glitter over the bruises - stephanie brown
request anon - meta human reader that has like scp 999 powers to spread joy, emotionally comfort and even reformed villains to rehabilitate and their powers manifest back when they feel so alone of wishing someone was there to comfort them and for someone to believe in them that things can be better and so one day their powers got triggered when they wanted to comfort an animal and now they're able to do those things for anyone and anything but sadly can't do so for themselves
content stephanie brown x gn! reader, meta! reader, comfort powers, non-consensual use of emotional/comfort powers, emotional manipulation concerns, consent issues around emotional regulation, breach of trust, betrayal, power reveal, hidden power use, emotional distress, trauma responses, steph’s family trauma, references to cluemaster/abusive parent dynamics, victim-blaming language from a villain illusion, crying, emotional burnout, power overuse, near-collapse, injury/blood mentions, vigilante violence, medical aftermath implied, complicated apologies, slow trust repair, difficult forgiveness, angst with comfort
masterlist
word count 9.4k
Stephanie Brown met you in the Clocktower with glitter on your cheek and blood on your sleeve. Neither of those things seemed to concern you.
The blood was not yours, apparently. That was the first thing Barbara told her, because Barbara Gordon had the unnerving gift of answering questions before anyone asked them and the even more unnerving gift of doing it without looking away from her screens.
“Not theirs,” Barbara said.
Steph, still halfway through climbing in the window because doors were for people with less dramatic branding, paused with one boot on the sill. “Okay. Love that we’re opening with reassurance. Mildly hate that it was necessary.”
Barbara’s mouth twitched.
You were sitting cross-legged on the floor beside a civilian who looked like he had been recently introduced to the concept of surviving something and had not yet decided whether he was grateful. His hands shook around a paper cup of water. His face was grey beneath the bruises, eyes fixed on nothing. You sat near him, close enough to be present but not close enough to trap him with care.
Steph noticed that first.
You did not touch him. You only held your own hands open on your knees, palms up, like an invitation he was free to ignore.
“You’re safe here,” you said quietly. “Nobody’s asking you to be okay. We’re just getting through the next minute.”
The man’s breath hitched.
Steph slipped the rest of the way inside, closing the window behind her with a soft click. Her cape caught on the latch because, naturally, the universe loved comedy.
Barbara glanced at her. “Spoiler.”
Steph tugged her cape free with the dignity of a woman who had absolutely not lost a fight with architecture. “Oracle.”
The man startled at her voice, and Steph immediately froze.
You looked up. Your eyes met hers.
You smiled, not brightly, not politely, but with the kind of calm that made room instead of demanding attention. “Purple vigilante in the corner is friendly,” you told the man. “Mostly.”
Steph pointed at herself. “Mostly?”
“You came through a window.”
“That’s a fair note.”
The man’s mouth twitched. It was tiny. Barely there. But in the room’s tense silence, it landed like a miracle had cleared its throat.
You turned back to him, your smile softening. “There you go. Still here.”
Something shifted then.
Steph did not have Duke’s powers. She could not see light bending around you or warmth moving through the air. She could not read emotional fields, not in any supernatural way. But she had spent her life learning rooms the hard way. She knew the sound of a mood changing because someone dangerous had gone quiet. She knew the tiny release of breath when a threat passed. She knew what it looked like when fear loosened one finger at a time from someone’s throat.
The man’s shoulders lowered. His hands stopped shaking quite so badly. The Clocktower itself seemed to exhale.
You, however, went pale.
Just a little. Not enough for most people to notice.
Barbara noticed. Steph noticed Barbara noticing. And because Steph Brown had never once seen a mystery and thought, Let’s respect boundaries and mind our business, she immediately decided you were interesting.
The man eventually drank his water. Barbara arranged a safe transport. You stood only after he left, and the moment you were upright, you swayed.
Steph moved without thinking.
You caught yourself on the back of Barbara’s chair before she reached you.
“I’m fine,” you said.
Steph stared at you. Barbara stared at you. Even the computers seemed unconvinced.
“That was a very poor room to say that in,” Barbara said.
You sighed. “I am aware.”
Steph leaned one hip against the desk, folding her arms. “So. Are you always this dramatic after floor therapy, or was tonight special?”
You looked at her. “Floor therapy?”
“You were on the floor. You therapied. I’m workshopping the terminology.”
Barbara closed her eyes briefly. “Please don’t.”
“No, let her cook,” you said.
Steph brightened. “Thank you, mysterious blood-sleeve person.”
“I have a name.”
“I’m sure you do. But mysterious blood-sleeve person has flair.”
You gave her your name. Steph repeated it, testing the sound of it, and something in her chest did a stupid little flip because apparently she was a person who could develop a crush between sarcasm and crisis response.
Barbara turned one screen toward Steph. “They’re consulting with me on civilian emotional stabilisation after the Narrows incident.”
“Ooh,” Steph said. “Official.”
“Unofficially,” you added, “I help people breathe when Gotham gets too Gotham.”
Steph looked at the blood on your sleeve, the exhaustion around your mouth, the glitter still stuck near your cheekbone like a tiny rebellious star. “And the glitter?”
You reached up, touched your cheek, and looked genuinely betrayed by your own fingers when glitter came away. “Children’s grief group made cards earlier.”
“Ah. Occupational hazard.”
“The glitter has unionised.”
Steph grinned. “Respect.”
You smiled back.
That was the beginning. Not the real beginning, maybe. Stories always had roots buried earlier than anyone wanted to admit. Yours had begun long before Steph, in whatever lonely place had shaped your power. Hers had begun in a house where love arrived inconsistently and danger had a familiar voice. But the beginning that mattered between you happened in the Clocktower, under blue computer light, with Barbara pretending not to watch both of you realised you were going to become a problem for each other.
Steph decided she liked you by the end of the week. She decided this with the solemnity she brought to most major life choices, which was to say she announced it while upside down on Barbara’s couch, eating fries she had not technically been offered.
“I like them,” she said.
Barbara did not look away from her screens. “I gathered.”
Steph narrowed her eyes from her inverted position. “That was a suspiciously quick gather.”
“You have mentioned them sixteen times in forty-eight hours.”
“Seventeen if you count this one.”
“I do.”
“Rude.”
Barbara’s mouth curved. “Accurate.”
Steph stole another fry. “They’re funny.”
“They are.”
“And nice.”
“Yes.”
“And weird.”
“This is Gotham.”
“Good weird,” Steph said. “Like emotionally competent weird. Which, in this family, is basically a metahuman ability.”
Barbara’s typing paused.
Steph rolled her head to look at her. Barbara’s expression had gone carefully neutral.
Steph sat up so fast she nearly choked on a fry. “Wait. Was that a joke, or did I just accidentally trip over classified information?”
Barbara turned her chair slightly. “They have powers.”
Steph blinked. Then, because she was Steph, she pointed a fry accusingly at Barbara. “You were just going to let me walk around making jokes without knowing there was lore?”
“It is not my information to tell casually.”
“But you’re telling me now.”
“Because you are going to keep asking questions until you either figure it out by endangering yourself or annoy me into a migraine.”
“That sounds like trust.”
“That sounds like pattern recognition.”
“Same thing if you’re fun about it.”
Barbara gave her a look. Steph ate the fry.
Barbara explained, carefully. Comfort. Emotional regulation. Panic reduction. Fear softened. Rage eased. Grief made survivable for the next few minutes. Not mind control. Not forced happiness. Not obedience. The power worked best when someone consented or when immediate danger made intervention necessary. You were strict about that. Barbara was stricter.
Steph listened.
She listened harder than she let her face show. Because she could joke about wizard lawsuits and emotional support cryptids all she wanted, but something inside her had gone very still.
Comfort as a power. Being able to make hurt smaller. Being able to reach into the room and say, no, not gone, but bearable.
Steph thought of all the nights she had laughed too loudly because silence was too close to crying. Thought of bruises hidden under purple fabric. Thought of doctors and stitches and being told she was reckless, too much, not enough, wrong shape for the symbol, wrong girl for the job. Thought of all the times she had wanted someone to make the room gentler without asking her to explain why it hurt.
“That’s…” Steph trailed off.
Barbara looked at her over the rim of her glasses. “Yes.”
“I was going to say neat.”
“No, you weren’t.”
“Maybe I was.”
“You were not.”
Steph picked at the edge of the fry carton. “Does it hurt them?”
Barbara’s expression changed.
Not enough for most people. Enough for Steph.
“They say it makes them tired,” Barbara said.
“That is a deeply suspicious sentence.”
“I know.”
“Have you asked?”
“Yes.”
“And?”
“They are very good at making other people feel safe. Less good at believing they are allowed to be cared for in return.”
Steph stared at the Clocktower floor.
“Oh,” she said.
“Yes.”
Steph did not make a joke.
That was how Barbara knew it had landed.
After that, you became part of Steph’s life in the way glitter became part of carpet. Suddenly, permanently, and impossible to fully explain to visitors.
You worked with Oracle on crisis calls and field aftermath. When Scarecrow toxin hit a subway station, you sat with survivors while Steph helped secure the platform. When a hostage situation ended with thirteen civilians shaking in the back room of a pharmacy, you guided them through breathing while Steph stood guard at the door, pretending she was not listening to every word. When a villain’s sonic weapon caused panic attacks across three blocks, you and Barbara built a response system in real time while Steph ran messages and cracked jokes into comms until a crying teenager laughed hard enough to breathe.
You were good at what you did. Annoyingly good.
Steph watched you ask permission like it mattered every time.
“Can I sit beside you?”
“Can I help the panic get smaller?”
“You can say no.”
“I’ll stop if you ask.”
People said yes more often than not. Some said no. You respected both answers, which did something complicated to Steph’s chest.
She started bringing you snacks.
This was not flirting, according to Steph. This was logistics. You forgot to eat after long calls, and Steph believed in solving problems through aggressive convenience-store offerings. Granola bars. Waffles. Juice boxes stolen from the kid-friendly section of the Clocktower supplies. Once, a bag of sour gummy worms and a bottle of water placed in front of you with the seriousness of a medical intervention.
You looked down at them. “Am I being threatened?”
“Hydrated,” Steph said. “Violently.”
“You brought candy.”
“For morale.”
“Whose?”
“Mine, if you refuse.”
You smiled and opened the gummy worms.
Steph felt victorious for reasons that had nothing to do with nutrition.
In return, you learned Steph’s tells.
That was less funny.
You learned that she joked faster when she was hurting. That her grin got wider when she felt left out. That she said “I’m good” in a higher pitch when she was actively not good. That she got meaner about herself in casual little asides, like if she made the insult first, no one else could land it harder.
You noticed too much. Steph noticed you noticing. This led, naturally, to conflict disguised as banter.
“You’re doing the sad eyes,” Steph said one night, sitting on the Clocktower floor while you cleaned a cut along her cheekbone.
“I am not.”
“You are. You look like a wounded deer with a counselling qualification.”
“You are bleeding on Barbara’s rug.”
“Deflection.”
“That is my line.”
“I stole it. I am a criminal.”
“You are a vigilante.”
“Vigilante with hobbies.”
You dabbed antiseptic onto the cut.
Steph hissed. “Betrayal.”
“You got punched by a man in a moth costume.”
“Do not disrespect Killer Moth’s cousin.”
“He called himself Murder Moth.”
“See? Branding is hard. We should support local artists.”
You laughed despite yourself. Steph grinned, then winced.
Your hand paused near her face, not touching the cut now, just hovering.
Something in the air softened.
Steph’s breath eased. She did not know why. Not then. She only knew that being near you made the pain feel less like proof she had done something wrong by existing loudly. Near you, she could hurt without turning it into a performance. Near you, she could be funny because she wanted to be, not because she had to outrun the pity.
She thought that was friendship.
And it was. That was the problem.
You liked Stephanie Brown. You liked her in a way that was not neat enough to file under friendship, not safe enough to pretend was only admiration, not casual enough to ignore when she smiled at you like the world had just become a little less disappointing. You liked her purple glitter nail polish, her chipped-tooth smile, her refusal to let despair have the last word. You liked the way she could walk into a room full of grieving people and make no attempt to make grief noble. She handed it waffles and called it trash.
You liked how fiercely she defended people who were used to being dismissed. You liked how she said, “Yeah, that sucked,” with more healing in it than some people managed with entire speeches. You liked how she saw your exhaustion and tried to feed it, mock it, sit next to it, threaten it with carbohydrates.
That was why you started making mistakes.
Small ones. Soft ones. The kind that looked like kindness until held under bright enough light.
Steph came in after patrol one night, shaking too hard to remove her own gloves. She was laughing when she climbed through the Clocktower window, breathless and bright, telling Barbara about how she had “absolutely meant” to fall through that skylight because surprise entry was a valid tactic and gravity was just jealous.
Then she turned toward you, and you saw her hands.
Not the blood. There was blood, yes, but not much.
The tremor. Her fingers flexed once. Twice. Like she was trying to convince her own body it was still under her command.
“What happened?” you asked.
Steph waved one hand. “Skylight. Gravity. Villain with a taser. Long story. Hilarious in retrospect.”
Barbara’s eyes sharpened. “Were you electrocuted?”
“Electrocuted is such a dramatic word.”
“Spoiler.”
“Lightly introduced to voltage.”
You reached for the medkit.
Steph kept talking. Faster now. Brighter. Your power reacted to the panic beneath the words before you gave it permission.
You should have asked. You knew that. You always knew that.
But Steph was smiling too hard, and Barbara was busy pulling up medical protocols, and the tremor in Steph’s hands was getting worse. You told yourself it was only the edge. Only enough to stop the panic from turning into something that would make her feel embarrassed later. Only enough that she could breathe.
Warmth moved quietly from you.
No visible glow. No dramatic pulse. Just the room easing by degrees.
Steph’s shoulders lowered. Her hands steadied. Her laugh became less sharp and more real.
“See?” she said. “Totally fine.”
You smiled back.
The guilt arrived late.
That was the first time. There were others.
Not many, you told yourself. Not enough to matter. Not targeted, not heavy, not controlling. You did not change her choices. You did not make her happy. You did not make her like you. You only softened the worst of the panic when it clawed too high behind her ribs. You only helped her sleep in the Clocktower after missions where she had nearly died and refused to call them traumatic because trauma was apparently for people without purple branding. You only let comfort sit in the room when her jokes got too bright and her hands too cold.
It was easy to justify because Steph looked better afterwards. It was unforgivable for the same reason.
Barbara almost caught you once. Or perhaps she did catch you and chose to issue a warning disguised as a conversation, which was very Barbara and therefore worse.
You were alone in the Clocktower kitchen, washing mugs after Steph had fallen asleep on the couch with a waffle-print blanket pulled over her shoulders. Barbara rolled in silently, which should not have been possible and yet absolutely was.
“She trusts you,” Barbara said.
Your hands stilled in the sink. You stared at the soap bubbles.
“I know.”
Barbara’s voice remained even. “Do you?”
You closed your eyes. The water ran too hot over your fingers.
“I’m not trying to hurt her.”
“I know.”
“I’m not making her do anything.”
“I know.”
“She was panicking.”
Barbara said nothing.
You shut off the tap. The silence that followed was worse than a lecture.
Finally, Barbara said, “You of all people understand the difference between helping and deciding.”
It would have been kinder if she had raised her voice.
You nodded.
“I’ll tell her,” you said.
Barbara looked at you for a long moment.
“Tell her soon,” she said.
You meant to.
That was the ugliest part. You meant to every time Steph sat beside you on the Clocktower roof eating waffles from a paper plate and complaining about Bruce’s inability to text like a human person. You meant to when she painted your nails purple and gold after a long night because “your hands look like they’re auditioning for Victorian ghost.” You meant to when she started texting you pictures of ugly pigeons, badly parked cars, and herself making increasingly stupid faces in patrol mirrors. You meant to when you realised your heart lifted every time she called you Care Bear.
You meant to.
Then Steph would smile at you like you were the one place she did not have to defend being too much, and cowardice would settle softly over your tongue.
The villain called himself The Mirror. This was, according to Steph, “deeply pretentious and probably a theatre kid red flag,” but the name stuck because Gotham criminals had a way of committing to aesthetics even when the aesthetics deserved jail time.
His power, or technology, or some miserable combination of both, fed on shame. Not fear. Not despair. Shame. He trapped people in their worst self-beliefs and reflected them back until they could not see anything else. Victims were found standing in front of broken windows, dark screens, puddles, anything reflective, whispering apologies to people who were not there.
A city like Gotham produced more than enough fuel.
The first major attack hit a probation office. The second hit a school. The third hit a shelter for families of incarcerated criminals.
That one made Steph quiet. Too quiet.
You found her in the Clocktower after the briefing, sitting on the floor beneath Barbara’s main screens, knees drawn up, arms loose around them. She had not changed out of the Spoiler suit, though her mask was pushed up into her hair. Purple eyeshadow smudged beneath one eye. Her mouth was set in a line that looked like it wanted to be a joke and could not find the strength.
You sat beside her.
“I hate this guy,” she said.
“Yeah.”
“No, like, normal amounts because he’s a villain, but also personal amounts because he’s rude.”
“Shame-based attacks are rude.”
“Exactly.” She leaned her head back against the wall. “Like, get a hobby that isn’t emotionally waterboarding people with their daddy issues.”
You glanced at her. She stared straight ahead.
There it was. The door cracked open half an inch.
You did not reach for it.
“Do you want to talk about it?” you asked.
Steph laughed. “Absolutely not.”
“Okay.”
She turned her head toward you, suspicious. “That’s it?”
“That’s it.”
“No follow-up emotional crowbar?”
“I left it at home.”
“Sloppy.”
“I know. Very unprofessional.”
Her smile flickered.
Then faded.
“My dad used to make everything my fault,” she said suddenly.
You went still.
Steph kept looking at the screens. “Not always directly. Sometimes directly. But mostly, like, the vibe. If I was upset, I was dramatic. If I was scared, I was weak. If I was angry, I was ungrateful. If I tried to stop him, I was stupid. If I didn’t stop him, I was useless.” She swallowed. “Villain families. Great childhood enrichment.”
Your chest hurt.
“I’m sorry,” you said.
“Yeah.” She picked at a scuff on her glove. “Anyway, I hate shame guy.”
You wanted to comfort her so badly your hands ached. Instead, you said, “I hate him too.”
Steph looked at you then. Something softened.
“Good,” she said. “Hating together is a bonding activity.”
“I’ll add it to our friendship scrapbook.”
“We have a scrapbook?”
“No.”
“We should.”
“You want a scrapbook of hatred?”
“Obviously.”
You smiled. She smiled back.
No power. Just the two of you sitting beneath Oracle’s screens with old pain in the room and no one trying to make it vanish.
That should have taught you better.
The final attack happened at the shelter for families affected by villain crime. It was exactly the sort of place The Mirror would choose because he had taste in cruelty: a converted old church with a daycare room in the basement, counselling offices upstairs, folding chairs in the hall, donated coats on racks, and walls covered in children’s drawings that tried very hard to make the world look kinder than it was.
You had worked there before.
Steph had avoided it before. Not because she did not care. Because she cared too much and had no idea where to put that care without letting it become grief.
The call came during a thunderstorm. Dramatic, of course. Gotham loved nothing more than timing trauma to weather.
By the time you and Steph arrived, half the building was caught in The Mirror’s field. Windows had gone black and reflective. People stood frozen in hallways, staring into glass, eyes wide and wet. A woman whispered, “I should have known,” over and over. A teenage boy clawed at his own sleeves. Somewhere below, children were crying.
Steph stopped at the threshold.
You felt it hit her.
Not your power. The villain’s.
Shame moved through the building like cold ink, searching for cracks in everyone it touched. It found Steph immediately because shame knew her shape. Knew the old wounds. Knew the voice of a father who made love conditional and blame hereditary. Knew Bruce’s disappointment, real or imagined. Knew every time she had been told she was not ready, not good enough, not supposed to be there.
Steph’s grin appeared. Too bright.
“Well,” she said, voice sharp, “this place could use better lighting and fewer trauma mirrors.”
You looked at her. “Steph.”
“Don’t do the voice.”
“What voice?”
“The ‘I see through your hilarious defence mechanisms’ voice. Very rude. Very accurate. Still rude.”
Oracle’s voice crackled in comms. “Spoiler, status.”
Steph pressed two fingers to her comm. “Inside the world’s worst self-esteem seminar. Ten out of ten on theme, minus several million for consent.”
“Can you proceed?”
Steph looked toward the basement stairs where a child screamed. Her face changed.
“Yeah,” she said. “Proceeding.”
You moved together.
For a while, it worked. Steph broke mirrors with purple batarangs and a level of enthusiasm that suggested personal satisfaction. You moved from victim to victim, asking when you could, offering when words were gone. Warmth flowed from you in controlled pulses, giving people enough space inside the shame to look away from their reflections. Steph kept the path clear, cracking jokes that should not have worked and did anyway.
“Hey,” she told a man sobbing into a blackened window. “I know the evil mirror seems convincing, but have you considered that men who monologue through glass are usually compensating?”
The man blinked.
You touched his hand after he nodded, and his breathing steadied.
Steph gave you a thumbs-up. You smiled.
The field grew stronger near the basement.
Children’s drawings lined the stairwell. Crayon families. Houses. Dogs with too many legs. A purple stick figure labelled SPOILR in wobbly letters. Steph saw it and went still for half a second.
You saw her see it.
Then, The Mirror spoke through every reflective surface at once.
“Stephanie Brown.”
Steph froze.
The voice was wrong. Smooth, echoing, almost kind. You hated it immediately.
“Oh, ew,” Steph said, but her voice shook. “Full government name. Someone’s desperate.”
The blackened glass in a picture frame shifted.
Arthur Brown’s face looked out. Not real. Not alive. Not even a good illusion, technically. But shame did not need accuracy when it had memory. Steph’s father stared from the frame with a smile that made your skin crawl.
“There she is,” he said. “Still playing hero.”
Steph’s hand tightened around a batarang.
You stepped closer. “It’s not him.”
“I know,” she said.
But knowing and feeling were rarely the same thing.
The image smiled wider. “Still ruining everything you touch?”
Steph threw the batarang.
The frame shattered. Every piece of glass on the stairwell reflected him.
The Mirror’s voice came through them all. “Still too loud. Still too reckless. Still trying to prove someone made a mistake when they told you to stop.”
Steph’s breath hitched.
You felt the shame clamp around her like a hand.
You reached for your power.
Stopped.
Ask. You had to ask.
“Steph,” you said. “Do you want help?”
She laughed, too high. “With my evil daddy mirror problem? No, I’m good, thanks.”
“Steph.”
“I said I’m good.”
The field surged.
Steph staggered. Below you, a child screamed again. The sound changed everything.
Steph’s head snapped toward the basement. The shame still had her. You could feel it dragging at every old wound, every insecurity, every fear that she was not enough and never had been. She raised one hand toward the wall to steady herself and nearly touched a shard of reflective glass.
If she looked too long, she would freeze like the others.
“Steph,” you said again.
Her eyes flicked to you. They were wet and furious.
“Don’t,” she whispered.
You did not know if she meant do not pity me, do not see me, do not use it, do not let the kids hear me break, or all of the above.
Then a small voice sobbed from below, “Spoiler?”
Steph’s face crumpled.
She moved.
Not because she was not hurting. Because someone needed her.
She pushed past you and down the stairs.
You followed.
The basement daycare was worse. The Mirror had turned the old wall-mounted television into a black reflective surface. Children sat huddled beneath tables and behind overturned chairs, crying while the screen whispered in voices that sounded like parents, teachers, bullies, older siblings, themselves. A volunteer stood frozen in the centre of the room, staring at her reflection and mouthing, “I failed them.”
At the far end, The Mirror stood in person. He was taller than you expected. Thin, pale, dressed in a dark suit threaded with reflective panels that caught every bit of light and turned it cold. His face was covered by a smooth silver mask.
“Ah,” he said. “The joke.”
Steph stepped in front of you. Even shaking, even hurt, even with shame clawing at her throat, she still stepped in front of you.
“Ah,” she shot back. “The loser.”
The Mirror tilted his head. “Do you know why you laugh first, Stephanie?”
“Oh, good, villain therapy. My favourite.”
“Because you are afraid someone else will.”
Steph’s smile faltered.
You felt the room lurch.
The children cried harder. Your power rose in response, desperate.
The Mirror looked at you. “And you. The comforter. The soft hand over the bruise. How noble.”
You moved toward the children.
His mask followed. “Tell me, do they know how often you touch their pain before they ask?”
Your blood went cold.
Steph turned slightly. Just enough.
Not enough to fully look at you.
Enough.
The Mirror laughed softly. “No? Secrets among heroes. How familiar.”
“Shut up,” you said.
Steph’s eyes remained forward.
“What is he talking about?” she asked.
The room seemed to narrow.
You had imagined telling her in the Clocktower kitchen. On the roof with waffles. During some quiet hour where your apology could sit between you without children crying and a villain wearing shame like cologne.
Not here. Not now.
But secrets always picked their own cruel timing.
“I’ll tell you after,” you said.
Steph laughed once. It sounded nothing like her.
The Mirror lifted one hand toward the television.
The children screamed. The shame field spiked hard enough to buckle your knees. Steph made a broken sound and nearly went down. The volunteer in the centre of the room lifted both hands toward her own throat as if trying to claw out a voice only she could hear.
There was no time.
You opened yourself.
The power burst from you in a wave. Not gentle. Not subtle. Not the tiny secret warmth you had used on Steph after patrol. This was all of it, thrown wide into the basement, into the children, the volunteer, the villain’s victims upstairs, into Steph.
Especially Steph.
You felt her shame hit your warmth and stutter.
Her breathing steadied. Her hand stopped shaking. The field around her softened before she gave permission.
Steph went very, very still.
The Mirror staggered back as the children broke free of the reflections. The volunteer collapsed to her knees, sobbing. Steph moved on instinct, hurling a batarang at the television, shattering the screen in a spray of black glass. You kept the warmth pouring out, holding everyone steady, keeping shame from reattaching, keeping the room survivable.
Steph tackled The Mirror.
It was not elegant. It was deeply personal.
She hit him hard enough to knock the silver mask loose and pinned him to the ground with one knee in his back.
“Here’s the thing,” she said, voice too calm, too even because your power still held the worst of her emotion down. “I make the jokes about me. Not creepy chrome theatre boys. That’s my bit.”
The Mirror wheezed.
Steph zip-tied his wrists with vicious efficiency.
Then she looked back at you.
The warmth was still in the room. Still in her.
Her face changed.
Not with realisation alone.
Recognition.
“All those times,” she said.
Your chest cracked open. “Steph—”
“No.” Her voice was soft. Horribly soft. “That feeling. After patrol. In the Clocktower. When I thought I was calming down.”
You could not answer. That was answer enough.
A child sniffled nearby.
Steph looked at the children, then at the unconscious villain, then at you. Her anger tried to rise, and your power, still active, softened it before it could sharpen.
Horror crossed her face.
“Oh my God,” she whispered. “You’re doing it now.”
You pulled back immediately. Too fast.
The room lurched. Children whimpered as the last hooks of shame scraped at them. You forced the warmth outward again, away from Steph this time, toward the civilians only, but the basement was too small and the field too tangled. Steph felt the edge of it. You saw her feel it.
Her eyes filled with tears. “You’re making me not mad.”
“I’m trying to keep the kids safe.”
“That’s not what I said.”
“I know.”
“Stop doing that.”
“I can’t yet.”
The words landed like a betrayal inside a betrayal.
Steph stared at you as if you had slapped her.
You kept your power around the children until Oracle’s evacuation team arrived, until Nightwing and Orphan cleared the upstairs rooms, until the last victim was guided outside into the storm-wet street and away from every reflective surface. Only when the basement was empty except for you, Steph, and The Mirror unconscious on the floor did you let the power die.
The cold hit immediately.
Your knees buckled.
Steph moved toward you before she could stop herself.
Then stopped.
You caught yourself on a table instead.
Good, you thought miserably. She should not have to catch you.
Steph stared at you, face pale, eyes wet, mouth twisted like she was trying to hold back six different reactions and hated all of them.
“How long?” she asked.
The question sounded exactly like fear wearing anger because anger had better shoes.
You swallowed. “Steph—”
“How long?”
You looked down.
Her laugh cracked. “Wow. Okay. That’s an answer.”
“It wasn’t every time.”
“Oh, cool. Good. Great. Love the clarification that you only secretly emotionally adjusted me sometimes.”
You flinched.
She saw it and looked angrier.
“Don’t do that,” she said.
“I’m sorry.”
“Don’t do that either.”
You closed your mouth.
Steph paced once, then spun back toward you. “I thought you got it.”
“I do.”
“No.” Her voice rose, then broke. “No, you don’t get to say that. You don’t get to be the person who knew I was joking because I was hurt and then use magic emotional bubble wrap on me because you decided I needed it.”
“It’s not magic.”
“I do not care about the genre right now.”
The words would have made you laugh on any other night. Tonight, they only hurt.
“You should have asked,” she said.
“I know.”
“You should have told me.”
“I know.”
“You let me think I was safe with you.”
“You were.”
Steph’s face crumpled.
“No,” she said, and the smallness of it hurt worse than shouting. “No, I wasn’t. Not from you.”
Your eyes burned.
“I thought you were the one person who didn’t treat me like I needed editing,” she said.
The sentence killed whatever defence might have still existed in you.
You gripped the edge of the table.
Steph wiped at her face angrily. “Do you know how many people have looked at me and seen a problem to fix? My dad. Bruce. Half this stupid family on their worst days. Teachers. Cops. Villains. Everyone who thought I was too loud, too reckless, too emotional, too stupid to know what I was doing.” Her voice shook. “And then there was you.”
You could barely breathe.
“You laughed at my jokes,” she said. “You didn’t make me feel dumb. You let me be too much. Or I thought you did.”
“I did,” you whispered.
“Then why were you revising me in secret?”
There it was. The line that opened the floor beneath you.
You had no answer that made you less wrong.
The storm tapped against the small basement windows. Upstairs, boots moved, voices called, sirens approached. The Mirror groaned faintly on the floor. Steph kicked him lightly in the ankle without looking, and he went quiet.
“I wanted to help,” you said, because it was the truth and not enough.
Steph laughed again. “Everyone does. That’s usually where they start making choices for me.”
“I know.”
“Stop saying that!”
You flinched.
Steph’s face twisted immediately with regret, but she did not apologise.
Good. You did not deserve to be protected from her anger.
“You’re right,” you said. “I knew better. That’s what makes it worse.”
She stared at you.
You forced yourself to keep going. “I know what consent means. I ask people every day. I built rules around it because I know comfort without choice can become control. And then with you, I told myself it was small. That you were panicking. That it helped. That I wasn’t changing you, just making it easier for you to breathe. I made it sound kind because I cared about you.”
Steph’s eyes shone.
“That doesn’t make it okay,” you said.
“No,” she whispered. “It really doesn’t.”
“I’m sorry,” you said. “Not because you found out. Because I did it.”
Her face went very still.
Then she nodded once.
Not forgiveness.
Acknowledgment.
That was more than you deserved.
Nightwing appeared at the top of the stairs. “Everything okay down there?”
Steph did not look away from you. “No.”
Dick’s expression changed.
You looked down.
Steph took a breath. “But the civilians are clear, and reflective boy band villain is zip-tied.”
“Okay,” Dick said gently. “Medical?”
You could feel him looking at you.
You hated that you needed it.
“I’m fine,” you said.
Steph laughed, cold and sharp. “Oh, absolutely not. We are not doing that too.”
You shut your mouth.
Dick descended a few steps. “Can you walk?”
You pushed away from the table. Your legs nearly failed.
Steph moved again. Stopped again.
Dick came the rest of the way down and caught your elbow.
You did not look at Steph. You could not.
As Dick helped you toward the stairs, Steph stepped aside.
The space she made for you felt wider than the room.
You did not see Steph for six days. Not properly. You saw evidence of her in the Clocktower because Steph had always left evidence. A purple hair tie on the couch. A half-empty box of cereal in Barbara’s kitchen. Glitter nail polish on the desk beside your files. A sticky note on the medkit that said RESTOCK OR PERISH in aggressive bubble letters. But Steph herself became a ghost with excellent dramatic timing. She avoided every room you entered, skipped crisis calls where you were assigned, sent updates through Barbara, and once climbed out a window when you came in through the door, which felt unnecessary but honestly deserved.
You did not chase her. That was the only apology you could make with your body.
Barbara watched you not chase her.
“You look terrible,” she said on the third day.
You sat at the Clocktower table with a mug of tea you had not touched. “Thank you.”
“That was not a request for gratitude.”
“I know.”
Barbara’s expression softened, barely. “You are allowed to be sorry without punishing yourself into usefulness.”
“I am not trying to be useful.”
Barbara looked at the stack of paperwork you had completed, the restocked medkit, the colour-coded victim follow-up files, and the tray of snacks you had stress-baked for the entire Clocktower.
You sighed. “Okay.”
“She is angry,” Barbara said.
“She should be.”
“Yes.”
“I hurt her.”
“Yes.”
That one landed harder because Barbara did not soften it.
You deserved that, too.
“She also misses you,” Barbara said.
Your throat tightened.
“That does not mean she is ready to forgive you,” Barbara added.
“I know.” Barbara gave you a look. You managed a weak smile. “Sorry. I overuse that phrase now.”
“You overuse many things.”
“Fair.”
On the sixth night, Steph came back.
She entered through the window because of course she did, carrying a takeout bag in one hand and a storm cloud in her face. You were alone in the Clocktower kitchen, cleaning dishes that were already clean because your anxiety had chosen domestic haunting as its form.
Steph landed silently behind you.
You turned.
She held up the bag. “I brought waffles.”
Your chest hurt.
You set the sponge down. “Okay.”
“They’re not forgiveness waffles.”
“I understand.”
“They’re angry waffles.”
“That sounds fair.”
“Also, I got extra syrup because I’m mad, not because I remembered you like it.”
Your eyes burned. You nodded very seriously. “Of course.”
Steph looked annoyed by your emotional face, which was fair because your emotional face had no chill.
“Don’t make me regret being nutritionally aggressive,” she said.
“I won’t.”
“Good.”
She sat at the small kitchen table and began unpacking containers with unnecessarily sharp movements. Waffles. Syrup. Hash browns. Two orange juices. A tiny packet of butter that she glared at because it would not open.
You stayed by the sink.
Steph looked up. “Are you going to hover like a sad Victorian ghost, or are you going to sit?”
You sat. Not too close.
She noticed. Her mouth tightened.
For a while, neither of you spoke. Steph poured syrup over her waffles with the focus of someone preparing evidence. You picked at the corner of your napkin and tried not to look at her too much.
Finally, she said, “I’m still mad.”
“I know.”
She pointed her fork at you.
You winced. “Sorry.”
“I’m still mad,” she repeated.
You nodded. “Okay.”
“I still feel weird in my own head when I think about it.”
Your stomach twisted.
“I’m sorry,” you whispered.
“Yeah.” She cut into the waffle. “I know you are. That’s not the problem.”
You waited.
Steph stared at her plate.
“The problem is I believe you,” she said. You looked at her. She did not look up. “I believe you didn’t mean to control me. I believe you didn’t make me like you. I believe you were trying to help. And I hate that because it would be easier if you were secretly evil.”
A broken laugh slipped out of you.
Her mouth twitched, but her eyes stayed wet.
“I keep thinking about all the times I felt better around you,” she said. “And then I get mad because I don’t know which parts were me and which parts were you.”
“You,” you said, then stopped yourself.
Steph’s gaze snapped up.
You swallowed. “I want to say it was you. I believe that. But I know I don’t get to be the proof right now.”
Her expression shifted.
You looked down. “That’s the worst part. I can tell the truth now, but I made myself hard to believe.”
Steph’s fork paused halfway to her mouth.
For several seconds, she just looked at you. Then she set the fork down.
“Damn it,” she said.
You blinked. “What?”
“That was a good answer.”
“I’m sorry?”
“No, you don’t get to be emotionally self-aware while I’m trying to be righteously furious. It’s rude.”
Despite everything, you smiled faintly. Steph saw it and looked away fast.
The silence between you changed.
Not fixed. Not soft. But less like a locked door.
“I need to say stuff,” Steph said.
“Okay.”
“You don’t get to make it easier.”
“I won’t.”
“No powers.”
“No powers.”
“Even if I cry.”
Your throat tightened. “Even if you cry.”
“Even if you cry.”
You nodded. “Even if I cry.”
“Good.”
Steph took a breath.
Then she talked.
She talked about how scared she had been in the basement. About hearing her father’s voice and hating that it still had a key to some room inside her. About realising your comfort was in her body before her anger could get there. About how horrible it felt to know she wanted to be mad and could not access the full shape of it until you stopped. About how it made her think of every person who had ever told her to calm down when what they meant was be easier for me to ignore.
You listened. You did not interrupt. You cried once, silently. Steph looked at you, saw you keeping your hands folded in your lap, and kept talking.
That was the repair beginning.
Not forgiveness.
Repair. There was a difference.
When she finished, the waffles were cold.
Steph leaned back in her chair, exhausted.
You looked at your untouched plate. “I don’t know what to say that isn’t just another apology.”
“Good,” Steph said. “Because if you apologised again, I was going to throw a hash brown at you.”
You nodded. Then, after a pause, “Can I ask something?”
Steph’s eyes narrowed. “Depends.”
“The angry waffles…”
“They remain angry.”
“Right. Of course. But did you bring them because you wanted to talk, or because you wanted to make sure I ate?”
Steph looked personally offended.
“Both,” she muttered.
Your heart ached.
She pointed at you again. “Do not make that face.”
“What face?”
“The face like you’re about to cry because I’m nice. I’m not nice. I’m furious and charming.”
“You are.”
“Both things.”
“Yes.”
She picked up her fork again. “Eat your stupid waffle.”
You did. It tasted like sugar, cardboard takeout containers, and a second chance with teeth.
After that, things rebuilt slowly.
Steph did not trust you with her panic right away. That was fair. You did not trust yourself with it either.
You made rules. Not because rules fixed harm, but because they gave both of you something solid to hold while trust grew skin over the wound.
No powers on Steph without direct verbal consent unless immediate death or serious injury was unavoidable. No subtle room-softening when Steph was injured, deflecting, or joking too brightly. If you felt the urge to use your power, you had to say so instead. Steph was allowed to say no without explaining. You were allowed to say no if using your power would drain you too badly.
That last rule was Steph’s addition.
You had stared at her when she wrote it.
She had glared back. “What?”
“I didn’t expect—”
“Yeah, that’s part of the problem, Care Bear.”
You closed your mouth.
She tapped the paper with her pen. “You’re not allowed to turn consent into a one-way street where I get boundaries and you get martyrdom.”
Barbara, from across the Clocktower, said, “Excellent point.”
Steph pointed without looking. “Thank you, Oracle.”
“You’re welcome.”
You looked down at the rule until the words blurred.
You are allowed to say no.
It felt absurd. It felt impossible. It felt like something you would have to learn to deserve, even though Steph would probably throw something at you if you said that aloud.
So you did not say it. You signed the rules.
Steph signed them too, adding a tiny doodle of a waffle in the corner labelled ANGRY BUT FAIR.
Barbara laminated the page.
Neither of you asked why she had a laminator ready.
Some questions in the Batfamily were traps.
Weeks passed. You and Steph found your way back through ordinary things. That was the only way to do it. Trust did not return in a cinematic monologue. It returned in waffle runs where Steph asked before sitting too close. In Clocktower nights where you said, “I want to help, but I won’t unless you ask,” and Steph nodded, sometimes relieved, sometimes angry all over again, but always heard. In nail polish bottles lined up on Barbara’s table because Steph decided your hands looked “haunted by paperwork” and needed colour.
The first time she painted your nails again, she chose purple with gold glitter.
“You’re making me your brand,” you said.
“I’m improving your marketability.”
“I thought I wasn’t supposed to be useful.”
Steph paused.
You realised what you had said.
Her expression softened, but she kept her voice light. “Correct. You are supposed to be sparkly and emotionally inconvenient.”
“That sounds like your brand.”
“I contain multitudes.”
She held your hand between hers, brush moving carefully over your nail.
No power moved. Your hand was only a hand.
Steph knew. You could tell she knew by the way her thumb rested against your knuckle: light, present, ready to let go if needed.
You looked at her bent head, the concentration in her face, the smudge of purple polish near her thumb.
“I missed this,” you said quietly.
She did not look up.
“Yeah,” she said. “Me too.”
It was not a confession.
Not yet.
But it made space for one.
The first time Steph asked for your power properly, it was not dramatic.
No villain. No basement. No evil mirror. No children crying. Just the Clocktower at two in the morning after a bad patrol where nothing catastrophic happened except Steph saw a little girl with her father in the back of an ambulance, and the girl would not stop apologising for needing help.
Steph had gone quiet afterwards.
Not joke-quiet. Gone-quiet.
She sat on Barbara’s couch with her knees pulled up, staring at the floor. Her mask was off. Her hair was loose and tangled. One cheek was bruised purple-blue beneath the old purple of her suit.
You sat on the floor several feet away.
Not too close. Not too far.
“Do you want me to call Barbara?” you asked softly. Steph shook her head. “Do you want waffles?”
A tiny breath. Almost a laugh. “Not yet.”
“Do you want me to shut up?”
“Never thought I’d say this, but no.”
You waited.
Steph rubbed both hands over her face. “I’m mad.”
“Okay.”
“And sad.”
“Okay.”
“And I feel stupid about both.”
“You’re not.”
She looked at you.
You held up both hands. “No powers. Just an opinion.”
Her mouth twitched weakly.
Then she looked down at her hands. “Can you…”
Your breath caught.
She swallowed hard. “Can you take the edge off? Not the whole thing. I want to stay mad enough to be myself.”
Your eyes burned.
“Yes,” you said carefully. “I can do that.”
“And if I say stop?”
“I stop.”
“Immediately.”
“Immediately.”
“And you tell me what you’re doing.”
“I’ll hold your hand if you want. I’ll let a small amount of warmth move through touch. It should help your body stop bracing so hard. It won’t make you forgive anyone. It won’t make you less angry. It won’t change what you think. It just gives the feeling a little more room.”
Steph stared at you for a long moment. Then she held out her hand.
“Okay, Care Bear,” she said, voice shaking. “Try again. Correctly this time.”
You took her hand.
Your power moved softly, carefully, no more than she had asked for. Warmth passed between your palms and stopped there, waiting at the boundary of her permission. Steph’s eyes closed. Her shoulders lowered a fraction. A tear slipped down her cheek. Her mouth trembled, but her hand stayed in yours.
After a few seconds, she whispered, “Stop.”
You stopped. Immediately.
Her eyes opened.
She inhaled. Exhaled. The room remained exactly as it was: blue-lit, messy, full of cold waffles and vigilante gear and a laminated consent agreement with an angry waffle doodle on the desk.
Steph looked at your joined hands.
“That was better,” she said.
You laughed softly, tears in your eyes. “High praise.”
“I’m a generous soul.”
“You are.”
She glanced up. “Don’t get mushy.”
“I would never.”
“You absolutely would.”
“Yes.”
Her thumb brushed over your fingers once.
No power.
Just Steph.
“I still like you,” she said.
Your heart stopped behaving normally.
She looked annoyed with herself. “It’s inconvenient and frankly offensive after the whole betrayal arc, but apparently my taste is stubborn.”
You stared at her.
Steph’s cheeks flushed. “Say something before I fake my death.”
“You already did that once, didn’t you?”
Her eyes narrowed. “That’s your response?”
“I panicked.”
“Terrible. Try again.”
You squeezed her hand carefully. “I still like you too.”
Steph’s face softened.
Then she pointed at you with her free hand. “To be clear, I am still healing from the aforementioned betrayal arc.”
“I know.”
She glared.
You corrected quickly. “I understand.”
“Better.”
“I’m still sorry.”
“I know.”
You gave her a look.
She smiled, small and real. “What? I’m allowed.”
You laughed. She laughed too. And for the first time in weeks, the room did not feel like a wound being carefully avoided. It felt like something bruised but alive.
The kiss happened later.
Of course it did. Steph Brown might be many things, but emotionally efficient was not usually one of them.
It happened on the Clocktower roof after a night of rain, with Gotham spread below in wet neon and dirty silver. Barbara had kicked both of you upstairs under the pretence of “fresh air” and the very real threat of revoking snack privileges if you kept staring at each other over case files instead of “handling whatever this is.”
Barbara was terrifying. Effective, though.
Steph sat on the ledge with a box of waffles between you, boots swinging over open air. She wore a purple hoodie over her suit, hair pulled into a messy ponytail, glitter polish chipped on three fingers. You sat beside her, close enough that your shoulders almost touched.
Almost.
The city hummed below.
Steph took a bite of waffle. “Oracle has the subtlety of a brick with Wi-Fi.”
You smiled. “She cares.”
“She meddles.”
“Also true.”
Steph looked at you, then away. “You’ve been better.”
You looked down at your hands. The purple glitter polish had started chipping, too. “I’m trying.”
“I know.”
You glanced at her.
She grinned. “See? I’m allowed.”
“You’re impossible.”
“And yet, wildly charming.”
“Wildly.”
She looked pleased for half a second, then nervous. That was new. Steph nervous without covering it immediately with noise.
You waited.
She set her waffle down. “Can I ask you something?”
“Always.”
“Are you using any warm fuzzy cheating right now?”
Your chest tightened.
“No,” you said. “No powers.”
“You sure?”
“Yes.”
“Even a tiny little emotional seasoning?”
Despite yourself, you laughed. “No emotional seasoning.”
“Good.” She turned toward you fully, one knee tucked on the ledge. “Because I want to know I’m about to kiss you because I have excellent taste, not because you’re doing magic serotonin crimes.”
Your breath caught so hard it almost hurt. “You’re about to kiss me?”
Steph’s confidence flickered. “That depends on whether you’re about to say yes or make this very awkward.”
You smiled, slow and helpless. “Yes.”
Her eyes widened slightly.
You softened. “Yes, Steph. You can kiss me.”
She swallowed.
Then, because she was Steph, she pointed at you. “If you make me cry, I’m pushing you emotionally, not physically, off this roof.”
“That sounds fair.”
“Good.”
She leaned in. Slowly, for once.
The kiss was soft at first, almost cautious, which would have surprised anyone who did not know how careful Steph could be with things that mattered. Her hand rose to your cheek, hovering for half a second until you leaned into it. Then she touched you, warm fingers against your skin, and kissed you like a joke finally allowed to become a confession. You kissed her back with your hands resting on the ledge because you did not want to take anything. Not from her. Not this. Not ever again.
No power moved. Nothing softened the nerves or polished the want into something easier. It was messy and human and a little syrup-sweet because Steph had definitely been eating waffles five seconds ago.
When she pulled back, her forehead rested against yours.
“No powers?” she whispered.
“No powers.”
“Good.”
“You taste like syrup.”
“Romantic.”
“I thought so.”
She laughed, and the sound trembled at the edges.
You opened your eyes. Steph was crying.
Only a little. She looked furious about it.
“Don’t,” she warned.
“I wasn’t going to.”
“You were thinking something mushy.”
“I was thinking you’re beautiful.”
“That’s worse.”
“Sorry.”
“No, say it again later when I can pretend to hate it properly.”
You smiled.
She smiled back, wet-eyed and bright and still healing, not smaller for the hurt, not softer because you had made her that way, but present because she chose to be. Her anger had not vanished. Her trust was not unscarred. The past remained a thing with teeth. But she was there, and you were there, and the space between you held no hidden warmth.
Only the ordinary kind.
Steph picked up the waffle box and placed it between you again with grave ceremony.
“Important note,” she said.
“Yes?”
“These are not angry waffles anymore.”
“No?”
“No. These are cautiously optimistic waffles.”
You laughed so hard your eyes filled.
Steph looked proud.
“Much better branding,” you said.
“I know. Growth.”
You leaned your shoulder against hers. She let you.
After a moment, she leaned back.
Below you, Gotham kept being Gotham: sirens, wet streets, bad decisions, worse architecture, people hurting and helping and sometimes doing both in the wrong order. There would be more crises. More calls. More moments where your power rose before your permission did. More days where Steph joked too fast, and you had to choose trust over instinct. Healing did not become easy because two people kissed under a cloudy sky with waffles between them.
But it became possible. That was the thing.
Steph reached for your hand.
“Normally,” she said.
You laced your fingers through hers.
“Normally,” you promised.
She squeezed once.
No powers. No glittering emotional shortcut. No secret softening.
Just Stephanie Brown’s hand in yours, warm and real and chosen. On the roof of the Clocktower, with syrup on her mouth and bruises under her hoodie, Steph looked at the city that had tried so many times to make her feel like a mistake and smiled anyway.
You loved her for that.
You would tell her later. When she was ready. When you were brave. When the waffles were less in danger of being weaponised.
For now, she rested her head on your shoulder and said, “I’m still mad sometimes.”
“I know.”
She lifted her head just enough to glare.
You smiled. “I understand.”
“Good.”
“I still like you.”
Her glare softened into something almost shy.
“Yeah,” she said. “Me too.”
Then she settled back against you, and the city lights flickered below like broken things refusing to go dark.
That, you thought, was Steph all over.
Not fixed. Not edited. Not made easier.
Still bright.











