#taliajay

Steph lies flat on her belly on a rooftop, one eye trained through the lens of a sniper scope. Across the street, Black Mask, original flavor, sits at his desk, doing paperwork; blissfully unaware of her presence, and the gun trained on the back of his head. She watches him for a moment. The moment seems so… mundane. Boring. He signs a piece of paper in front of him—then clicks through tabs on his computer.

He’s been at this for an hour now.

The most exciting thing that happened was Lin bringing him a new cup of coffee. Black, of course, and probably laced with a splash of brandy, or something.

She stifles a yawn.

Any minute now, she thinks—and then she’s going to ruin this fucker’s whole night.

Her ears prick. Behind her, there’s the sudden, soft sound of feet, alighting on the rooftop. They’re too light to be Batman or Nightwing’s, and she never would have heard Black Bat, so…

“Robin.”

She hears a soft, quiet curse before Robin comes padding toward her. The mask hides her grin. “Black Mask,” he says finally, coming to crouch down beside her. She feels the warmth of his body through her suit—or at least, her brain tells her she does. “What are you doing?”

“Waiting.”

The package was dropped off not that long ago. It should be making its way up to Roman’s office any minute now…

Robin huffs. “For what?”

“It’s a surprise. Aren’t you supposed to be with Batman? I thought you weren’t allowed out without supervision.” A rule Steph herself would have chafed at. She’s the reason for it, though. No more solo missions. It’s an over-correction, if you asked her. Tim worked almost entirely solo toward the end of his tenure, and nothing happened to him.

Steph just… She got unlucky.

And sure, yeah. She could’ve used more support. If Batman had just believed in her, maybe she wouldn’t have tried so hard to prove herself.

But. Anyway. That’s over and done, now. And the baby Robin—not really much of a baby, honestly. He’s, what. Two years younger than her? But he’s still so fucking short. His head is level with her chest. And the way his cape seems to drown him just makes him look even smaller.

So.

Baby Robin.

Anyway. He’s like, fifteen, sixteen now, and still stuck patrolling with either Batman or Nightwing. Maybe Red Robin, sometimes. She can understand his desire to strike out on his own.

Doesn’t mean she’s not gonna needle him about it.

Robin huffs again—and even without looking at him, she can see his pout. “I’m supervised. You’re supervising.”

Steph snorts. “I don’t think I count, kid.”

Sionis shifts, putting a finger on the intercom. God, she misses the bugs she had in his office. She really needs to reapply them. He’s supposed to be flying out for some kind of convention next week—maybe then?

“Don’t call me kid. I’m not that much younger than you.” Robin nudges her ribs with what she’s pretty sure is his foot. “Are you going to shoot him?” Coming from any of the others, the question would be accusatory. Coming from Robin, there’s only mild curiosity.

Interesting.

Which is why Steph answers. “Nope. You got any binoculars on you?”

“…yeah?”

“Mm. If you’re going to stick around, you might as well watch the show. Sionis’s office is—”

“I know. I’ve staked him out before.” He doesn’t snap, exactly, but his tone is terser than before. Also interesting. Steph files that away to think about later. “Okay. I’ve got eyes on him.”

“Good.”

“You still haven’t told me what we’re waiting for.”

“A surprise,” she repeats. Roman’s office door opens. A woman walks in, carrying a box. A very familiar box. Steph grins. “There it is.”

“That’s not a bomb, is it?” Robin asks, warily.

Steph doesn’t answer. Her grin widens.

Robin shifts next to her. Roman pulls out a knife, and slices through the packing tape. Then he flips up the lid.

The box explodes. A cascade of purple glitter flies everywhere. They’re too far away to smell it, but Steph knows that a flood of stink has washed through the room as well. She adjusts the sniper scope, moving it a few inches to the left to take aim at Roman’s PC. She fires.

It shatters in a burst of plastic and sparks. She fires a couple other shots, too; taking out Roman’s mug, his screens, a decorative bust. Then she sits up, quickly disassembling her sniper and packing it away in her bag. “C’mon, kid, we gotta go.”

Robin takes a second to move. When he lowers his glasses, his eyes are wide—there’s a grin on his face. “Holy shit,” he says, not resisting when she grabs his arm, tugging him behind her. “Did you just glitter bomb Black Mask?”

Steph throws a wink at him on instinct, despite the gesture being hidden behind her helmet. “Sure I did. That shit is going to take weeks to get out.”

jaytalia confessions

i feel you on being starved for jaytalia TuT they're so good! we need more of them! (idk if you saw it, but i did share another jaytalia wip here, and there's another older one here i didn't include this time because i haven't changed/added much to it)

this one is (one of) my take(s) on the "jaytalia's dalliance in lost days ended with a baby". because a) i love baby/kidfics and b) give that man a baby <3

rough snippet:

Jason arrives five minutes early.

Talia, however, is late. By nearly ten minutes; long enough that Jason’s stomach starts to squirm, wondering if he’s been stood up.

But then she slides into the seat across from him, not a single hair out of place but still, somehow, looking almost… frazzled. Jason doesn’t like it. He doesn’t like the feelings it conjures up in him, either; the way he almost wants to spirit her away somewhere else, somewhere safe, where no one can see her like this.

It’s ridiculous.

Talia doesn’t need his protection—nor does she need his help safe-guarding her, what, reputation?

“I apologize for being late,” Talia says, slipping into that stilted, overly formal dialect she and Damian both use when they’re feeling off balance. “I lost track of time.”

“Don’t worry about it.” Jason waves a hand. Lost track of time? It’s not inconceivable, he supposes. Talia is a busy woman. But something about it rings false anyway. “I didn’t mind waiting.”

She smiles at him; a strained thing. The discomfort in his stomach grows.

The waiter comes by, taking Talia’s drink order before leaving again. As soon as he’s out of earshot, Jason puts his hands on the table.

“What’s going on?” He keeps his voice low, his shoulders lowered. The time he spent waiting wasn’t just consumed by his nerves. While he had long memorized the layout of the restaurant; figuring out how long it would take to reach any exit from virtually any table—as well as which tables provided the perfect vantage points—he had spent his time waiting sizing up all of the other patrons, calculating which of them could be hidden threats. None in particular had stuck out to him as active dangers… but Jason was as fallible as anyone else.

Talia shakes her head. “No— It’s nothing like that.” She gently covers one of his hands with her own. “It’s… I wanted to talk to you about something… personal.”

Personal.

Jason brow furrows. He has plenty of time to think about it as the waiter comes by again, dropping off Talia’s water. Talia dismisses him when he goes to ask for their order, begging off another few minutes to look at the menu. But even when he leaves, Jason is no closer to figuring out what she could be talking about.

She squeezes his hand. “Los Angeles,” she says. Jason’s face heats.

Los Angeles… That was… God, two, nearly three years ago now; before he’d come back to Gotham. It was also the first, and last, time Talia had taken him to bed. They hadn’t spoken of it since. Had barely spoken at all since. Talia had checked in with him regularly during his big revenge plan, and then again after, but… slowly, it had all trickled off. Sometimes he got a message from her; a notice that she was in the same area as he was, but for the most part, they had gone their separate ways.

He missed her.

He wouldn’t dare say so.

He knew what he had been. A link to her lost love—her greatest love. She had cared about him, he wouldn’t do her the disservice of saying that she didn’t, but ultimately he had been a means to an end.

Not that he had been any better. He hadn’t realized how much he missed her; how much he had grown to care about her until her absence. By then, the anger had—well, not worn away, but had burned down from an inferno to something more contained. It no longer fueled him, drove him… and it left him aimless. Lacking purpose.

If he was being honest, he still was… but he’d grown used to it now.

“What about it?” he asks, realizing that the silence has stretched for a beat too long.

Talia’s face does… something. “I…” She withdraws her hand, leaving his feeling cold. “Oh, Jason. I’ve thought about this moment so many times, and I’m still no closer to knowing what to say.”

“Just say it, then.” If for no other reason than to relieve his anxiety.

She laughs once. “That night,” she says. “We weren’t… We weren’t exactly careful.”

Jason stills. The sound of the restaurant around them seems to fade; becoming distant, drowned out by the dull roar of blood rushing in his ears. His eyes are fixed on Talia, her mouth, watching her lips shape words that are, for all that they’re plain English, utterly incomprehensible.

“I got pregnant,” Talia continues. She doesn’t look away from him. He can feel the weight of her gaze—far lighter than the weight of her words. “I… chose not to tell you. With… With your plans, your state, I didn’t think that you were in the best place for it. I understand if that makes you upset with me—but I will not apologize for it.”

Jason swallows past the lump in his throat. “I— Did you—”