Family of the Cowl; The Court of Owls – Silent Night
Part one: Chapter One: Cornucopia of Falsehoods
/
"There he goes!"
The scuttling, fast and flabby shadow ran across the lot with its tail tucked. There wasn't any way to describe it. After a last-minute break in report of one - Dr. Langstrom as the Man Bat of Gotham City, the guards had come but so too had one other crime fighter from through the grape vine. Tim Drake pulled himself away from his dilemma; Batman was going to flip his lid and then the others WOULD roast Red Robin until he croaked.
As for his temporary appearance…
Today after all was a very important time to celebrate. He'd gone out to find his objective to be the only one who could complete the mission in record time, and yet he was the only hero on call to answer the lab security guard's wailing plea.
Now though, his goose was cooked.
Tim came across a building with marble walls, seeking out his own reflection before letting out a loud "gobble gobble."
/
~ He turned me into a bird! A, a damned turkey! ~ The bird…the... Bird of this particular season, in the windy city was going to be lost until easily located by rabid dogs…
Turkey – Tim was helpless but not unable to waddle off to wherever he could to find his brood. Still, the night crept in to blanket the space. His beadier eyes made him incapable of seeing off into the distance. Humans had this problem, but not as much as a fifty or so pound turkey ready for the dinner table.
/
Dick and Jay showed up at the door of Wayne's manor. His girlfriend Kori would be stopping by before jetting off to do some good at the local soup kitchen with the bat clan. This year, it was a must but one person had since gone to replace the cranberries.
"Tim was supposed to have gotten back with the whole cranberries I requested…that was…oh my… forty - five minutes ago…" Alfred shook his head while Bruce Wayne eyed the clock in the den. A young Damian wasn't in the picture yet. Dick was still not old enough to want kids so the earlier years now, were a small blessing. Then again, Talia had not come clean about their son yet, so how could the detective have summed up that much?
"Who's already arrived, Alfred?" Bruce didn't look away from the door as he got up from his seat. Alfred blinked and mentally pictured the dining room with all of the setting arrangements carried out in accordance with the man of the house's placement list. "Master Richard and Miss Kori Anders will be seated beside you, Master Bruce. Miss Kyle will be joining us as well, I deduced by how you've laid out your grandparent's good cutlery onto my list?"
"Ah, just since it matches the set." Bruce blushed with a nod, nervous to tell Dick and Jay that Cat woman was no longer behind bars for being on her very best behavior. "Selina was the one who suggested the soup kitchen; since Barbara's plan last year to volunteer at a food pantry had so little participants, we decided to make it a new tradition. My father would have considered the same I think."
"Your father far from simply cared if the people of his city starved, Master Bruce." Alfred wagged a finger to add, "He fed the hungry because it was a just show of good faith to the public. Your father tried his very best but…there are those who'd ungraciously oppose his good Samaritan faith I, fear..."
Who that may as well be, we can't say. Bruce milled about the room until he was ready to greet his house guests for tonight's Thanksgiving feast. This year, Tim had been granted kitchen privileges since Al wanted to share in his favorite baking methods. And, he wanted to go to bed early before the drinks got splashed all over the sofa in the den.
Jason was coming, which meant utter mayhem.
Stephanie and Dick were good, but Dick was…. a bit pushy when it came to being a –
"Al! We made it…" Dick stopped the butler in the hall as the doors swung wide open to reveal a panting and smiling nervous, couple. A red - headed, tall and prideful alien maiden followed behind, and a debonair male with ebony bangs falling away from his face and a long tail at his back. Had he not lost the man - bun habit? He was wearing his best button down while Kori Anders wore a heavy turtleneck top with a long billowing skirt to match her highest heels. She was, a bit wild but the sweetest when it came to caring for her family. Appearances meant little and Dick loved her if not just as much as his love for peace and justice for all.
Well, she seemed a bit distracted by his nerves than usual, and a bit…
Swollen up.
Al gawked.
"Mrs. Anders! Do sit down, my dear. You came all the way across the country to see us tonight. Dick took the lead and held Kori's arm as it looked to be more than one kid on the way.
And, from behind a face peeked in the doorway to look up at her mother. Jay stood beside the new addition – as the prophecy would not yet pull the family apart for two more years after. A three-year-old girl with purple eyes and silver locks in two pig tails was batting her lashes away at the butler curiously. "Daddy? Mama? Am I allowed in too?"
/
Dick sat with Kori, while Bruce eyed over the child who was admiring her grandpa's study.
Dick cleared his throat. Bruce crossed his arms and looked over to his oldest son, his golden child looked like he was getting cold feet. "Well?"
"Ahh, yes so…Kori thought – "I believed I was comfortable with us in the "making of love" and for that to –
"No, no." Alfred put a hand to his temples, then pointed to the silver haired three-year-old in her best party dress and silver – grey button-down wool coat.
"That child! Where ever did she come from is what Bruce and I would love to hear…"
/
Dick told them about the prophecy of the Child of the Golden Dawn, and he also told them about Isa's promise that Ava would be raised to oversee to the Chosen child once it was time to…Well, Kori was actually with twins according to the doctors.
Jason stood outside and spoke with Cassandra Cain who was just texting to her teammates. Barbara was doing a last-minute sweep of the city to be on the safe side. She was trapped in a room with James Gordon until he was conked out; at the sheer moment of a breakthrough with his only daughter, then they'd both be dully satisfied for the night to go along. No drunken rants about Batman or the GCPD. The missus had since departed so she was, the only one who could tame the beast that was her overprotective pops.
"Is Barbara like, the only one who can talk any sense to him, Dad? Kori; my brother is honestly a goody – goody but a real dirk when he makes up his mind."
Starfire shot her old "outlaw" partner a firm glare. "I am well aware of my husband's many peculiar, flaws…Yet our child was adopted for reasons that we as parents would never allow for you all to shame." She coaxed over the young toddler who was walking earlier than three could manage, a reason being her origins mostly. Not being of their world ( New gen and part two new year arc, back tracking to before Dick went…solo in Bludhaven because of Roku's curse.)
"Ava Marie? Say hello to your father's "Gnorfka." Grandpa Bruce!"
/
Cass actually looked interested in the outcome; if Bruce would be ok with introduction, until Jay pulled her to the side. Oracle was calling them. They had to move it in ten.
"Ah, shoot!" Jay slapped a palm to his face dramatically. Little Ava blinked back lighter lashes from her mother's lap. "Sorry…but we forgot something a the store; I'm going to call up…Uncle Timmy before they close." Definitely sounded like it, but Bruce started to rise with a speculative stance. "I'll go with you."
"No!" Jay defended his time alone. The last thing he wanted was to keep more secrets from daddy dearest.
"We got this, right Cass?"
"Huh?" She was beside Kori and meeting the cute Ava for the first time. Looking up from her new family member, she nodded. "Sure, yeah. Tim. Gotcha."
/
The door shut behind them and Jay could feel Bruce's disappointed gaze still penetrating his motorcycle jacket's back. He shivered and got as far from the spot as mentally possible with the Cain kid.
"Oracle; we're outside. What are the coordinates?" Cass waited for Jay's boss to lay down a few locations onto their devices. And also… Just because it was a nation holiday, that didn't mean the world had stopped needing vigilantes to rid the bad seeds from their harvest season. No way. Tim had been after a damned lead and THAT really ground Jay's gears in doubly hard. He had to cover for the teen. He was older but more street smart as to not end up around any…heh….fowl – play.
~ It's the city's business district; Tim was stopping a break in at the museum of natural history when Man bat showed up. He went after it when I tried to say Batman-
"Bats is with his own crisis, Barbara." Cass sighed and let her feet touch back to a rooftop as she slipped off to find their other missing bird.
~ Thing is…he's not picking up. I think it was dropped because I still got a faint signal from his device. ~ Oracle put her hand under he chin and felt the glow of those screens bring her back to center.
"What about the Comish, Babs?" Jay swept off by bike instead, catching more time to get back with the "item" Timmy had left off of Al's last second list.
~ He's fine. ~ Barbara grinned and spun round in her wheel chair to check the door for any "forced entry." ~ I had him drink and talk himself to bed. Same as last year. As alert as my dad is, he can sleep like a ton of bricks, so just skip the desert for me. ~ She shrugged in a nonchalant manner.
"Good call, Barbie." Jay smirked below his helmet. "And for your information, you'd better pull a house arrest on that old man until we find Tim."
~ Aha! There! His locator is still there, right –
As soon as the rest could be said, a dark figure came hissing out of the wall where a break in had been monitored, prior to Tim's sudden absence at the scene of the crime. A decrepit figure scuttled off while Jay's bike did an ollie to keep the beast or whatever THAT was in it corner. "That's as far as we're letting you hobble, Langstrom –
Jay's eyeholes had gotten a bit wider as his guns suddenly got heavier in his hands. No. Not a bat…
The figure coughed. Half broken by the mask with two horns, but it held weapons upon its wrists, bleeding out while another winged freak put out a call in the form of that ugly screech.
"Who is that??" Cass ran to aide Jay. "I'm…not sure…." The figure then gained back some of its stamina and miraculously slipped away into the hazy darkness, as if they were not to be seen again for a very long time.
Jay stood breathless before the real Langstrom, as the hybrid grey creature came barreling after them on the wings of a true bat – man. Cass got out her weapons while Jason shook off his own shock. They cried out into the darkened streets as an explosive battle commenced, and just as it began to pelt a chilling rain onto their backs. At a time when eating until you popped, and they were just holding up the gravy train once more.
/
Tim awoke to find that he was alive, but it was not in the form of a bird, but in his own body. It must have been a temporary shot.. Did Langstrom find a way to reverse his own work? He scrambled to his feet as the brainiest; Red Robin, and the one who needed to get that sauce before…was going to have only
A clanging bell sounded off at the Gotham City clock tower. Tim's spirits drooped, too late…. Shoot!
He padded home on foot, trying to connect…his unit! Where? He patted down his sides…Ah, right.
Tim groaned and kept running now. Al was going to stick him back at the kid's table for this…