01 || River Tam || Day 45

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01 || River Tam || Day 45

[ The shot opens with two small toy dinosaurs, standing facing each other on the railing of a wooden bridge.

A young woman's voice begins talking: ]

We've played this game before. We are veterans in the sport.

Perhaps it was an oversight to bring a professional lab rat to a new lab. Perhaps she broke their teeth before they put her down she can't remember.

There's something in the water.

[ The camera angle shifts - here is a face full of an older teenage girl, long hair damp and brow furrowed. She seems to understand that this is recording, peering at the communicator intently before waving her arm wildly in a futile attempt to shake it off.

Quietly: ]

So what is the difference between a sport and a game? Hunting labrats is fun for the ones holding the gun, pull the trigger if you're ruthless, put down the broken specimens, they're just dragging down the standard deviation isn't that it?

Keep them fighting keep them starving keep them sleeping keep them kept.

[ She sighs and rubs a hand over her face. ] We are not a fan of these particular sports. Lab rats can still chew through the ropes, the wires, the bones.

Just give us time.

Just...

[ Her voice cracks at this point and there's a small sob snuffled in there, but the girl regains her composure fairly quickly. ]

Be polite, River. Say hello.

Hello.

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[The things Cass sees in River are disjointed, fractured, but still possible to read and what she gets sparks the immediate desire to be someone this girl can rely on.]

I'm Cass. Can find you, if you say... where you are. Or show again.

[She's still learning the layout of the little town, a bridge isn't too helpful as of yet.]

I'm planet-bound, trapped by this gravitational well! [ Angry frowning but River climbs up onto the bridge's support and turns a rapid circle once, twice, three times.

Then she stretches her arms out and does it again, only in the opposite direction and slower. Any excuse to show off form and the ability to keep her arms steady.

The park and gazebo are easily identified in her sweep. ]

I'm here.

Whatever here is.

Under glass and observation.

[There's no response after that because Cass has no response. Instead she just turns her comm off and goes to find River on her bridge.

When she gets there, she's not in costume. She found normal clothes, thankfully. She's just a girl when she jumps up onto the bridge beside River and smiles at her.]

Here is Cape Kore. Hi.

Kore. Core? Center, nucleus. They didn't give me any capes. [ River rolls her eyes and spins on her bare toes, her boots unlaced and left ignored on the actual bridge before she puts her feet in fourth position.

Already showing off, she must like you Cass. ] Hello again.

Will lend mine. [She really does have a cape, too. She likes it, but she likes River too. Sharing won't be hard. And she smiles again, watching River twirl around. There's less worry to her now, it's been buried down a little better in favor of showing off. Always one to encourage things like that, Cass applauds her.]

Good turn. Where'd you... learn that?

Are we super-rats? [ There's an intriguing idea. River leans in a bit. ] Do you fly?

[ And a curtsey. ]

Dancing is math is music is everything pull tight pull taunt. Easiest way to speak.

Sometimes. [When she has her grapple gun and tall buildings, it feels like flying.] Bat, though. Not rat.

[Cass bends at the waist, a weird kind of bow to match River's curtsey.]

Can't do math. [She can look at a group of people and know how many are there, how long it will take to knock them all unconscious, but actual math? Not so much.] Dance is better. Can understand that.

Microchiroptera? The only mammal to evolve flight.

[ River claps, because this is exciting. A friend who can fly? ]

Everyone does math, the distance between a thrown fist and a duck to avoid. You can leave it to me; our head is in it.

We should dance! And fight. For fun, for art, for practice.

Better at fighting. Only danced once. Mosh pit. Lots of people... bumping into each other. It was good.

[Cass jumps down from the bridge now, landing without a sound despite her heavy boots.]

Have somewhere to live?

[ River can do the silent boot thing too! This is actually really exciting, since no one else she knows can do what she does, and Cass can.

Not to mention the similarities in the way they speak, even though Cass takes the simple route where as River can't find the trees for the woods. ]

They're good. I'll teach you. A fist for a pirouette. You'll see. [ A smile. ]

No. I'll trail your comet.

Sounds like... good trade, to me.

[Cass holds her hand out for River's. They're already connected, making a physical connection only seems right.]

Will show you, then. It's nice. We have neighbors.

One hand helps the other. [ River takes Cass' hand and gives a little squeeze. ]

Neighbors. Favorite and least? [ Give her the good gossip on their way home. ]

[Cass squeezes back, then starts to lead River towards home.]

Mm, no least. Everyone's nice. [Does she have a favorite? Her lips purse as she considers.] Made fort, with Jesse. Tim lives farther, but know him... from home. Guess, it's a tie.

[ River nods. ] No one else from home for me here.

Better. Is Tim a bat too?

Well, I'm here. Other good people, too. Can make new home.

Tim is just Tim. [It's not really a lie, because Tim is Robin and not a Batanything, but she promised him his identity would be safe with her. She won't tell anyone, no matter how much she might like them.]

Good people. Bad too. [ That's just logic. ] And neutral powers. Weapons. Like me. Try to be good for Simon's sake. No unnecessary inflictions.

[ Cass' answer is accepted as simple fact. ]

[She squeezes River's hand again.]

People made into weapons... can't help that. Be good for you, not just Simon. Because you're good.

[And hey look there's the house. The pillow fort she made with Jesse is still up in the living room, a pile of pillows and blankets that don't look like much but that had been very, very fun. It's part of why it's still up.]

Welcome home? Can pick any room.

She gives her word and all her effort.

[ Simon, however, is good. He wouldn't hurt people. River will hurt whomever needs hurting and whomever threatens those she cares about, so there is a difference in her mind. Like a drop-shadow. ]

Which one do you like? [ Letting go to peer around. Oh and to slam her fist into the first camera she sees, on principle. ]

[The destruction of the cameras makes Cass grin. She hadn't really cared much about them, she'd gotten used to her whole life being recorded when she was still tiny, didn't come up past her father's waist. There's a lot less getting shot for no reason with these cameras, so they had stayed.]

Tim will like you.

[She leads the way to the room she's picked out for herself, and it's a mess. The bed isn't made, there's clothes she's managed to round up strewn on the floor and her batsuit is in the pile, the cowl hanging off the side of the bed. She's never been good at cleaning up after herself, but at least there's no plates of old food in there?]

This is mine.

[ River just smiles back until Cass shows her the room. It might be a mess but it's lived in and that's what River thinks she wants/needs right about now.

So she jumps on the unmade bed and bounces. ]

Good!

[She sees it so fast, that this room has stopped being her room and now it's their room. River needs a home too, needs one just as bad as Cass does.

She she leaps onto the bed beside River and grins at her.]

Yours, too. Welcome home, River.

[ Cass gets the tightest, best hug River can muster.

This is amazing and so much more than she could've hoped for and it's all almost almost enough to balance out against being kidnapped and so far from the stars.

Home is good. Cass is great. Some small jagged bit of River's mind that was threatening to stab it's way through everything else settles.

Home is good, even if it ends up temporary. ]

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01 || River Tam || Day 45

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