Too rare, sometimes. But like a flare among ash, precious and hidden, it’s something to look for, and treasure when found.
Pierre Gasly - Pierre’s laugh is spontaneous and fiery. It’s the release of every pent up emotion he keeps so hidden, strong and playful and delightfully unprofessional. His laughter is silent, but when he laughs it consumes him like a sunrise, and he almost always doubles over as though he just can’t control it. Pierre’s laugh makes me want to laugh by his side.
Daniel Ricciardo - Daniel’s laugh is as unrestrained and boisterous as he is. Daniel holds nothing back, and yet it always appears as though he does - like his smile could always go a little wider, his laughter last a little longer. Daniel laughs like he enjoys the motion, and like he knows everybody is watching him, which they often are. Daniel’s laugh makes me laugh too.
Sebastian Vettel - It’s difficult to make Seb laugh, but when he does his laughter is as soft and charming as every word that comes out of him mouth. Quiet, restrained, but glowing in the subtle sort of way Sebastian always is. Seb likes losing himself in his smile, and laughing is one of the few moments he does not appear to have something unbearably clever brewing in the back of his mind. It’s the laugh of someone grateful to have something to laugh about. I miss Seb’s laughter lately.
Lewis Hamilton - Lewis’s laugh is so unlike every other one of his mannerisms. It is short and loud, ringing in the air for moments after, leaving Lewis with an unbeatable grin and atypical aura of childishness. Lewis's laugh is a dog’s excited bark or the high, clear call of a bird. His laughter is simultaneously surprising and familiar all at once. I grin every time I see Lewis laugh, because I don’t think he does so as much as he would like to.
Charles Leclerc - Charles tries to disguise his laugh under planned chuckles and polite nods, but his real laughter is as wild and electric as he is. Charles’s laugh is all over the place, instant and lingering all at once. Charles laughs because he can, and because he wants to. When Charles really laughs, he throws his head back, collapses to the side, or doubles over, holding nothing back. His laughter is high and erratic, and it melts away all semblance of his “flawless” exterior in favor of something far better, something far more perfect. I think Charles deserves to laugh more.
Lando Norris - Lando’s laugh is familiar, ecstatic, and absolutely, undeniably human. Lando’s laugh is the laughter of your best friend, your favorite cousin, the class clown in the back of the room, the guy who laughs at his own jokes before they leave his mouth. Lando laughs in sharp bursts of glee, because he can never contain it, and he is never expected to. Lando laughs like it’s his first reaction to anything scenario, and it probably is. I think Lando’s laugh is more contagious than any other.
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backstreets back go tell a friend. I would like to have more of this written before I start posting it but given that i’m likely to have a lot more time to write now and, you know, maybe it’ll be a good distraction. anyway I hope if you read the original this has everything you liked from it and if you DIDN’T you should go read that.
tdwk masterlist
ttlb masterlist
* * *
He was fast. Aspen tried to counter his punch, but the blow glanced off her shoulder and knocked her back. Fuck. He tried to sweep his leg under her, but she jumped over it the second she saw his hips twitch.
If she hadn’t been gasping for breath, she would have smiled. She was fast, now, too.
She had half a second to think before the next blow came. She ducked, but she felt knuckles graze her temple. Close one. She couldn’t afford to get bruised, now, not while she had work.
She could feel herself getting tired. This has to end, now, before he noticed her exhaustion, too. The second she found her centre she lunged, going for the takedown, but he darted behind her and grabbed her arm, twisting it behind her. Aspen didn’t think, she just rolled, and she felt her foot hit bone behind her as she somersaulted her arm out of his grip. She wheeled around, and for a long moment she and her opponent circled each other.
“You’re getting better.” Dick said. His tiny fists were raised.
“I’m sorry I kicked you there,” Aspen said. She’s winded. Dick is not. It stings just as much as it did the first day, that she’s so unfit compared to him, but hey, he’s a circus kid, those are both advantages. She’d get there too, eventually. Dick took her on the trapeze the other day.
“You didn’t hurt me.” Dick smiled, which was the only cue Aspen gots before he hit her with a spinning back kick right in the gut. It bypassed her own defensive stance, it was so fast, and it felt like someone threw a brick at her stomach. When she doubled over, he grabbed her arm and threw her over his shoulder on to her back on the mat, twisting her elbow and wrist with surgical precision until she tapped out. He let her go, then, offering her a hand up without a shred of pre-teen smugness. Aspen wondered, not for the first time, how this kid is so chill, how he managed to be this nice while kicking her ass, but she just closed her eyes and let her head collapse against the mats.
Dick laughed. Good. Kid didn’t smile enough.
“That’s enough for today.” Calum says. He’d been watching from outside of the mats, like he did every time she sparred with Dick.
“Good work, Grayson. I’m just gonna stay here, do a quick quality control test of the mats. I’ll catch up.” Aspen nodded, not opening her eyes. Thank god they’re done. Some of this training felt good, she wasn’t going to lie, but about this time every morning she was tempted to just let Dick kick her ass until Calum let her go have a shower.
She could feel Calum’s presence above her as Dick’s footsteps tapped off of the mat and then out the door. Calm didn’t move, and after a long moment Aspen cracked an eye open to see him looking down at her, with that face he does when he’s really trying not to be amused by her. He was, she knew he was. “Mats are good.” She announced, opening her eyes all the way and giving him a tired smile. Calum stuck out a hand to help her up, and this time, she took it. “Fairly high quality, good condition -”
Halfway through helping her up, Calum knocked her feet out from under her and yanked on her hand, pulling her into his chest as she fell on top of him. Her head was spinning, but once she got her bearings she realized he was lying on his back, with her lying chest to chest on the mats. His grip is tight; he’s clinging to her. She can feel her heart thumping against his solid chest.
“Focus, Penny.” Calum said. He had her right on top of him, his eyes sparkling into hers.
“Oh, I’m focused.” She smiled. “What am I focused on, again?”
Calum laughed a little. She felt lightheaded. She loved these moments before they kissed. “You’re in a bit of a scrape here, darling.”
Aspen considered it for a second. Calum’s other hand was on her waist, holding her steady. He was smiling up at her. He was sweaty from their workout earlier, and his hair was all messed up. He almost looked normal like this. Like her gym-buddy-boyfriend in basketball shorts. Her heart thudded against his chest harder. “I’m in complete control of this situation.”
“Yeah?”
“Yeah.”
Calum flipped them over, supporting himself carefully over her. His hand is planted by her face; he’s careful not to hold her down. His other hand was still steady at her waist. “You sure about that?”
Aspen smiled bigger. “You’ve fallen right into my cunning trap.”
“That’s sure what it looks like.” Calum teased before he leaned in to kiss her. It was light, at first, but she pressed deeper, keeping him there. It felt good. She couldn’t feel her aching muscles anymore; she was out of breath for an entirely different reason. It felt so good she almost forgot to wrap her leg around his, trap his arm, and tilt her hips to tip him over on to his back. Almost.
Calum let her grab his wrists as she straddled him, trapping his hands against his chest as she looked down on him. She knew he was letting her do this, she’d seen him in a fight. It still felt good, though. The first time she had tried that, he had just laughed. Now he was playing at being trapped beneath her. “Goddamn,” He said, obviously pleased. Aspen would be pretty pleased too, with a good-looking girl on top of her, but it was more than that. He was proud. Maybe he didn’t resist her maneuver, but he hadn’t been expecting it, either.
After that, Aspen didn’t waste her time. She leaned in, knitting her fingers in Calums as she kissed him, and he opened his mouth almost immediately to let her kiss him deeper. She felt warm all over. Calum smelled sweaty and rich and it was driving her wild.
Calum pulled back after a moment, and Aspen let him, just so she could catch her breath. She could hear him smile in the small space between them. But his hand slipped from hers to give her waist a gentle squeeze. “We have work,” he reminded her.
Aspen dropped her head into the crook of his neck and pouted her lips, brushing up against his neck. He was right, she just hated to let go of him. It was so recently she got to kiss him at all, it still felt like a privilege. “I guess I’ll let you go this time.” She said, heaving herself off him.
She was picking up her water bottle and towel when she heard Calum find his feet behind her. The mats amplified his sounds. On any other terrain, he’d be soundless. “And here I was gonna tell you to be more aggressive when you’re sparring.”
“I can be aggressive when I’m not fighting a kid.” Aspen said, trying to focus in on the training again. “You saw the security footage.”
Calum reached out and squeezed her elbow. “I did.”
Aspen looked over at him, and he gave her a little smile. Just recently he had seen the footage of Liam attacking her. He had asked her if it would be alright, if he saw it, in that initial talk after he gave her the lab. She had wondered if he had already watched it, but she gave him permission anyways. Based on that, the first moves he had taught her were focused on getting out from under someone. He still wouldn’t spar with her, in case the experience of having a guy try to take her down freaked her out. Aspen was kind of thankful for it. She’d felt nothing but safe with Calum, but she’d also had a few nightmares, and she was gonna take it easy in any way she could at that point. She was tough, and she was gonna stay tough, but that meant not overwhelming herself just to look tough.
They split apart after that, going their separate ways without a kiss goodbye. Aspen had her own bedroom in the manor. She hadn’t been allowed to stay over, but she had a place to keep her work clothes and a four-piece bathroom near the manor’s gym to get showered in every morning. Calum had stocked the room with, she was pretty sure, the most expensive soap you could find in Gotham - the prices when she looked up the brands made her head spin. She left his place every morning smelling like a basil-lavender-sicilian-lemon-rose, and feeling only a little bit like the world’s most complicated one-night stand.
There were rules, you see. And they were good rules, and she understood them and all. Her problem was just the fact that these rules existed. Aspen, historically, had not done super well with Calum’s rules.
He didn’t want Dick to know about them. That was fine, that was something Aspen understood, she didn’t want to waltz into his kid’s life while there was a possibility of them not… not seeing this through. Aspen, for her part, wasn’t crazy about being linked to him in the public eye. She’s seen how his girlfriends get treated in the supermarket check-out line. So that meant she hadn’t been able to stay over, and Dick’s pretty involved in the whole “Batman” thing so she hadn’t been able to have Calum over at hers without raising suspicion, and she wasn’t gonna be able to fuck him at the office, and neither of them could really do the seedy-motel thing, and…
Long story short, these rules meant they haven’t done much more than kissing, and Aspen was starting to lose her shit about it. I mean, if he wasn’t feeling comfortable emotionally, that would have been one thing, but if it was just from circumstance…
Aspen, in the steam-soaked shower, slipped one hand delicately between her legs. God, if only Calum was here. Her body was aching, but she wasn’t tired out yet, and she just yearned for this final bit of tension to be released.
She takes a deep breath and turned around, turning the cold water on until it hurt her skin and gave her goosebumps.
“I don’t think you should be there.” Aspen said, pouring herself a cup of tea. Used to be she only grabbed something caffeinated in the afternoons, when she needed a pick-me-up, but between early mornings training and nights in the Cave she was starting to need more of it.
“It wasn’t a question.” Calum replied, knife clinking against the plate. They were in the kitchen, having breakfast at the little table with Dick while Alfred busied himself around the stove.
“You don’t need to be there the whole time with the DA. I’ll be fine.” She insisted, cracking open a scone. Honey ginger. Alfred was mixing it up this morning.
“I know you’ll be fine, but I want to be there anyways. At least for this first meeting. You're my employee, it'll look good for me to be supportive and involved.”
"Dick thinks you should come home after work and hang out with him instead of coming to the meeting. They grow up so fast." Aspen said, giving both boys a wide eyed, emotional look.
"I think he should be at the meeting, actually." Dick piped up.
Aspen snapped into a glare. "Seen and not heard, Grayson." Dick grinned at her and wiped yolk off his mouth. He knew there was no venom in it. Aspen looked back across the table at Calum, where he was still looking back at her. He could be hard to distract when he wanted to be.
Dick had started watching their spat like a tennis match, poached eggs forgotten, as Aspen geared up for her rebuttal. “As far as the DA knows - and correct me if I’m wrong - Liam and I are just unfortunate employees of yours. I think it might be a little suspicious. You can stop by at the start or the end to say hi and continue your professional relationship with the DA’s office, but I don’t need you to babysit me through the whole thing.” She couldn't say it out loud, but she didn't want to make the DA suspicious that there was something more between them. Romance-wise or caped-vigilante wise. "I mean, you are also Liam’s boss. Do you visit him when he's meeting with his legal team?"
Calum's eyebrow twitched, even though the rest of his face was impassive. Aspen smiled. She knew he loved it when she hit him with a good argument. "I was his boss, and he wouldn't want me there. Also, he did kidnap you."
"Good point. Counter: I also don't want you there."
Calum smiled and ducked his head. "We'll discuss this at work." He said, and Aspen couldn't tell if that meant she won or not.
"I guess we will."
Aspen turned back to her scone, buttering it pointedly. It took a lot of effort to butter something pointedly, but she was determined. She couldn't maintain her facade once she took a bite, though. The scone was still warm, melted butter running through the fluffy insides over chunks of candied ginger - fuck, she was going to have to take another cold shower. "Mr. Pennyworth, another triumph." She announced.
"Thank you, Ms. McMichael." The butler called over from the stove. "Again, I did ask you to call me Alfred."
"And I asked you to call me Aspen, so it looks like we're at an impasse, huh." She said, after another bite.
Dick caught her eye as she set about buttering the other half of her scone, and something in his gaze almost made her pause. Hm. That looked like trouble. Maybe it was time she saw herself out. "I think I'm gonna head out now. My big meeting at the hospital is tomorrow and although I have some wealthy patrons and the like behind me, I want to be prepared." She took her napkin off her lap and downed the rest of her tea quickly, winking at her wealthy patron across the table. “Plus if we’re, uh, working late tonight I need to get it done as soon as possible so I can focus.”
“Good luck!” Dick said cheerfully.
Aspen gave him the stinkeye, even though she appreciated the sentiment. “I’m gonna kick your ass tomorrow morning.” She promised.
“Like hell you will.”
“Not at the table, if you please, Master Grayson.”
Aspen stuck her tongue out at Dick as she left. Calum shook his head near-imperceptibly at her, but he was fond, she could tell. At least, that was probably fond. She’d put $5 on it.
“Hopefully I won’t see you gentlemen tonight.” She said as Alfred came over to help her with her coat.
“Let’s hope.” Calum agreed from the table. He hadn’t gotten up. “Let’s meet after lunch to discuss the meeting?”
Aspen knew she wasn’t getting out of this. “Drop by the lab whenever.” She sighed. “See ya, boys!”
She smiled to herself on the way out the door. One of the best things about this new life was finding a place at Hood Manor. She had been disconnected from her roommates ever since the promotion to PA, and now, with her fucked up hours at work and in the Cave, she saw them less than ever. It was nice to have somewhere she fit again, that was all. Being the person who drank tea with Alfred while Cal and Dick, for some reason, took decaf coffee. Being Dick’s godforsaken sparring partner. It felt a little bit like having a life.
Aspen slid into the driver’s seat of her car. Her new car. Not just new to her, either, new new. There wasn’t a convenient transit route up to the Manor, and if she was coming up every morning before work and every night after, Calum figured he’d just… buy her a car. He didn’t fuck her on top of it, it didn’t get THAT shades of grey, but holy shit, she had a quasi-boyfriend who bought her a car. She still felt a little thrill every time she turned the key in the ignition. He had offered to pay for gas, too, but she had insisted on taking care of that herself. He would have, though. If she let him. He would have taken care of everything.
Sometimes Aspen wonders what might have happened if things had unspooled differently. If, after Calum had kissed her that night, she hadn’t gone back to help Liam. Maybe if she had played her cards right she’d be burning in the sun in Mexico, or on an iron-wrought balcony in Paris. Maybe Calum would have been with her. Probably not. Aspen was almost certain she’d made the right choice, in the end. I mean, she had this car, now. But she wondered, every so often.
She always took the long way to work, and today (after she took advantage of the parking spot with her name on it) she stopped by the coffee shop around the corner. It still felt weird, to be able to buy a tea in the morning without going into a shame spiral over wasting her money on something she could make at home, and how she was gonna waste all her money on this, and drink herself into poverty like some Charles Dickens character on hard Earl Grey. The baristas were starting to remember her. It felt surreal. She used to be a barista remembering people and trying to get a perfect ristretto shot -- not in Gotham, but while she had been in school. This was gonna wear off eventually, she was sure, getting knocked on her ass every few minutes about the intangible what-the-fuck-ness of her life, but for now…
Her current project at work was teaching herself programming. Well, she called it teaching herself. Whenever she got really stuck, something she couldn’t fix with a google search and a prayer, she’d wander down the hall to whatever software engineer had the best opinion of her at this point. She was learning some basics - she was getting ambitious for sure, trying to code a machine-learning AI to create an index of violent deaths in Gotham, comparing the crimes to the villain they were attributed to or proven to be from. Anyone could look at a corpse with facial rictus and say it was a Joker special, but she’d be interested to see if there were any less obvious signatures from Gotham’s flourishing criminal community that they just hadn’t noticed.
When she got really frustrated, she’d take a break, roll her chair back and slouch and try to collect her thoughts. She had a few tanks of critters Calum hadn’t noticed until after they had moved in, and she let him and Dick name most of them, so he wasn’t mad about it. She watched the axolotls, Martha and Achilles, wiggle around the aquarium for a minute.
She hasn’t started a proper research project yet. She’s been running PCR gels and such for Calum, especially back at the Cave, but for a while she hadn’t been able to think of exactly what she wanted to dedicate her time and extensive resources to until Calum had to fight off a Venom-crazed junkie and came back bruised and bloody. That wasn’t exactly new, but the other guy hadn’t made it through the withdrawal combined with the stress from the injuries. Then Aspen knew. Might as well give back to the hospital that gave her her first stitches since that canoe trip when she was sixteen, right? They needed it most, too. Venom wasn’t really starting to get national attention yet, partly from the mayor’s attempts to keep it quiet. Cal had filled her in on that.
Anyway, she was meeting with the board tomorrow to see if they’d approve the collaboration with her as chief liason. Which. She was gonna be one of the only people without “Dr.” before her name in that room and she was gonna be coordinating a big research project, hopefully meaningfully participating in it, and - it was big, was all.
Maybe it was good that she hadn’t slept with Calum yet. Wouldn’t want to think that this was just because she was a pretty face.
Well. Such as it was. She rubbed her scar absentmindedly, staring at her computer screen.
She heard Calum’s footsteps before he knocked on the doorframe of the lab. When she wasn’t doing wet lab, Aspen liked to leave the door open. If Calum happened to be swinging by, he’d be able to see her at her computer and know she was okay without having to duck in. Of course, he did also have cameras in the room, but she liked to think he noticed and appreciated this too.
She turned in her chair and gave him a smile before she spoke. She was still being careful about what she said to him at work, at least while the door was open. “How’s it going, boss?” She grinned, raising an eyebrow at him.
That was careful for her, anyways.
“Always a pleasure, Ms. McMichael.” Calum didn’t smile back, but he had a warm look in his eye, and that was enough. “I was hoping to talk about the meeting at the DA’s this evening. May I?”
His hand was on the doorknob. Aspen was almost squirming in her seat. “Please.” She said, in her most polite voice, and Calum closed the door.
Immediately, Aspen stood up and started to walk over to him. Not too fast. He didn’t need to know how eager she was for him to just touch her again. Calum looked her up and down as she walked over, jaw flexing. “I really do want to talk about the meeting.” He said.
Aspen didn’t reply until she was already within arm’s reach and Calum’s hands had closed around her waist and pulled her in. She leaned closer, the tip of her nose brushing his cheek as she ghosted her lips over his. “I know you do.” She said, so close she knew he could feel her lips flex into the words.
Calum groaned, lips parted, eyes already closed, waiting for her to lean in and complete the kiss. Aspen knew that. She didn’t move. After a long, long second, Calum groaned again and grabbed the back of her neck, pulling her in for a kiss with mouths already half-open, deep, totally work inappropriate. Aspen couldn’t help but smile against his mouth, pressing her body up against his so close she almost fell when he stepped her back until her back hit something he could kiss her up against. He smelled clean now, like boy and expensive cologne, and Aspen knew for the rest of the day she’d be smelling him on her skin. Fuck.
After a few long moments, he drew back, keeping one hand tight in her hair so she couldn’t chase his lips. He’d picked up on doing that surprisingly quickly, and she kind of wished it didn’t turn her on so much. “You’re a terrible tease, you know that, darling?” He murmured as she tested his grip.
Once she established that he wasn’t going to let her go for another kiss, Aspen leaned her head back, looking at him through half-lidded eyes, throat open and unmarked. “What’re you gonna do about it?”
Calum closed his eyes and huffed out a breath, finally letting her go as he rolled so he was next to her, back up against the same wall. “Nothing. For now.” He conceded, finding her hand without opening his eyes.
“Oh, good, no consequences.” Aspen teased once she had caught her breath, rubbing her thumb along his knuckles. Calum cracked his eyes open and turned his head to smile at her as she brought his hand to her lips and kissed the knuckle of his pinky finger, then the ring finger, then the middle, then the pointer. Then, once he had been lulled into a false sense of security, she slipped her fingers out of his and grabbed his wrist, pulling two of his fingers into her mouth to the first knuckle before he could make a fist and cut her off. She could feel him test her grip as she drew her tongue along the underside, but he was more than strong enough to break her hold entirely, and he didn’t. Aspen met his eyes and hollowed her cheeks, and when he experimentally pushed his fingers a few centimeters deeper she let go of him and let her hand trail down to grip his forearm, putting him in complete control.
“Fuck, Penny, look at you.” Her heartbeat picked up as he experimentally started to fuck her mouth with his fingers. He never went deep enough to gag her, but he started to use a little more force, and she let him. Was this how it was gonna happen? Up against a wall in her lab? Would he bend her over her desk so she couldn’t sit down to work without thinking about his grip on her hips, his hand in her hair? Calum was looking at her like he’d devour her if he could, fixated on her lips wrapped around his fingers, but when their eyes met again he snapped out of it, withdrawing his fingers and using that hand to grip her jaw, palm pressed against the ridges of her throat. It felt like he knocked the breath right out of her. Aspen groaned and tested his grip, but she wasn’t going anywhere.
Calum watched her squirm for a second, smile on his lips when she relaxed. “God, you’re a menace.” He said. She could feel the cool wetness of his fingers against her jaw. It had only been a few seconds, but the feeling would stay with her all day.
She took a deep breath to try and calm the pounding of her heart, regain her composure. “Means a lot to hear it from you, sir.” She smiled.
Calum moved in for a quick kiss, a peck, and he kept his hold on her the whole time so she couldn’t chase his lips and draw him back in. “You really have to stop that.” He said, letting her go, and this time Aspen was ready to focus and not try to make out with her illicit boyfriend.
“Fine.” She sighed, walking back to the desks and pulling out a chair for him, too. Not that she had stopped her seduction entirely. She knew he was watching her walk away. “Step into my office. Let’s talk about the appointment with the DA.”
In the end, Aspen got her way. Kind of. They decided together that Calum would accompany her to the DA’s office, but not stick around too long. He was not to be coming into the meeting with her. She was putting her foot down. He made it hard, given that he was adorable and kept trying to give her little touches to get her to cave.
Unfortunately, she didn’t have to suck his dick to get him to agree. Next time, maybe.
As Calum left, he paused with his hand on the doorknob. He hadn’t opened the door yet, which was the only reason he smiled and said “Be good,” after he kissed her goodbye at her desk.
Aspen grinned lopsidedly. “Oh, I’m very good, sir.”
Calum sighed, fingertips still on the doorknob like he didn’t want to leave. “Stop. You know what that does to me.” He almost pouted.
Aspen was delighted. She liked when they could have serious, intense, sexually charged moments, but this was fun. “I have no idea what you’re talking about, boss.” She said, without bothering to feign innocence.
“Sure.” Calum shook his head. “I’ll meet you back here when it’s time to leave for the DA’s office, alright?”
“Sounds good. Have a very calm and productive day.” She said, and she meant it, a little. She didn’t want him distracted by their unbearable sexual tension for the whole afternoon. That would just be cruel.
He laughed as he opened the door to leave. “Likewise, Ms. McMichael.”
Aspen didn’t say goodbye, just smiled at him as he left. She knew if she did, it would come out too soft, too fond, and if any of her coworkers were passing by they might hear it and get suspicious. It was fun, for a second, to feel like she was caught in an office affair without the violence and terror and legal frustration of the other half of her life. For a second, she pretended to be a regular scientist, just trying to violate HR regulations and fuck her boss.
She smiled and shook her head to clear it. She had to get back to work.
A couple of days ago I made a post featuring a fake ad I made which was essentially satire regarding F1 as a sport. The post kinda blew up and got more notes than anything I’ve posted in a while, which was incredible and I’m extremely grateful to everyone. Then, somebody commented this on the post:
And I’ve been thinking about how to respond to this for a while now, because my initial reaction was frustration, then apathy, then puzzlement. I’m not entirely sure why you, dear commenter, decided to comment on a post that was clearly satirical and attempting to call out the flaws in a fandom that you are not even a part of. But you bring up an interesting point.
Because, honestly, I can’t really defend F1 in this manner. I can’t defend the actions of the FIA or their bullshit “we race as one” marketing strategy. I can’t defend the fact that the sport is predominantly made up of white men. I can’t defend the fact that everything is money-driven, proven by the fact that they’ve chosen to hold a race in Saudi Arabia next year. I can’t defend the drivers that don’t kneel or the drivers that use slurs or the drivers that wear hate symbols on their clothing. And honestly, they don’t deserve to be defended.
What I can defend, however, is the fandom. Not all of it, of course, because as with any amassed group of people there will be those who take it to the extreme, those who misunderstand the core of the sport, those who treat the people they claim to like just as badly as they would those they hate. But the side of the F1 Fandom that I’ve seen? The side that I've chatted and blogged and tweeted with and grown into for the past months?
Far different.
We are the fandom that cries for drivers we’ve never met after a single bad race. We are the fandom that designs and dreams of our own teams, where the drivers can be loved and supported the way they deserve, where We Race As One really means just that because we do really want it to. We are the fandom that rose up in defense of Alex Albon when he was under fire by people with unfair power. We are the fandom that unconditionally supports lewis Hamilton and his 93 race wins, knowing how far he’s still got to go. We are the fandom that couldn’t wait to watch him break that record. We are the fandom that never gives up on a driver, that wants to support and love them no matter what place they come in.
More than that, we are the fandom that KNOWS of all the flaws in the sport. We are the fandom that calls the FIA out on their bullshit because they too-often deserve it. We are the fandom that's aware of what a bigot Max Verstappen can be, and the majority of us have relinquished all support of him and his actions. We are the fandom that waits with bated breath for the first female or LGBTQ+ racer because we know how much everyone deserves representation. We are the fandom that despises the actions of every power-hungry higher up that treats the drivers or the inclusivity initiative like they’re nothing.
My post was, again, satire. I’m well aware of every issue you may have with F1, and probably more. I do not wish to debate, argue, or mock you, dear commenter, in any way. I understand where you are coming from. My point is that you cannot generalize about an entire fandom in this manner, and you certainly cannot do it without understanding the fandom yourself.
Our sport may not be perfect. We may not be perfect. But we’re trying our best, just like any other fandom. Please let us keep growing.
okay, so Calum doesn’t get shirtless or anything in this chapter - he doesn’t even show up so i figured i’d at least give you guys the benefit of this picture. anyway this is the penultimate chapter of The Devil Wears Kevlar! Next week is gonna be super action packed so mark your calendars. After that... we’ll just have to see. other news includes trigger warnings: Aspen briefly experiences something akin to a PTSD panic attack, and there are mentions of death of a loved one but honestly they’re not as intense as the other chapters I just thought I’d let you know ANYWAY HAVE FUN I CAN’T WAIT UNTIL NEXT WEEK
“Mac! Look alive!”
Aspen jerks her head up. Ashton was looking at her across the lab, eyebrows raised. Right. She had been doing - um, she had been working on…
“I’d really like that graph by the end of the day.” Ashton prompts gently.
Right! Graph. Jesus, was that all? It really shouldn’t have taken her this long to begin with. “Yeah, sorry, I’m just having trouble with the statistics. There’s something weird about the indications of significance. I’ll fix it and then it’s all yours.” She says quickly, focusing on the graph in front of her and not just middle distance.
Ashton smiles bittersweetly at her. She can see it out of the corner of her eye. She probably wasn’t supposed to notice that. The thought is surprisingly funny; it’s just one more thing she’s not supposed to see. “Thanks, Mac.” He says before he turns back to his own work.
“Mac” is new. He never called her that before her little, uh, incident. He wouldn’t have let her work on the error bars on her own before, either. He would have come over and fixed them himself and printed it, while he was at it. Unmean but brisk, with no room for weakness.
Was that what she was these days? The team’s weakness?
Aspen taps a little harder on the keyboard. It helps a little.
It’s been a week. A whole week since her untimely dismissal from the great office of Mr. Calum Hood. A little more than that since her cheek had gotten filleted. She was going to get the stitches taken out that evening after work. It was pissing her off that the rest of her wasn’t healing as quickly.
Oh. She blinks at the screen. Turns out the statistics were an easy fix. She hits print and takes the tiny commute to the printer before handing it to Ashton. He smiles at her for it, but his eyes catch on her scar again. Only for a second, but she notices. It happens a lot now, but she still notes it, every time. She can’t help it.
Personally, she kinda thinks the cut looks rakish. She’s started answering to inquiries about it with “you should see the other guy” and her very best mischievous smile, and people usually act a little more relaxed after that, which is nice. At night when she’s brushing her teeth, though, she finds herself looking at it and wondering if she’s always going to be introducing people to her scar.
Still, it could be worse. Falcone’s never gonna call her his pretty little girl ever again.
He’s in trouble. That’s another thing that’s changed over that week. Falcone’s been indicted for a bunch of charges related to the Sionis and Trident murders, and he’s pleading not guilty but they’ll just see how it all shakes out in court. Her only contact with Calum is emails from his lawyers updating her on what the prosecution needs from her in anticipation of the trial. She can’t believe she’s going to be so stupid as to testify against a mobster, but hey, she has a feeling the night guard is going to be keeping an eye on her for the next few weeks.
It’s funny; she feels paranoid, but it’s not paranoia if it’s true, right? After a few days of anxiously taking taxis everywhere, worrying that the cabby is on Falcone’s payroll, she allows herself the much cheaper danger of walking home. She’s heard a lot more suspicious noises on rooftops lately. Maybe it’s just wishful thinking, but it’s nice to pretend Calum is looking down at her from above and getting pissed that she’s on her own like that. Maybe if she starts waltzing into crack dens he’ll talk to her again. Maybe she’ll join a Russian roulette team.
Aspen toys with the thought of taking up cliff diving as she settles back down at her desk. The BAMF project is going swimmingly - they decided to use Tencel for the bandages and now she was helping to determine a good formula for the “healing fluid”. She loved doing R&D like this. It was only a mixture of salts and synthetic proteins, but she could make it sound like miracle juice. If she hadn’t been quite so observant that night, she would have been thrilled to be back down in the lab, doing what she loved.
But here she was.
It’s 4:30, and although it’s only a Monday she can still read the atmosphere in the lab. She’s not likely to be needed any more tonight. Plus, she’s gonna run out of mutilation-based sympathy at some point, she might as well use it while she can. “Hey, Ash, is it cool if I head out?” She says, rolling her chair over towards his desk. “I want to get my stitches out and there might be less of a wait if I go now. You know, so I miss the rush of all the people who also get off at 5 and need to get their stitches taken out.”
Ashton chuckles, putting the graph aside for a second. “Will you come in early tomorrow to score the mice?” He says, after a long moment.
Good. That’s good. She’s edging away from pity. “Yeah, sure, whatever you want. I’ll bring you something from the gift shop.” Aspen teases as she walks her chair back to her desk to grab her things.
It will be nice to come in early, anyways. She finds that she misses the half-hour of quiet she used to get before the day began. Being the first in the lab and checking up on the mice, changing their bandages and marking how they’ve healed, sounds really nice right about now. She’s always felt a bit of resonance with those little animals, anyways. She, too, is soft and skittish and just wanting to sleep in a pile of wood shavings.
As she enters the elevator, she lets herself think for the first time that maybe it’s good that Calum didn’t let her join him. It’s a thought that’s been hovering around the edges of her mind for weeks, but only now is it becoming concrete. She thinks she’s tough, sure, but she’s let herself be treated so gently the last few days and she’s starting to think she might miss it. Maybe she’s more delicate than she ever imagined. I mean, if she identifies with a mouse, how’s she gonna stand up to fucking Catwoman? Maybe Calum didn’t try to transfer her out of spite, or a pigheaded desire to protect her. Maybe he just saw something in her, some hairline fractures that would widen into faults under any pressure. Maybe he heard her tell Liam what time he got into the office.
Not that it mattered. She’d never see him again.
She had tried. The day she had been, uh, let go, she had tried to come back at the end of the day. Her excuse was that she wanted to say goodbye to Janet, but she was really hoping to talk to Calum about some of the evidence she had collected and just… make her case properly, she didn’t know. But when she had said hello to Jan, let herself be hugged and fussed over, once that was all out of the way, well… “He doesn’t want you up here.” Janet had told her, glancing at Mr. Hood’s office door. It was closed. Aspen didn’t know if he was in there, if he was listening. “He told me to tell you he was out if you ever came up. I’m really sorry, Aspen, but you know how he gets.”
It had been another blow, then, the kind that left you mercifully numb for a while before it started to hurt. “I understand.” She had managed, finally. “You’re just doing your job. Oh, my god, you’re gonna have so much work now.” And that had been that.
Now she wondered if it had been a test. If she was supposed to march in there and demand he at least let her talk to him, goddamn it, so she didn’t go crazy sitting on all this. But if it was a test, she had failed, and it was no one’s fault but her own.
It was nice outside, but windy, and on her walk to the hospital the breeze picked up her hair and whipped it around her face. She had started wearing it down more, at least while her cut still looked raw and meaty when it wasn’t bandaged up, but it was just getting annoying now. She wasn’t sure why she was even bothering to hide the cut. It wasn’t even that gross now, anyways, and if she could live with it so could that weird guy on the train who had stared at her so long he almost missed his stop.
The waiting room in Gotham General was busy, which shouldn’t have surprised Aspen. Shit went down in this city every single day. Maybe Calum had popped out on his lunch break to break a few arms. The thought of him in that Armani suit busting kneecaps was funny, making her bite her lip as she checked in.
He did that a lot, you know, she’d read an analysis of injuries attributed to the Bat. She was just thankful she had fallen stupid head over heels for a vigilante that practiced non-lethally. It made sense; he had an incredible position of power, and if he used that power to kill people who had been struggling all their lives - like, if he had killed the Joker she would have been cool with it, but the thugs, the kids like Liam… She wouldn’t have been able to stand for that.
She pulled a scientific journal out of her bag and settled in to wait. She wanted something good to bring up at the next lab meeting, put this period of weakness behind her. She had a feeling the efficiency of the collagen synthesis could be improved. They were currently using cultures of mouse fibroblasts to produce it, since using yeast hadn’t worked out, but she had seen some recent research on using insect stomach lining to produce another factor that hadn’t been viable in yeast models, and maybe if they -
Aspen heard a bang, far off, and jumped in her seat. So did the man next to her. Her heart started thumping, and she reminded herself that this wasn’t another incident. She wasn’t in any danger. She could hear yelling, back in the ambulance bays, but this was a hospital. Some people were scary when they were sick. There were people here trained to keep them and her safe. She should know, her grandpa had been dangerous in his last few days in the hospital, he had been a big football player (the shouts were getting louder) and in his last few days, in his last few days he had been so angry and he had to be restrained, she understood it could happen to anyone -
The bay doors were there one moment, and then she saw them bend. Aspen’s rising panic catches in her throat. It was happening again. She stands up, quickly, scrabbling in her jacket pockets for that knife. She had stopped carrying it a few days ago, feeling silly, but now, now - fuck, it really wasn’t there, why hadn’t she kept it - someone huge and hulking ran through the waiting room, yelling, screaming something, and burst through the sliding doors like the glass was just rain. It was over in a second. Aspen stands there, flooded with adrenaline, as a few orderlies and security guards chase after the woman. There are fat drops of blood among the broken glass.
The nurses are saying something to calm the room down. Aspen can’t hear it. Fuck, she had thought - she had really thought, for a second, that shouting, that something was for her. She sits back down. Her journal is all crumpled now.
Fuck.
But she stays. Some people leave, but she stays. She needs to get her stitches out, and anyways there’s nowhere safer when a big beefy thug is on the loose than the place said thug was trying to escape. Right?
Her name gets called soon enough, and she gets to wait a little longer in a little emergency room cubicle until a doctor can come and slip the stitches out of her face. The doctor’s a little shaken, too. She doesn’t make much small talk as she’s cleaning up Aspen’s face with an alcohol wipe. Aspen’s still sweaty and jittery. “I know there’s like doctor-patient confidentiality, but can I ask… is that lady gonna be okay? She just ran through that door like -”
“I’m sure she didn’t feel it.” The doctor says, setting the wipe aside. She’s still focused on Aspen’s face, she won’t look her in the eye for more than a coincidental fraction of a second. “You never saw someone on Venom before?”
“Venom?”
The doctor smiles. Her hands are cold. “You’re new to Gotham, aren’t you?”
“Yeah. I’m gonna have to start learning a little faster.” Aspen says, glancing at the blurry red line that was her scar in her own vision.
“Oh, I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to -”
“No, no, it’s okay. I’m very new.”
“I saw the report from when you got the stitches in. You’re very brave.”
“Thank you.” Aspen says, quickly. She doesn’t want to talk about that, just get the stitches out. “But, uh, what exactly is Venom?”
“‘S a drug. Only really around in Gotham. We’re trying to figure out an effective treatment for - depending on the dose, it can make you feel really strong and euphoric, and if you take enough it just - it has this unbelievable effect on the muscles. It’s incredible.” Aspen feels scissors snip right by her face, cold where they brush her cheek. “And we have no idea how to deal with it. Most people we just hold and put on a saline until they detox, but the ones who have OD’d - it’s hard to restrain them.” Aspen feels the threads loosening under her cheek. “This might hurt a little.”
Aspen white-knuckles the edge of the hospital bed she’s sitting on and holds her breath as the suture thread slips right out from under the skin on her cheek.
“Perfect. No bleeding, even. You took good care of it.” The doctor says, putting the suture aside. Aspen looks at it on the tray. It has a few bits of her face stuck to it, pieces of healing scabs. It looks so small.
As she says thank you and prepares herself to go, the doctor stops her with a look as she’s washing her hands. “The report said you saw the Batman?”
Aspen feels a twinge of pain, and curls a hand into a fist to try and hide it. “Yeah, he, uh, basically saved my life.”
The doctor turns off the tap. Her eyes are shining. Aspen wonders how young she is. “What’s he like?”
“Oh, uh… brisk, I guess.” Aspen blinks. “He didn’t really give me a chance to get my bearings, y’know, he just hauled me up and pulled me out the window. It was all really fast.” It’s different, telling this story to a stranger. She wants to make herself sound braver in it. Make Calum sound kinder. Well, he saved her life, that was kind. Easier, she guesses.
The doc is still looking at her expectantly. Aspen feels a little glow of pride, attaching herself to the Bat like this. She’s never really thought about him this way. “Um… He’s really caring, when you get down to it. When he took me to the squad car the cops had their guns drawn at first because, you know, he’s like a vigilante and all, but it really freaked me out. He got between me and them and made them put their guns down before he let me get in the car. He didn’t have to do that. I know the vigilante thing is kind of controversial, but I think he really is a good guy, you know?” She shrugs, wondering if her little smile gives anything away. That she knows him. That she’s fallen for him before.
“Wow.” Says the doctor. “Yeah, wow. That’s incredible. I’m so glad you’re safe.”
“Yeah, well, me too.” Aspen’s smile is easier, now. It feels different, without her cheek stitched up.
The doctor laughs. Aspen feels charming again, even with the scar. “Yeah, well, the next time you see him, tell him to look into that Venom stuff, alright? We could really use the - what do they call him, the - the world’s greatest detective on this case.”
“I haven’t heard that one before.” Aspen says, taking a step into the hallway.
“Well, it’s what they call him. Have a good night, alright?”
“You too!” Aspen gives a little wave to the doctor, and finds her way back to the emergency room exit. Someone has already swept up most of the glass.
It sticks in her mind as she begins walking to the subway. Someone should tell him. Bring his attention to this. A new street drug without a treatment was a bad thing no matter what, but if it made you strong enough to bend steel - Batman should turn some of his thousands of dollars in funding to that.
World’s greatest fucking detective. He couldn’t detect his way out of a paper bag.
That was mean. Aspen just thought that at him because she was bad. Probably if it was a big paper bag he could manage.
Anyway, it didn’t matter if she should tell him about it or not. Calum Hood had decided never to see her again, and it wasn’t like Batman had an open door policy.
Wait.
The Batman was supposed to be a ghost; you never knew where he was going to be. Except she knew, and the GCPD knew, that at the next major disaster he would be there. And he wasn’t going to ignore her if she showed up there, all cute and vulnerable without a bulletproof vest. He’d see she was serious. He’d see she could take the heat. And he’d see there was even a convenient project for her to work on to keep her cover.
Was she really going to do this?
Aspen took a deep breath. She didn’t have to decide now. If something came up, she’d think about taking that risk.
It was the kind of thing you couldn’t take back.
For the next few nights, Aspen compromised. She listened to the news while she was doing dry lab prep, and turned on all the notifications on her “Gotham News & Alerts” app, but she didn’t, like, start going out and trying to buy Venom right from the source. It gave her time to think. Really, it was bold of her to think he didn’t already have a crack team of biologists - just that he preferred the processing of the GCPD lab so they had it all recorded, maybe. He had to have a real reason for this, other than just... doing this to hurt her.
She was working on her miracle juice when it happened, with the news on and some 80s pop playing overtop to help her focus. There had been a break-in at an upscale cocktail party, which was good, and a riot at the Arkham Asylum - nothing huge, that happened all the time. Batman probably didn’t get called for those. When the news came through, she almost missed it under her music.
“The small riot at Arkham Asylum-” Ha, Aspen thought, small riot. “-has escalated after Pamela Ivey, a.k.a. Poison Ivy, began to demolish the heritage building. Known for her control over plant life, Ivey has used her abilities to destroy the foundation of the building. No inmates are reported missing, but GCPD are suggesting that all citizens in the area begin evacuation to the city centre. We’ll bring you updates as they come, but for now, we turn to journalist and Gotham history expert -”
Aspen bit her lip and tried not to freak out. Just because it was the first disaster to come along since her painful rejection, that didn’t mean it was time to make her move. What was she going to do during a prison break, anyways? She didn’t know anything about working with psychiatric patients, or overseeing evacuations, or -
“Update now from Arkham Asylum, police efforts to control the plant growth are failing. Experts are now trying to evacuate the Asylum in preparation for controlled burn, but analysts are concerned that moving large groups of inmates might end up just like every other -”
Plants. Jesus Christ, she knew biology. She couldn’t believe it didn’t hit her sooner. Aspen squints at the news report and tries to do some on-the-spot identification. Her pulse was racing. Taxonomy had her pulse racing. She couldn’t believe it. Now she got why Calum did this.
She needs to focus. It looked like… like… It looked like jute. Okay, there was that. She knew the plant. She knew the plant! Fuck, okay, she couldn’t get ahead of herself. Focus. She had read something about jute recently, something as to why it wasn’t bigger as a source of natural fiber… part of it was the water required, part of it was… cold sensitivity. The plants didn’t respond well to cold! That was how they were gonna beat this without burning down a heritage building. Batman had to have something that could do that, right?
Oh my god. She actually had to do this.
Aspen takes a deep breath. She had thought that she would have a choice, when the time came. That she’d be able to weigh her options objectively, and maybe sit this one out if it came to that. But she couldn’t. Her mind was already racing. She’d stick a textbook and a cookie sheet in her backpack, improvise some armor. She should wear black. If they were evacuating inmates, she should plan for the worst, this was Gotham after all. She packed her pocket knife.
As Aspen hustled to the door, she paused with her hand on the knob. She should say goodbye to her roommates. In case -
No. She couldn’t. It might destroy whatever foolhardy courage had gotten her this far.
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why could I be putting a gif of Cal with a skull on his face up??? does Aspen die from a loss of ear blood??? scroll on, gentle reader, and soon all will be revealed. I will say real quick this chapter does have a content warning for violence again so consider yourself warned!! ok bye I hope you love it!!!
Aspen didn’t know what was going on for a few seconds, which is a very long time when you are bleeding and tied down and cold. The dark figure who had come through the gaping window wasn’t alone; little black birds seemed to follow him in, and now they were swarming the room, making the air rustle around her. The man, Angelo, who had been cutting her ear off, she heard him swear, and the black figure charged him. They both ran into the chaos of the room behind her, so Aspen tried again to take stock of what was in front of her.
Don Falcone was on the floor. When had that happened? Through the swirling of wings around her, Aspen could see one of the little animals clinging to his skin. No. She saw the glint of metal in the floodlights. Not an animal. A little robot. Some drone. And not a bird -
“Aspen.” The Batman says, standing over her. She had forgotten Gotham had a Batman. He reaches out, and she doesn’t flinch as he cups her face, dark gloves wiping at tears and blood. “You’re safe now. I’m gonna get you out of here.” He says, but even as he does he turns her head to look at her injuries. He runs his thumb over the cut on her face - under his touch, she can feel the edges of it. So that’s what happened when the knife slipped. He doesn’t touch her ear, thankfully, but that’s how she knows it’s bad.
She should thank him. He saved her life, she should thank him. “I didn’t think anyone was gonna find me.” She said instead, finding his eyes through the mask.
He breaks her gaze almost immediately. “I’m gonna get you out of this chair.” The Batman says, and he lets go of her and moves behind her. He does something with the chains - something that sparks, she can feel it on the backs of her legs and her arms each time before she hears metal hit the floor and feels a little freer. When her wrists are freed last she stands up, even though she stumbles immediately as blood flows back through her. “Careful,” the Batman says, sounding vaguely annoyed, and he reaches out to steady her at the waist. “Come on. We’re going back out the window.”
“What?”
He’s walking her, rushing now, half-carrying her to his unconventional entrance every time she stumbles. “You’re not going to fall, but if you do, I’ll catch you.”
“I’m - wait, wait -” Aspen says, trying to touch her face to assess the damage.
The Batman doesn’t stop. “I’m not waiting until Falcone and his gang come to. Hold on to me. Ready?”
Aspen’s not looking at him. She’s looking back into the half-built room, where she can count three bodies on the floor. Limp bodies. What exactly had happened? The Batman’s got no patience for that; he’s grabbing her arms, throwing them around his neck until she grabs her own wrist with a cold hand for purchase. One of his arms wraps tight around her waist, where she can feel the hard edges of body armor jut into her back. With the other arm, the Batman reaches out into the space above the city and shoots out some kind of line. She can feel his body jerk with it as it connects to something out in the darkness. His grip on her tightens. “Don’t look down, okay?”
She doesn’t have a second to react as the Batman steps out over the edge and pulls her with him, falling through the air for a stomach-churning second before whatever he’s using kicks in and starts to haul them up in a parabola towards another skyscraper. She can’t look. Aspen’s not afraid of heights, she’s been rock climbing before. But now she knows she is distinctly untethered, and she clings a little harder to the man who saved her life. His armour digs into her skin, but at least this way she knows she’s still safe.
She almost died this way five minutes ago. It’s a chillingly clear thought, even as her stomach turns from vertigo.
She tries not to scream as they stop moving, suddenly. It takes her a whole second to realize that they’re stopped on a rooftop. The little bats have come with them, she notices once she unburries her head from the Batman’s chest. They seem almost friendly now, and they routinely swoop in near her, like they’re curious.
“Alright?” The Batman says. She tries to meet his eyes, but it’s dark and windy and he’s got this stupid pointy mask on. She just nods, and digs her fingers into the ridges of his armour. “Good.” He says. “I’m going to take you to a police officer, he’ll get you to a hospital. It’s just a little further.”
Aspen swallowed hard. Hearing that didn’t help her catch her breath. “And this is the only way to get there?”
“You’re bleeding.” He says. “Hold tight.”
There is apparently no room for argument on that rooftop.
The trip to safety feels so long, jerking from building to building and sometimes going into free fall in midair as the Batman grapples her home. She doesn’t open her eyes again. The wind whistling past her ear was starting to sting - she could feel the blood trickling down towards the back of her neck, tangling with her hair because of the wind. She’d been shaking with adrenaline for so long, her body was finally starting to realize it was hurt. She couldn’t open her eyes from the wind, couldn’t hear over the wind, so she had to just cling in free-fall and feel it all. The arm around her waist wasn’t enough to soothe all this.
After one long, long drop that almost makes her bite through her lip, they drop to the cold cement of the sidewalk and the grappling gun retracted for the last time. One of the bats hovers in her face, chirping at her mechanically when she opens her eyes. She smiles despite herself. She’s totally distracted until she feels the Batman’s voice vibrating through his chest, even through the body armour. “Put your weapons down.”
When Aspen looks up and squints through the flashlights pointed at them, she sees the hollows of a gun and for a second she clings even tighter. “Wait,” she says, hearing Falcone in her head, I am the police. If these are dirty cops, she’ll be back in that chair in a few minutes. She can’t take that a second time. She’ll break and then she’ll die.
“Engage offensive mode.” She’s close enough to hear the Batman say, and in an instant the storm of bats surrounding them centres in on the officers in front of them and goes sharp, feels like a cyclone. She hears a few startled cries in the darkness, and the guns must be put down because he says “Stand down” to the bats, and he turns so less of his body is shielding her.
“Alright, let’s get you out of here - shit.” One of the two cops reaches for her - and the second she flinched, the bat in front of her darted at his outstretched hand and she heard electricity. The Batman chuckles beside her as the officer rubs his hand, swearing almost under his breath. “Jesus.”
“You’re gonna be alright.” The caped crusader says, turning to her. His arm didn’t leave her waist.
“Falcone said -”
“I have it on good authority that these men are clean. Trust me.” And another night Aspen might have protested, but he had just grappling-hooked her over the chasms between buildings. Compared to that, a ride in a squad car could be bearable, right? She nodded hesitantly, and she could have sworn the corner of the Batman’s mouth twitched up. “Good. Stay out of trouble in the future.”
Oh. They were saying goodbye. Aspen blinks. Somehow, it feels too soon. “Thank you.” She says. She has to search for the words - she thanks the barista for Calum’s coffee every morning, and the Batman just saved her life. There’s gotta be something else she can say.
“It’s my job.” He replies, and after a long, long moment he steps back and she hears the grapple gun go off - it’s surprisingly quiet when she’s not in his arms - and then he’s gone. She catches a glimpse of him against the night sky, just one last look; him and the mobile cloud of bats around him.
Wait.
“Autonomous swarm.”
“What?” The cop says. He hasn’t tried to grab her, not this time.
Autonomous swarm. “Nothing.” She says, closing her eyes for a second to try and keep the image of him - the Batman - on her eyelids. Even that’s disappeared after a second.
But she knows what she saw. She knows that mouth, those lips, better than she should. She’s heard that voice - or a voice a lot like that one - from gruff-sounding mornings where she had assumed he was hungover. She knows that tech, goddamn it, if nothing else. She feels dizzy, and this time it’s not just the blood loss. It’s shock, medical or not.
Looking back, she doesn’t know why she doesn’t say something stupid in front of the cop. Maybe it’s just that it’s been a night full of keeping her mouth shut. Holding her tongue for safekeeping. She needs to get it together. Just for a little while. She’s never been an actress, but she’s already been forced into the role the innocent victim. She can play that a little longer. “I’m sorry. I have to go to the hospital.” She says, turning to the officer. “I’m losing blood.” Maybe he’ll take it as an excuse for her hesitance.
The officer’s face softens. Fuck, she must really look bad. “I have gauze for you in my car. We’re four minutes away from Gotham General. Don’t worry,” he says, giving her a smile before he opens the car door.
“First time seeing the bat?” His partner asks under the sirens on the drive there.
Aspen almost laughs. In the red and blue, she can see fingerprints of blood on her arm, glistening there. With the hand that’s not soaking up blood, she lays a finger on the mark. It’s big, bigger than hers. “I think so.” She says, after a moment.
“Get used to it. He’s been busier than ever, these past few weeks.” He smiles at her in the rearview. She grins to herself in the back, and tries not to feel the edges of her wounds through the cloth.
She’s quiet for the rest of the ride. He had known her goddamn name back there, and she hadn’t blinked, wouldn’t have noticed if not for - if she hadn’t noticed those bats - and then he just left her there, with the cops - and she had thought that he could be mixed up in the other side of it, killing men off - god, no wonder he was so stressed all the time. Jesus.
The emergency room is fine. She’s been there before. The wound at her ear is shallow enough to be stitched up, no surgery required, thank god. It’s hard to get the needle through the cartilage there - the doctor says the knife must have been sharp. “It was.” Aspen says, and she hears it detached, almost cool. She’s trying to think, but it’s hard when she’s so numb, and not just from lidocaine.
Her mind’s not on her fucked up ear. The second they told her it would heal and she’d keep her hearing, the second the freezing injection kicked in, she forgot about it. It’s not her face, either. Another surgeon takes a quick look at it, but that sharp knife saved her this time. The edges are clean. Maybe that makes her lucky.
But anyway, that’s nothing. They stitch her up there too, sutures running under the skin like a secret, closing the slash that runs along her cheekbone until just under the outside corner of her eye until it almost looks like a pursed little mouth. But anyway, her mind’s not on that. It’s on the Batman, and autonomous swarms, and suits, and cars, and nicks from shaving, and everything else she’s seen over these few weeks. It’s on Calum Hood.
She allows herself the luxury of thinking it, letting the full phrase form in her mind.
Calum Hood is the Batman.
She can barely think it with a straight face. Like, seriously, what the fuck?
The officers from the ride over are nice to her, when they come back in to take her statement. Of course, she doesn’t tell them everything she knows. Just about Don Falcone, Liam, the questions they asked, and the man who almost butterflied her cheek. When she said Angelo, they exchanged looks. “You’re very lucky, you know that? They only use his real name when they think the vic - uh, the victim won’t be leaving.” It’s not reassuring. She’s a girl who knows too many names now. True names. Like in old fairy stories. They’re supposed to give you power.
Ha.
She uses her new traction as a frail and injured witness to get herself a cup of coffee before the cops leave her again. She can’t afford to get delirious tonight.
The officer she spoke to on the phone that morning - that morning? Jesus - comes to see her personally, and that Officer Gordon asks her a few more questions in a soft voice while another officer swabs under her nails in case she brought any bits of Liam with her after their fight in the parking garage. The analyst is going to put it to the front of the queue, he tells her, it’s what they do in all the Bat’s cases. She just nods, playing shell-shocked. Well. Playing might not be the best word. Does he know? Does Officer Gordon call Calum Hood, or does he call the Batman? Which did she connect that morning?
“Wait, did you find my phone? Can I - I should call my mom, oh my god.” She almost died back there, she’s sure of it, and she had been meaning to call her mom like three days before the gala and then she forgot - she almost didn’t get to talk to her mom again in her life. Oh my god.
“Hang on. Deep breaths, you’re alright.” Officer Gordon has such a good voice for calming people down. “We found your phone. Unfortunately, it is currently being processed for evidence, but you can use mine to call your mother if you know her number off by heart.”
Aspen forces herself to take a deep breath, like he said. “That would be amazing. Thank you so much.”
Gordon gives her a smile and his cell phone, and steps outside the curtain around the bed so she has a little privacy.
Telling this whole thing again - again - Aspen knows she’s going to break down. Might as well get it over with. She plugs in the number and brings the phone to her good ear. It’s probably way too late for her mom to pick up - yeah, she gets answering machine. “Hi mom.” She has to pause to catch her breath. “Um, I have some news for you. And it’s kind of bad. But I’m fine now, so don’t freak out when you hear it, okay? My cell’s in evidence, it might be hard for me to get in contact with you after this. That sounds bad. I’m sorry. But I promise I’m okay. Um. I got a little kidnapped?”
She’s lucky the cut on her cheekbone isn’t longer. If she had cried directly on it she’s sure it would increase the risk of infection.
It’s the wee hours of the morning when she gets home. None of her roommates are up - fuck, she has to write a big announcement email, doesn’t she? Tell the folks back home about all her brand new scars. Aspen stays awake just long enough to bang out a few paragraphs about what happened, saving the details about organized crime, and she hesitates if she should be even talking about, you know... so in the end she holds back. She sends the email, collapses into bed, and for once is thankful that her phone is gone - no calls, no alarms.
Her roommates each wake her up, when they get up and hear the news. Mel cries and offers to stay home from work with her. Paige is in a rush that morning, but she gives her a hug and promises to bring dinner for them so they can relax as a house tonight. When she hears the front door close for the last time, Aspen gets up and slips a chair under her doorknob. She’s seen it work on TV, and her bedroom door doesn’t have a lock, so maybe it’s the next best thing. It helps her fall back asleep, at least.
It’s around two in the afternoon when she wakes up again, and she answers concerned emails in between bites of leftovers at the kitchen table. Calum sent her an email on her personal telling her not to worry about coming into work until she’s ready, which she appreciates.
She’ll be ready, alright.
If there’s one thing she knows how to do, it’s research, and there’s plenty out there for her if she’s willing to dig a little. She’s certain about the Bat’s identity, of course, she knows enough for that, but that’s different from evidence. So she finds evidence. The timeline, for one, is dead simple - the Batman makes his first confirmed appearance within the same week Hood Enterprises announced the prototype for a new material for body armour. The morning Calum had come in “hungover” with pissy, dark circles under his eyes (she wrote the date in her own daybook, a doodle of him angry in the margins, but now she’s glad she did) was just after a major fight by the wharf with some weapons smuggler that the Batman had tidily ended. And, even though it’s anecdotal, it’s true she’s only seen him “cut himself shaving” on the parts of his face a cowl wouldn’t cover.
It keeps blowing her mind, all of this, every time she hits on a new detail. Oh my god. Oh my god. She tries not to think about the kiss while she’s doing her reading, it’ll fuck with her scientific objectivity, but it feels almost as surreal as those electric bats. He pressed her up against a desk and kissed her and held her body like it hurt to let her go, and then he walked away, and then he must have heard later about what someone had caught on a security monitor, or called her cell, and it rang on the floor of the parking garage and no one picked up, and then he saved her and left bloody fingerprints on her and called it a night. How could he just - okay, okay, she’s getting worked up again.
She’s on edge the rest of the night, even though later her and her roommates eat pizza and watch Legally Blonde. She’s going to work Monday, she’s decided that. She’s going to be a good little PA and have Calum’s coffee ready at eight fucking thirty and she’s gonna pencil herself into a spot for a meeting with him and then they’ll see. They’ll just fucking see. He might have body armour but under her soft skin she’s fucking made of kevlar.
She’s feeling a little mad at him, she realizes. She’s pissed that he’s been hiding this from her the whole time, and then the audacity to kiss her and rescue her all in the same night - she was so close to the dark knight of Gotham this whole time and he yelled at her for being late for a meeting once. A meeting! And he was under gunfire every night! God. He was lucky she was so resilient.
She’s not sure if she has the right to be betrayed, but the one thing she does know is that she can help. She wants in. She doesn’t want to wear a bulky suit and fly around like that every night, but she’s smart, and she’s loyal as a dog, apparently, and he needs her. She can help him, if he’ll let her. And once she’s prepared her statement, he’ll let her.
She’s gonna make him regret every second he wasted her talents.
Part 1 Part 2 Part 3 Part 4 Part 5 Part 6 Part 7 Part 8 Part 9
i can’t believe we’ve been doing this so long! You guys are such troupers to follow this nonsense this long. i hope you like this chapter as much as I do. also, i lost my wallet the other day but it turned up today and i couldn’t be happier. also also my roommates have been getting rid of a lot of clothes and now I can have them and it makes me very happy :) anyway enjoy!
Aspen shows up to her usual station outside the office at 8:25. She’s early. She’s prepared, and she wants him to know it. Now that she knows - well, not everything, but a little more, she doesn’t think it’s unreasonable to expect him to be watching her right now. Maybe to make sure she’s steady on her feet. It would be cute, in a very very very creepy way.
She had been googling Liam and Falcone all night, to see if they’d been picked up or anything. Nothing yet. She was trying not to think about it. Gordon had said he’d keep her updated, but radio silence so far. She was trying not to think about it. These days, she didn’t have much faith in anything without a kevlar cowl and an overdramatic cape.
Calum. That kiss - those kisses, rather - their mistake - whatever, it felt so far away in the morning light, out here in the open with her back exposed.
To an outsider, it might have seemed like nothing had changed. Like a spot the difference. Coffee in hand. Too-thin coat bundled around her. Bottom lip pulled into her mouth, teeth worrying it. Check, check, check. But a keen-eyed puzzlemaster might notice the paper schedule was missing from her right hand, and that her hair was down, obscuring her face. A true genius might have seen the new sharp edge to her gaze, the addition of a pocket knife weighing down her coat pocket. Just in case.
The car rolled up like it always did, like the world was clockwork around her. So much had changed, but Alfred’s punctuality remained. It was almost reassuring, Aspen thought as Calum stepped out. Maybe there was something left of the mechanics of her old life to be salvaged.
“You should have taken a few more days off.”
“Good morning to you too, sir.” Aspen said. Usually she’d chirp it, like a hollow-boned sparrow. Not today. But Calum did smile a little, even though he brushed by her without taking his coffee. There are six differences between the picture on the right and the picture on the left. Can you spot them all?
“I was worried about you.” He said, once they had entered the elevator and she had successfully handed off the coffee. “I’m - I’m glad you’re alright.” He meets her gaze directly, not in the mirrored surfaces of the elevator. He looks sleepless, too. Should they hug? Thinking back, Aspen can’t remember if she felt particularly safe in his arms (as Calum Hood) or not, but if he gave her another chance she’d like to find out.
Ding.
Aspen walks on autopilot to her desk, but Calum stops her, grabbing her elbow with a grip so light that she might not have felt it if his skin didn’t feel so hot against hers. “Come into my office?” He says, eyebrows raised politely, before he turns away and lets go of her to head in. He trusts her to follow him.
Jesus, she’s got to stop overthinking his every move.
...she can’t. In the few steps to cross the threshold, a thousand possibilities have run through her mind. Is he asking her in to kiss her again? To talk to her freely, for once, like a real person? Strange that he’s one of the most powerful men in the world and they’re stealing space in offices for safety before they do anything real. He has a literal suit of armour, he shouldn’t have to sneak around like that.
He sits at his desk. Is she in trouble? She can’t be, she hasn’t done anything yet.
This is her chance. Before he says his piece and changes the course of her life again, she’s got to take care of this. “Actually, sir, I kinda had something I wanted to say to you.”
He nods at her to go ahead. He’s so fucking quiet, it’s freaking her out. Her stomach twists, despite all the times she’s mouthed this in the mirror. “I just wanted to thank you for saving me the other night.”
“Well, all I did was ask the night guard to check in on you when you weren’t answering your phone.” He says, with a wave of his hand. The motion is relaxed. Too relaxed. She thinks, for just one moment, she sees through him. It gives her the confidence she needs to go on.
“We both know that’s not what I’m referring to.”
There it is. One of Mr. Hood’s eyebrows quirks up, but the rest of his face is motionless. Another mask. He’s good, though. Aspen almost questions herself. “I’m not sure I know what you mean.”
“Whatever. Just listen.” She says, too quickly. She’s not like him yet, she can’t hide how nervous she is. “I know I can help you. I know the GCPD is expediting all your cases, and I know their forensics lab doesn’t need that extra pressure. I can do PCR and gel electrophoresis, I can do superglue fuming, mass spectrometry. Let me help you.”
Calum’s sitting up now, knuckles white on the armrests of his chair. Has she made a mistake? Well, he looks just a hair too nervous for her to be wrong about the secret identity. Right? Her hands feel sweaty. “Help me with - Miss McMichael, I don’t know what exactly you’re insinuating, but -”
“Don’t you dare.” Nerves and passion make her snap at him, but somehow it works, the Batman holds his tongue. “Calum. I know about your night job. I know I can do this. And,” she says, taking a deep breath before tucking her hair behind her bad ear, “you don’t have to worry. You know I can keep my mouth shut.”
The cut on her face is still a little scary-looking. She had cleaned it up as much as she could that morning, but it’s punctuated by black suture thread on both ends. She knows he knows what it looked like that night, but she wants him to see it now, in the cold light of day. She wants him to see what she can do. All of it. A bloody update to her resume.
His jaw flexes as he takes in the scar on her cheek. Everything is quiet for a moment, just his hot gaze on her face and her watching him watching her, waiting for him to nod, to smile, to give her a fucking approving flex of the eyebrow.
She gets nothing.
In fact, it’s not until he stands up that she realizes that he is mad. There’s anger in the set of his shoulders and she’s seen this directed at her before but it’s never crackled through him like this. He walks around the desk so she has to take a step back to remain a safe, businesslike space between them. Are they still pretending to just be colleagues? She can’t tell.
“I don’t know what you’re insinuating, but I think this experience has affected you more deeply than you would like to let on, Miss McMichael.” He says. Yes, then. Still pretending. He has the fucking nerve to act like he doesn’t know she’s right. Her anger quickens again in her chest. Fuck. “I started the paperwork last night to transfer you to our branch in Central City. I had some qualms about this, but -”
The floor under her feet seems to tip. Central City? “Wait, what?”
“- But now I’m certain it’s for the best. In fact, I might ask to ensure the process is expedited.”
No. No. He can’t. Her stomach lurches. “You can’t do that.”
“Sir.”
Aspen shakes her head. This isn’t possible. This is another test, it’s just another test, and she’s gonna pass. She won’t let this happen. She forces herself to look him in the eye. “Calum. You can’t send me away like that.”
“You would do well to remember your position.” He spits out, every word formed crisply off his tongue like saying this doesn’t bother him in the least. Not a test. This is real. “And I think you’ll find I can. You ought to read contracts a bit more carefully.”
This isn’t him. This was mean. Aspen just needs to think, for a minute, she’s sure she can get a handle on this if she just has a minute to - wait - “It hasn’t been a month. You promised me - we had a verbal contract that if you didn’t want me before a month was up you’d send me back to Dr. Irwin’s lab.” She says, hoping that it’s the right thing to say. If don’t want me - in your office, I mean, you had to send me back to the lab. And- and if I’m here, you can- you can keep an eye on me.”
It’s a hail mary, but Calum seems to still a little to think it over and she knows it’s her best shot to keep herself from losing everything. She takes a deep breath, bites the inside of her lip, and gives in to the urge to duck her head. “Sir.”
Her heart is pounding in the silence that follows. Maybe his hearing is bat-like and he can tell how close she is to arrhythmia. But maybe not, because after a moment he lets out a breath and ducks his head, one hand on his desk as he moves around it to sit back down. Aspen wonders if she’s shaking. She doesn’t know if it’s good or bad.
She just has to pray he wants her nearby.
“...I suppose that will give you a chance to heal, away from all of this.” Calum says after a long moment. Aspen relaxes a little. She’s won. Well, maybe. Somehow it doesn’t feel like it. “I’d like you to clean out your office this morning, as soon as possible.” She just nods, feeling amputated.
He takes another deep breath, looking her over, still and numb on his office floor. “This isn’t out of spite, Miss McMichael. I want what’s best for you.” He says, almost gently. He’s touched her so softly in the past few days. There’s still a part of her that can’t believe he’s doing this.
“I do know what’s best for me, sir.” She says, meeting his gaze for a long moment. But he doesn’t take this chance to say anything more, and she knows that this meeting - whatever it is - is over. “But I’ll clean out my desk.” He nods once. Still nothing. Damn it, she deserves better than this. “Would you like me to bring your daybook in for you?”
He nods again, but at least he says something this time. “Thank you.” Of course, it’s a dismissal.
And just like that, Aspen leaves, still a little too shaken to be angry. She just had a brush with… something. Fuck, she can’t believe he would try and take everything from her like that.
The box she stole from the lab a few weeks ago is still in her office, kicked into a corner like an afterthought. Somewhere deep down, she really thought she could stick it out. Had she been naive? Well, yes, but not about this. She knows herself, knows her limits even better after that nightmare at a high-rise construction site. And yet, here she is, packing up her desk calendar and pencil cup. It doesn’t matter what those limits are, really, she supposes. Calum kicked her out just the same.
When she brings in the daybook, balanced precariously on top of her belongings, Mr. Hood is clicking through something on his computer and he barely looks up to pluck the book off the stack. In fact, he lets her get to the door without so much as a nod before he calls her name, calls her back. She takes a few tentative steps inside, letting the door close behind her.
“I am doing you a favour.” He says, once she’s turned around and met his gaze. Aspen doesn’t know what he wants her to say to that.
It suddenly hits her that this might be the last time she ever sees him.
“Sir?” She said, pausing by the door. She has to ask. She had wondered in that skyscraper if she would have held her tongue if Calum hadn’t kissed her, but it wasn’t until her uneasy sleep last night when she realized the question went both ways. “I need to ask -”
He stands up behind his desk. Obviously he’s in no mood for any more of a fight. “I can still sign those forms if -”
“No! No, it’s not that.” Aspen shakes her head, white-knuckling the box. “It’s nothing like that. It’s just - would you still have, um, called the night guard if we hadn’t… how did you put it?” She wishes her hands were free so she could fidget with them. She can’t look him in the eye. “Hadn’t made that mistake?”
His eyebrows flicker for a second before recognition dawns. Aspen feels very small as he moves around his desk, coming to stand in front of her. It’s a precarious distance he chooses. Just out of arm's’ reach. Not too close, of course, but after the last few days she kind of misses too close. “I would have called the night guard for you no matter what. The second you didn’t pick up, I left the afterparty and I called the night guard. I’d do it again in a heartbeat.”
He waits there, letting her search his eyes for any hint of a lie. It feels generous of him. He never lets her look at him like this. After a long moment, she nods. “Thank you.” She says. “I know I said it - um, earlier, but I’m never gonna be able to say it enough.” She tries not to let her anger well back up inside her; she’d do something to thank him if he let her.
Calum can see it, the threads of frustration running through her. She knows he can see it because he takes a step in, finally holding her hands in his around the box. Aspen almost jolts when he touches her; it’s like he just closed a circuit and now this thing they share is flowing through them. “Is this really how you want it to end?” She blurts out. With all the nervous energy running through her, it’s a wonder she doesn’t step back, break his hold.
He smiles at her, and it’s only a little bittersweet. “Sir.” He reminds her. She wonders if he’ll miss that. Reminding her.
“Sir, please.”
Aspen had always known there were soft things about Calum Hood. There had to be. She had never really seen them, but they had to exist, somewhere, silk and lambswool. He couldn’t be all chrome and steel and tasteful oak.
Now she sees it. He looks at her with all the softness of sunshine in the morning, and when he leans in and kisses her there’s tenderness in his lips. It’s not a kiss like they’d shared before - his mouth presses against hers and gently flexes, a movement so simple and delicate it almost makes her squirm. After a second, he pulls back, resting his forehead against hers for the barest moment before leaning away completely, still holding her hands down on the box.
Aspen’s heart is pounding out of her chest as he tries to smile, letting go of her hands. She sees him hesitate, and then he reaches out and untucks her hair from behind her ear so it covers her scar again. His finger traces gently all the way along her cheek. He doesn’t want to let her go. He’s not going to let her walk out, right?
OOF um I only have the first chapter written and I do want to have more than that ready so I can publish it regularily so not for a little while? If you do want to talk about it we can totally do that but for now we're still waiting on my muse and my schoolwork to cooperate
