Batfam Week 2020

Day 2 Prompts: Hurt/Comfort | Underappreciated Family Members | Dark Batfam AU

How Now, BatCow?

It had been a rough night for one Stephanie Brown, Batgirl. She'd tried to stop a simple mugging only to end up surrounded by more gang members than she could comfortably fight off. Because of course the mugger belonged to a crew. Of course he did, and of course they'd been drinking inside the bar that the alley bordered on and of course they'd happened to come out right as she dropped off of the fire escape to confront who she thought was a single mugger.

This was Steph's particular brand of luck. She supposed she should be used to it by now, and it wasn't like it was her fault this time that things had gone south, but the flames of embarrassment when she'd had to call Oracle in a panic for backup support were sharp accusers. Made worse by the fact that it was Red Hood who came swinging in to save her butt.

Ok, Jason wasn't quite as bad as if it had been B, but then again, who could be? Jason was definitely the second worst person Babs could have called. How he managed to look so scornful when his hood covered his whole freakin' face, she did not know. But he gave Steph the uncomfortable feeling that she was back in the Robin suit and had let Bats down again for the twelfth time in a row.

Ugh. Not her night. She wasn't dead or captured, but feeling like an inadequate piece of crap? Yeah, that wasn't fun.

"Be more careful next time," he'd said to her with disgust once the alley was littered with shot-up gang members. (Not lethally shot, this time, but probably only because it was Oracle who had called him and he didn't want a lecture from the one person in the Batfamily he actually still sort of liked.)

"It wasn't my fault!" she'd protested. Steph swore she could feel the eye roll that he was giving her underneath the hood.

"You don't think?" he asked her, stepping in closer.

"No, I don't think," she said, putting her hands on her hips. "It was one guy when I dropped down."

"Which guy?" he demanded.

"Why does it matter?" Steph countered.

"I'll show you," he said sharply. "Which. Guy." Steph sighed and picked her way around writhing and knocked out bodies until she found the original mugger.

"This one," she said, giving him a little kick.

"Not your fault?" the Hood asked her again. "Let's see. He's wearing Renegade Rogue colors. We're outside the Motley Brews bar and it's Saturday night. Who always drinks at Motley Brews on Saturdays? Oh, that's right - the Renegade Rogues. And what time is it? Look at that," he said sarcastically. "They rang last call ten minutes ago."

Steph stared at him.

"How was I supposed to know any of that?" she asked him.

"Did detecting get taken off the syllabus?" Jason snarked at her. Steph felt her temper flare up.

"I guess I wouldn't know, seeing as how B couldn't be bothered to train me as well as the rest of you."

"Yet here you are in a suit, anyway," Jason said pointedly. "Like I said. Be. More. Careful. You think any of us want another dead Bat to deal with?"

Steph swore she didn't mean for it to, but her chin wobbled.

"Been there, done that, got the t-shirt," she muttered as she turned her back on him and shot her grappling hook up to the nearest roof. She didn't hear it as she flew off into the night, but behind her, Red Hood sighed.

It was some time later when Steph, still in her Batgirl suit, came creeping into the barn that sat nestled in the grounds of Wayne Manor.

"Hey, girl," she called out softly to Batcow, who was kneeling on the ground contentedly chewing her cud. "It's me," Steph said, walking through the shadows to sit down at Batcow's side. Steph sighed as she stroked the cow's head and leaned up against her.

"What's that?" Steph asked her. "Oh. I screwed up again. You know. Like always." Steph didn't want to, but she sniffed as she snuggled a little closer into the cow's warm side. "Steph the screw-up," she muttered. "Steph, the wannabe Robin. Steph, who's gonna get herself killed again sooner rather than later."

"Yeah, of course it was Red Hood," she continued after a pause. "It's Renegade Rogue night down at the bar," she mocked in a dopey voice. "Be more careful, Batgirl." Steph pulled her cowl off and laid it next to her, followed by her gauntlets. "You know, for someone who hates B so much, he's sure got his snark down pat."

"Ouch," she heard a voice say through the dark. "Low blow, Blondie." Steph jumped.

"Well, you know what they say," she said, regaining her voice as Red Hood approached her. "Like father, like son."

"You're full of them tonight," he said to her, settling down on the hay beside her. "You gonna be in town all week?"

"What are you doing here?" she asked him grumpily as he pulled his hood and gloves off and tossed them next to her cowl.

"Me? I followed you. The question is, what are you doing here in the dark with Bat-Steak? Ow!" he yelped as Steph hit him in the arm, hard.

"Don't call her that," she said with heat.

"Geez, someone's sensitive about a cow," he said, rubbing his arm.

"She's Batcow," Steph glared at him, even though he couldn't see it in the dark. "Not just any cow."

"And that makes her special because…?" he asked her with a slight tease in his voice now.

"Because she's the only other person in this family who doesn't get any respect," Steph said more bitterly than she intended to.

"Hey, Blondie," Jason started to say, sounding a little guilty now. Steph didn't answer him and reached out to scratch Batcow's ears.

"Look," Jason sighed, running a hand through his hair. "Maybe I was a little too hard on you out there."

"I don't know," Steph said with self-loathing in her voice, "sounded like you were telling the truth to me. I didn't know about the gang and the bar and all of that. I didn't notice what colors he was wearing."

"Well, the Bats don't really teach you kids to pay attention to things like that," Jason muttered.

"I'm not a kid," Steph said. "I'm twenty. Geez, Jason, you're barely that much older than me."

"Right," he said on a soft laugh. "Of course. Look, I was scared, ok?" he said, reaching out to squeeze her knee. "I'm trying to apologize."

"Scared?" Steph asked him, disbelievingly. "Of those gang members? No, you weren't. Don't lie."

"I wasn't scared of the gang members, Blondie," Jason said seriously, tapping her leg with his hand, and was it just Steph, or was he sitting a little closer to her now? "I was scared because you almost got yourself killed."

"Oh," Steph said, slightly surprised. "Why do you care?"

"Why do I care if Robin dies again? Gee, let me think," Jason said sarcastically. Steph turned her head towards his face in the dark. "Bad enough you got killed once," Jason said more softly, and their lips were so close that his breath floated into Steph's as he spoke.

"Almost killed," Steph murmured.

"Pretty damn near killed, from what I heard, Dead Robin," Jason said, and then he was kissing her and Steph's heart was racing a mile a minute because he was damn good at it, way better than Tim, sexy and bold and confident, taking control of the kiss and making it deep and wet and holding her head firmly in his hand and Steph was losing her breath and soaking her panties and tingling with desire before he drew back to let her lips go. But he didn't let go of her face, although his hand was gentler now as he stroked her cheek.

"I'm sorry, ok?" he said softly, his lips barely touching hers as he spoke.

"Um, ok," Steph whispered back. "You want to make it up to me?" she asked him, leaning forward to brush his mouth in a light kiss.

"I really do," Jason murmured back with a smile in his voice.

"Great!" Steph said cheerfully, drawing back the tiniest bit. "Because I think Batcow is depressed, and I want to steal her some friends."

"Wait, what?" said Jason.

"Here, look," Steph said, reaching down to her Batbelt, which forced him to let go of her face, although Jason didn't let that deter his proximity to her. He promptly slid his arm around her shoulders instead, which Steph didn't seem to mind, so he tugged her into his side while she pulled her cellphone out.

"Cockblocker," he mouthed silently at Batcow's head as he leaned him and Steph back against her bulk, although Steph was snuggling into his shoulder, and that wasn't such a bad development. She was bringing up a YouTube video to show him.

"Are those cows in a forest?" Jason asked her, completely confused now at what he was seeing and the direction that this night was suddenly veering off into.

"Yeah," said Steph happily. "It's an animal sanctuary. See how the cows are all friends? And they roam around all day in the woods and the fields hanging out with each other. Cows form really close bonds, they can totally have BFF's. But Batcow is all alone. I want to help her."

"Why don't you just ask Bruce to buy her some friends?" Jason asked her, feeling puzzled.

"Like Bruce would listen to me," Steph muttered. "Anyway, I found out on the sanctuary's website that dairy cows get their babies taken away from them and sold for veal and it makes the mommies really sad. Isn't that awful? I didn't know that! I thought eating dairy wasn't that bad for animals."

"Uh, right," Jason said, thinking about how delicious hamburgers were. And steak. And chili. "Are you a vegetarian?" he asked Steph, frowning a little bit. He wanted to get with Steph, but he did not want to date a vegetarian. That would be a conundrum.

"God, no," Steph laughed, to Jason's great relief. "You think I could give up Big Belly burgers? But see, that's why I want to steal a dairy cow and her calf. Or, well, more than one, but I'm not sure how big a trailer we can find to transport them in."

Jason's head was starting to spin, but he kind of liked it. Blonde Batgirl wasn't like the other Bats, which he'd already suspected. She was… fun. In a weird way. But a cute way.

"Go over why we have to steal these cows, again?" he asked her, starting to lightly trace circles on her arm with his fingertips.

"Because," Steph said, turning to cuddle her face into the crook of his neck, "we need to atone for eating so much dairy and beef."

"Oh," said Jason with a smile. "That's… not completely irrational," he said as Steph turned a little more and wrapped her arm around his chest.

"So you'll do it?" she asked him hopefully.

"Sure," he said with a grin as he wrapped his other arm around her. "I've done worse things."

"I know," Steph teased him. "This is practically heroic in comparison." Jason snorted.

"I don't think Bruce will see it that way," he said.

"Damian will," Steph said confidently. "And Bruce doesn't need to know where the cows came from."

"You really think he won't find out?" Jason asked her skeptically. Steph made a pfft sound with her mouth.

"By the time he figures it out, Damian will have convinced him that the cows need to stay and he won't be able to do anything about it." Jason laughed.

"You may be slightly more cunning than I gave you credit for earlier," he said, bending down to kiss her again. Steph wrapped her hand around his head and kissed him back.

Coming tomorrow - The next chapter! For Day 3 prompt Bonding During A Mission