Sad Beautiful Tragic | Dick Grayson [ON HOLD}

4

"It's a setup, just like with Ann Williams. They've been forced into this. I think it's the same person behind it" Dick explained to him, and Ashley resisted the urge to be annoying since they were on official business. 

"So what? We just pull back, wait for the mayhem to start?" Barbara asked him. 

"No, I can go in there and talk to them. They're not criminals, they're parents. They think their children are in danger" Dick explained. "Gar and Conner are searching for the kids right now. That's the leverage. We find them, this all goes away. Call your men off and let us handle it."

"If you're wrong, this is gonna be a bloodbath" Barbara said and there was an underlying threat.

"We got this" Dick said and Ashley eyed the policeman distrustfully. 

 "Stand down!" Barbara called out, and the cops clamored around to get out of the hero's way. Ashley couldn't help the feeling that something was going to go wrong, anxiously looking up to Hank as the pit of dread settled in her stomach and she forced herself into a false sense of calm so she could be more efficient. She wouldn't allow another situation like Donna's, she'd make sure her team walked out of the bank alive. She had too, because even for all their annoying tendencies and obnoxious burping after too much coke and pizza, and body odor after a long night of patrols and heroing, they were her family. She wouldn't fail them again, she couldn't. Ashley kept her spot beside Dick, looking up at Dick as they walked toward the front entrance. 

"I should be going in through the top" Ashley muttered, her eyes looking around anxiously. "Or taking the vents, I'm the smallest so I could be in and out in ten minutes" Ashley told him quietly. 

"We do this as a team" Dick responded to her quietly. Ashley's face twitched in anger, her usual mask of composure breaking as she clenched her fist and her heart hammered anxiously. 

"All right, each of us has a gunman to contain but remember, they're not professionals" Dick said louder so everyone could hear him as they approached. "They're scared and probably on drugs, don't be surprised if they're irrational. No sudden moves, no loud noises" Dick said and Ashley looked at Hank pointedly and he looked down at her and flipped her off, making her roll her eyes in response as Dick kept talking. "The calmer the better" Dick said, eyeing Ashley warily. 

"What?" She asked him stubbornly. "I am calm" She rolled her eyes and Hank poked her ear. "For fucks Hankathy" Ashley sighed and Dick opened the door. 

"Wait" Dick said, an odd amount of calm in his features.

"Stay back!" The gunman at the desk on the left said and Ashley narrowed her eyes as she surveyed the scene, looking for her best opening. 

"Easy" Hank said and Ashley sighed.  "Everyone, just relax" He said and Ashley rolled her eyes. 

"Hank they're not gonna relax" Ashley sighed quietly and he gave the smallest shrug with the movement of his neck.  

"You don't have to do this. Look, we know somebody took your children and forced you into this" Dick said quickly and one gunman turned to look at the two by the desk. "We're gonna find them and bring them back to you safe and sound. Nobody needs to get hurt" Dick said, taking a small breath. Ashley peeked at him through her bangs as a tense silence ensued, the hostages keeping their heads down and for the first time in her life she was glad that her fellow Gothamites knew how to handle the situation. Ashley prepared to move and almost let out a sigh of relief as she heard Connor's voice.

"We found the kids safe and sound" Connor said over comms and Ashley nodded to Dick since he had decided he wanted to lead the charge. 

"The kids are safe. we found them" Dick said. "Now put your guns down" Dick said, and Ashley tensed even more when she noticed they didn't move at the news. 

"Nobody needs to get hurt." Dawn reiterated Dick's words from earlier. Ashley's hands clenched tightly together, once again and she noticed her hands felt sore from when she had dug her nails deep enough to break skin. "This is over." 

"Something's wrong" Ashley said to him nervously, pulling her bottom lip in between her teeth. "Why aren't they standing down?" Ashley whispered, resisting the urge to move forward. 

"No, it's not over" The man who held the gun to the bank manager said. "Not yet."

"The people in the bank aren't the parents" Connor said over comms. 

"Shit" Ashley said as the man turned and pointed the gun at DIck. Ashley stepped away from him, deciding to not be in the line of fire as the man took his head off. Ashley barely had time to respond as one of the other men turned around and rolled cylindrical objects toward them. Ashley barely caught the shock written on Dick's face as he turned and shielded her with his own body as the objects exploded. The last thing Ashley processed was her scream. 

A/N Bit of a doozy here. The next chapter has a bit of trauma with some suicidal tendencies on display so beware, nothing too forward but I might change it up as I did with this chapter and ch2 so take that into consideration. I might be late with the next chapter because I'm tweaking the next few chapters into something a tad more acceptable and so it flows better when i get to the later chapters. I do want to stress, however, that while yes Ashley has been into the field a grand total of one time since Donna died, she hasn't been put into any stressful or hard situations as the bank scene is because she hadn't had any of the team in any real danger (let's be real, gizmo was a piece of cake for them) so Ashley's going into almost a PTSD mode (I don't quite know if that would be the term I would use for it but the situation is most definately a trigger for her). She's very volatile, very fragile in the next chapter. She's also very protective, moreso than she's ever been. Anyways have a great week, um I'm gonna redo 5 and I'll see y'all on the other side!