Nightwing; A Series Of Doubts – Give and Take –
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Chapter 31: There Goes the Plotline of My lifetime
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This will be partly in another's POV so do note that graphic depections of post rape scene are…a bit messy. Enjoy, near end of story! Wait and see….
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~ I couldn't have come at a better time. ~
~Had John not actually succeeded in locating where my actual body was, still lying at Will's in a coma, I took too long the few moments it happened. He stood over me, face in disbelief that under all of the ominous threats, my spirit was just predicted to be…elsewhere.~
~I begged him to send me to where the action was and Raven had flipped, having been the one to track me down in that secluded alpine villa out in the German countryside.~
~I was aware. That a skin walker was taking advantage of MY enemy, so swift as a jet fighter's wings, I took to Gotham the next flight as an option.~
~Or, well. John just "poofed" me there, his observation from the next room not as welcoming as I was putting on by my mask.~
Slade Wilson; rapist, grooming piece of horse shit.
~I couldn't see the kid as coherent so he must have been dosed by my dopple to have his legs spread. I'm no more disgusted than the brit in the shadows is. We had a plan, and now, as the double zips up his jeans…~
~I know I was too late. Too late to stop it, too late to warn Dick if he didn't already pick up the cues I'd left for his family to follow. That this double was a psychopath who had gone after Nightwing in his time, done the same as making the teen his bride, and then he'd been killed.~
By his own depression of having…loved a monster.
By a wake - up call from Nightwing's allies, he'd committed suicide.
He was that afraid to let go, so Slade jumped in. His fists all he would need as Slade's double went to the wall, latching onto –
A Gun.
~Damn it!~
Dick put his head between his knees, hands over his ears while still in a brief period of shock.
~ It should have been more, yet I knew that this thing was an infection to our reality. It had to be put away, or else an antivirus had to step in.~
~That cure, had to be me as a ducked from the shot, looking for a piece of furniture to scar it with.~
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John moved about as soon as the two Slades were at each other's throats. He came over to the bed that had the frightened Nightwing completely naked between the sheets.
"You can't stay here, lad." The man held out his palm. His comforting stretch of kindness made Dick feel it misplaced for a person who had thrown away everything to keep a false promise.
"You….how did…that was him…Was….wasn't…it?"
John C nodded, Dick finally taking the hand as he was led to the adjoined bathroom to have a robe that smelled of his enemy's skin. Fresh from a shower, had to be the drugs talking. Dick threw aside the blush and held his skull. John got up to be sure he could walk, his movements changed as a spell was formed.
The other side, right at the end of this crossroads…
"Can…" Dick tried to speak, his voice raw from….
He turned to the floor and heaved a dry hock, as the small bit of food in his belly was enough to put him into a fatigued state. John took over and caught the hero, knowing he was a trauma victim, and a rape victim that needed the proper allies to come to his aid.
"That wanker is out, Rich." John told the hero as the boy nodded, the tears had not stopped falling.
The irony of it was, that the hero to free the princess from her tower, was none other than the man who had caused him this lifelong pain in his chest…..
John groaned and looked for the exit. This was going to be an interesting process, he thought.
"Next stop, home."
With a hop through, Raven caught them at the end of this metaphorical rainbow, while a fury of gunshots and katana clanking together made the heroine wish she had stayed to help.
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The demon wasn't the faker.
His legs stumbled for a grip, the only exit being blocked by what was described in his golden eye as furniture.
Kindling, as his exact copy was sure to bite back once he'd recovered.
"You're not as slick as you think." The sound of a match had the fake scuttle back for the exit, smoke billowing up as the real Slade was down to kill.
To slaughter the loser.
"You'll just restart it!" Threatened the snapping dog, his nose down as the serum kicked in, muscles pumping below flesh and muscly sinew. The door was hacked by the gun in his hands, the lock and knob fell off as the rest wouldn't have him a dead victim of this – the real Slade was angrier than he'd seemed in the back of the alternate's mind. He was not a fan of this, this was….
Revenge, while he crawled for the way out. The first spark ignited as the real devil of his waking dreams threatened to destroy the faker's last weekend away. He was going to tell Dick all about, his lover….Nightwing. He would have returned. He wasn't dead, not here! This Slade didn't even want the kid…
"Why." He rasped and looked to the next roof over, the window wide enough to jump through topless. His eye gleaming back at the hellfire that Slade of this world had left roaring.
To devour, as he had done to that boy.
Nightwing would not forget, he could not. He'd always cling to the enemy for the way that WAS what he had need to know; to decide if being a hero was as cut and dry, that this Slade held no pity for the victim. His forever enemy, the fake grinned as he jumped. Slade in his rant grabbing the man's attention as a bullet flew freely to crack at the back of the fake's skull. He stumbled, falling as Slade knew he'd be alive.
That time could not be healed as Nightwing wished until the anomaly had been deleted from this existence for good.
With a fall to the ground and a graceful land, the crushed, totaled form of the faker was still only with a broken arm or leg as Slade knew what that eye was.
He knew how to handle this ending.
"I'm taking it back." The real Slade stepped as his blade switched. The gun could wait, lucky shot and all as the fake was to his back, looking into Slade's eye as if it only mattered before they both had to vanish.
In the fake's world, Nightwing was not dead because of his intervention. Just as he would be if the faker stayed, so Slade saw the glowing gold and knew it to be the only part of himself that was a problem. A false feature and…if he cut out the bad….
Slade straddled the victim's legs as he was forced to bat and fight his way, yet the blade was far faster as the mastermind of another dimension was carved from his face, the screaming and curdling gurgle of life, far from a reality he'd wanted as the fake began to cackle. His eyes empty in both sockets now. The face of DEATH staring at Slade as e froze while clinging to the bleeding relic.
"Death? You think I'd die twice not to see it?? I got what I wanted….in time, he will come back to us…you'll see! The word of Galileo still must be! –
The splatter of blood was done as Slade's dark blue eye never beat back, never batted once with the blood of his enemy, himself covering a many – times – revived corpse as well. He was dead, a part of that could be so. He wasn't, he was…
Slade crushed the glass relic as it vanished into powder. The curse…
He sent his knives through the faker's gut as it started to vanish. The time was restored.
Finally…
Red Hood looked on and then to the sky from a near by spire in the area. Slade nodded up, as if Jason could see that he needed time to think and to reflect on who he was going to be once Deathstroke made it very clear.
He did not rape the boy wonder, it wasn't him.
Right now, John wasn't here to mock him. Batman would gather the rest as he took to the streets below, jumping down with a hurt in his –
The pain was vital. The misery as he SAW. He SAW the vision of the last; of the faker's very…
Memories.
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He was sick of giving Nightwing a boost, most days it wasn't to help him but to get him to take off somewhere.
Slade in his universe had a boy wonder, not as young. The madness of Arkham's lunacy had broken him. His late chance not up to fate to decide as he slipped in the window with his sniper and gear in tow.
"Where did you go just now?"
A light went on and he saw the boy wonder, an adult in his uniform from work. He'd just gotten in? It wasn't even half past the hour to punch the clock!
"I, forgot my phone."
"Papa squat." Dick pointed to the sofa, the baddie rolling his eyes at this nonsensical gesture. Dick owned this place and paid rent here in Blud, yet Slade was a…freelancer to him. A security service officer to keep any baddies away from his blue bird on the force.
"How was work today –
"No comment, you lied to me big time." Dick tapped his foot and pointed for Slade to sit, so he took to the sofa chair instead of the man's love seat. Gave him too many ideas. Was this place ever dusted the last time he was here?
"You don't do much on the presentation."
"I have a life." Dick frowned.
"Can't you be a role model and a good host, Rich –
"No more talking, ok? You went over our agreement and I did get your name being passed around the table; KG Beast is not a threat anymore, thanks to you."
"I try."
"And you also went and tried to kill him." Dick snipped. "I told you to keep my bad guys out of your clear shot. Someone is going to suffer and I can't take the fall. You know how they drill us –
"You can't have a lover who is also a mercenary. Am I wrong?"
"VERY." Dick sniffed. "As in, you need to go. I can't keep you out of the public's eye, the same for Nightwing."
"You must love to keep him safer than you would anything else." Slade snorted and crossed his arms, a bit….a bit jealous.
Ok, a lot more! He had not gone to see double. He'd come to be sure that Beast had left Grayson alone. Again…He knew that the brat was used to flipping into a sniper's path. He was this close to Slade's…
"You talk about Nightwing as if he's to be cherished and yes ,that is…mostly right. It's why I found you here. Made sure you didn't lose your head after Catalina's –
"She was after more than the good in me, Slade." Dick gripped his arms tightly. "We all know what that would have meant, if you didn't pull me out of that apartment when you did."
"Good thing the bartenders in Blud are all seeing." Slade rubbed his chin. "The job didn't pay. So I didn't go through with it. And…" Slade moved a few inches up to tug his bird close, a hand to his prize's cheek.
"Beast can't have you." Slade promised with a smirk. "I'm the only one who can keep you in my sights. You'd be dead without me, though I did make sure to send a few untracable notes to your computer. Encrypted, i might add." Slade's other hand came up to seize his lover's chin.
"A thank you might do for my not doing what you'd expect…I've become far more flexible having you to tease…"
"Too tired." Dick wrenched out of his lover's grip and Slade did not do a thing to bother him much more.
"You either want me, or I should, just vanish."
"Blackmail, old man?"
Slade did not grin as he picked up his things. "Believe me, Richard. You had people who cared as much as I did, yet if you keep giving Nightwing a place where Dick Grayson might not still remain, then what good are you. If you can't love anyone else…That would be my fault." Slade shook his head, Dick's heart confused as he fumbled after the man. A hand to his back, a meek sound made its way out.
Slade always got what he wanted, and Catalina had done no better as Richard gripped the man's arm to see that one eye directed through him.
"I love you, Slade…I don't want to see us torn apart…."
Slade softened his stance and to his surprise, his mask was lifted. The hero was in a kissing mood?
Well…that might make it up to him for ditching date night…
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It was a long bridge up.
Slade was never found, the real one having taken off somewhere, while Bruce ranted and lamented that Dick could never go to Blud, that he should stay with his team and….well, he did. He stayed until he was finally twenty one. As old fashioned as it had sounded, he kept his place even after the fact. Paying the rent with a job in Jump's precinct since the fake Slade had been so humble all the live long while. The fake never came back to haunt him, until…
The fear in Blud rose as a cloud of ash, so Dick was forced to vacate Titans tower, that year alone he was only alone. He never called Tim, Jason or the Bat and Babs, only Babs understood the trauma when finally, the main player on this stage revealed itself.
The prediction of Galileo finally making more sense as nuclear threats were shoved into Nightwing's arms.
The keeper of the keys, he felt powerless as he had in someone else's throws.
"Deathstroke." The real Deathstroke, his finger on the trigger as the two spoke about a city on the brink of becoming the new Hiroshima.
"You can always try and stop me, little bird."
Dick swallowed, this all feeling too familiar. He looked at his own escrima glued to his hands, the city up in smoke and flame.
The face of a devil who held all of the world in his palm.
Dick dropped his arms, a smirk about his perfect features as Slade noted this, noticing how the bird walked over, his breathing hazy through the smog.
"I'd fall to my knees for this city, Slade. I'd do anything to keep it safe, so." He put the sticks down as his mask was removed.
"You wanted to see me like this, go on." The perfectly marred blue bird's eyes were haunting with a lust for false control behind them.
"Name your price. I'll take any offer…even…even if it means doing this all over again."
Slade wasn't sure; Dick was a trauma victim of rape. What if it only angered the bat? What if –
"I wanted the original, all along." Dick reassured. "Nothing can compare, and you wanted me to tell you that. That's all this is, DS. A negotiation." Dick let his fingers dance over the man's armored clavicle. Slade allowed his mask to fall, the kid had gotten taller only by a few inches.
He was easy enough to pull in for a kiss as the city smog made it hard not to let their eyes water.
Embracing the pain, washing it down with the taste of one's enemy, Dick gave in as fate had predetermined.
As Galileo knew of the stars while Blud's fate was never his call.
In this city, Deathstroke held Nightwing by the balls. Dick was pulled in close, tasting the man who had put him through so much in so short a time.
Dick moved his body to harden, his member leaking through his suit.
Fate had decreed it.
"Well, maybe…we should start up a new arrangement…. hand those keys over to the next candidate…sir?"
And so, time would only tell what might become of the new Prince of Bludhaven as the skies told of his lost fortune. Of the time a night bird was born again, as the other man agreed with a small sigh.
"You may just be right about that…my, Nightwing."
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FIN!!!
How was it?? Told you it was a time hop! And in the end, they end up trying to stop the other from taking Blud as their own. They are…just too terrible together, so that's the finale. Next up I may take a one shot and play with it a bit but…. for now? Humor will be needed to wash the taste of smut out of this writer's mouth. Enjoy more to come – and glad you read it to the bitter end! Read on and stay curious for more fics like this one! And thy never did get to Dick's birthday, which means the fake didn't care. So? We will end it on that note…See ya!