Chapter Text
“Focus. This isn’t talking, this is controlling. Put your consciousness into it.” Pamela Isley frowned at him. Dick swallowed, fighting the urge to rub his eyes. They’d been at it all night. The radio wafted in from another ‘room’--it wasn’t really a house, since it was made of living plants in the middle of Robinson Park that Poison Ivy had commanded to take the shape of a shelter, but it had separate sections like rooms so that really was the best word for it. (It was warm, and the rain couldn’t get in unless Ivy let it. It was nicer than juvie or the streets, so Dick didn’t complain.)
The aloe plant shook in front of him, trying to do what Dick was telling it to do--but that was the problem, wasn’t it? He was telling it to let him in, and it was trying, but he had to actually take control.
Easier said than done.
“...the body was believed to have been stolen from the crime scene, possibly an accomplice covering their tracks.” The radio was clear even against the din of plantlife chattering away around them. While it felt like he could hear the noise in his ears, Ivy had explained that it was actually more of a distance-based sixth sense all on its own. Hence why even in the loudest of areas plant-wise, his hearing was completely unhindered.
“Try again,” Ivy stood, turning to leave the room. “I’ll get us something to eat.”
Dick bit back a sigh, continuing his attempts as the radio blared on.
“Geez, a child bomber. It sounds like something that happens in third-world countries, not here, you know?” The female radio host tutted.
Her male counterpart made an agreeing noise. “And really, with people crazy enough to kill a kid, there’s nothing they could have done to prevent it, you know? They picked the worst time too, what with Ivy’s breakout from Arkham.”
Dick cut off communication with the succulent, listening intently to the radio.
“Do you think the kid knew he was carrying a bomb?” The woman asked.
“I guess we’ll never know,” the man sighed. “We’re just lucky the workers noticed there was a bomb at all, or even more people would have gotten hurt.”
“What?” Dick spoke aloud, walking out into the other area. The radio was sitting on top of an oversized camellia, hooked up to a solar battery Ivy had legally purchased from a terrified man running a little eco-friendly electronics store. (Ivy had told Dick that she always tried to avoid collateral damage to establishments like that, since they’re technically on her side of ‘the argument.’)
“Yeah, but the poor kid! First his parents, then whatever crazies gave him a bomb.” Dick grabbed either side of the radio, listening to the woman’s next words. “Hopefully his body will be found and given a proper send-off soon. Rest in peace, Richard Grayson.”
---
Ivy didn’t ask why the radio was destroyed. She didn’t have to.
“They--they lied. There was no bomb, I didn’t--I never wanted to die! Their security just sucked! And I saw one of their guys talking to one of Zucco’s guys, so I thought maybe they knew about my parents, and it’s not my fault!” The boy in front of her seemed to be having a full meltdown, his tears making the grass beneath him shoot up like plant-steroids. Ivy reached out and put her hands on his shoulders, holding him a good distance away from her.
“Men are trash, ” she said. The comment from seemingly out of left field got his attention, his blubbering put on pause as he looked into her face with confusion.
“Men are trash, and they will do everything they can to protect themselves, even blaming a dead child for what they did. You said they had no guards or cameras or anything, and they were dealing with highly volatile chemicals. ”
Dick nodded. “They didn’t even lock the front door. And--and they put that goo stuff on the top shelf, ANYBODY could have knocked it over!”
“Exactly.” Ivy released his shoulders. “They’re fully grown adults. It’s their responsibility to take precautions in a city like this one. Hell, with Arkham’s revolving door, I could have shown up and they wouldn’t have been able to even slow me down. What happened to you is not your fault. ”
“But nobody else knows,” Dick said miserably, looking down at the wreckage of the radio scattered around him. “Everybody thinks I’m still dead.”
“We can fix that.”
Dick looked up at her, and Ivy felt a pang in her chest at the look in his eyes. “How?”
Ivy smirked, the plants around her shuddering as they felt her mood shift. “We’ll show those men exactly what we think of liars. ”
---
The Gotham City Police Department was in shambles. The two men who’d been running the experiment that killed Dick Grayson were hiding behind the cop who’d been interviewing them. Poison Ivy held herself aloft like an avenging angel, silhouetted by the bat-signal shining on the cloud behind her. The wall between her and the sky had crumbled, brick yanked to the ground by weeds that snatched at the bodies of anyone who got too close.
“I heard you’re looking for a body when you should be looking for a boy,” her voice was thunderous as her plants grabbed at the men’s guns, throwing them out into the streets. “I heard that you’re harboring liars. ”
Vines wrapped around the legs of the scientists, yanking them into the air and dangling them several feet above the ground, but still low enough for Ivy to sneer down at them. “I think you two should tell the truth to these wonderful officers. Perhaps you should tell them you left the front doors unlocked. Maybe you should tell them there was no bomb, that it was your experiment that took an innocent life!”
“Please, we don’t know what you’re talking about, honestly!” One man seemed on the verge of tears.
“What are you talking about?!” The other shrieked, his voice shrill. “What, can you talk to the dead now, or just the daisies they’re pushing up?!”
“FUCK YOU!” Everyone’s gazes dropped to directly underneath Poison Ivy, where Dick Grayson stood, his tiny form shaking with anger as shrubbery burst into being around him.
“What the--” The second dangling man started. Ivy’s vines slammed both of them into the opposing wall, letting them fall--unconscious or dead, she didn’t know or care--to the ground.
“That’s the kid who broke her out of Arkham!” Dick turned to see the guard from the Asylum staring at him. Shock spread like a visible ripple effect through the small crowd as people realized that the formerly-deceased boy did bear a great resemblance to the official sketches of the rogue’s jailbreaker.
“Poison Ivy.” A shadow fell upon them all. Dick looked up to see Ivy be tackled by a dark figure. She avoided him, landing on the ground between the figure and Dick. The new person rose and--Dick took in a sharp breath.
Batman was here.
The man behind the cowl looked at them both before settling upon Dick’s face. Something in the man’s expression seemed to twitch--pity? Dick couldn’t tell, as it was gone as quickly as it had come.
“Dick Grayson.” Not Richard. Dick. Only people who’d met him knew he went by Dick. How did the Batman know?
Ivy stepped forward, raising her arms to command her plants to her in a show of dominance. The inhabitants of the room scurried away, happy to leave their problems in the hands of a man dressed as an animal.
“Dick, let me help you,” Batman ignored Ivy, staring right past her. “This life isn’t what you need. You need--”
“Shut up!” Dick clenched his fists, stepping to Ivy’s side. “Who the hell do you think you are? You don’t know me! What are you gonna do, send me back to juvie? I already broke out once. You gonna make a children's ward in Arkham?”
“I know what you’re feeling, what you’ve been through--”
“NO!” Batman didn’t know. Batman couldn’t do the things Dick could do, that Ivy could do. Ivy knew what it was like to get hurt when she hadn’t done anything wrong. Ivy knew Dick better than Batman did.
Batman took a step forward and Dick growled. He felt Ivy’s hands fall on his shoulders and was dragged into a scene he’d nearly forgotten.
Dick had been six years old. He didn’t have many friends, as there weren’t any other children travelling with the circus, so he tried to play with kids before and after shows when he could.
Sometimes they were mean. An older boy had called Dick names, had thrown dirt at him and told him to ‘go pick up peanut shells.’ Dick had started to cry; he didn’t know what he’d done wrong. Why did the boy hate him?
Dick’s mother had come up behind him and put her hands on his shoulders. He could feel her glare from behind him, boring holes into the boy’s head. It had scared him off, and Dick felt safe, because his mother was there. No one would hurt him when she was there.
Dick willed back the tears that threatened to fall at the memory. Ivy’s hands were turning white and it kind of hurt, but her glare was pointed at the man before them, not Dick. (She’d grabbed his shoulders earlier, too. Thinking of it made him feel warm… safe.)
“You will not take him.” Poison Ivy snapped. Batman shifted to stare her down.
“This constitutes a kidnapping, you know.” He said. “You are a wanted criminal, and you are not his legal guardian. I hope you realize this means I will have to target you more directly.”
“Fuck you,” Dick’s cursing seemed to surprise Batman, who hadn’t been there for his entrance earlier. “This isn’t a kidnapping. It’s a team-up.”
Batman, somehow, seemed to frown even more at that. “Dick, you are just a child. You can’t--”
Dick’s arms shot straight up, and the plants around him responded in turn, vines grabbing Batman and throwing him into the air. Dick could feel everything the plants could, like they were an extension of himself. He couldn’t help the manic grin that split his face in two. Ivy chuckled from behind him, her grip on his shoulders loosening.
“You did it,” she murmured, a gleam of pride in her eyes.
“You don’t need to save me, Batman,” Dick beamed at the so-called hero as he struggled against his bonds above them. “And you’re not allowed to call me Dick. That’s what people I like call me.”
Dick looked behind him to Ivy, to Pam, and the way the sun had set behind them during the commotion. The night was just beginning.
Dick turned back to Batman. “You can call me Nightshade. Deadly Nightshade.”