#void says stuff

batfam wing au. not sure if it'd be better as a "the bats have wings for some reason" or "everyone has wings" or soul wings or whatever. important part is: wings. they have those.

i see a lot of variations on what kind of wings the whole batfam would have, and while i haven't seen an iteration i dislike yet, imagine this:

dick with owl wings

like, depending on how au we're going and what continuity, could be perfectly innocent. he flies a bit quieter than everyone else, maybe.

but. what's got this rotating in the brain microwave.

let's say it's a soul wings type au. where everyone has wings, can hide them at will, but don't get them until their teens or such.

an au where maybe, early on in his days as robin, dick got yoinked by the court of owls. and then, years later, he sprouts owl wings? that can't feel good. it's an ever present reminder of what he was being trained for once. a remainder of what he almost became. and, admittedly, incredibly useful too. they're large, warm, beautiful and terrifying.

i'm just imagining the ways he'd have so many thoughts about it but hide that out of not wanting to talk about the court until its been so long that its just kind of... weird, to bring up how he feels about his own wings now. even better if maybe he grew his wings while he & bruce were fighting, maybe he was staying with the titans? and so it's a long, long time before anyone who even knows enough to make any connection to the court ever sees his wings.

and maybe, years later, when they're fighting the court again, for the last time- please, he hopes, for the last time- maybe everyone finds out his connections. cobb, the capture long ago. and a lot of behavior of his seems to make a bit more sense, now. for someone who loves the sky so much, he's always struggled to take good care of his wings. and now they know that's because of how conflicted his feeling get when he looks too long.

or maybe, he doesn't get taken by the court. he gets his wings, and doesn't really have any weird feelings about them- they're huge, pretty, and jason doesn't even pretend to be annoyed when he pulls the younger robin in close with them!

and years pass. until eventually, whenever the court of owls becomes relevant comes to pass. i haven't read that yet, but, still. dick finds out about his heritage. his connection to the court. what they wanted him to be. and suddenly, his wings feel like a promise of a destiny he doesn't want.

and sure, they win, the court goes down or whatever. but his wings are still and always will be owl wings. maybe he finds out they'd planned to take him the moment they first saw his wings. the moment he grew them, was when they started trying to take him. they just kept getting intercepted, maybe.

or another universe where dick sprouts his wings, and he wants to celebrate- everyone celebrates when they get their wings! except he has to go on a mission in space, and then his brother's dead & he's not talking to b, and then he's alone in bludhaven.

when tim shows up to get him to be robin again, dick isn't there.

sure, contacting him had been spotty for a while- but nightwing had finished a case just last week! right? except, as tim looks into it, the last case attributed to nightwing was over a month ago. the last spotting of him within the week he got back from space.

and he finds programs, very well-hidden, that are slowly generating the responses people have been getting from dick. it's set to respond slower and slower, until eventually theres no response at all. but gradual enough you might not notice for much too long.

and now tim's got another issue to fix while he takes up the mantle.

and maybe it takes much too long before anyone other than him realize they should be looking at all. and when a talon, ginormous owl wings, starts popping up visibly? well, all that they find is one of the court's going against them, one with a seemingly soul winged destiny to be with them.

maybe cass is who finally gets the talon to share. while tim was definitely getting through dead end leads pointing towards the court, cass is who finds out her oldest brother doesn't know who he is anymore. it's cass who he opens up to, about how he vaguely remembers them coming for him as soon as he took the time to preen for the first time. but before that? nothing, just... feelings.

feelings that led him to rebel one day.

"two of a feather, and one superfluous"

i am as obsessed with this song as this fella omg,,,,,

details i had too much fun with below:

okok here me out au idea that someone's probably already thought of:

post-movie, stone eventually re-opens the mean bean and takes to wearing game eggman-style sunglasses cause he's just crying a lot over the man (also yalls designs of him in that style are amazing-). and like, everyone's just kinda fine with him being there cause he isn't like, independently trying to take over the world or anything so the wachowskis just leave him be despite everything.

and one day shadow just shows up. for whatever reason and we get that good good stone & shadow vibe. at the mean bean together with their unhealthy coping mechanisms,, and one day like. wade wanders in cause he's wade and i feel like he's a regular at the mean bean. but this time shadow isn't in the back which i'm fully convinced is just like,, stone's apartment. and wade's just like "woah you're not dead???" and by the time the next movie's plot comes around the wachowskis find out shadow's still alive by wade of all people calling in backup for them and shadow and stone just casually show up. or something like that it'd be really funny i think

but also also imagine: mean bean is closed one day cause stone is big sad & wade shows up and gets both stone and shadow to play like,, mario kart or something with him and it ends up becoming a thing where whenever the grief is hitting stone (or shadow even though he won't admit it to wade) they just call wade over and game all day.