Archive of Our Own ^beta

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….That's a hit list.  

What?

There's no way she sent him a hit list. Right? She's a bat. 

Is it a test? It's gotta be.

But if she thinks he's gonna play ball, tie those pieces of shit up for the cops just for ‘em to be let go tomorrow? Nah. 

He's gonna fucking kill ‘em, and shove it in her face. He's not a dog to be called to heel. He kills people. Fuck anyone who tried to get him to stop, even with whatever the fuck this approach is. 

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He saw Bruce's face, when he first took his helmet off, made him look at who Jason is now. He was horrified. Disgusted. 

Dick couldn't hide it either - he'd hunted Jason down just to tell him how appalled he was. 

He can't really break into the Clocktower to see how she's reacting, but he can go see her at the Library - he'd spotted her there last week. And if they're in public, she can't do anything too obvious without fucking up her own life. 

Except he sees her, and he's watching for her to panic, to get angry, to react the same as the others-.

He's fully prepared for her recommendation to be for him to fuck off and leave her alone. 

But she doesn't tell him to go away. No, she encourages him to talk to her - to specifically her. Not to anyone else, which she could easily have done, to brush him off politely.

And she starts…flirting with him. Her tone was definitely suggestive. 

It could have just been her alluding to what they both got up to when not in civvies, but he doesn't think that's it. She was tentative, but not like she was trying to manipulate him into trusting her, and figuring out how to do it. More like she wanted him to…he's not sure. But maybe…

She hadn't-. She'd said she was excited to see where he went, but not like excited to see how he could ‘get better’, or whatever it was Dickhead said. Different, somehow. 

It's-. He'll have to think about it. 

It's not what he'd expected.

She isn't what he'd expected. 

And-. She'd looked up at him through her eyelashes, and he'd suddenly understood why people really went for that. But also because she was doing it, and behind it, she was looking at him. Not the guy he was pretending to be him, but him. 

That was who she was after. For some reason. He hasn't worked out quite why yet, but he'd like to. 

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…That. Is not telling him not to kill people. 

It's saying the opposite. It's saying ‘don’t dump dead bodies on my doorstep, because I can't clean them up easily’.

And the second part of it is another hit list. 

He sits back on his heels. 

Huh. Huh. 

Okay then. 

…If she's encouraging him, he's gonna show her what that means.

Because even if mmmaybe dumping the dead bodies actually on her doorstep had been too far, he's still maiming and killing people. Either she's trying to pretend that she's fine with that - in which case, giving her the body parts of people he's killed will bring that to a swift end. 

Or. Or. Or she's actually okay with it. Or even, she actually wants it. What he does. What he will continue to do. 

And if she wants that, wants what he does, wants him-. 

He'll show her what that means. 

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She's-. Shit, she's gorgeous. He'd needed a reason to be talking to her -and if it worked out- to be talking to specifically her, instead of any librarian around. Flirting had been an obvious step. But actually, he's not using it as a cover. Or- not just as a cover. 

And-. Whenever he comes to talk to her, she doesn't ever look unhappy to see him. She smiles.  

No one else looks happy to see him. No one who knows who he is and what he does. But she looks happy to see him. Every time. No matter what.

He sent her some fingers last night. He'd hunted the men on the list down, he'd cut their fingers off to hear them scream, and then he'd killed them. And then he'd sent her the fingers to prove what he'd done. 

Most people would be very upset at that. 

But she was sitting there, smiling and laughing with him. 

And then, and then-. She'd been the opposite of disgusted. Oh, but she had. 

It's-. …She likes it. Giving him orders, and having him obey. She really likes it. 

He wants to see that expression on her face again. 

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She's not what he expected. She's not what he remembers either. 

She's changed. 

And-. He doesn't think that anyone else has noticed. 

He's hacked into their comms a couple times now - she's let him, he knows that much. 

And compared to how she talks to him, the way she talks to the rest of them-. She's not rude, and she's helpful, of course she is. 

But she's not as helpful as she could be. Not compared to how helpful she is to him. 

And she's not playful. She's just…professional. They're colleagues, not friends. 

And they don't seem to have noticed. 

Even when sometimes…sometimes it's not subtle. Dick and Bruce especially seem to be in her bad books. He doesn't know what they did, but there's the occasional moment when she sounds resentful and bitter. Quietly, but even so. 

They're supposed to be-. They were closer than this, back before. Dick had been her Robin, had been the Robin to her Batgirl. And she's worked with Batman for longer than nearly anyone else. 

And it's very clear that absolutely none of them have noticed that she's started giving him orders too. Or that he's visited her at the library several times. He knows they haven't, because they haven't turned up to yell at him about it, and there's no chance they wouldn't if they knew. 

But then, she probably is keeping it on the down low, that she approves of what he does, even when they don't. 

She didn't use to be like this. He'd shot a harpoon through someone's hand for hitting her, and she'd been furious at him. For hurting someone like that, and for doing it in her defence. 

If he did that now, though, she'd react differently. Admittedly, probably not for smugglers. But the people she sends him after, he hurts ‘em worse than maiming their hands, and she is categorically not disapproving of him doing it. 

It's very very much the opposite. He likes it. He likes her approving of what he does. -Of what he does for her. 

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The other librarians have started automatically sending him to her. It's…nice. He likes being associated with her. 

She's started-. She's started saying ‘Good boy’ to him. It's-. There's the undertone too, which is ‘my good boy’. He fucking-. 

She keeps saying it, and smiling at him. 

He-. 

And the way she reacts to him-. She doesn't sound like that for anyone else, she doesn't look like that at anyone else-. It's just for him. 

And he for damn sure doesn't look at anyone the way he looks at her. Why would he?

Who else would appreciate what he does? Who else would want what he gives her? 

Who else would give him what she does? 

Fuck anyone else, she's it for him. 

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Ah…shit. 

He should have taken this fuckhead’s teeth out first. They're…he can't do anything with them now. He'd just-. The piece of shit had been boasting of what he'd done, and Jason had smashed his teeth in. Damn it - he can't pull them out if there's nothing left to grip. 

And his fingers are a mess as well. Both his hands are ruined - he tried to crawl away, and Jason had stomped on them, hard. 

Teeth and fingers are portable. They're subtle. Easy for him to wrap up nice, and present to her without announcing to anyone around that he's giving her something like this. 

But this? There's nothing small he can give her. Nothing that's not broken anyway.

And he won't give her subpar gifts. 

The only things that aren't smashed at least a little are…the eyeballs. 

…That could work. He's still gonna apologise though, he didn't plan it, and that's not really good enough, is it.

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“If you touch him, boy wonder, I will destroy you.” Her tone doesn't match the words. 

“Babs, what-?” Dick looks back at Jason, still tense and ready to fight. “He's Red Hood, he's dangerous and out of control-. He's been killing people!”

She says lightly, “I know.”

“You know?”

“I know he's been killing people,” she's not facing him, but he can see the smirk curling over her lips, “and I know that he's dangerous. But I also know that he's not out of control.”

“What-? Yes, he is!”

“He isn't. He's under my control, Nightwing.”

“He's what?”

“He's mine, do you understand?”

Jason is hers. He likes that she's declaring it. 

He prowls forward. 

Dick stutters back a step. 

Jason doesn't do anything, just waits by her side. He doesn't need to do more than that. 

She murmurs, loud enough for Dick to hear, “Will you kneel for me?” 

He answers by going to his knees. 

“Would you kill for me?”

He can't help the smile. He's already killed for her, but he says out loud, “Yes.”

“Would you stop killing for me?”

…If it’s her asking, “...Yes.” He's pretty sure she's just proving a point anyway. 

She turns her head, says very quietly, just for him, “Good boy. Thank you.”

She puts a hand on the back of his neck, hiding her thumb in his hair and rubbing soothing circles where Dick can't see. To him, it would show as just a possessive gesture, but it's not. It's her taking care of him. 

Dick says, “You're- you're working with him. He's killing people and you're letting him! That's not what we do- Babs-.”

“It's not what you do.”

He shakes his head, “You're better than this, I know you are-.”

“I'm better than letting murderers and rapists keep on hurting people, yes.”

“That's not-.”

She raises an eyebrow.

“Babs, please, I know you're angry, but killing isn't the line of work we're in-.”

“It's not the line of work you're in.”

“I’ll have to tell Bruce, you know that. Why are you-. Please just stop, and I can-.”

“Can sweep it under the rug, the way he swept your little indiscretion under the rug?”

…What are they talking about? She's been steamrollering Dick in their conversation, and that's always nice to see, but Jason doesn't know what they're talking about.

“That's not-. I didn't want to-.”

“Don't lie to me.”

“I can't-. He won, Babs. I'm not proud of it.”

Jason shifts. He really doesn't like not knowing what's going on. 

Babs keeps rubbing the nape of his neck as she says, “No, Dick. He won when you started torturing yourself over it. He enjoyed causing pain however he could, and you doing it for him is his victory. Not anything else.”

“I-.” Dick's throat works silently. 

…The tone of her voice. …She's talking about the Joker. 

She tells him, “His death is my victory, not his.”

“You-.” He chokes off.

“I had him killed. And I've never lost a night's sleep over it.”

She turns to Jason, murmurs, “I'll tell you, just not right now.” She cuts a glance over to Dick.

The squeeze of her hand is reassuring, but also-. She thinks he needs that care from her. That he will need that from her. 

Yeah, okay. Not right now. 

She looks back to Dick. “Nightwing. You should leave. If you want to come back and talk, you may do so, if you ask first.”

Dick says helplessly, “Babs-. I don't understand. Why are you-?”

“This is who I am. It's who I want to be.”

“...With Jason?”

“He sees me for who I am. You started seeing only who you wanted me to be, and when I didn't ‘measure up’, you shut me out.”

“I-.”

“You left. You didn't choose me, and Jason did. 

"And I chose him.”

“Because he kills people?” His voice is thin and desperate. 

“Because he bothered to look at me!” 

Dick steps back at the force of her words. Then he looks at Jason. 

Jason says, “I chose her because she bothered to look at me, too.” 

Because she'd liked what she'd seen there, when she looked. And she'd wanted it, when no one else had. 

She'd been willing to prove it, too. She hadn't just said words at him, she'd put her money where her mouth was, and chosen Jason. With all of what that meant. 

And that is why he chose her right back.