InsaneJournal

Tweak says, "Snupin Santa is fun for all!"

D. (heir) wrote in rooms,
@ 2015-08-10 03:09:00

Entry tags:

!dc comics, *journal, *log, barbara gordon, damian wayne, donna carroll, helena wayne, jason todd, selina kyle, stephanie brown

public
So much for that.

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	heir 2015-08-10 08:17 am UTC (link)
	I'm 24. I repeat, what use could I have for it? (Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread)

	shadowbabs 2015-08-10 08:20 am UTC (link)
	You still talk like a ten year old, so I'm not buying it. You're seriously 24 years old and never took one art class? Theater? Anything? (Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread)

	heir 2015-08-10 08:25 am UTC (link)
	[>:\| ] Why would I? (Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread)

	shadowbabs 2015-08-10 08:27 am UTC (link)
	You might like it, short stuff. You still good with animals? (Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread)

	heir 2015-08-10 09:26 am UTC (link)
	[...] I am. (Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread)

	shadowbabs 2015-08-10 09:29 am UTC (link)
	Can you help me out with my horse? She's having a hard time calming down. (Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread)

	heir 2015-08-10 09:31 am UTC (link)
	[...] Fine. (Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread)

	shadowbabs 2015-08-10 09:32 am UTC (link)
	Thanks. I'm outside the manor by the stables. (Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread)

In-person, DC: Babs G & Damian W

heir
2015-08-10 10:21 am UTC (link)

He had no idea what to expect. Damian figured Babs was old by now. What she was doing with a horse, given she was a cripple, he didn't want to guess. Black hoodie, black jeans, hood up, and he made his way down to the stables on silent feet, sticking to shadows out of habit. It was dark out and he didn't have to work hard to remain undetected. Or..., he wouldn't have had to, if he hadn't had a the ass-end of a cigarette cherrying inches from his face, glowing in an open, poisonous orange as he inhaled.

He flicked the butt to the ground, squashed it out, and approached the stable from a side, so he didn't see her yet, expression set grim and wide, blue eyes serious as he rounded the corner.

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Re: In-person, DC: Babs G & Damian W

shadowbabs
2015-08-10 10:54 am UTC (link)

Even from a distance, Barbara's horse could be heard whining, stomping, frustrated at the new surroundings. Babs knew that keeping calm was the best way to help an anxious horse, but she was feeling nervous too. The horse could smell it on her. It thought if she was upset, there was good reason for it to be, too.

It took one look to know that Barbara had just arrived from a different time. Worn brown leather armor, a fur hood made out of deep black and daggers at her hips were visual proof of the hunter she had to be to survive. Barbara was holding onto the horse's reins as it whined, kicked at dirt and tried to pull away half-heartedly. Nervous. Confused that it was here and not some digital world.

She turned, pulled down her hood and stared at him. Her red hair loose, wild and curled, rolling down her back in waves. In the light of the stables, he could see how Batgirl would still be a title that applied to her. She was younger than him by a couple years and had the same kind of intensity in her eyes that her father did. And no, she wasn't a cripple.

"Damian?" She asked, taking a full five seconds to register and believe this was actually him. Something clicked in her mind and her expression went serious. "Have you been smoking? I can smell it on you."

The horse neighed and tugged away from her. Babs took a step back so it wouldn't feel crowded.

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Re: In-person, DC: Babs G & Damian W

heir
2015-08-10 11:47 am UTC (link)

No, she wasn't a cripple. She wasn't old either. Near his age, he thought. However, she was wearing skins. Damian looked at Barbara openly, sizing her up with the smallest crease between his brows, like he was trying to put it all together. He assumed she was a new arrival, perhaps from some post-apocalyptic timeline, where men went back to the earth, a successful reset of civilization—as she hadn't been around on the journal, and it was easy enough to accept this as likely. (Save for the strange make of those daggers and the tooling of the reins. Medieval, perhaps?) Her red hair spilled down her back, free of that jetted hood, and Damian pushed back his own, one hand up to his temples, palm brushing up over thick, dark hair. And if she wasn't a cripple, he wasn't a child, and they could both be somewhat surprised.—Damian was nearly as tall as his father now, and though he was, in appearance, equal parts al Ghul and Wayne, his eyes, as always, were his father's solely, pupils pinned in an expansive, cold sea.

The horse, a pinto, was anxious. Ears up in alert, tension around the mouth, and uneasy on stomping hooves. The man turned his attention to the creature with more interest, more softness in his own demeanor. He'd always found animals far more sympathetic and deserving than people. And he neared with slowness meant to prove he was harmless to the prey animal. (A quick duck from afar told him she was a mare.) "What's her name?" Yes, he had ignored the question about smoking. If she could smell it on him, that hopefully answered her, so he didn't have to bother with such inanities.

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Re: In-person, DC: Babs G & Damian W

shadowbabs
2015-08-10 01:00 pm UTC (link)

That look from Damian reminded her so much of his father that it made her chest ache a little. She hadn't really seen him in months and months, almost a year. And, Damian was this walking reminder of the man she so desperately wanted to emulate since she was a teenager. Her gaze turned momentarily affectionate and she shook her head. "You're worse than my dad. At least he admitted to it and felt bad about it." A gentle tease as if to say she'd likely bug him about it later when she was feeling particularly nagging.

"Her name is Montoya." Barbara said with pride (even if it was a totally lame thing to do, naming your horse after someone you admired) and she held the reins out if he wanted to take it. "She's never been in the modern world. And, while I think we're pretty far from cars and stuff, she can still sense something is really off."

Montoya snorted at the end of the sentence as if to punctuate it and then turned to look at Damian. Another whine and a hesitant step back as if she was ready to launch into another fuss.

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Re: In-person, DC: Babs G & Damian W

heir
2015-08-11 04:40 am UTC (link)

There were several, perhaps limitless, reasons why Damian Wayne did not do well with people. One, of course, was he thought them all below him. But, another likely had to do with how he was raised, by whom—by which, I do not mean his mother and grandfather, but assassins, human weapons who are not renowned for their silver tongues so much as their concise and efficient killing. Body language spoke volumes. It could inform you the direction in which someone intended to strike next, if they were going to flee. If one knew what to look for, one might even be able to tell when one of those silver tongues was lying. It was a different way to communicate, one Damian was better at. Perhaps this was the reason he found animals easier than people (easier and better).

As blatant as it was the mare was nervous, so too was affection plain on Barbara's face. Damian gave her a glare when she teased, but it had little truth behind it. Montoya. He all but sneered at that. Yet he took the proffered reins, bent in his palm, loose, one hand up, clear, for the horse to see. He extended fingers into the space between them for her to get his scent. He spoke quietly as he did that.

"It's alright, Montoya," he told her—useless words, but his tone soothing. He held the reins slack, so she didn't get the wrong idea, that he meant to tether her, if she wanted to thrash. "Everything smells different, doesn't it?" Everything about Damian softened, though he was unaware of it. He nearly smiled. If she sniffed him and her ears didn't pin or swivel, and if she didn't shy away, he touched her muzzle lightly. "Even the grass. I know."

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Re: In-person, DC: Babs G & Damian W

shadowbabs
2015-08-11 06:30 am UTC (link)

Barbara took a step back so she could watch Damian with the horse. This was the true test to see if he was that angry little boy she remembered. Damian was a terror in every sense of the word, but she had seen him curled up next to his giant dog. She had seen him scratch under his kitten's chin. It proved to her that he was good, that maybe one day he'd be a little more like Bruce than his mother.

The horse took a moment, but then stopped pacing back and forth in short spurts. It stilled, pushing its nose into Damian's hand and taking a large, audible sniff. Barbara watched and found herself relaxing, too. She smiled, even if Damian was too much of a man to. "That's it." She whispered and the horse looked up to her, huffing with a shake of its head. It was still a little on edge, but calming by the second.

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Re: In-person, DC: Babs G & Damian W

heir
2015-08-12 07:14 am UTC (link)

Damian would have argued he had never been 'an angry little boy,' as that diminished what he, naturally, considered rightful frustration and rage. He would, however, accept the title of terror. It had too chaotic a taste for his tongue, and his mother and grandfather had raised him to be more methodical than entropic, but it was an allowable difference, he thought. Or would have. Had he been able to read minds. Luckily, he couldn't.—Which, I suppose, takes us back to the body language and importance thereof in communication. Montoya eased, pushing her nose to Damian's outstretched fingers, and took a whiff.

The man smiled, a flashback to the boy Barbara remembered curled up next to Titus, and he mindfully released tension from his own muscles, thinning the air of it. Slowly, he moved his palm up Montoya's piebald muzzle to her forehead in a soothing series of strokes. He wanted to draw closer, nose-to-nose, but the horse huffed and he gave her more time.

"It's not so bad." Gentle, gentle—gentler than anyone else had seen in years. More earnest too, and had he realized, he wouldn't have come. It was too late now, however, and Damian was too engrossed to realize.

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Re: In-person, DC: Babs G & Damian W

shadowbabs
2015-08-18 07:45 am UTC (link)

Barbara had been called a terror in her own youth and her anger could have matched his beat by beat. She prided herself on logic and reason, but when it came down to her father being in danger or proving herself to Bruce, there wasn't anything in her except rage. It took the Joker's bullet and years in a wheelchair for her to work through that twisted, dark part of her. And, while it still surfaced, she had gotten a lot better at keeping a cap on it.

Though, this Gotham was different. She thought about how Stephanie talked about Bruce like there was something wrong with him for being serious and guarded. Wasn't that who he had always been?

Her mind drifted towards the bat family she left behind and only snapped back when she heard Damian's soft voice. Babs knew she was seeing something hidden, something special in this Robin. And, she was glad that it'd be imprinted in her memory. She'd need an easy reminder like this for when Damian tried to snap back in the other direction. He could yell at her all he wanted and she could think back to this. A vision in blue of a boy treating a horse with such kindness you'd never think he'd hurt a fly.

The horse huffed again, but stepped forward in a demand for attention from Damian. It stilled, which was a good sign and didn't search with wild eyes for immediate danger. Babs let the moment linger for a little longer and then, "Do you mind if she stays here?"

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