Chapter Text
Rule One of being a Bat: Avoid time travel at all costs.
You’d think it would be “protect your identity even (especially) if it destroys all your interpersonal relationships” or maybe “healthy communication is the work of the devil”. Even, god forbid, “no killing”. But Bruce had been very, very specific. Oddly specific. This-man-has-been-through-some-shit specific.
Rule One: Do Not Time Travel. Non-negotiable.
It had felt weirdly targeted at the time, but Steph had never asked any of the others if they’d gotten the same talk. She’d had the sneaking suspicion she’d leave the conversation offended, and figured she’d cut out the middle man.
Right then, in that moment, holding a smoking cube of dubious origin and staring at a skyline she only vaguely recognized from those wistful pictures of Gotham Before that rich people liked to hang up like fine art, Stephanie had to concede that Bruce had maybe, possibly, been onto something.
“Oh, fuck me,” she said to empty air.
It offered no response, just a vague whistle as the wind slid through her hood. The cube burned cold through the weave of her gloves even as the smell of smoke settled at the back of her throat, and Stephanie itched with the urge to let it drop and smash against the concrete below, every nerve in her body demanding she get as far away from the damn thing as possible. Not-quite-metal creaked under the strength of her grip as her hands flexed uneasily instead.
“Shit. Shit,” Steph breathed as she stared at buildings too short and tall, at the damningly familiar bridge made up to mimic the Romantic Era—which in itself was Gothic in a bad wig and trench coat, so it didn’t stick out too much in the Gotham skyline if you weren’t used to the flat, utilitarian thing that had replaced it after one too many arches went boom. Which Stephanie was.
“Come help, Stephanie,” she breathed. “It’s an all-hands-on deck situation, Stephanie. The world’s at stake, Stephanie. No, it’s totally fine you’re just some guy in a jumpsuit, Stephanie.”
Next time, she was letting the world explode. Or be invaded, or freeze, or whatever terrible flavor of the week it had been. Stephanie honestly didn’t remember, wasn’t even sure anyone had told her in the first place.
There was a list of people this shit was supposed to happen to, and she wasn’t fucking on it.
Shit.
Nothing to be done about it now. Except maybe scream, which would be loud and terribly embarrassing for everyone involved. Damage control, then. That was like her whole job, right? She could do damage control.
Trying to call up Tim’s extensive folder of disaster protocols he’d forced her to read, if only so she would know when not to get involved (which was insultingly but understandably often), Stephanie only made it through Actual Zombie Apocalypse to Guy Gardner Becomes Batman before her memory fuzzed enough that she was forced to write it off as a lost cause. There was a Jim Gordon Trapped in 1837 in there somewhere, she knew, but none of it was relevant. Steph was also fairly sure it was outdated.
Well. Time to write the Stephanie Brown Stuck in the Past or Possibly An Alternate Universe But Please Let it Be Time Travel Because Every Alternate Universe So Far Has Been Evil And She Will Die If She Goes Against Evil Batman protocol on the fly.
Right. Okay. She could do this. She could totally do this.
A peek over the rooftop edge gave her a weird sense of vertigo and very little information she didn’t already have. Smog hung thick and heavy like a halo below the clouds, another point in favor of Let it Be Time Travel. Bruce, all his many, many flaws aside, had actually done a damn good job of cleaning up the city in the most literal sense. (Unless, of course, this Bruce simply didn’t care, because this Bruce was evil.) Gotham sprawled out below, lit by windows and billboards, familiar in it’s shades of flickering sickly-yellow street lights and burning neon advertisements. Nothing that couldn’t be found in fifty different locations across the city.
Ugh. Whatever. She’d snag a map like every other tourist. Maybe it would even have one of those helpful little you are here! bat icons on it.
Step One of Stephanie Brown Stuck in the Past or Possibly An Alternate Universe But Please Let it Be Time Travel Because Every Alternate Universe So Far Has Been Evil And She Will Die If She Goes Against Evil Batman: Get off the roof.
The stupidly bulky box was still spitting smoke in her hand, and the four, maybe five emergency grapple lines that were not conductive to juggling large objects taunted her from her back right pouch. She couldn’t just leave the thing here, right? No.
Rule One of Stephanie Brown’s Not-So-Excellent Adventure: Don’t lose the freaky transporter cube.
Steph glanced at the rusted ladder peaking out over the lip of the roof and let loose a long, heavy sigh.
Turns out, fire escapes are really only made for one, maybe two people at a time. Certainly not one person and a giant fucking cube. Which seemed like an oversight to Steph, but that was Gotham for you. Building regulations were only ever a loose guideline. A very, very loose guideline. Something to laugh at and throw away, even.
The metal wobbled and creaked dangerously as she inched her way down. The little demon in her head that sounded suspiciously like Bruce kept pointing out the empty spaces where bolts were, theoretically, supposed to go. Steph hissed at it to shut the fuck up with extreme prejudice. Just like the real thing, it ignored her.
“Thank god, thank god, thank god,” she breathed as her boots hit sweet, sweet mildewy concrete. “Fuck you,” she directed to the rusty ladder that, even now, wobbled in place.
Step Two of Stephanie Brown Stuck in the Past or Possibly An Alternate Universe But Please Let it Be Time Travel Because Every Alternate Universe So Far Has Been Evil And She Will Die If She Goes Against Evil Batman: Please, god, let there be time travel.
The street beyond her little alley was, for all appearances, empty, which—while scaring the shit out of her more than anything—was oddly convenient for darting to the nearest trashcan. The cube came with her, of course, still huffing and puffing like a smoke machine left out in the rain. Not a single part of her wanted to still be holding it, but her palms felt physically stuck to the sides, and the idea of letting it go made sweat itch at inside of her gloves.
(Please just be baby Gotham. No fear-fueled curfews. No weird dictatorships. No horrifying normal city in which no one bothered to lurk in dark corners.)
There had once been a chain holding the trashcan to the lightpost it stood below—Antiquated design or design of antiquity? More at seven—based on the pattern rusted onto the side. Someone had clearly deemed it no longer necessary, and Stephanie couldn’t help but agree, because it took a solid three of her meanest, nastiest kicks to knock the thing over. It clanged horrifically against the concrete. Damaged her pride a bit, too, if she’s being honest.
The top layer that spilled out across the asphalt was all food scraps and cups, the remnants of last-minute dinners on the go. Couldn’t have been more than five hours old. Already, it smelled foul. The entire city smelled foul, though, so maybe it wasn’t a fair judgement.
Here’s to hoping no one was awake and aware to see her rummaging in scraps with her feet like a rejected audition tape for a Gorilla Grodd henchman. Her boots had, tragically, seen much worse.
The first newspaper was useless, stained by something dark and rank, the remaining typeface bleeding and indecipherable. It might have been a Gotham Gazette.
Understandable place for it.
The second, buried beneath a clump of greasy waxpaper, was a significant improvement, taste-wise—a relatively intact Star-Ledger—
Stephanie stood there a moment, feet covered in trash, stupid cube chain-smoking in her hands, on a dark abandoned street in some untenable section of theoretically-still-Gotham. Freezing her ass off.
“Is that the fucking Vietnam War,” Stephanie said.
HERSHEY STARTS WORK ON NEW DRAFT SETUP
In 1967.