Author's Note: Hey all! I'm updating a little early; I hope you don't mind :D. Thank you to everyone who's reading this, and a special thanks to everyone who drops me a line every now and again. And COOKIES to those who drop me a line every chapter… and Sporks gets a face-short and a frog for making me laugh. Take care guys and enjoy the chapter!
Chapter 11
"You're nuts, like absolutely, positively, certifiably nuts, man," Wally says. I can't argue with him, because I kinda think I'm a little crazy, too. "You're just gonna pop into the Bat Cave with a non-Bat and ask what's for lunch?"
I run a hand through my hair and laugh, imaging busting into the Cave with Pietro and asking Alfie to set another plate. Yeah, Bruce is gonna crap a brick, two bricks, then throw them at my head. I flop back in the arm chair behind me and scowl at Wally who's sprawled over the couch in front of the 72 inch flat screen TV. Then den is a mess of food wrappers, soda cans, crumbs and video game controllers. Throw pillows are on the floor along with a sleeping bag.
"Wallace, you're a pig," I say, and he oinks.
He's not wearing his mask, and he didn't freak out when Pietro followed me out of the infirmary and saw his bare face. He just kinda shrugged, still half-asleep, and said "Whatever. Keep it to yourself, dude."
I'm wearing my street clothes, sans sunglasses. Connor's sleeping in, so I'm not too worried about him coming out and seeing me, but if he does… Like Wally had said, 'Whatever. Keep it to yourself, dude.' After what SB did for me and Tro, he can have my social security number if he wants it.
"Your cuz is an oinker, too," Wally says with a smirk. He tilts his head toward the kitchen where sounds of a speedster rooting through the fridge and pantries and eating up everything in his wake can be heard. "You know, you really should have fed him sooner. I have to eat every 30 minutes. He went for hours."
I frown, feeling like a douche for not realizing that myself, but Tro hadn't said anything. "I gave him an IV."
"For water," Wally says. "Surprised his stomach didn't start eating his flesh, man." Wally's talking with a smile, I know he's joking, but I feel like an ass. I'd stared at how skinny Pietro was, and wondered if he'd been skipping meals to lose so much weight since I'd seen him last. It just didn't occur to me to think: Duh, Dickie, he's like Wally. He loses pounds by the hour if he uses his powers and doesn't eat right before and after.
Or maybe not. I haven't really asked him about how his powers work yet. They seem like Wally's, he eats like Wally, he talks and twitches like Wally.
Pietro comes out of the kitchen with a jug of milk and a box of Cocoa Pebbles. "Hey, this has a name written on it. Can I have it anyway?" He waves the cereal box.
"Dude! That's mine! That's like my last box!" Wally's up in a flash and standing in front of Pietro. "Eat the Apple Jacks!"
"Already did," Pietro says with a wicked grin. "And the Cinnamon Toast Crunch, and the Frosted Flakes, and those round things in the pink tin. I thought they were cookies, but they were nasty. I need the cereal to wash them down with." He shakes the box in Wally's face and Wally's hand blurs toward the box… but Pietro blurs, too. I blink and Pietro's sitting on the arm of the chair I'm lounging in. He shakes Wally's cereal box again, and Wally growls, vanishing. I look to my cousin to find him gone, too.
Crashes and the sounds of furniture scraping and sliding across the floor rock the base. Magazines fly off the table as blurs of orange and green and white and blue streak around the room. Every few seconds, I catch glimpses of Pietro, posing and shaking the cereal box, and Wally glaring.
"Can' ' 'retoomuchofaklutz!" Pietro sings.
"Gimmemycerealyoubratthief!" Wally shouts.
The couch crashes over onto its side and Wally sits sprawled beside it, rubbing his knees. "Owowowowwow…. Shit!"
"Klutzklutzklutz!"
"Wally, is he faster than you?" I have to know. Wally glares at me and disappears. I gasp as a skinny body squeezes into my chair. Pietro's sitting beside me.
He pressed his lips to my ear. "I can't tell who's faster 'cause he keeps knocking into stuff." He giggles and blurs away as an orange streak rams into my chair.
"Yiii!" I throw myself into a back tuck and land on my feet next to Wally who lands on his belly and skids across the stone floor.
"That'sit! !" Wally's on his feet and huffing like an asthmatic. "You…" he stops as a door slams and we hear a wall crack.
Stomp. Stomp. Stomp-Stomp.
We look at each other and then at the entrance to the den as a bedraggled, sleepy-eyed Connor trudges into the room, large hands balled into fists at his sides. "What the hell are you doing?" He roars.
I point at Wally who squeaks. From the kitchen, I hear the sound of bowls rattling and spoons scraping porcelain.
"I was saving my cereal from Robbie's cousin!" Wally shouts. "He ate everything else, something has to be sacred! I think he even drank your milk. That jug he had looked like it said 'organic'."
Connor growls deep in his chest, eyes narrowing, then the anger is gone, and he's staring at me with an almost wondrous expression on his face. Eh?
"Robin, your mask…" he says, and I feel a flash of "Oh crap" before I remember that I don't care.
"Yeah, it itches and I'm not really a fan of sunglasses in a building. So," I glance back at Wally and grin, "keep it to yourself, dude, but my name's Dick Grayson when I'm not wearing leggings."
"The rich guy's kid?" Connor says. "You…" He freezes. "Does that mean Batman's…?"
"The rich guy?" I raise a brow and shrug. "Keep it to yourself."
Connor nods at me, so serious I almost crack up. This guy will take my identity to his grave. "Uh… thanks… uh, Dick. I… nice to meet you, I guess."
I snort. "Likewise… I guess." I clear my throat and tilt my head toward the kitchen. "Tro, you almost done eating everything in there?"
"Hey… how long's this pizza been in here?" Pietro calls back, sounding preoccupied.
"Geez…" Wally grumbles. "I guess I gotta go home, too, seeing as there's no more food." He makes a face. "Pizza? When's the last time we ordered pizza in here?"
"M'gann and I had some a few weeks ago," Connor says. "Guess we forgot to throw the last of it out."
"Gross," I mutter. Should I tell Pietro not to eat it? Nah.
"What do you mean you gotta go home, 'too'?" Connor asks, looking from Wally to me while scratching his bare chest. The dude has some serious muscle, and I'd be lying if I say I'm jealous. I spend hours in the gym, and it makes me stronger, but not buffer. I got muscles, but they're skinny muscles, and I'm skinny, so I look like a string bean next to Connor… and Wally. Wally's no Boy of Steel, but he looks like he can hold his own in a fight.
"I'm going home in a little bit, and taking Pietro with me. I think he'll be safer in the Bat Cave and…" Batman will be there. I know I'm 15, I know I'm going to college soon, but still, sometimes you just want your dad to help you take care of things.
Connor frowns. "I thought this was gonna be a Team thing, an 'us' thing. I can still help out." He looks hurt and a rush of warmth runs through me.
Geez, Con.
I would hug him, but only Pietro and Wally like hugs.
"I know, and I'll call you if I need you man, but… I think this is beyond us," I say. And maybe it is and maybe it isn't, but when it comes to dealing with daddies, I'd rather let a daddy handle it. This is more than just beating the bad guys. This is family and legal custody and all sorts of ugliness that's no business for non-relatives.
Pietro comes out of the kitchen, gnawing on a decrepit pizza slice. His eyes scan the room and he waves at Connor.
Connor stares at him. "That pizza's rancid."
"I've eaten worse." The pizza's gone in two bites. "I'm Quicksilver, by the way. Never-got-to-introduce-myself." He smoothes his devil horns off his forehead with one hand and licks pizza grease off the fingers of the other.
"Superboy," Connor says, still staring. "What the hell are you wearing?"
Pietro looks bemused, Wally grins and I groan, palming my forehead. Wally had loaned Pietro something to wear, since the clothes he'd worn in were ripped and bloody. I hadn't taken in his outfit before, but my cousin is wearing a pair of too-big jeans belted tight around the waist, and an over-sized sweatshirt with my friggin' face on it.
"Oh yeah! That's a Team Grayson shirt. You want one? They're hot, baby, and I'll sell you yours at a discounted rate."
Super-speed does not save Wally's ass from my foot.
(~*~)
I park my motorcycle in the garage. I keep one without the Robin insignia on it at Mount Justice, too. Pietro rode double, hanging onto my waist and fiddling with my iPod. We didn't talk the whole trip, and he's still quiet as he climbs off my bike and stretches his arms and legs.
Bruce's street legal cars are all here, so he's not at the office or undercover, and Batman's not usually out in the afternoon. Pietro walks around the garage, peering in the windows of the Porsche and Lamborghini. His hands hover over the hoods of the twin Ferraris, as he gazes at the sea of luxury cars, and racing bikes surrounding us. Mixed with the new cars are vintage models and showroom classics.
"Holy shiggity! How rich is this guy?" Pietro puts his hands behind his head and whistles. "How rich are you?"
I shrug. I don't really like talking about how much money I'm worth these days. I've got a trust fund I get access to when I'm 21 that's turned into a real nest egg, not to mention Bruce made me his heir apparent. Yar, yar, if something ever happened to Bruce I'd have to share it all with Jason, Tim and Alfie, but… it makes me uncomfortable. From trailers and tents to mansions and summer cottages.
"Loan me 20 bucks?" Pietro's beside me again, squeezing my shoulder. "Feels weird living in a big place, huh?"
"It used to," I say. "Sometimes it still does." I watch him, frowning at the shadows in his eyes. "You said Magneto's house was pretty big, too."
"Dude, it doesn't compare. You could fit that house in this garage." He rubs his arms through the folds of the sweatshirt and looks down at his sneakers. "Is your new family gonna be okay with me coming in right now, or do I need to wait out here while you explain?"
"No, you're coming in with me. I'll explain everything with you—what's wrong?" He's still looking at his shoes, and now he's biting his lip.
"It's just… I…" He looks at me and smiles self-deprecatingly. "I don't get invited inside houses where people keep the real silver on the tables. Even in Magneto's house, he locked up the valuables."
I'm tired of hearing about that bastard Magneto and what he did to my family members. I take one of Pietro's thin hands and march toward the door that will take us into a back hallway of the manor. "Family is always welcome here."
"But I'm…"
"My family, which makes you extended family to the rest of the house," I say. "Come on, you aren't the only gypsy to pass through these doors. And my brother Jason, hah, before he moved in here, he got caught stealing the tires off the Batmobile. He had the car up on bricks, man. It was epic."
I talk as I pull Pietro through the long hallways decorated with portraits of dead Waynes. They all look solemn and boring and I wonder what kind of lives they led and what they'd think of Batman.
"The tires? You're lyin'," Pietro says, a smile in his voice.
"Nope. If we'd taken like five minutes longer getting back to the car, he would have gotten away with it," I say. We reach the door that leads into the kitchen and I touch my hand to it. Behind the door I hear Jason's voice, and Tim's, they're arguing (surprise, surprise) and there's Alfie's "tut-tut". I glance over my shoulder at Pietro, who's pale as a ghost, and take a deep breath.
Here goes.
I push open the door and step into the kitchen where Alfred's at the stove and Tim and Jason are sitting around the kitchen table eating apple slices and bickering,
"Hey guys!" The direct approach seemed like a good idea to me a second ago, but with Jason, Tim and Alfie staring at me like that, maybe it's not. "Uh… this is my cousin, Pietro. He's… visiting."
"Young man," Alfred says, covering the pot he's stirring and wiping his hands on a dish towel, "Master Bruce has requested that you go straight to his study when you got home."
Alfie's face is stern, all business, Tim looks nervous and Jason looks apologetic. What the hell is going on? My stomach drops into my shoes. "Sure, but what's…"
"Please take your guest with you. Master Bruce wishes to see him, too."
Oh hell.
Author's Note: So, what's the verdict? Like it? Hate it? Don't care about it either way? Any way you liked it, let me know. Please review!