Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

All through the journey, Kory’s mind kept weaving back and forth between Rachel’s and Gar’s words.

'You’re a part of us. Isn’t that obvious by now?' Gar’s voice, soft and ghostly, echoed in her head. Then Rachel’s came on: 'Don’t be scared of those people … sometimes, there’s no time to be scared.'

But the mysterious woman’s voice, deep and imposing, always won over the contest. 'Koriand’r?' It blared. 'We thought you were dead …'

We thought you were dead … we thought you were dead …

But why had the woman thought that? And who was she, anyway? Could it be true, what Dick had suggested about having a history with the woman?

X’hal! Kory wanted to cry out loud, even though she had not the slightest idea what that meant.

“We’re here!” Dick announced.

Kory started out of her reverie to find her vision engulfed with a three storied, modern, real estate jewel, much like the safe house they once held Dr. Adamson in. She blinked twice, not believing her eyes. Not believing Dick.

“I’m very sure you got the wrong address,” she told him. “This looks nothing like a motel.”

Dick shrugged. “That’s because it’s not.”
And he slipped out of the Jeep before Kory could unload a host of questions on him.

An out-of-nowhere wave of agitation pooled in Kory’s chest at Dick’s behavior. It rose to claw at her throat, just waiting to thrash at him.

But she swallowed it, easing herself out onto the flag stoned driveway as Dick walked up to somebody. A woman. Stubby, late forties, suited, holding a pen and clipboard. No eminent threat there. Just a harmless, real estate agent.

“Mr. Grayson,” the real estate agent shook Dick’s hand. “Right on time.”

“It’s a gift of mine, Mrs. Drew,” Dick dipped his hands into his trouser pockets, glancing round the perimeter. "Occasionally, though, it can be a curse.”

So Dick had had the house in his plans for a while?

Kory rushed up to Dick, only to break to a halt right behind his shoulder. She felt odd, all of a sudden, being the subject of the real estate woman’s scrutiny; and something within her still refused to trust the sweet exterior the lady harbored. Instinct or paranoia, Kory could not tell what was setting her off.

“Oh!” Mrs. Drew looked from Kory’s face to her new pair of ankle boots. She then turned to Dick, a wide grin across her round face. “And who’s this lovely lady?”

Dick glanced over his shoulder. “This is Kory. She’s my ...”

Kory held her breath so hard, that her face flushed up.

“My eyes,” Dick completed, but the curl at the corner of his lips showed everything that went unsaid.

“You mean your feminine eye?” Mrs. Drew came up, gesturing for Dick to walk ahead of her through a pair of tinted, glass doors. “Of course, that just makes the selection process easier.”

She then turned on her heels, spotting the blush of embarrassment that had not quite melted away from Kory’s face. “Follow me, then!” she sung. “Right this way, Mrs. Gray---”

“Miss. Anders, ma’am!” Kory cut in.

But that did not stop the elderly lady from giving her a lazy, knowing grin. “Mhmm, ” Mrs. Drew hummed, and the frown on Kory's face melted away despite herseld.

…………….

The house had a cool, homely air to it. Nevertheless, the walls and floors smelt new, as did the quaint furniture, purely in mahogany shades.

Mrs. Drew gushed about the creamy, white carpets, flint-colored walls, and beige curtains being ideal and vogue. But all Kory had her eyes on were locks, bolts and alarm systems. She examined the electro-controlled, living room glass doors with interest, as Dick pretended to listen to Mrs. Drew’s rambling. His eyes were glinting with concern when Kory finally met his gaze, so she went over to him.

“Where did you say the gym room was again?” Kory asked Mrs. Drew, her mind already on training.

“Second floor to your right,” Dick answered instead. When he registered the surprised look on Kory’s face, he explained, “I did a digital tour of the house, just so you know. The gym room’s pretty much the star of the show.”

“But so are the master bedrooms,” Mrs. Drew chimed in. “Would you care to have a look, Ms. Anders – or will the open plan kitchen do it for you?”

Kory twisted her golden ring round her finger. “Can I talk to you, Dick?”

“Perhaps, you could do so upstairs, Ms. Anders?” There was just no stopping with Mrs. Drew. Kory wriggled her shoulder out of the real agent's hand as she directed her attention to the zig zag staircase. “You will find the ambience even more pleasing with every floor…”

His face mirroring everything Kory’s was hiding, Dick started his way up the stairs. “Thank you, Mrs. Drew,” he said through clenched teeth, then beckoned with his head for Kory to follow. “Kory and I can take it from here.”

“Oh-- okay then! Take your time, Mr. Grayson.” Mrs. Drew scribbled something on her clip boarded paper. “And get back to me in twenty minutes, will you? I won’t have gone too far.”

“You’re too kind, Mrs. Drew…” Dick called back, his voice an echo beyond..

Kory ran up the stairs after him when the doors beeped shut behind their overbearing real estate agent. ...... The walls on the second floor were thick, so Kory felt like she was walking through a deceptively beautiful horror house, in those old, silent horror movies she watched occasionally with Gar.

“Dick?” She called out, her heart jammed in her throat. “Dick!”

“Hey!” Dick emerged from the room at the end of the hall. “Over here.”

Kory took her boots off when she finally reached him. And man, was the master bedroom something! It was spacious, moderately furnished; a wide, silver ray of midday sunlight slanting in through a glass protected balcony, facing the urban skyline.

At the center lay a king sized bed, covered in beige and white beddings with a row of hazel, silk pillows neatly arranged over each other, at the head.

“Not bad,” Kory remarked, dropping her boots at the door. She groaned when her bare feet rubbed through the fluffy carpet. “But I need to know what’s going on,” she set her eyes hard on Dick, who had his back to her as he stood in the balcony, “How will you pay for all this anyway?”

Dick spun around. “Trust fund.”

“Bruce Wayne’s?”

“Under my name, of course.” Dick flicked his tongue across his lips. “Might as well put one thing from him to ‘actual’ good use.”

Kory heaved a sigh of exasperation. On the one hand, she was caving under all the surprises Dick kept throwing at her. On the other, she wanted to know why he was so comfortably tackling his insecurities all of a sudden. Then, of course, there were the questions concerning her own identity, playing like a broken record in her mind.

So she asked Dick the most average question. “Are you sure about this?”

“I don’t want to run anymore. Trigon’s not a done deal, I know. But we can do this, don’t you think?” A smile cracked Dick’s face open. “Take him on. Together.”

Kory wanted to cry yes. Yes, she wanted a safe space with just Dick, Gar and Rachel. More than anything. She wanted to fight for them. With them. No matter what it cost her. Because they were all she had come to cherish in the little time she had spent consciously on Earth.

But she was also an alien warrior, commissioned to protect Tamaran from harm. Somehow, though, she had woken up on Earth, having no clue as to what her mission was, and a strange someone only recently started whispering in her ear that they had thought she was dead.

“I’m afraid for Rachel,” Kory admitted. “She’s wavering. Maybe, me too.” She fiddled with her ring as she reached the inevitable conclusion. “It’s more complicated now, Dick.”

Dick did not immediately react. Instead, he watched her quietly, his lips a tight line.

“Are you still going with your plan?” He addressed Kory eventually. “We’re not so far from your ship.”

Kory had not really thought about visiting her spaceship. At least not that soon. All she had wanted was fresh air, and when Dick had pleaded with her to go motel hunting with him, she had said why not.

“The Starfire,” Kory remembered out loud. “That’s the name of my ship,” she explained, when Dick’s eyes narrowed in confusion. “And before I put it in that abandoned warehouse to continue with my mission, I remember crashing.”

“An accident,” Dick speculated.

“Hell of a coincidence, don’t you think?”

Dick shifted on his heels. “Kory, are you suggesting …?”

“To cloak the ship, I must’ve been running from some kind of trouble.”

“Or you just needed to keep humans at bay,” Dick suggested, but his jaw clenched. “If what you’re thinking is true, wouldn’t you have remembered who was hounding you by now?” His eyes were darting when they settled firmly on Kory’s. “Kory, if you think you were in danger maybe …” He trailed off and fell silent.

“You think I shouldn’t go to the ship,” Kory deduced.

“No!” Dick shook his head, alarmed. “’All I’m saying is you should apply tact. You know --- go low key, take your time, get solid details about what must’ve happened.” His face softened. “Kory, you need to be well prepared.”

Kory’s heart did a flip. Had Dick just admitted that he wanted her to stay with him? Longer?

She should not feel elated like that, in the middle of a serious conversation, but there she was --- unable to help herself. Because she was yet to come across a person so damaged, so mysterious yet so beautifully unpredictable, caring and tender.

There could only be one Dick Grayson, and it saddened her to imagine a life beyond several galaxies, where no such person existed.

“Okay, then,” Kory conceded. “But I’ll need one thing to prepare myself with. And it’s in my ship.”

Dick looked skeptical. “Death of Worlds…”

With the help of the ancient Tamaranean book, Kory had managed to summon a black hole and, with Rachel’s help, thrust Trigon into a foreign dimension. For how long the black hole could hold, the book could not say. So the team had agreed to keep the Death of Worlds under lock and key, in the Starfire, where Trigon could not gain easy access, should he escape. And he surely would try.

“There must be something in there I can use to fill the gaps in my mind.”

“The book is not safe outside your ship,” Dick reminded Kory. He lifted his hand to his face, heaving a sigh into his palm. “But we could save the information you need from it on my phone … take pictures.”

“Great idea.” Kory returned Dick’s smile, equally grateful as she was wary. Her journey had officially began and the relief trickling down her body was so overwhelming, that she wanted Dick to share in that feeling, that precise moment.
“So you’re never gonna tell me…?”

She did not have to finish the sentence for Dick to realize where she was headed.

“Kory, no,” he groaned.

“You trust me enough, don’t you?”

“You know I do. I’m just … not ready to talk.”

“Okay…” Kory walked over to a dresser and leaned on it. She was now just a few steps away from the balcony area where Dick was standing. “So what if Rachel tells me?”

“Wh--?” Dick began, but he stopped to shake his head when things added up. “Right! I forgot.”

Rachel could learn people’s secrets without even asking about them. At one touch, the teenage empath had stumbled upon Dick’s nightmare; the one Trigon had conjured up to turn him to the dark side.

Kory tilted her head, trying to catch Dick’s eyes as he looked anywhere but at her. “How bad was it? Because Rachel has not spoken a word of it to me ever since seeing you.”

Another resigned sigh, and Dick brought his eyes up to meet Kory’s searching ones. “I don’t want to go over the details,” he said, his voice low in his throat.

“Then don’t.” Kory dared to close the charged distance between them, so that just 4 feet stood in their way. “Just quit pushing me away.”

Dick’s gaze wavered. He dipped his hands into his pockets before steadying his eyes on Kory again. “You got hurt. Seriously.” He pulled his hands out of his pockets to run them through his hair, and Kory noticed his eyes glistening with something. Tears. Just a thin film of it.
“And I just lost it. I turned to the darkness…” Dick paused to shake his head. “No. I became the darkness.”

“Trigon’s a liar,” Kory found herself bursting out. She could not help it. Seeing Dick that way made her want to smash something, or someone. “None of that bullshit he showed you was real, okay?”

“But what if he gets to you?” Dick snapped. But he was addressing the air more than her. “What if I never get to see you again?”

“Never see me again?” Kory watched Dick anxiously. The sag of his shoulders, the labored breathing, and the utter brokenness in his dilated eyes all spelt bad news. But she shook off the temptation to prod him further, remembering her promise to not have him go over the details of his dream.

A quiet moment drifted by, Kory watching Dick, Dick watching her.

“There’s many ways of hurting a person, Dick,” she eventually said, cocking her head to one side. “For instance, how do you think 'I' feel when you keep secrets from me?”

“Am not…” Dick began to protest.

“Don’t answer that,” Kory interjected, rolling her eyes, “It’s more of a rhetoric question, than me being a pain in your ass.”

And Dick laughed at that. Really laughed: eyes crinkling up, head thrown back, the dimple on his cheek deepening. He looked even more handsome carefree.

Unable to contain the warmth swelling in her chest, Kory drew closer.

Dick stopped laughing when he noticed her proximity to him. His eyes grew wide and the sunlight beatifully brought them out, casting an amber flicker across them.

“And how about this place?” He asked softly, referring to the house.

“It’s a surprise, Dick,” Kory giggled, “not a secret. And I like it.”

Dick wrapped his hands around her waist, keeping her at arm’s length, so that his eyes could tread down her body. “Never seen this dress before. Secret of yours, or what?”

"What, you don’t like it?” Kory frowned.

“I wouldn’t be picturing you out of it if I did.”

Dick leaned into Kory so fast, only to brush his lips (soft and reminiscent of that morning’s maple syrup) against hers. Kory snatched them, and he relented, kissing her at last.

The kiss was neither intense nor gentle. It was mild and slow, and Dick was always sweet and patient with her; moving along fluidly with every brush, twist and jolt of her lips.

His breathing grew more ragged when his fingers found the knot holding Kory’s dress together at the waist. “Here,” he breathed, desperate, “help me get this off of you, please?”

Kory fought to break the spell she was under, emerging just partly from it. “But Mrs. Drew ...”

“Won’t be back in ten minutes,” Dick kissed her jawline, “25 seconds,” her neck, “and whatever milliseconds,” and playfully ran a finger along the plunging V-neck of her dress. He then dug his fingers into her waist, gently leading her towards the king sized bed. “C’mon. We’ll be done in 8.”