coda of sorts to 5x14 – see author’s note on ao3 for warnings.
Eddie shuts the door to the truck behind him and shields his eyes from the sun with his hand, peering at the entrance to the building. Sometimes Eddie gets here a minute or two late or Christopher finishes early, and he’ll already be standing at the door waiting for Eddie’s truck to pull in, and all Eddie will get is a distant wave from Christopher’s instructor, Siena, before they go.
Today isn’t one of those days, though, and with a bounce in his step, Eddie starts towards the entrance.
Christopher and Siena aren’t out yet when Eddie gets to the stands, so he rests back against the railing, curling his hands around it, and keeps his eyes trained on the locker room doors. He drums his fingers against the metal, tap-tap-tap. Counting down the seconds.
Really, Eddie doesn’t know why he gets so—excited seems like a stretch. Anticipating maybe fits better. There’s no reason for it, though. Even when Siena comes out, there’s no guarantee it’ll even happen, and even if it does, there’s absolutely no reason to be standing here waiting for it like it’s something special. It doesn’t even mean anything. It’s ridiculous, but—
“Dad!”
Christopher comes tumbling out of the locker room, covered in dirt and beaming wide enough that Eddie can’t see his eyes through his squint. Siena trails behind as Christopher hurries over, wearing the same smile everyone who spends more than five minutes with Christopher can’t help. Christopher knocks into Eddie’s hip when he gets within range, more stumbling than intentional, but Eddie gladly takes whatever willing affection he can get from his pre-teen nowadays. He steadies Chris with a hand on his shoulder, then lets himself run that hand through Christopher’s dusty hair.
“Hey, buddy.” Eddie allows Christopher to pull back, returning his smile as Chris peers up at him. “How were the horses today?”
“I got to ride Lucky today!” Christopher rocks in place with his excitement. “Then he ate a sugar cube out of my hand!”
After months of this, Eddie hardly even needs to tamp down on any lingering fear at the thought of Christopher riding a horse without him around, which lets him focus instead on the second half of Christopher’s story. “Yeah?” Eddie glances up at Siena. “The sugar cubes were alright?”
Siena waves him off, smiling amiably. “Your husband checked with me last week. Sugar cubes are great treats for the horses.”
All the restless energy from the waiting settles comfortably in Eddie’s chest like a sigh. “Oh,” he says, “good.”
Really, it’s so dumb. It doesn’t mean anything. Still, Eddie waits for it every time.
Remember that you are a primate, and one of the basic primate threat responses is to go absolutely bugfuck and hope that whatever’s after you decides you’re not worth the risk. Charging directly toward the problem waving your arms wildly in the air and shrieking like a gibbon is always valid.
au where the JL finds out about both the contingency plans and the batfamily at the same time
Does the shear amount of deeply personal betrayal secrets make it the breaking point between JL and Batman? Did something happen to the batfamily that forced the batfam into using contingency measures? Does Batman leave the JL because the JL went after his (unknown at the time) children? Do the JL and batfam only meet bc thats the contingency plan Batman had put in place forBatman?
Made this post for the angst but tbh the JL having to track down the batfam bc they are listed as the batman contingency (with a cute code name like “Rockin’ Robin” or “Call The Colony” that makes no sense to the JL but is hilarious to us) only to end up having to stand back as they watch like 7 kids having the time of their life as they beat up their dad and verbally roast him is so so funny
Huh. And here I was, picturing them standing in the Contingency Room™, struggling to process it, and hearing, “What are you doing here?” They turn around, and there’s a pre-pubescent boy standing there, a half-eaten oversized cookie in his hands.
He stares at them.
They stare at him.
He stares at them.
They stare at him.
He huffs. “It’s rude not to answer questions when people ask them, y’know.”
“Oh,” someone says.
“Sorry,” someone else mumbles.
“You first,” someone much closer says.
The boy rolls his eyes. “I live here.”
“What?” someone says
“Oh,” a different person repeats, with a hell of a lot more feeling.
The boy nods at the briefcases they’ve already brought down. At least one person snaps theirs shut with a guilty expression. “So. What do you think?”
“Um…”
“It’s very…”
“Uh…”
“…What is happening right now?” someone whispers.
“Pretty good, right?” The boy hops up on a table or desk and takes another bite of his cookie. “I helped design them.”
Dead. Silence.
Wonder Woman bends over with a bright smile. “I don’t believe I caught your name?”
“Robin.” He swallows and smiles back with chocolate-stained teeth. “And you’re Diana, right?”
“That’s right! We’re a little confused about what all this is doing down here. Do you think you could tell us, Robin?”
Robin frowns. “Isn’t it obvious?”
A grumble of discontent rolls through the League. Wonder Woman ignores them. “We just want to make sure we aren’t… misunderstanding anything.”
“It’s emergency plans. In case any of you go bad,” Robin says, “or get brainwashed, or mind-controlled, or manipulated, or in case of evil clones, or doppelgängers, or power-stealers—“ He takes another bite of his cookie and just keeps going, even with his mouth full, “or body-snatchers, or people from alternate dimensions, or futures, or time-traveling evil descendants, or villains with your same origins, or something.”
(And that, as much as they all hate to admit it, sounds a lot less unreasonable than any of them were thinking.)
“How long has Batman had these?”
“Let’s see…” Robin taps one finger against his chin. “Well, he started making them just after he got me, so that’s… three years ago? Maybe four? Y’know, trying to come up with some of them was really challenging.”
“I should hope so,” someone mutters.
“Yeah, about that,” Green Arrow says, “why is mine just a note that says, ‘if you can’t beat Queen in a fist fight, you deserve the future you get’?”
Robin looks at him. “Because I could beat you in a fist fight, Ollie.”
“You could not!”
“Could so.”
“Could not!”
“Want me to prove it?”
“No one is fighting any children today,” Wonder Woman says, before anyone can find out what Green Arrow’s answer would be. Robin sticks his tongue out at them. It’s disgusting.
“Okay,” Superman says, “but if all of this is in case of… some variety of evil Leaguer, why doesn’t Batman have one?”
Robin takes another bite of his cookie, kicking his legs back and forth over the edge of the table. He actually fully chews & swallows this one before speaking up again.
Hi so this phenomena is whats known as a sinkhole. For those of you that dont know let me lay it out for you.
So heres the general idea: A road is built, somehow, overtop a large cavern or cave. Doesn’t really matter how. Now, the dirt is usually packed enough to support itself for a bit, because otherwise there wasnt a cave to begin with. Somehow, a pothole exists. That pothole gets deeper somehow, maybe erosion. Over time, it gets deep enough to start breaking in to the cave. Slowly, over time, the dirt stops supporting itself. Gets loose or whatever. And it all falls into that cave. So what was once a perfectly safe street with a Pig Factory above it is now a massive 30 foot hole in the ground with part of a Pig Factory in it.
Meant to include this
Sometimes the hole didn’t exist before but a leaky pipe caused underground erosion or compaction that created a hole. That’s more common in new cities that don’t put much into maintaining infrastructure.
Such as putting more money into the local police budget and less in urban planning?
ALT
Just little old me. Nothing special :P