Tarot Fic: Judgment
Sep. 22nd, 2007 04:19 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
infiniteprydeRequested by: ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
whinystatement
Fandom: DC Comics / Brave and the Bold MUSH (Batgirl/Cassandra Cain)
Spoilers: Not particularly, but it helps to know that in-game, Cass Cain is Bruce Wayne's ward
Lyric from: Deathboy, "Empathy Malfunction"
Air struck her skin for the first time in hours, cold and unpleasant on the sticky sweat. She stank of that, of exertion, of leather. Hot water washed the sweat and the worst of the soreness away, but not the smell. She'd never been really sure how they cleaned it out of the suits. It took her long enough with the perfumed soaps and shampoos; like blood and rot, it wanted to stay in the flesh, in the hair, in the sinuses and lungs.
Dryness meant new clothes. Someone had laid them out for her, two sets, so she didn't have to spend half an hour trying to sort out the right ones in her closet. That was right: there was something this morning, for the reporters. Charity something. She didn't remember what. Then this evening there was something else: a dinner, and a party. She'd have to be polite, and be very careful with Alfred's lessons. And remember to smile. And remember not to scare people when she smiled.
That was all right. There would be enough time to sleep between the reporters and the party. She was getting good at parties; usually she could find someone to talk to, who didn't mind that she was slow. Lately she could even find whole groups. That made it easier; she could let them do most of the talking. They liked that, if she was careful. They didn't understand much, but they could always understand "I'm paying attention." Besides, it was funny watching them react to her without ever noticing she was doing it on purpose.
And after the party was over, the pretty girl would go to bed, and the real girl would put leather over her skin and be able to come out again.
Sometimes she wished she could do both at once. Be her real self, and show her real face. Around more than just the few of them.
She wondered if he ever wished that. If he was ever as lonely as she was, talking to half a dozen people with their real voices, but smiling at the city in the pretty clothes that still looked like they should belong to someone else.
She never asked him. If he said yes, what hope would she have left?
whinystatementFandom: DC Comics / Brave and the Bold MUSH (Batgirl/Cassandra Cain)
Spoilers: Not particularly, but it helps to know that in-game, Cass Cain is Bruce Wayne's ward
Lyric from: Deathboy, "Empathy Malfunction"
Air struck her skin for the first time in hours, cold and unpleasant on the sticky sweat. She stank of that, of exertion, of leather. Hot water washed the sweat and the worst of the soreness away, but not the smell. She'd never been really sure how they cleaned it out of the suits. It took her long enough with the perfumed soaps and shampoos; like blood and rot, it wanted to stay in the flesh, in the hair, in the sinuses and lungs.
Dryness meant new clothes. Someone had laid them out for her, two sets, so she didn't have to spend half an hour trying to sort out the right ones in her closet. That was right: there was something this morning, for the reporters. Charity something. She didn't remember what. Then this evening there was something else: a dinner, and a party. She'd have to be polite, and be very careful with Alfred's lessons. And remember to smile. And remember not to scare people when she smiled.
That was all right. There would be enough time to sleep between the reporters and the party. She was getting good at parties; usually she could find someone to talk to, who didn't mind that she was slow. Lately she could even find whole groups. That made it easier; she could let them do most of the talking. They liked that, if she was careful. They didn't understand much, but they could always understand "I'm paying attention." Besides, it was funny watching them react to her without ever noticing she was doing it on purpose.
And after the party was over, the pretty girl would go to bed, and the real girl would put leather over her skin and be able to come out again.
Sometimes she wished she could do both at once. Be her real self, and show her real face. Around more than just the few of them.
She wondered if he ever wished that. If he was ever as lonely as she was, talking to half a dozen people with their real voices, but smiling at the city in the pretty clothes that still looked like they should belong to someone else.
She never asked him. If he said yes, what hope would she have left?
