Archive of Our Own ^beta

“This is absolutely a terrible idea,” Steph says, but it’s half hearted at best, unlike the way that Duke has been loudly protesting for the last twenty minutes, with Damian ‘helpfully’ stressing out even more. “But Nightwing, I am totally here for your return to chaos.”

Dick rolls his head in an approximation of rolling his eyes, a smirk playing at his lips while he adjusts Peter’s spare web shooters.

It’s been a crazy week, at least by normal people standards, and maybe an above average week by Dick’s standards. It had started with the family July 4th gathering (not a celebration whatsoever, because if normal cities are bad with illegal fireworks, Gotham was a complete nightmare when given that opportunity) and then had continued by a portal opening smack dab in the middle of a tunnel leading into the Bat Cave.

So now it’s Steph, Duke, Damian, Dick, and Tim all trapped in another universe, where the city that they swore to protect doesn’t even exist. Half the other big cities are completely wiped off the map, too, like Star City, Metropolis, Bloodhaven, the list goes on. It’s hardly even a surprise, in comparison, that the heroes that protect this world aren’t the Justice League.

It’s hard not being able to do anything to protect anyone. The laws against metas and other heroes are still being established and they’ll be a lot harder to skirt around if the Bats start going out in New York City in the hopes to still save who they can.

Dick’s riding a bit of a serotonin high, because under the dark of night, Peter had led the Bats through one of his patrol routes, allowing them to swing around using their grappling hooks while going mostly unnoticed. However, problems arose when their grappling hooks ran out of things to latch onto, because the architecture is quite different than the architecture in Gotham, and the grappling hooks slide right off the sleek designs, at best leaving a scratch that’s high enough that only the next window washer will ever be able to see. However, Peter’s webs clearly didn’t have the same problem.

One thing lead to another, and well…

“Okay, so I’ll jump down to catch you if you fall,” Peter says, though it’s more of a ramble as he rushes through all of his thoughts. “And it’s gonna be me, because I feel like the wires on your hooks could leave some serious rope burn, and my spidey-sense should tell me beforehand if he’s going to mess up. Don’t feel bad about messing up, by the way, because it took forever for me to get a hang of the webs, and even after a year and a built in targeting system in my HUD, my aim isn’t perfect. I’m guessing that it’s similar for your grappling hooks, too, because especially if you’re not enhanced, you have to be really careful about—”

“Spidey,” Dick interrupts, resting a calming hand on Peter’s shoulder. He does his best to make eye contact, though he knows that with the pupil-less eyes of the domino masks, that’s a little bit harder to achieve. “It’s fine, I trust you.”

Peter breathes out a sigh.

When he lifts up his hand, foam releases from the web-shooter, and it quickly solidifies into a thick glob of webbing, sticking Dick’s hand to the suit.

“Yes, Richard, I’m certain that you will not fail miserably,” Damian deadpans.

Duke vibrates in silent secondhand anxiety. Steph starts dying with laughter. Tim already tried breaking out of Avengers tower without permission and so he isn’t allowed to be out with them tonight.

Peter flicks his wrist, and the canister of web-fluid pops out, and then the collection of backups rotate into place. Peter swings his hand up so that it’s on top of the glob of webbing, and then stares down Dick as he deploys his web-solvent.

“I’m going to jump off a building now,” Dick decides.

“If we come back and you broke something, Bruce is going to kill us,” Duke finally bursts, gasping out all in one quick breath as if somehow they all don’t know.

A pause follows, then Damian arches a brow at Duke and asks, “More than usual?”

Dick turns around and lifts up his now unstuck wrist, getting his hand into the position that Peter always uses to fire, with his middle and ring finger just barely hovering over the trigger. He squints up at the next rooftop over, trying to figure out how long the line will be when he shoots it out.

Directly behind him, he hears the chime of the start of a video recording. Peter simply says, “For science.”

Dick takes one more chance to doubt his aim, then shoots out the web. The moment that the web connects with the opposite building, Dick flicks his wrist up, and the web finishes firing, sticking just barely to his hand. He adjusts his grip so that the web line is underneath his fingers, and then lets out one last steading breath.

“Here goes something,” Dick says, before jumping off the building. For a moment, he feels like he’s just falling, because he’s used to the pull of the grappling hook, but then he’s swinging towards the building he’d latched to, and he just barely remembers to press his feet against the brick. He looks up, trailing the web line up to where it's attached, and gives an experimental tug. It holds.

He grins.

The next shot is aimed right at the top of the next building, and Dick jumps off his perch, shooting out a second matching webline as he goes, yanking himself up towards where he’d latched the web.

It’s a short enough distance this time that he’s able to shoot himself further up, and he ducks into a roll when he lands on top of the roof, still grinning.

In comparison to what he can do with a grappling hook, it’s laughably basic, but Dick can already see the potential, and he’ll be hard pressed to give the spare web shooters back to Peter when they go back to the tower. After all, he feels like he’s just found the next thing for him to train.