InsaneJournal

Tweak says, "the calm before the storm"

Barbara Gordon (i_batlikeagirl) wrote in we_coexist,
@ 2008-12-27 03:56:00

Entry tags:

barbara gordon, dick grayson

Stumbling across a kitty cat. [Dick]
Barbara loosened the scarf around her neck slightly as she left the library. It wasn't as cold outside as it had been when she had come into work, and between the sweater, the jacket and the pea-coat, she was more than warm enough. The walk to her father's place (yes, Barbara still lived at home at almost-twenty-one) was less than ten minutes long, so she didn't bother taking a layer off. Barbara wondered idly whether her father, deeming it unlikely as it was only six o'clock, and he had three underworld cases to supervise. She felt a little guilty being happy about the Commissioner being at work late, but it was the perfect time for her to go help Bruce Wayne as Batgirl.

She was too preoccupied with imagining possibilities for what she'd be doing tonight to notice the slight shift in the air around her. A gust caught her from behind, blowing her long ponytail forward and around her face. A light in one of the windows of the apartments next to her caught her eye. She had walked this street twice a day everyday for the last three years, but she had never noticed that odd orange light, or the arches around those windows, or the molding between floors.

Wait a minute. Where was she? This wasn't the way she usually went home. Barbara wasn't the type to get lost no matter how distracted she got, so being in unfamiliar territory, no matter how subtle, was starting to weird her out. She decided to walk to the street corner and read the sign, just so she could get a better grip on where she was. Impatient to find her bearings, Barbara half-jogged to the street corner, only to find that there were no street signs. To make things worse, none of the other buildings around her looked familiar either.

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i_wingit
2008-12-27 04:36 am UTC (link)

Dick was still a cat. He wasn't happy about it. Not that he had anything against Buffy, who had been nice enough to put him up while he was inconvenienced by fur and a tail, but he really missed having hands. There was also a slight inconvenience thanks to the stupid watch-curse-spell thing that was--well, inconvenient.

To keep from going absolutely stir crazy (and embarrassing himself by tearing up Buffy's carpet again), he slipped out in the early morning, taking advantage of one of the nights Buffy had come in early from one of her 'patrols' (the similarity in phrasing was ironic) and crashed hard. Buffy was like him, in her own slapdash I'm-the-Slayer way, but he wasn't ready to explain what his nights were like until he could stand on two feet and ten toes and look her in the eye to do it.

Anyway, that meant he was out, moving as best he could on three good legs and tramping through snow. At least as a cat he didn't get as cold as when he was a man. He was hopping down off a fire escape into an alleyway when he saw the last person he ever expected to see standing on the street corner.

It was Barbara. She was standing. The black-and-white cat stopped and stared with bright blue eyes at her.

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i_batlikeagirl
2008-12-27 04:55 am UTC (link)

Barbara looked up and down the streets around her, completely flabbergasted. A quick mental tally ruled out hallucinations; the sandwich and soup that comprised her lunch and the cup of Earl Grey that had followed later were not exactly vision inducers. None of the villains she knew could pull teleportation either. Could she be dreaming? Maybe she was still asleep at work and this was just a weird -

The cat jumping off the fire escape derailed her thoughts. It was a cute little tuxedo cat, and it seemed to be watching her.

Barbara approached the cat slowly, her boots sinking into the snow. "Hey there, kitty." She crouched down five feet away from the cat, holding her hand out towards it.

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i_wingit
2008-12-27 05:03 am UTC (link)

Dick froze, legs splayed, as Barbara approached. His brain (thankfully his, and not a stupid cat brain) just went in circles. Holy shit, it's Barbara. It's Barbara, it's Barbara, she's walking, it's Barbara walking. Oh my God. She saw me. She's coming over here. Should I run? I'm a cat! I don't want her to see me as a cat! Shit!

His whiskers twitched as she stopped. All these extra senses... Barbara always smelled good to him, but now she smelled better than good. Fascinated, he stood still, pink nose twitching. Wait. I'm a cat. I'll just... pretend to be a cat. She doesn't have to know. Right. Just pretend.

He moved forward, hindered by his inability to use one of his back legs, and touched one of her palms with his nose, cold and wet.

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i_batlikeagirl
2008-12-27 05:17 am UTC (link)

"Aww you poor thing. What happened to you?" Barbara rubbed her free hand across the cat's head for a good thirty seconds before lifting it towards herself and carefully cradling it. "You shouldn't be here in the cold alone." The cat was too clean to be a stray, so it must have gotten locked out.

She continued petting it gently. "I'd take you home, but I have no idea where I am right now." Barbara had no idea why she explaining herself to the furry cat. It might have something to do with the fact that it was watching her as though it understood every word she said.

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i_wingit
2008-12-27 05:26 am UTC (link)

Well, Babs, the thing is I sort of got shot by this cop because they had an order to shoot anyone in a mask, but you wouldn't know that because you were Oracle, and you're not Oracle yet, oh God I hope you don't end up as Oracle, what am I--oop!

Being lifted from the ground took Dick by surprise, and he only struggled a little before he got tucked neatly into Barbara's chest and most of his thoughts derailed entirely. Unexpected feline benefits. A loud buzzing sound knocked him out of it, and he realized he was purring. Rather loudly. His whole body vibrated with it.

Being a cat definitely had to top the weird list. And Dick had seen a lot of weird.

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i_batlikeagirl
2008-12-27 05:35 am UTC (link)

Barbara got to her feet and walked westwards down the street (was it really west?) She continued rubbing her right hand down the cat's side as she walked, looking for any familiar sign.

She came to a stop at the end of the block and shrugged at the cat. "Okay. I'm totally and completely lost." Barbara and the cat needed to get indoors now; the snow had begun to come down in fistfuls.

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i_wingit
2008-12-27 02:31 pm UTC (link)

Gotta get to shelter, Dick agreed silently. Just get you safe and then bolt. Figure out the damn cat thing... and then find out what the hell is going on. Right. One thing at a time. The cat began to wriggle and squirm in her arms until it was free, landing ungracefully but adequately on three legs then hopping nimbly forward into the snow.

It looked back at her once, waiting for her to follow, and then took off down the street toward a shelter for newcomers Dick has seen on his way. They even had pamphlets about The City there. Lassie has nothing on me, Dick thought smugly.

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i_batlikeagirl
2008-12-27 03:27 pm UTC (link)

Barbara smiled as the cat sprung free and took the lead. She had been right - the cat was intelligent. Despite not having any idea where it was leading her, Barbara followed it down the next few streets without hesitation. Her instinct told her this cat could be trusted, and years of masked crusading had her instincts honed to near perfection.

Thanking the gods that she had been too lazy to take her coat off, Barbara tightened her scarf and trudged through the snow behind the cat. Hopefully it would lead her to some sort of refuge where she could wait until the snow storm lightened up a bit.

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i_wingit
2008-12-27 11:21 pm UTC (link)

Dick was inordinately pleased when The City acquiesced to his silent request. The shelter had a warm, friendly glow, and the pamphlet stand was just to one side of the door. Here you go, Babs. Stay out of trouble. I hope you don't get too pissed off at me if you ever find out about this... I hope you don't find out about this... As soon as she opened the door, the tuxedo cat trotted back the way they had come and slipped around a corner before she could follow.

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