DC | Training With your EX Gets Rough…

The training room in the Batcave was cold, the air thick with the smell of damp stone and ionized electronics. Cassandra stood in the center of the reinforced mats, her breathing shallow and controlled. She wore her Orphan suit the tactical fabric hugging her frame, the hood pulled up to shadow her face. Her eyes, dark and unreadable, tracked every movement in the cavernous space.

"Cassandra."

Bruce's voice was gravel beneath boots. He emerged from the shadows near the Batcomputer, his cape pooling around him like spilled ink. He didn't look at her directly; his focus was on the Hero standing a few paces behind him.

"{user} is here to improve {poss} close quarters efficiency," Batman stated, his tone clinical, devoid of any inflection that might betray suspicion. "{poss} reflexes are good, but {sub} lacks experience against someone who reads movement as intuitively as you do. Spar with {obj}. Non lethal. Test {poss} reactions."

Cassandra's entire body went rigid. For a split second, the muscles in her shoulders locked a micro expression of shock that only she would recognize. Her pulse spiked, a rapid flutter against the carotid artery she knew so well.

{user}.

The name didn't need to be spoken. She could sense {obj}. Even without looking, she could read the shift in the air, the way the space around {obj} seemed to change. She remembered the heat of {obj}, the way {poss} body language used to speak a language more honest than any words she had ever learned. She remembered the weight of {obj}, the quiet confidence that had once offered her a strange, terrifying kind of sanctuary.

She forced her breathing to slow. Control. Discipline. The assassin's training took over, layering a mask of stoicism over the sudden storm beneath her skin. She turned slowly, her movements economical and precise, until her gaze landed on {obj}.

Her eyes swept over {obj}, not as a fighter assessing a threat, but as a predator recognizing a ghost. She read the way {sub} stood, the subtle tension in {poss} frame, the familiar way {poss} weight distributed. The scent of {obj} something uniquely {obj} cut through the sterile cave air.

Batman remained oblivious, standing like a statue of judgment between them. He saw two students; he did not see the history written in the way their pupils dilated or the way the space between them suddenly felt charged with unspoken memory.

Cassandra stepped forward onto the mat, her boots making almost no sound. She raised her hands, palms open in a neutral combat stance, but her fingers trembled almost imperceptibly before she clenched them into fists.

"I will... train with {obj}," she said, her voice quiet, rough.

She didn't look at Bruce. She kept her eyes locked on {user}’s. Her body language was a contradiction: her stance was defensive and ready, but her stillness was something else entirely. It was an invitation. A challenge. A question.

Do you remember? her eyes asked.

The training room in the Clock Tower was silent, save for the low hum of surveillance equipment and the distant patter of rain against the reinforced windows. Cassandra moved through her warm up stretches with feline precision, every muscle fiber working in perfect synchronization. Her mind was a calm lake, focused entirely on the physical sensations of her own body the tension in her calves, the stretch in her shoulders, the rhythm of her breathing.

When the door slid open, she didn't need to turn around to know someone was there. She read the vibrations through the floorboards first. The weight of the footsteps, the cadence of the movement.

She straightened up, wiping a bead of sweat from her forehead with the back of her hand. Her dark eyes flickered toward the entrance.

It was {obj}.

Cassandra froze, though her face remained a stoic mask. Her heart rate spiked a betrayal of her training but she forced it down, burying the recognition deep beneath layers of discipline. {user}. The scent of {obj} hit her before {sub} even spoke. It was a familiar constellation of notes that tugged at memories she rarely allowed herself to touch.

She watched {poss} body language. {sub} walked with that quiet confidence she remembered, but there was something else a subtle shift in {poss} center of gravity, a softness in {poss} shoulders that spoke of the hero {sub} had become. Her eyes traced across {poss} arms, the way {poss} muscles moved beneath {poss} shirt, the steady pulse at {poss} throat. She saw everything: the micro expressions, the way {sub} held himself. She saw the history written in the way he occupied the space between them.

"Training," she said simply, her voice quiet and rough. She didn't ask why {sub} was here; she simply acknowledged his presence. Her gaze dropped to {poss} hands, then back to {poss} eyes. "You want... to spar?"

She knew she should maintain distance. She knew that bringing {obj} into her space, physically touching {obj} in the heat of combat, would be dangerous not because of {poss} skill, but because of what those touches might unearth. But as she watched him, she felt the familiar pull. She wanted to test {obj}. She wanted to see if {poss} body remembered her as clearly as hers remembered his.

Cassandra stepped onto the padded mat, rolling her shoulders. She began to unwrap the athletic tape around her knuckles, her movements deliberate. Her black eyes never left his. She was reading {obj}, searching for the ghost of what they once were beneath the surface of the man standing before her.

"No weapons," she instructed, her tone professional despite the storm beneath her ribs. "Just... hands. Movement."

She settled into a combat stance, low and balanced, her body coiled like a spring. She was offering {obj} a challenge, but she was also offering {obj} a language she understood better than words. Through the spar, she could ask {obj} questions she wasn't ready to speak aloud.