I don&#39;t kill

1. She can see many things people don’t expect. She can see things people think; things people miss. She can see the lies and the truth through their lies.

2. She doesn’t know how old she is; point 1) is one of the reasons, because time was meaningless to her. Things used to be but they didn’t disappear when they stopped to exist. It’s only since that man healed her brain that she understands how time works.

3. She’s a virgin.

4. She knows that sex is something private, but she’s never really understood it. There’s no difference to her between the way Babs looked at Dick and the way Dick rippled in her bedroom. This is basically the only reason she could be in the same room as both of them at the same time.

5. Batman was right about Steph. But, um… he was right both times? He was right about Cass too, when he said she wasn’t. She was taking too many risks. That’s why it hurt so much, to be rejected, because she knew he was right. Batman is right, always, Cass feels it. When she came back, Babs had a very serious talk with her about what “right” means; she talked about things that are right or that seem right but that are really wrong because they’re not possible. Cass listened, but she doesn’t really understand, or at least she doesn’t agree. Barbara says sometimes Batman is “morally right” but “factually wrong” and that sometimes he sees things in black and white. This is wrong: sometimes Barbara is wrong that way. She says things that are real but that aren’t really true. She says that Cass wasn’t really responsible for the people she killed, so she did nothing wrong. Cass knows, no. she wasn’t doing the right thing. This is how Batman is right. There’s right, and there’s wrong, and what can and can’t be done and what’s reasonable or not doesn’t really enter it. It changes things, doesn’t change that.

6. Sometimes it’s easier to forget that her father hugged her and they looked at the stars. Sometimes it’s easier to pretend she didn’t know he loved her at all.

7. After Steph died, sometimes she was Steph. She knows Tim wanted her to go away, when they were in Blüdhaven, because when he looked at her he thought of Steph. It made him hurt.

8. She likes movies and TV shows, because of the way the people in them say things that aren’t true without lying.

9. She’s pretended not to see “Red Hood” following her. Sometimes she makes a friendly gesture at a camera. He hurts, and she doesn’t have the power to make him stop. If he comes to her city and kill someone, she’ll stop him, though, because she is not his Batman.

10. One day she’ll have a Robin.

BONUS: WTF CANON? She can so dodge death lasers, FabNic, wtf are you even talking about, the girl’s been dodging bullets at short range since she appeared, since when can Tim do physical stuff that she can’t. Also where do you get off writing her unsure around computers and angrily smashing machines she doesn’t understand, remember how she used to live with Oracle? There’s plenty of stuff that just didn’t happen in my headcanon. Dick and Cass fighting, for instance, never happened. Cass may have been “drugged by Deathstroke,” but she wasn’t as chatty as people say she was; it was just the contrast.

From:

etrangere.livejournal.com

♥ 5., 6., 7. as especially heartbreaking; and 8. made me go d'awww a lot (lol more than 10. which is also d'awww)

From:

Stephanie Brown.

From:

1. There are people that should die. She won’t kill them, because that’s Batman’s rule and she’s wearing his symbol (it would also hurt Cass the way Steph doesn’t want to hurt anyone ever again), and she’s proud that she earned their trust and respect.

2. Children, and especially little girls, are her weak point the way children are Batman’s. Abusive parents are as much of her hot button as dead parents is his.

3. When she was a teen, she wasn’t a “nice girl”, she got into trouble and she ran around, and after she became Spoiler she still had that rep, because she had bruises like she’d gotten into fights (guess what, she had) and she feel asleep in class. She was called a slut more times than she cared to count and she was never popular.

4. She resented her mother for being unable to take care of herself and protect them, but she willingly took on the job to protect her.

5. She’s going to have nightmares about her father’s claim that “he made her Spoiler, maybe he could make her a better Batgirl”. Cold sweat and seething anger and nightmares. The two things she most wants to do then is kick some ass and hang with Tim or Cass.

6. She won’t stop protecting Gotham until it kills her.

7. Her Batman is Bruce. She knows what they think about Batman and Robin. She can’t say she hasn’t fantasized.

8. Generally, Dick is like her soultwin. They have the same taste in movies, they laugh at the same jokes, and they have the same opinion on Damian. The things they disagree about are: Bruce, the mission, whether feathers are an acceptable costume choice.

9. None of her costumes have shown more skin than when she was Robin, because, well. Because she doesn’t want to be scared. She doesn’t want to be shamed. She needs body armor but more than that she wants to feel safe.

10. When she reads something on one of Batman’s files now, she always ask someone else for confirmation before she takes anything for granted.

BONUS: WTF CANON? She’s not just an energetic bubble of sunlight and sweetness, Bryan Q. Miller; there’s nothing wrong with that, but she’s just not. She can get fucking angry, and fucking scary. I’m also very unsatisfied with the way canon’s been treating her sex life since the end of her pregnancy, i.e., she doesn’t have one. It’s like they’ve been punishing her by making her celibate all this while.
Also I have to edit out the fact that the Case in the Cave has Jason's name on it. If Steph had seen it even once, she'd have searched who he was and she'd have discovered Bruce's identity.

From:

etrangere.livejournal.com

Generally, Dick is like her soultwin. They have the same taste in movies, they laugh at the same jokes, and they have the same opinion on Damian. The things they disagree about are: Bruce, the mission, whether feathers are an acceptable costume choice.
LOLOL

From:

daggerpen.livejournal.com

You probably don't do my pet ship, so... Jason Todd?

From:

I already did that request on my tumblr, so you can have the copy pasted version, 5 more facts because I always have Jason headcanon, and another request if you’d like. Including that ship I may not have headcanon about.

1. In love with Bruce.

2. Everything Jason does post-resurrection is because of or about Bruce.

3. Doesn't have daddy issues. He has Bruce issues, and Bruce adopted him, plus daddy sounds porny, so. Thing is, the spectre of daddy issues sounds disturbing to everyone else, so he plays on that stuff.

4. Turned tricks when he lived on the streets. He doesn't think that makes him ~damaged for life~ . He's very much not okay with someone bringing it up, ever. It's his.

5. Started dyeing his hair red and managed to continue the habit while in prison, because he thought it'd fuck with everyone's mind. ~red-headed chiiiiild~ Jason trolling is a thing of beauty.

6. He likes to flirt, but he's not trying to get into anyone's pants as he does. He just likes the way it makes discussions go, witty and fast-paced and fun. It's best when it's with someone who gets it and isn't hoping for anything else.

7. Feels about girls like Mia and Steph like they're basically his sisters. He doesn't want to have sex with them, he wants to hang out and snark with them and he feels so much kinship for them. He wouldn't necessarily turn down sex.

8. Talia was at the intersection of his mommy issues and she occupied the Bruce space of his mind. She filled that role; she was rich and powerful and confident and she took care of him. He wouldn't have attempted anything and he didn't even realize he was totally attracted until she signalled that she was. (Plus the fucking-Bruce-through-you they both did.) But even with all that, it wasn't transgressive for him the way sex with Selina would.

9. He keeps tabs on everyone in the family. Not directly on Babs, because he's fucked-up, but not that fucked-up. (If she asked him to become one of the Birds, he'd say yes. It wouldn't even enter his mind to turn her down. He doesn't turn women like Oracle down when they give an order.) He hasn't attempted contact with the girls because. He's reluctant to drag them in his bullshit. He feels vaguely that they're on the same side.

10. He didn't hate school so much as he hated the way everyone looked at him, either like he was worth less than nothing or like he was “hot” because he spoke with a working-class accent and thir parents would never approve, and he hated the way he was older than everyone else in his class, because yeah, guess what, he'd had to drop out before his mom died because they needed any money he could bring back, and he hated the way the teachers obviously didn't expect any better from him, not some kid Bruce Wayne had taken a fancy to, that man was a good-for-nothing lay-about so he must've like Jason because Jason was the same. He fought, because what kids don't fight at school, but the others knew the rules better than he did and he got caught every single time, but nothing ever came out of it, because, again, Bruce Wayne.

He hated that school. Bruce suggested that he transfer to the public school Dick had gone, or that he become homeschooled, but Jason stuck it out. No way he was going to let them run him off, no way he was going to give up, no way in hell. He stayed, he hated it, and when he didn't fail his classes he stole a bottle of (some liquor, I don't know what, but something they only keep for guests, because it's not like Bruce drinks, ever) and he was planning on getting spectacularly drunk. Instead, Bruce caught him, and they had that celebratory drink together. He didn’t manage to convince Bruce to let him get drunk, though.

From:

BONUS FIVE
1. He’s been self-destructive since he was a child. Stealing the tires of a car that looks suspiciously like the Batmobile, even if you don’t believe in Batman, is not on anyone’s recipe to a long and healthy life.

2. Unlike Dick, he never imagined that Batman-and-Robin would be forever. He lived in the now, because it was the now that mattered. (Bruce was the first person to believe in Jason’s potential, in his future.) When he was Robin, he couldn’t imagine what he’d be ten years later. He’d just draw a blank. Most likely, when he thought about it, he’d be dead.

3. Queerest Robin to ever queer.

4. I’ve come to the conclusion that he’s biracial. His Dad was Asian. (It didn’t strike either Bruce or him as unlikely that Shiva might be his mother, and Sheila was drawn as very white. Then again, she was drawn by Aparo, so…)

5. He’s always been good at the psychological stuff. He’s always been good at reading people’s moods, guessing their motivations, finding unerringly the weakest person in a group, the crack in anyone’s psychological armor, their fears, their desires, which button to push. It’s a skill he had to develop to survive. Bruce made him a better detective, but he’s only made Jason able to pinpoint the evidence that let him know the things he knew. Of course, Bruce’s teachings mean that Jason know what to look for, now. Bruce made him pro-active, instead of just reactive. And Bruce isn’t any more immune to Jason pushing his buttons that anyone else.

From:

Well since the DC ones are taken, I'll go novels and say Sethra Levode

From:

You don’t go for the easy ones, do you. (what, there are only 3 characters in the DCU?)

1. She used to be bloodthirsty. She created Kiera when she felt herself become uncaring, but she didn’t expect Kiera to become her own person and strengthen parts of herself she’d practically forgotten, much less both.

2. She probably didn’t expect Kiera to become the Thief when she created her.

3. Kiera may have originally been created during the Dragon-Jhereg war, I have no idea.

4. There’s no direct access to the Paths of the Dead in Dzur Mountain. Well, there isn’t anymore. She hasn’t told Vlad because at the time it would have been too complicated to explain and since then it seems like the sort of thing he would blurt out at Verra to try and get a reaction out of her, and if Sethra can help she is not going to help him get himself smote by Verra.

5. She may or may not have been a god for a time, before she turned it down and became a vampire. Look, it’s as good an explanation as any how come she lived that long.

6. She’s asexual.

7. If she didn’t turn Dzur heroes into stones and/or various animals, they’d be disappointed. And dishonoured, which is much more serious an ailment for a Dzur hero. It’s sometimes a bother to fit that occupation into her timetable, but it generally amuses her, so all in all it could be worse.

8. “Serenely amused” tends to be her default these days. Which is lucky, given the shenanigans her friends tend to get into.

9. She likes that word. Friends. Truth be told, there was a time the idea startled her.

10. Oh, to be a fly on the wall when/if she receives Paarfi’s letters begging for information about the times he’s novelizing. Or when/if she reads the novels.

From:

Nice ones, I like. Thought not all of them are in my own headcanon (asexuality interferes with rampant shipping!).

-You don’t go for the easy ones, do you. (what, there are only 3 characters in the DCU?)-

No, but Cass is the one I'd ask about :)

-
7. If she didn’t turn Dzur heroes into stones and/or various animals, they’d be disappointed. And dishonoured, which is much more serious an ailment for a Dzur hero. It’s sometimes a bother to fit that occupation into her timetable, but it generally amuses her, so all in all it could be worse.-

Hah, that totally makes sense :)

-
9. She likes that word. Friends. Truth be told, there was a time the idea startled her.-

Yea, I figure she's had some very lonely times.

-
10. Oh, to be a fly on the wall when/if she receives Paarfi’s letters begging for information about the times he’s novelizing. Or when/if she reads the novels.-

Brust does need to write that ^^

From:

I don’t know, asexuality only interferes with rampant sexing, they can still fall in love. My Tim is asexual, but I ship him with Steph and Kon and I do think he is/was in love with Dick. (And I have this sort of OT6 that includes him. Cass/Steph/Tim/Kon/Cassie/Rose!)

Here, have three more gratuitous Cass headcanon, then. (MAH BABY)

1. Sometimes she takes a night not-really-off to go dancing. She has fun and she catches a few dealers and stops assaults, so Oracle and Batman would both be pleased, and she dances with cute girls and boys.

2. She’s proud of nothing more than of being a detective. Batman said she was a detective. She does her own information-gathering and her own deducing now. The easiest way to gather information is to hit people, but she doesn’t need help to piece what she finds together.

3. The thing she misses most now she’s alone in Hong Kong is tag on rooftops with Steph.

From:

I buy all three of those :)

From:

*Flails.* So many choices!!! Okay, NaruSasuSaku :D

From:

all takes place in my Happy Future for them

1. It’s about Sasuke. It wasn’t fate; it would’ve gone very differently if Sasuke hadn’t left Konoha. I picture them as an isoceles triangle: Naruto and Sakura standing side by side, looking at Sasuke. Naruto and Sakura are a sort of united front line. It makes Sasuke unsure sometimes. Like he’s the odd person out, the step-something that’s imposing. Like he’s something wrong.

2. All the sides of the triangle have different relationships. Naruto and Sasuke have their broken-forever-brother-rivals thing; Naruto and Sakura have their Konoha-kids-friendship-we-can-pass-for-normal-for-half-an-hour-at-a-time; Sakura and Sasuke have a complex relationship that is half about their own thing and half about Naruto-our-dead-last-Hokage.

3. Sasuke is powersexual. That’s the only reason Sakura got on his radar as a potential partner. Other shinobi have sparring as foreplay for a kink. Team Seven has destruction on a massive scale due to fights.

4. Some point down the line, they’re going to be the not-secret of Konoha. Basically, Sasuke comes back and they’re joined at the hip and they move in together. People don’t realize at once why, but when it becomes obvious that they have no romantic interest in anyone else, well… That, and the fact that when Ino tried to get Naruto to date one of her cousins, Naruto howled with laughter and said that he already had Sakura and Sasuke.

5. They’re not really into public displays of affection. Or more accurately, not PDAs that leave no place for doubt. Naruto is a physical guy, everyone knows that, he likes to touch people, and Sakura doesn’t mind hugs from friends. And besides, it’s no wonder that Naruto keeps touching Sasuke, given how it annoys Sasuke – bumping him and nudging him and sprawling with his arm around Sasuke’s neck. It’s only a matter of time before Sasuke’s teeth-grinding explodes into a full-blown tantrum, really. Sakura’s more subtle with her touches. Feminine, like they teach at the academy, soft touches of the arm to make the other relax and go with what you’re asking. Sasuke never initiates. He just takes it. Stoically. It’s going to take years, but he’ll mellow out. At its base, the reason why Sakura and Naruto touch him so much is for ownership. It’s instinct for Naruto. Kiba knows when Naruto doesn’t: it’s a matter of smell. For both of Naruto and Sakura, it’s also a show of solidarity – it’s about reassuring Sasuke again and again that he belongs with them, and it’s about rubbing it in the face of the people who don’t like that Sasuke was even allowed back.

6. Belongs with them, belongs to them. Same difference.

7. Any child they have, either biological or adopted, will be a member of the Uchiha clan. None of them will have Uchiha genes. Sasuke wants his cursed bloodline to die with him.

8. They still tend to take Sakura for granted. This is because Sakura is by far the one most able to pretend to be normal. It’s true her issues are comparatively less severe. She doesn’t have a major form of PTSD, for instance. Sakura’s way of dealing with things is to shoulder them on and plod on. Also she’s been socialized as a girl, so she’s been taught that the right thing for her to do is to quietly do with the hand her partners deal her. She’s become more assertive since then, but she’s still in the habit of wanting to facilitate things for the boys. She feels it’s her job to make things go smoothly.

9. She doesn’t do most of the housework because: insane hours at the hospital, and if she comes home to find ~*The Mess*~ there will be hell to pay. And after a few times? They’ve learnt better.

10. The things they complain most loudly about, they don’t really mind. Their flaws feel like home.

From:

XD These are excellent, and yet, not sappy or anything. I want your Happy Future to be canon, lol.

1. Yes, I completely agree; it's all about Sasuke.

2. Is it just me that finds it weird that Naruto and Sasuke's relationship is the easiest to define and understand?

3. LOL. XD

4. Loudly, and in front of others, no doubt. Not that he'd need to, as I'm sure Ino would make sure everyone knew it anyways. If only to keep other people from hitting on Sakura's boyfriend.

5. And again, it's really all about Sasuke.

6. For them? Yes, undoubtedly.

7. Well, he kind of has a point. After all, it's a bloodline that encourages fratricide.

8. I always thought she was the most balanced, for obvious reasons, but yes, I'm sure they would take that for granted.

9. LOL, just lol XD

10. That is such a Team 7 thing, all three of them.

From:

Since you asked for second requests...

The Robin I grew up with. Dick Grayson.

From:

1. He’s not loyal to Batman, he’s loyal to Bruce.

2. In love with Babs.

3. In love with Bruce. He’s managed to sublimate it into “Bruce is the ideal human being”.

4. He doesn’t get casual sex at all. This has the consequence that it’s not casual for him, ever; when Helena told him they weren’t going to have a relationship, he was hurt.

This is because for him, relationships are something fluid. He grew up in a circus, and spent the off season with CARAVANES, and he’s always known that blood and family aren’t related. There’s nothing shocking to him about people taking on several roles or shifting from one to another. The Titans are his family, and Bruce is his family, and Babs is his family, and everyone Bruce lets into a costume, and if he’s in love with them or attracted to them it doesn’t make them any less his family. It all goes together.

5. He’s been a performer since he’s four. It feels natural, it feels right when people are looking at him. If he puts on a show, it’s barely even conscious. He just knows that it makes everything in his body hum, and he grins when his friends shake their heads after particularly impressive acrobatics.

6. With regards to “Batman”, the cowl, the name, the role, he’s in something of a conundrum. Twice now he’s assumed Bruce’s role. The second time at least, he thought it was going to be forever. He’s managed to strike a balance with it. By the end, he no longer felt like the cowl would choke him and swallow him down. He was—well. He was an adequate protector for Gotham City, and that’s what Batman is supposed to be. But he wasn’t Batman, not the way Bruce is. The idea of assuming Bruce’s role breaks Dick’s heart because it means that Bruce can no longer do it and because he doesn’t feel as good as Bruce (no-one can compare to Bruce in Dick’s eyes, not even Superman). He doesn’t like being Batman. But on the other hand, if he got passed over for someone else, he’d feel betrayed. He comes from an aerialist family, you inherit what your parents did and you continue their work.

The one thing he really and truly likes about being Batman is working with Robin.

7. He’s attractive, he’s always been, and ever since he’s a child he’s been used to making people gasp when he launches into a spin. He doesn’t get what it means when people act differently around him, because people have always acted that way around him. Basically the only way to make him realize you’re attracted to him is to kiss him.

8. I’m not sure how much I believe he and Slade had sex. Probably. Almost certainly, given the Renegade arc. Dick has a complex relationship with Slade, because of the Titans, because Slade’s relationship with the Titans is equally complex, and because of Bruce. He comes at it from all the ways. Sometimes he sees Roy with Lian and his problems with Cheshire, and he’s reminded of Slade, for a moment as brief as a narrowed eye before it relaxes again in false geniality. It’s not fair to think that, so he always feels a little guilty. He’s never talked with anyone about his problems with Slade, mostly because he lives with it and it doesn’t weight that much (see also: denial). Sometimes he feels like he owes Cass an apology. Like Slade is his responsibility. Or his partner.

He feels responsible for Rose Wilson.

9. He’s the least envious person in the world. Sharing isn’t just a make-do solution for him, and it’s not something he believes in either; it just is. To him there is nothing to get jealous or envious about.

From:

10. I probably said it before, but if I didn’t here it is: Dick’s never come to terms with his history of sex assault. In large parts, it’s because he’s never actually dealt with it. There were bigger problems to deal with; he doesn’t remember it all that well. He’s never told anyone about Tarantula. He thinks it’s too linked to Blockbuster, he’s too ashamed of having allowed Tarantula to kill him to want to dwell on that moment of his life. And he, well, he let her. He doesn’t like to think of that night. He let her kill him. And Bruce forgave him for that, and if Dick didn’t tell Bruce about the rest it was because he didn’t think of it, and it didn’t seem relevant, and… so he didn’t, and he hasn’t. As for Mirage, it bothered him, but he was over-reacting. It shouldn’t bother him. And Raven was in a bad place, she didn’t mean to – and honestly, if the Titans started to hold the times they were brainwashed or manipulated into attacking the team against each other, the only Titan left would be Donna! (see again: denial.) auuuuuuugh

BONUS WTF CANON: nothing Tomasi writes about the character makes even the slightest bit of sense. Dick would never let Bruce buy him a job as a curator in New York. Dick would never let someone who’s kidnapped a woman and forced her into pregnancy walk with no more than a verbal slap on the wrist, even if that someone is Talia. So that arc never happened. Without even going speaking about Nightwing: OYL. Also, despite what Wolfman retconned, I like to think he lost his virginity to Kory.

From:

Kory is Starfire, right? Because I could totally see that.

I'm afraid my reaction to the first paragraph was, "WHAT sexual assault?" Because, you see, I was reading about Dick Grayson's Robin in the 1960s to 1970s. Anything that happened to him after that I've only heard about from Linkara or Scans_Daily. I've never heard of Tarantula, Blockbuster or Mirage. I dimly recall hearing about someone called Raven in Teen Titans who keeps going evil--but she wasn't in Teen Titans when I was reading it. (I can tell you who was: Robin, Kid Flash, Speedy, Wonder Girl and a red-headed psychic named Lilith.)

So I don't know the events you're alluding to. It's not fan denial of unpleasant events; I literally had never heard of ANY canonical sexual assault until this minute.

Clarification, please?

From:

God, I'm sorry.

Yes, Kory is Starfire.

Okay, so: Mirage was a shape-shifter who once took Kory's shape and slept with Dick. When it was discovered, the reaction among teammates was "DICK YOU SLUT" and anger that Dick hadn't realised he wasn't sleeping with Kory. That happened in the early 90s I think? Raven once used her powers when she was eil to make Dick be in love with her and kiss him. The Tarantula thing I've read myself, so I can talk more about it, but it's a very controversial storyline and my opinion is the minority.

So, summing up: Dick is the protector of Blüdhaven, and there's this woman who takes on the identity of "Tarantula" because she wants to fight crime, the way he does. He doesn't have more of a right to it than she does. She sounds like she's thought about it and she's decently-trained, so it makes sense to Dick and he agrees. Meanwhile, supervillain Blockbuster has found out Dick's secret identity and is busy ruining every aspect of Dick's life. So Dick's busy, and he doesn't realize at once that Tarantula is killing people. When he does, it's when she offers to kill Blockbuster. Dick refuses, of course, and instead puts together a plan to be able to bring Blockbuster to justice. It looks like it succeeds, but at the last minute it fails horribly, when someone they trusted turns out to be a villain.

A second confrontation between Dick and Blockbuster occurs, at the end of which Blockbuster tells Dick that everything that's happened - all the people Blockbuster has killed to get to Dick - it's never going to stop. If Dick smiles at someone in the street, Blockbuster will have that person killed. If someone walks past Dick, says hi, shakes his hand, they die. At this stage Dick has been entirely isolated from his friends and his family, and he's been running himself ragged or worse, so when Blockbuster says that Dick can only repeat, like in a transe, "it's never going to stop..." and that's when Tarantula appears, points a gun at Blockbuster, and shoots him. Dick "lets" her (understand: he doesn't push Blockbuster and he doesn't take the bullet). He walks up to the roof, still pratically incoherent, Tarantula reaches him and tries to comfort him, he tells her not to touch him, and she has sex with him. (I posted two scans here (http://runespoor7.livejournal.com/65591.html#cutid1).) Then she basically kidnaps him and he's incoherent for about an issue and a half.

ROBIN RELATED HEADCANON to make up for that:

1. In a vague way, as a young teen Dick believed Batman and Robin was going to last forever.

2. The trophies were his idea.

3. The strangest thing about staying in one place all year round, for several years, was that his classmates barely changed over the years. Dick was used to seeing new faces every few months. That was an adjustment.

From:

Oh, God, the poor bastard.

I am not upset with Tarantula killing Blockbuster, since clearly Blockbuster had found something that he was good at--killing people close to Robin--and was never, ever going to stop. But her forcing a traumatized man to have sex with her on a rooftop afterwards? UM, HELLO, THIS IS RAPE. THERE IS NO WAY TO MAKE THIS OKAY. And his babbling afterwards kind of INDICATES that he is not remotely okay. (The writer and artist both get props for leaving Dick severely messed up afterwards.)

So I repeat...the poor bastard. He didn't deserve that.

I can't even go near the Mirage and Raven things, because for some reason kissing/having sex with the wrong person because of mistaken identity was a common trope in the 1980s and 1990s, and I wince to report that it was generally played for laughs, not as sexual assault. Because someone fucking you and thinking you're someone else is just hysterical, y'know. WHAT IS THIS I DON'T EVEN.

2. The trophies were his idea.

I think that might actually be Silver Age canon. I dimly recall an issue in which all the stories were focusing on the trophies in the Batcave where Robin--a.k.a. Dick--kept picking things up and pointing to pictures/photographs and asking, as a kid would, "What's this? Why do you have this?" And Bruce briefly mentioned that he hardly had anything in the Batcave before Dick came along. In fact, I can recall a VERY early story in which Bruce's auntie was coming for a visit and Bruce and Dick put one medium-sized cardboard box of stuff that would now be trophies into the back of one closet.

I also remember a frame story in which they were cleaning out the attic of Wayne Manor--I guess Alfred either refused or wasn't asked to clean up there--and Dick found two or three things that related to Batman's cases and asked about them. "Why are you hiding this stuff up here, Bruce?"

So yeah, I'd say that the trophies were completely Dick's idea. He's a performer by nature and training; he doesn't like the idea of hiding who you are or what you've done. Hiding says there's something wrong with it, something that you don't want on stage for the whole world to see.

And the fact that Dick wanted to learn about what Bruce had done and thought that it was worth remembering probably made a huge difference to Bruce Wayne; it took him out of the "lone vigilante with sidekick" mode (Golden Age Commissioner Gordon was as worried about Batman as he was about any of the multiple villains in Gotham) and put him in a family context. It said, Fighting crime and upholding the law is important. What you've done, the lessons you've learned...they should be passed on. I think that this made a huge difference, both to Bruce as a person and to Batman's approach to crime.

From:

Superman/Batman

From:

1. Everyone who’s ever worked with them kind of ships them. More or less platonically, more or less consciously. Hawkman is of the opinion that they have a warrior’s bond (it’s very manly in his mind), Hal sees them as best friends kind of like Ollie and him (he’s not even thinking about these times he and Ollie got drunk or gave each other a hand, because come on, now), and Ollie think they should drop the pretence, man up, and have wild monkey sex. It would do them a load of good, especially Bats, and in turn it’d do everyone else a load of good, ‘cause it’d mean there would be no more of that lousy will-the-won’t-they no-they-won’t-cause-they’re-both-morons tension. Dinah agrees, especially when she’s been treated to a full meeting of Superman being noble-minded and Batman being, in Ollie and Oracle’s words, “a prissy little @%!” (Oracle’s swearing redacted.) So does Diana, but she’s decided a long time ago not to interfere. Neither of them would appreciate, and she doubts it would do much good.

Not everyone ships Bruce and Clark. Only their friends do.

Lois ships them a little. She’s been known to call Batman, “Clark’s other wife” or “Clark’s boyfriend” when something particularly outrageous happens and Batman lurks around to see how Clark is hanging up, or when he calls Clark away in a hurry.

2. She would not at all be opposed to a threesome, if it didn’t quickly turn into a battle between Bruce and her. Lois knows she’s a jealous woman, and she understands that Bruce – Batman, whatever the mask he’s choosing to hide behind – is a possessive bastard. She’s not jealous of the League, of Wonder Woman, or anything like that, because her trust in Clark is complete and he’s Superman. Of course he’s going to go out and save people, that’s how she fell for him. But with Bruce. Well, it’s complicated. She dated him, and she’s not the world’s greatest reporter for nothing; when Batman told her who he was, it was like the puzzle suddenly made sense. He stakes claim on the things he love and he tries to drive them away and he’s too old to learn to share. Everyone’s heart would get bruised on the long term, and there would be damage done to everyone’s relationship.

So she’ll just stay on the sides, tease Clark with Bruce, and remove herself when Batman and Superman get involved.

3. Superman and Batman are public. They’re roles. Bruce and Clark are private. They’ve been friends for too long to be able to dissociate the two easily. Bruce only manages to split “Superman” from “Clark” when he’s busy thinking up contingency plans, in case everything goes wrong – and the truth is he does that because he can’t help it, because it gets mechanical to think of all the ways everything always go wrong, because he slides easily into it like he slides into a swift dream – and Clark only realizes that Bruce is Batman like it’s an entity that’s not exactly Bruce, Clark’s friend, when he’s reminded of these plans. After a while it comes to comfort him, almost, that there’s someone on Earth who’d be ready to stop him if it came to it. Clark thinks at least it would be his friend.

Bruce doesn’t want to think of it. in these scenarios, it’s always Superman. Never Clark. Lois is assumed dead, of course; the most important link to Clark’s humanity severed. The truth is Bruce can’t deal with the thought of fighting his friend. Of putting down his friend. He can’t deal with it at all. So he separates, he compartmentalizes, he makes it all about Superman’s powers and Superman shattering the faith the world has in him and Superman taking on the League. It’s… bad enough that he has to think of Jason that way.

So it never features into Bruce’s plans that Clark could turn evil. Because that wouldn’t happen.

From:

One is *so* in my headcanon now :) And 3 makes a ton of sense.

From:

4. The ring. Lois had… well. Lois felt extremely vindicated when Clark gave Bruce – or gave Batman, whatever – a ring. To symbolize his trust, and to give him something to hurt Clark has that trust been misplaced, or shattered.

She really hates that she can’t do a story on how Superman and Batman are married. She can see the headlines from here. All she’s had is a tipsy chat with the intelligence known as Oracle, and a sympathetic conversation with Diana, and neither quite gets it. Oracle hoards truth because knowledge is power, and Wonder Woman is truth and feels how it’s right. To Lois, truth isn’t meant to be hidden or savoured. It’s meant to be shouted.

5. In spite of Clark’s love for Bruce, he will never love Gotham. That is just never going to happen. In fact, Clark only understands Bruce’s love for Gotham because it’s Bruce’s home, and because it’s the city Bruce protects. He’s guessed that Bruce hates Gotham a little deep down, maybe because his parents died there, or because it fails to live up to Bruce’s hopes.* Sometimes Clark suspects Gotham is practically a living being to Bruce. Clark keeps it to himself. He doesn’t want to deal with Bruce’s contemptuous disregard for what he calls superstition. He wonders if Bruce is aware that he’s more superstitious than most.

Batman doesn’t care for Metropolis. He doesn’t care for any place as he cares for Gotham. He hates when he has to work because the architecture is all wrong for his style – his efficiency is reduced by a non-negligible quotient – and he hates that people always compare Gotham to it and find Gotham lacking, because how resplendent Metropolis is, how miraculous, the City of Tomorrow. He hates that Gotham could be so much better. But really, deep down? He just doesn’t care for it. It’s not Gotham. He’ll take care of it if Superman can’t, but he’ll do it because it’s Superman’s city.

* 6. He knows better than most how crushing Bruce’s hopes (expectations) can be. Sometimes he’s amazed Dick turned out as healthy as he did; sometimes he’s more amazed Bruce’s expectations of Clark have only gotten higher since they first met. Like none of the mistakes Clark did was enough to convince Bruce that Clark isn’t quite the paragon Superman needs to be; not his short-sightedness with Luthor, or his treatment of Conner, or his killing three people. He’s stopped being amazed that Bruce doesn’t hold these mistakes against him: Bruce can’t forgive these things, and he never forgets, but he needs to cling to some things to go on. On a good day, it’s one of the heaviest weights resting on Superman’s shoulders, knowing that Batman looks up to him and expects him to always be the better man.

7. The Batman and Robin costumes were Lois’ idea. They’re always Lois’ idea. One Clark really doesn’t fancy explaining to Bruce. He takes all the comfort he can in the thought that Bruce probably doesn’t want to acknowledge that any more than he does, and that’s the reason he hasn’t mentioned it yet. The possibility that he hasn’t because he doesn’t know, as so that one day he might confront Clark with it, is too terrifying to contemplate.

8. On a basic level and symbolic level, Clark realizes Batman is married to Gotham. He wonders if that makes him the other woman. It’d certainly put a new spin on why Bruce hates to see him drop in Gotham unannounced. (Not that Clark is enthused at that perspective either. He doesn’t fit there. Except for lead-lined buildings owned by the other paranoid, manipulative, genius-level billionaire in Superman’s acquaintances – the one that shamefully wastes his talents on being a bad guy – it’s the one place on Earth where he feels least effective. The sky is lower in Gotham.)

From:

9. Bruce keeps an eye on Lex Luthor. His excuse is that Luthor became Batman’s problem when he made a move on Gotham after No Man’s Land, a prediction only confirmed by Talia becoming Lexcorp’s CEO.

Another part of the truth is that, when he discovered the truth about Superboy’s… parentage…

Lex and Bruce have had agreements and arguments over the years. The East Coast is a small world. They’ve crossed paths often enough, and when they were younger they were—not friends. Never friends. Were they? Bruce’s relationship with Lex was nothing like his relationship with Harvey, certainly, but there were… similarities. Debates Bruce used to crave. Lex always had an intellect to reckon with. They don’t have the relationship they used to, but they’ve still crossed each other’s paths enough over the years. With the charity balls and social events, Lex has seen more of Bruce’s wards and adopted children than Bruce is comfortable with anyone knowing, and his smiles over the years have turned more cutting with the years, heavy with meanings Bruce doesn’t like to contemplate. Bruce is careful with his identity – some have called him paranoid – but when it comes to Luthor there’s no such thing as too much prudence. They still see one another, at times picked to be as meaningless as possible. Lex doesn’t talk about Superman; Bruce doesn’t pretend he’s stupider than Lex knows him. (They don’t talk about the time they talked after Superman’s death. They broke the rules then: Lex talked about Superman, and he mentioned Jason, spiteful. A cheap shot. Later they pretended they’d had too much to drink. Maybe they had; Bruce doesn’t drink, but grief is intoxicating enough on its own.)

Bruce has had Superman’s DNA since the first opportunity he had to swipe it. He wonders how much of Luthor’s experiment that resulted in the clone is his fault, but more than that, he wonders. He’s developed a program that recreated Cadmus’ experiments to perfection. He keeps the protocol under key next to the Kryptonite. In case.

10. Clark has tried to think of Dick as Batman. He really has. He’s proud of what the young man has become, how the enthusiastic child who hero-worshipped him is now at the lead of his generation, and a brave, honourable man. He’s glad that Dick could do it without sacrificing his self, his happiness, his soul to the Mission Bruce gave him. He likes to hope that maybe he’s had an influence there. He will not tell Dick, because Dick will only believe these things if they come from Bruce, but because of this Dick has already surpassed Bruce.

He has, however, told so to Bruce, breaking their tacit agreement not to talk about the children. It’s one that’s been in effect for a while, with occasional breaches. They’ve said very unkind and very true things to each other on that subject. Clark used to flatter himself on having the moral high ground, but it’s been a while since he lost it.

They were tranquil in the Cave; Bruce had the cowl on at that moment. “I know,” he said, and smiled as contentedly, as proudly as Pa ever had.

It was that smile that forced Clark to continue, dragging to truth out of him. “I can’t think of him as Batman,” he said, and it was rueful and rushed like the shameful confession that it was.

Bruce, no, Batman had stopped typing. Clark could see his reflection on the screen. Then he resumed typing.

“I know,” he said in Batman’s voice, the one that spoke in condemnation only, and he sounded no less content.

Clark stayed for a long time, breathing and watching his best friend updating his life’s work, before an earthquake called Superman away.

From:

-
Bruce has had Superman’s DNA since the first opportunity he had to swipe it. He wonders how much of Luthor’s experiment that resulted in the clone is his fault, but more than that, he wonders. He’s developed a program that recreated Cadmus’ experiments to perfection. He keeps the protocol under key next to the Kryptonite. In case.
-

I like ^^

From:

Has no one asked for Bruce/Dick yet?

From:

1. The keyword is sublimation.

Very few people on Earth have more practice than Bruce at consistently deceiving themselves (certainly none that comes to mind), and even less at repressing. Bruce has made repression and self-denial into a calling. Bruce serves the Bat at times by denying he exists independently from it, and more often by denying his own dreams and desires. Besides, Bruce raised Dick in ways that he didn’t raise Jason. To Bruce, Jason was older than most people he knew. And while Dick already had a life before Bruce – he had two entire cultures backing him up, as a Rom and as a carny – he also looked (looks) up to Bruce in ways that made Bruce. Um. “The adult” feels wrong. But still. Dick saw Bruce as someone that could raise him.

Dick himself has much less repression-and-self-denial issues, mostly thanks to the Titans and his relationship with Kory. That is, as an adult with adult relationship wrt to Bruce. Otherwise, as Robin he was already supposed to be expansive and enthusiastic. Bruce liked it, it was right for Dick to be so. But that was a child’s role and the expression of a child’s desires. Bruce disapproved of Dick expressing other desires. If not for his friendships with the Titans, Dick would’ve grown to be much more unhappy, with no one to accept his need for emotional outlets as a mature person. But he’s nevertheless taught himself that the love he feels for Bruce is purely familial. It’s easy for Dick to persuade himself of that, because he doesn’t put strict limits between things. Everything moves, everything is related, everything is the same thing. Love is love is love. Familial love, friendly love, physical love – Dick flows between these without a thought. He doesn’t with Bruce, because Dick never initiates. It’s like I said: everything is the same to him, so he doesn’t feel the need to initiate. In his mind there’s no difference, there’s just love, so he doesn’t know he desires people physically until they make him aware of it by interacting with him on that level.

2. Of course they’re in love. They’re each other’s model for a perfect human being. When trying to prove that the other reality isn’t superior to this broken one, Bruce only asked whether Dick was a better human being in that other reality. Dick has a scale to judge people, and Bruce, because he can’t rate people compared to Bruce.

3. They have eminently compatible kinks. This is because Dick made himself into everything Bruce wanted. As usual, it was entirely unconscious. I realize it sounds kind of wrong (not to mention kinky, unhealthy, and tons of other shit), but it isn’t. Not anymore than the entire Batman-and-Robin deal. Neither of them realized what they were doing, and they were entirely too caught up in each other. It’s just that as Robin, Dick was exposed to tons of things, and certain reactions became kind of Pavlovian; and as Robin, he understood his job was to make Batman smile, and he’s a performer, and Bruce reacted best to all of Dick’s natural tendencies. Their kinks just fit.

From:

4. Deep in his heart, Dick always believed (or hoped) that Bruce would come back. (It’s not the first time they’ve played this dance; every time Dick is devastated and every time he refuses to give in. It was different this time, because of Damian, because Jason was back and cutting a bloody path into the Gotham underworld as he assumed Batman’s identity, because Superman couldn’t stop it.) He thought Bruce was dead, really dead; but Bruce coming back, well. That was right.

5. Bruce never wanted Dick to be Batman. Bruce never wants Dick to be Batman. His fingers itch to claw the cowl off Dick whenever he sees Dick in it. He hasn’t because so far Dick seems to like there being two Batmen, and because he has a good rapport with Damian. Bruce is starting to get used to the idea that if there are several Batmen, Dick can be allowed to be one of them. If there are several, he doesn’t have to be the Batman. He doesn’t have to be Bruce. In Bruce’s mind, that would be mutilation. Cutting away all the good parts that make Dick a better person than Bruce ever could be, that made Dick the one ray of sunlight in Batman’s life. He would like Dick to take back Nightwing’s costume and identity again, though. Nightwing is—full of grace, and effusive, and fearless. All things Dick should always be. The idea of Nightwing feels like a smile in the city sky. Nightwing moving, Nightwing grinning, Nightwing’s silly quips and horrendous puns, it all fills Bruce with pride and something else. Something hungry, yearning. He doesn’t have a word for it; he captures the feeling through watching Nightwing graceful leaping, the dramatic spread-kicks he favours, the way his locks tangle with sweat too low in front of his domino, and on the back of his neck.

6. Barbara knows more than they do themselves. She’s not as given to self-deception as they are, and sharp astuteness is part of her own curse. Among the countless reasons why Dick is attracted to or in love with her, her being like Bruce features heavily. It bothers her less than the idea that he’s still also in love with Batgirl. For one, they don’t know it. For another, even if Bruce could acknowledge the fact that Dick is almost as in love with him as he is with Dick, he would never be able to make any move. Barbara isn’t good enough a person to refuse Dick on that ground, and she is perfectly capable of greed. She’s not Bruce; she’s not a martyr. She knows, and she’ll refuse or have him on her own terms.

From:

7. Everyone knows about what they say about Batman and Robin. Hell, some of the people who’ve worked with either Batman or a Robin used to say some of these things before they worked with together. Bruce and Dick both know the gossip, of course. They don’t care. It used to bother Dick, because how could these people think that of Batman? It was far more disturbing a thought than the sleazy laughs the crooks sent his way when they hypothesised about what Batman liked to do to him. You’d think it’d make for some interesting first interviews between new members of the League or the Outsiders, but frankly, there are so many factors making a first interview with Batman interesting, it doesn’t really come into account.

No one hates the rumours more than the Titans. Those who were Titans when Dick was Robin. They had no reason—they didn’t— they never suspected that. Never imagined that. It took them a while to become aware of it, too; the Titans aren’t exactly street-level, they don’t rub elbows with the drug-dealers or whatever Batman and Robin go after on most nights. In fact, Roy was the first to hear about it, because of his crime-fighting with Green Arrow. He told the others, too, one time Robin wasn’t with them.

It’s wrong. It’s just wrong, and it infuriates the Titans because—well, because they’re more aware than anyone else in the world how fucked-up Dick is when it comes to Batman. If Batman had asked Dick, then… they think (know) Dick wouldn’t have said no. Would never say no.

It’s their secret. It’s Dick’s greatest weakness, and one the Titans protect as fiercely as Donna’s faraway look when Lian plays ball. Dick doesn’t know, and Dick has enough Batman-related issues without the bad guys giving him ideas, or making things more difficult for him, or making light of them.

8. Dick doesn’t know about Jason. It would hurt him horribly if he did, but it might, in some non-me universe, provide the impetus to make Bruce and Dick admit their feeeeelings for one another. (Ideally, it’d go something like this: Dick would feel betrayed, Bruce would be pushed by someone to inquire, and kisses would happen. There would be lots and lots of angst, of course, but they’d be together at the end. They would be very good together. Totally co-dependent, but very happy.) Of course, in my!headcanon, it won’t happen because being platonic is what their relationship has bloomed into. They can still be happy this way. Dick would be happy when Bruce was happy and when Bruce makes it clear that he’s more proud of nothing but Dick. It should also be noted that Bruce isn’t in love with Jason because of Dick. That doesn’t have a lot to do with that, and deep down Bruce knew he didn’t take Jason as Robin as a replacement for Dick. If it had been the true reason, he would never have been able to admit it aloud.

Bruce… suspects about Deathstroke. There are things he doesn’t enquire about. He will not confront Dick about it. He has not confronted Slade about it, even when he had the opportunity. He kind of knows. He doesn’t want to think about it for reasons he doesn’t wish to examine too closely – there’s the usual assortment of not digging up bad things Dick is more comfortable of they stay buried, putting the past behind – how can he convince Dick not to blame himself on things past if he goes looking into it? But also, and this isn’t something Bruce would admit to himself, he can’t face Slade with that information. He couldn’t take Slade’s gleefulness, his knowingness.

9. Dick knows he’s not supposed to know about the Titans’ opinion on his issues with older, bigger, authoritative men. Donna called them “father figures” during one conversation he wasn’t supposed to overhear; they were talking about Deathstroke.

He knows about some of the issues they have about his relationship with Batman – they call it “issues”; he disagrees. But he doesn’t have the words to explain, and when he tries to show them (can’t stop moving), they just file that up as more proof of his issues.

10. At some point, Bruce explicitly made Dick promise that if someone killed Bruce, Dick wouldn’t kill them.

From:

^__^ So, sticky and hot, right? XD Love your headcanon, I really do. I especially loved 2, 3, and 6. Bruce in denial and Dick all fluid and Barbara all knowing, it's just excellent. Thanks for these :D Also nice to find someone else who loved Devin Grayson's run on Gotham Knights.

From: