Tenth Unused Utility Belt | Video

[hellofist]

People keep showing up, with memories... that don't match up. Happening a lot, lately. Guess it happens... all the time, but... seems like more, now.

[Cass stops a second, not looking into the feed but at something past the comm, jaw clenching and relaxing as she thinks.]

Know I did... something. Or... something happened, to me. Made me... someone people don't like? Or are scared of. Don't know.

[It's a little terrifying, to talk to Tim and see him be relieved she's not whatever she becomes in his future.]

I guess, want advice. Want to know... if you did something... bad, or wrong, would you... want to know? Want someone... to tell you, so you could stop? Or just... let it happen, hope you... do right things?

Comments

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[surfaceshine]

I wouldn't go so far as glad - not pissed off anymore, anyway.

If not needed, at least I can not do what I did to fuck it up the first time.

[There's uncertainty lingering under his confidence - he knows himself, knows he doesn't do things like that without good reason, knows Sam is his weakness; and he knows how sometimes decisions only make sense in the moment but in that moment they make perfect, terrible, logical, powerful sense - but only Cass would see it. It's nowhere near the surface, lingering down inside of him where he keeps all the things he doesn't want anyone to see.]

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[hellofist]

[She does see it, and she would hug him if she were with him. At the very least she'd reach for his hand, but all she can do now is lower her eyes from him because it's not something he wants people to see, so she won't look.]

Still don't know... if I'll ask. Can tell it's big. And... bad. Very bad.

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[surfaceshine]

Well, that's somethin' only one person can decide, sweetheart.

[He's taking a moment to pack it all back in where it goes, but he means it nonetheless; and he means it when he says] Hey. [so she'll look back up at him. Waits to meet her eyes, and means it when he continues:]

Nothing - and I mean nothing - is set in stone.

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[hellofist]

[It takes her a long time to look at him, but when she finally does she does it without hesitation. She needed her own minute just as bad as he did. She wants to ask and she doesn't and it's giving her a headache, but what Dean says next helps.

She nods, thinks it over for herself a few times. Nothing's in stone, nothing's in stone. The person who does those bad things, it's not her. It doesn't have to be. She can do what she has to do to avoid the future that makes people afraid of her.]

Will remember. Will... never forget.

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[surfaceshine]

[Dean waits. He can wait, as long as it takes, give her her moment too. If she takes too long or cuts the feed, he thinks, he can always just go find her. It's a small Barge and he's confident in his ability to find her, in the obscure but certain knowledge that she'd let him find her.

But she looks up, she nods, and she says that; he waits another few long moments, doesn't know he's letting her see the same thing in him reflected back at her. He doesn't have to go to Hell, he doesn't have to be the person they told him he was, will be. And if he can, she can - and if she can, he can.

The corners of his mouth quirk towards a smile, though it's lowkey and sincere. There's pride and affection in his low voice.]

Attagirl.

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[hellofist]

[The smile that finds its way onto her face is weak, tremulous at first, but it builds and sticks while she watches his hope starting to shine through him too. She touches her fingertips to the image of his face on her comm and when he praises her, the smile breaks out completely and she ducks her head because she's pleased this time.

She's worked so hard to see that kind of pride in her, from the Bruce in her world and the one here, from her father when she was little and wanted him to think she was good enough. She's starting to learn that that isn't something that should be earned, it should be given because you're loved. Dean is proud of her because she's her, not because she's a weapon or Batgirl.

He's proud because she's Cassandra.]

Thank you.