#ficbits

[tinsnip]

Phoenix makes the great sacrifice of flipping himself over like a stranded fish, and is rewarded with the sight of Miles in a robe, pouring tea.

"Do you take milk or sugar?"

"Come the fuck back over here."

Miles blinks at him.

"You heard me."

Deliberately, Miles takes a sip of his tea, then puts the cup down. Phoenix opens his arms wide, realizing briefly that he stinks, not caring, and it works out fine because Miles moves straight into them, climbing on to the bed and dropping on Phoenix like a great big cat.

Phoenix hugs him. He hugs him as hard as he can. He squeezes so hard his muscles ache. He splays his fingers around Miles's sides.

Miles lets out a brief huff, then a small amused snort, and then he gives as good as he gets. Ooof: Miles is strong. Stronger than Phoenix had figured. Then again, Phoenix is realizing that Miles has a bit more muscle on him than Phoenix had imagined. He'd never really had time to appreciate that before, has never really had time for things to not be urgent and dramatic. He's never had time for tea and a robe and a hug that feels like it's massaging his soul.

"Hey," says Phoenix, smiling and kind of stupid. "Hey. Hey, there."

"Hello," says Miles, with a hint of a laugh in his voice. "Good morning."

"Yeah? You think so?"

"It's all right so far."

"That's good: don't get your hopes up."

"I would never." And Miles actually kisses him on the side of the head. Hard. Phoenix thinks he may have just emitted actual hearts.

#wrightworth #myfic #ficbits #themmmmmm~~~~~~ #narumitsu #phoenix wright #miles edgeworth

[gretano8]

practicing fuller, more complete scenes

#valorant #killjoy #cypher #ficbits

[undertheopensky]

“Four, when’s the last time you ate something?”

“Uhhhhh-”

Quick, play dumb!

“What’s food?”

Not that dumb!

#joke doesn’t 100% work in English but it made me laugh anyway #linked universe #ficbits #skies writes #theoretically #this is not for whumptober #which should tell you all you need to know about how THAT’S going

[sparklyslug]

That cute fanart reminded me of a Baze/Chirrut WIP I abandoned (checks watch) SEVEN YEARS AGO so I went back to reread and its 4K of some actually pretty good stuff if I say so myself

The world stops shaking and spinning around him, and Baze can’t breathe for moment. It’s a combination of a few things; surprise, confusion, perhaps a bit of admiration, and most of all, being slammed into the rocky ground with enough force that his lungs have forgotten what they’re normally supposed to be doing at times like these.

They remember, and he sucks in a deep breath. The blind man sitting on him rises slightly with the motion of his chest, but the pressure of the bo staff jammed under his chin and pinning his wrists to the earth doesn’t ease up a bit.

So all that accomplishes is getting Baze a mouthful of dust, which has been stirred up into small drifts by the scuffle, short as it was.

“--fuck?” Baze wheezes. He meant to put a ‘what the’ in front of that, but there’s only so much he can handle just at the moment.

“Now now, we’ve only just met,” the man says with a smile. Infuriatingly, his eyes are focused somewhere just to the left of Baze’s head. How is this possible? He’s not even visibly winded. “It usually takes at least four assassination attempts before I decide if I want to get that friendly.”

“But you’re blind,” Baze coughs, though he should really know better.

“I’m what?” the man on his chest says, eyes widening. He pantomimes looking to the left and right, and then squints down at Baze. “Well, what do you know. So I am.”

“Since you can’t see,” Baze clears his throat. “I’ll just tell you: I’m not laughing.”

The man’s still smiling, but his eyebrows shoot up in some surprise. “Do I know you?” He asks, more uncertain than he’s been throughout this (sadly) very short encounter.

“No,” Baze says, too quickly. He doesn’t know why it even matters, but he can feel his face heating up. Not, of course, that he needs to worry about being caught in a blush.

#my fic #ficbits #my rogue one emotions #my baze and chirrut emotions #there are LOTS #sparkly originals

[rewordthis]

March Prompt by @ficwip: Write a 3-sentence fic about an unexpected sight through a window. Words: 113 Series: Jujutsu Kaisen Characters: Nanami Kento

The window above the kitchen sink has been left with no blinds or curtains for far too long, despite the strong sunlight on late mornings that strains his vision when he prepares himself a cup of coffee— and sure, that is the least of his worries in his line of work but he also internally, silently, really likes the warmth on his skin to bother changing things.

What he doesn’t like, is the sudden screen of smoke and darkness that is raised right in front of his eyes, mere seconds before his phone starts ringing and draw a curse from his lips.

Another day-off cancelled, for the sake of the greater good… “Shit!”

#3sentencefic #jjk #jujutsu kaisen #nanami kento #fanfic #my writing #writing prompt #by the way… is there anyone willing to tell me how people write? #because fullstops and columns and whatever I have no idea how are used in english! 😅 #113 words #ficbits

[probablytoooldforthis]

In a conversation about what superpowers you would have and I picked water and commented about how it was an odd choice for a geologist (not really but don't get me started) and then this happened:

*********

"What is your superpower, Crystalline?"

"I can make things crystalize and make crystal grow faster."

"Ha! That is a lame ass superpower! What the hell good is that? What are you going to do, make pretty jewelry? Ha ha... OW! Hell, what the hell, what did you do??? I'm dying!"

"Enjoy your kidney stones." *building falls down as the steel mineral structure falls the hell apart*

*********

#ficbits

[fanfic-collection]

The strands of timelines whirled around you. Step by precarious step.

Loki straightened up in his chair, a small smile forming on his face. “You made it.”

“I will always come for you, my love.” You replied, reaching his side.

Loki gripped tight the strands, tilting his head to the side as he studied you. He scrunched his eyes shut and a double appeared beside you, a perfect duplicate of himself.

Tears welled in the original’s eyes as he studied you. “I cannot… let go…” He murmured, glancing at the many strands tangled around him. Bursts of green magic occasionally emanating from his hands.

The double looked at you and held out its hand. You took it and smiled, though continued to address the original Loki, the one sitting on his throne. “My love.” You murmured, squeezing the double’s hand before pushing past it and kneeling before Loki. You wrapped your arms around his legs and rested your chin on his lap. “Then here I will stay.”

A small smile quirked at the corner of Loki’s mouth and he nodded, the duplicate slowly vanishing.

#loki x reader #ficbit #Loki spoilers

[contentment-of-cats]

Fun and Games

This has been kicking around in drafts for a few months. I was cleaning it out and...

With thanks to @shards-of-silver for getting me off my ass.

Upon promotion to senior lieutenants, there are perks.

Ensigns sleep a dozen to a barracks, junior lieutenants share a four-rack of bunks around a common area and share sanitary facilities. Senior officers of lieutenant commander or higher have their own private quarters increasing in size and amenities, and at flag rank a suite of rooms. But nothing beats the heady rush of getting your own room with a door that closes. Despite what the contractors say, those bunk partitions don't do squat to stop you from hearing every snore, fart, or wet dream from your fellow juniors. There's a corresponding increase in cubic storage along with the bigger room and one may trust the newly-minted senior loots to go a little crazy.

Thrawn as a new commodore aboard rearranged officers' quarters by duty station, so now all bridge officers are housed a literal thirty second run to the bridge or assigned six-man lifepod. Faro has always run a looser ship in terms of culture, and there are times when bridge officers' country is decorated for various holidays and observances. For example, observances of Longnight see small dishes of food and lanterns set out to guide and appease the spirits of those lost in the vastness of space. But today there is something new outside of Agral and Pyro's twofer.

A sign-up.

It's a datapad on a sticky at reading level with a stylus on a cord.

"Sign up for tabletop games night - Quests & Quarries, Pirates & Privateers, Hyperspace Hellscape, Ancient Lands Archaic Warfare, and other RP games coming to a horizontal surface near you!"

The list is growing fast.

A note above the hatch control says, "Game in progress. ENTER QUIETLY."

"Already the social hub," Faro mutters and then jumps out of her skin when Thrawn agrees with her. Even in boots, he moves almost silently. "Let a lass know, sir! You almost scared it out of me!"

Thrawn's shadow - Vanto - is not here or otherwise she'd have stood a better chance of hearing the approach. He is looking at the sign-up sheet and then at the door sign, then turns to her.

"These are not like Scrabble?"

Pyro's love of table games is legend. She even collects them.

"No, Commodore. These are, well, a kind of strategy game." Thrawn visibly brightens. His skin changes color, his pupils disappear as the nictitating membrane crosses them in a three-part blink. "Players create characters and ascend levels in different scenarios called dungeons. It's kind of like academy war-gaming, but more flexible and personalized."

"They will not mind if we enter and observe?"

"They'll snap to attention for a flag officer on deck or I'll have them cleaning the stormtroopers' urinals with ear swabs, but I do not think they'll object."

Faro taps the hatch open and as they step in Vanto barks, "Commodore on deck!"

The response is satisfyingly swift.

"Officers, as you were," Thrawn nods. "I do not wish to disturb the game in progress, only to observe."

Of course, the furniture is bolted to the deck, but there are an additional folding couch and two additional folding chairs added to the room and-

"Pyrondi, where did you get the holotop?" Karyn hasn't seen one in probably twenty years. This one replaces the low table normally issued to this accommodation, bolted down as per regs. "It's got to be a month's pay."

"I bought it at an antiquities shop on Coruscant. Lomar did the new innards, and then all of us wrote code." Us being - apparently - herself, Lomar, Hammerly, Barlin, Agral, Yve, and Carvia.

"Major Carvia, what is your part in this madhouse?" The man budges loots up the couch to make room for their captain and commodore in the armchairs. "Surely you're not a player?"

"I helped Pyro carry this up here and did the coding for groundpounder dungeons. No offense, but this bunch is all Navy." The major wags his finger at Pyro. "I will thank you, youngster, not to refer to items as 'antiquities' that I am old enough to have owned brand new."

"Everyone do a stretch, get some snacks, and we'll come back into it in fifteen?" Pyro asks and everyone agrees, getting up a little stiffly after hours gaming. "Sync and go."

Thrawn looks over the table, at first studying the current dungeon, but then with more interest at the leather-bound manuals of flimsi, and beautifully made sets of dice and other paraphernalia.

"Please, Lieutenant, explain." Thrawn settles in one of the armchairs, accepting one of Pyro's fruit teas and a packet of sweets.

"Well, first these are the handbooks for players and dungeon masters. These others are for aspects - beings, arms, character classes." Pyrondi takes a small bag and empties it into her hand. "These are my dice."

"Is a gambling chip counted as dice?" Thrawn looks intently. "These are thystine and aurum leaf, correct?"

"If a binary decision is needed, yes, it counts. They are thystine, but as you can see, every player has their set and aside from the chip they can have sets of seven to fifteen, it depends what games they play."

Vanto's set is doonium, which makes Thrawn smile fleetingly. Carvia's is some kind of bone or ivory. Agral's is synthetic fireopal. All sets are as individual as the player.

Oh, no. ART.

"And what about the crystal ball?" Karyn asks. It's a perfect sphere set on an elaborate base.

"Oh, that's a toy I picked up from a junk dealer. He said it didn't work, but when you ask it a yes-or-no question it gives you a nonsensical answer. Watch. Is the mess going to serve hash for firstmeal again?"

The sphere roils with smoke and then shows a wavering answer in its center.

Better not tell you now.

"See? It gives positive, negative, or non-committal answers. To be fair, I don't want to know if we're having hash again."

The players filter back in and take their places as Thrawn is given a rough crash course in play. Pyrondi looks around, sets up a triptych screen to hide her materials and plans, and then asks if everyone is ready. Snacks and drinks to hand, all affirm and the game resumes. Karyn watches her superior as he watches the game with eyes bright. Pyro is a force of chaos and order, handling players firmly but also throwing wild situations at them. The dice can't be rigged or fooled on a dice pad, holding them firm.

Thrawn reminds his officers that night phase is coming, and they have watch coming up. The party breaks up with others putting the room back to order and bidding good rest.

"If you do not mind, Lieutenant, Captain Faro and I will join for the next game."

"Please do, sir. The more the merrier."

Karyn almost groans but holds it in.

"As I remember, you said the same thing before you wiped the walls with me at Scrabble."

Pyro only grins. "Good rest, sirs."

#ficbit #thrawn #chimaera crew #karyn faro

[bedlamsbard]

my next fic probably isn't going to be the Yonderverse "Loki organizes Steve's and Bruce's dual stag party and it goes, uh, well, Things Happen" but it COULD be.

peak comedy: Steve, Bucky, Loki, Thor, Clint, Rocket, Sam, Rhodey, Scott, and Bruce getting into Trouble In Space while Steve and Bruce just want to go home and make out with their respective brides-to-be. (Tony was invited but opted out, saying he had had enough of space and someone had to hold down the fort on Earth.)

#this is where that clint ficbit with the pied raven would go #nat's and betty's hen do is either equal amounts of trouble or all the girls are just doing shots in a bar in norway like normal people #or possibly both #adventures in accountability #roleswap endgame au concept #I don't do pure comedy well so it's unlikely but it's one of several ruminating fic bunnies

[confusedguytoo]

Lot’s of people talk about the Scoobies not digging up Buffy in Bargaining.  I had a thought why that could be.  Imagine Dawn and Spike questioning the Scoobies about Buffy having to dig herself up.

“Why didn’t you dig her up?” Dawn asked.  “You didn’t have to open the coffin

“The way the ritual was set up, it said not to disturb the body and that the resurrected person would be strong enough to join the casters on their own.  I think if the spell hadn’t been interrupted she’d have either been teleported up, or maybe her body would have animated and dug itself up and then she’d have fully resurrected on the surface.”

“Oh, you lot are even bigger morons than I thought.  Buffy had to dig herself up, because you’re not smart enough to remember that Egyptians buried their dead in tombs, not under six foot of dirt!.  It’s only the most famous thing about that whole bleeding country!”

#Buffy The Vampire Slayer #dawn summers #spike #willow rosenberg #ficbit

[tinsnip]

Extremely nsfw fic snippet as I work along on Rivals with Benefits - Miles and Phoenix finding themselves, finally, in Miles's bed.

It's maybe… not the best blowjob he's ever gotten. It's a bit weird - Edgeworth's been an amazing fuck so far in all the stupid little situations they've put themselves in so far, but now… hmm. Not a bad blowjob. Not exactly. Blowjobs are like pizza: even when they aren't great, they're still pretty good. But maybe… Edgeworth doesn't do this all that often? Or something? Because he keeps starting and stopping, and huffing irritated little sighs at himself, and it's kind of hard for Phoenix to focus on the blowjob when he keeps wanting to tell Edgeworth to relax. It takes him out of the brainspace that he had never previously realized blowjobs required. So now he's lying there having Edgeworth do things to his genitals and he is sort of feeling like maybe he should go somewhere else to give Edgeworth some privacy. Oh for fuck's sake— It feels weird to do it, like Edgeworth's gonna yell at him, but it's his dick right? Right. So he looks down at Edgeworth and— Oh. Oh, of course that's the reason. Fucking Edgeworth is having difficulty giving a blowjob because his stupid hair keeps getting in his face, because of course that's why. Fucking idiot. So Phoenix reaches down and pulls his bangs up out of his face— —and Edgeworth looks up at him— —and holy fuck, suddenly that's Edgeworth with Phoenix's dick in his mouth and Phoenix's hand in his hair and his eyes are - not mad, not sad, not happy, maybe a little irritated but that's honestly just Edgeworth's baseline, and it's just him, just him looking at Phoenix, just Miles looking at Phoenix, Miles his rival, Miles his friend, Miles in the dark in Miles's apartment with Phoenix in his bed and Phoenix's dick in his mouth— Miles splutters a little but mostly deals fine with what immediately follows, which is good, because Phoenix most absolutely does not have the bandwidth to congratulate Miles on successfully concluding a fucking blowjob, he's too busy being kicked in the brain by his own balls to do anything other than twitch in Miles's bed and yell about it, holy fuck, holy fuck, holy fucking fuck— "Shh! Shh!" "Oh, Christ… oh, God, I… oh my God, Miles… fuu—" "Shut up! For God's sake, Wright, this is an apartment building!" That stops him, and then he immediately gets the giggles, because of fucking course he does, of course he's just had Miles Edgeworth suck him off and is therefore going to crack up in Miles Edgeworth's bed and snicker and try to be quiet while Miles keeps shushing him and he is going to fucking run out of oxygen and die, he is going to smother himself with a pillow if Miles doesn't do it first, but oh my God— "'This'— ah ha ha, fucking 'this is an apaaartment building'—" "Wright—" But Miles is snickering too now and also, which is funnier, trying not to, so he kind of snorts and makes a weird noise and that's really funny, and now he's pressing his face into Phoenix's thigh and wheezing against his skin while Phoenix muffles his own stupid screeching laugh with his arm, practically biting his own bicep to shut himself the fuck up so they don't wake the neighbours.

#wrightworth #narumitsu #i love these fucking idiots so much #ficbits #myfic

[gretano8]

decisions ..

#killjoy #ficbits #im having a lot of fun doing some key panels #but id like to do the whole fic at some point #one day .. #valorant

[undertheopensky]

My cat has routines, like most cats.

One of these routines is that, around nine p.m., she will start yelling come-play! noises and tearing in and out of my room.

I will get up and follow her, asking what she wants. She will lead me on a loop around the house, mrrting and meowing, until we get back to my room, at which point she expects me to go to bed.

I usually do, and she can sleep on my chest or curl up next to my hip as takes her fancy.

She does not know why this works.

(Her noises verge on the edge of distress-noises, which always break whatever concentration/hyperfixation I have going on. I realise the time, and take my night meds. I get up and go to brush my teeth, and follow her around the house for the two minutes it takes to brush them. Then I get back to my room and go straight to bed, because by now my body has realised it's tired.

If I stay up looking at my phone for longer than five minutes, she will shove her entire body between my face and the screen and lie there like a purring brick. I inevitably fall asleep waiting for her to move.

She is not trained to be a therapy cat. But fuck if she didn't fix the sleep schedule that's been fucked up my entire damn life.)

#white noise and quiet fingers #this is not my usual style #in fact i think i was briefly possessed by the ghost of five-years-ago!sykie #who hadn't yet realised she was having dissociative episodes or anxiety attacks or for that matter wasn't a full time she #i hope she's doing better now #(they are dw) #<3 #on that note i just tried to brush my teeth before eating dinner because the cat yelled at me #so that's the level of sleeper-code i'm dealing with here #cats are assholes #pidge is a cat #ficbits #skies writes #theoretically #skies thinks too much

[cryptconstellation]

“Alex, why do you have a baby?” Dana asked, blinking in bewilderment and apparently only just noticing PARIAH.

“Bbbbhhhh.” PARIAH contributed, lazily waving a baby arm at her. Dana waved back more on reflex than anything else.

“We ate Greene and too much Redlight, and Blacklight came from PARIAH. And we ate it when we broke it out of the lab, and then it ate us- uh, it’s ours.” Alex hastily simplified at the increasingly incredulous face Dana was making. “Look, it has our eyes?” Void tried, hitching PARIAH up with a flex of biomass so their faces were next to each other. PARIAH obligingly cycled through faces into a squishy, child shaped copy of Alex’s. And sprouted tendrils again, wiggling them at Dana.

“I… see that.” Dana said, entirely at a loss for words.

#I was going to draw a nicer version of this but then I remembered I can’t draw children #so u get the quick doodle form #also the rest of this ficbit is probably never seeing the light of day so u get that for context too #alex mercer #dana mercer #prototype 2009 #pariah prototype #uhhhh how do I tag the baby…. #pariah greene #?????

[avinryd]

ficbit time!!!

BG3 brainrot incoming. What can I say, the sad arrogant wizard got to me. I will not apologize.

-

“What in Mystra’s name were you thinking?”

He keeps his voice below a shout, barely, but Arden flinches as if he hadn’t. Still, their voice is level when they reply,

“What do you mean, ‘what was I thinking’? You were there, in my mind. You know. You saw.”

‘What I saw was a stubborn fool with more power than sense,’ Gale does not say. That would brand him the most egregious hypocrite on the Sword Coast, after all. Instead he exhales deliberately though his nose, searching for calm before he speaks again.

“Your mind is a maelstrom, Arden—” fuck, he can’t quite keep the awe from his voice  “—and I’m no illithid master of the psionic arts. At least, not yet. So I ask again: what in the Hells were you thinking? Did nothing I said, no impression of the severity of the situation get through to you?”

“Of course it did!” They snap back, eyes flashing in a very literal sense. “The situation seemed very urgent, so I chose the most expedient solution available.”

“How does ‘pouring your entire life force and then some down a drain’ register to you as a solution at all? Let alone the most expedient!”

“This, coming from the man whose apparent life plan is to find the darkest corner of Faerun to detonate his mistake, rather than find a way to fix it. Your self-preservation record seems as black as mine, Gale of Waterdeep.”

Before Gale can sputter out a reply to that comment, they continue bitterly,

“There’s a hole in the Weave sitting in your chest, and I’m brim-full of the stuff that threads the loom.”

Lightning crackles between their fingers as if to illustrate.

“It’s just…so much. It stood to reason that enough of it could er—fill the hole, as it were.”

(There’s more to it than that; Gale’s no fool. The sorcerer’s hands have balled into fists, some deep-seated frustration robbing them of their usual eloquence. “Brim-full”. “So much”. If Gale had to guess—with that part of his mind not worried about the apocalypse in his chest—he’d conjecture that Arden suffers under a problem diametrically opposed to his own. He shelves the thought for later.)

Arden at least has the decency to look ashamed.

“Clearly, I’m outclassed—I’d never encountered Netherese magic before last night. I won’t— I won’t apologize for my actions, but I did not take you at your word and for that, I am sorry.”

-

There's like, 2k in this doc so far and I'm not quite done with this piece. I'm thinking it'll be a series of oneshots(actually 2 series, companions) that vaguely follow my playthrough as Storm Sorcerer blast-first-questions-later Arden. We have a good time, and Arden's vowed to vaporize everyone who's ever hurt their friends, up to and including the gods themselves.

#baldur's gate 3 #baldur's gate 3 fic #gale x tav #gale x mc #gale x named tav #ficbits of ryd #avinryd

[windlion]

So someone posted a Murderbot/Batfam crossover and my brain just . . . went to work. Of course Bruce Wayne is from the Corporate Rim. Of course Bruce is human. But his boys. . .

Before the escape pod was towed into his bay, Bruce already knew that it contained a single ComfortUnit from his ping. That one, alone, escaped the station currently burning up in atmosphere was a mystery. Haleys was known for their work with specialized programming for constructs; why a ComfortUnit? Why this one?

What he did not expect on opening the pod doors was a tiny form curled into a ball in the safety netting. Bruce tapped the feed to be sure they were online, and a tear-stained face turned up to look at him. Dark hair, skin washed pale in the bay lights, eyes reflecting bluer than blue. Bruce asked carefully, “Is there anyone else with you?”

“Just me.”

That was the ComfortUnit.

Bruce stood frozen, staring as the child rubbed their face, attempting to straighten up. Belatedly, Bruce extended his hand to help them climb out of the netting, registering the feel of flesh and thin too light limbs. The construct awkwardly clambered out of the pod and came to rest on the deck in front of him. “Were there. . . were there any other life pods?”

“I’m afraid not.”

The ComfortUnit looked up at him, then back to the singed plating of the life pod. If they had ejected a second later, they would likely have been caught in the gravity well before Bruce could catch them with his tractor beam. If others had tried. . . there would be nothing left after the atmosphere burnt it away.

Abruptly, the ComfortUnit pinged hard across the feed, sending a string of numbers, he/him designation, the hard IP again, and a deep, desperate helplessness. HubSys, SecSys, and the shipbot all pinged back, a chorus from all over the ship greeting the child. But not the response that he wanted. Bruce could see the boy’s face fall.

“They- they got me out. Before they fell, too.” The boy’s face was haunted, one hand clenching tight while the other rested on the pod’s surface. At least enough of the pod was functioning on emergency protocols to indicate to the governor module that they were still on company property.

If Bruce didn’t know otherwise, he would think he was facing an eight or nine year old child. It absolutely turned his stomach. Someone had – someone had designed him this way. He could all too easily see the marketing. In theory it would spare “real” children, allow predators a “safe” outlet, but in reality. . . they made this person to be a target, to be locked into a life of cruelty and exploitation.

In the Corporate Rim, anything was for sale. Anything.

It didn’t matter that it was a construct who could be mentally older than himself; Bruce still found himself using a more gentle voice than he would with interrogating an adult. “Who were they?”

“Mary and John.” At his nod, the boy elaborated, “They were older models with a lot of experience, and they were helping me integrate new modules. Giving me context so things made sense.”

Two older ComfortUnits. Designated male and female. To . . . to train this one. So he was relatively young after all. Bruce couldn’t tell if that made this entire situation better or worse. He could not condone dropping the lab facility into the atmosphere, burning up the human researchers and killing countless conspirators to hide the dirty laundry, but he also could absolutely not condone this.

“Do you-- how long have you been operating?”

“Just about 5,000 hours.” The boy rocked back on his feet, swinging his hands alarmingly like a restless child. “I’ve been getting really bored with the analysis tests in the lab. They said I hadn’t passed enough to go to human trials yet.”

Bruce didn’t allow the intense relief he felt to pass his face, but from the way the boy’s eyes flickered, he’d caught some micro-expression anyway. Some days he wished his face was part of what had been replaced. With alarming forthrightness, the boy declared, “You don’t agree with my function.”

He most certainly did not miss having organic knees as he held the low crouch to be on eye-level, “You’re a child. You should be allowed to be a child.”

The boy frowned, his face admirably expressive with his bright blue eyes. “That concept only applies to humans.”

Bruce flicked one arm, displaying the grappling gun held within the left forearm. “My body is comprised of only 34% organic matter. There is arguably more humanity in you than there is in me.”

“Oh.” The boy dipped forward to look at it more closely, and Bruce obligingly held still. “That is so cool.”

“They’re augments. I didn’t choose to have the accident, to lose my limbs, to lose my parents, but I did choose how to react to it.” Bruce rotated his arm slowly so the grappling gun was stowed away, back beneath the synth-flesh coverings. “That’s what I would like to do for you. Give you a choice.”

Stubborn blue eyes locked on to his. There was skepticism in there, and a very fast-working mind. “So you’ll be my new client.”

“No. I’ll be your guardian.” Absolutely not entertaining that line of thought, though surely if any tabloids found out he was keeping a ComfortUnit, they’d be all over it. It would be easy enough to present the boy as an augmented human: they were more organic than he was. The press would buy that he'd find a child in the same kind of catastrophic situation and sympathise. “And you can decide for yourself what your function is, if you want to change.”

“Change?”

“Grow.”

That startled the boy, his eyes going wide. “You mean I could grow up?”

“I was about your size when I first received augments. I think I can make it work.” He stood up at last, obviously to his adult height, and let the boy digest that for a moment. “So, what do you think?”

“Yes!”

----

“What should I call you?”

“Uh. The researchers called me Little Dick.”

“NO.”

(And in that moment Bruce aged ten years.)

#sometimes I write #DC #DC/Murderbot #Bruce Wayne #Dick Grayson #not that he knows it yet #here have a quick ficbit #Bruce has no idea the directions his life is going to take #he's already a Corporate majority shareholder in Wayne Enterprises #who violently disagrees with most Corp Rim practices #tw for implied child prostitution of a sort #because yeah that's. . . that'd be a thing #(Local CEO so busy Solving a Problem he doesn't realize he adopted a person) #(Bruce reluctantly allows Dick to keep the name later because it makes Dick cackle that it's a double bluff) #(Bruce uses any and all nicknames to avoid this eventuality for So Long)