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With a crossword puzzle from a crumpled copy of the Gotham Gazette forgotten in her lap, Babs stares blankly outside the kitchen window. There’s a heft inside her ribcage that she hasn’t been able to shake off for a few days now. It’s highly inconvenient. She doesn’t normally fixate on feelings like this. Normally she’s able to brush them away, especially if they’re silly. And this one certainly qualifies.
Babs watches two snowflakes frozen together drift down to the ice-stiff grass of the Drake’s vast property. When she raises her gaze to find another double snowflake to mindlessly track, her eyes catch on the grandiosity of Wayne Manor in the far distance, looking like a castle atop the hills of Bristol Township and with a sudden vigor, Babs’s heart stings in shame, a reminder of her failure last week.
Or at least, her misunderstanding of the situation.
The sky had flashed over them that night as they stood over the skyscrapers, with no one in earshot save for the gargoyles on the parapet. Batman loomed above her, the anger and raindrops rolling off the black cape. Sirens wailed as the GCPD took care of the remnants of the dismantled crime ring below, but instead of the victory Babs should have been feeling, she felt oddly defensive under Batman’s scrutiny.
“I don’t understand what’s the problem,” Batgirl had said then, her eyes not leaving the whites of Batman’s glare. “I saw an opening, so I jumped in to help you. You’re welcome, by the way.”
“I didn’t need you,” Batman boomed in that deep growling way typically reserved for villains, confirming that gratitude was the last thing on his mind. But then came the killer: “I work alone.”
Babs had tried her best to be unbothered despite the glare she was being pinned under. She still didn’t understand what she’d done that was so bad. But the moments her next words were out, she had a feeling she’d said the wrong thing.
“Right, alone, with Robin.”
“Gotham doesn’t need your heroics,” he’d snapped, cutting Babs deep in a place she couldn’t reach to put a bandaid on. “Go home.”
And so that’s what happened.
Look, even if she was wrong to jump into his fight last week to help him, Batman still shouldn’t have shouted at her the way he did. She isn’t some child playing dress-up. She’s almost sixteen. She’s spent this entire past year solving mysteries, planning rescue missions, and beating up bad guys three times her size, all without Batman’s mentorship or training. Heck, she’s barely gotten the guy to tolerate her. And maybe it would make sense for Batman not to approve of some rookie, but she’s good. Really good.
And hey, yeah — maybe she’ll never get to learn under Batman’s wing. Maybe she’ll never get anything more than a grunt of annoyance when they cross paths during patrol. She can even live with Robin’s insufferable childlike antics like when he sticks his tongue out at her simply because Batman doesn’t care to chide him.
But at the very least, she… she deserves to not be scolded.
To make things worse, the humiliating headline from the Gotham Gazette’s front page is still rolling around in her head — what kind of professional journalism publishes “Wannabe Batman Sidekick Let-Down” as the cover story, anyway??? — and so is the blurry photo of Batman towering over Batgirl with an intimidating scowl, his mouth open in a harsh, biting way. What Batman said to her was only for her ears that night, but from the way the picture has blown up on social media, reposts and memes, everyone’s gotten the gist.
@lieutenantobvious | so batman hates batgirl, huh @gothamgazetteofficial
3.4k likes | 240 comments | 536 reposts
@ohnoourtableitsbroken3 | omg why is this so embarrassing??? im embarrassed FOR her
473 likes | 16 comments | 39 reposts
@sugarsweetbabiex | god i want batdaddy to shout at me too
6.8k likes | 62 comments | 1.2k reposts
@malesuperi0rity5ever | female heroes sucks haha no I mean suck singular no backspace backspace no not goddamn text to speech stupid phone delete tweet wait what is this app called again
7 likes | 3 comments | 3 reposts
@ladiesletsettiquette | I don’t normally comment but I just want to say Bat Girl’s behavior is especially appalling to me, so unladylike. It’s like I always tell my granddaughters: girls should not be acting like boys. Or bats. I don’t understand the theme, to be honest. At least maybe this Bat Girl will stop after getting publicly humiliated!!! And hopefully chooses to spend her free time doing something more ladylike!!!
13 likes | 6 comments | 0 reposts
After doom-scrolling for the hundredth time yesterday, Babs had deleted her social media apps. She’s used to the Gotham media’s disdain for vigilantes — and the narrow-minded judgment from men and women alike — but she’s not used to seeing herself at the center of it, and with such unflattering words. The article speaks more about her costume colors and less about the criminal activity that she and Batman had stopped — and yet somehow all of it still makes her ashamed. Too ashamed to even show up to patrol, even.
Tonight will be the eighth night in a row that she’s skipped the field work and stuck to solving cases from the security of her bedroom and anonymously tipping off the GCPD with potential leads — and the eighth night in a row that she’s felt awful.
It’s one thing to have confidence as a hero, but when everyone else thinks you’re a loser, does self-confidence even matter?
Wayne Manor mocks her from here, and so does the small white truck parked in front of it, probably delivering fresh groceries for Alfred to sort out to make dinner for its occupants. Babs feels a new burn of horror — oh great, what must Alfred think of her? — and closes her eyes before she can cry.
When she opens them again, she sees a little face over her crossword puzzle and a pair of impossibly light blue eyes looking at her.
Babs jolts, clutching her chest, because she didn’t see the five-year-old move from the kitchen table where he was working on a jigsaw puzzle to the window seat, in front of her.
“Hi,” Tim says obliviously, casually balancing his weight on her drawn-up knees with his soft gummy palms. “You look sad.”
Shoot. On survival instinct alone, Babs shakes her head and forces herself to smile her 100-kilowatt smile. She’s not Batgirl right now. She’s Barbara Gordon, high school sophomore, part-time babysitter, and tonight she’s getting paid to look after little Timothy Drake, only child of Jack and Janet Drake, one of the richest families in the country. She can’t be wallowing on the job — what if he gets bored? If Timothy’s anything like her last Bristol babysitting gig, Boris Softbottum, he’ll go and tell his parents that Babs was “too boring”, and she’ll get fired. She can’t suck at being Batgirl and Barbara Gordon.
“Oh, no, I’m not — I mean, I’m totally awesome, Timmy! Feeling great. Just thinking about, you know, this.” Babs gestures to her crossword and jokingly says, “Can’t come up with a word for someone who gets angry when someone else really awesome tries to help them. But don’t worry. Do you need help with your puzzle — oh,” Babs breaks off, looking to the side at the completed jigsaw puzzle on the table, the one she’d brought from home with all 300 pieces. The final image of a girl and her horse smiles at her. “Oh, wow! Good job, Timmy!”
The five-year-old’s entire body falters at the praise, and Babs instantly reaches out with her arms to catch him if he slips from where he’s made a playground of her knees. But he sinks down slowly himself, staring at her with wide pupils. Babs isn’t sure what’s made him so starry-eyed. She doesn’t have another puzzle — she thought this one would keep him busy for at least another hour or two as she prepped dinner.
Tim’s stomach lets out a gurgle.
“Alright, that’s my cue,” Babs says, getting up. “How do you feel about… let’s see…”
Before firing her, Boris Softbottum’s mother had given Babs an entire list of foods her child couldn’t even be within ten feet of. The instructions left by Janet Drake had been pretty much nonexistent in comparison, just a single sentence thanking her for “putting up” with Timothy. It was a little strange, but at least there were no allergies Babs needed to be worried about.
Her eyes fall on eggs, milk, and a full bottle of syrup in the fully stocked refrigerator. “You’re not one of those kids who hate breakfast for dinner, are you?”
Tim’s eyes widen further, and he shakes his head in the hardest and fastest no Babs has ever seen from a child as small as him. “Can we really do that?”
For the first time all week, Babs finds herself grinning for real.
~
Making scrambled eggs and pancakes is an overall blast, even with the small spills of egg batter and the slight burning of one of the pancakes. For some reason Tim stiffens whenever he makes a mistake, but Babs is able to ease the frozen look of guilt off his face with a cheerful reassurance and a quick paper towel swipe over the counter. The rest of the time, they’re talking and giggling over the silly ketchup faces Tim’s put on the pile of eggs.
But when Tim climbs onto the counter and retrieves another plate, Babs looks down at the first, her smile slipping, wondering if there’s something she’s done wrong. Maybe she served the foods too close together — there was a picky eater she babysat in Gotham who didn’t like it when his different foods touched.
But then Tim simply says, “This one’s for you,” and clumsily serves her a syrupy pancake. Like it’s obvious that Babs is supposed to be eating with him too, and she’s not just the babysitter who was planning on feasting on her half a granola bar in her backpack.
Something funny happens to Babs’s heart as she watches Tim squeeze out a ketchupy smile on her scrambled eggs. The kids she babysits aren’t usually nice. At worst, they’re like Boris Softbottum, and threaten to eat her heart if she doesn’t sing them a lullaby. At best, they ignore her. But Timothy Drake? This kid’s slowly but surely checking off all the boxes for being a complete sweetheart. Jack and Janet Drake either seriously won the kid lottery, or somehow they’re great parents despite the dreariness of Drake Manor.
As they both eat in quiet contentment in the kitchen, Babs gets stuck on that. Sure, the refrigerator’s fully stocked with fresh food and every room has been tastefully designed in an art deco style, but there’s no personalization of any kind to be found anywhere. Maybe the Drakes aren’t the type to nest, but it seems weird that there aren’t photo frames on the walls, or coats in the foyer closet other than Babs’s, or even a single magnet on the refrigerator. It’s strange, considering all the other houses she’s babysat at have been a little bit more… lived in. Even Wayne Manor, which she’s been to a couple times, despite Bruce’s obvious displeasure, has more character than the Drake Manor.
Out of nowhere, Tim, almost through his entire plate already, thoughtfully says, “Poophead.”
Babs slows down on her bite of pancake to look at the little kid.
Tim’s face turns pink. “Sorry! Not you. You said, what’s a word for a person who gets mean at someone who’s trying to help them? I thought… poophead. I-I’m sorry.”
It registers all at once, and soon Babs is laughing. Tim’s embarrassed, sorry-he-even-opened-his-mouth expression softens away.
“There really isn’t a better word than that. Batman really is a poophead sometimes,” Babs says, giggling.
“Batman?”
Babs catches herself gracefully. “My dad corresponds with him sometimes, on cases. He says Batman works alone, and sometimes it’s frustrating. That’s all I meant.”
Tim tilts his head thoughtfully and says, “But Batman isn’t always alone. He gets helped out. By Robin.”
Babs points her fork in Tim’s direction in affirmation before taking another bite of her pancake.
“That’s so true.”
“And by Batgirl!” Tim adds.
The heft in Babs’s ribs grows heavier. She laughs, poking at her food, and says, “Yeah, but she doesn’t really… help Batman. She’s just sort of there. Everyone online says so.”
Tim’s fork clatters on a plate loudly, and when Babs looks up at him, she’s met with wide, shocked eyes. Babs isn’t sure what she said to make him react that way, but then Tim starts talking a mile a minute.
“She’s the coolest. She’s brave and nice and she never gives up. She saved my kindergarten bus when it got stuck in the mud that one time! And looked really awesome doing it. And she took on that racecar driver guy with the robot arm! And she got into that big cool suit to fight Joker when he got super strong and disengaged the tubes so Batman could take him out. And also, she rescued Batman from Poison Ivy before Robin was even around. She rescued him! I dunno what other people are saying but I think Gotham has it real good with yo—I mean, with Batgirl around, and they should be really happy!”
Tim’s risen out of his chair during his proclamation, his eyes intense on hers. Then he seems to realize that he’s standing and settles down, shoving his mouth with eggs and looking very interested in his dinner. Babs has no idea how Tim even knows some of those details of her prior missions, but there’s a warm, special feeling inside her from his words, reminding her why she even started doing this in the first place.
Becoming Batgirl was never for Batman.
But before she can fully bask in the revelation she’s just had thanks to a five-year-old, there’s a shrill ringing of the doorbell.
Babs straightens in her seat. Jack and Janet Drake said they’d be arriving home late, but she’d expected it to be sometime closer to midnight. It’s barely past seven. Maybe the gala downtown they were at was a bust the moment it started and they decided to come home early? Either way, Babs rises from her seat and leaves the kitchen to get to the front door down the hallway. She puts one hand on the doorknob, about to turn it, when she peers through the ornate side window and freezes at the figures standing outside.
It’s not Jack and Janet Drake — it’s two men.
One man, maybe in high school, is built like an oak tree, and the other is thin and much more wrinkled, leaning on a walking stick and muttering something to the bigger one under his breath. Behind them on the drive-in up to the manor, through the snowfall, Babs can see there’s a white truck out in front of the Drake Manor. The same white truck that was in front of Wayne Manor half an hour ago. Babs observes the company label on the side of it, and then the distinct lack of work uniforms of the two men on the porch. They’re just in regular clothes and long trenchcoats, their hands shoved in their pockets. Is that normal? The thinner, older man sees Babs in the window, and his eyebrows lift slightly before his face splits into a wide, unsettling smile of blackened teeth.
Babs lets go of the doorknob warily.
“We see you,” comes the muffled shout from the other side of the door, followed by a thumping on the door. “Open up — we’re delivering groceries.”
Right. Okay. Deliveries. That makes sense, even if they’re extremely creepy deliverymen. A sense of relief washes over her. But she doesn’t make a move to unlock the door. She presses the speaker button on the panel by the door instead.
“Just put them on the porch, please!” she says, then draws back deeper into the foyer.
“Can’t do that, missy — company policy,” comes the older man’s voice again.
Groceries… wasn’t the refrigerator full of food, though? A chill sets over her. Babs feels a hand slip into hers and she looks down to see Tim at her side, squinting at the door in confusion. Her instincts win over and she pulls out her phone from her back pocket, and finds Janet's number. It rings in her ear.
Ring-ring-ring.
There’s more thumps on the door.
Ring-ring-ring.
The thumping stops.
They might have left, Babs thinks to herself. They might have left and I just overreacted. They’re probably two regular employees, and I acted too fast, just like Batman says I do — no, wait, he’s a poophead, remember?
Ring-ring-rin—
CRACK.
Everything happens quickly. The door breaks inward with a splintering cracking sound. A hissing noise fills the foyer in the next moment. Babs puts her phone in her hoodie pocket and pushes Tim behind her immediately, eyes narrowing at the sudden intrusion, and her fists go up — but then her eyes begin to sting as smoke pours in, and the two men, now wearing gas masks over their faces, walk in.
“Take the boy, Pipsqueak,” the older man orders through the mask.
Oh, hell no.
Babs opens her mouth to tell Tim to run, but she’s only met with spluttering coughs behind her. Her heart drops to her stomach when she sees Tim collapsed on the floor. What’s worse is that she’s struggling to stay upright, too. She’s practiced holding her breath for situations like this, but she always thought she’d be doing it as Batgirl, not Barbara.
Right. She’s Barbara. She shouldn’t be fighting. She should be reacting like a civilian — and calling the GCPD. Better yet, her father. She reaches for her phone again, hoping that Janet Drake has picked up —
“The number you’ve dialed is currently busy. You may leave a message after the tone.”
But then the big guy goes for Tim, coming in way too close, too fast.
Babs roundhouse kicks him in the chin, sending him reeling backwards with a grunt. She scoops Tim into her arms and flees — but the effort forces her to inhale, and as she rounds into the kitchen, her lungs are burning from whatever variation of knock-out gas the two men have sprayed into Drake Manor. Against her will her body sinks to the kitchen floor. She presses her back against the refrigerator, fighting the heaviness of her eyelids.
Danger, danger, danger, her inner voice is shouting at her.
I know, thanks, she thinks back.
From around the corner, she hears voices and footsteps.
“Boss, uh… the girl’s tryin’ to hide the, uh, the Drake kid.”
“Well, find them, then! You know this damn leg can’t move for shit.”
Babs knows when she’s going to pass out. Her vision swims as she looks at her contacts. Her thumb hovers over Dad, and then she changes her mind last minute.
She doesn’t know why.
Maybe because of the gas, or maybe she’s really lost touch of reality. Because there’s no way Bruce Wayne is going to pick up a call from her, the last person who should even have his number.
The big guy enters the kitchen. Someone pulls Tim’s limp form away from her — no, give him back — and the floor rushes far too quickly towards Babs’s head. She lets go of her remaining sense of gravity and instead desperately clings to her last lucid thoughts.
“Got him, Boss.”
“Great. Let’s book it before the transmission jammer goes down and the security system goes off,” Babs hears the older man say.
“What about the girl, Boss?” the big guy calls, craning his head back.
A snarl. “Unless she’s someone important, we’re not going to get much from her. Leave her.”
“Uh… alright. Sorry, commissioner’s daughter. The gas will wear off soon.”
A limping set of footsteps and the thud of a walking stick halt. The older man’s voice is shrill from the other hallway when he speaks.
“She’s who?”
“I’ve seen her at school, Boss. The Gordon girl. Takes advanced classes. She’s pretty and smart and — ”
“I don’t care about all that, why didn’t you say she was the commissioner’s daughter in the first place? Put her in with the others!”
Babs can’t stay conscious like this. So when the big guy leans down to pick her up, she desperately claws the back of his head, snapping the gas mask off, and presses it to her own face — and engages it.
Her head’s still spinning, but she wastes no time in pulling herself up with the counter as her support, grabbing the spatula that they’d been mixing the pancake batter with — and shoving it into the bigger man’s gaping mouth as he starts to call for help from his boss. Tim falls from the big guy’s grasp, but Babs scoops up the five-year-old in her arms and darts backwards, towards the back door of the kitchen.
“Pipsqueak, what’s happening? Answer me!” shouts the boss just as Babs shuts the door and dashes into the snowfall outside, gulping in lungfuls of fresh air.
~
Only after Tim stirs awake in her arms with a moan does Babs realize she left her phone in the kitchen, somewhere under the refrigerator. Shoot. Despite the chaos, she should have remembered to pick that up.
I guess I’m not used to fighting without having everything on my utility belt, Babs thinks ruefully.
Right now all she has are the not-appropriate-for-winter clothes on her back and the gas mask she’d stolen from Pipsqueak looped at her waist. But what good is any of that? When she had her phone, she should have called 911. Or her dad. But who had she called, in her gassed-up haze?
Bruce Wayne.
The poophead.
“Ow,” Tim whines, hands coming up to his nose. Babs winces — she knows firsthand how waking up from knock-out gas can leave the nasal cavity sore. She’s quiet for a few moments to let Tim’s headache pass, wishing there was something else she could do.
Was running away even the right answer? If she’d let herself get caught by the two kidnappers, Boss and Pipsqueak, they wouldn’t be out in the snow under a pine tree only a few yards away from the manor. They’d be warm in that truck.
The truck, Babs thinks, her deductive reasoning kicking in as she peers through the needles of the pine tree towards the white truck on the driveway. It’s got other kids.
And her heart sinks as she realizes just who the other kids are.
“Babs can I have a blanket?” Tim mumbles, curling into Babs’s shoulder. Babs’s arms immediately tighten around him, rubbing his back in awkward apology. Then Tim blinks, looking around in realization. “Oh.”
“Yeah,” Babs agrees. “Sorry, buddy.”
“S’not your fault the bad men tried to steal me. What are we going to do?” he asks, snuggles a little more firmly into her arms, looking all too calm for a little boy amid his kidnapping attempt.
“I’m thinking.” Babs looks out from the pine tree and blanches at the way the kitchen’s back door has been blasted open.
Boss stands in the doorway, outrage in his eyes.
Their would-be kidnapper’s eyes land on the snow, and Babs’s heart falls. Even with the heavy snowfall that’s descended upon them in the past five minutes, her footsteps are still clearly visible, leading into the patch of trees where they’re hiding.
“You think this is a game, lass?” the man calls out, sneering. “Well then, I can play.”
Making sure Tim’s secure around her torso like a baby koala — he’s not much different from one — Babs moves quickly and stealthily up the pine tree, avoiding the needles. Dick’s better at climbing into weird places, but she thinks that her frenemy would be proud of her for going up the most ouch tree possible.
She pulls herself and Tim up a good few feet while keeping an eye on Boss as he creeps closer, into the shadows of the woods. The keys in Boss’s trenchcoat pocket clink with each step.
Tim tucks into Babs’s neck, and she can feel him shiver. She hates that he’s scared. But then Tim lets out a hushed, “This is so awesome,” and Babs gets the impression that Tim Drake might not be a normal five-year-old.
“Timmy,” Babs whispers, “Think you can put on the gas mask?”
Tim obediently slides it on, and blinks up at her, waiting for her next instruction. Babs doesn’t think the men will hurt Tim if they get caught, but her stomach churns at the idea of letting him go nonetheless.
“Stay up here, okay?” she whispers, shifting Tim so he’s sitting on a branch. “And stay quiet, no matter what.”
Tim’s eyes widen in fear.
“Lass,” comes Boss’s sing-song voice.
In the darkness of the woods, he’s stopped, looking around for them. From her nights as Batgirl, she’s learned that most people don’t look directly up. So when she takes the plunge into the darkness below, legs extended, the older man doesn’t see it coming. The kick lands, even without shoes. His walking stick tumbles down and rolls across the snow-coated grass. Babs rolls into a perfect landing, and then slams her heel into Boss’s gut just as he tries to get up. Swears leave the man’s mouth as he hunches over in the snow.
“You think,” he spits out, “that just because your daddy’s the law, you can hit me, stupid little girl?”
“You tried to kidnap me,” Babs says with an exaggerated big-eyed look of an innocent high school girl who doesn’t know what she’s doing, “And you have the gall to act offended that I’m fighting back?”
“You’re an accessory. Your father probably won’t even give that much for you,” Boss says with a grunt. “No, the real prizes are the little Bristol boys. Give me little Drake, and I’ll let you go. You can even tell everyone how scary I was. No one will blame the Commissioner’s pretty, traumatized, little daughter.”
Babs clenches her jaw. What a jackass.
“You don’t have to get involved,” the man continues between wheezes on the ground. “Just leave all the work to the boys. They’re not even going to be hurt. Just held up for a few inconvenient hours for a ransom. What do you gain from playing hero for no reason?”
No reason? There’s plenty of reasons that criminals shouldn’t be humored, but the most important one right now is sitting up in the pine tree, out of Boss’s sight. Babs isn’t going to let anyone hurt Tim.
“You’re delusional if you think you’re going to convince me to stay down,” Babs snarls, walking up to Boss to kick him in the side so he’s on his back. She needs to take the keys in his trenchcoat, free the others in the truck, and then —
A sharp pain shoots up her ankle as Boss slams a metal can into it — and Babs screams as she falls. Too late she realizes that Boss was faking injury to lure her close — and then there’s a weight on her, and a metal can up to her face, and a PSSSHHHHHHH —
Babs holds her breath even though Boss is currently crushing her chest. His mouth is covered with the gas mask but from the way his eyes are, she can tell he’s grinning wildly underneath it, black teeth and all, pinning her arms and torso down. Her throat burns as the gas streams to the back of her throat. She bites down hard on the man’s fingers, but his gloves seem to protect him. Her vision swims.
“Breathe it in, you little shit. I’ll find the Drake boy myself, and you can pass out into a coma for all I care,” Boss grunts into her ear. “I’m sick of you upper class vermin, given so much more from the moment you’re out of the womb by your corrupt high born parents, than what I’ve accumulated over an entire lifetime, working the so-called honest life.”
Babs shoves at Boss with her limited mobility, her lungs begging for the next breath even though the only air around her is the gas. Boss grabs her face with gloved fingers, prying her mouth open and shoving the nozzle of the can in between her teeth. The gas tastes sour.
She’s going to fail. She’s going to lose to a guy just because he has too much knock-out gas and she’s just fifteen, and there’s no one who actually trained her for combat besides herself.
Batman was right about her. Gotham doesn’t need your heroics, he’d said, Go home.
She did go home, though. Now she’s just Barbara Gordon, high school sophomore, part-time babysitter. Doing normal things like normal girls do. And look at where that’s gotten her: she’s currently having knock-out gas for dessert.
So, really, what’s the point in trying to pander to someone else’s idea of who she should be when she can’t seem to do any of it right?
Babs growls, sick of everything, sick of being told what she shouldn’t be, but the older man just continues in his rant. Babs doesn’t see the way he reaches for the walking stick until it’s in his hand.
“I wasn’t going to hurt anyone, you know,” the old man snaps, and brings the stick down on her before Babs can even flinch.
Thwack.
“I just wanted the money.”
Thwack.
“But now, because of you, I think I will, lass. After I wring out all the green I can from them — ”
Thwack. Thwack. Thwack.
“— I think it’ll be gratifying to make the little Drake scream.”
Babs sees red. Her arms and midsection throb and sting from the caning but she raises her legs and brings down her heels on the backside of his bad leg. It’s the old man’s weak spot. He roars in pain, clearly not acting, and drops the can.
Babs pulls herself up, rips the gas mask off his face, and sprays it in his eyes.
Boss swears before jerking away to holding his breath, but he’s not moving one way or another. Sluggishly, clumsily, Babs reaches into his trenchcoat pocket before he can make a grab for her — and by some miracle, pulls out the keys on the first try.
“Babs!” comes a cry from her right, where she can make out Tim, out of the tree, eyes wide. “Babs, don’t — don’t die!”
“It’s okay,” Babs says, pushing herself woozily to her feet. Her voice is coming out feeble, like a breeze could blow it away. “Not… dying… today.”
Tim rushes towards her, stumbling through the snow on his bare feet. He moves much faster than Babs can, which she’s grateful for, but she’s sure she had a really good reason she didn’t want him coming to her.
A gloved hand lurches out to grab Tim by the ankle. He screams, falling forward, and Babs’s heavy eyelids snap open in alarm, heart pulsing erratically.
Oh, yeah. That’s the reason.
“How dare you,” wheezes out their would-be kidnapper, as if there’s still any way he can still get up. His hand grabs the can and sprays it into the air — but with Tim wearing the mask and Babs holding her breath again, the only one coughing it into their system is the Boss himself. He continues to talk, clearly too outraged to think clearly — “Filthy rats! I deserve to be rich after a lifetime of — of my life. I won’t let you get away from m—!”
Babs pulls Tim away from the man as he collapses, dropping the can. Tim flings himself free.
Tim’s face pillows into Babs’s stomach and his arms wrap around one of her legs. His shoulders are shaking, and Babs thinks he might be laughing — she’s had a couple of hysterical giggles after a life-threatening mission before herself, especially when the bad guys were stupid — but then she hears his keen, and she immediately drops down in front of him, hating that her tongue is too heavy to form words and that her fingers are shaky and uncoordinated as they wipe at the tears on the little boy’s cheeks. Tim leans into the touch and cries harder.
Wordlessly, Babs picks Tim up, letting him latch onto her with his arms and legs. She walks out of the woods and is met with an abundance of heavy snowfall drifting down on the world. The cold bites at her hands and feet. As she walks, she brushes off the snow from Tim’s feet and hopes that he isn’t going to get sick from all this. And shoot, she’s going to have to explain all of this to Jack and Janet Drake, isn’t she?
Jack and Janet will come home, Babs thinks. Jack and Janet will fire me. Ha. It’s almost like the beginning of a nursery rhyme.
With great difficulty, Babs breathes in and out — the fresh air making the world spin a little less, and her thoughts more sensible. Like the fact that she might need to get her oxygen levels checked. Her lungs feel like they’re on fire.
It feels surreal to reach the truck in the darkening evening, amidst a quiet, heavy snowfall that’s making everything harder to see through. But she’s almost there, and then she can lie down and catch her escaping breaths.
Tim shifts to watch as Babs struggles to get her numb fingers to fit the key into the truck’s back door keyhole. Sounds come from inside the truck. A scuffling sound, like someone’s moving away from the door, and a hushed voice saying something. The others. She hopes they’re okay.
Babs can’t explain it to Tim — her mouth still refuses to cooperate. Her lips are heavy — could they be swollen? She blinks rapidly. All the same, Tim helps her with the key by leading her shaking hand to the keyhole. Finally Babs is able to turn the key.
And then she flings the doors open to the alert and angry— and now shocked — faces of Dick Grayson and Jason Todd.
~
“No way, they snatched up a friggin’ baby!” is the first thing Jason yells upon seeing them.
It would be funny hearing that, since Jason appears not all that much older than Tim himself. But the situation being what it is stops Babs from laughing, as well as the sight of the monkey wrench in Jason’s hand, looking fully prepared to be weaponized. Jason waves it threateningly at her.
“You better fucking let him go, or I’ll — !”
Needless to say, this isn’t the way she expected to meet Bruce Wayne’s newest ward. Last month, Dick told Babs about his new little brother, fresh off the streets of Gotham, on a rare moment of sincerity on patrol. Babs had thought about maybe bringing him cookies, if he liked that sort of thing. Looking at his hollowed out cheeks and the way his hoodie hangs loosely off his frame, she wishes she had a few right now to offer him.
“Babs!” gasps Dick, wide-eyed.
Babs waves with a weak smile. To his credit, he doesn’t stick his tongue out at her, as he’s so fond of doing.
“Dick Grayson?” Tim squeaks in that star-struck tone of his, his koala-hold on Babs slipping from shock.
“Uh… yes?” Dick says in utter confusion. “Wait, you’re the Drake kid, right?”
A monkey wrench drops to the truck’s floor, where snow has begun to blow in from the outside.
“You know each other?” Jason demands. In the waning light of the evening, Babs catches the shade of blue that Jason Todd’s eyes are, as well as the anger in them. “Do all the kids in Bristol know each other? Is kidnapping a type of networking event?”
Instead of immediately answering, Dick launches himself at Babs, wrapping his arms around her gratefully. If Babs wasn’t already speechless, she would be by now. Dick doesn’t hug her unless he’s Robin saving Batgirl from a grappling hook malfunction, and even then he’s always got to be annoyingly smug about it in that cheerful way of his.
“I thought — what are you — how did you —?” Shaking his head, Dick looks around with a fierce alertness. “Never mind, Babs, listen, there’s these two men out there who — ”
“We know,” Tim peeps from around them, wide-eyed. “They tried to grab us, too, but Babs beat them up.”
Jason does a double-take at that, his eyes wide on Babs. “Wait, really?”
“But I think the scary man did something — he hurt her throat, she can’t talk — ”
“What?” Dick asks, alarmed, looking at Babs in concern, his hands frantically going up to Babs again. “Are you okay?”
Babs feels lightheaded, still stuck on how uncharacteristic Dick is acting. He doesn’t even look like he’s planning on cracking a joke about how long she took to free them, or how he didn’t actually need her help.
A deep growl comes from behind them.
“Who’s hurt?”
All four of them snap to attention, whipping their heads towards the voice behind Babs. Against the white snowstorm that has crept upon them, in all black, stands Batman.
His glare is as livid as it was the last time Babs was on the receiving end of it. Babs doesn’t think she wants to be on the end of it again. But when his gaze lands on her, those white slits narrowing, she knows for sure.
Her biological fear response kicks in, and the last thing Babs hears is her name being shouted by everyone around her as she swoons into the snow.
~
Babs wakes up, briefly, to a considerably warmer environment, but not at all a bed. Someone’s carrying her, it seems, and she’s nestled in. She didn’t think she was still young enough or small enough to be carried. From somewhere else she hears Tim’s worried voice — “You sure she’s not dead, Mr. Batman?” — and then a deep rumble of affirmation against the side of her face. It’s curiously chest-shaped and covered in Kevlar.
Huh.
She’s never known how warm the inside of Batman’s cape is.
~
When Babs wakes up, she’s greeted with the dripping stalactites above and the sound of a ventilator beside her. A family of bats chirp in the distance, echoing through the various underground chambers. When she turns her head, she spots Dick and Jason and Tim playing cards across the cave, in the distance. The blindfold they must have used on Tim to keep him from knowing the location of the Batcave on the route over hangs around his neck.
On the side of her own hospital bed, in that black cape, is the one and only.
“Barbara,” Batman rumbles quietly.
“Poophead,” Babs mutters.
“Are you feeling any better now?” Batman asks, steamrolling over ‘poophead’ like the professional vigilante he is.
“Yes. Loads.” Babs says testily, and tries to sit up but fails, thwarted by flat pillows.
With a close-mouthed hum of consideration, Batman reaches over and — fluffs them. Babs slowly sits up, feeling like there must still be something in her system that’s making her experience a Batman who doesn’t want her completely wiped off his radar. Her trips to the Batcave medbay are typically, exclusively clinical. She’s never even gotten a pillow before.
“You’re… ahem. You took a few hits,” Batman says, as if he’s tolerant of her existence.
Babs sniffs, looking at her wrapped up and elevated ankle at the end of the bed.
“Nothing I can’t handle.”
Batman grunts hesitatingly. “Good. However. You… you shouldn’t have to handle all this. By yourself.”
“Uh-huh, yeah, I know,” Babs replies, and gives Batman a defiant look. “Gotham doesn’t need my heroics, blah blah blah. You’ve said. I called you before dealing with it myself, didn’t I?” But the snarkiness leaves her tone as she keeps talking, fiddling with her hands. “I didn’t actually mean to bother you in the first place, you know. What happened was that I — well, it doesn’t matter. I must have miscalled, but I’m glad it was alarming enough on your end that you came, as Dick and Jason were in danger too.”
“Barbara, I was — ”
“No, let me talk. I have to say that moving forward, I’m not stopping. I won’t get in your way again, and you can have all the space you want. But you don’t get to determine what my choice is — ”
“I was wrong.”
“And I am shutting up now,” Babs says immediately. “Because I must be dreaming.”
Batman grunts and busies himself with reviewing Babs’s vitals across the screens. “Alfred… had a word with me. I shouldn’t have been so upset with you that day. Your instincts have always been stellar, but anytime I see you or Robin flying headfirst into danger without conferring with me, I’ve been told I react… aggressively.” Batman inhales, and looks like he's trying to tackle one of Babs’s for-fun computer viruses with his next words. “You’re both… my kids. Even though you have a father — you’re still — ”
Babs doesn’t expect the tears to rise to her eyes, but they do.
“Ditto,” she blurts, because okay, it’s true, he’s always cared about her in his own weird paternal way, but also this conversation is way too mushy-gushy to have with Batman. “But to your own point — you never confer with me.”
“True enough. I… I thought keeping you away would be a good strategy, but. It hasn’t been.”
“Right. We never work together. I’m hardly part of the team,” Babs points out, despite knowing she could be pushing all of Batman’s buttons. “So, if you don’t tell me what the plan is, B, obviously you’ll get all freaked out when I swing into the battle. ”
“That will change, moving forward,” Batman says, his voice soft despite his cowl still on. “If you’re still interested in being a part of the team. A very passionate little boy told me that I don’t know how good I’ve got it, with Batgirl on my team.”
Babs looks over at Tim across the cave and feels her heart swell.
“I think I’ve got a fan,” Babs says softly, grinning. “But yeah, I’d really like that, B.”
“Babs, you’re awake!” exclaims the little boy in question, darting up to them. He shyly pauses before Batman, his eyes shining in awe, as Batman stares down, before clamoring up to snuggle next to Babs.
“Hi, Timmy,” Babs says, booping his nose. “I’m sorry about how tonight turned out. Are you okay?”
Tim stretches out on the bed with a big yawn before laughing. “Are you kidding? Tonight was awesome. I got to see Batgirl fighting, and now the Batcave, and meet Dick Grayson, and Jason taught me a card game! I don’t even think I’m going to need a bedtime story tonight.”
Besides her bed, Batman stills. Babs inhales sharply.
“Come again?” she asks carefully.
“I mean, you,” Tim amends, suddenly focused on staring at the stalactites above with great concentration. “I got to see you fighting.”
Babs exchanges a look with Batman. “Tim…”
“Wow, is it my bedtime?”
“Tim!”
Tim squirms, but Babs pins him down against her, and he shrieks, half laughing, half terrified.
“I don’t know anything! There’s no way I figured out all the Bat identities because of an impossible flip Robin did that only Dick Grayson can do — ” Dick’s mouth drops open. Jason’s eyes are wide, his mouth splitting into a grin as he watches everything unfold. “— and I mean, there’s no way I would remember Dick Grayson doing that flip when I was a baby and my parents took me to see the circus! But I seriously pinky promise I didn’t peek when you guys brought me over here blindfolded! I totally get that you didn’t want me to know that you live next door!” Tim squeaks, apparently horrified at his own motormouth, his face turning the color of a tomato. “I mean, I have no idea where we are?”
“This is fantastic,” Jason says, delighted. To Batman, he says, “Can we keep him, Bruce?”
Dick lets out a scandalized, “Jason, codenames!”
“He already knows, Dickface.”
“Tim,” Batman says with a withering sigh, bringing all the chaos to a halt in the Batcave as he pulls his cowl down. “It’s alright.”
Babs releases Tim from the prison of her arms, ruffling his hair in wonder, because their identities were thwarted by a five-year-old, but Tim still looks miserable, burying his face into his hands.
“Aw, Timmy, it’s not your fault you’re so smart,” Dick coos, settling on the bed beside Tim to give him a hug.
Jason snorts. “Yeah, it’s Dick who’s in trouble for being so obvious.”
Dick makes a sound of protest, but glances furtively at Batman nonetheless to check if he’s really in trouble. It doesn’t seem so, as he tells Jason to mind his business.
Babs sinks down into her pillows as the brothers start a heated argument she’s sure will soon be the norm. As for herself, she’s had a crazy day. She’d like to rest. And since she’ll be off her sprained ankle, maybe she can catch up on all the social media she’s missed? If the Batgirl hate has died down. Somehow she has a feeling that even if it hasn’t, she’ll survive. Namely by filling her feed with dogs and cats and software development — normal Barbara Gordon things.
As Bruce and the other boys help her up the stairs to have a hot dinner prepared by Alfred and a night’s rest in the castle-like Wayne Manor, she realizes her heart finally feels as light as a feather once again.
~
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