[Open]

[forceforlight]

Who: Dick Grayson/Nightwing forceforlight and YOU!
What: April catch all
When: During April
Where: Rooftops around the city; a park
Content Warnings: Updated as needed


He knows better than to complain, especially after the past few months in Blüdhaven. It's been a long time since he's had a quiet, even after coming to this world.

Which is why Nightwing sits on the edge of a high rooftop, a bag of bagels on the rooftop behind him and a cup of coffee warming his hands. After all, early spring isn't any warmer in Michigan than it is in New Jersey.

"I'm going to jinx myself if I say it," he says to whomever shows up, without looking their direction. He's just really used to listening for people coming up behind him. "But, damn, it's quiet."



The name "circusbrat" wasn't taken on TikTok. Not that Dick had any real plans of what to do with it. So far, he'd posted a few short videos of him at a local circus school, doing some tricks on the silks and the lines. There were also a few from the park, with him doing some simple, if impressive, gymnastics.

Which is what he's doing now: filming himself doing handstands.

However, every time he starts, he ends up in a heap of giggles as Haley runs in and hops up to lick his face. "Haley, no," he says, gathering the puppy up and ruffling her ears. "We really need to work on your stay, don't we?"

Comments

nightwing

[exponentially]

"You definitely just jinxed it," comes a familiar voice from overhead, and Jon drifts down to settle next to him. Probably the fabric rustle of his cape gave him away, but he's not complaining. It's never a good idea to startle a vigilante, after all, especially one trained by Batman.

He feels a little guilty for not being around more, but.. well, it's just easier to keep busy, especially now that his other-mom has gone back home. Still, Dick is always going to feel like safety and comfort, so after a few moments, he leans into his side a little, dropping his temple onto his shoulder.

"Mom's gone," he says, though by now he expects Dick already knows as much. "I cleared out the apartment. It was sort of sad." He's glad she went back home to her Clark and her twins, but it's still kind of lonely. "I heard another Robin arrive." He listens for their voices and their heartbeats, of course. "Is he settling in okay?"

[forceforlight]

He may not have super hearing, but Dick knows what to listen out for with the supers. Even Clark doesn't sneak up on him.

Much.

He lets Jon lean against him, sucking in a breath at the news. "I'm sorry," he says after a moment. "B left a month ago, so I get it." Not that he'd TALKED to Bruce since he'd arrived, but that's neither here nor there. Just knowing Bruce had been around had been enough. "And yeah. We have another Tim. He's around fourteen years old and...well, taking to all this about as well as can be expected. I'm not sure how much he's had to do with the multiverse before now."

He's not asking Jon if he's okay. That's always a 'values thereof' question. And how okay, really, can he be with this place taking his MOM away?

[exponentially]

He straightens up a little in surprise at hearing about Tim's age, turning on his perch and arching his brows questioningly. "Fourteen? That's like D's age.." Well, Damian is fifteen at home now, but it's still weird. Weirder even than it had been when he'd first come home older than Damian. Tim and Jason and Dick and Stephanie and Cassandra are all supposed to be adults in Jon's head.

Still, he'll have to drop by to say hi sometime. It's still Tim, after all, and he ought to know Jon's around if he needs a(nother) super.

"He's not staying with older Tim, is he?" Last he recalls, Tim-from-home's place is some crappy apartment in a rough part of town.

[forceforlight]

Dick nods, taking a sip of coffee before glancing over. "Right now, I think he's mostly at the hotel. But he's going to need a guardian in the eyes of the authorities here."

It occurs to him that Jon may need one as well. It's something to bring up. Perhaps later, though.

Nightwing

[robintohood]

Jason's not surprised that Dick sensed him coming. He wasn't trying to sneak up on him and Dick's well-trained enough to pick it up. Jason's surprised by the bagels though.

"Thanks, asshole. Now we're gonna get a jailbreak," Jason says casually. He then sits next to Dick. He's in his Red Hood suit and perhaps the most notable thing for Dick to notice is that Jason's body armor lacks a red bat symbol. "Expecting company?"

[forceforlight]

Dick reaches back, grabbing the bag of bagels and offering it to Jason. This isn't the first time he's seen the younger Jason in his full body armor, but the lack of the red bat is still a bit jarring.

"There's a really good Jewish bakery a couple blocks away from here. I found it when I was walking Haley the other day." And crime fighting is hungry work because they're out all night doing it. "I sort of figured anything that didn't get eaten tonight would keep until I got up."

[robintohood]

Jason takes off his helmet to reveal the domino mask he's wearing underneath before reaching to grab an everything bagel.

"You're not wrong. Surprised you found any place nearby with decent bagels," Jason says. "Apparently, we've been spoiled from living in Jersey."

He then takes a big bite of his bagel.

Park

[kid_flash_found]

Bart had taken Kat-El with him to do some hospital appearances on behalf of the Alliance, a job he understood, but he was just as glad to ditch the costume and let the furry beast enjoy some harness time outside. If it happened to be the park that Dick tended to film from, that wasn't really stalking. Tim had told him about the TikTok as soon as it had happened, and he'd been amused.

"And here I thought you could keep your poise through just about anything. Now I find out your kryptonite is tongue baths." Just a teen with a cat on lead laughing at his best friend's big brother. "Maybe you should do puppy yoga instead? I bet she'd love jumping up on your poses."

[forceforlight]

"Only from puppies." Dick's grinning, though, moving to sit tailor-style in the grass, Haley in his lap. "Would you grab my phone, please? And I could do puppy yoga. Though I would have to do some research on it. Believe it or not, I'm not done a lot of it."

[kid_flash_found]

"Max thought it would help me focus. I think I lasted a whole twenty minutes," Bart says, grinning at the memory, embarrassing as it might be. "It's more that some people do silly things with their pets at the same time. Or just be a jungle gym for animals."

The cat is keeping Bart between himself and the dog and human, but otherwise seems mostly okay. That's part of why Bart takes him for walks, even if most people think he's crazy for it. They never met Kat-El when he was in his velcro phase. But he takes a step to scoop up the phone and bring it over, pausing to snap a couple pictures because the duo are just that cute.

"So, the two of you settling in?"

the guy whose name would be bleeped out on kids' networks

[overlyprecocious]

After the older Tim did the work of letting at least some of the Bats know about his presence, Tim sets up a meeting with Dick first since - well, Dick. (If he's also very curious about the dog he saw in Dick's OurPowers post, well, that can stay between him and himself, thank you.)

They arrange to meet at the park, where Tim is not terribly surprised to see Dick doing casual gymnastics. It's still a little weird, coming up closer, to see him looking older than Tim's used to - in person - but then Tim's promptly distracted because Haley looks in his direction and comes running towards him while he's still several feet away.

[forceforlight]

Dick rolls to his feet, going for the phone to pick it up and stop the recording. "Abandoning me already? I knew you loved Tim more."

Even if it's not the right Tim. Or, rather, not the Tim that Haley knows. Not that she cares as she runs up, jumping against Tim's leg and barking to get his attention. "She doesn't bite. Unless she's scared." Since she'd bitten him once. "Haley, down."

Haley promptly ignores Dick.

[overlyprecocious]

“Hey, girl.” He is more than willing to temporarily abandon his plan to properly meet this Dick Grayson in favor of kneeling down to greet Haley with ear scritches. “You having fun? Learning gymnastics?”

Nightwing

[faceguy]

Leo's not used to humans being up on the roofs; he's even less used to them hearing him coming. He must be slipping if he was heard that easily, but then it wasn't like he was trying that hard.

Or this human is just really good.

Either way, Leo freezes for a second, before coming closer slowly. He'd been up here watching the streets below for any signs of anything concerning - more specifically, anyone who might be hunting for someone. He's not really supposed to be out here doing this, but who's going to stop him?

Well, other than humans who hear him coming.

"For sure you jinxed it." Good going. "But hey, we're past the full moon - maybe people calmed down."

He wonders if this guy will freak out at seeing a human-sized turtle behind him.

[forceforlight]

The lenses on his mask hide the way that Nightwing's eyes travel over the...human sized turtle. Less surprising to a guy who has fought a human-sized crocodile, but it's still a surprise for a moment.

After a moment, he reaches over and snags the bag of bagels, offering it over. "Help yourself," Nightwing says, the corner of his mouth ticked up in a half smile. "And I don't know if I subscribe to the whole full moon thing, honestly. But it's as good a reason for it being calm as anything, I suppose."

[faceguy]

Free food from a stranger? Don’t mind if he does!

(Someone should really have a talk with him about this sometime.)

“Thanks!”

He takes a big bite before responding. “It’s gotta be somethin’.” Swallow. “Central’s usually a mess.”

Although it has been a mess for Leo, which is why he’s up here now, but he’s not going to talk about that. Not for a bagel.

Dick

[gooddoggoddog]

"Arf! Arf arf!"

A large white wolf dashes towards the pair, before skidding to a stop. She bows and wags her tail in the universal dog signal of 'Hey, wanna play?'

[forceforlight]

The dog barking gets Haley's attention, turning away from Dick to look at the other dog. And promptly takes off toward the wolf before Dick can get his fingers into her collar.

Dick, on the other hand, does look somewhat apprehensive. Though he's been around enough shapeshifters that the sight of a large, improbably white wolf doesn't immediately make him dive to keep Haley back.

But if he pulls his bag closer to be able to grab his escrima sticks if necessary.

[gooddoggoddog]

There's a fairly good stick nearby that Ammy picks up and offers to Haley. Tug of war would be a little one sided if Ammy was aiming to keep the stick, but she's more than smart enough to keep from pulling back too hard. She pulls back just enough to keep it entertaining for Haley.

Nightwing

[fearfully_symmetrical]

She knows who he is. Sort of. There'd been a Nightwing in her universe, and she'd of course read the file CADMUS had. One of the Gotham set. The Bat Club, as she'd called it. She'd always assumed that Batman and his abilities were kind of bullshit. A show put on for the creeps of Gotham so they'd be scared.

But even just floating in the air, behind him, sure she hadn't made a sound - she assumes that what they said about Batman, and who he trained, were actually true. Some of them, anyways. It's actually creepy - and a little bit intimidating, since she can't understand it.

Well holy shit.

"How did you...?"

[forceforlight]

"You think that because you're flying, you're completely silent." Nightwing turns, giving her a look over. Looks like Peej. Sounds like Peej. Uniform is similar, but different enough that she's probably NOT Power Girl.

"The belt is metal. Even flying, it makes some sound as you physically shift. Nobody can stay completely still, even for a few minutes." A pause. "Well, not unless you have to." A skill all the Bats picked up, after all. "You're also not very aerodynamic. Nobody is. Wind sounds different going around a body than it does flowing across a flat rooftop. I don't need superhearing. I just need to know the difference."

[fearfully_symmetrical]

"No way," she replies, after that. It sounds like bullshit. It has to be, right?"

Then again, word on the street was that Batman had shown up, undetected, in Waller's house. In her house, a site with more security than the White House could dream of, probably.

And, so, after a beat:

"Crap, it's true what they say about the Gotham set, then."

Park

[deadthenred]

Back when he first came to himself, Bucky would go to bars, park benches, subway stations. Any place ordinary and crowded, thick enough with people that he could sit there for a minute and feel human by association. He hadn’t needed to do that in a while, but something about getting thrown into another universe has a way of making a person feel disconnected.

So he’s sitting on a nearby bench when Dick starts doing handstands, and Bucky notices him the same way he notices the blonde woman pushing a stroller, or the best place to set up a sniper rifle if you wanted a good view of the whole field. It goes without saying that he has no idea what TikTok is. And that he’s not planning on going up and introducing himself. The whole point of being an anonymous guy on a park bench is being anonymous.

But then the dog starts barking directly at Bucky, in the friendly way dogs do, and he doesn’t know what to do about it.

[forceforlight]

Mostly, Dick's just having a little fun. Something that might get posted, something that might not.

But Haley starts barking and Dick's head turns that direction, easily rolling out of the handstand and grabbing his phone to turn off the recording before giving a sharp whistle. "Haley. Haley, come here, girl. Leave the poor guy alone." He jogs over and scoops the puppy up, ruffling her ears. "Sorry about that. I promise, she was only trying to be friendly."

[deadthenred]

"Oh." There's a pause that hangs there for a second. Bucky's not exactly used to anything trying to be friendly. But what else would a dog be doing? He notices that Dick doesn't have his phone out; there's still a part of him that hates being photographed.

Still, he isn't sure why he says what he says next.

"You think I could pet her?"