Chapter Text
He needs to find Kory, Rachel, and Tim.
He doesn’t know where he is. He doesn’t know what’s going on. He just knows he needs to find them.
So he walks through this quaint little town, trying to find them, trying to stay calm. He walks down every street. He enters every store, every building that’s not a house. He’s trying everywhere. He’s not getting anywhere, but he doesn’t know what else he can do.
It’s been five hours, and he just finished searching a small, cute family-owned florist shop when he hears a cry.
It’s Kory’s.
He knows it is. He’s never heard her let out a cry like that before, but he knows it’s hers. He just does.
So he sprints as fast as he can to the alleyway where he heard it come from. And as he rounds the corner, he sees Kory cornered by a big beefy guy holding a knife, threatening at her. She’s shaking as she hands over her purse and a necklace to him.
“Rings too,” he says gruffly.
“No, not them. Not them,” Kory says voice shaky and scared, but still with a firmness in it. “I gave you everything else. But I won’t give you them.”
The man’s eyes narrow at Kory before he moves in a blank of an eye to slam her up against the wall hard, pressing his forearm to her throat, and trying to force her rings off of her. She lets out a strangled cry and starts kicking her feet.
Dick doesn’t stop to think about why Kory isn’t blasting this man into the next galaxy, doesn’t stop to contemplate Kory’s very un-Korylike appearance, he just moves, rage running through him.
Dick charges forward, grabs the man, and throws him off of Kory. The man barely has a chance to look at Dick before Dick socks him hard. The man falls to a ground, but Dick doesn’t stop there.
He leans over the man, grabs his shirt to pull him up, and punches him again.
And again.
And again.
The images of Kory’s scared face, of him hurting her flashing over and over again in his mind.
This fucker hurt her. This fucker scared her.
“Ted! Ted! Stop it! Stop!”
Kory’s cries break through his rage. He freezes his fist in the air and whips his head around to look at her, and what he sees makes his heart stop. Kory’s looking at him, eyes wide in fear. Fear towards him.
“Ted...I don’t...How could...”
She shakes her head and looks at him like she can’t comprehend what she’s seeing.
“Ted?” Dick asks, confused.
Kory doesn’t respond, just looks at him in shock and fear. Dick barely notices as the mugger makes makes a break for it, running away.
“Kory...” Dick says softly. He starts to get up.
Kory takes a step back, shaking her head.
“Kory?” she asks, completely confused. “Who’s Kory?”
“I-what?” Dick asks.
He takes a breath and calms his mind. Okay, okay, okay. Something is going on here. She doesn’t know who she is. And she thinks his name is Ted. Okay, okay. Whatever this place is, it or the witch has messed with her mind, made her think she’s someone she’s not. Which explains why she didn’t fight the mugger. And why she’s wearing this very un-Korylike coral sweater and white linen pants. Maybe Tim and Rachel are likewise living a false life. Maybe that’s the thing the witch did to them, except it didn’t work on him for some reason.
Okay. Okay. Okay. He needs to break her out of it. But not right now. With the way she’s looking at him, with what just happened to her, she’s not gonna listen to him. If he tries to tell her who she is, she’ll just bolt. She’s already spooked and freaked out as it is.
So he’ll play along. Pretend to be whoever she thinks he is. Pretend that she’s whoever she thinks she is. He’ll calm her down. He’ll take her somewhere safe and comfortable. And then he’ll tell her who she really is.
In the corner of his eye, he sees her purse on the ground, the contents scattered around it. He picks up the contents: a glasses case, a wallet, a pack of gum, and an ID.
He, as discreetly as he can, glances at the ID.
Carol Grayson.
Dick has to stop himself from sucking in a breath, to keep all reaction off his face.
They’re married. They’re married. They’re married.
In this fake life, they’re married. That fact brings him both incredible joy and incredible pain.
He looks back up at Kory; she’s holding her arms around herself and trembling.
“What is wrong with you?” she asks, slightly panicked. Her gaze moves to his bloody hands.
“He hurt you, Carol” Dick says simply. “I was protecting you.”
“You didn’t have to go that far,” she protests. “God, Ted...I mean, I’ve never seen you like that. Not ever. Have you ever even punched someone before?”
Dick pauses, deciding how to proceed. The man she thinks she’s married to is clearly not like him at all.
“I’m sorry,”‘ Dick says, even though he’s not sorry at all. “I don’t know what came over me. I just saw you hurt and scared and in danger. And I guess I just lost it.”
He shakes his head, as if confused by his own actions.
“But you’re right. I went to far,” he continues.
It feels so weird, so bad, lying to her like this, pretending to be someone he’s not. He hates being false with her.
Kory seems to soften though. But she’s still shaking. And of course she is, this Kory doesn’t know that she’s a superhero. She doesn’t have any memories of being in danger, of fighting. She’s just a normal person. Of course, she’s shaken after a mugging.
Dick slowly and carefully stands up.
“Hey,” he says softly, holding his arms out. “Come here.”
Kory hesitates for only a second before stepping into his arms and sinking into him. Dick wraps his arms around her. She starts shaking and he can feel tears wetting his shirt.
“I was so scared,” she cries.
Dick brings up one hand to stroke her hair.
“I know. I know, sweetheart. I’m so sorry that happened to you,” Dick whispers into her hair.
“I thought I might die,” she continues crying.
Dick shushes into her hair. “It’s over now. I’m here. I got you.”
She sniffs at him. And then she sniffs at him again.
“You smell different,” she says, voice still chocked up. “Did you get a new cologne?”
“...Yes.”
He continues to hold her like that for a few minutes, whispering reassuring words into her hair, before she pulls back from his arms. Instinctively, he brings his hands up to cup her face and gently wipes her remaining tears away.
She gives him a small, grateful smile.
But then it drops.
“Why did you call me Kory?”
“Uh....,” Dick wracks his brain for an answer. “Uh....”
Kory looks at him expectantly.
“I banged my head!” he blurts out.
Kory’s eyes widen in alarm.
“What? Ted, oh my god! We need to get you to a hospital,” she says, worried.
Fuck.
“No, no, i’m okay. It was minor, I promise,” Dick tries to reassure her.
“You got my name wrong. That is not a minor head injury!”
Double fuck.
“I uh... No. Here, what happened is shortly before this whole incident, I watched an episode of a TV show where a character, a red-head even, named Kory got mugged in an alley. And so uh, you know, with that, and the very minor head injury, I guess I just got confused for a a minute.”
Kory just looks at him for a few moments.
“You’re sure you’re okay?”
“Yes,” Dick swears. He reaches down to entangle their hands together. “Now lets get you home.”
Wherever home is. Or wherever she thinks home is. Just somewhere comfortable and safe that he can start to prod at whatever spell she’s under.
“Okay, let’s-”
She cuts off with a scrunch of her eyebrows. And then she gives his left hand a squeeze.
“Where’s your wedding ring?”
“What?” Dick asks, taken by surprise.
Kory’s gaze moves to his left-hand. “Where’s your wedding ring?” she repeats.
Dick’s own gazes moves to her left hand, where she has both a wedding and engagement ring, the rings she defied the mugger to try to keep.
Dick’s silent for a second as he thinks of an answer, a lie.
“I hurt my ring finger,” he eventually explains. “I uh...As I was walking down the street, and I um, I passed a couple of kids playing basketball, and uh, the basketball ending up flying towards me, like above me. And I tried to reach up to catch it, but it was too high, and so it just ended up hitting the finger. And uh...this is actually when I banged my head. The force of the ball knocked be backwards, and I banged by head on the brick wall behind me. Uh, anyway, I was worried about my finger swelling, so I uh, I took the ring off. But, don’t worry! I put it somewhere safe, you know, just until my finger’s okay!”
Dick takes a deep breath and prays she buys it.
Kory looks at him for a second, before huffing a laugh. “It sounds like you’ve had quite the ordeal.”
“Not as much as you,” Dick answers softly. “C’mon, let’s go home. I think we both could use some relaxation.”
Dick gives her hands a squeeze.
God, this is painful. Acting like her husband. Except it’s not real. And he’s not being himself, and she’s not being herself. It’s so...odd and painful. It’s both natural, but unnatural.
“Home sounds perfect,” she sighs.
The two of them leave the alleyway, hand in hand. Dick tries to let Kory lead the way without her knowing that he’s letting her lead the way.
He doesn’t know where “home” is. Or where she thinks home is. It could not even exist. But Dick thinks it does. This isn’t just a mind-trick. Kory had an ID with the name “Carol Grayson.” So it’s not just her that’s affected, but their surroundings too. So more likely than not, they have a home. Dick just doesn’t know where it is.
He messes up one time. He continues walking straight, not realizing that Kory was about to turn left. She looks at him quizzically, and he just tells her that he wasn’t paying attention.
God, he hopes he gets the real Kory back soon. He hates lying to her. And he misses her. The real her.
“So... that cologne...” Kory says, breaking him out of his thoughts.
Dick’s head snaps in her direction.
“You don’t like it?”
He’s not wearing any cologne; so that would just mean she thinks he naturally smells bad.
Kory makes a high-pitched hum.
“It’s not bad,” Kory assures him. “It’s just...I don’t know, different, I guess. I just love the way you usually smell.”
Wow...This spell or whatever it is deep if she has false sense memories.
“I’ll stop wearing it,” he assures her, easy-going on the outside, but panicking on the inside. What if he can’t break her out of it? What if he can’t get her back? No! No. That is not a possibility. It’s not. He’ll get her back. He will. He has to.
“You don’t have to,” Kory says.
“I want to,” Dick says sincerely, and then more playfully he says, “I live to please you, Princess.”
Kory’s head snaps in his direction.
“‘Princess?” she asks, very confused and taken aback. “You’ve never used that pet name before.”
“Yeah, no, I just thought i’d give it a try,” Dick says sheepishly, trying to cover his error.
Kory gives a skeptical hum.
“You are acting so weird today. Are you sure your head’s okay? I really think we should take you to see a doctor.”
“I’m fine. I’m fine,” Dick assures her. “I’m more worried about you. You just went through something terrible. We’ll take care of you first, and then we’ll take care of me, okay?”
She smiles softly at him and shakes her head.
“Okay, now that’s more like yourself,” she replies. “Putting my needs before your own. Even when you shouldn’t.”
Dick smiles bashfully at that and feels himself start to blush for some reason.
They continue walking until Kory stops. And then they’re standing in front of a house. Their house, Dick presumes.
He takes the place in. It’s a cute decently-sized pastel yellow house. A beautiful porch out front with a table and some chairs placed on it. The house is surrounded by a white picket fence, because of course it is. The yard is full of life, full of lush greenery, pink roses weaving in and out of the white fence, and a beautiful garden on the side of the house.
So this is their house, huh? Or their fake house. It’s pretty enough. But he can’t picture he and Kory living in it. Especially Kory; it just doesn’t seem like her.
Kory opens the gate and starts walking up the house. Dick follows quickly behind her, trying to act like all this is familiar to him. Kory gets her keys out and unlocks the door, and then they step inside.
It’s nice. Very sunny and bright. A mix of white and bright colors. Pretty, but still homey.
There’s wall of photos that Dick is itching to look at, but he resists, worried it would raise more alarm bells for Kory.
Kory immediately removes her shoes and places them on a shoe shelf near the door.
Weird. Titan’s Tower was never a shoe’s off household.
But this isn’t Titan’s tower. This isn’t their life. This isn’t even the true Kory.
But nevertheless, Dick copies Kory, taking his shoes off and placing them on the shoe shelf. Dick then comes up behind her and runs his hands down her arms.
“Let’s run you a nice, hot, relaxing bath,” he whispers in her ear.
She leans back against his chest.
“Mmmm...that sounds nice.”
Dick takes her hand and leads her to the stairs. And he can feel himself relaxing into it, into the husband role. He can imagine this in real life. He can imagine coming home, although not this home, with Kory at the end of a long day. Maybe after a particularly difficult battle. Can see himself going through these exact motions, saying these exact same things. Can see him leading Kory up the stairs of their apartment. Can see him going into their master bathroom and running a hot bath, putting Kory’s favorite scented bath stuff (it’s jasmine) into it. Can see them slipping out of their supersuits. Can see them sitting in the tub together, her back against his chest. Can see her laying against him, eye closed as she rests and relaxes. Can see her forcing him to turn around so that she can massage his sore muscles. Can see himself turning back around, putting his hands on her hips, and moving her so that she straddles him. Can see them-
No, no he can’t let himself go there. Can’t let himself get carried away. He’s not her husband. He’s not even her boyfriend.
He shakes himself of these thoughts and returns his focus to the task at hand.
Again, he tries to let Kory take the lead without letting on that he’s letting her take the lead, without letting on that he doesn’t know the layout of the house. And he seems to be doing do successfully.
They walk into their bedroom and then into the master bath.
“Why don’t you change while I get this bath ready?” Dick suggests.
Kory agrees, brushing her hand down her arm as she leaves. It sends a shiver down Dick’s body. He shakes that off too - not his wife, not his wife, not his wife - and busies himself with preparing her bath.
He plugs the drain, runs the water (hot, as she likes it), and starts opening and closing the bathroom cabinets looking for bath salts or something. He finds some rose-scented bath salts. Hmm, not her favorite scent.
He pours the rose bath salts in the tub, and watches as it starts to bubble. He hears feet padding up behind him and turns to see Kory approaching in a thin light-blue bathroom. He tries not to pay attention to how it hugs and accentuates her curves.
“One bath, ready to go,” he says.
“Looks heavenly,” she sighs.
With that, she slips out of the robe, letting it fall to the tiled floor.
Dick involuntarily lets out a sharp intake of breath and quickly inverts his eyes. She’s not really giving him permission to look at her naked body. She thinks she is, but she’s not.
He opens the cabinet again and pretends to look for other bath stuff. He tries not to be to obvious about it, that he’s avoiding looking at her naked body. Not only would it be another thing he does that confuses her, but it will also probably hurt her. Her husband not wanting to look at her naked body; yeah, that would hurt. And Dick can’t bear to hurt her feelings, even in this totally fake situation where Kory isn’t really herself and she’ll understand as soon as she’s brought back to herself.
He hears the water move and slosh as Kory slides into the tub. She lets out a moan. And yeah, he needs to get out of here, if the heat starting to pool in his stomach is anything to go by.
Dick turns around to face her, keeping his gaze straight on her face.
“I’m gonna go and-”
“Aren’t you gonna join me?” she asks, lifting an arm out of the water to reach for him and giving him a sweet but seductive smile.
Fuck.
Dick’s whole body tenses and he stares at her wide-eyed. But only for a half-second, then he forces his body to relax and his face to look normal.
“Not today,” Dick says. “I just want you to relax. So i’’m gonna go make you something nice to eat and some tea for when you get out, okay?”
“Okay,” she grumbles, still looking disappointed.
Still keeping his gaze up, Dick takes a few steps forward towards the tub, and then leans down and over to kiss the top of her head.
“Have a nice bath.”
With that, he turns around and starts to walk at the door.
“Thank you. I love you.”
Dick stops dead in his tracks; in fact, he almost falls to his knees. It’s like he’s been shot in the chest.
I love you.
I love you.
I love you.
Those words coming from her mouth...Except she doesn’t mean them.
It’s a pain he’s never known before.
He knows he should say it back. If he wants to keep this charade up, he should say it back. But he can’t. He can’t. He can’t bear for the first time he says those three words to her to be like this. So he just unfreezes himself and quickly walks out of the bathroom, closing the door on his way out.
Once the door’s closed, he leans against it and takes deep breaths, trying to will the painful aching in his chest away.
Maybe this is torture.
Maybe that’s the point of all this. The witch sent he and Kory here to torture him. Giving him what he wants, but having it not be quite right. Kory isn’t right. Their home isn’t right. Having him be aware, but Kory not. Creating a situation where she’s saying all these things, and acting in all these ways, things that Dick wants to hear, things that Dick wants to do...but having it all be fake and having him know that it’s all fake.
It’s painful. And maybe that’s the point.
Like Trigon’s vision. Maybe this is intended to break him.
Dick stands there for a few moments, taking deep breaths, trying to calm his racing mind and heart.
Focus on the task at hand.
Focus on the task at hand.
Focus on the task at hand.
He pushes himself off the wall and walks down the stairs.
Make Kory a meal. Eat it together. Start asking her questions. Start poking and prodding at her memories. And then go from there.
But as he reaches the last step, he is again distracted as he sees the pictures on the wall. Pictures of him and Kory. He finds himself drawn to them. And he can’t help it; he approaches them.
The two of them sharing pink cotton candy at an amusement park.
The two of them in hiking clothes, arms around each other, at the top of a hill, sunset behind them.
The two of them at the beach lounging on beach chairs under a large yellow umbrella, brightly colored drinks in their hands.
The two of them at some kind of garden party, dressed very fancy, with Kory sitting on his lap.
The two of them in front of this house with big bright smiles on their faces, a “Sold” sign in the yard.
The two of them in a selfie, clothes covered in paint, laughing.
And then... A wedding photo.
Dick’s breath hitches when he sees that.
No. No.
He can’t look at that. His chest hurts too much in painful longing. And besides, he needs to focus on the task at hand.
Make Kory a meal. Eat it together. Start asking her questions. Start poking and prodding at her memories. And then go from there.
He forces himself away from the wall and to the kitchen. Okay, what to make? What to make? Spicy stuffed peppers is Kory’s favorite thing that he makes. But who Kory thinks she is right now is so different from who Kory actually is, so she could not like that. And it’s spicy, which is a risk. What if this Kory doesn’t like spicy food? He doesn’t know how much longer he can blame a head injury for not knowing basic stuff about her.
He decides to just make spaghetti. Simple, easy. And who doesn’t like spaghetti right? So he goes about opening and closing various cabinet doors, looking for the things he needs. He doesn’t know his way around this kitchen, so it takes a little longer to make than it usually would. But after about 20 minutes, the spaghetti and the tea are ready.
He fills and sets two plates on the table and then waits for Kory.
And about 10 minutes later, she comes down the stairs, dressed in only that thin bath robe.
Fucking great.
Couldn’t take it easy on him could she?
Dick stands up to greet her.
“You sure you don’t want to get changed into something more comfortable?”
She shakes her head as she approaches him. “I’m more than comfortable in this.”
Dick gulps.
Kory walks up to him and wraps her arms around his neck. Dick hesitantly places his hands on her waist.
“How you feeling?” he asks her.
“Much bett-”
“Carol!” an alarmed voice cries out from the kitchen entrance.
Kory whips her head around and then loudly gasps.
Dick lifts his eyes up and meets the scared, angry, and confused gaze of...
...Himself?