RP Log: Bart Allen and Cassandra Cain
Apr. 8th, 2006 03:41 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
evilbeejTITLE: "Collateral Damage"
WHO: Batgirl, the Flash (Bart)
WHEN: Immediately following Lex's kidnapping of Kon (again).
WHERE: Metro, then Gotham.
WHAT: What happens after Cass and Bart both break.
***PREVIOUSLY***
Batgirl stares at the time frozen Mercy for a few long seconds, like she's... contemplating something. Hurting her further? Who knows. She's... not at her best right now. In the end, trembling just slightly, she yanks the batarang out of her, still careful not to cut anything serious, grabs a pair of bat-cuffs from her belt and binds Mercy's hands behind her back, leaving her for the police. Her hands... never quite stop shaking though.
"Long story, Haste," says the Flash, voice hoarse and face set. "Do me a favor, will you?" He hands her the disembodied robot head of Lex Luthor. "Give this to Thad. Tell him to work on it with as many scientists as he can muster. Find out where it beamed Superboy."
Then his face folds in a little bit, and he watches Cass for a second. "Bandage that before I speed her back up," he says dully. "Please. Let me know when you're done." He blurs; he starts working on documenting *everything*, in *disgusting* detail.
The thought disgusts Cassandra, who's spent the last few moments debating the pros and cons of violently losing her lunch, but she nods, wordless taking her limited first aid supplies from her belt and patching Mercy up, even making sure the wound won't get infected. When she's done she steps back away from her... slumps against the wall... and sinks to the ground covering her masked face in both hands, shaking her head slightly and refusing to make a sound.
The lack of explanation makes Haste frown, but she nods. She will DEMAND information later, Bart. For now, she accepts the robo-head from the Flash. "'Kay. See ya later." And so, the Girl Who Makes Haste dashes away to find Thad!
***NOW***
"Cass--" comes a whisper after a long moment, barely audible in the fallout of the situation. There are sirens outside, there's yelling, there's anger and accusations--
--and then everything is abruptly silent and still, paused, holding its breath. There's a gloved hand on Batgirl's shoulder, a familiar weight and grip. The whisper again: Bart. "Cass, come on. Let me get you out of here."
Batgirl's head jerks upward towards you, your touch rousing her out of her trance where your voice could not, one exposed eye staring up at you miserably for a long moment. She turns her head slowly to look at Mercy - still bound and... bandaged - then looks back up to you, giving a small silent nod before taking your hand, her own hand trembling uncontrollably.
It's extremely gently that the Flash picks Batgirl up, this time. Carefully. "If you close your eyes," he notes quietly, "you won't even notice we're moving. Bad kind of mask to get sick in." And then he takes off, heading Gothamward.
Cassandra doesn't really have it in her to ponder that long enough to laugh, just numbly letting Bart pick her up and take her out of what could be a rather bad situation and back to her 'home' of Gotham City. She's never been chatty, but there's a certain miserably quality to her silence that's hard not to pick up as she stares at her gloved hand, splotched with Mercy's blood and - though Bart doesn't know it - giving her a sudden and rather vivid reminder of a man she'd never met and would never know anything about, slumping forward, bodylanguage blaringly loud with terror... and then nothing. The moment - in a lot of ways - her life ended for a great long while before Barbara and Batman gave it back to her. Quietly, softly, she sobs once, squeezing her eyes tightly shut and just letting the ride get over with.
Yeah. There're a lot of things Bart's dumb about, but other people's moods are not one of them. He's remarkably perceptive, as empathic as you can get without actually being empathic--
A slight shift in grip; it allows for more actual contact, in reaction to the audible sob. He's practically cradling Cass now, running, instinctively holding her closer. "Sssh," he goes, and it blends with the wind that's bending around them. Detour. He doesn't want to leave her alone, and he doesn't want to go poking around looking for the Batcave, because that would be *rude*.
Gotham City Central Park, nighttime, in the middle of the forest where the rocks are overgrown with ivy and moss and the trees have lichen; the young Flash sets Cass down, but doesn't let go. "Do you want me to take you someplace else?" he asks, whispering -- it's quiet, and easier than trying to talk in a low voice, hoarse as he is from yelling. "Or do you want to be alone?"
Batgirl tries to quiet herself, unthinkingly taking what comfort she can from her closeness, the heat of your body. When you finally set her down she doesn't even look at you, just staring at the ground and, indirectly, her still open, upturned palm, only vaguely aware of her surroundings. When you speak her head snaps up to look at you and she says, "N-no! I... I mean..." she tenses for a moment and lowers her head, shaking it slightly. "... if- if you want... for just a minute..."
"I handed in the report," Bart reassures Cass, still in that whisper; he still doesn't take his hands away, doesn't break contact. He's a big believer in contact! "The police know what happened, and they /have/ the report from, well. A JLA member. So I don't have to be anywhere. So-- as-- as long as you need me, I'll stick around. Okay?" He's tilting his head, trying to look at her eyes. "I know you don't really like talking, so I'm not gonna ask you if you wanna talk about it. I'm just here. Okay?"
Batgirl nods once, not unaware of the contact, but not trying to put a stop it it, murmuring a soft, "Thank you..." After that she's quiet for what feels like a long time, just staring the the ground - at her hand - and sniffling every so often. Damnit. She's... she's supposed to be better than this. She's Batgirl for God's sake. She doesn't lose control like that. She doesn't... cry over her mistakes. But... here she is. She turns her head to look at Bart for a moment, then looks back down, finally releasing that one eye isn't seeing through the slight filter of her masks lenses. One finger touches the rim of the tear in her mask before she finally decides - to hell with it - and pulls it off, finally fully revealing her face to you, marred though it may be by a rather painful looking red mark from where she skidded across the ground, her hair still pulled back by a tight band to keep it out of her face. "... I'm sorry." She says finally. "I just... when I saw him, I just..." she sighs and puts one hand - the clean one - to her head, squeezing her eyes shut and taking in a slow shaky breath. Luthor's... gotten to her too?
It's obvious in Bart's shift in posture that he's totally taken aback by Batgirl's removal of her mask, but to his credit, he moves past it pretty fast, doesn't say anything of it. Instead, he silently pulls her into a hug, one arm around her back, one hand moving to encourage her to put her head against him. "...don't be sorry," he whispers after a long moment. "We both lost it back there. We both did. We'll beat him, and we'll get Kon back, and we'll *fix* this. We've got the truth on our side."
Cassandra's eyes widen as Bart pulls her against him, staring over his shoulder a moment, like she's trying to process how to react o this before her eyes slide shut and she rests her head against him, nodding slightly in a way. "... I know. I-I know... we... have to. But..." her fingers twitch and tremble slightly, like they're trying to curl into a fist but just can't finish the motion. "I... can't stand to think... that Conner's with him right now. That I let him-" she stops, only barely holding back another sob. "... I... do... do you know about... about Sparrow...?"
/Does/ he know-- oh. He /does/-- no, she needs to talk about it, or she sure as hell wouldn't have brought it up. He won't lie! "I know who she was," Bart answers after the tiniest of hesitations. "I know she was working more closely with Batman than anyone else, the past couple of years. I know she died last summer. Steph told me that." Good thing Cass has no idea why Bart has a Superknee, courtesy Thad-science. She hates Luthor enough as it is.
Cassandra is still and quiet for a long moment before she nods once against you. "She... she was..." she sighs, "I... I can't... read... you know? Never... just never learned..." she lets out a kind of huff, like a voiceless bitter laugh. "She was teaching me... never complained... never acted like there was... something else she'd rather be doing. She was... so kind to me when we met... back when I was... still new... when even Robin... treated me like a freak. Like they were afraid of me." Her hand finally curls into a fist and trembles violently. "She... never treated me like that. She was... was like... a mother. I-I never knew my real one, s-so... Luthor... captured her and Batman. Tort-... tortured them both... and just before Superman saved batman... he... he..." she sobs once miserably, "Luthor... poured her ashes in front of him. One of the... best people I've ever met... and she spent her last moments... alone... in pain... and in fear... because of *him*. I-I just..." again her face is buried in Bart's chest, almost like she's trying to hide how she looks right now, the tears streaming down her face from him. "... Couldn't... handle it wh-when I saw him..."
There's nothing that *can* be said to that. It's not all right. That part-- it'll never be all right, it'll never get better. The things that've already been done, there's no fixing. There's only doing better in the future, and that's no consolation in the raw moment. Bart says nothing, only holds Cassandra close, like he can shield her - even if just for a little while. He's been trying to protect Kon from Luthor since last summer, and he lost *again*-- but maybe, at least, if he can at *least* give Batgirl enough time and safety and quiet space to fall apart on someone-- or at least someone to fall apart *on*...
There *is* something he can say, and the young speedster says it. It's a quiet murmur by Cassandra's ear, "I understand." There's nothing but candor in that statement, candor and commiseration. He leans the side of his face against her head, and-- it's not quite rocking, because they're still standing, but it's pretty close. No matter how I try to describe it, it sounds funny, but it's something that's instinctively done if you're hugging a crying person.
Cassandra never let herself fall apart over Sasha. She buried all that, under rage and her ever-present duty, nearly killing herself working to exhausting protecting two of the most horrifyingly crime-ridden cities on earth. Finally after almost a year the dam breaks, and she finds herself weeping pitifully against the shoulder of what has essentially been her human taxi service for the last few weeks. The one part of her still capable of seeing straight tells her to stop, to quit being so horrifyingly weak in front of her teammate... her friend, Bart. But she doesn't. not for a long while. When she finally does slow down she keeps herself against you a bit longer, her shoulders occasionally shaking with a muffled sob before she finally pulls away, face and eyes reddened, her head lowered to the ground. "I-I... thank- thank you, Bart." It's all she can think of to say. She's never once had to deal with anything like this, and never dreamed she'd willingly show any kind of weakness, much less so blatantly. She almost looks ashamed of herself through it all, though after that there's a kind of warm numbness inside of her that keeps that from being too strong.
Gold-colored gauntlets fall away from Cass as she pulls back, and Bart's watching her silently; if she were looking up, his face would match the tone of his voice a moment ago. When she thanks him, he takes a step forward, but stops himself *just* before giving Cass a rather more fierce bear hug. She -did- pull away. But his hands go to her shoulders again, just long enough for him to do the kinetic and tactile equivalent of underlining, putting in bold, highlighting, and capitalizing something for emphasis. "Any time you need someone, Cass," he says quietly, earnest and backed with worry, tinged with a driving need to help her understand it's okay, "*everyone* needs to be able to fall apart. Everyone needs it. It's grief, it's frustration, it's hurt. It's human. Anytime you need, you just call me, okay?"
Cassandra looks up at Bart slowly when his hands go to her shoulders, brown eyes tinged with green, shining slightly with still unshed tears as she listens to him speak. She nods finally after a long moment, softly speaking, "... I... I will." She seems about to say something else, another repeat of 'thank you'... but instead, after a moment's thought she leans in, almost timidly, and pecks him on the cheek before taking a slow step back, a small sad kind of smile on her face, her hands clasped in front of her as she gives another firm nod. Her last quiet 'thank you' for... well, for everything.
"Okay, good--" Bart starts with a decisive nod... and then Cass up and completes the role reversal from the afternoon, and it's the Flash's turn to blush wildly. His hands fly up to his face, eyebrows up; everything about him is going "!", and he's pulling his goggles down and trying not to grin because it would be /inappropriate at this time/. "Okay-- no, no problem. So you're gonna be okay for now?" Now his body language is antsy; he's *blushing*, dammit, but he won't leave until she says she's okay to be left alone.
Cassandra laughs softly in a small quiet voice despite herself and gives another nod. "Yes. Go on and... meet with the others. We'll... figure out what we'll... do about Conner."
"...okay!"
And like that, the Flash is gone in a blur of wind and color and fluttering leaves.
WHO: Batgirl, the Flash (Bart)
WHEN: Immediately following Lex's kidnapping of Kon (again).
WHERE: Metro, then Gotham.
WHAT: What happens after Cass and Bart both break.
***PREVIOUSLY***
Batgirl stares at the time frozen Mercy for a few long seconds, like she's... contemplating something. Hurting her further? Who knows. She's... not at her best right now. In the end, trembling just slightly, she yanks the batarang out of her, still careful not to cut anything serious, grabs a pair of bat-cuffs from her belt and binds Mercy's hands behind her back, leaving her for the police. Her hands... never quite stop shaking though.
"Long story, Haste," says the Flash, voice hoarse and face set. "Do me a favor, will you?" He hands her the disembodied robot head of Lex Luthor. "Give this to Thad. Tell him to work on it with as many scientists as he can muster. Find out where it beamed Superboy."
Then his face folds in a little bit, and he watches Cass for a second. "Bandage that before I speed her back up," he says dully. "Please. Let me know when you're done." He blurs; he starts working on documenting *everything*, in *disgusting* detail.
The thought disgusts Cassandra, who's spent the last few moments debating the pros and cons of violently losing her lunch, but she nods, wordless taking her limited first aid supplies from her belt and patching Mercy up, even making sure the wound won't get infected. When she's done she steps back away from her... slumps against the wall... and sinks to the ground covering her masked face in both hands, shaking her head slightly and refusing to make a sound.
The lack of explanation makes Haste frown, but she nods. She will DEMAND information later, Bart. For now, she accepts the robo-head from the Flash. "'Kay. See ya later." And so, the Girl Who Makes Haste dashes away to find Thad!
***NOW***
"Cass--" comes a whisper after a long moment, barely audible in the fallout of the situation. There are sirens outside, there's yelling, there's anger and accusations--
--and then everything is abruptly silent and still, paused, holding its breath. There's a gloved hand on Batgirl's shoulder, a familiar weight and grip. The whisper again: Bart. "Cass, come on. Let me get you out of here."
Batgirl's head jerks upward towards you, your touch rousing her out of her trance where your voice could not, one exposed eye staring up at you miserably for a long moment. She turns her head slowly to look at Mercy - still bound and... bandaged - then looks back up to you, giving a small silent nod before taking your hand, her own hand trembling uncontrollably.
It's extremely gently that the Flash picks Batgirl up, this time. Carefully. "If you close your eyes," he notes quietly, "you won't even notice we're moving. Bad kind of mask to get sick in." And then he takes off, heading Gothamward.
Cassandra doesn't really have it in her to ponder that long enough to laugh, just numbly letting Bart pick her up and take her out of what could be a rather bad situation and back to her 'home' of Gotham City. She's never been chatty, but there's a certain miserably quality to her silence that's hard not to pick up as she stares at her gloved hand, splotched with Mercy's blood and - though Bart doesn't know it - giving her a sudden and rather vivid reminder of a man she'd never met and would never know anything about, slumping forward, bodylanguage blaringly loud with terror... and then nothing. The moment - in a lot of ways - her life ended for a great long while before Barbara and Batman gave it back to her. Quietly, softly, she sobs once, squeezing her eyes tightly shut and just letting the ride get over with.
Yeah. There're a lot of things Bart's dumb about, but other people's moods are not one of them. He's remarkably perceptive, as empathic as you can get without actually being empathic--
A slight shift in grip; it allows for more actual contact, in reaction to the audible sob. He's practically cradling Cass now, running, instinctively holding her closer. "Sssh," he goes, and it blends with the wind that's bending around them. Detour. He doesn't want to leave her alone, and he doesn't want to go poking around looking for the Batcave, because that would be *rude*.
Gotham City Central Park, nighttime, in the middle of the forest where the rocks are overgrown with ivy and moss and the trees have lichen; the young Flash sets Cass down, but doesn't let go. "Do you want me to take you someplace else?" he asks, whispering -- it's quiet, and easier than trying to talk in a low voice, hoarse as he is from yelling. "Or do you want to be alone?"
Batgirl tries to quiet herself, unthinkingly taking what comfort she can from her closeness, the heat of your body. When you finally set her down she doesn't even look at you, just staring at the ground and, indirectly, her still open, upturned palm, only vaguely aware of her surroundings. When you speak her head snaps up to look at you and she says, "N-no! I... I mean..." she tenses for a moment and lowers her head, shaking it slightly. "... if- if you want... for just a minute..."
"I handed in the report," Bart reassures Cass, still in that whisper; he still doesn't take his hands away, doesn't break contact. He's a big believer in contact! "The police know what happened, and they /have/ the report from, well. A JLA member. So I don't have to be anywhere. So-- as-- as long as you need me, I'll stick around. Okay?" He's tilting his head, trying to look at her eyes. "I know you don't really like talking, so I'm not gonna ask you if you wanna talk about it. I'm just here. Okay?"
Batgirl nods once, not unaware of the contact, but not trying to put a stop it it, murmuring a soft, "Thank you..." After that she's quiet for what feels like a long time, just staring the the ground - at her hand - and sniffling every so often. Damnit. She's... she's supposed to be better than this. She's Batgirl for God's sake. She doesn't lose control like that. She doesn't... cry over her mistakes. But... here she is. She turns her head to look at Bart for a moment, then looks back down, finally releasing that one eye isn't seeing through the slight filter of her masks lenses. One finger touches the rim of the tear in her mask before she finally decides - to hell with it - and pulls it off, finally fully revealing her face to you, marred though it may be by a rather painful looking red mark from where she skidded across the ground, her hair still pulled back by a tight band to keep it out of her face. "... I'm sorry." She says finally. "I just... when I saw him, I just..." she sighs and puts one hand - the clean one - to her head, squeezing her eyes shut and taking in a slow shaky breath. Luthor's... gotten to her too?
It's obvious in Bart's shift in posture that he's totally taken aback by Batgirl's removal of her mask, but to his credit, he moves past it pretty fast, doesn't say anything of it. Instead, he silently pulls her into a hug, one arm around her back, one hand moving to encourage her to put her head against him. "...don't be sorry," he whispers after a long moment. "We both lost it back there. We both did. We'll beat him, and we'll get Kon back, and we'll *fix* this. We've got the truth on our side."
Cassandra's eyes widen as Bart pulls her against him, staring over his shoulder a moment, like she's trying to process how to react o this before her eyes slide shut and she rests her head against him, nodding slightly in a way. "... I know. I-I know... we... have to. But..." her fingers twitch and tremble slightly, like they're trying to curl into a fist but just can't finish the motion. "I... can't stand to think... that Conner's with him right now. That I let him-" she stops, only barely holding back another sob. "... I... do... do you know about... about Sparrow...?"
/Does/ he know-- oh. He /does/-- no, she needs to talk about it, or she sure as hell wouldn't have brought it up. He won't lie! "I know who she was," Bart answers after the tiniest of hesitations. "I know she was working more closely with Batman than anyone else, the past couple of years. I know she died last summer. Steph told me that." Good thing Cass has no idea why Bart has a Superknee, courtesy Thad-science. She hates Luthor enough as it is.
Cassandra is still and quiet for a long moment before she nods once against you. "She... she was..." she sighs, "I... I can't... read... you know? Never... just never learned..." she lets out a kind of huff, like a voiceless bitter laugh. "She was teaching me... never complained... never acted like there was... something else she'd rather be doing. She was... so kind to me when we met... back when I was... still new... when even Robin... treated me like a freak. Like they were afraid of me." Her hand finally curls into a fist and trembles violently. "She... never treated me like that. She was... was like... a mother. I-I never knew my real one, s-so... Luthor... captured her and Batman. Tort-... tortured them both... and just before Superman saved batman... he... he..." she sobs once miserably, "Luthor... poured her ashes in front of him. One of the... best people I've ever met... and she spent her last moments... alone... in pain... and in fear... because of *him*. I-I just..." again her face is buried in Bart's chest, almost like she's trying to hide how she looks right now, the tears streaming down her face from him. "... Couldn't... handle it wh-when I saw him..."
There's nothing that *can* be said to that. It's not all right. That part-- it'll never be all right, it'll never get better. The things that've already been done, there's no fixing. There's only doing better in the future, and that's no consolation in the raw moment. Bart says nothing, only holds Cassandra close, like he can shield her - even if just for a little while. He's been trying to protect Kon from Luthor since last summer, and he lost *again*-- but maybe, at least, if he can at *least* give Batgirl enough time and safety and quiet space to fall apart on someone-- or at least someone to fall apart *on*...
There *is* something he can say, and the young speedster says it. It's a quiet murmur by Cassandra's ear, "I understand." There's nothing but candor in that statement, candor and commiseration. He leans the side of his face against her head, and-- it's not quite rocking, because they're still standing, but it's pretty close. No matter how I try to describe it, it sounds funny, but it's something that's instinctively done if you're hugging a crying person.
Cassandra never let herself fall apart over Sasha. She buried all that, under rage and her ever-present duty, nearly killing herself working to exhausting protecting two of the most horrifyingly crime-ridden cities on earth. Finally after almost a year the dam breaks, and she finds herself weeping pitifully against the shoulder of what has essentially been her human taxi service for the last few weeks. The one part of her still capable of seeing straight tells her to stop, to quit being so horrifyingly weak in front of her teammate... her friend, Bart. But she doesn't. not for a long while. When she finally does slow down she keeps herself against you a bit longer, her shoulders occasionally shaking with a muffled sob before she finally pulls away, face and eyes reddened, her head lowered to the ground. "I-I... thank- thank you, Bart." It's all she can think of to say. She's never once had to deal with anything like this, and never dreamed she'd willingly show any kind of weakness, much less so blatantly. She almost looks ashamed of herself through it all, though after that there's a kind of warm numbness inside of her that keeps that from being too strong.
Gold-colored gauntlets fall away from Cass as she pulls back, and Bart's watching her silently; if she were looking up, his face would match the tone of his voice a moment ago. When she thanks him, he takes a step forward, but stops himself *just* before giving Cass a rather more fierce bear hug. She -did- pull away. But his hands go to her shoulders again, just long enough for him to do the kinetic and tactile equivalent of underlining, putting in bold, highlighting, and capitalizing something for emphasis. "Any time you need someone, Cass," he says quietly, earnest and backed with worry, tinged with a driving need to help her understand it's okay, "*everyone* needs to be able to fall apart. Everyone needs it. It's grief, it's frustration, it's hurt. It's human. Anytime you need, you just call me, okay?"
Cassandra looks up at Bart slowly when his hands go to her shoulders, brown eyes tinged with green, shining slightly with still unshed tears as she listens to him speak. She nods finally after a long moment, softly speaking, "... I... I will." She seems about to say something else, another repeat of 'thank you'... but instead, after a moment's thought she leans in, almost timidly, and pecks him on the cheek before taking a slow step back, a small sad kind of smile on her face, her hands clasped in front of her as she gives another firm nod. Her last quiet 'thank you' for... well, for everything.
"Okay, good--" Bart starts with a decisive nod... and then Cass up and completes the role reversal from the afternoon, and it's the Flash's turn to blush wildly. His hands fly up to his face, eyebrows up; everything about him is going "!", and he's pulling his goggles down and trying not to grin because it would be /inappropriate at this time/. "Okay-- no, no problem. So you're gonna be okay for now?" Now his body language is antsy; he's *blushing*, dammit, but he won't leave until she says she's okay to be left alone.
Cassandra laughs softly in a small quiet voice despite herself and gives another nod. "Yes. Go on and... meet with the others. We'll... figure out what we'll... do about Conner."
"...okay!"
And like that, the Flash is gone in a blur of wind and color and fluttering leaves.
