2. Time Traveling Squids
As was the norm every morning, Dick's math class was abuzz with the rapid yet cheerful chatter of students. If these students had been in any other class, this would be highly unusual (most people would expect teenagers to be sluggish and barely conscious in the morning), but as they were in the strict and bitter Mrs. Koepke's class, the students knew that they had only a precious few moments between when the bell rang and the aging teacher got to class after her morning cigarette, and then silence would reign, as the old crone would send anyone she caught talking down to the office.
As the door opened, the noise abruptly ceased, though not for the normal reason of their elderly teacher's arrival. The woman who walked into the classroom was decades younger than their regular instructor, the raven hair flowing down her back and her young complexion a stark contrast from the graying hair pulled into a tight bun and the sagging ancient skin of the woman who normally instructed them.
The silence that had fallen continued for a moment, with the exception of the squeak of a dry erase marker against a white board as this unknown woman wrote her name. After she finished, the young lady turned to the baffled students, smiling warmly at them.
"Good morning! My name is Miss Winchester. Your regular teacher is out sick today, so I'll be subbing for her."
A faint murmur moved through the room, incredulous at this information. In the past thirty or so years that Mrs. Koepke had been employed at Gotham Academy (which was probably not even close to the actual amount of years; the strict instructor's true age was a viciously guarded secret), not once had she ever been ill or absent. In fact, some said that the teacher's absence was a sure sign that she had gone to round up the other three horsemen of the Apocalypse (it was commonly affirmed that the student body was sure that the old woman was the personification of one of them, though which one was commonly disputed).
'Miss Winchester', however, knew none of this. In fact, her number-one priority had nothing to do with the teacher she was covering for, or even anything to do with math. Well, okay, it did have something to do with math, without it she'd never have been able to get back to where (or rather, when) she came from, but that wasn't the point.
No, her number-one priority was to get rid of the thing that stood a good chance of wiping her, her siblings, and her uncle out of existence.
But right now she had to take attendance. "Okay! When I call your name, please shout 'Here' if you're in class! If you're not... well, then you can't hear me anyway! Boyd, Joshua!"
"Here."
"Brenner, Kathy!"
"Here."
The 'substitute' went down through the attendance sheet, listing names cheerfully.
Right until she got near the end of the "G's".
"Gordon, Barbara." 'Winchester' stated, her voice having lost most of its upbeat tone.
"Uh... here, ma'am." Babs called out, looking confused at the sudden change in the teacher's voice. "Are you alright, Miss Winchester?"
The young woman cleared her throat. "I'm great, thank you, Miss Gordon." Swallowing hard, 'Winchester' read the next name on the list.
"Grayson, Richard."
"Here."
The young woman allowed herself a brief smile as she looked at the dark-haired boy. Heh. He really was adorable when he was younger.
Pushing that thought aside, she continued down the list, finishing a moment later. With attendance recorded, 'Miss Winchester' opened up the lesson plan left by Mrs. Koepke and began to instruct the students, going on for a good chunk of the class period (well, a good chunk excluding the first ten minutes. One student had to tell her that this was Pre-AP Algebra II, not AP Calculus after she started writing equations that looked closer to Ancient Greek than math to the class).
Of course, as often happens in large cities like Gotham, what looked to be an ordinary day soon turned into something completely abnormal.
Without warning, a giant shadow was cast over the academy, screams erupting as glass shattered and what could only be described as a giant tentacle burst through the window, wrapping itself around one of the students and pulled them outside.
"Oh my god, Dick!" one of the girls screamed.
"Everyone, remain calm! Get out to wherever you go for fire drills and stay put!"
"But what about-"
"DID I STUTTER?! GET OUTTA HERE!"
"Yes ma'am." With that, the terrified students fled the room. All except for Barbara Gordon, who the teacher grabbed by the arm.
"Oh, no you don't! You're comin' with me!"
"Wait, what? H-HEY!"
Despite the red-head's protests, the raven-haired woman dragged her away with ease, grabbing the struggling girl's backpack before exiting the classroom and pulling her down a flight of stairs, leading her into the woman's locker room next to the gym. It was only then that 'Winchester' let go of Barbara, immediately unzipping the girl's backpack and sifting through it.
"You mind telling me what's going on?! And stop rooting around in my backpack- Oof!"
Without warning, the mysterious woman tossed the girl her costume. "Here, Batgirl, put on your suit."
Barbara caught it, her mouth gaping in shock. "Wha- HOW DO YOU KNOW THAT?!"
"I know a lot of things." She replied, unbuttoning her shirt. "Just put the damn thing on and follow my lead, and hopefully Pa- I mean, Grayson won't end up dead."
"Oh, no, I'm not going anywhere until you tell me who the fuck you really are!"
'Winchester' clenched her jaw, beginning to lose her patience. "Put. The. Fucking. Costume. On."
"NO! I want an explanation, or else you're not getting anything out of-"
"AUNT BARBARA JUST PUT ON THE FUCKING THING AND HELP ME SAVE MY FATHER!"
A deafening silence fell over the locker room, the red-head staring at the older woman. "F-Fa… Father?! That's… that's completely ridiculous! Dick and I are high school freshmen! You have to be at least thirty!"
"I'm only twenty-eight!" She retorted, glaring at her.
"That's still way too old! You can't possibly expect me to believe that you're actually his daughter when he's only my age!"
"Well, he isn't your age in my time period!"
Once again, Barbara simply stared at her in shock. "Time… period… Are you trying to tell me that you're some sort of time traveler?! You being Dick's daughter is more believable than tha-"
Before the red-haired girl could launch into a tangent about exactly why that was impossible, a short series of shrill beeps erupted from a gym bag that had been on one of the benches in the center of the room. Not giving the girl even a second to question another thing, 'Winchester' dove into the bag, pulled out her cell phone and clicking 'Answer Call'. "Hello? Oh, hi, Papa! We were just talking about you! What? … Well we'd be down there already if someone wasn't so damn stubborn and cynical! … I know, but- Urgh! Why is everyone in my family such a giant pain! … Okay, fine! And tell Iris to calm her non-existent tits when you're done!"
An annoyed grimace marring her features, the woman picked up the gym bag and tossed the phone over to a surprised Barbara. "Here, Papa wants to talk to you. I'll be changing in the bathroom."
For a moment, Barbara simply stared at her retreating form, in a slight daze from all the action, before snapping out of it and putting the phone up to her ear. "Uh… hello?
"Hey, Babs." The voice on the other end was of an older man, in his early fifties at least. His voice was deeper and smoother than the voice she associated with him, but Barbara had no doubt in her mind who the person she was talking to was.
"D… Dick?"
The older man chuckled. "I don't think that you've ever met anyone else with that name."
"B-But how?! You sound so… so…"
"Mature? Handsome?" The older Dick suggested.
"Old."
Barbara could almost see the grimace on his face. "Well, what do you expect? I'm decades older than the boy you know. Speaking of which, why are you giving my daughter such a bad time about this?"
"I… She's really your daughter?! How the hell did she get here?!"
"I have an older daughter who just so happens to be a speedster. Listen, Babs, I know that this is all probably a lot to take in-"
Barbara snorted. "Understatement of the year."
"Regardless, it's important that take all the help we can get with this issue. Thanks to someone miscalculating how much power would be required to hold back a time-traveling super villain and his giant squid of anger-"
In the background, another voice, this time a man who sounded around thirty, yelled "I said I was sorry already, jeez!"
"Quiet, Jai, I'm talking to the past version of your Aunt Barbara. Anyway, I'm asking you as friend, Barbara. Please, just do this for me."
The redhead looked at her costume, then at the door apprehensively. "I don't know, Dick…"
"I'll tell you how to get the past me to let you drive the Batmobile."
"Done."
Five minutes later…
The 'giant squid of anger', as the future Dick had called it, was probably one of the ugliest things that Batgirl had ever seen in her life, and that was saying something. The thing was a vibrant shade of pus green, had eyes all over its body, and worst of all, it seemed to be leaving a trail of thick, vomit-colored slime behind it.
"Ewwww. What the hell is that?!"
"I don't even know. We always just refer to it as the giant squid of anger, or GSA."
"Isn't that the acronym for the Girl Scouts of America?"
"Meh. I was never a Girl Scout."
The elder woman, now dressed in a black-and-blue skin-tight spandex suit with matching knee-high boots and long gloves, with a mask to conceal her true identity, launched forward, running straight at it.
"Hey! Wait for me, uh… What should I call you?!"
"Name's Blackbird when I'm wearing the suit, Aunt Babs!"
Batgirl raised an eyebrow as she got closer to the elder, following her onto a tentacle close to the ground. "Blackbird? Seriously?"
"Hey, I wanted to continue the 'name your alter ego after a flying creature' that my family has going on, and Raven was already taken!"
At that point, the pair had reached the top of the squishy creature, where a tall man with a giant clock on his chest was cackling and the Boy Wonder had an understandably freaked out look on his face while being tied up and dangling over the edge of the squid. His expression turned to hopeful, however, when he caught sight of Batgirl.
"Babs! Thank god you're here! Wait, who's she?"
Quick as a whip, the redhead speed over to Dick's side, beginning to untie him. "Long story, tell you when you're not in danger of falling to your death!"
Meanwhile, Blackbird had begun battling it out with the clock-adorned man. "Why. Are. You. Always. Getting. In. My. Way?!" The villain hissed, with each word throwing frustrated and clumsy punches that the heroine easily dodged.
"Well, Chronos," Blackbird began, swinging her leg across his torso and causing him to fall to the ground, moaning in pain. "That's the thing. Since my family and I are the only people who seem to be capable of keeping psychos like you from shitting up the timeline, it's sort of my fucking job to get in your way."
Chronos' only response was a hiss, half angry, half pained. Smirking, Blackbird kneeled down, pulling his head up by his hair so his eyes would meet hers. "And ya know what, clock boy? I fuckin' love my job."
Out of the corner of her eye, the heroine saw him grin. "Well, then…" Suddenly, the villain leapt up, face still twisted in pain, and slammed down one of the buttons on his control panel, which released the ropes around the Boy Wonder. "Let's see how much you love it when you don't exist!"
"That… THAT DIDN'T EVEN MAKE SENSE, YOU FUCKASS!" With that, the dark-haired woman leapt at the villain, knocking him unconscious with a single kick to the head.
Meanwhile, Barbara was screaming, a terrified expression on her face. "DICK!"
Blackbird ran over to the ledge, watching helplessly as the past version of her father fell, bracing herself for impact and fading out of existence.
But the fade never came. When Dick was only a few feet from the ground, a bright white blur streaked by, catching him just before he hit the pavement.
Babs blinked in confusion. "What… What just happened?"
Blackbird let out a sigh of relief, her shoulders sagging after releasing the tension bracing herself for death by father existence failure had brought. "Iris always has to be a big damn hero, doesn't she?"
Back on the ground, Dick was staring at his savior in shock and gratitude. "Who… Who are-?"
The red-haired speedster snorted. "Geez, Papa, don't you know better than to fall off of giant squids of anger? That never works out for anybody!"
"P-Papa?! What the hell are you-?"
Without giving him time to finish asking, the speedster stopped suddenly, releasing her charge as Batgirl and Blackbird came bounding down the monster, the latter having Chronos swung over her shoulder as if he was a sack of potatoes.
"Could you be any more dramatic in your entrances?" Blackbird asked sarcastically, pulling the unconscious villain off her back and dropping him on the ground.
"Well, I could have come out of a giant cloud shaped like my head, but I decided that was just ridiculous." Iris answered. She was completely serious about that.
"… A sarcasm sign. Someday I will make you one."
Batgirl, meanwhile, had run over to her best friend, whom she seemed to be trying to suffocate via hugging.
"OHMYGODIWASSOTERRIFIEDCANYOU IMAGINEWHATYOURDADWOULDHAVED ONETOMEIFYOUDIEDHOLYSHIT!"
"B-Barbara… I can't breathe…"
"Oh, sorry." Sheepishly, the girl released him. Dick then stared at the two women in front of him.
"So, now that I'm not falling to my death, you mind telling me who these women are and why one of them called me Papa?"
"Er, yeah, about that… They're sort of… your daughters from the future."
"… What."
"And you have a son who is the redhead's twin and is in the future with future you who I talked to earlier."
"WHAT."
"Also you have you let me drive the Batmobile now."
"WHAT?!"
"I kind of feel like we're out of place here, Rose." Iris whispered to her sister.
"We are out of place here, idiot."
"Jerk!"
"Bitch!"
"Asshole!"
"Fuckface!"
"Ooh, nice one!"
"Thank you, I got it from one of my students."
This exchange would have gone on for a while, had the giant squid of anger suddenly decide it wanted to be paid attention to, releasing a roar that could probably be heard over in Metropolis.
"Oooh, shit, forgot about the giant squid thing."
"HOW THE HELL DO YOU FORGET ABOUT A GIANT SQUID?!" Dick screamed, not completely sure how these silly girls could be his future children.
"Well, it wasn't making any noise, so-"
"That was a rhetorical question, Iris. You don't answer it."
"Oh, yeah."
Once again, the pair of sisters prepared to fight the giant squid, probably for the eighteenth time. Of course, they weren't expecting a black figure to plunge into the thing, ripping out a few of its eyeballs in the process.
"Oh, good, Terry's here."
"Terry? Oh, god, don't tell me he's mine."
"Of course not!" Rose snapped. "Iris, Jai and I are your only kids!"
"Oh thank god."
"Terry is your little brother!" Iris added cheerfully.
The Boy Wonder blinked incredulously. "Little broth- Seriously?! How many fucking kids does Dad want?!"
"Don't worry, Terry's the last one! I… think…"
Before Dick could demand to know what she meant by that, the pair ran off to help their Uncle subdue the beast.
Half an hour later, the monster was wrapped up in its own tentacles.
"Well, it looks like all those loose ends are… tied up!"
Rose stared at her sister as if she couldn't believe she'd made that joke.
"Eh? How was that?"
"No." Blackbird replied flatly.
"Okay!"
Terry sighed, still covered in goo from the fight. "Can we just go home now? I just wanna throw this nut job into Arkham and get the government to take the thing wherever they take giant squids of anger and the like."
"Sounds like a plan. Iris?"
"Okey-dokey Loki! Bye Papa, bye Aunt Babs!"
In a flash, the trio, the villain, and the squid were gone, leaving a tired and confused Robin and an exhausted Batgirl in the destroyed courtyard of their school.
"I want to ask what the fuck just happened, but at the same time, I don't think I want to know."
"Eh, whatever. Now, about that Batmobile driving thing…"
A/N: Oh my god, how did this thing get so long? I started with a plan to make Rose meet the Doctor in a crossover type thing (don't judge me, I was having Doctor Who feels at the time), then it turned into Rose time traveling, then Iris joined, and then this one-shot happened!
Also, because I think it might be asked: this takes place about one year before Impulsivity, at which point Babs is not Batgirl, but Cassie is. I will explain this in later one-shots, but right now I need sleeeeep.
Remember to review! And drop prompts in my submit or ask box at Schmatey on tumblr!