Chapter Text
It was spring break and Percy had gotten permission to spend a couple days with his boyfriend. It was midafternoon and they were cuddling naked in bed, taking a break. Percy was comfy and relaxed, content with Jay’s arms wrapped around him.
Suddenly, they heard an explosion in the distance, a few explosions in fact, and Percy shot up wide-eyed as he sensed the ocean beginning to crush in on the city. He expanded his senses and froze the water in its tracks, putting an end to the flood before it could devastate the city.
“What’s wrong?” Jay asked, noting Percy’s far away look and odd behavior.
“I think someone blew up the flood walls, the city is below sea level, I stopped it from flooding for now but I’ll need to examine it and secure it better,” Percy said. As he spoke, he felt water squirting through one of the ice blockages he’d made and he willed it to freeze more, using the ice as a temporary flood wall. Percy’s focus was far away, Jay helped him into a pair of underwear.
“What do you need? How can I help?” Jay asked.
Percy took a deep breath, “I need to get to the ocean without being seen….run the shower? I have a feeling I can teleport through water, just remembered that I should be able to do that.”
Jay went and stopped up the tub and turned the shower on while Percy mentally went over the broken flood walls, all 8 of them, and shored them up some more.
“Anything else?” Jay asked.
“Just, uh, cover for me if my family asks? You can get into my phone. I have a feeling it might take a while,” Percy said.
“You got it,” Jay said. He then gently kissed Percy on the cheek, “Good luck.”
“Thanks,” Percy said as he went to step into the tub, under the spray of water, “Uh, you should look away before I teleport,” he instructed and Jay looked away.
Percy meditated for a moment, becoming one with the water, feeling the spray of it. All water was the same water, he willed for himself to appear in the ocean near where he kept his suit. After a moment of feeling like mist, he appeared at his destination, completely intact. He breathed a sigh of relief that he’d done it successfully, he’d been unsure. He took a moment to check over the ice walls, making sure they were still frozen solid after he’d turned himself to mist.
He quickly put on his wetsuit along with the goggles and the handkerchief over his mouth, securing the accessories to his head by pulling the wetsuit over them. He then froze on his boots, gauntlets, and the chest plate of armor. With his “superhero” appearance now intact, he darted through the water to Gotham and flew up over the city.
He examined the flood walls. They were less walls and more frozen waves from when the water started to rush in. Fortunately, no one had been near the flood walls, though the trucks which had likely been the source of the explosion and the debris was trapped in the ice. He went back to the edge where the flood wall had been and refroze the ice to match the flood wall, he also sent supporting pillars down deep into the sea floor securing the ice wall properly in place, ensuring the flood wall was secure enough to withstand the pressure of the ocean. He then melted the ice that had been further inside, leaving the debris behind on the ground as he put the water back where it belonged. He ensured the ice wall was slightly taller than the existing flood walls, confident it would hold out against the waves and tides.
There were 8 such sections of flood wall that had been exploded and he repeated the process for the other 7. Once everything was firmly in place, he fixed it in his mind. Now he no longer needed to concentrate on it as much, they would stay firmly in place for as long as he was awake. Which, he would need to sleep eventually, so he needed a more permanent solution.
Percy sighed, he’d probably need to actually collaborate with people for this. He went to the rooftop of the GCPD where he knew they kept the Batsignal. He perched on the roof and waited for someone to come to speak to him. After a few minutes, Commissioner Gordon appeared.
“You’re not one of the usual crowd,” Gordon muttered.
“They call me Riptide, I have water powers. I sensed the impending flood and came to help, used my powers to freeze it in its tracks. I’ve frozen ice substitutes of the flood walls which should hold for a while but it isn’t a long term fix, need to replace them with actual constructed barriers. I figure I should make myself available to collaborate on how best to go about fixing things, I can adjust the shape of my ice barriers as needed,” Percy explained. He was careful not to use a Gotham accent as he spoke, he aimed for a more neutral American accent though a bit of his natural New York accent peaked through.
“Huh, well, that’s useful. We’re, uh, still in the early stages of responding to the incident, haven’t started organizing construction crews yet,” Gordon spoke, “How long can you keep your ice walls up?”
“As long as I’m awake to focus on it, I suppose. If I fell asleep, it would start to obey the laws of thermodynamics and begin to melt,” Percy explained.
“That’s interesting to know,” said a new voice as Robin jumped down to join them, “Riptide, pleasure to meet you, I’ve read your file.”
Percy looked anxiously around and was reassured when he didn’t see Batman with him. Robin noticed him looking, “Batman is dealing with the rogue who did this, Crypto, dropping him off at Arkham. Now, as for construction crews to repair the flood walls quickly, I believe our best bet is consulting with Wayne Enterprises, they have the resources on hand necessary to do such a thing on short notice and with how much property they own in the city, it is in their best interest that the city does not flood,” Robin explained. Percy merely nodded.
“Is there anything I can do?” Gordon asked.
“I would recommend a mandatory evacuation order for anyone living on the first or second floor near where the flood wall has been breached. Even if we are reasonably confident the flood wall will hold, they would be most at risk if it suddenly gave out. So, evacuating people from at-risk areas and probably putting up blockades for authorized individuals only to go near the breached flood walls,” Robin suggested.
“Sounds good, I’ll get on that. I expect you’ll be on your way, then?” Gordon said.
Robin gave a cryptic smile. “Riptide, follow me to Wayne Enterprises, we’ll have a meeting about how to fix things. Also, since you’re what’s keeping the city from flooding, consider me your protection detail for the mean time,” Robin said in a friendly voice.
Percy narrowed his eyes suspiciously and Robin elaborated, “Batman doesn’t like unauthorized metas operating in his city but if you’re with me, you’re authorized.” Yeah, that sounded more like it.
Robin started grappling towards the tallest building in the city, Wayne Enterprises HQ, and Percy flew along after him by levitating his ice boots and gauntlets. Robin had evidently called ahead during the journey because they were greeted on the roof by a black man in a nice business suit.
“Mr. Fox, pleasure to see you,” Robin said in a friendly voice. Percy suspected that perhaps Wayne Enterprises helped provide the bats with their gear, which would explain what seemed like a familiar friendly relationship between the two. They went inside and Percy modified his ice boots to have better tread since floating around inside would probably be considered rude here.
They went to a big board room where several people were assembled for a meeting. Percy felt distinctly out of place.
“So, the situation is this: 8 bombs exploded next to the flood walls of Gotham, since our city is below sea level it is as risk of flooding without the flood walls. Riptide here has created a temporary patch of ice that is currently preventing the flooding. We need to construct a more permanent fix within a day,” Robin explained.
“We have already sent out a few survey teams to examine the sites and what needs to be fixed. We already have a few concrete trucks in the city for various other construction projects, we can redirect them as this takes higher priority,” Fox chimed in.
"It takes time to set up molds for pouring the concrete though, especially if we’re adding rebar, which we should if we want the flood wall to be stable enough long term, this isn’t something we can easily do in a day,” someone chimed in, probably one of the civil engineers on the team.
"I can probably make molds out of ice pretty quickly, not sure about the rebar though,” Percy commented, “Uh, for my initial patch I put the ice filling in where it looked like the flood walls had been, but I can put ice walls differently? Like, I can put the wall further out into the ocean leaving a clear space to work where the flood wall needs to be repaired, or such that you can make a more temporary wall that is further out and then you can fix the main flood wall up properly inside it later.”
The engineers gave a considering look then started talking amongst themselves about some stuff that went over Percy’s head, though then they concluded they needed the info from the survey teams back before they could make more definitive plans. The meeting broke up after a bit and Percy felt awkward, unsure what to do next.
Mr. Fox spoke up, “Robin, Riptide, the two of you can wait in one of our offices until we are ready to proceed, we will work on designing the proper engineering plan and will get back to you.” He led them to an office then pointed out a secretary, “Please let us know if you need any refreshments or anything." He then left, leaving Robin and Riptide in a nice office.
There was silence for a few minutes, Percy awkwardly sat on the leather couch. “Who’s office is this anyways? The CEO’s?” Percy asked after a bit to break the silence.
“No, Mr. Fox is the CEO. This is the majority shareholder’s office, but he rarely comes in,” Robin informed him.
“What’s a majority shareholder?” Percy asked.
“He’s the primary owner, Bruce Wayne,” Robin informed him.
“Oh,” Percy said. He’d generally been wanting to avoid running into Batman but he realized there might be one worse, he didn’t want to run into his foster father here, what if he was recognized?