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Being the real-life incarnation of a magical girl concept came with its perks, such as being able to save people in trouble, having magical abilities that suited his fighting style, and getting to design his own transformation sequence. But something that had once seemed like a positive— being immune to low-grade drugs and sedatives— spelled trouble for Nightwing now, because whatever his kidnappers had drugged him with was hitting him harder than a fucking horse tranquilizer . His head was so cloudy that it felt like he had ingested enough cotton balls to stuff that giant brown cow Squishmallow he had won for Damian at the local fair. He wasn’t hallucinating, probably, but he was disoriented and had no idea where he was.
What he knew for certain was that he was tied to a metal chair with some meager lengths of rope. That was an insult to both his civilian form and his magical form. He could very easily escape from those ropes… if he wasn’t drugged up so badly that his vision was blurry and he was barely able to move.
He should summon one of his weapons, or use one of his attacks to free himself from the meager restraints.
“H- Ah- Buh-”
Now if only he could articulate the command to do either of those things.
There were a few ways that this scenario could end. Either Nightwing would be tortured by his captors, or he would somehow manage to free himself.
The sedative pounded behind his eyes. He was hearing voices that sounded like they were just outside the room. The voices sounded like his teammates shouting out their attack commands, Red Hood summoning his gun from the aether and Red Robin calling out one of his close-range attacks. Probably auditory hallucinations, then.
There was a professional video camera stationed on a tripod right in front of Nightwing’s chair, facing directly at the magical hero. A red light was turned on next to the lens, indicative of the camera recording. Nightwing knew from an experiment he had done months ago as Dick Grayson that he could not be recorded in his magical form. The film would distort and waver around his body, much the same as how people reported seeing Nightwing when he patrolled the streets, so nobody could retain a clear memory of what the hero looked like. Another one of the perks of being magical.
There was a new way that this scenario could end, and that was with Nightwing’s civilian identity being livestreamed to the entire internet.
Nightwing recalled his own test footage filmed in the security of his own home. His hero form was blissfully protected by the same magic that gave him a mask and suit to protect his identity with. His civilian form, not so much. The transformation between the two was a blinding light that no camera could catch.
The sedative was giving him the very, very strong desire to power down so that he could sleep. He had tried sleeping in the suit before, but it buzzed with too much energy to make him want to sleep. It was like the magic was encouraging him to be at his absolute peak performance when he used it. But Nightwing didn’t want to be at his absolute peak performance. Nightwing wanted to be Dick Grayson so he could sleep off his damn pounding headache.
He dipped his chin to his chest, not even fighting against the restraints anymore. He had forgotten he was restrained, actually. Why was his memory so foggy? Where was he, again?
The voices were growing louder. Batgirl was shouting about how the enemy would regret touching Nightwing, and Robin shouted something in reply about a camera.
If he was hallucinating that badly, it was probably time to turn off the transformation and sleep off the horse tranquilizer of a sedative. Whoever had kidnapped him would probably torture him whether he was awake or not. And he couldn’t stay transformed forever. He was steadily running out of the stamina he needed to keep the magic running.
He heard an echoing crash, and the voices were suddenly far too loud for his pounding migraine.
Oh well. Better to save what little energy he had left and transform back while he still could.
A flash of white light filled the entire space.
Though it should have been instant for anyone without the magical powers held by him and his teammates, Nightwing saw figures rushing about during the time-stop, one darting in front of the camera on the tripod (when had that gotten there?) to block it, and the other standing in front of Nightwing-turned-Dick to shield his face from the others.
“Heya, Red,” Dick slurred. It was either Red Robin or Red Hood, judging by the reddish blob in Dick’s field of vision. His eyes slipped shut almost immediately.
“ Grayson? ”
“No, it can’t be Dick-”
“When did I say his name was Dick?”
“How do you two know my brother?”
“ Your- wait, hold on-”
So much for keeping a secret identity. Wait, did his teammates know his civilian identity somehow? Had they seen him in the newspapers before, or was he close friends with them?
Someone cut his bindings. Someone else picked him up. A cape was tossed over his lolling head to keep his identity at least somewhat hidden. The darkness was nice. Good for sleeping.
“We have a lot to talk about once we’re back at base.” Who was speaking, again?
The wind tore at his clothes, like he was being flown by whoever was carrying him. It was like he was flying with his teammates after a long battle, mentally preparing what conversations they would have about magic and training and their censored private lives once they landed back at their secret base, hidden away in a cave like all good superheroes would do. Dick wondered when he could see his teammates again. He’d like to actually go flying with them sometime, instead of hallucinating it.
The sedative tugged at the forefront of his brain, begging for sleep.
Dick finally gave in to the desire, and fell into a dreamless sleep.