Dani's To-do list
- Stargaze on the bell tower
- meet Nightwing
- more treasure hunting
- do not get shot
Dani doesn't run into Grayson again the next day. He had offered to give her his number after they finished dinner, but Dani doesn't have a phone so she declined and told him she'd see him around. He probably thinks that's the last he'll see of her, but Dani meant it. She really likes him. He's wicked smart and funny and let her ramble about maps for the better part of two hours without prying into her home life once.
Still, Dani has a hard time keeping track of people, so she continues her Blüdhaven adventure and only spends a little time looking out for her new friend.
The evening after their dinner, Dani is listening to the woes of a once-bride at the top of the clock tower. Turns out, her fiancè left her at the altar and she jumped off the building she was meant to be married in. Which, who gets married in a clock tower? It was the 60s though, so what does Dani know, maybe it was a trend.
The ghost is pretty bratty, reminding Dani of Kitty. She mostly jumped out of spite and embarrassment. She couldn't bear the thought of facing her family as someone who was left at the altar. She wanted her ex-fiancè to feel guilty for leaving her, to blame himself and spend the rest of his life in shame. She certainly didn't deserve what he did, but Dani thinks jumping to her death to make her ex feel bad might have been a bit of an overreaction, not that she'd ever say that out loud.
But hey, he ghosted her, so she ghosted him, right? Hahaha.
"Will you help me find him? I want to see how terrible his life is without me," growls the ghost. Dani glances at her, at her perfectly coifed hair and flowy white ballgown drenched in blood. Ghosts choose their appearance, and she's deliberately sticking to the past, to the one moment she hated so much she was willing to risk her eternity spiting the man who wronged her.
"Will you?" she repeats.
"No," Dani says. "It doesn't matter. Your own existence matters. Don't you think you've wasted enough time on him?"
"No!" she shrieks. The bell behind them rings out like it had been hit by a sledgehammer. It hurts Dani's ears, but she doesn't react. This girl never learned what it was like to not get her way. Giving into her temper tantrum would only enable her further. "I need to see him suffer!" The bell rang out again, sounding more like the shriek of tearing metal than clapper on cope.
"You're the only one suffering," Dani tells her.
The girl just screams, shaking the bell. "I hate you! I hate you! You're just like the rest! I hope you suffer the pain I felt!" She forcefully snips the summons Dani loosely held her in, disappearing with the sudden silence of the bell.
Oh well. She can't help everyone.
Dani kicks her feet, leaning back to search the smoggy sky for some stars. The wind is nice up here, and the summer heat is barely noticeable. If there was less air pollution, this would be the perfect spot for stargazing. The view of the city would be gorgeous too.
Maybe she should spend the night here? No… when the bell rings in the morning it'll not only wake her but also send her half to her grave. (Would that make her three-quarters dead? Food for thought.)
Dani is just considering how to get down in a more fun way than climbing without going splat when she's lifted from her perch by the back of her hoodie. She's been scruffed! For the second time in less than a week! She is not a kitten!
Despite kicking her feet and waving her arms, the scruffer does not put her down.
"What are you doing on the top of the clock tower at two in the morning?!" her captor asks, a male voice that sounds beyond stressed.
"Not jumping, if that's what you're worried about! Put me down!"
"I didn't think you were going to jump, I thought you were going tofall!"
"I would never!" she shouts back, still trying to twist out of his grip. Dani's a master escape artist! Who knew picking her up by her sweatshirt would be her white whale? "I would simply deny gravity my consent, I would say, 'no thanks' and it couldn't do a thing about it. Leggo!"
There's a heavy, exasperated sigh, which, rude. He's not the one dangling from his shirt.
She's set down, and she immediately whirls around to face her attacker.
It's Nightwing.
The hero is dressed in his signature black body suit and domino mask with the emblem of a bird in bright blue on his chest. Blue lines run along his limbs, with the palms – which are now held up in either surrender or vexation – the same blue undercutting a strange mesh running through the material. His escrima sticks are poking out behind each shoulder blade, with another, similar rod pinned to his utility belt. His cheeks are flushed, hair windswept like he'd just sprinted here. Or, well, climbed, probably, since this is one of the tallest buildings in the city.
"Why are you on the top of the clock tower at two in the morning?" he repeats, sounding tired. "And don't say stargazing, because you can't even see the stars."
Dani giggles. "That actually was the plan, though."
"No, it wasn't," he argues.
"If you don't want the truth, how about an increasingly improbable story?"
He doesn't dignify that with a response, just runs his hand down his face. "The wind can pick up really suddenly up here. You may have thought you had a good hold, but one strong breeze and you would've been a pancake."
"Hm, pancakes sound good," Dani hums. "Is it too early for breakfast?"
"Do you have zero self-preservation skills?"
Dani levels him with her best unimpressed look. "You dress up in kevlar and punch people in the dead of night. I don't think you have any room to talk."
He splutters pretty hilariously. "I'm trained!"
"By a man who dresses up like abatand punches people in the dead of night!"
"Listen, we're not here to debate Batman's aesthetic."
"You brought him up!"
"...No? You did?"
"You sound confused and tired. Maybe you should call it a night. I think I'm going to go pancake on th- no I mean get pancakes."
Nightwing throws up his hands in exasperation. "You can't gaslight me!"
"Obviously, it's not funny if youactuallyget gaslighted."
He realizes he isn't going to get anywhere with her. Smart man. "Can I at least help you get down?"
"Like, with your grappling hook?"
"Yes. With my grappling hook."
Dani gives him a wicked smile. "I'd love that."
Nightwing looks exhausted. "Alright, come here." He picks her up without waiting, guiding her arms around his neck and her legs around his waist. "You have to hold on really tight, okay?"
"Yes, yes, less talking, more flying."
The hero settles another arm around her waist, pulling her even more snuggly against his surprisingly hard chest. He steps to the edge, and just as Dani feels their balance shift into gravity's grip, she whispers into his conveniently close ear, "I want pancakes," and slightly loosens her grip. Nightwing gasps and crushes her closer, and Dani bursts into laughter as they enter freefall.
A jerk, and they enter an arc as the grappling hook engages. Dani's stomach does a funny flip as they swing back towards the building. Nightwing twists in the air and pulls his legs in close. They jolt as he makes contact with the side of the building, absorbing most of the impact in his legs. With another push, they begin repelling down the side of the building in smaller, more controlled falls.
When they reach the ground, Nightwing carefully sets her down before fixing her with what she guesses is a glare behind the mask. "You scared the crap out of me, kid."
"I know, that was the point."
"You're such a menace."
"I'm glad we understand each other."
He pretends he isn't amused, trying to be stern as he unhooks his grapple and lets it reel itself back into the little device hidden in his gauntlet. "I have to finish patrol. I only stopped by because I thought someone put a bomb in the bell."
"Lol," Dani says. "Nah, that was me."
"I'd gathered," he replies drily. "Do you have a safe place to stay the night?"
Deciding to spare his poor heart, Dani nods. The cemetery is always safe.
He doesn't look entirely convinced, but he accepts the answer nonetheless. "Just… be careful, okay?" Before she can answer, he reaches into one of dozens of pouches on his utility belt and hands her a twenty. Whoa, déjà vu. "For pancakes. Have a good night."
"Thanks!" Dani slips the twenty into the pocket of her hoodie. "Have fun punching!"
He waves her off and shoots his grapple, quickly following its launch until he's a small figure swinging in the distance.
Dani kinda likes him.
It's the next evening that she sees Grayson again, but the circumstances are… less than ideal.
See, Dani was following another ghost's instructions to their body. It's gruesome, yes, but some ghosts can't rest until their body is safe underground or scattered as ashes. They seek out her help and what is Dani supposed to do? Ignore them?
The young man was some kind of IT guy that learned too much about the embezzlement of some funds his boss was siphoning off to feed into a drug cartel. The poor guy had been shot on his way to present his findings to an undercover FBI agent. From what she's gathered, it happened about ten to twenty years ago.
"This wall?" Dani asks, inspecting the immaculate bricks of the alleyway. "How did they get you in here?"
"Not the wall, I'm below here, where the wall meets the floor. It used to be a cellar, I'm down there with a few others. They poured cement over it." He's nervous, though Dani gets the feeling it's more his personality than the situation at hand.
Dani steps back. How should she go about this? She could technically phase through the ground, but the thought of using her powers so readily makes anxiety curl in her stomach.
Another way, then.
"I was buried with my intel, too," Tyler – the ghost –provides helpfully. "They didn't search me after they shot me. It's a flashdrive in my right pocket."
"If only this happened when there was better internet," Dani bemoans. Oh, just ten years later, and this whole mess could've been avoided by an email attachment. "Let me go find a sledgehammer."
"Oh, there's construction just down the street! I bet you could find one there!"
She did, in fact, find a sledgehammer there. She had to pick a lock to get into the construction site, but after that, she had her pick of tools. The sledgehammer came with, but she also grabbed a sharp looking pickaxe that would probably help pry open the cellar door.
Resigning herself to becoming sweaty and covered in dust, Dani hefts the sledgehammer and begins breaking up the concrete. Her enhanced strength helped the process some, but the layer was thick and it took her twenty minutes to break through enough of it to get to the door underneath. Once she got there, though, it was just a matter of using the pickaxe to pry off the broken up slabs from the door until she had cleared out enough to hopefully let the door open.
The ghost was buzzing around her in excitement, looking over her shoulder like a curious child. Dani slams the edge of the pickaxe into the door and starts to pry it open.
"LOOK OUT–"
Bang!
A bullet flies over her head as Dani hits the ground, instinct driving her to duck when she heard the warning in the ghost's emotions a microsecond before he'd shouted. Dani scrambles up, knicking her leg on one of the more jagged edges of concrete as she tries to get her footing. She nearly trips twice as she runs out of there in a dead sprint. Unfortunately, the area doesn't have a lot of hiding places. It's on the outer parts of town, full of empty streets where new buildings are slowly being built over the old ones. Only some of the warehouses are occupied, and even then, certainly not at nine at night.
More gunshots ring out as Dani launches herself over the fence of the construction site she'd stolen the tools from.
"I'll– hold on, I'll get help–"
Dani feels the ghost's presence fade, but she doesn't spare him a glance. He's not strong enough to materialize, so the best he can do is interfere with small devices and maybe mess with doors or lights. She doesn't have the time to call him back though, since she's suddenly very aware that there is more than one gunman when another shot rings out from a different direction.
Dani vaults over the shovel of an excavator, rolling when she hits the ground as she loses her footing on the uneven dirt. She's quick to launch herself back up, blood pounding through her so hard she can feel it, a heady rush of adrenaline sparking along her senses.
More sprinting. She weaves through beams, ducking under low-hanging equipment when she can to throw off her pursuer. The problem isn't losing them, it's minimizing the risk of getting shot. They keep firing rounds off into the dark, only a few beams of flashlight cutting through the gloom trying to catch a glimpse of her. There's no cover beside the machines, which she just passed, and only a forest of support beams to cover her retreat.
Her best option is to get out of the construction zone. She's a sitting duck here as long as she and her pursuers are trapped in the fenced-in area. If she gets out, she has some time to change directions before they can follow.
With this in mind, she aims for the fence again, wincing internally as one of the beams of light cross over her and she hears a shout. She tumbles to the ground to avoid any shots, which immediately go above her head, but is quick to get back on her feet and run the last few steps to the fence. She vaults off one of the nearby piles of wood and uses the momentum to get her up and over much more quickly than her first jump. The sharp wires on the top of the fence slice into her palms, but she ignores it.
She lands on the other side of the fence, but her ankle rolls where the sidewalk dipped into the dirt. Dani feels something tear, but she doesn't hesitate to continue running. The ankle isnothappy, but honestly, neither is Dani. They're all having a bad night, okay? She and her body can suffer together.
There are more voices down the street, so Dani cuts into an alleyway and hops on a dumpster so she can grab the side of the fire escape and pull herself inside. Gasping for breath, she goes to climb but pauses when she hears, "BPD! Put your guns down! Show me your hands!"
With a groan of hopeful relief, Dani slumps against the railing. There are more shouts, another gunshot, the sound of a taser being deployed, and a lot of radio static. She thinks she can detect a few different voices, but there's so much chaos she can't determine how many people had actually been after her.
Tyler appears closer to her, worry pinching his eyebrows together. "I managed to get one of the phones to call 911! Are you okay, Princess? Did they shoot you?"
Still trying to regain her breath, Dani shakes her head. He doesn't look any more relieved, so she croaks out, "I'm fine."
"Somehow, I doubt that."
Dani jolts as she searches for the voice as Tyler vanishes in fright, the summons between them snapping. It's… well, it's Grayson.
"Uhhh."
"I'm not even surprised. You're just a magnet for trouble, aren't you."
"Uh, hey. What's up?"
Grayson gives her a flat glare she can just barely make out from the glow of his flashlight. He's not pointing it at her, at least. "What's up, is that we got a call from the same place shots were being fired in, and we were just arriving on scene when I see a tiny little figure run from four mobsters with semi-automatics."
"Funny story about that, actually."
"Save it," he snaps, before he has the flashlight in his mouth and his hands on the fire escape. With one smooth motion, he joins her on the platform, flashlight beam scanning her for injuries. "Where are you hurt?"
"Um, they're just scrapes."
"No, they just feel like scrapes because you have more adrenaline in you right now than heroin in a junkie."
Why exactly is Grayson so pissed? It's not like Dani was the one shooting up the streets.
Carefully, Grayson inspects her knee, grimacing at the wound there before he runs his fingers down her leg, following the swelling and prodding for further injury. He finds it at her ankle, which she gives a sharp yelp at when he applies pressure.
Wait, why is Dani allowing this? She barely knows the guy. Still, when she makes a move to put distance between them, one look from him has her settling down with a grumpy huff.
"Your hands?" he asks, reaching for one. Dani pulls them away with a scowl.
"I nicked them on the top of the fence when I jumped it," she tells him bitterly. "Why are you so mad? It's notmyfault."
Grayson looks at her with an unreadable expression before groaning, rubbing his eyes with the hand not holding his flashlight. When he looks at her again, his eyes are softer. "I'm sorry. I'm not mad at you, I'm just worried."
"Well, knock it off," Dani demands hotly. "I'm just fine, and I don't need some random guy I barely know snapping at me for getting randomly attacked on the streets!"
"You're right, you're right, I'm sorry," Pretty-cop placates, looking genuinely contrite. "That wasn't fair to you." Dani folds her arms, but she nods to let him know she accepts his apology. "I could help you get to the hospital –?"
Dani shakes her head.
"Yeah," he huffs, a quirk to his lips. "I figured. Let me help you out? I have a place nearby, with a fully-stocked first aid kit, a shower, and a drawer full of take out menus~~"
Dani glares at him. "I barely know you."
"Please?" he begs. "I'm going to be worried sick if you just wander around on a possibly broken foot, more than I already have, given that this is one of the most dangerous cities in America!" Dani doesn't lighten up. He sighs. "Look, I like you a lot. You're hilarious and wicked smart. You remind me so much of my brothers, including their tendency to get hurt and try to deal with it on their own." It reminds her of Danny, whenever she has an injury. It's not very often (that she's injured around him), but he always get this same look in his eye. Somewhere between pained and protective and worried sick, and Dani feels her resolve wavering. "I have an atlas full of maps."
Her resolve shatters. "Fiiiine."
He breaks into a relieved grin. "I have a cab waiting, if you're ready to go." When did he call a cab? "I can give you a piggyback there, or if that makes you uncomfortable we can figure something else out."
"Nah, that's fine," Dani mutters. She's a little annoyed with herself for caving to the puppy dog eyes. She's supposed to be the one with the puppy dog eyes! Danny has to look away from her when he's trying to be stern so he doesn't get caught in them.
Grayson hops off the fire escape again and holds out his arms for Dani to jump into. With a resigned groan, she clambers over the railing and carefully lowers herself enough for Grayson to grab her waist and slowly return her to the ground. After readjusting their positions, Grayson squats down in front of her and opens his arms so she can climb onto his back. His police belt and uniform make it a little bulky and uncomfortable, but he's warm in the dying heat and Dani puts her head on his shoulder with a sigh.
The adrenaline crash hits her like a train, and she's suddenly very thankful Grayson found her. Yeah, she'd survive without him. But the shower and food sounded heavenly right about now.
Maybe she can trust someone new just this once.
I have like three things to say about this chapter.
One, I split it after it became like twenty pages. So, more Grayson next week. Two, that scene about the ghost on the bell tower? I went on a ghost tour once and that was the story the tour guide told us (and it was spoopy guys, she was really into it), and I remember I leaned over to my friend and whispered - not so quietly - "he ghosted her so she ghosted him" and burst out laughing. The whole group heard me (maybe the ghosts did too) and the tour guide told me to watch out. I'm writing Dani to be as unhinged as I am lol. Three, I actually say "lol" all the time (not the letters, just... lol. like hole, but with an L. Am I the only one who does that?)
I hope you enjoyed! I'll see you all next week :) I'm at chapter 6, but I think that I'm going to try and wrap up the Blüdhaven arc in that chapter, try to get them to Gotham. Idk about y'all, but I need some MORE BATFAM. I'm so excited to share with you my fantastic headcanons (and a lot of stolen ones lol).
~Starr