#Steph just listens and trusts her and let's her go without fighting

[aingeal98]

I think we're due for a comic where Cass just solos the entire family like I know that powerscaling isn't actually important in comics and that telling a good story is key but consider: dudebros are annoying and stupid and they're getting too misogynistic about her so I need someone to write one story where she just effortlessly slams the family including Bruce and then we can get back to telling the emotionally compelling and heartwrenching stories.

[casscainmainly]

Do you think Cass believes in Steph? When Bruce was being all “stop hanging out with Steph, she’ll never be like us”, Cass listened to him but she was clearly conflicted.

This is an interesting question! It kind of depends on what you mean by 'believe in'. If you mean whether Cass believes in Steph's fighting abilities, the answer depends on what era we're talking about. Modern era, particularly Batgirls '22 onwards, I'd say Cass definitely believes in Steph:

Batgirls (2022) #4

Modern Steph-Cass is defined by a deep implicit trust in each other, and Cass acknowledges that Steph is strong. They're also sharing the Batgirl mantle, and Cass associates Batgirl with strength of all kinds, moral and physical. So safe to say Cass believes in Steph now.

Handing Steph the Batgirl mantle in Batgirl (2009) can be seen as a sign of belief too (and Steph herself takes it that way). The BIG caveat, of course, is that Bruce ordered Cass to give Steph the mantle. Bruce, as usual, complicates things - though I think part of Cass believed Steph would do well, it's tangled up in her grief and loyalty to Bruce. I'd classify this era as 'Cass does believe in Stephanie, but not wholeheartedly and if they had let Cass and Steph interact properly it would've been angsty'.

Then we get to the era you're talking about, which is Steph-Cass at its messiest. The issue you're referring to, Batgirl (2000) #38, does feature Cass going against Bruce's orders to hang out with Stephanie. They play rooftop tag, and when Steph misses a jump, Cass demonstrates for her and encourages her to try again:

And Steph makes the jump without Cass' help! Cass believes in Steph's tenacity and ability to overcome obstacles, otherwise she wouldn't have made Stephanie try again.

But it's important to note that, while Cass believes in Steph's strengths, that doesn't necessarily mean she believes in Steph's vigilante/fighting abilities. Cass forces Steph to stay on the roof while she fights some gangs, and when Steph enters the fight she knocks her out and drags her away. Then we get this moment:

Cass bluntly and unhesitatingly sides with Bruce here. She values Steph, and knows that Steph has strengths she does not possess, but she does not believe Steph will ever be on her and Bruce's level. This moment of betrayal will haunt the rest of their interactions until Steph's death.

I honestly think Cass' conflict at the beginning of the issue is less to do with her disagreeing that Steph's "not like [Cass]," and more to do with her enjoying Steph's company. In fact, Cass only agrees to hang out with Steph when she frames it as "play[ing]." Cass does not seriously try to refute Bruce's dismissal of Steph at all.

It leads to this really heartbreaking scene in Batgirl (2000) #55. Just look at Steph's expression :((((. Cass genuinely loves and cares for Stephanie, but she also contributed to the generally hostile atmosphere Steph faced at the time. I think here Cass just wants to keep Steph safe, but that doesn't negate how Steph is receiving this, nor the fact that Cass straight up told her before that she believes in Bruce's perception of her.

This thread is not really picked up on after Stephanie's death, and Steph in Cass' death hallucinations tends to be very idealised. Long story short, I think at the beginning Cass didn't believe in Steph fully, but after her death this changes and now she believes in Stephanie with all her heart. But because of Steph's death/the lack of a Steph-Cass reunion, there's a lot of gaps in this process. I think Brombal might (hopefully) pick up on all this though if Steph appears again in Batgirl (2024)!!

[msfcatlover]

I have been thinking so much about Jean-Paul Valley in my Reverse!Robins AU. Specifically, how he’d react to Steph’s return.

Because, listen: here is a man who had his autonomy stripped from him. Had his identity stripped from him. By the cult his father secretly raised him to serve, while letting Jean-Paul think he was having a normal childhood (and he did. That is one of the things I like about JPV as a character; in the original “Azrael: Fallen Angel” & “Knightfall” stories, he had a perfectly normal childhood… aside from the hypnotic brainwashing implanted while he slept.) This guy who was tricked into murdering several people, when he never, ever wanted that.

He gets saved by the Bats. And they help him. They really, genuinely help him, and sure, Duke & Damian are still teenagers (JPV’s like… 20-22 at this point in my mind,) but they’re also his anchors to reality. Damian, who also was raised to be a weapon by someone he should’ve been able to trust. Damian, who has experience with cults & rebuilding your identity after losing everything. Damian, who’s basically JPV’s “Brainwashed Cult Assassins Anonymous” sponsor. Duke, who also had a normal childhood. Duke, who knows Gotham like only a kid who was raised in its heart can. Duke, who agrees that this whole situation is certifiably fucked, but never hesitates to help Jean-Paul potentially recover a lost memory or find a new one, because it’s not just about who Jean-Paul was before the cult of St Dumas got their hands on him, it’s about remembering that he’s a living human being right now.

They take him in. They save him. They help him save himself. Bruce offers to pay for him to go back to college, for fuck’s sake!

They gave him his life back.

Jean-Paul can never, ever repay them. They tell him they don’t need it, but he wants to and he can’t. He feels so selfish to take & take without giving back, but how do you pay someone back for all that?

So his couch is always open to them, whenever they want. He’ll be their ally, their friend, their confessor, their confidant, their homework editor if need be. And when newer batkids join, well, Jean-Paul would’ve done his best anyway, but the fact he’s entrusted with Duke & Damian’s apprentices is just. It’s something else. And it’s hardly a hardship—the kids are a delight. Obnoxious, sure, and messy, and pushy, and constantly interrupting, and sometimes they break his stuff, and always they eat all his food, but Jean-Paul has more civilian friends now, and they tell him that’s just what kids are like.

What matters is that he loves them. He loves them because Duke & Damian love them, and then he loves them for being them.

And then. Stephanie. Dies. (Because Jean-Paul is broken, he’s a sinner, he can never make up for what he’s done, what he is, and he can never have nice things. Because Steph was sunshine & rage & stubbornness, because she joked that “We blondes have to stick together!” Because no one was there for her when it mattered most. This has to be punishment, right? He got too close, and Steph paid the price.) (His therapist says he’s being irrational again, but it doesn’t feel irrational. They say they need to adjust his medications. Jean-Paul knows better than to trust himself, but he can trust in Bruce to make sure the therapist is safe, so Jean-Paul doesn’t fight it. He’s not happy, but he doesn’t fight it. Because if he starts hallucinating again, he knows it won’t just be his father hovering over him, demanding to know why Azrael refused to avenge them. So yeah, sure, adjust the meds if you think it’s needed—he doesn’t miss Steph that badly. Yet.)

And then. Steph. Comes. Back.

She’s not dead. She’s not dead, but she’s different, she’s so very, very different. Damian says she fights like she spent time with the LoA, that same cult that raised Damian which he’s told Jean-Paul so much about over the years. Training like that takes time, but it’s been 6yrs, and she’s back, risen & gifted back to them! And she’s killing, but Jean-Paul’s killed before, and he’s been kidnapped by a cult before, and he thinks he knows how this goes. Death Mask isn’t Azrael, but he thinks it’s close enough.

And. And. And. He can save her. Because he knows what to do now, after nearly a decade in recovery. He can make up for his sins, he can bring her home again, and maybe, finally, he’ll have finally managed to pay them all back! He can give Steph her self back to make up for—(“You didn’t kill Stephanie,” his therapist reminds him, “you never laid a finger on her. Remember? You didn’t hurt her. It’s not your fault.” But it feels like it is, it feels like it, he can’t shake the idea that he did)—and he can give the Bats their sister back to make up for all that they’ve given him over all this time! A life for a life, and yes! This feels right!

He cooks up scenarios, imagines Steph reaching out in a moment of lucidity, or showing up injured on his doorstep guided by muscle memory, or running into her on the street or in a cafe and the look of alarm & recognition in her eyes as she—like he did, still does occasionally—knows that she knows him but can’t remember. He imagines the conversations they could have, all the different variations, and knows that it will take time, but patience is a virtue and Jean-Paul’s gotten rather good at it. He can be her anchor.

He just needs to figure out how to start.

(And meanwhile, Steph’s on the other side of Gotham like, “Why are my ears burning, and why do I feel like I’m staring down a tsunami-level wave of second-hand embarrassment right now?”)

[horsechestnut]

I would love details on the Reverse Robin AU idea, I always adore those. (Though I often feel they miss an opportunity by not having Duke be first. Then again I sort of have a "Either its the first four Robins being reversed, or its all of them and thus Duke is first" system. A lot depends on what swerves the story best.) Sorry for the off topic ramble and no pressure to share, but yeah it'd be cool.

One thing I am notably curious about is how you'd handle the pre death relationship between Bruce & Stephanie. Cos so much of their canon one is filtered through his grief over Jason and projection onto her which led to his awful treatment of her, which led to her desperation to please him. Without that death things would probably be a lot more chill.

Still, I could see a similar death happening if Bruce got to up his own ass with trying to play master mind and it all blowing up in his face (Which I insist would have happened with his crime control plan regardless of Stephanie.)

No apology necessary! I love off topic rambles and am prone to doing them myself (see how long this explanation ended up for reference lol).

Here's a link to a sort of fan-fic/sort of explanation I wrote earlier (Though I think you already found it). I would love to flesh it out into a full fic, but I'm not sure that will ever actually happen.

As for Steph and Bruce specifically though, I think there's still tension between them, but it comes from a different place. Spoiler is a rouge agent, a teenager with no training, no oversight, and a personal score to settle, and Bruce isn't really prepared to handle that. Damian came to him pre-trained and if Tim comes second (which I think he should since he's both before and after Steph in canon) he was doing it because he believed it was the right thing to do. Without Jason Bruce has never had to deal with anyone who's completely untrained before, and without Dick he's never had to deal with a personal grudge as motivation (except his own, and he's really not prepared to get into that), so the combination of them in Steph seems far to dangerous to have in the field. Besides, it sets a bad precedent, he can't just let any teenager start running around fighting crime or he'll have a We Are Robin situation on his hands, and he already has a Robin. I don't think it's really personal for him, it just makes logical sense for everyone if she would stop, but for some reason she won't, even after Cluemaster is dead. (She also reminds him a little to much of himself at that age, but he's not going to think about that).

On Steph's end I think things are a little more complicated. I think the indifference would both drive her insane and give her this sort of false hope. No matter what she does it never seems to be enough, but the parts of her Bruce seems to dislike are all related to Spoiler, not Stephanie, which means she can change them! But there are parts of Steph that are baked into Spoiler, which carry over to Robin in turn that she can't get rid of no matter how hard she tries. Plus there are just enough similarities between the way Batman talks to her and the way Arthur did that sometimes it activates her fight instinct when logically she knows she should just listen to him. And unfortunately Bruce doesn't respond well to being snapped at, but he also never seems to hold it against her for more than a day. So Steph just keeps running in this circle and never knows where she stands with Bruce, and in some ways it's better and in some ways it's worse, because at least with her dad she knew where she stood and could stop trying.

I don't like that answer, trust me I wish I could say things between them would be better, but personally I don't think so. Bruce might be nicer about the way he says it, but I think he'd still want Steph to stop and Steph would still think if she tries hard enough he'll realize he was wrong.

Sorry, that got away from me, but anyway, I think the concept of including Duke is interesting! I just don't really know enough about him to know how it would play out or have thoughts on how We Are Robin could happen without Robin.