16812/Winter Library Time

Winter Library Time
Date of Scene:	06 January 2024
Location:	Library - Wayne Manor
Synopsis:	Chill out time in the Wayne Library, with snacks
Cast of Characters:	Phoebe Beacon, Damian Wayne, Tim Drake

---

Phoebe Beacon has posed:
    The snow had begun to fall in the early morning hours, covering Gotham City with a three-to-five-inch blanket of soft white, covering the sins and sinners alike and giving the fascade of clean innocence to the city.

    By mid-morning, in the gray light of a snowstorm overhead, the library had become a hub of gentle repose. The fire had been built up and was crackling away, adding to the coziness of the room as snow continued to fall outside on the grounds of Wayne Manor. A sandwich tray had been sent up and stood to the side, with a variety of comfort food sandwiches meant for the vegetarian and vegan members of the Bat Fam, along with fruit and cheeses, and a separate plate with dog treats. Because inevitably where Phoebe would wander, Idu and Potato are bound to follow.

    Potato is up on the couch, curled up into a relaxed donut and offering a place for Phoebe to lay her head. She's sitting on the floor, on the rug in front of the couch, with a pink-and-purple Peruvian blanket slung over her lap, along with the lighter Idu, who is acting as a tablet rest as Phoebe pours over information on a tablet. Every once in a while, Potato's head moves, slowly eyeballing a sandwich that is just... barely... hanging over the side of the platter.

    The mood in the room is one of relaxation and warmth.

Damian Wayne has posed:
Not all is relaxation though. Damian Wayne has been pacing since he arrived at the Tower. A glance outside, and then back to his phone, before he heads over to take one of the vegeterian options. He rises it to take a bite, but not before raising his phone again to look at it. "Nothing." he grouses and frowns as he goes to sit by the fireplace.

The way he's perched, he looks like a bird, just waiting for the word to launch into flight as he finally checks the ringer on his phone again and sticks it in his pocket. He's dressed for something, in a black turtleneck, blue jeans and hiking boots. Finally, he takes a bite from the sandwich and reaches for his pocket, stopping himself and instead glances at the book at his side, a dog-eared paperback.

Tim Drake has posed:
    Tim's been out of commission the last couple of days, resting after recovering from an infection. He's back up on patrol duty soon, but down-time for him means research time, and all roads do eventually lead to the Wayne family library.

    He's in one of the wingback chairs, though he's got his legs hooked over one arm rest and his head nudged up against the other as he flips through a book that's possibly older than he is. Not that that's a great feat, or anything, but he is technically the oldest in the room. His eyes glaze over as he rereads the same sentence for the hundredth time, before he sighs and closes the book.

    "Do you want to talk about it?" he asks, head canted towards where Damian is perched.

Phoebe Beacon has posed:
    Idu had raised his head, those radar ears focusing in on Damian as he paced around the library floor, watching as he grouses (fantastic bird pun), and then goes to repose, side-lit by the crackling fire.

    Phoebe's attention is also taken y Damian's agitation. Her eyebrows rise up and her lips purse as she looks to Tim, and then back to Damian.

    "Yeah. it's... not like you to be this openly agitated."

Damian Wayne has posed:
"No." Damian starts to say, a mutter. And then he pauses. "Yes." he decides and considers his siblings. "You will not laugh." Is it an order? Absolutely not. But.

"I have made a New Years resolution." he explains. "I am looking to strengthen the bonds of those I work with and those I call friend." With that out of the way, Damian considers his next words. "You two do not count. You are family. I am close to you both. I decided to, after some thought, to reach out to Charlotte and asked her to meet for burgers."

A buzz on his phone, a glance at it from his pocket and he sets it back into place. "I had planned to use Phoebe as a mutual ground to talk. Instead, we spoke of animals and anime. It was a nice conversation. As I was leaving patrol, she suggested that she come over tonight, to go riding. And we were going to watch the first season of 'Frieren' together. I have seen it. But she hasn't, and I was going to introduce her to Goliath."

To illustrate the point, he holds up the novelization of the same anime. But he's drawn on the front of it. It's a picture of Batgirl (II) stuck, bent over, in a Wayne Enterprises crate, her butt covered by her cape and a bubble that reads 'It's dark and scary in here!'

If you know the Mimic meme, you get this.

"She said it was a date. So. I am nervous."

Tim Drake has posed:
    This seems serious, especially if Damian is telling them not to laugh, so Tim's legs swing over the arm rest and his feet hit the floor. The sudden change of position has blood rushing to his brain, and he blinks a few times until it passes.

    Okay maybe he was sitting like that too long. Oof.

    He sets the book in his lap aside and frowns with confusion at Damian until the mental math of Charlotte = Charlie works out in his brain, and then he nods, slowly. Then he's squinting at the picture, mouth slightly agape.

    Intellectually, he knows this is a meme reference. But anime is not one of Tim's areas of nerd specialty, so he's absolutely clueless. All he can do is sit there as the wordless dread of 'am I an old person now?' sinks in.

    "I'm sure it'll be fine," he says, on autopilot. Then he manages to re-engage his brain, and his fingers flex where they're resting against his knees. "Uh. Like a date-date?"

Phoebe Beacon has posed:
    Phoebe brings her legs down, which makes Idu HUFF in the indignity of his place of rest adjusting, and he voices his complaint by just rolling to his side on Phoebe's legs, not letting her up.

    "Charlotte--?" she questions out loud, trying to trace back who that might be if Damian's trying to make inroads with the Titans.

    "I mean, I could laugh. We totally are still fighting." she points out to Damian, and then she sets her tablet to the side.

    "Is it possible that you are reading too far into a throw-away statement? Because 'it's a date' can mean 'that's an agreed upon arrangement' rather than 'we're going on an actual date'."

    She purses her lips. "Though riding Goliath is pretty cool, not going to lie."

Damian Wayne has posed:
"Charlotte." A pauses, and Damian clarifies. "Charlie. Misfit." That should make it clear. "We were eating our meals and I suggested she come over and she said that we will have a riding and anime watching date. She may have been teasing me." See, that's why Damian needed to talk about it. "It is not like I haven't dated in the past." See, experience!

"I just want to make sure of her intent. Because she is closer to the family than Gabby is. And I do not want to have a misunderstanding where it will cause issues with our dynamic." He finishes off his sandwich. Then a glance outside. "I carried you home last night on Goliath's back after... whatever happened at the school. I need to get back there and run some tests. Do you remember anything? Also, that means I totally won the fight."

A subject change is nice.

Tim Drake has posed:
    Immediately ceding the topic to Phoebe's higher emotional intelligence is an easy choice for Tim. Instead, he slides to his feet and wanders over to one of the bookshelves to return his most recent choice to its proper place, before he starts eyeing the shelf's contents for his next.

    "You could always settle this with a rematch," he points out, which is totally him goading things on for his own personal benefit-slash-entertainment. Book in hand, he turns around and lifts a shoulder up in a loose shrug. "Something unconventional. And maybe not a prank war, I'm too old to get grounded by Bruce again."

Phoebe Beacon has posed:
    "No, we're fighting because he brought me to Titan's Tower under false pretenses and I met Starfire. Do you *know--" Phoebe starts off, pointing to Tim. "How *hard it was* for after two and a half years of having Kori Rising from the Foam on the half shell stuck in my head to meet the real deal and find out 'oh no, she is exactly that beautiful in real life'?!" Phoebe asks of Tim, as if this were a perfectly scandalizing thing. "AND ON TOP OF EVERYTHING ELSE she has a compltely lovely disposition! How can I possibly go 'ugh everyone in the Titans is awful and infantalising' when Koriand'r is just... wonderful?!" Phoebe questions, and then she breathes out. She rubs the back of her head.

    "I'm going through the blood tests and the swab info again. Finding trace amounts of Fear gas is disturbing enough in the air, since Crane hasn't been heard from for some time... but..." she pauses, and she bites at her thumb nail a moment as she puts her glasses back on.

    "My healing powers should have resolved that. And the elevated vitamin levels are also concerning."

Damian Wayne has posed:
"It is not my fault that you have fetishized one of my teammates and now that you have met her, you are finding further questions with your feelings." Damian responds with a smirk. "I was unaware of your previous fantasies involving Starfire, and had I known, I would have made sure she was aware so that she could have treated you with better kindness."

Yes. Damian is rubbing it in.

There's a nod to Phoebe as she speaks though. "I hope to get blood samples from the others as well. I do not think that Cupp being there was coincidence, but for the moment, I have to accept that he might have been a red herring. I also need to have /words/ with my mother."

Tim Drake has posed:
    "That whole Kori on the halfshell thing is a cognitohazard and I don't want anything to do with it. Especially since I was just talking with M'gann about hosting socials with the Titans," comes Tim's reply as he leafs through another book. Nothing seems to catch his eye in this one, though, and he returns it to the shelf.

    Eventually he concedes defeat and returns to his previous seat, flopping into it with legs, once again, hooked over the arm rest. "Cupp is dirty, there's no doubt about that. Conniving, too. Don't discount his presence, it might be a setup. Wouldn't put it past him."

    He sighs and sinks further into the chair so that his head can get some support rather than hang over the edge. "Anything I can do to help?" he asks.

Phoebe Beacon has posed:
    "Pump the brakes there Damian, that was a Terry-influenced hallucination, not *my* fantasy. It also involved Kian and Garfield cherubs and Caitlin ripping up trees. There's reasons I don't associate a lot with the Titans." Phoebe comments, "... mostly because the first couple of times I expressed dismay, I got head patted and told I'd understand when I grew up. NOt exactly the most supportive of role models." Phoebe comments, and she frowns.

    "I need to follow up on my threat though. I'll need to get a legal 'needs to stay X feet away and not contact' order. He keeps coming onto University grounds to follow me around, there's going to be a further problem -- if not from Campus Security, then someone else is going to lose their temper. And I dunno how long I can save Jason, Talia, or Robbie off from him." she frowns. "And if Robbie gets at him, there's no garuntee that Cupp will come out the other side once he sees what actually was done."

    And she looks over to Tim. "We could recalibrate the medical sensory array in the batcave and run those samples again. Pull lab tests from the other ten students who were there and see if we all have elevated vitamin and traces of fear toxin. It's just -- it shouldn't have been enough to trigger anything, you know?" she ventures. "If there were trace amounts, it doesn't explain everyone breaking the windows and lining up. All I can remember is smelling something kinda sour in the air, like someone had a real bad milk fart. We were all gathering for a meet-up on overcoming self-destructive behaviors."

Damian Wayne has posed:
"Sorry." That is sincere. Damian realizing when he's crossed a line? Go figure. Instead, he goes back to listening, letting Phoebe and Tim talk things out as he listens, not sure of what he can offer.

"There was traces of fear gas according to the sensors." That's all he can add, only to realize that was already done. "...the explosions seemed synched up with the preacher's speech. And he was thrown off when the windows were repaired."

Tim Drake has posed:
    Tim folds his hands over his stomach. "Well, I'm biased towards the Outsiders for a reason," he says. Because it's his team, of course. Always have to root for the home team.

    "Something sour in the air?" This seems to capture his attention, and he lays there (or whatever you call being curled into a C shape in a chair meant for sitting, not laying) mulling over that for a few moments as he drums his fingers. "We really ought to have an easier way of capturing samples of air particles."

Phoebe Beacon has posed:
    "Because we don't infantilize new superheroes, we just tell them 'this is a hard stupid life with no insurance'?" Phoebe questions as she looks over with a dry humor to Tim, and then she leans her head back.

    "Could add air samplers onto the dominos, but that would increase the weight and thickness." she mulls over it. "Yeah. Smelled something sour, and then the next thing I know, I'm in the Cave and Alfred's swabbing my cheek. THat's like... almost an hour of missing time. And any sort of missing time's an Issue." she ventures, and then she looks over to Damian "Luckily, Damian flew me back here on Goliath, so that I wasn't taken in by the trauma teams. Good thing Sewell wasn't in the room -- he'll probably have to figure out a new trauma group for the eleven of us."

Damian Wayne has posed:
"Sewell was legit?" Damian asks curiously, as the young man only interjects when he's needed, drawing in a breath and looking thoughtful. As for the Titans? "Someone has to stay with the Titans from the group. Dick's never around. So it's me." he mutters as he considers that.

"I did not have a kit on me to immediately take samples." He'll take the responsibility for not having it.

Tim Drake has posed:
    "You can't afford to infantilize heroes in Gotham, that's how people die." Tim frowns up at the ceiling, momentarily caught up by what he's just said. "Sorry," he adds. "That was pretty dark."

    He pushes himself half-upwards so he can dig his phone out of his back pocket, and then he's texting away, eyes on the screen. "Point stands, anyway. Our current tech is pretty bulky and needs time to set up. We'd be more likely to have it on us if it was more portable. Might be a good avenue to pursue with WayneTech."

Phoebe Beacon has posed:
    "Dress it up as Environmental technology. Make it sensitive for taking in parts-per-million in hazardous conditions, so exposure has to be very quick and very correct -- like dropping into a volcano?" PHoebe offers back to Tim in thought. She's always happy to help spent WayneTech cash. That's how she 'borrowed' an experimental synth skin once. Caroline Beacon is doing so well for it too.

    "And Dark, but Right." she replies, and gives a soft hum.

    "Yeah, Shaw Sewell. He's the psych I've been seeing for cognitive behavioral stuff for the credit I need for another class. He's all right -- you know those vitamin packets that have been in the news? That's part of his study. He's been monitoring something like seven hundred students as part of the study." Phoebe replies as she reaches up for a sandwich from the platter. "Dunno if it's placebo or just having The Right Psych, but I have been feeling pretty good since I started going to him for regular appointments, you know?"

Tim Drake has posed:
    There are a few thoughtful noises from Tim at Phoebe's suggestions, his fingers flying across the screen of his phone. Given his position as an R&D tech, he has a fair few contacts who might be able to roll up some new prototypes for them. Either way, he fires off a few texts and then lays his phone down after, all done with that for now.

    "I'm glad to hear it, Pheebs. It's a hard balance to strike with everything that we do, and your mental health is important." Then, because he is who he is (an annoying older brother) he looks back at Damian, "So have you bought snacks for your date with Charlie yet?"

Phoebe Beacon has posed:
    "And also fire estinguishers?" Phoebe offers, turning back to Damian. "Charlie and I left a pretty big fire ring on the north lawn of Zatanna's house during some training we can't do here." she explains. And she turns back to Tim.

    "Also, totally helps that I have an extremely supportive group of siblings who know what I do at night."

    There's a pause.

    "Now *that* is a cognitohazard."

Damian Wayne has posed:
You ever see what happens when you step on a cat's tail and it just reverbs through it's whole body as it stiffens and shakes? That is a close approximation of Damian's reaction as he sits up when they mention plans for the date. After a momentary pause where he considers the question, he takes out his phone. Glancing at it, he lifts his head and looks outside.

"Maybe she just can't make it tonight." he decides soberly.

His attention returned to the other two, he shakes his head. "Which is fine. I can spend the evening concentrating on coordinating the event next week at the museum." he decides.

Tim Drake has posed:
    Is Tim laughing? No, he's got a totally straight face. But boy is it a struggle to maintain, the corners of his mouth twitching inwards as he stares at a fixed point on the wall. Keeping it together. Just barely.

    He throws an arm over his face and lets out a long, slow exhale. "Well, it's good that we have each other. With all the other ways we deprive ourselves, at least we have a good support group." Then his jaw cracks on a yawn, and he adds, "But I think right now I'm going to stop depriving myself of sleep. Gotta use the bed here every once in a while, right?"

Phoebe Beacon has posed:
    "... you're actually going to sleep? You're not running a fever, are you?" Phoebe ventures towards Tim, coompletely dry humored.

    She does motion to Damian, and appears to offer a seat next to her on the floor.

    "It may be she ran into trouble. I've had to duck out of planned things for our night work. It happens, little brother." she states fondly, both to ease Damian's mind and to provide poor absent Charlie with an excuse.

Damian Wayne has posed:
"I'm well aware." Damian comments and blows out his breath. "Since it seems that this is breaking up, I find myself with an evening free. So. I'll patrol." He hops out of the chair, and stretches out as he just lets it go. "With the weather as it is, I'm sure that the extra help will be appreciated."

"Thank you for listening, though. I appreciate it." he offers a brief smile to the pair before he starts to head to the door to go kit up and hit the streets.

Phoebe Beacon has posed:
    Phoebe pauses. She looks over to Tim.

    "I'mg oing to give him a thirty minute head start and then pelt him with snowballs over 58th street. Wanna play my overwatch until he goes down?" she questions to Tim with an amused expression.