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The day that Bruce Wayne's will was executed, Stephanie Brown wasn't even sure she was meant to be there. Sure, she'd been a Bat for going on seven years now, and a vigilante for longer than that, but she and Bruce had had some serious differences over the years, differences which had earned her the boot more than once.
She thanked the universe again for letting Cass sit to her left, the pillar of moral support Steph desperately needed right now.
Dick sat near Babs, at the end of the table, their hands clasped and eyes red-rimmed from weeping. Jay had a hard look on his face, but it was one Steph recognized, and knew he would wait until he was alone to break down. Tim seemed a little lost and sad, but he could compartmentalize better than anyone else at the table.
Cass squeezed her hand, and she glanced at her girlfriend, giving her a quick kiss and a tiny smile, even though she still felt like she might never be able to smile normally again.
As she turned back, her eyes glanced over the tall shade in mourning black: Damian.
He hadn't cried at the funeral, and he hadn't cried at the manor, and Steph was a little terrified that both of his parents' policies on accepting comfort would render him incapable of dealing with this grief. He sat across from her, two seats from Dick, looking very still and unusually small. He was already nearly six-foot at fifteen, and she had no doubt that he'd be taller than his father when he was grown up, but right now he looked like the tiny Robin she'd first met while on patrol.
The executor, an older woman with silvering hair and weathered skin, cleared her throat, and everyone took their seats around the table of the Wayne Industries board room.
"We're here today to see that the will of Bruce Wayne, head of Wayne Industries and a number of other organizations, is executed to the fullest satisfaction of his heirs.” She cleared her throat. “'I, Bruce Wayne,'" she began, voice managing to be both prim and stately, "currently residing in Wayne Manor, being of sound mind, do declare this to be my Last Will and Testament. I revoke all wills and codicils previously made by-"
Steph kind of tuned out after that. It was mostly listing terms and definitions, anyways. It was too surreal to be sitting here, surrounded by these people, listening to an executor read a will for Bruce . It just couldn't have happened. He was Batman. He was Bruce Wayne. He was fucking immortal . They'd done this before, she knew, but there had always been that lingering sense that he wasn't really dead, that he was just biding his time before a grandiose return.
That comfort was absent now.
When someone died of inoperable brain trauma, the way he had, with all of them in the hospital room, blood leaking into his brain, delirious, losing all sense of reality, forgetting who they were as minutes passed-
She swallowed. That wasn't something you could fake. Or, at least, if it was, she didn't know if she could follow someone who could do that to his family.
"'-Gordon to replace me as head of Wayne Industries,'" the executor was saying, and Steph realized that Babs was crying openly now. "'And I leave to her the properties and funds listed in sub-article seven. To Richard John Grayson, I leave the properties and funds listed in sub-article eight. To Jason Peter Todd, I leave the properties and funds listed in sub-article nine-'"
Jason stood abruptly, face stone, and stalked out, shrugging off Dick's arm as he slammed the door behind him.
Steph glanced at Damian; he was decidedly green.
The executor cleared her throat. "It continues: 'To Cassandra Wayne, I leave the properties and funds listed in sub-article ten.'" She shuffled some papers and pulled up her reading glasses to squint. "In addition to the that, he noted that he wanted you to take the family car."
There were gasps, and Steph was sure that one of them came from her. It wasn't exactly a surprise, but no one had thought he'd put it in his will.
Bruce had chosen his successor. Cass was the new Bat.
The executor raised an eyebrow. "I assume you know to what your father was referring?"
Cass nodded silently, and Steph held her hand under the table, feeling the faintest tremor in her grip.
"'To Timothy Jackson Drake, I leave the properties and funds listed in sub-article eleven, along with access to my personal files.' He has included several strings of numbers and letters, which he assured me you would know how to use." She passed him the piece of paper, and he took it numbly.
The executor cleared her throat. "'To Damian Thomas Wayne, I leave the properties and funds listed in sub-article twelve, to be held in guardianship until his eighteenth birthday.'"
Steph felt herself swallow hard, and Cass's grip on her fingers felt like a vice. She'd known in her heart of hearts that Bruce wouldn't include her. She wasn't a real Bat, wasn't a real fighter, wasn't anything but a kid in a purple suit who got in his way. He would never leave her something like she'd meant something to him, like he'd been her distant-but-kind sort-of mentor for the past ten years.
But the executor wasn't finished.
"'And finally, to Miss Stephanie Brown, I bequeath my youngest son, Mister Damian Thomas Wayne.'"
You could have heard a pin drop. Steph opened her mouth to speak, and closed it again, brain stuttering to a halt.
It was Damian who broke the silence, with a furious, "WHAT ?"
The executor looked over at him, taking in his ghost-white, outraged expression. "You father was clear," she told him, showing him the will. "Stephanie Brown has been appointed as your legal guardian in the event of his death before your eighteenth birthday. In the event that she declines the position, he asked that Miss Wayne take over in her stead. Ideally, he would prefer if both of you take up the responsibility, but he understands if either of you would prefer otherwise." The executor nodded to Cass, who blinked in reply.
Damian's throat worked, fists clenched on the table as he stared at Stephanie, who stared right back.
What.
"I'm-" she choked out finally, still staring at Damian, "I'm his guardian ?"
"If you choose to accept the appointment," the executor said. "You can decline, if you wish. The will stipulates that you choose within a month of Mr. Wayne's death, so you still have several weeks to make your decision."
Stephanie just stared at her. She was aware she probably looked ridiculous, eyes wide and mouth open, but this was an impossibility.
Bruce Wayne had left her his son.
Bruce fucking Wayne, who wouldn't have said he was proud of her if he'd been roasting over an open fire, had left her a literal piece of himself.
She was kind of a mom. Again. But this time she could-
She met Damian's snarling eyes, and she realized that his experience with moms was probably comparable to her experience with dads.
Good fucking grief.
Was this Bruce's master plan? To fuck with her sense of self-worth from beyond the grave? Did the old bastard get such a kick out of it that he'd sat down and written it out and had it witnessed?
But the executor still wasn't done. "'In addition to that, I leave the properties and funds listed in sub-article thirteen, and the sum necessary for a full scholarship to the graduate school of your choosing.'" The executor slid Stephanie a sheet of paper, but her ears were still ringing too loudly for her to register it. "He gave me the account number he set up for you, Miss Brown," she said. "He was quite specific that no expense be spared."
The tense hush was suddenly cut by Dick's low laughter, which quickly turned into a loud guffaw that he was helpless to silence, tears streaming down his cheeks. "Oh my god," he said between gasps, ignoring the bewildered look Steph was giving him and the daggers Damian was glaring in his direction. "Of course ." He rubbed the tears from his eyes, a true grin on his face for the first time in days. Babs put a concerned hand on his shoulder, and he leaned back to rest his arm on the back of her wheelchair. He wiped at his eyes and smiled at them both.
Damian muttered something acerbic in what sounded like Arabic, and Steph looked back to him.
"Hey," she said quietly, still feeling like someone had tossed all the tables in her brain. "Damian."
"What?" He sneered at her, arms crossed, hands balled into fists. He was so tense that he looked like he'd shatter if he moved too quickly.
Steph faced him fully, putting both of her palms flat on the table. "If you don't want me to be your guardian, I'll let Cass do it. If you don't want her to do it either, tough luck, because you're never gonna find anyone better than her. But really, I'd like if we could both do it." She took a deep breath. "I need you to be serious with me for a minute, D. This isn't a joke. I know it's a fucked up time to be making a decision like this, but I'm ready to do it." She held his icy blue gaze for a full minute, watching him swallow hard.
"Fine," he spat, looking down and away. "Whatever you decide."
Stephanie stood up, still in a bit of a haze, and walked around the table. Before he could avoid it, she wrapped her arms around him, holding him in place with a rough hug. "Okay," she whispered to him, ignoring his squirming. If he really wanted to get out of her arms, he was more than capable. For now, he'd have to be content to be smothered by some affection. He stopped moving after a moment, but seemed confused about what to do. "Hug me back, you little bastard," she hissed, and his hands rose hesitantly to her back.
"Never thought I'd see the day," Babs muttered, and Steph raised one hand to flip her the bird. Not the moment, Babs.
***
When the executor had finished and gone, other sections of the will to attend to, Steph stayed behind with Cass and Damian.
"I'm gonna get some water," she said after a minute had gone by and neither of them had spoken or moved. She fled into the hallway, quickly locating the nearest emergency stairwell and ducking into it.
Apparently she hadn't been the only one with that idea.
Jay sat on the top step, smoking. She glanced up, and- yep. He'd disabled the smoke alarm.
"Don't worry," he said, voice rougher than usual. She could see his bleary eyes from where she stood. "I'll put it back when I'm done. I just needed something to- to do." He took another drag and sighed the smoke out through his nose.
She leaned against the wall and tried to breathe, the smoke adding a bitter but familiar note to the air.
Jay's elbows rested on his knees, head bent, a posture of pure defeat. "I can't believe he did that," he said finally. "I really thought I- I didn't think he'd put me in there. But he did. Right next to Dick. Probably the exact same amount of money and everything." He laughed a little, and it turned into a cough. "Fucking bastard," he muttered.
"Tell me about it," she said, voice cracking. "I got Damian."
Jay stared at her. "He gave you the kid?"
She nodded.
Jay burst out laughing, carefully holding his cigarette away from his mouth until he could stop. "Jesus fucking Christ. Of course he did."
"That's the same thing Dick said," Stephanie said, more than a little annoyed. "What the hell is that supposed to mean?"
Jay smiled down at her, taking one last breath of smoke before stubbing the cigarette out on the step beside him. "Well, you're the most normal of us, aren't you? You're the only one who could really keep him in line." He stood up, cracking his back. "I mean, besides Dickie, but he's in Blüdhaven most of the time, and he's spent too much of his life living Bruce's fucked up version of reality. But you?" He stepped down to the landing - not that it made a difference, since he had almost a foot of height on her - and clapped her on the shoulders. "You know there are options outside of the capes and cowls, and you still chose it, but it's not everything you are. You had the kinda-terrible childhood we all did, but you came out of it a functional human being, with a sense of humor and some kind of morality. I guess the old man's hoping some of that will rub off on the kid." He gave her one last crooked grin and stepped past her, through the door, leaving her alone with her whirling thoughts.
When she got back to the meeting room, she froze.
Cassandra had her arms around Damian, and Damian was-
He was crying.
As quietly as she knew how, she stepped outside again, closing the door, the tears that she'd been keeping in since the funeral threatening to slip out again.
Maybe they were all a little less fucked up than they thought.
***
The movie began slowly. Three children in a room, a nursery, as their guardians put them to bed for the night with their large dog.
"She's a Saint Bernard," Stephanie whispered, squeezing her hand under the blankets. "I always wanted one when I was little." With her other hand, she scratched Titus's chin. He gave her an answering groan and leaned into her fingers, squirming a little as he stretched. Stephanie was a more relaxed mistress than his true master, who refused to allow him on the furniture, and Titus was taking full advantage of the right third of the couch.
Cassandra paid special attention to the dog in the movie, in case she could somehow find one and give it to Stephanie someday.
And then he stepped through the nursery window, and began a hunt for his shadow that made Cassandra shudder. The way they held it down and sewed it back in place-
Noticing her rigid posture, Stephanie laced her fingers through hers. "I know, I don't like it either."
But that was over soon enough, and Cassandra relaxed onto Stephanie's shoulder, fuzzy socks propped up on the coffee table next to Stephanie's.
The boy could fly, and he taught them all to do it, one by one, with the help of the little blonde fairy, who Cassandra couldn't help but think resembled Stephanie (especially when she made faces and rude noises). She'd look good in that costume, too, with its tight dress and lack of pants. Cassandra would have to see if Stephanie was open to something like that.
The boy - Peter Pan himself, she realized, glancing at the cover and taking a minute or two to read it - took them all away into the sky, leading them past the stars, into a flashing set of patterned lights that made Cassandra blink and made Stephanie laugh, giddy.
And then Neverland.
The Lost Boys were a fascinating blur, all sound and body language- and that she could read as easily as breathing. They were a pack akin to dogs, slipping and tripping and aware of each other in a way that the other characters were not. She ached for that, the feeling she shared occasionally when all of her brothers and sisters were home with their father and Alfred, when they were one and many. And though Bruce was gone, she hoped someday they could reclaim that feeling. The memory brought tears to her eyes.
"The animation is really really good here," Stephanie said under her breath, and Cassandra believed her.
"Are there such things as Lost Girls?" she asked, in lieu of reply.
Stephanie gave her a smug smile. "You'll have to wait for the second one."
When the pirates came onscreen, especially the man with the frankly ridiculous mustache and hook for a hand, Stephanie booed loudly and put down her root beer float to gesture crudely in his direction. When the shorter, rounder pirate in the stripes - Smee? Smee. - came on screen, Stephanie giggled. "They're in love," she confided. "Him and Captain Hook."
Cassandra looked away from the screen. "How do you know?"
Stephanie leaned forward and brushed her lips over Cassandra's, a motion that sent heat into her fingertips and core. She tasted like butter and popcorn and soda, and pulled away too soon. "I just know." She gave the tip of Cassandra's nose a tiny kiss and sat back, settling her arm over the couch's cushions again. Beside her, Titus whoofed gently in his sleep.
Then there were tunnels, and trees, and mermaids. And the historically inaccurate and deeply offensive depictions of Native Americans, which Stephanie made a face at and fast-forwarded through.
And then there was a battle, and the children fought valiantly, if inefficiently. Of course, they were all entirely outclassed by Peter Pan, who had so mastered his gift of flight as to render the entire fight unnecessary. He reminded her of a bird, a bird who so despised being caged that he spent every waking moment of his time in the air. She understood that.
Stephanie laughed aloud when the pirate was defeated, and Cassandra squeezed her hand as the children returned home safely.
"I forgot how much I loved that movie," Stephanie sighed, snuggling deeper into their makeshift blanket burrito. "Did you like it?"
Cassandra smiled. "I bet we can fly like they did."
Stephanie's eyes widened. "Oh my god." Cassandra felt her muscles bunch the instant before she stood, and followed her up. Stephanie grabbed her hands, beaming. "We've got to do it!"
Cassandra leaned forward and kissed her once, thoroughly, before settling back on the couch. "I agree." She pulled her blanket back over her knees. "But maybe tomorrow? You said there was a second one."
Stephanie snorted and flopped back down, cuddling in close. "You win, but only because I love 'Return to Neverland' so much. Don't judge me if I sing along."
***
Dick had just finished his morning run around the grounds when he heard something familiar coming from the training room. He cracked a grin, even if his heart was still sore over Bruce. Stephanie's love of Disney was well-documented, and he for one was glad to have some more cheerful music for their daily hours of grueling training.
He stuck his head in, opening his mouth to sing along, and let it shut with a click.
It wasn't Stephanie whose hands gripped the bars, swinging in time to her low singing, body flipping deftly through the air, chalk-prints on her black workout clothes, singing 'You Can Fly!'
It was Cass.
She noticed him immediately, of course, and gave him a wave mid-flip, which he returned slowly, still in awe. She swung herself onto the bar and perched there effortlessly.
"I didn't know you liked Peter Pan," he said weakly, walking into the middle of the mat.
She leapt down to meet him and shrugged. "Stephanie showed me yesterday. It's stuck in my head."
He smiled. "I know how that goes. Did you like the movie?"
She nodded. "We watched the sequel as well, but I preferred the original."
"Same here." He looked over at the sound console set into the wall. "Do you want me to put the song on over the speakers? I'm sure we have all the Disney music somewhere. If not, I can just use some of Bruce's exorbitant riches to buy a copy of the album."
Cassandra was quiet for a moment, expression flickering between surprised and pleased. "Yes, thank you. I would like that. But just Peter Pan, please. I would like to see the other movies before hearing their music."
Dick laughed. "Don't worry. Nobody dates Stephanie for long without getting a lot of Disney exposure." As he spoke, his cell phone buzzed in his pocket. "Sorry, Cass. Gotta go see Jay about some drugs. I'll turn on the music before I leave, though." He clapped her on the shoulder and waved, and Cass waved back, getting started again as the opening notes of 'A Pirate's Life' filtered through the air.
***
"Okay," Stephanie said, laughing almost too hard to speak. "Okay, whose idea was this again?"
She and Cassandra were on a rooftop in Gotham - well, technically, Batwoman and the Bat were on a rooftop in Gotham - but the two of them were definitely there, and they were holding hands.
Cassandra raised an eyebrow. "But we have to hold hands," she explained. "They did in the movies."
"Yeah, but they could fly . Like, for real fly, not fall and hope our state-of-the-art grappling lines don't give out." She shifted her grip on Cassandra's hand with a hint of nervousness.
"Here," Cassandra said, pulling her close. "I'll show you. Your new cape lets you glide."
The smile she got was almost as sweet as their mid-flight kisses, set to Stephanie's off-key humming as they flew over Gotham together.
***
When Stephanie finally got around to showing Cass 'Hook', she was rewarded with the interested look in Cass's eyes as she stared at Rufio.
"I used to have the biggest crush on him," Steph sighed, as they leaned over her laptop in bed. "Something about boys with dyed hair and leather pants."
Cass studied the boy closely for another moment before realizing why he seemed familiar. "He reminds me of Jason."
Steph smirked. "Like I said."
When they reached the credits, Stephanie dropped the bomb. "Robin Williams passed away a few years ago," she said quietly.
Cass felt her face crumple a little, and could do nothing to stop it.
"I know, I cried too," Steph confided, pulling her close and winding her legs around Cass's hips under the covers. She tried and failed not to press her cold feet into the back of Cass's thighs. "He was a great guy. And he was in a few other Disney movies, too, if you want to watch them."
Cass found that it was beyond her power to refuse.
***
And that was how they ended up watching Aladdin together with Damian, who crossed his arms and huffed, but eventually allowed himself to be corralled onto one of the couches in the main living room. Titus ignored his master's loud complaints and climbed up, sitting his too-big Great Dane body in Damian's too-small lap. Damian scowled, but evidently couldn't bring himself to move the dog.
Two-thirds of the way through the movie, his composure finally cracked. "This is a completely ridiculous description of the Middle East," he snapped. "Not to mention racist, misogynist, and scientifically inaccurate."
Cassandra raised a brow at him. "Scientifically inaccurate?" She would have thought his problems would lie more with the plot than the inclusion of magic, especially since nearly every member of his family had been brought back from the dead more than once.
He gestured towards the screen. "If they'd wanted to travel to any of the places depicted in the span of time shown, they'd have needed to travel at upwards of several thousand kilometers an hour, a speed hardly conducive to singing, let alone canoodling ." He said the last word through gritted teeth, as though personally pained by the film's deviation from the known laws of physics.
"We all know you're grumpy, D, no need to spread it around," Stephanie admonished, waving her empty mug at him. "Now go get your Batmom some more hot chocolate, kiddo. I'll pause it 'til you get back."
He snarled at her wordlessly and snatched the mug, stomping off to the kitchen, muttering insults loudly in several languages.
Stephanie pulled one eyelid down and stuck out her tongue at his retreating back.
Cassandra smiled. "Shouldn't you be the adult here?"
Stephanie shrugged, pulling a package of M&Ms out of her pocket. She offered some to Cassandra, who took several of the red ones. "He's just a teenager. There's nothing you can really do but let him get all that angst out now."
"And if he doesn't?"
Steph rolled her eyes. "Then we end up with Bruce 2.0." She covered her mouth immediately, realizing what she'd said. "Oh god."
Cass took her hand, leaning forward to kiss her now uncovered mouth. "It's okay. You're allowed to say his name. And he was good at many things, but not emotion."
Steph kissed her back, remembering how Cass had simply held Damian while he cried. "I think we're gonna be pretty good moms for him," she whispered, and she felt Cass nod her agreement.