Actions

Work Header

Unable

Summary:

The relation with Batman was... tense.
Stephanie tried her best to do everything the Dark Knight asked from her, even if he constantly compared her to Tim during training, didn't encourage her at any point of her formation and refused to properly consider her a partner.

[Zero to Hero: part 5]

Work Text:

The relation with Batman was... tense.

Stephanie tried her best to do everything the Dark Knight asked from her, even if he constantly compared her to Tim during training, didn't encourage her at any point of her formation and refused to properly consider her a partner.

She is the Robin to whom he never gave a fair shot.

The Bat only handed over to her a sidekick uniform to make Tim come back, after the boy distanced from Gotham and spent all his time with his generation of the Teen Titans.

Typical: the growing teenager who doesn't admire his father anymore and wants space from him.

Except... Bruce is not Tim's father in any sense of the term and there was no reason for him to part ways with the Bat other than Drake's despicable pettiness. He just wanted to hurt Bruce by leaving his side... and now Batman wanted to claim him back using Stephanie as a bait.

The whole deal is SO MESSY.

It's evident something will backfire. Spoiler alert: Stephie is 90% sure this will backfire on HER long before it implies Bruce, Tim, the other bats and their issues.

That's what Eddie believes, too.

The day she gets hurt because of this mayhem, she'll let him conclude by 'I told you so'.

In the mean time...

"How has the week been?"

"Busy..."

Steph narrated the training plus interventions she performed over the past days with Bruce.

As Batman and Robin. Like a... real, authentic Dynamic Duo.

She couldn't lie to Eddie, he detected her 'down' mood and how the seventeen-year-old girl was not... fully into the heroic tales she told.

"He blames me every time I commit a blunder," she whispered, looking down to her feet, from her sitting position on the fire escape of an old building, her legs dangling above the metallic edge. "I know he is a mentor, he is supposed to... help me get better, but all he does is being... hurtful. No matter what I do, it's not good enough. I am not capable to be the Robin he expects from me."

Eddie and her hugged.

Albeit she didn't conjure it up tonight, Stephanie feels guilty, what adds up to the feeling of... being an outcast. Batman, the former Robin, Batgirl, Oracle whom she heard in comms once or twice... No one among their nest believes in her. Even those who call themselves her friends consider her... unable.

Eddie is the only one who always believed in her. Yet she... cast him away these past weeks. She wanted to be Robin... on her own.

"How is my baby?" She asked prior blaming herself further.

"Claire took her first steps this week!"

Excitedly, Ed kept her abreast of the novelties regarding her fifteen-months-old daughter.

While Steph tries to impress the bats... others take care of her child. Diedre Vance and Nina Damfino, Eddie's by now great friends watch over her, Ed and the girls play an in-between of cool uncles and good parents for little Claire. Stephie visits when she can, but... creating a role among the Batfamily requires more energy than what she assumed initially.

She cannot reach Batman's expectations... she also fails at being a present mother for her daughter.

Stephanie feels like no matter what she chooses, there is no good solution for her.

 

Series this work belongs to: