#yesdanger

Tim gets back to the main room and finds Cassie still curled up and hiding under the kitchen table while giving off a distinct impression of not having moved whatsoever. He empathizes, definitely, but also still needs to deflect.

"Sorry to interrupt, but do you have a moment, Wonder Girl?" he asks, leaning down just enough to peer under the table at her.

"No," Cassie groans into her knees without unwrapping her arms from around her head. Tim, again, empathizes. And anyway, there's worse ways to deflect than letting Cassie delay him getting back to the . . . everything that's currently going on in the meeting room.

"If it makes you feel better, I'm pretty sure Superboy's already moved all the furniture he's going to move," he says. "Though if it makes you feel worse, we can just pretend he didn't."

"He's moving furniture dressed like that?!" Cassie screeches as she whips her head up to stare bug-eyed at him. It's difficult to tell if the screeching is more a horrified thing or a mortified thing.

Probably still safe to go with "worse" either way, Tim decides.

"Pretty sure he's finished, like I said," he says. Cassie buries her face back in her knees with a groan.

"I can't," she says despairingly. "I literally physically cannot. I super, super can't. I'd die, Robin. I would absolutely and actually die!"

"Is that hyperbole or a legitimate concern?" Tim asks.

"Don't patronize me, you don't get it, you're a boy!" Cassie hisses shrilly. Tim was in no way patronizing her. Honestly, under the circumstances, it was a sincere question. "Just like, imagine if Cissie had shown up to movie night dressed like that!"

"That seems disrespectful of a teammate," Tim lies. He decides not to point out the flawed approach of making assumptions before drawing conclusions, given he has an actual sense of self-preservation. A slim one, but still.

Seriously, though, Kon doesn't even need weapons or weapons maintenance or body armor or much in the way of tech at all, and his suit is basically just glorified spandex. Cadmus should have the budget to spare to give him a new one every day. Tim has no idea how he actually ran out, no matter how far behind on laundry he may or may not be.

Does Cadmus not even have laundry services? They should, given how much on-site staff they're allegedly supporting.

"Supporting" into never having an actual out-of-lab life, but Tim really can't afford to think about exactly how many clones Cadmus is probably doing that to right now.

Literally. Literally he can't afford it. He's only got the one trust fund, okay?

. . . he'll revisit the issue when he goes supervillain, Tim decides. He'll have a few more revenue streams by then, and it sounds like something Kon would appreciate. Well—will appreciate, if he maybe does some self-reflection or goes to therapy or whatever.

Should he be finding Kon a therapist? Like, just in case he needs one at some point, given just how the vigilante work tends to go?

. . . given how it's maybe gone for Kon a few times, Tim can't help thinking, and then doesn't think about Kon trying to sell—the product to Tim Drake on their last date.

Tim is absolutely going to be revisiting the Cadmus issue when he goes supervillain, yeah.

"If literally anyone even tries to say what they think 'the guy thing' version of any 'self-assessing' might be, I'm going to put an arrow through every screen in this base and the modem," Cissie threatens, jerking her head towards the decoy modem in the back of the room. Tim decides not to mention either the word "decoy" or anything about where the actual modem is. He doesn't genuinely think Cissie is going to shoot any of the cave's tech, but better safe than sorry.

Anyway, it's admittedly difficult to predict what's going to happen when the team gets together, so yeah. Definitely better safe than sorry, when it comes to not having to write up an incident report for Red Tornado. Tim used to think that adults were exaggerating about how bad teenagers actually were, but then they'd started the team and he'd started regularly hanging out with other teenagers without direct adult supervision and he'd realized that actually, they'd been underselling it.

Wildly underselling it, in fact.

Suzie leans down to poke curiously at the scissors and then envelopes them into her smoke, where they vanish without a trace. Tim just . . . decides not to ask why. Although–

“. . . don’t fly too fast with those either,” he says, vaguely mortified about being this person, but also not actually going to stop being this person. It’s going to be so embarrassing when he’s a supervillain telling people not to run with scissors and that they need to put back their grocery carts, but fine. 

“Oh, I don’t think I can drop them without bringing them back, but okay,” Suzie agrees, her hand briefly dissolving into fog and then reforming with the scissors in it, like she’s demonstrating something. “See?” 

What Tim sees is that the scissors are visibly frosted over and so cold that they’re still wrapped in fog of their own. 

. . . Tim adds another mental note to his “teammate abilities to get more information about” list. Just . . . definitely that’s another thing to put on that particular list. 

What the hell, Suzie. 

Is there a reason his teammates just don’t tell him they can do these things? Is he doing something wrong, that his teammates aren’t telling him they can do these things? 

Tim is going to make a questionnaire and it is going to be very thorough. He’ll fill them out himself if he has to; he’ll just find an excuse to get every member of the team alone at some point and ask them the questions. Follow them around the base or while they’re in the training room or literally stalk them back to their individual homes; whichever, at this point. 

Seriously, why are they not telling him these things? 

“Alright then,” Cissie says, eyeing the scissors leerily as Bart zips back into the room, doing a very bad job of hiding a pair of safety scissors behind his back. They’re strapped into a sheath, so for the moment Tim just doesn’t argue, and Suzie smiles brightly and vanishes her own scissors back into herself. It is . . . slightly alarming to watch, he has to admit, and a lot more concerning than safety scissors. “. . . so do you just keep stuff in yourself like in general, or . . .?” 

“Well just when–oh, that’s right, I forgot!” Suzie exclaims, then shoves a hand into her own chest–Tim carefully does not freak out while Cassie yelps in alarm and Cissie visibly cringes. Kon doesn’t seem to notice anything as weird at all, but at this point Tim has very thoroughly learned that literally every goddamn insane thing that has happened to Young Justice is absolutely and entirely Kon’s fault, so that’s unsurprising. 

"Wilkes," Damian says impatiently, because Colin has inexplicably not woken up despite an entire human being entering his personal space.

"GNKFH!" Colin chokes as he jerks awake and immediately falls off the top bunk and out of bed. Damian rolls his eyes, then leans over the side of the bunk and eyes him dryly. Damian will never understand why civilians do not raise their children with survival instincts. It seems very counterintuitive to him, if they are going to bother making the investment in producing heirs to begin with.

Admittedly, Colin has a very different relationship to being anyone's heir than Damian would consider ideal even for a civilian, but at the least St. Aden's staff could be putting in some basic effort.

"Wilkes, please maintain some situational awareness," he says in exasperation. "And ideally some modicum of dignity, if the capacity for it actually exists in your personality."

"Oh my god, Robin," Colin wheezes into the rug. "What the frick, dude?!"

"I am not a 'dude'," Damian replies witheringly. "I do, however, require your time."

". . . like, you 'require' my time, or you 'require' Abuse's time?" Colin asks as he pushes himself up and squints at him, ruffling his hair into . . . really not even a semblance of order, no. "Because either way, waking me up like a creepy creep seems like a pretty stupid start to asking me for help."

"I require your time, not your help," Damian corrects in exasperation. "I am perfectly capable of reaching my goals without assistance."

"Uh-huh," Colin says, then gets to his feet and brushes himself off with a yawn. "So you showed up in my room after midnight 'cuz you just wanna hang out, then? Is that it?"

". . . I may require some minor assistance," Damian allows begrudgingly. "Very minor."

"So like who's dead this time?" Colin asks.

"Ideally, no one undeserving of it," Damian says, then flicks down the hood of his cape and tilts his head to the side. Beloved chirps inquisitively, leaning forward to peer curiously at Colin. "Beloved, this is Abuse. Wilkes, this is my Beloved."

"Uh," Colin says, blinking stupidly at Beloved. "Okay, I definitely did not hear her name right, so could you just . . . ?"

And, most especially again, finds unpleasant. Beloved should not be concerned with the state of anyone but himself, when his point of origin is in such a position as to require the assistance of Robin desperately enough to manifest a Pocket over it. 

When his point of origin’s truest image of himself is ragged and hungry and bruised. 

It disquiets Damian, that Beloved could manifest in the manner that he has and still be so concerned with what he perceives as the needs of others. 

He accepts one small ration, mostly because it pleases Beloved when he does, and for now tucks it back into the tiny box they came in. He will return it to Beloved at a later time, or simply keep it to hand in case Beloved requires it. 

“Love love love,” Beloved chatters up at him, his atypically blue eyes aglow with delight. 

Not literally aglow, though Damian only notes that fact because he almost expects them to be. 

He thinks, again–and just as irrationally as before–of lightning. 

Pennyworth transports them back to the manor without further interruption or incident, and does not inquire invasively after anything. He requests the usual report of Damian’s time at school, which Damian delivers as efficiently as possible, since at least in that he is not required to waste Pennyworth’s time. 

The first time Pennyworth had asked him for such a report, Damian had assumed it was meant to be relayed to Father so that Father would not need to come looking for the information himself. Then he learned Father would be requesting the same report at dinner each evening and realized it was in fact a test. Father wishes to be certain that the events of Damian’s reports do not vary, either to be certain of the quality of Damian’s attentiveness and observational abilities and overall recall, or to be certain that Damian has not been duplicitous or subversive while out of Father’s immediate sphere of influence. To be certain that Damian has conducted himself acceptably as a Wayne, and not the version of “acceptably” that he would as an al-Ghul. 

But Grayson did not expect enough from him, Damian reminds himself. Grayson did not think he could meet higher expectations. Father simply knows him to be more capable than that, as his blood son; as a worthy heir. And Father’s standards are naturally the standards that Damian must uphold, of course. Father’s standards are the ones that matter. Grayson is not the one who hospitality Damian is encroaching upon, nor the one with multiple other heirs. Grayson has no heirs at all, in fact. 

When Grayson had worn Father’s mantle, Damian had thought, briefly, that perhaps . . . 

That thought is irrelevant, because Father was never dead and Grayson no longer wears his mantle. So Damian does not think it, and instead steps forward to meet Father at the base of the stairs. 

“How was school today?” Father asks, which is somewhat earlier than he typically requests Damian’s report, but Damian supposes it is convenient for him at the moment. Or perhaps Father will not be attending dinner this evening for some reason, and therefore it is convenient for that reason. 

Damian reports on his morning classes as required, and additionally informs Father: “We spent the latter half of lunch period outside on the grounds. The weather was tolerable.” 

Damian does not understand why Father desires weather data with his reports, as if he were not nearly always in Gotham himself and therefore perfectly aware of the weather at such times, but it is, inexplicably, a data point that Father desires all the same. Another test, he supposes, to make certain that he has remained observant and clear-minded and has not left the city himself, nor been anywhere he should not have been. 

Everything in the League was a test too, but at least those Damian had understood the rules of and purposes behind. Father’s tests are . . . less intuitive, generally. 

“Good,” Father says. He does not comment on the use of “we”; does not in fact comment on the presence of Beloved at all. He does not even glance towards the shoulder Beloved was previously sitting on or the collar of Damian’s coat where the other is currently crouched down and concealed. Given it is Father, of course, Damian is perfectly aware that Beloved is no more concealed from his notice than the sketchbook in his closet is, but Father still pays no mind to Beloved’s presence whatsoever. To Beloved’s–existence, even. Which . . . 

Damian did not in any way expect that Father would consider Beloved’s presence favorable, of course, but he did not expect him to simply . . . ignore Beloved’s presence. As if Beloved were entirely unimportant to . . . as if it simply did not matter that Beloved has manifested; did not matter that he has . . . 

“I, uh–haven’t really either,” Kon admits a little awkwardly and then immediately regrets admitting. God, that is so fricking embarrassing, especially for an omega. And like–he didn’t know he was gonna be an omega, yeah, but Suzie’s probably just forgotten anyway, and . . .

Well, like . . . he doesn’t actually know that, admittedly. Even Suzie doesn’t know where she actually came from or what her life was like before the DEO. Maybe somebody’d made her like Cadmus had made him, or maybe she’d just been handed over by her family and in a lab since she was born, or she’d just freakin’ condensed into existence all on her own, or just any other reason she might’ve never seen a real nest up close before.

So like–no, he doesn’t actually know, he guesses.

. . . they don’t actually know, he guesses.

“Really?” Suzie asks, ducking down a little so just her eyes show and peering over the edge of the nest at him, her fingers curled lightly against it. She doesn’t ask him why or anything. Just . . . asks him if it’s true, that’s all.

“Uh, yeah,” Kon says, and glances down at her foggy hands and hair and what he can see of the smoky trail that follows her everywhere and how close all those are to his nest without actually being, like–in his nest, and . . . and like . . . “You really, uh–think it’s . . . cute, or whatever?”

“Yes!” Suzie says, immediately perking up again and popping up enough to beam at him. “It’s really cute. Do you, um, need more things for it?”

“Uh . . . Reddie already brought me a lot, so . . .” Kon trails off, resisting the temptation to say “yes” anyway. Just–whatever Suzie maybe went and got–if that’s even what she’s offering to do or whatever–it’d smell like her. And it’d smell more like her than the blanket does, because she’d have just touched it, and maybe even deliberately, like . . . scented it, or . . .

She wouldn’t do that, he tells himself, embarrassed by even thinking shit like that.

“Oh,” Suzie says, and visibly wilts, her smoke and fog settling down heavier around her body as she forces a smile. “Um, good. Good! I’m glad he got you good stuff.”

“. . . he did, yeah,” Kon says, and like, he’s not always all that great at reading people but Suzie is real easy to read, and it seems like she’s, like . . . disappointed, a little. Like maybe she wanted to . . . like . . . “Uh. I kinda put it all in the nest, though, so I don’t really have, uh–any extra blankets to, you know, get under or anything . . .”

He doesn’t actually really feel like doing that, but he’s pretty sure some omegas do that, and if she really, like . . .