It goes like this –
Gotham U is having a spirit week, Mom, so of course I have to wear the Gotham U baseball cap. You wanted me to get the normal college experience, right?
Either Mom is not in the mood to get into it, or Stephanie's been discrete enough about her Batgirl stuff that it doesn't ding Mom's suspicion radar, because that somehow works. Stephanie can keep the cap over her head and Mom doesn't have to question the injury she got last night.
And now Stephanie has to pretend to have school spirit, when she actually has the furthest thing from it. She's just counting down the minutes until class is out, knowing that it will bite her in the butt later when she has to go back and re-read the PowerPoint slides the teachers put up before her test.
She should stop and force herself to pay attention, but she can't. She can only think of training tonight.
It's going to be with Cass. Sure, Damian will be there too and he's kind of annoying – but more annoying in a little kid way than anything serious, though she's sure he'd want to stab her if she told him that. Either way, it's easier to deal with little kid anger than it is with Dick's general... dickishness. Dick's been forced to admit she belongs, though – or at least he seemed somewhat chill last night. It had taken saving his life to do it, of course, and she kind of wishes it hadn't.
By time she gets done with school and gets to the Batcave, Damian and Cass are already hard at work. Damian's attacking a training dummy, Cass is walking around him and watching. She turns and looks when Stephanie comes in, and smiles.
Stephanie will confess she loves seeing Cass's smile. You know, when it's genuine and she's just showing her teeth – and even though Cass isn't the biggest person for words, you can always tell how she feels – when she lets you – based on her expression, and this one just says I'm genuinely happy to see you.
The teeth disappear and Cass switches to smiling with her mouth shut and taps her chin and raises an eyebrow. Devious. Probably intentional.
"Batgirl's here," Cass says to Damian, who stops training on the dummy to glower at her.
Get over it, kid. But Stephanie's too busy being happy to finally get to training and Cass to be really mad about it.
"We can start working on the last one," Cass says to Damian. "Control."
"Tt. I've never not been in control of my actions," Damian says, a little snootily.
Even though it's obvious she's talking about in combat.
"Am I playing too rough with the bad guys?" Stephanie asks, smiling. "I'll try to rein it in."
"She's not taking it seriously!" Damian says, almost before Stephanie finished talking. "See? I told you I was the only professional among your group of … cohorts."
Stephanie guesses Dick getting over himself doesn't mean the kid did too.
Cass sighs.
"It was a joke," Stephanie says.
Damian sniffs. "It wasn't funny."
"Harsh crowd."
Damian just seems confused. She guesses he doesn't get she's referencing stand-up comics. He doesn't seem to get many of her references. The kid is in serious need of a pop culture education.
"Damian has asked me to teach him my incapacitating moves," Cassandra explains. "I don't know if I can teach it to someone else. But I can give you both skills that would be necessary, if you get that advanced."
"'If'?!" protests Damian.
At the same time, Stephanie says, "Sweet."
Cass gestures them over to a corner of the Batcave. She's set up some training dummies with circles around certain parts of their 'bodies' – around the spot right between your collar bones, shoulder joints, the armpit area...
"What's this for?" Stephanie asks.
"Practice," Cass says. "I want you each to try what would be a 'knock out' move on the dummy. Batgirl, then Damian. I can't watch you both at once."
Damian nods sharply. Like he's getting graded for nodding. It's weird.
Either way, Stephanie has a dummy to fake-knock out. She goes for a strong right hook to the temple. Knocking someone out is always risky, because you pretty much have to get their brain to slam against the side of their skull so hard it stops working temporarily. At least, that's how she thought about it.
Cass watches her, then says, "Good job. It might not always make someone pass out. But... would definitely rock them."
Stephanie smiles. This is a bit more interesting than regular sparring with Cass – not like she doesn't like regular sparring, but it's new.
Damian takes his turn. He bunches his legs slightly and lifts off the ground with an uppercut to the chin. The dummy's head snaps back.
"Their jaw would shatter," Cass says.
Damian shrugs. "They'd live."
Soooo nice of you. But Stephanie will confess she's not exactly sure she would care either. Definitely when she just started being Spoiler, she really didn't get Robin's need to protect or rescue people who would have killed them without a second thought, and she sure as hell still doesn't get Cass jumping in front of bullets for complete scumbags.
"Either way," Cassandra says. "It's not the point of the exercise."
Damian scowls slightly. "I guess not."
"Do it again," Cass says. "Both of you. Stephanie – a little harder. Damian – a little gentler."
It is super easy for Stephanie to hit the dummy harder – probably even harder than Damian hit his. She just imagines it's her dad and that does it. The thing swings wildly on its string after her punch.
Cassandra cringes.
"Hey, you said to hit it harder."
"You drew back too much," Cass says. "You telegraphed."
What. Ever.
"Keep the form you had earlier," Cass says. "When hitting it harder... you lost it."
Stephanie nods. She should know that. Well, she did. It just wasn't at the top of her brain at the moment and she knows that if Batman – Bruce – were here he'd have some explanation for how you always have to be thinking about everything.
Cass continues like that for a bit, having them each practice the punch or kick she describes and then offering feedback on it for both of them. Stephanie can tell Damian's getting bored, and she guesses she is too. The novelty of the new exercise wore off quick; it's much more redundant than sparring. But training with Cass this way is weirdly reminiscent of training with Batman. He always wanted you to get something completely perfect, and keep doing it until you do.
Stephanie doesn't mention that of course, because she's not an asshole. She could tell Damian had some unresolved issues with Batman – or maybe it was just the fact that his dad was dead. Either way, she's trying to avoid sticking her foot in her mouth like she did earlier.
"Except one time," Cass says when the two of them are taking a breather after the exercise, "You're using more force, Damian. Even though Batgirl is physically stronger than you."
"No she's not!" Damian says, again, almost immediately before she's done talking.
Cass furrows her brow. "She's older. She has larger muscles."
Stephanie can't resist the bait, so she doesn't even try. She just flexes her biceps and says, "I do, don't I?"
Damian groans.
"Now," Cass says, "You two should spar."
Stephanie frowns. She didn't like fighting Damian last night. He came at her like he genuinely wanted to kill her, or at least seriously injure her. Total faux pas for someone who was supposed to be on her side.
If Damian has any similar objections – or you know, however he would phrase it 'blah blah, you expect an amateur to fight me? I was trained in the League of Shadows' – he doesn't show it. He just walks over to one of the sparring mats, shifts his weight more to the balls of his feet and holds his hands up in guard.
Stephanie groans internally. Might as well get this over with. She does the same.
Damian doesn't even wait for Cass to say "go" – major jerk move – he just comes straight at her. Fast little bastard. Stephanie's surprised enough she can't even get her foot up in sidekick position to use her long legs to her advantage, so she just steps to the side out of the way.
Damian turns on a dime and punches her in the kidney – owww – and then tries to get on her back. Before he can get his grip solid, Stephanie grabs his wrist with one hand and his elbow with the other, steps back, and throws him on the floor.
She's standing above him and obviously that was a mistake because he just kicks both feet up at her face the instant he slams onto the floor. Stephanie takes the shot to the nose and stumbles back.
Freaking kid.
"Lucky shot," she says, and at least her nose isn't broken or anything. Just sore. "I wasn't ready."
"Death doesn't wait for you to be ready."
Stephanie pinches the bridge of her nose in annoyance and immediately regrets it because it hurts, but damn is that kid dramatic.
"Follow the sparring rules," Cass says from the sidelines.
Stephanie kind of wishes she hadn't said anything though. She doesn't want someone fighting her battles for her when her opponent is ten-freaking-years-old.
The next round, fortunately, Stephanie is definitely prepared for Damian to charge her again. She's taking Barbara's advice. Use the advantages she has that her opponents don't, and hers in this case is reach.
Damian, however, does not charge her now that she's ready which is kind of disappointing. She was really looking forward to side-kicking him back three or four feet.
He waits a moment, probably testing her patience. She's not about to let him win. Two can play that game.
Damian scoffs and comes in, starting with what looks like a backfist –
Weird to try to backfist her to the head when it's so much higher than his is and his arms are so short –
But of course that's a feint. She gets an arm up in guard to block it, and he shin kicks her straight to the stomach.
She exhales with the blow.
You exhale with a block and with an attack, Batman said. It's a kiai. A fairly basic concept. The logic is that it's supposed to help direct your chi. But practically, you expel the air from your chest, clench your stomach muscles. It makes you hit harder and prepares you to be hit. Getting hit in the chest on an inhale is a bad idea.
It's not like she doesn't get her hits in, too. As far as she can tell, Damian really doesn't like it when she re-grabs him and uses her size to her advantage – which, to be fair, she hates that when other people to it to her. But she's also not going to let a ten-year-old kick her ass.
It's a pretty typical sparring exchange of blows for the next fifteen minutes, neither of them having their Batgear or anything they can use to make it more fun. Stephanie tries to come in with a backfist, he counters with a duck and sucker punch to the ribs. He comes in with a roundhouse kick, she grabs his leg and tries to pull him in for a kick to the groin. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't.
Stephanie will admit that sparring Damian is annoying as hell. He obviously got the full Bat-approved combat education before starting. It doesn't seem fair. She feels almost like she should get a something, otherwise it's like Everyone else got sweet ninja skills from their childhood trauma, all I got is this shitty T-shirt.
She doesn't say that, of course, because that'd be ridiculously insensitive. And make her look like a sore loser on the rounds she does lose.
Stephanie occasionally tries to make conversation while they're fighting, but it's like talking to a brick wall.
It goes like this.
Damian gets in a hit. Stephanie says, "Nice shot", because she's capable of being a good sport. And of course Damian would immediately lift up his head slightly and say "As always!"
Stephanie gets in a hit. She smiles. Damian scowls deeply. And so on and so forth.
"It must be killing you that you're not winning all of these," Stephanie says on the next round she wins, because well... she's rubbing it in a little, okay?
Damian's habitual scowl deepens further and he raises his hands up in a fighting position. "And it's not killing you that you're not?"
Stephanie comes in with a round-house kick at Damian's waist, he leaps over her leg suddenly – she'll admit she wasn't expecting that – and lands on her chest with an elbow. Stephanie exhales with the blow and stumbles back slightly. Damian steps forward and before she knows it she's on her ass.
Ow. He swept her leg while she was stumbling back. Fast little jerk.
Damian's standing above her, looking down at her, rambling: "You're nominally an adult woman. Don't you think you should be better?"
Try to poke the angry ten-year-old and he'll never shut up about it.
"Aren't you embarrassed?" Damian continues.
But he's being pretty sloppy for someone who prides himself on assassin training. He didn't even move out of her arms reach before ranting about how much better he is then her. Which seems like a really stupid move. He's leaving himself open to attack.
… If she does this, Stephanie knows she has to do a feint, he's quick enough that he'll move out of a regular leg sweep. But maybe...
If she grabs for his leg with an arm (he steps back as predicted)
She can her legs up at his face, a mirror image of the move he did earlier! He ducks down to avoid the kick to the face, but her momentum's already taking her up and backward, right on top of him. The two of them crash and fall back on the floor and Stephanie can feel Damian trying to do something to get out of her arms' reach, but she doesn't let him. She grabs him by the bicep and starts trying to out muscle him. She pulls him towards her and he elbows her in the ribs as she brings him in, but it's not so hard that she can't just suck it up like a big girl and slam him on the ground, so he's on his back and she's pressing her left elbow into her chest and pinning his shoulder down with her right hand.
… She may have miscalculated this slightly. Cass or Barbara would just be annoyed at a stunt like this. Damian looks like he wants to kill her. He reaches a snake-hand strike at her face, she instinctively shuts her eyes and ducks her head because it sure looked like he was going for an eye-strike, despite how sparring unfriendly that would be.
The instant her eyes shut, there's a sharp twinge in her left arm – the one that was braced against his chest – and Stephanie lets go to avoid getting her arm broken. And before whatever else Damian was going to do next can happen –
She's lifted to her feet. Damian wouldn't be strong enough to do this so quickly so –
Yup. There's Cass. She jumped between the two and is holding each of them by their shirts. To Steph's surprise, Cass is glowering at her. Like she did something wrong! She wasn't the one trying to poke someone's eye out or break their arm!
"What did I do?" Stephanie asks.
"Are you serious?" Cass says.
Wow she's mad. Stephanie doesn't really see her mad often. Her voice isn't even super loud; she's not yelling, she just sounds cold.
… it's kind of scary.
"I don't know what Brown did, but I didn't do anything!" Damian protests. Which is so weird. Why's he protesting, when Cass isn't even getting on him?
But just because Cass is acting like he didn't do anything doesn't mean Stephanie will. "You wanted to poke my eye out!" she says.
Damian scoffs. "It was obviously a feint – you'll notice you still have both eyes!"
He is really unbearable to spar with.
Cassandra lets go of both of their shirts and steps back a pace. Damian immediately starts trying to straighten himself out, like he's wearing a fancy suit instead of a T-shirt.
"Sparring's over," Cass says.
"Tt. Fine by me; I wasn't learning anything!" Damian says.
Stephanie groans. "Yeah, that's not really something to brag about."
"Well, I learned not to take my eyes off you," Damian says. And it's not just a regular snooty voice; there's actual venom in the words –
Shit.
She may have messed up.
Because when she attacked him when he was gloating in her personal space, she was aiming to knock him off his high horse. You know, 'stop lecturing me about how much better you are for being raised by assassins when this would be regarded as stupid by assassins'.
But she's guessing he took it as a genuine threat. Like she genuinely wanted to hurt him, because she wasn't following the sparring rules –
And it's really not fair that it's a big deal if she doesn't follow the rules, when he didn't at first, but she also guesses that's part of... being a grown up. Not trying to get revenge on kids who are annoying you.
"Whatever you're doing, cut it out," Damian says. He still sounds genuinely mad – Stephanie didn't even realize there was a difference earlier, because he always comes across as kind of cranky, but right now his voice is pitched a little lower and there's an urgency to it.
Stephanie raises her hands slightly. "Sorry," she says.
Damian's frown just deepens, though. "Stop that!"
Cass just looks between the two of them.
"Stop, uh, what?" Stephanie asks, because as far as she could tell, apologizing was how to put things on the right track.
Damian exhales sharply.
Cass takes a step towards him and he takes a step back.
Okay, Universe. Message received; I won't be petty with ten-year-olds anymore. Now can things get back to normal?
But they're not. Damian still looks... upset.
"I shouldn't have attacked you outside the sparring match," Stephanie continues.
"You should have," Damian says.
What?
"What?" Cass asks.
"It's a good reminder. I've gotten sloppy." Damian exhales sharply at the end of his sentence again; Stephanie can't tell if it's anger or... something else.
"It's not a good reminder; you should be able to hang out without feeling like I'm going to attack you when I'm not supposed to," Stephanie starts. "You shouldn't have to watch your allies 24/7."
"'Should'," Damian says, while rolling his eyes. "No one cares what should happen."
Stephanie doesn't get it. The more she tries to apologize, the more scowly Damian seems. Right now it seems he's more upset about the aftermath of what she did than the actual action itself.
"You have to be ready," Damian continues, speaking past her. "If I had been sloppy when you had a knife and you threw it at my turned back, I'd be dead."
That was a suspiciously specific example. "... Damian, did a sparring partner throw knives at you?" Stephanie asks.
Rather than answering, Damian immediately turns 180 degrees around and starts walking away, towards where he has his motorcyle and gear, on the way other end of the Batcave. Far enough away that it feels like Stephanie has a bit of space.
Stephanie sighs.
Cass walks up to her, and touches her on the shoulder.
Stephanie smiles slightly. She guesses Cass isn't super mad. But...
"Shouldn't you be comforting Damian?" Stephanie asks.
On his side of the Batcave, Damian tenses, stiff as a board.
Cass shrugs. It didn't seem like he would accept any comfort. He seemed... more distressed the more you tried, she says in sign language. Must be feeling pretty non-verbal now. Or she just doesn't want to be eaves-dropped on.
Yeah, Stephanie says. I could tell that, and I don't even have your abilities.
If she were saying it out loud, she would embellish the phrase a bit, like freaky ninja body language training, but she doesn't know how to say that in ASL. Probably for the best for now; she doesn't want another patented Stephanie Brown foot-in-mouth moment.
I'm bad at this, Stephanie says.
You're not bad at sparring.
Stephanie wasn't even thinkingabout sparring, but now it's going to be at the top of her brain. Great. No, not sparring. Interacting with people, she says.
You're bad at it? Cass asks, gesturing more emphatically and widening her eyes more than usual on the you? to emphasize the sign.
Stephanie laughs.
Cass laughs too.
But, Spoiler, Cass signs after a moment. You can't... do that stuff with D-A-M-I-A-N.
Spelling out his name, she's guessing, because Damian doesn't have a name sign yet. The letters come slow as she spells, since Cass isn't very confident with it yet.
I know, Stephanie says.
I mean it. It's how assassins train. You always have to be ready to be attacked.
Well, ouch. Cass is talking from experience, Stephanie knows this. And well... it makes her feel like a jerk.
I'm trying to help him not to be training like an assassin, Cass continues.
Stephanie nods.
There's some slight footsteps in the background. And...
Well, speak of the devil.
"What are you two doing?" asks Damian. He's wandered up, dressed as Robin, but at least he seems... well, not normal but, you know. Damian normal.
Though it could just be harder to tell if people are upset behind the domino masks.
"Um, talking," Stephanie says.
"I didn't hear anything. Beyond your extremely condescending and unwelcome first sentence."
Stephanie frowns slightly. She knows that she wasn't trying to be condescending. But she really doubts Damian would believe her.
"Sign language," Cassandra says.
Damian lifts his left hand up close to his forehead, right above his eye, kind of like he's pantomiming holding binoculars. Normally a sign around his eyes would make Stephanie assume he's trying to talk about looking or seeing something, but the angle of his hand is all wrong and he's not making the two fingered V that Stephanie always assumed was supposed to represent two eyes.
"Not army hand signals," Cassandra says."Sign language."
"Like for deaf people," Stephanie clarifies.
Damian's forehead creases slightly, like he's thinking. "You're not deaf, though."
"It works for anyone! That's just why it was invented!"
Damian scoffs.
Stephanie decides against trying to apologize again, because she doesn't want to bring it up. And Damian just kept getting more upset if the tried to apologize more anyway. So instead, she says, "You're still coming to training tomorrow?"
Damian raises his head slightly. Stephanie can't tell if he's trying to do his regular looking down his nose (while being 4'6") thing. "You're extremely egotistical if you believe you would be capable of scaring me off."
"I'm egotistical?" Stephanie asks.
Damian snorts. "I'm glad you agree."
Stephanie smiles. She can't help it. Even though she knows it was intended to be annoying, it's still just little kid annoying, and at least she knows she didn't mess up too bad.
… She'll confess, dealing with the little kid annoying thing is easier when they're not fighting. When her competitive instincts can't get the better of her.
Damian puts on his motorcycle helmet, and Stephanie assumes he's leaving. "You are not so incompetent as I previously believed," he says.
If he hadn't seemed so... thoroughly weirded out earlier, Stephanie would wondering if being a jerk – breaking the sparring rules, whatever – had warmed Damian up to her. But he was, so she doesn't know what's going on. So she just says, "Thanks so much."
And Damian drives off.
The place seems more relaxed with him gone – or at least, with Stephanie knowing she doesn't have to worry about getting ticked off or ticking him off.
"I know I messed up today," Stephanie says.
Cass shrugs. And to Stephanie's surprise, she actually responds out loud. "It's okay. You're not... you didn't volunteer to train Damian. I did."
"Why did you?" Not like Stephanie thinks it's a bad idea; the kid clearly needs as many positive people in his life as he can get. But back when Cass was Batgirl, she didn't seem like she had time to train anyone. Now she's training everyone.
"He needed help."
Stephanie waits, because she's almost certain there's more than that.
"Dick said I could do it," Cassandra continues. "That I... understood where he was coming from. More than Dick."
"And do you?"
"I don't know."
Stephanie sighs. Not out of annoyance, she just... doesn't know what to say. To tell the truth, she is a bit tired of talking about Damian. She just wants to hang out with Cass.
"So," she says, "I'm thinking... rooftop tag?"
Cass sighs and shakes her head, but then she says, "Okay. For old times' sake."
"Okay," Stephanie says, and reaches over and taps Cass on the shoulder. "But you're 'it'."