Who: Dick and Mia Where: Old Titan hideout When: Sometime before Thanksgiving (back dated, cause Chan forgot to tag!) What: Escrima practice, then lounging with food. Rating: M for Mia Mouthing
Dick had been napping, but hearing someone enter the old factory warehouse that was the old Titan’s main headquarters, he opened his eyes and turned his head to watch Mia walk in.
“Oh hey. Thought you were standing me up!” he said with a grin while rolling to his feet on the mat. “I was going to be heartbroken. And eat your hoagie that I brought.” He nod toward his motorbike where there was, indeed, sandwich bags hanging with two drink containers set on the floor.
~~~~~
“Yeah sorry. I was going to text, but my phone is in the bottom of this bag.” She replied slipping the messenger bag off her body and to the floor. Underdog was at her feet. She knew this location. She walked a few steps decided she was bored and laid down instantly in the middle of the walk way.
“You brought me food? That makes you my favorite you know?” She smiled, poking at the bag.
She already had on workout stuff. She just had to toss the hoodie she had on across a chair. It was rather big on her, but it was also warm.
She did feel a bit bad for being late, but she started a few stretches to warm herself up a bit. “I’m assuming though that the calories are my reward for after.”
~~~~~
“There are cookies in there, too.” He shucked off his jacket, throwing it toward the same chair, noticing the hoodie. “Oh hey, ET dino. Tim has that same…” A pause. “Um. One just like that. As in, exactly like that one.”
“It is! Besides, trust me, this is going to work up an appetite.”
~~~~~
“Cookies basically make you prince fucking charming.” She didn’t miss a beat. She really hadn’t thought about the hoodie. When it got cold outside, Mia just liked oversized and warm. She moved to the floor to do some sitting stretches. “That brand is awesome and warm. Good taste.” She said, holding and pulling on her toes.
“It always does. Do you think it’s weird at all the way we reward ourselves for food? Last parkour session it was all you can eat pancakes.”
~~~~~
“Oh, you,” he said with a playful bat of his hand her way. “We both know you’ll do a lot for sugary desserts. Okay, so will I, but yes, incentive for effort.” Not that he was worried about Mia not doing her damndest in practice. She always did. So really, the cookies were just to soothe the aches and pains they were both likely to get.
Dick raised a brow at her. “Uh-huh.” But with a bit of mental debate, he seemed to decide to drop it and not inquire on it further. Batkids were more prone to finding things out on their own anyhow rather than inquire directly. Well, unless they were Jason. Jason was pretty dern direct. This one would be pretty easy to confirm next time he was at the manor, though, just in seeing what was missing.
And it wasn’t like she was going to miss the dubiousness in his voice.
Dick picked up his escrima sticks and tossed her a pair. “Hey, I think rewarding our baser survival instincts such as being sure we don’t starve is fine in a lot of instances. We work hard, we eat a lot--life continues happily on!”
~~~~~
Mia once play fought with Lian just take a giant bite of the younger girls Snickers bar. There really was nothing she wouldn’t do to satisfy that sweet tooth. She grinned at him as she finished a few more stretches. “How do I earn cheesecake?” Cheesecake was her downfall.
She watched him for a second, but he seemed to not believe her, but he also didn’t seem like he’d pry further. She thought she might need to warn Tim.
She caught the sticks easily, twirling them in her hand experimentally and then going through a few moves to warm up a little. “And luckily work hard enough to not worry so much about the caloric intake.” It was one of those statements Mia knew others hated but she couldn’t imagine actively dieting.
~~~~~
“Uh… probably pressure point training. As in seeing how long you can solve verbal math equations while someone presses on your pressure points. Trust me. That’s exhausting.”
Dick grinned. “Yeah. It’d be ridiculous if people like us tried to count calories.” They just plain consumed too much with their active lifestyles. At least he knew he did.
Dick came up to her side, holding his stick up so she had plenty of warning. “All right. Let me see your grip.” He smacked her stick experimentally, just to give her an idea of how her grip would handle the vibrations of his (which were a different composite than wood, so felt more solid). “Nice.”
He hopped back from her, setting up in an easy stance. “I’m on defense. No need to be gentle.”
~~~~~~
“You ever do that shit to me, I’ll kick your ass.” That sounded horrible. It didn’t matter that he was the better fighter. The threat of that would power her up to that insane “mother lifting a car off her child” adrenaline level.
She felt the vibrations in her arm when he smacked the sticks against each other. She knew enough with these, but she knew he was much, much, much better than she was. She was treating this like any other sparring session. There wasn’t really another way to approach it. So she circled for a few seconds sizing him up, but going in for a quick hit. It wasn’t the biggest things, but it was obvious she was testing and would ramp it up.
~~~~~~
“Hey, being able to focus through distraction has saved my butt quite a few times,” he said with a grin. He was not the least offended that she threatened his obliteration for it, though. That was something someone would have to volunteer for and not something Dick wanted to train Mia on.
Dick did a lot of things with flare. He liked to move, jump around, flip over and off of anything available. He handled escrimas a bit differently. These were his weapon when he wanted to end things quickly without using too much energy. So unlike their parkay training where they found excuses to expend energy, Dick was keeping his blocks very precise, close to his body and not extending a great deal.
Finally he stepped back, calling a whoa. “All right. Good, but I want you to whip the out less. You’re leaving your inner arm vulnerable for just that instant before it comes back..” He made a downward diagonal strike, stopping evenly with his hip. “So stop here.” He bent his stick back further with just his wrist. “Rather than here. It’s getting in habit of holding your wrist strong and your thumb doesn’t crook back further than your forearm.” He put the sticks up defensively again. “Okay, go.”
~~~~~~
“I can focus through any distractions. Haven’t you met my family?” It was true. The amount of things she got done around them was rather amazing.
But it was time for business. And to her credit she didn’t start humming the song from Mulan. She had to adjust her own style to go against him though. That was fine. Mia could fight in many different ways, but it wasn’t lost on her the change he was throwing out.
They’d been going for a good few minutes before he called a time out. He showed her where she’d fucked up, and she listened intently. She had always been good at this. You got to be the best by learning from the best. She still cursed Oliver out regularly though. It was how she showed her love. But she paid close attention because she knew that now that it had been pointed out that if it happened again she’d definitely end up bruised and sore.
“Alright then.” She watched him for a moment, but he gave her nothing with his body language. So she went right back at it, taking his advice. It was hard though to do things perfectly even on the second try.
~~~~~
“Point. You know, my ability to focus since hanging out with you has been so keen.” Yes, he was teasing her.
Part of Mia’s charm, she seemed to pick up everything thrown at her, and it was rare that she continued making mistakes. But they did happen when someone was still getting the hang of the movements. He was starting to use sweeps against her blows, doing more than just mere blocking when he caught her hand adjusting wrong on an overhand.
And really, it was the same principal. So his stick crossed her, jabbed her right in the inside of her elbow, and then his other was inside, the bottom of it butting against her wrist and the other end swinging in to whack her on the inside of the bicep. A blur, and it made an audible Whap! The kindness was in that he only rest the stick on her ribs rather than continuing on her exposed side. This time.
“Too far back,” he quipped with a small side turn of his head and cheeky grin. “Let’s try that again. Down, then up and over.”
~~~~~
She was paying close attention. In fact so much so that she really wasn’t up to her 100% quip level. She was going hard but it dyed away instantly the second she got tagged. In a real fight she would have just gritted her teeth and continued. Instead she whipped her arm out of his arm reach. “Jesus… FUCK!” She took a step back and shook her arm. “Son of a bitch.” She muttered.
She couldn’t be too mad, however. She knew what was coming if she messed up, and messed up she had. She took a deep breath, slightly annoyed by his smiling face. She brought up an arm pointing a stick at him with a bit of mock menace. “Paying for that.”
But she went back at it, and he probably wouldn’t pay for it.
~~~~~
The smile didn’t falter at all when she cursed, and when she pointed at him, it widened. “That’s what I like to hear.” Because she would have to work hard to pay him back for that smack. But even if it took her some years, he didn’t doubt she would get her strikes through.
She was called Speedy for a reason. If they kept at it regularly, it wouldn’t take that long.
Okay, so actually she was probably called Speedy because Roy set the precedence of his mouth running before he thought and she inherited the namesake. But Dick liked the thought that it was Speedy because she picked up things quick.
“All right. I’m going to start defending a bit more aggressively now,” he said, even while the escrima clacked loudly between them. Before he’d moved rather passively on his feet, just to keep with her motions. Now he didn’t, starting to outright duck her blows and push her off balance.
He was going to start finding more openings, but he was at least going to verbally warn before he starting smarting her physically for openings still.
~~~~~
She got back to work, and she would call him many more games during this particular activity. Some were run of the mill, some were extremely creative. Still it had been a good session, and once they were done she’d simply dropped her sticks, got the hoagie out of the bag, and plopped herself on the nearest couch to eat that shit.
After she’d swallowed that first rather large bite she spoke up. “I liked you better when we were running around the park and doing gymnastics.”
~~~~~
She had some welts, and those were going to bruise spectacularly. People in their line of work were used to bruises, though. But while he chowed down on his sandwich, sitting cross legged on the arm of the couch, his smile did turn a bit more sympathetic. He didn’t try to defend himself, just held out the bag with two cookies. He figured she’d earned both of them with how many licks she’d taken.
“Next time take some ibuprofen beforehand. It helps.”
He chewed thoughtfully on his sandwich. “So… Holidays. How is that going to go?” Now that she was kind of a joint custody child but not really.
~~~~~
Some of those hits were harder than others. Some would get red and fade, but there was one on her shoulder she knew was going to leave a mark for a while. She didn’t even wait before diving for that bag of cookies like a feral child. She checked off the ibuprofen advice to be remembered at a later date.
She looked at him at the moment not getting the question of course. She loved Dinah, really she did, but she thought the fact that Oliver had holiday privileges was clear, so hearing someone question that made her pause for a second.
“We have a tradition. We throw Thanksgiving for the Youth Center.”
~~~~~
“Sooo… not going to swing by at some point? Because you haven’t lived until you’ve had some of Alfred’s turkey fixin’s. Think of it as a bonus. You get to stop by and see Dinah and Sin, and see how much of the leftovers we allowed to survive.” He added quickly. “And it doesn’t have to be on the day, but you know... Just don’t want you to think you can’t or anything.”
Okay, yeah, it was a bit awkward, because it was trying to paint something plainly in a family that usually did things by subtle cues unless it had to be spelled out. But he wasn’t sure what Mia thought about stopping by to see them whenever she wanted. It also wasn’t really his place to extend that invite, because he didn’t really live there anymore, but there were a number of people who had open invite to the manor, and he couldn’t fathom Mia not being on that list.
~~~~~~
“I.. I hadn’t really planned on it.” Normally after the big dinner and cleanup she stayed in a food coma until Saturday. She was pretty sure any leftovers would be gone by then. She did suddenly feel awkward. “We’ll see. Maybe Dinah will want to paint the nursery that weekend.” It was the best she was offering.
Mia probably was on a stop by whenever invitation, but that didn’t mean she felt particularly comfortable using it. She could only think of one time that she’d just shown up without warning, and that was when Dinah had gotten back. Nothing would have kept her then.
She swallowed, but then took another bite of her hoagie. “It’ll be a good holiday either way. You all will survive without my pretty face.”
~~~~~
Well, he’d put it out there at least, but he knew at least when to drop a subject (most times) and not push for more. Hell, at least it wasn’t like trying to deal with Jason, who became a spitting, highly offended feral cat at the offers to be with family.
“Yeah, but it would have been great to see you rolling around on the floor like the rest of us, barking like walruses and trying to scoot toward more pie. Okay, yeah, you probably don’t want to see how awful we are when we have too much food around. We have no restraint.”
Okay, they weren’t quite that bad. Tim and Dick mostly rotated between napping, grabbing more food, napping, then trying to figure out how to burn off all the excessive sugar later. Of course the rest of the family was more reserved, and he wasn’t sure how Dinah would be. Sin would be interesting to see how she handled such fare.
“Hey, you going to take the group on a holiday trip? You know they won’t do anything fun for Winter Break unless you plan it like usual.”
~~~~~~~
She could only imagine. They trained and worked out so much that they all had appetites above and beyond. But the imagery in his words was definitely a thing of hilarity. “Poor Alfred, slaving away to have the dinner eaten in like two minutes flat.” She shook her head.
“Japan. Been planning it for a while. It’s cold as fuck that time of year there, so it’s definitely the off season.” She shrugged. “I figure it’d be fun anyway. Last year was all beaches. So we’ll deal with the cold this time.” She was quiet for a second. “Most of the Titans are going. I invited Connor because Maxine is going. Tim isn’t going, because heaven forbid one of you assholes takes a vacation.”
~~~~~
“It’s how we show our love,” Dick said, patting at his stomach. “By leaving no dish undevoured.”
Dick wrinkled his nose. “Vacation? What is this blasphemous word you speak of?” But then more seriously. “Pretty sure he’s just worried about protecting the family’s identity. Still, it’d be nice. He needs to figure out how to have fun and relax.” A shrug, then a grin. “My friends and I used to just go everywhere in masks. Secluded places sometimes, sure, but when one of your friends can port you anywhere as easily as snapping fingers, it makes popping up in foreign cities to run amok pretty fun.” The trouble they would get up to… Thankfully this newer generation seemed a little less reckless.
“... Do any of you speak Japanese?”
~~~~~~
“But he hangs out with us out of mask a lot. Our civilian things are open invite. So he’s just some guy I know. Occasionally Maxine will bring a classmate or whoever it’s all fine.” She bit into a cookie, ignoring her sandwich for the moment. “I’m just going to go with stubborn S.O.B.” And there was literally nothing she could do about it. She’d already asked him quite a few times if he’d changed his mind.
She probably should try again.
“Not completely? Like I’ve been going over some basics, but we’ll muddle through. I think most of our stuff is in the cities which will be helpful.”
~~~~~~
“Stubborn son of a gun who doesn’t know how to be around friends for long lengths of time then?” Okay, he was being protective. But there wasn’t a whole lot of ground to defend Tim’s aloofness with. Tim just liked to keep busy and work. Too mission oriented. And really, Dick would be the worse kettle calling a pot black on that, so he didn’t bother to point it out.
Dick sighed and shook his head. “Yeah, you’ll be fine. They accommodate tourists. Just don’t let anyone stab their food with their chopsticks. And try not to start any fights.” That last was said with teasing.
~~~~~~
Mia thought maybe it was a work/life balance thing he needed to work out, but somehow it seemed hypocritical to point it out. Mia thought she had a good work/life balance, but if you really thought about it most of her “life” things were still “work” things like the foundation and her new building. Still it was definitely better than his.
She gave a bit of a shrug. “I’ll try again, but I don’t know that it’ll help.”
She gave a snort and flicked a bit of cookie at him. “I solemnly swear to not throw a slushie on someone.”
~~~~~~
“Good.” Trying never hurt.
Dick laughed, then started to pick at the crumbs that tumbled into his shirt, because darn it, cookie was not to go to waste. “Yeah, try to restrain yourself. I am not going to Japan to arrest you.”