Disclaimer

I don't own anything. DC Comics, and anything that it publishes, is not in anyway owned by me. It is all owned by rich, talented people. I'm a nobody. Please don't sue me.

Life Closed Twice

Cassandra Cain's life had been destroyed twice. This did not include the time that she had been killed by Lady Shiva, her life ended temporarily at Shiva's hands to cure Cassandra of her death wish. That moment had preceded her victory over the world's premier martial artist, and had been a new beginning rather than an ending.

The first time her life had been destroyed had been because she had succeeded.

Tiny fingers had dug through flesh to tear out a man's throat. Cassandra had looked into his eyes as she had killed him, and she had seen death as he had seen it. Terror... then nothing. Her hands had been soaked red with blood, staining them with a crime that could never be washed clean... while her father had looked at her with pride.

Her life had been destroyed that day, when she had killed a man whose name she had never learned. She had run from her father, run as far and as fast as she could, never stopping, always afraid that he would find her and force her to kill again. She had been little better than an animal, with no name, no words, no friends save wild beasts she sometimes shared dinner with. All the while her hands had stayed stained, unable to ever come clean after what she had done.

The second time her life had been destroyed had been because she had failed.

She had finally stopped running when she had met Barbara. Barbara had taken her in, given her missions in the torn warzone that had been the Gotham of No Man's Land. Eventually, she had been given the most important mission imaginable: Batman had chosen her to bear his symbol, gifting her with the mantle of Batgirl. She had finally found a way to give back something to the world that she had torn something from when she had been a child of eight.

The stains on her hands had never truly disappeared but they had faded, becoming memories even she rarely saw. She had made friends, gained a purpose, a life. She had been... happy. But she had still felt alone. Her only true friend, Stephanie, had a boyfriend, and a life, and a family... while Cassandra had her mission, Barbara and Batman as mentors... and nothing else.

It had been enough... barely. She had been feuding off and on with both of them, but she had still done her job... still had her mission. Until the day she hadn't.

It had begun in fire. A battle with a killer robot in a huge library, with the only way to stop it being a command word hidden in a book. A book that she couldn't read.

She had tried to learn to read... some. It had been hard, and with so many other, easier, more useful things to do, she hadn't devoted that much time to it. Every time she had tried to learn, it had seemed as though the letters got away from her, changing into gibberish before her eyes. She would always give up, confused and upset, and go practice her martial arts instead.

But that day, she had needed to read... and she hadn't been able to. The robot had rampaged through the library, burning books, and nearly causing the death of countless people. All of her efforts to stop it otherwise had been in vain, and Barbara – Oracle – had spoken endlessly in her ear, trying to help her win, growing more and more upset at the destruction of the books.

Finally, when Cassandra had held the key to stopping the robot in her hands, and had been unable to even tell her the letters... Oracle had had enough. "How stupid can you be..."

Stupid. Surrounded by geniuses like Oracle, Batman, Robin... she had always felt stupid. In a world where everyone could read, being the only one who couldn't do what five year olds could... she had always felt so stupid. She had kept it secret, her private shame, her fear that she wasn't good enough, not smart enough to deserve to wear the Bat...

Then to have Barbara, a woman who was like an older sister to her... the closest thing to a mother that she had ever had... to have her tell Cassandra that she was what she had always feared. That she was stupid... it had been too much. Cassandra had stormed out of Oracle's home after her debriefing, not wanting to hear her apologies for saying what she really thought, ready to take her aggressions out on the criminals of Gotham.

She had found criminals, all right. An entire ring of them, kidnapping people to ship to other countries. She had seen things like that during her years wandering the streets, although she had always been able to fight off anyone who had tried to take her. But she still remembered the fear and misery that she had seen in those who had been taken before her as a little girl.

While she had been hunting for the rest of the victims, Barbara... Oracle, and Batman had tried to call her. They had asked her repeatedly to return to the Clock Tower, but she had refused. In the end she had caught the criminals, although she had been wounded in the process, with Batman arriving to rescue her at the last minute. Everything had seemed fine... until Alfred was wrapping her injured ribs.

While she was receiving medical attention Batman had explained to her the reason why he had tried to recall her. He had been following the human traffickers, and had been on the verge of busting the entire operation. Her rescue of a handful of people had prevented that. He had been angry that she had disobeyed orders, been erratic... and so he had fired her.

He had taken Batgirl away from her... taken her cave away from her... taken her life away from her. She was Batgirl no more. She was nothing anymore.

Her life destroyed in a single night by her failures.

Author's Notes

I came up with this idea while rereading Batgirl. I noticed that in issue 48 Cassandra was fired as Batgirl, although she gets the mantle back in issue 50 after visiting Barbara. In issue 54 she has her falling out with Barbara over the 'stupid' comment, and Stephanie comes to her and tells her about being fired as Robin. All I had to do was switch the order of events of a seven issue span around slightly, and Cassandra and Stephanie would be fired at the same time.

This was written for the DCU Big Bang 2013, and includes original art by DYLogger. Please check out my AO3 page if you'd like to see it!

(I use the same user name on Archive of Our Own. I'd post a link, but this site makes that difficult.)