Helena Wayne is (the_huntress) wrote in doorslogs, @ 2013-03-07 02:11:00 |
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Entry tags: | damian wayne, door: dc comics, huntress |
Who: Damian and Helena
What: Talking and bonding
Where: Batcave, Wayne Manor
When: Backdated to Valentine's Day
Warnings/Rating: Waynesibs cuteness? A little bit of fighting.
Before Damian ever set foot back in the cave, he knew this would be the last time he’d be here. Or at least, he wasn’t planning on returning for a long time. It wasn’t just the flashdrive that he found or that unfamiliar, bitter sense of betrayal he knew was a little unfounded. For the first time in a year, he felt like he didn’t belong here. Out there with Stephanie and Grayson, that was as close to home as he would get, but this manor wasn’t anything but unfamiliar and cold territory. He was so stupid for trying to make a home out of a place he had never been. For pushing Bruce into being a father that Damian himself didn’t know that well in the first place. He had spent more time chiding himself than feeling anger towards Selina or Bruce. More time ruffling his own feathers at trying to act his age or whatever that meant.
Even though he had told Bruce flat out that he wasn’t his father, Damian didn’t mean it. All he wanted was for Bruce to fight back. To tell him that he was wrong. Because if Damian wasn’t being watched over by someone like Grayson or treated like a sibling by Steph and Hels, he needed to feel like Bruce was an authority. A father who was really invested with what Damian was growing into instead of just doing it by obligation. Instead, he found himself turning to people he knew weren’t just humoring him. Grayson genuinely needed his help, Stephanie would always stick with him and Hels was one of the only people who tried to cheer him up with a sort of goofiness that he not-so secretly appreciated. Which meant, when she asked him to come by and vandalize the cave with Valentine’s decorations, he couldn’t really say no.
Dressed in a black turtleneck and jeans, he appeared ontop of a cave rock, looking down at Hels. “Hey.” He called out, voice meekly hoarse from not really using it all day. “You’re such a weirdo, you know that right?” Damian smirked from his perch and then descended with two easy jumps that made it look like he was barely touching the face of the rocks at all. His face was stern and hurt in a way that looked unfamiliar on the little bird, but he was happy to see her.
"I'm brilliant," Helena replied from her spot on top of a Tumbler, one leg bent, foot to the opposite thigh, her other foot dangling off the roof as she drew a heart, complete with arrow through it across the roof. She wasn't an artist, but she could do this, totally. "Remember the Christmas Tree? Remember how much fun we had with that?" They had all laughed, even amongst the snow and the cold melt trickling under clothes to chill skin.
It had been a welcome distraction then and this was a welcome distraction now, keeping her thoughts from lingering too long on the missing Kara, perhaps gone since Helena hadn't seen her again, and the fact that Spencer was also gone. He better come back with Tim. Her jaw tightened slightly and she pressed down too hard on the window paint, leaving a bloom of pink across the black top of the Tumbler.
She frowned, but left it and drew a second heart around it. There. A smile made her lips curl upwards and she finally risked a glance at Damian. "You know you want to get in on this, Damian. I promise not to tell anyone, but you're going to have to make your own deal with Oracle."
Damian strolled towards the tumbler, putting his hands in his pockets with his shoulders up a little. For someone raised by ninjas and bred in a lab, Damian was quickly picking up on mannerisms of not only people his age, but people in general. He was a lot better at it when he was at school, finding that the distant rich playboy thing was a pretty good way to get respect around campus. But, here with his sister (and Damian really did see Helena as his sister because she had traces of his father) his posture came off as least threatening as Damian Wayne could be. Just like how when they got the Christmas tree, he was just a little brother trailing behind her in the snow, here he was a doubtful younger sibling who didn’t understand Valentine’s Day, but liked a little bit of mischief.
“Everyone owes me for taking care of Grayson anyway.” Damian said simply, even though there wasn’t anything in his voice that suggested he didn’t want to be the one to take care of him. But, the little bird got a free pass for now. “What do you want me to do?” He asked, face remarkably innocent. He knew how to cause trouble, but he didn’t really know the first thing about vandalism.
It probably helped that for all his growling and scowling, Helena didn't see Damian as a threat, not a physical one (they were on the same team anyway) and not as one vying for a position within the family. Perhaps it might have been different in her own world, Bruce's son by another woman, but here they were equals were they not? The Selina and Bruce here were too young to have either one of them, though Helena had no idea about Damian's mother. All she got from Morgan on the subject was that Damian was better off right where he was and she was more than willing to accept Morgan's assessment on that particular matter.
She pointed her toe to the mountain of window clings, magnets, window paints and other various and assorted party items. "Pick one and start. You're going to have to help me lock and load the Bat Valentine's though." Helena grinned. It had been a stroke of luck to find the Batman plushies, but then she'd gone ahead and gotten some of those bears that were always around close to Valentine's, clutching little hearts that said various and assorted Valentine's Day slogans. She had every intention of spring loading them into the Tumblers so they went flying once Bruce got in.
Unlike Hels, who had a long, meaningful relationship with both her parents before everything went to hell, Damian didn’t get to bond much with his own father from his Gotham. Most of his time in Gotham was spent at Grayson’s side and when Bruce returned, their relationship was tentative at best. So, he wanted this Bruce to be his father. And, maybe that was selfish and naive, but Damian felt like it was the right thing for him. It wasn’t that different from how he thought of Hels as his actual half sister whether she liked it or not. Damian liked the idea of having other Waynes around. Even if she was a big weirdo.
He picked up an armful of window clings and started spreading them over computer screens and the tumbler and batwing. Like everything, Damian took it very seriously. He made sure the clings didn’t bubble and were in a place that was easily seen. Maybe he wasn’t a very cheerful helper elf, but he was an efficient one. A silence fell for a little while and at first it felt comfortable, but then Damian perked up to look at her. “Why do you make me do stuff like this?” It was an innocent question, almost childlike.
There could have been a bit long answer to the question, about how holidays brought families and people together. Or about how family was more than just the people that had your back when Crane poisoned members or Ra's released a virus. It was about the laughing and the good times too, and Hels knew they had a severe lack of that for all that they might try. "It's about family," she said simply as she hopped from one Tumbler to the next. "When I remember my mom and dad, it's not just the crime fighting I remember. I remember them reading me to bed at night, and Christmas dinners, and," she stopped to smile, a tiny, wry thing full of memories. "On Valentine's Day night they always went out together. There would always be two squad cars in the driveway and I always knew that somewhere on the property would be Kal and Diana. Even when I was 18 and I'd been going out with them for years. Dad always worried."
She couldn't count the times she'd happened across her parents talking, usually while they were curled up on the couch or getting ready for bed, and Dad was always worrying while mom was busy reminding him that she was ready for this and that they had trained her. She drew a fresh heart on top of the Tumbler she was on. "And this Bruce needs to remember that life isn't all gloom and despair." She glanced up from the giant heart she was working on to look at him. It had been harder when she first came here to think of Damian as her brother, even if he was only her half brother, but not anymore. She'd never had one back home, but if she had, Damian would have been good, even if he was part grumpy old man.
Damian paused when she launched into an explanation, hands smoothing over a window cling as he tried to understand what a family would be like beyond crime fighting. He knew that Grayson and Stephanie had tried to help him be a kid before, but he thought they simply found him too intense for his age. But, Hels knew what it was like to have something close to a real family. She was the expert. He’d have to trust her on it. Damian gave a small sound of appreciation and then slapped his last window cling up on the front window of the Batwing before jumping down to get something else to put up.
“I think he remembers.” Damian said gruffly, pulling open a large red paint pen to color the cave rocks with. “He doesn’t spend any time with either of us, but he’s more than happy to go chasing Selina around the city like none of us exist.” Yes, there was some bitterness in his voice punctuated by the packet of paint pens ripping open with a pop. “He’s not going to understand this. He’s going to think we’re annoying.” Damian lifted a pen up and looked for a good rock to draw on and then started climbing back up the cave like he was half monkey.
"I don't think he has the first clue of what to do with all of us," she said quietly. It was nagging her that she hadn't spoken to him since she'd been in the bunker. She only dimly remembered them being on the comms and Oracle giving her some of her work for a little while. They hadn't even really talked, it had just been voices -- what do you need? Where are you? Who's still alive? -- devoid of anything but weariness.
Maybe she should have gotten a whole bucket of bubble gum pink paint and flung it around the Batcave in a fit of spite and 'Hey! Remember me?' But she hadn't. This couldn't be done in spite. They'd do this and after she'd bring up what she needed to with Bruce. The tip of her tongue jabbed into the corner of her mouth as she finished up and slid off the roof, leaving one Tumbler completely untouched -- for now.
For a moment she watched her crazy monkey brother doing what she'd done so many times she'd lost track. "What are you talking about?" Was this finally what had been bothering him? What made him want to go home? She crossed over to the pile of goodies and removed the Valentine's Day confetti she'd found, but it took her a couple minutes to find the bag of black Halloween bat confetti that she had also picked up.
He crawled up on top of a ledge, hands on his hips as he looked down at Helena and that softness in her voice. Damian decided then that he’d give her a hug at the end of this. Sisters liked hugs, right? Grayson and Stephanie seemed to. And, Damian still had some lingering guilt for not being in Gotham during the plague. A hug wouldn’t make it all better, but in the Wayne family it did mean something.
Damian started drawing stick figures instead of hearts. He’d get to the Valentine’s things eventually, but he was busy thinking about things that were important to him. First, his cat Bandit. The tiny kitten who crawled on his chest when he slept at Selina’s hideout. The one he named with Stephanie. “You know before everyone got here, Selina was the only friend I had.” Damian said simply, drawing the whiskers and leaving a space to represent white pieces of fur on his first cat. “We lived together for a while, even.” And, all of that sounded new to him. Even the concept of having a friend felt new to the baby bird. “But, once everyone started showing up she distanced herself from me like she thought I wasn’t going to stay in the family because of her.” He scribbled in the red to represent Bandit’s black fur, all too late realizing that he should have let the rocks be the black fur and the red be the white. Oh well, too late to fix it now.
“But, it’s like how most people are with me. I remind them of my father, so they stick around until they realize I’m not him.” Damian paused before finding another good place to draw Isis. “And, once Bruce started acting like the Batman she knew, they predictably got together.” He sounded betrayed, but unsurprised at this point. Hurt, but in a familiar way.
His tone kept her attention and she watched, silently, as he drew his stick figures. Not that she was much better, but she wasn't critiquing his style or even his efficiency. She was paying far more attention to what he was saying.
"I didn't." When she had come here, it had been Selina that brought her closest to Gotham. From there it hadn't taken much for her to come to the city proper, first for the raid on Crane's plane, and then because of Tim and Tristan. She wondered for a moment how many of them Selina had brought home, the eternal momma cat carrying them in by the scruff of their neck's. Not that she would tell the other woman that -- she'd wait until Selina figured it out on her own.
Her attention turned back to him once he mentioned how he reminded people of Bruce. She'd never felt that from him, but that wasn't surprising. Her dad had been different from most of the Bruce's she'd heard about. The hurt though -- she wanted to scale the walls of the Cave and go hug him now, but she couldn't. Her time in the bunker had cost her weight, yes, but also muscle mass and she was still hiding that information while simultaneously trying to regain it as quickly as she could. Until she had it back, earthbound she remained.
"They got together?" She asked, head tilting to the side like a cat faced with something that they weren't quite sure of. "You think she pushed you away so she could have what she has with Bruce?"
Isis was a smaller cat, a baby kitten that was almost completely black save for a tiny, teardrop of white. Damian opted to draw her as a series of fuzz balls with pointed ears. “Yeah, they’re having sex.” The little bird said frankly as if he were reading a criminal report, the distance put between what it meant to him made it easier. “But, that’s the way it’s supposed to go. She was just waiting around for him to start acting like how she remembered.” That distance he was trying to string away from the situation snapped tight and turned gritty and angry. Damian’s drawing of Isis slipped for a second and he had to improvise a tail to make it look like she didn’t suddenly sprout another paw.
Isis she knew. She had been the one that Damian was worried about while his ribs were broken and that Hels had taken care of and it was almost easier to focus on the cat than what Damian was saying. Bruce and Selina were together? Had gotten together? "Are they dating now?" She asked, the question coming out abruptly. It was a good thing, right? So why did Damian sound so hurt by it? Because Selina had chosen Bruce over him? None of this added up right. Selina hadn't withdrawn from her, she'd tried, said things while she was dealing with Ra's, but Hels knew that wasn't true. So why had she pulled away from Dami? Her eyes narrowed, brows coming together as she tried to piece things together.
“I don’t think people date in Gotham, Hels.” Damian gave her a similar narrow look from the top of his perch like she was talking crazy. Maybe in her Gotham, people had stable, normal relationships (besides all the vigilante work), but it didn’t work that way here. Or where he was from. “They’re sleeping together. That’s just how it’s supposed to be.” Damian thought he was really getting good at sounding indifferent about it, but no one in the cave was convinced. Not even the cat drawings. He turned to add a face to Isis and some paws before coloring in her fuzzy fur even more. There was a short pause as Damian debated whether or not to give full information as to why this was upsetting before he added quietly, “I kissed Selina before.”
"People totally date in Gotham," she said, grinning when she saw his narrow look. "Only in Gotham they do it when they're in suit and cowl on the top of a roof somewhere." Of course, she and Tim hadn't been dating when they'd found themselves on the top of a roof at the hotel, but she didn't mention that, just looked down at the bags of confetti in her hands. Cracking two of them open, she poured them into one bag and began to shake it so they'd mix together. "Why?" She asked, glancing up at him again, voice laden with curiosity. She had a feeling she already knew an answer to that, but she wanted to hear it from him instead of assuming.
Damian didn’t even really know how to answer that. Why did anyone do something that stupid. “I was drunk.” Which was true, but not the right answer. Damian had drank plenty while he was here with the entire bat family and he didn’t try to make out with any of them. He knew why he kissed Selina, why he was afraid when she got too close and why he was so upset when he found out that she picked his father over him, but Damian didn’t want to believe he could ever be trapped by emotions like that. “I- she meant something to me. I thought I meant something to her, too. But, I was wrong.”
He leapt off the rock onto one a little higher up and began drawing his third cat that he had stay with him in the diner. She was unnamed for now, moody, old and ready to hiss warnings at him. Unlike the other two, she was mostly white with some calico markings on her back, which meant drawing her was a little more difficult.
The why was simple, but it was the details that could have changed everything.
Damian being drunk? Didn't help. Hels stared at him wordlessly for a few long moments as he began work on his third cat. She wanted to chuck the paint pens at him, all of them, for the fact that he'd kissed her mom. Well, not her mom, but the Selina here. That was her -- snapping the cap back on, she aimed for the back of his head and let loose with a quiet grunt.
Damian was in the middle of trying to figure out how to draw different colored spots when the pen went zooming for his head. His ninja training should have alerted him to even the slightest sound of something heading towards him, but talking about feelings or whatever made him sloppy. When it hit the back of his skull he made an aack sound, grabbing the spot it hit and turning to look at her with little brother anger. “What the hell!” He frowned deeply, flapping his little bird arms at her almost like he was about to fall out of his own nest. “I’m trying to confide here! You asked! Forget it!”
He threw his own pen down, leaving the third unnamed cat unfinished before he leapt down the rocks towards her. “I know it was a mistake now. Clearly!” Damian was still flapping his arms, huffing while his face turned an almost pink color. “Not everyone got to actually live their teens. I’m not used to hormones and girls and all that stupid crap!” His face was definitely turning a weird shade of red now and he was positive that if he died a virgin he’d be happy. Or if he could go back to being ten and grow up like a normal Robin that would work, too.
"You kissed my mom!" She retorted, hands going to her hips as she glared up at him as only an older sister could. If she hadn't been mad about the fact that he kissed her mom (drunk or not) she would have laughed at the way he was up there flapping his arms like a bird about to take off. Hels almost asked how he would have felt if she'd kissed his mom, but those words were wisely kept behind her teeth.
"I didn't get to do any of those things when I was a teenager either! Now get down here, I want to talk to you." Her rage, as usual, was quickly spent and with it vented, she could take care of him. He was hurting, that much was obvious, and it wasn't in the flush of his face or the flapping of his arms, but that strain in his voice and the frustration in his words. Hels didn't know what it was like to go from being ten to being eighteen in such a short time, but she did know that as much as family could drive you crazy, they were the ones to help you piece everything back together.
“She’s only KIND of your mom!” Damian shouted. “And, at least you were a teenager!” His squawking echoed off the cave and once it bounced back at him a couple times, he quieted back down. Posture slumping as his flapping abruptly stopped. His anger was a constant boil that frequently splashed and spilled over, but it cooled once she told him to come down. He gave a ttt and then jumped down to walk over to her. Face to face, the two really did look like siblings. The dark hair, blue eyes, serious expression that could crack once and awhile if the moment struck them. “What.” He grumbled.
They could both get that stubborn set to their jaw, but Helena's cracked first because Damian really was like her little brother. They were in this together. She gave him a glare for about half a second, unafraid of that petulant grumble before throwing her arms around his neck and hugging him. "Don't kiss my kind of mom, Damian." Cause even if she wasn't her mom, that wasn't to say that one day this Bruce and this Selina wouldn't stay together and make another little her and that'd be weird. So weird. "We've got to find you a girlfriend," she added. "Maybe we can auction you off in a Most Eligible Bachelor's of Gotham with the proceeds going to the," she paused to think. There were several good charities, but with the plague so recently having damaged their city, "Building of a new veteran's home."
Damian waited until her arms were around his neck and his own were wrapped around her back before he smiled. But, she could hear it in his voice. The little bird was serious, but when it cracked it was all too obvious. “That sounds humiliating.” Damian said pulling back to give her a look like she was nuts. “But, if it’s for charity I guess I can’t say no.” The smile that he had hidden from her before twitched a little on his lips before he snuffed it into a straight line. The strong hug and hint of a smile was enough. He couldn’t use up all his nice quota for the year already. “I’m going to put streamers up.” He said determinedly, moving away from her to pick up two rolls of red paper and started hopping around the cave like a tiny bird moving from branch to branch.
"Just think of who else we could get up there," Hels grinned, not even bothering to try and school it back into something serious like Damian did. It was the biggest difference between her and the rest of them, perhaps, that she could smile so easily, that her childhood had been great and that she still believed there was something beautiful in life. "You do that. I'm going to put confetti in the air vents." She almost wished she could put a hidden camera in the Tumblers to record Bruce's expression, but if she got to see a glitter covered Batman, that would be good enough for her.