The Bird and The Bat ||Graybat|| (Wattys 2017)

Chapter 1

"Why are you doing this, Dick?" Barbra asks desperately. Dick keeps punching as Barbra deflects and ducks.Why IS he doing this, she thought while knocking out one of the Joker's goons with a single punch. Dick pushes and pins her to the ground with a knife in hand. His eyes weren't the dazzling blue Barbra fell head over heels for. They we dark black...almost demonic as if hypnotized. "Dick! What the heck has gotten into you?" Barbra says struggling to escape Dick's hold. As he puts the knife near the right corner of her mouth, she kicked him off of her. They circle each other like in a wrestling match. "Tim, Damian and Jason need you! Bruce and Alfred need you! Gotham needs you! I need you!" she says trying to snap him out of the transe he was in. Dick charges at her.

"Smile!" he says pointing the knife at her face. Barbra moves making him cut her arm pretty badly. The moment Dick said that she knew the Joker did something to him.

"Dick! Don't you remember me?" Barbra questions. "The Joker brainwashed you somehow," she tries to explain. "I'm your girlfriend!"

"I don't have a parter, only enemies,"

"What about Tim? What about Jason and Damian, huh?"

"Who?"

"You don't remember?" Barbra says taking out another one of the Joker's goons. "I-I love you, Dick! Like, with all my heart. And I can't stand to see you like this." His eyes turned back to the Nightwing blue (I know it's cheesy)

"Babs?" Dick asks looking at the giant cut he made on Barbra's arm.

"Dick?"

"I hurt you!" he says as he tears up at the horrid action he did.

"Dick, it's only a scratch," she says looking at the cut and wiping off excess blood. She also had a cut on her lip and another cut in her leg. "I'll clean it up back at Wayne Manor." Dick runs up and hugs her.

"I'm so, so sorry Babs," he says crying a little on her shoulder.

"It's fine, Dick. I'm just glad you're okay." The head over to Wayne Manor and clean up. Dick got into his Batman pajama pants and shirt and Barbra got into her Robin shirt and Nightwing pajama pants. Everybody was just hanging around watching a late night movie. Bruce was reading and sipping his coffee, Tim was fighting with Damian because Damian spoiled the ending, Alfred was doing the dishes, Jason was texting Blair and Dick and Barbra were sitting next to each other sharing a blanket and were the only ones paying attention to the movie.

"Okay, you ALL need to go to bed I'm tired of hearing you fight. It's giving me more headaches than Tony Stark trying to one up me in a wealth contest," Bruce commands. They all head upstairs to their rooms. Tim and Damain finished their fight up there. Usually Dick would give Barbra a goodnight kiss on the cheek but he didn't that night.

"Aren't you forgetting something?" Barbra says to Dick pointing at her cheek. She was standing at Dick's door frame and Dick was sitting in his bed reading with his table lamp on.

"Oh yeah...goodnight," he says turning off the table lamp and getting under covers. Barbra thought he was still upset after he cut her today. So, she ran and jumped on top of him. He sat up and she smacked him with a kiss. Dick pushes away in disgust

"What the heck?!"

"What?"

"Why would you kiss me?"

"I thought you were upset."

"So you kiss me?"

"Well yeah. You usually kiss me goodnight on the cheek but you didn't tonight."

"Maybe I didn't want to kiss you."

"Dick...." Barbra's eyes fill with tears.

"Now get out of my room," Dick says pointing to the door. Barbra runs out in tears. She flew on top of her bed making her face submerged in her pillow. She flips over on to her back and looks at the ceiling.

"What the heck happened? Why doesn't he want to kiss me? Why is he acting different? Is he still brainwashed by the Joker?" Barbra thought to herself. She could hear Dick punch his wall in anger.

Barbra tries to go to sleep but whatever just happened spun around in her head. So she walks over to Tim's room. "Tim," she says in tears. "Can I sleep in your room tonight?"

"Yeah Barbra. Come here," he opens his arms to hug her. She runs into the bed and hugs him.

"Thanks Timmy," Barbra says getting comfy on the right side of Timmy's bed.