.
“Dick, did you hear what I said?”
Dick Grayson’s eyes fluttered open, and he tore from the warm embrace, from her arms, throwing his legs over the side of the bed. The soft, royal covers slipped from his naked body, and he blinked at the sight of the foreign—no, alien—room.
“Dick, honey, what’s wrong?”
He whirled toward the golden-skinned woman upon the bed, the covers hiked up over her features. Her glowing green eyes met his desperate, frightened ones.
“Dick, what’s wrong?” she demanded this time.
Dick shook his head and leaned forward upon his thighs, sweat dribbling down his heated face. He was here, back in the past, before Shiva, before Barbara…
Before Tim.
He sat up and turned to the woman pleading at him. “I’m sorry, Kory, but this—us—it’s not going to work.”
Her kind face tensed. “What! How can you just—”
“I know we
were in love, but it was so long ago…for me. And I was hurting from what went
down in
The slap hurt more than he thought it would, and he quickly fled the room as starbolts sizzled in his wake.
*^*^*
“What? Is the Joker now hiring the lowest of the low life?”
Nightwing’s breath caught in his throat as he watched Robin take down the Joker’s henchmen. The alley was small, and the boy didn’t see Harley approach. For a moment, all Nightwing could do was watch.
This wasn’t the Tim he knew. He still saw the fifty-something year old sitting across from him in the Batcave, discussing his 401K and complaining about heartburn.
He still saw the chalk-colored face and dyed green hair.
But before him fought the spunky thirteen year old he wanted to hate the first time he saw the boy but couldn’t. Somehow, Tim had won him over, and he couldn’t help but smile.
Of course, his face snapped serious when Harley lifted her oversized mallet.
Nightwing threw a set of batarangs, slicing across the woman’s head and knocking her unconscious. Robin whirled to see Harley upon the ground, then looked at Nightwing on the rooftop.
His eyes softened. “Bust-ed.”
Nightwing flew down to land next to Harley’s body. “Isn’t it past your bedtime, kiddo? Does the old man know about your little jaunt here?”
Robin crossed his arms and averted his eyes. “He might…have told me to…y’know, go home, and this was on my way.”
Nightwing glared skeptically.
Robin met his eyes briefly and rolled his eyes. “About ten blocks out of my way, but still—”
Quickly wrapping up the villains, Nightwing offered, “Come on. Let’s get something to eat.”
*^*^*
“So how long have you been going out on your own?”
Tim,
sitting on top of
“Since Bruce banished me to Bludhaven,” Dick offered, stealing a bite of Tim’s churro.
Tim stole Dick’s pizza slice. “You weren’t banished. Bruce asked you to check on those dead hoods.”
“Banished.”
“Trusted.”
Dick sent him that same glare from earlier. Tim rolled his eyes again.
“All right…banished.”
They ate in silence for a moment.
“Are you going to tell Bruce?” Tim asked hesitantly.
Dick shrugged. “Not if you promise to meet me every Saturday night.”
Tim raised an eyebrow. “Why? I thought—”
“Look, I don’t understand why I’m punished for what happened between…” He stopped, then ruffled the boy’s hair. “You’re my little brother. I’ve missed you.”
“What are you going to tell Bruce, though?”
Dick looked
out over the bright lights of the city, his eyes reminiscent. “About you disobeying him, nothing. About me coming back to
“What about Bruce and Babs?” Tim slurped his smoothie.
“How…How are they doing?”
Tim twitched a shoulder. “Well, Bruce has been out longer each night now that Barbara’s working for the GCPD, but you should see her in her uniform.” He whistled. “Man-oh-man…”
That Dick remembered, which meant that when Tim went missing the first time around, she’d returned to her Batgirl persona.
“And y’know, I think she’s completely healed since Two-Face shot her.”
Dick whirled toward Tim. “Barbara was shot?”
*^*^*
The banging of the window awoke Barbara from a deep sleep, but its insistence dragged her from her bed. “Just a minute!”
She ran to her bedroom window to see the distraught man she’d let in just over four years ago. “Dick?” She opened the window. “What’s wrong?”
“You were shot.”
Barbara blinked the sleep away from her eyes. “Yes, but that was five months ago.”
“You were shot.” He grabbed her hand. “You were on life support.”
“I’m better now.” She pulled off his mask and placed a gentle hand to his wet cheek. “It’s okay. I’m okay.”
“I could’ve lost you, Barbara.”
“You didn’t.”
He bent his forehead to touch hers. “I didn’t?”
She smiled up lovingly. “No, you didn’t.”
Their lips met. Slowly, he reached down to lift her, then laid her down upon the bed. “I won’t lose you again,” he promised.
She worked off his jumpsuit as he worked off her nightgown. “You never did.”
*^*^*
The boy should have been dead, Batman hated to admit. One of the Riddler’s henchman whipped out a gun in Robin’s blind spots, and if there was one thing the Batman knew, it was his partner’s limitations.
Yet Robin used the current henchman he engaged as a springboard and jumped behind the gun-toting nut, taking the man down with a single kick. The boy shouldn’t have been able to do that move. He shouldn’t have the acrobatic skills or the sixth sense to even have known the henchman was behind him.
There was only one explanation.
Once they were in the car and on the way home, Batman snapped, “Where is he?”
*^*^*
“Hey, honey. Why don’t you let me ice those buns?”
Dick glanced over his shoulder at the drunk mid-aged female. She was a cougar no doubt, and the way her eyes never reached his gaze unnerved him. Compared to the Joker, though, she was a minor annoyance, like Dr. Light after the lobotomy.
“Sorry, lady, I’m going to have to cut you off,” Dick said as he scrubbed a few glasses clean.
“Aw, come on, sugar lips. Give me some of your sweetness.”
“I’d rather not.”
She leaned over. “I said, ‘Come on!’”
“He said, ‘No.’”
Dick followed the woman’s gaze to the monolithic figure dressed in an unfathomably black suit that made him look like the Ghost of Christmas Past. His continence was that of a military general who had found out his dog was killed.
The cougar made some intelligent responses before vacating the stool, which Bruce immediately occupied. “What are you doing?” he demanded.
“I don’t need you to look after me.” Dick scowled and placed down a tonic with lime. “I’m not stupid.”
“Then don’t act like it,” Bruce replied. “What are you doing here?”
“Honestly? Hiding under your radar.”
“I was here last night.”
“Yeah, well, you missed me, didn’t you?”
Bruce narrowed his eyes and ignored the awkward gazes of the riffraff about him. “You have a B.S. in Business Administration.”
Dick mixed a drink for a drunken police officer. “Your point?”
“This is underneath your abilities.”
“E.g. underneath your standards.”
“Yes.”
Well, at least they’d cut to the chase. “You banished me to Bludhaven because you felt guilty about what went down with Barbara. Why did I have to leave? Why did I have to sacrifice my family because you did something you felt was wrong?”
Bruce slammed his hand against the bar. Dick watched as the man rose from his seat and buttoned his jacket. “Are you done?”
Dick thought for a moment. “Yes, sir.”
“Quit. James is in need of an assistant in the publicity department. You will start on Monday.”
Dick tried to keep the smile off his face. “Now waitaminute—”
“Whatever rathole you live in now, give your landlord notice. I’ll
contact our real estate office and have the penthouse opened in the
Tossing his towel in the sink, Dick shook his head. “Who do you think you are? You just show up here, make demands of me, and expect me to comply?”
Bruce stood in the doorway, and though he wore the mask of Bruce Wayne, he was definitely the Batman. “There is no expecting, Dick. You will comply.”
He left, and Dick fell back onto his seat with a smirk.
*^*^*
The paper came across Dick’s desk at nine-oh-five. He was in James’s office by nine-oh-six, waving the memo in the doorway. “I’m not writing this.”
Letting out a huff, James leaned back in his seat. “We don’t make executive decisions, Dick. We promote them.”
Yeah, right. “I’m not writing this,” he snapped before storming out.
He took the elevator to the top level. Bristling down the hall, he never glanced at the secretary as she bubbled, “Mr. Grayson, Mr. Kingsley is in a meeting. You can’t—”
Like hell he couldn’t. Dick shoved open the CFO’s door, bursting into the older man’s office. “Paul, we’ve got to talk.”
Paul’s graying temples and charismatic smile proved his tenure in the executive position, but at the moment, Dick ignored that and the obvious international businessmen sitting the seats before Paul’s desk.
“Dick, I’m sorry, but now’s not a good time,” Paul said without looking up. “We’ll talk later.”
“Unless you want me going straight to Bruce, we’ll talk now.” He shook the paper for emphasis.
Paul forced a charmer’s smile. “Okay, we’ll talk now. If you’ll excuse me.”
They exited to the hall, Paul buttoning his suit jacket and situating the arms. “Is there’s something I can do for—”
“What the hell is this?” Dick demanded.
Paul gave an apathetic glance. “A wrinkled piece of paper?”
“You’re cutting jobs. Wayne Enterprises doesn’t cut jobs.”
“It does if it wants to make budget this year.”
“Screw budget,” Dick snarled. “You’re not going to let go more than a hundred thousand employees.”
“I’m sorry, but who died and made you my boss?” Paul brushed off a piece of lint from Dick’s polo shirt. “Oh, that’s right. No one, and let’s be honest. Even if something were to happen to Bruce, you wouldn’t get this company anyway.”
Dick’s eyes grew dark, but he held his anger in check. “That’s neither here nor there, Paul. You can’t just cut jobs because of the current economic situation. Wayne Enterprises has always had—”
“Again, Dick, who are you to be preaching to me about company philosophy?” Paul leaned back on his foot, his face easy with coolness. “You’re nothing but some white trash Bruce picked up at a tent sale. Frankly, I’m surprised he’s even given you a position in the company, one, which I’m told, is for me to give you information, and you to write press releases. Why don’t you do your job, and I’ll do my job.”
As Paul headed back into his office, Dick offered, “But you’re not doing your job.”
Paul glanced over his shoulder. “What would you have me do? A corporate restructuring? Please. That’ll take too much time and too many resources. Trust me. This is the better solution. Maybe a more intelligent person could see it.”
Fuming, Dick watched Paul enter his office before storming down the hall. A few moments later, he passed by a different secretary, who smiled politely. “Good day, Mr. Grayson. Mr. Fox will see you now.”
Dick nodded and entered the office. Lucius stood immediately and smiled at his one o’clock. “I’m sorry, Summer. Would you mind excusing us for a moment? Mr. Grayson and I have something to discuss.”
They used an adjacent conference room. “I see you received the memo,” Lucius began, taking a seat at the head of the table.
Dick remained standing. “I can’t believe you let this pass.”
“I had no choice, Dick.” Lucius took off his glasses and pinched the bridge of his nose. “Paul is technically on the same level as me. He reports directly to Bruce, who reports to the Board. I can’t override him.”
“But you must have said something. Anything!”
“I did. Trust me.” Lucius rocked forward in his seat. “You know how Paul can be, and without Bruce here to cut through his crap, he took advantage.”
“But what about—”
“If this goes through and we do balance the budget, the Board will think Paul’s an economic genius. It doesn’t matter that his morality compass isn’t working, and Bruce won’t have leverage to fire him.”
Dick averted his eyes and let out a deep sigh. “You’re saying that in order to stop this, we’ll need someone as powerful as the CEO.”
“To address the Board before it goes public? Yes, but Bruce is ‘out of the country.’ ”
He didn’t use air quotes, but Dick thought he heard them.
As he collapsed to the chair to Lucius’s right, Dick dropped his hands to the arms and just stared at Thomas and Martha Wayne’s painting on the wall. “Paul called me ‘white trash,’ something Bruce picked up at a tent sale.”
Lucius opened his mouth, but Dick cut him off. “I’m not petty. I really don’t give a shit what Paul Kingsley thinks. What I need to know is if the rest of Wayne Enterprises, the Board especially, thinks of me that way, too.”
Lucius cocked his head to the side and twitched a shoulder. “I think the Board believes you’re in media training, so you can play a bigger role in the company’s future.”
“So you think I could pass as the Wayne Heir?”
Lucius hit Dick on the shoulder. “You’ll have to cut your hair. Get out of khakis and a polo shirt and put on a suit. And you better not to be seen in that leather jacket between now and the press conference.”
Dick swiveled toward Lucius, a mischievous glint in his bright eyes. “Paul called a press conference for Monday. I think we can push it off until Thursday, give us a little time.”
“The press and Board will think we’re stalling.”
“We are, so let’em think it. LexCorp. is giving their budget press conference on Thursday, but their new CEO is a friend of a friend. I think I can get it pushed up, so it looks like we’re waiting to see how bad their finances are. Same with Drake Industries, and you know Derek Powers loves to be front and center. He’ll jump on this and move his media address to Monday.”
“So that gives us six days to restructure a multi-billion dollar company and sell it to the Board?”
Dick gave Lucius a hesitant smile. “Yeah.”
Lucius immediately picked up the phone on the table and hit
a specific extension. “Connie? Apologize to Ms. Gleason and tell her I won’t be
able to finish our meeting. Also, call my wife and tell her I won’t be home
tonight, and would you mind getting us some take-out?” Lucius
put his hand on the phone. “What do you want from
*^*^*
“Batman, you better take a look at this.”
The trepidation in J’onn’s voice was not to be dismissed, and Batman stopped his discussion with Wonder Woman to see the monitor. On the TV was a press conference, and even the great Batman was shocked by the sight of Dick Grayson in a black, tightly pressed suit and short hair. He addressed the press gaggle with an ease sometimes Bruce didn’t have.
“—but usually with restructuring comes bankruptcy. Is that a possible future for Wayne Enterprises?”
“It’s possible future for any company, Ms. Gleason, but if you mean is Wayne Enterprises in a financial crisis? The answer’s, “Heck no.’ This is simply to run more efficiently during the recession.”
“What about
layoffs?”
“Only to wonder who your source is, Mrs. Lane-Kent, considering layoffs were never an option or even a discussion. It will never be a discussion while Bruce is CEO. Next question.”
Wonder Woman smirked at Batman. “Left during an important time for your company?”
“The freedom of the OA seemed more imperative than budget season.”
“Apparently not to everyone. What does this mean for Wayne Enterprises?”
Batman smirked. “It means Paul Kingsley has finally been financially out-wrangled.”
*^*^*
The soft knock on his cubical wall was expected, even the smiling, thirty year old with glasses and a secretary’s bun. Dick returned her grin, leaning back in his chair. “Margaret, to what do I owe this visit? Did James finally file that sexual harassment complaint?”
Margaret didn’t try to keep a straight face. “Is there a reason you’re middle-aged-happily-married-father-of-two boss needs to file a sexual harassment complaint against you?”
“I told him to go home and get laid.”
“Ah.” She shook her head. “Not yet, but give it a few days. Your other boss wants to see you.”
He motioned toward the knickknacks upon his desk. “Should I get a box?”
“Don’t worry. We’ll get someone to do that for you.”
“Please tell them not to break my Batman mug. You have no idea how long it took me to find one with a blue insignia.”
They made it through the halls and elevators fairly quickly. “So why is he firing me in person? Why doesn’t he just have you do it?”
Margaret laughed. “He’s not going
to fire you.”
”Wanna bet?”
By then, he had opened the door to Bruce’s office and saw the older man standing behind his desk.
“What the hell did you think you were doing?” Bruce ambushed.
Dick took a deep breath. If he didn’t feel like he was ten all over again and had gone out on his own one night… “Finance gave me a press release to write before the budget press conference last week. I had no choice.”
“You had no choice?” Bruce repeated, straightening his back and crossing his arms. “You restructured my company.”
“I made it more efficient.” Dick argued. “Okay, so yes, we have culinary authors now working in the corporate cafeteria, but just think of the untapped monetary source.”
“Are you seriously telling me that you can rationalize taking nuclear physicists and making them factory foremen by calling them untapped monetary sources?”
“They’ll probably come up with more efficient production methods.” When Bruce just glared, the younger man just threw up his hands. “Fine. You want to fire me? Go right ahead, but I saved your people’s livelihood.” Dick retreated the office entrance. “The man I grew up admiring and tried to intimate would have been proud of—”
A shotgun round thundered through the hall the moment Dick opened the door. Dick grunted as the ground received his body, and the pain in his back from the fall registered before the pain in his shoulder.
He then heard Margaret’s shrill and looked down at his torn appendage.
He’s been shot.
He immediately grabbed the bleeding and pulsating shoulder, fighting pass the immediate pain until shock took over. Thundering footsteps announced Paul Kingsley as he marched into the room, flipping up his reloaded barrel. “You think you can take my job?”
Dick blinked, cringing past the pain. “W—What?”
“Was that all this was? A play to get me fired and you in a higher position in the company?”
“Dude…what are you on?”
Paul suddenly jerked to the left, sharing his aim with Bruce who had come forward. “Ooooh, no. You do not get to squeeze me out to put your little servant boy in my position.”
“Paul, think rationally,” Bruce eased.
“Think rationally? Thinking rationally would have been to fire the peons to balance the budget. Thinking rationally would have been to give the top executives their due pay, not to make them take a yearly dollar salary for the foreseeable future. Thinking rationally would have been to keep the carnie trash in the untouchable tent where it belongs.”
Bruce’s face darkened, and even through the haze of pain, Dick saw the mask metaphorically ripped off Bruce’s face, revealing the Batman. “Paul, if you do not put the gun down now, I will shove it in a place you will not find comfortable.”
Paul gave Bruce his entire attention. “Oh, you think you can make threats against me? Don’t you know who has the power here?”
God, this was going to hurt.
Dick used all the strength he had to kick, hitting Paul behind the knee. The man cried out as he toppled back, and Dick passed out, only seeing Bruce lunge at the last moment.
*^*^*
Detective Barbara Gordon had visited many crime scenes, first as the police commissioner’s daughter, later as Batgirl, and now as a detective in her own right. However, this was her first one in high heels, a low-cut dress, and sparkling earrings.
“Let me through!” she screamed at the patrolman as she ducked under the tape and dashed through the chaos.
She had been putting on lipstick, waiting for her dinner with Dick. She’d called him less than a half an hour before five, confirmed the time of their date. He said he was waiting for Bruce to yell at him, but at four-thirty—Bruce was probably gone. Now…
“Hey, Babs!”
Her heart fluttered when she swiveled to see the young man sitting on the edge of an ambulance, his legs dangling off. His face was worn with exhaustion, and his shirt was off. A thick bandage wrapped his right shoulder. Next to him, Bruce Wayne stood, vigilant as ever, even in his Gucci business wear.
“Oh, thank God,” Barbara muttered as she dove into Dick’s arms. She ignored his protests and pressed her lips hard into his.
He unexpectedly pulled away, shooting a glance toward Bruce.
Barbara’s heart skipped a beat. After all this time, Dick had known—about her and Bruce, the kiss they shared during his time away. Had Bruce told him? And now Dick looked to Bruce for approval—or for closure?
Bruce granted the two a half-grunted grin, the best he could do after the firefight. “I’m happy for you.”
Dick finished the kiss, much to Barbara’s delight. She then punched him in the gut, stealing the air from his mouth. “What is wrong with you? Getting yourself shot and worrying me. You know how I heard? Montoya called me and said I should get over here. She didn’t tell me how you were or what happened, and what did happen—”
“I fired Paul Kingsley today,” Bruce muttered. “He became a disgruntled former employee.”
Dick’s eyes snapped up. “You fired Paul?”
“Yes. He failed to comply with the company’s code of ethics and forgot W.E.’s greatest asset is its employees. When he asked who would take his place, I told him you would.”
Barbara saw the appreciation in Dick’s eyes, though her boyfriend hid it well. “But you still gave me a hard time.”
Bruce’s eyes softened a tad, and he looked away. “There are obvious changes that will need to be made, such as the engineers working as secretaries. They should be used to make Wayne Enterprises more green.”
Dick stuck out his tongue.
Seeing the boy she grew up loving and hating, Barbara sat down next to Dick and held his hand. “You could’ve died.”
Bruce patted Dick on his good shoulder. “I have to speak with the head of security about this breach. We’ll talk later about finalizing your promotion.”
As Bruce left, Dick sat spellbound, his eyes wide. “I can’t believe it. Can you believe it? Barbara…I’m going to be the CFO of a company.”
“I hope that means you’ll take fewer risks.” She leaned her head against his chest. “I almost lost you.”
“This happened today because of Dick Grayson, not…y’know.”
“But if you weren’t so damn altruistic—”
“Like Detective Gordon, who gets shot at once a day.”
She pulled away. “That’s different. I’m not wearing a target.”
“You knew who you were dating when you started going out with me.”
“Not originally, and if I would have …” Barbara blew out a loud breath and stood, her back toward him. “I still would have jumped in head over heels.”
Dick grabbed her delicate hand, rubbing his thumb up and down hers. “Honey, I…I love you more than anything, but this is who I am. This isn’t going to change in ten or fifteen years. Even when I can’t do this anymore, I’m still going to be involved in some way.”
Barbara glanced back, tears saturating her flushed face. “I know, which is why we have to steal all the time we can together.”
Getting down on one knee, in front of her colleagues and peers, she took out a box from her pocket. Inside was two rings—a diamond ring and a silver band. “Richard John Grayson, will you marry me?”
The expression on his face froze her, and he immediately patted the seat next to him again. She begrudgingly took it, muttering, “If you’re going to say no, just say no.”
He bent his head to touch her forehead. “I would say yes a thousand times over to you right now, but it wouldn’t be fair to you.”
Barbara snatched her head back. “You’re still not with that alien bitch—”
“No!” He sighed and rubbed the back of his head. “You’re not going to be believe me, and that’s okay. I don’t expect you to, but still…you need to know about Sam.”
*^*^*
“So you said yes?” Robin gasped.
Nightwing swung next to him across the
Robin flew onto the edge of a small apartment building above Devil’s Square. “You told her everything? Like she was married in the future to some other guy and chose him over you?”
“You really believe me?” Nightwing asked.
Robin shrugged. “Yeah, why wouldn’t I? You’re my brother.”
Nightwing ruffled the boy’s hair and sighed. “She didn’t really choose him over me. It was just…y’know, the wrong time.” He smiled widely. “Now, it’s finally right.”
Robin allowed Nightwing a moment of good-nature before he ripped, “So, who do you think is going to be our new stepmother, Wonder Woman or Zatanna?”
Feeling a presence behind him, Nightwing suddenly whirled, only for a taser to knick him just below the chin and just above his suit collar. Robin’s dug into the boy’s forearm skin. As the volts jingled through Nightwing, he saw the purple pants and white face that haunted much of his childhood and now would finally destroy him.
“Oh, look, Harl. We finally got the Batman’s goats.”
To Be Continued…