Author's note: Disclaimer - Don't own anything. Hi. So explanation as to why this took so long - I just went in to sixth form, and my marks have been slipping, so I haven't really been allowed to write much. I'm really sorry, and I hope to be updating every three and a half weeks from now on.

"And now for the most important part of patrol, rookie: getting coffee," Dick's new S.O. told him cheerfully. She seemed a cheerful lady so far, very committed to her job, but she had just made one grievous sin in Dick's opinion. She had pulled up just around the corner from the coffee shop Dick visited at night; and if Dick went somewhere as a civilian where he frequented as Nightwing, his chances of getting recognised where going to be much higher than usual.

"C'mon," Officer Jodie told him, taking off her seatbelt. "I'll introduce you to the crew; they're a real bunch of characters."

'Shit,' Dick thought, panicking slightly, 'this isn't going to end well.'

Dick got out of the car, ducked his head, and obediently started shuffling after his new partner, his sense of foreboding growing with every step.

"Great espressos here, if you ever get the 7 a.m start," Jodie chatted amiably.

"I'll remember that," Dick replied quietly. "Although I think it might take more than that for me to be awake for the beginning of my shift."

Jodie laughed at him. "You'll get the hang of it, don't worry. With all the crazy stuff that goes on in this town you'll be up at the crack of dawn often enough to make you a morning person."

"Maybe." Dick sighed. To tell the truth, he had always been an early bird. In the days before Dick had known Bruce was Batman, he had nearly killed his adopted father through sleep deprivation, getting up at the crack of dawn and bouncing all over the master bed, not realising the other man had probably arrived at the mansion only twenty minutes before. However, during his police training he had gained a reputation as a bit of a grouch on a morning. Dick suspected the rest of his colleagues wouldn't be so sprightly if they had to stay up till three in the morning, and get up at half six most days. It really didn't leave you in the best mood.

"Well this is the place - best coffee in town, for the price; nice pastries too." Jodie continued while they made their way over. Dick held the shop door for her, praying for divine intervention so he wouldn't have to go in. But God had obviously used all of his earthly powers for the next ten years on stopping Damien killing every other member of the Batclan, because help came. Keeping his head down, Dick stepped reluctantly over the threshold. The cheerful ring of the bell had never seemed so wrong.

"Hey guys, this is my new partner, Dick Grayson," Jodie greeted loudly, while Dick cringed.

He risked a quick peek from under his hair, then had to do a double take. A guy about Liz's age, who had been typing furiously on a laptop, looked up at them both with a face like he was sucking a lemon. Serving a cyclist couple were a man and woman who were finding time to glare at each other in between each stage of making the orders. All of the changes Nightwing had made the night before were gone, with the exception of the table and chairs, and the repairs to the wall. The differences were jarring.

"So, how long before he takes a bribe do you think, Jodie?" the young man on his laptop asked snidely.

Dick opened his mouth with every intention of setting the kid straight, but Jodie placed a restraining hand on his arm.

"That's Lex, he's a bit of a cynic, but don't worry, he'll grow on you," Jodie intervened, before Dick had chance to speak his mind.

"That's not answering my question, Officer," the young man taunted.

God, Dick wished he was in his costume right now; he suspected Lex wouldn't have had quite as much to say when faced with Bludhaven's own dangerous and quite possibly insane vigilante.

"That won't ever happen," Dick said darkly, working hard to stop himself slipping into the intimidating growl he was supposed to save for his night job.

The man behind the counter paused his glaring match with the female member of staff to snort derisively. "Sure kid," he scoffed. "When pigs fly."

Dick turned to Jodie, as if to ask whether this guy would grow on him too. He received a slightly raised eyebrow in return.

"Umm. Hi, I don't think we've met before," Jodie tried bravely.

"That's William," the woman behind the counter practically spat. "It's only temporary," she added before turning away.

"Are you going to order anything?" William asked borderline aggressively.

"A latte and a…" Jodie trailed off, turning to Dick.

"I'll have the same thanks," he answered, bat-paranoia preventing him from ordering his regular espresso.

With one last look of disgust, the grumpy middle aged man turned his back to them, to get on with the orders.

"So Kerrie, how've you been?" Jodie asked the woman behind the counter.

"Fan-fucking-tastic. Apparently the night-shift let some prick re-decorate the shop last night, absolutely trashed the shop," she spat, as she dried a mug.

"Really, this place looks normal?"

"That's because I had to take all the shit down. I rang my boss about all the ridiculous posters, and she started fucking giggling about yoghurt. Stupid bitch," Kerrie muttered poisonously.

"Hey!" Dick started to defend his friend, before he forcibly reminded himself that Rebecca wasn't Officer Grayson's friend.

"What, worried I'll corrupt little Lex over there with my bad language?" she mocked Dick, unknowingly making him relax, as she gave him an excuse to get involved. "Don't worry, I'm sure he'll call you worse when you leave," she said, turning round to place the mug back on the shelf. "Describes her perfectly anyway," she muttered, what she thought was quietly.

"I don't think you should talk about your boss that way," Dick threatened subtly.

Kerrie only laughed bitterly in return. "She's not fit to be in charge of this place anyway. A few days ago, I walk in here, the tables and chairs were smashed, actual fucking arrows were stuck in the wall, the place looked like a medieval battlefield; so I called the police. Officer Mahwell came;" she said to Jodie, "closely followed by Rebecca. She says it was nothing to worry about, her and Shaun just had a little too much fun with some of the historical weapons Shaun keeps from his Professor days, then sends him on his way. She wouldn't fucking tell me what really happened, so I had to find out for myself. Turns out the arrows I had to get out of the wall were the same ones Green Arrow uses. So I told Rebecca I was going to go to the papers, and then the dumb fuck tells me that'd be 'violating the affecting the custom of the shop by bringing the shop into disrepute clause of the contract' and she'd sue me for everything I made from the story. She probably just wanted to go to the papers herself," she muttered sullenly.

Dick felt a sudden rush of gratitude for Rebecca for hushing everything up. If Kerrie had gone to the papers mouthing off about how superheroes came to her coffee shop, she could have gotten everyone who worked there killed. Even the best case scenario would end with the whole area being infested with photographers, Dick being unable to patrol the area properly for months, and never being able to go back to the shop as Nightwing.

Not to mention what Batman would say.

Fortunately, Jodie's inherently friendly nature wouldn't allow her to take part in talking about a woman behind her back, and she changed the topic before Dick had to.

"So Lex, how's college life treating you?" Jodie asked pleasantly.

He scoffed. "I swapped from English to History; worst decision ever. One of the girls in my class is completely fucking stupid. She wouldn't quit talking to me in class, so I asked her out, and she actually thinks I'm going to show up for a date tonight; it's going to be hilarious."

Dick got a horrible sinking feeling in his stomach; a history major who never stopped talking sounded a little bit too like College Kid.

"That's not nice Lex," Jodie scolded, in a tone Dick had only seen her use on people she had stopped for dangerous driving. "All she did was try to be nice to you."

"Subjecting me to her stupid rants is not being nice," Lex argued petulantly. "She just parrots the opinions of some guy she says used to be a history professor in England anyway." he muttered.

"You either call her now and make an excuse for why you can't go, or you actually turn up tonight." Jodie ordered sternly. "Either way, don't you dare hurt that poor girl that way."

"Or what? Are you going to arrest me for hurting someone's feelings?" Lex mocked her.

Dick took a menacing step forward, ready to give the kid a talking to that Alfred himself would be proud of. Then he found himself forcing Lex and Jodie to the floor on instinct, when he heard glass shattering behind them.

A quick glance revealed the cause of the noise; a brick was lying on the floor, surrounded by shards of glass that formerly made up the window. Then came some shouting and laughter, clearly from young men.

"Gotta love living in Bludhaven," Jodie muttered. "But nice reflexes, rookie."

"Thanks," Dick told her, jumping to his feet. "Don't worry, I got this."

Dick vaulted through the gap where the window used to be, out onto the street, and spotted a group of teenage boys running towards an alley that led to a maze of backstreets; obviously they were hoping to lose him in the labyrinth. It was quite a good plan.

It might have even worked if they'd tried it with anyone other than Nightwing.

Unfortunately for them, thanks to his night work, Dick knew these streets like the back of his hand. Which made it laughably easy for him to know where they were going, and cut them off.

Dick tackled two of the youths, feeling childishly happy when one of them went down into a pile of trash. Although that was not that it was an unlikely thing to happen considering how filthy Bludhaven was.

"Stay down," Dick ordered the two young men, who of course did the exact opposite of what he said. The first made a fairly wise tactical retreat to hide behind the third boy; the second wasn't as smart, and tried to punch Dick in the face.

Dodging the blow with practised ease, Dick returned the favour, only with much more skill and precision. Whilst the guy was clutching his face Dick went for a pressure point, and watched him drop to the floor with satisfaction. With a surprisingly high pitched yell of indignation, the third boy jumped to his friends defence, fists swinging wildly.

'Oh well,' thought Dick, thinking back to the phrase he had had repeated to him over and over again throughout his police training. 'There's no such thing as excessive force in Bludhaven.'

Dick drew his taser and fired at the third young man, taking more than a little schadenfreude from the noise he made. Well, he had started it, and Dick had deliberately aimed for his arm. It wasn't going to do much damage.

That just left the second guy, who had apparently finally grown a spine, and was now brandishing a plank of wood he had found somewhere in trash lying around at Dick. "Come on then!" he yelled, sounding more scared of the random rookie cop he was facing off against than most of the people Dick interrogated as Nightwing.

Unfortunately, Jodie chose that moment to catch up, and Dick wasn't sure his partner should see a rookie cop win a fight against three people. Which meant the next moment he took a plank to the face and gained a broken nose.

"Drop your weapon!" Jodie ordered, pointing her taser at the youth, who complied laughably quickly, obviously afraid to share the fate of his friend. Well, Dick would have laughed if he wasn't busy trying to keep his blood away from his uniform. Blasted things were impossible to dry clean.

Jodie handcuffed the three boys then gingerly applied pressure to Dick's nose. "You gonna be okay?" she asked him quietly, and received a resigned nod in return.

As they herded the three kids towards back towards the car, Jodie looked Dick up and down with some sympathy. "I tell you what, seen as though you're injured, I'll handle the paperwork," she offered generously, trying to cheer him up.

"Thanks boss," Dick replied gratefully, even though he was slightly distracted with trying to set his nose. As they slowly shepherded the young men towards the patrol car, he sighed deeply as he imagined the ridicule he was going to get from his new colleagues.

Nightwing was stood on the edge of the roof of a block of flats, glaring at the world beneath him. His face ached, he knew the bruises under his eyes dipped below his mask, and frankly everything felt wrong with the world. The wind was picking up, swirling snow around in flurries that would normally have filled Dick with childish glee, but now only reminded him how cold it was.

Perhaps worst of all was the fact that for the first time ever in recorded history nothing was going on in Bludhaven, making Dick standing out here freezing his ass off completely pointless. Dick sighed as he realised that it really was completely pointless. He could probably call it a night now, go home early and get some half decent sleep; if anything major happened, his alarms would trigger.

Dick gingerly picked his way across the rooftops, annoyed that the snow drifts on the roofs were impeding his progress towards his home. But as Dick noticed one window that was boarded up with cardboard instead of spilling light out onto the street, he realised he had one more errand to run before he could call it a night.

He dropped down lightly in front of the coffee shop, practically melting into the warmth that spilled out when he opened the door. But he quickly hardened again when he heard the sound of someone trying to suppress their sobs, but being unable to. It was a sound he was depressingly familiar with.

Nightwing saw Rebecca balanced on the arm of a chair that was faced away from the door, trying to comfort it's occupant. The person sat there was obviously folded in on themself, as Dick couldn't even see the back of their head. However, the sobs did sound female, specifically belonging to a young woman. He inched closer to the chair, fearing his suspicions from earlier in the day would be proved correct.

"You're here early," Rebecca stated, in an almost accusing tone.

"Quiet night," he muttered, as he took a seat next to Liz, who burrowed into Rebecca in a hug, as he tried to approach. "What's wrong?" he asked soothingly, placing a hand on Liz's back.

"She got stood up on a date," Rebecca answered for her, when it became clear after a few attempts that Liz wasn't able to speak right now.

Nightwing's blood boiled as Rebecca's brief explanation drew a fresh round of sobs from Liz.

"Hey, it's okay, please look at me," Dick said as calmly as he could manage.

College Kid shook her head against Rebecca. "Uh-uh. I'm a really ugly crier, and I wasn't exactly pretty to start off with," she managed to get out eventually.

"That's not true Liz, you're really pretty," Dick tried to cheer her up.

"Then why does nobody want to go out with me?" she asked, turning to face him. "I'm nineteen and I haven't even had my first proper kiss yet, and I'm ugly, and I've only ever been asked out as a joke."

Dick seethed as Liz's sobs overtook her again and she had to stop talking. If Lex ever found himself out after dark, Nightwing would make sure there would be hell to pay. But for now he had to cheer Liz up.

"You're not ugly, and you shouldn't let one guy ruin your confidence. He's just an asshole; you're brave, and loyal, and generally much better than him," Dick told her with conviction. "You deserve better, and you can do better."

Liz's sobs slowly faded to sniffles. "Really?" she asked, with heartbreaking vulnerability.

"Really. That jerk doesn't even deserve your tears," he told her firmly.

"It's not just him," Liz admitted. "My great aunt just died, and I failed a pop quiz, and the college photography club is threatening to drop me because I don't take interesting enough pictures," she said, drying her eyes on her sleeves.

"I'm really sorry about your aunt," Nightwing offered his condolences, as Rebecca gave Liz a reassuring hug. "But I know Shaun can help you with your school work, and I think I can do something about your photography club. Do you have a camera on you now?"

Liz nodded, so Dick gently took her hand and guided her out the back door into the alley. "When I say so, get ready to take the picture," he told Liz, guiding her into the middle of the alley, and pointing her camera skyward.

Nightwing grappled to the rooftops, and backed up a little, to give himself room for a running start.

"Okay, get ready." Nightwing called, as he drew his escrima sticks, activating the eerie blue glow of the shock setting, and set off running towards the edge, before leaping over to the next building.

"Did you get it?!" he asked Liz.

"Yeah," was her markedly happier reply.

Nightwing jumped down to join her, landing with a roll. "Let me see?" he asked.

Liz handed over her camera, so Dick could scrutinize the picture. He had originally had his activated escrima sticks out so that people were less likely to think the picture was a fake, but they had the added side effect of illuminating the snow around them, making the picture look much more dramatic.

"You can even put it on Facebook," he told her.

"Really?" she asked, diving in for a hug. "Thank you!" she squealed. "Hey, what happened to your face?" she asked, looking at him for the first time with eyes that weren't obscured by tears.

"I got into a fight," he told her, with a smirk in his voice.

"And what does the other guy look like?" Liz asked, with genuine curiosity.

Dick merely smiled at her before walking back inside; now he just had to do what he came in to do.

"So what happened to your window?" Dick asked, feigning ignorance perfectly.

"What happened to your nose?" Shaun cut in immediately.

"Shaun! Some kids smashed it in because the day shift were serving cops. It's not the first time it's happened, to be honest. We should probably just ban the whole force." Rebecca explained jovially.

"Because vigilantes don't cause us more trouble? We should ban those instead," Shaun muttered grumpily.

"No," Rebecca and Liz snapped at the same time, causing Nightwing to smirk.

"I can get it fixed by tomorrow for you, the Bat-family has a collateral damage fund," Dick offered, in a falsely casual tone, secretly overjoyed that he could clear his conscience.

"We can manage to get a window fixed by ourselves, thank you very much. We did survive before you, you know," Shaun ranted, mainly to himself but also to the room at large.

"What Shaun means to say is that would be very kind and helpful, thank you," Rebecca supplied for the Brit, while she passed Nightwing his usual drink, in a to-go mug. He swore that woman was psychic.

"Who do you know who'll replace a window during the night?" Liz cut in.

"I have a plan for every contingency." Nightwing answered in monotone, as he made his way out the door. Internally he was cringing into a little ball, thinking of all the broken windows in the manor when he was first learning to use bird-a-rangs.

Author's note - When I had writer's block, I went to a-really-angry-sorceress for inspiration. And frankly, everyone in the world deserves to see what the crack fic she helpfully wrote for me.

Nightwing was stood on top of high rise, brooding loudly. Nothing was happening and his face hurt, he really didn't want to still be outside in the cold. "I AM BROODING," Nightwing screamed, "BECAUSE I'M A MEMBER OF THE BATCLAN, AND THAT'S WHAT WE DO 99% OF THE TIME."

A head popped out of the window just below his feet. "Could you shut the hell up already," Jim From Downstairs demanded, a vein throbbing in his forehead, "some of us have to get some sleep before work tomorrow."

"Well some of us are working right now," Nightwing retorted, crossing his arms stubbornly. Batman always had said that pain medication made him obstinate.

"Then get the fuck off my rooftop!"

"Well, that's a new version of 'get off my lawn' if I've ever heard one."

And with that particularly witty repartee (at least in his pain-killer addled brain), Nightwing fucked off to the coffee shop.