#sob19

"It stands for Bitch." Dick, Jason and Barbara all said it in unison. The same scathing tone, the same hard inflection on the word. Raven could feel her girlfriend's disdain for the term, and for the equal amounts of conflicting emotions that she knew her brothers and her mentor held for Gotham's Dark Knight. They had the longest history with Bruce, after all.

Tim and Stephanie both laughed, and Duke nervously chuckled alongside them before they each gave their own answers.

"It stands for Boss for me, personally," Duke admitted. Tim seemed to think on his answer a moment before shrugging his shoulders and saying, "Batman. B is just quicker to say."

Steph waved a dismissive hand in the air as she went into further detail. "It was Batman when I was Spoiler, and then Boss when I was Robin... Now it's Bitchman." She gave a decisive nod before repeating, "Definitely Bitchman."

From across the room, Damian tutted and muttered something under his breath before stalking off with Titus following close by his side. Dick almost moved to follow after him, before Cassandra caught his eye. A quick warning or reassurance that the youngest bat didn't need or didn't want to be followed.

Which was when Raven finally turned to her girlfriend, curiosity aglow in her eyes.

"And what about you, love? When you use 'B', what does it stand for?"

It was Cass' turn to wave a dismissive hand now, her face growing slightly pink as she tried to turn away.

As her brothers and friends goaded her, however, she eventually confessed in a small, voice, "Batdad."

Jason and Dick let out the loudest and longest overly dramatic groans. The rest of the group was a bit more forgiving with low laughter and a few teasing remarks. Raven reached over for the bat's hand, and held it up to kiss along her knuckles.

"That's positively adorable, my love."

...

Bruce had met the empath before, however briefly that had been, some years back. She'd been a member of his eldest son's team of heroes, after all. And despite their falling out at the time, and despite his best efforts to fool himself, he was a concerned parent. He'd learned some of the barest of details about each of Dick's teammates. No matter how briefly they may have been part of his team.

Who knew that it would take so much time, and so many odd relationships with his other children, for them to finally get to know one another.

After all, despite all outward claims, he was not nearly as asocial a creature as he strived to be. Somehow or another, it seemed he'd met every damn one of the metahumans and heroes that roamed the earth. And now one of those heroes was dating his daughter.

They all sat in companionable silence for the longest time. The Batman gauging the Titan and the Titan taking in the Bat's mood. If it wasn't for the obvious blinks and quiet sips of tea to break the stillness, one would think the two were engaged in a staring contest, or battle of wills.

Although, if you were to ask Cassandra, the latter wasn't too far from the truth.

She cleared her throat carefully, gaining her father and girlfriend's attention.

"Raven is... studying to become a... doctor," she said, nearly sighing in relief as the tension finally started to break between the two.

"My father was a surgeon, you know," Bruce supplied, "And Wayne Enterprises continues to fund scholarships for certain specializations... Have you considered-"

The doors of Wayne Manor swung open as they approached to reveal Tim and Jason, both clad in slacks and sweater vests waiting. The unnerving display caused Raven to begin to question Dick’s own sweater vest ensemble. While this wasn’t an out of place outfit for Dick with the three in coordination something seemed clearly off.

“Hey there Dick, good to see you.”

“Likewise Tim.”

“How was the trip?”

“Fantastic, we listened to Wicked for the first half and Bye Bye Birdie for the second!”

“Little too on the nose there don’t you think?” Jason asked.

“Not at all, the perfect show tunes for a road trip if you ask me.”

“It was a nightmare.” Raven cut them off before they could continue farther.

A bizarre little shuffle went on as Dick shook first Tim’s hand then Jason’s before they were guided inside. Raven had been to the Wayne mansion a handful of times before with Dick, it was how she had met Cass and Harper after all, somehow though the majesty of it all wasn’t overwhelming. The opulence reminded her of Azarath and of home.

The four of them traveled down the main foyer into a small guest seating room on the left. Inside Raven momentarily forgot all about the weird way the boys were acting because there was Harper and Cass and oh boy was Raven having a gay moment.

Jason and Tim seemed taken aback as well. Raven wasn’t surprised, instead of the outfits they had been getting them into earlier the two were sporting nothing but light workout gear. Harper was in nothing but a skeleton motif tank and loose black shorts while Cass was in skin tight shorts and a black sports bra with attached bat eared hood. If you asked Raven they looked amazing. The toned muscles and various patterns of scarring telling her just how much trust they had in her and how comfortable they were in showing her so much.

“What happened to our planning?” Jason just sank in despair. "I thought we bonded through that brawl."

“You guys got so worked up we were ready like five hours early. We got bored and went for a workout.” Harper shrugged.

“Comfier.” Cass added.

Jason simply wandered aimlessly out of the room, as if his whole world had come crashing down around him.

“What’s up with him?” Raven asked.

“Oh I told him if he helped me dress up Harper it would impress Barbara.” Tim flashed a momentary shit eating grin before becoming rigidly serious again and locking eyes with her. “But onto the real business.”

“Ahem.” Dick cleared his throat. “You two ladies better look after my girl here. Treat here right you hear?”

“What? No, no, no, your girl needs to make sure she treats Cass and Harper right!” Tim countered, upset that Dick had usurped his moment.

“I’m the adult here and I’m going to make sure Raven is treated how she deserves!”

“Well I’ve been teaching these two for years now and I need to know that they’re going to be in good hands!”

Raven felt a small tug at the bottom of her dresses skirt. Turning she found Cass holding one finger over her lips for silence and Harper looking ready to bust a gut. Motioning Cass lead the two quietly out the door, leaving the two siblings to bicker behind them.

“God I can’t believe what dorks they are.” Harper laughed once they were out of earshot. “Do they really both want to be dads that badly or something? And Jason! Oh my god I can’t believe I managed to convince him to wear that stupid sweater vest.”

Cass and Raven snickered with her.

“At least you two got to change into something more comfortable, Dick and Kori made me take a five hour car ride in latex. This stuff doesn’t breathe you know.”

“It’s worth it.” Cass pulled Raven into a side hug, burying herself into the empath’s side and stealing a quick kiss.

“Yea, honestly it suits you a lot. Looks super cute and you don’t even notice the fact that it was probably bought from some kink store.”

Raven was dressed in as Kori described it a ‘Latex Galaxy Print Emily Dress’. A simple black latex dress with blue, purple and red galaxy print swirls across the chest portion, short puffy shoulder sleeves a somewhat short skirt and a high almost sailor collar, finished off by an O-ring attached right in the center.

“Uhg” Raven groaned. “I let Kori pick it out but didn’t take into account her lack of tact and understand when it comes to certain social customs still. A pretty dress is a pretty dress is all she said. Though I have to admit her matching the galaxy design with your hair was a stroke of genius.”

Raven ran a hand through Harper's hair before pulling her down for her own kiss.

“Again, you hardly notice it looks kinky or anything. Either that or I’ve just been spending too much time around the local capes and hoods. Have you seen Cat Woman’s outfit? The dress really doesn’t stand out that much in our line of work.”

“I suppose you’re right.”

“So, we have a surprise for movie night.” Cass beamed at her pushing Raven to raise an eyebrow in interest.

“Oh?”

“It’s an anime. I’ve finally gotten Cass fully into anime, and now it’s your turn.” Harper laughed.

“As long as it’s Cass picking that’s fine with me, the last time it was your turn to pick we ended up watching that god awful Lance and Masks.”

The three settled down together in one of the side rooms, a massive TV adorning the far wall and one large comfy couch for them to quickly pile onto. Raven let Cass guide her in between herself and Harper. While they’d definitely had movies night before this was an entirely new situation for Raven. Previously she had always been off to the side while the lovebirds cuddled. She could definitely get used to this though, something about the way the two of them embraced and held her just made her feel so safe and warm. Harper pulling her almost on top of herself and Cass spread out all across both of them kept her in such close proximity it was almost impossible to tune out their feelings of affection that washed over her like she was being dipped in a warm comfortable bath. It was pure happiness.

Bruce was tired. He had finished his patrol late the night before and hadn’t had time for sleep before dealing with the various Wayne enterprises that required his attention. Refusing to take a day off he had just finished his second night straight of patrols and was running on fumes when he made it back to the mansion.

Upon arriving the first thing he found was Jason passed out in a patio chair dressed like what Bruce could only assume was an attempt at Mr. Rodgers. He didn’t want to know. In the foyer he found Duke scolding Tim and Dick both also dressed in outlandishly PBS father figure style outfits. He had to blink a few times and then go double check on Jason to make sure he was seeing everything correctly. Those three wearing matching outfits was not a good sign.

Checking in on Harper and Cass who he’d heard were opting to spend their weekend at the mansion for once instead of at either Harper or Stephanie’s apartments was delighted to find all three girls snuggled up fast asleep together on the couch. A large comfy blanket sprawled out across them.

“Wait.”

It didn’t take the world’s greatest detective to realize that something didn’t add up, namely the number of people in the pile. Silently he went through a mental checklist of who all was there. There was Harper and Cass yes. But the third girl was someone he didn’t recognize. It wasn’t Stephanie, or Barbara, or Carrie or Kate. Not Violet not Harley(thankfully.) not Selina and not anyone else that sprung to mind.

Rubbing his eyes he wandered into the kitchen where he found Damian eating breakfast and Alfred putting on a new batch of coffee.

“Oh thank you Alfred, I definitely need that today.” He groaned as he plopped down into a seat at the table next to Damian.

“I think what you need is a good sleep sir.” Alfred replied but began grabbing a third cup nonetheless.

Bruce hummed to himself a moment in thought.

“We didn’t adopt any new kids recently have we?”

Damian and Alfred looked at him in confusion.

“There’s a third girl with Harper and Cass. I don’t recognize her.”

“Ahh. That would be Miss Raven.” Alfred turned back to the coffee maker. “No, she is simply here as a guest, from my understanding those three have begun dating. She’s one of Dick’s Teen Titans.”

Bruce nodded in acceptance.

“Okay good. I was worried we would need to renovate and add another bedroom.”

“I’m pretty sure that won’t be a problem.” Duke said around mouthfuls of toast. “Looks to me like they’ll be sharing a bed anyways.”

And that was not what sleep deprived Bruce needed to be thinking about right now. Anything would have been better than his children's relationships, god a Joker attack would be better.

“And do you know what’s going on with?...” he let the question die out.

“On second thought I’ll ask Dick what they were doing tomorrow. Alfred please ignore my earlier request for coffee and cancel my eight o clock, I believe we should still be able to reschedule to tomorrow for that. I’m going to go get some rest after all.”

“Of course sir.”

“Have fun at school Damian.”

“Tch.”